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The Part-time MBA at Frankfurt School provides candidates with global business perspective, allows them to develop their management skills and offers extensive career opportunities – this is why it was my personal first choice. What made it even more attractive for me, was that it does not only attract people from all over the world, but it also includes candidates from a wide variety of industries and cultures. What stands out to me, is our lecturers’ ability to manage a highly heterogeneous class with different skill sets and varying areas of expertise.
Especially for the module on Corporate Finance, I had the intuition that our group consists of either absolute experts in the field or complete greenhorns. Therefore, I was very curious to see if and how our lecturer would manage to convey fundamental knowledge, solution-oriented approaches and strategic thinking within the framework of an exciting and interesting lecture for everyone. And I must say, my expectations were definitely exceeded: Chapeau, Prof. Zacharias Sautner!
I assume I speak for almost everybody when I say that the online-only format makes it more difficult to deliver an interesting, exciting and interactive lecture. We follow the course, see the instructor and his presentation, but often lack the direct connection to our fellow students. During Professor Sautner’s lecture, however, I had the feeling of sitting in a room with my fellow students again!
“I see my job, mainly, as teaching students how to think. The specific material, they’ll forget. But if they learn to think they will learn to solve the problems they’ll face later in their careers.”
– Prof. Eduardo Schwartz, UCLA, adopted by Prof. Zacharias Sautner, Frankfurt School
At the beginning of the first day, Prof. Sautner invited each candidate to introduce themselves and to assess their knowledge of Corporate Finance. It was great to see my fellow students again since the last lecture and the introductions let me get to know some of them even better. Going through people, it became clear that some of us were very well versed in the field of Corporate Finance, while others hardly had any experience in this area. However, instead of impeding the overall learning environment during the lecture, this variation led to an exciting, dynamic and interactive weekend.
Through interesting and real use case studies we enhanced better understanding of financial resource management at departmental and corporate levels. Hereby, we had the opportunity to participate in discussions and share opinions and experiences with the group, which luckily many of my fellow students did.
On the last day of the lecture, Prof. Sautner took the time to give us valuable advice for upcoming job interviews and assessment centers. “Be prepared to receive rejections” was his first advice to us. Although we receive excellent training through the MBA programme, not every graduate immediately fits every job. Therefore, it is especially important to apply to a variety of companies, as they look for differing criteria and characteristics in their applicants. He further stated, that good preparation is essential for a positive application process. Again, some of my fellow students were able to share their valuable experience with us and give insights into the application processes of a number of well-known companies.
At the beginning of the module, Prof. Sautner explained that his focus was not on conveying pure facts and information, but rather to enable us to apply knowledge independently in order to master future challenges. At the end of the lecture I have to say that for me personally he definitely achieved his goal through his interactive approach, the exciting use cases and the constructive exchange.
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