Week 8: Final week in Boston

Boston is home of 2 of the most famous educational institutions in the world: MIT and Harvard. And out of the places I have seen in America so far, Boston reminds me most of a European city.

The most memorable events of this week, for me, were the 'Negotiation Skills Workshop' by Mellisa Manwaring, the day spent at Harvard Business School where we had a talk by Prof. Tony Stuart and in the afternoon attending a HBS Case with a 2nd year class. Finally we had a leving meal in the Harvard Faculty building, where our Harvard Coordinator Paul Bottino, gave us a fairwell talk and a commemorative photograph.

At Harvard we all also took part in a business plan competition, where the top 4 plans won $150. It was with great satisfaction that all the prizes went to the Global Scholars, who fended off competition from top MIT and Harvard students.

As a student who has never taken a negotiation lecture I found the art of negotiation fascinating. There are 7 key elements to negotiation:
In many ways these elements are interdependent, however the one which needs to be evaluated fully before every negotiation is 'Alternatives'. This is simply what can I do if this negotiation doesn't happen. Having listed all the alternatives you then choose your BATNA (Best Alternative To Non Agreement). The BATNA often determines the flow of the negotiation and ask one of the most important questions: "Do I need to negotiate".

Another very interesting concept which Melissa explained to us was 'anchoring' this is the well documented psychological effect where the first offer given by one of the negotiating parties acts to anchor the further offers and has the greatest effect on the outcome of the negotiation out of all the offers. No matter how ridiculous!

A day later we were able to see a master negotiator at work when the writer of the definitive guide to negotiation "Getting to Yes" Roger Fisher gave us a role play example of negotiating.

The opportunities available to Students at Harvard, Stanford and MIT is just incredible. If only I had known what was available at university when I was still at school, maybe I would have worked harder ;)

Week 7: Leave Stanford arrive in Harvard

Flying from West to East coast of America takes approximately 3500km and 7 hours, almost the length of the trip to get from the UK to America.

Highlights this week included Northbridge Venture Partners: a chance to network over free food and drink with local entrepreneurs, a Harvard Business School Case by David Ager focusing on IDEO and quite possibly the highlight of the whole experience in America meeting Dean Kamen of DEKA.



Its difficult to describe Dean Kamen; we arrived at DEKA for lunch and sat in the board room to wait for him. In the mean time a multi millionaire from Switzerland came to join us along with 2 people from a well known web company. Dean entered the room, a short to medium build man who always wears a Denim Shirt and Denim jacket (there are pictures on the wall of the boardroom of him shaking hands with various past presidents wearing the same outfit) and for the next 2 hours captivated the audience talking about his history and what he is working on now.


To say that Dean Kamen is a prolific inventor is an understatement. By the time he was my age (24) he had created the lighting for the New York City Christmas lights, made a kidney dialysis machine which revolutionized the way diabetes were treated. He has also invented a heart stem, drug dispenser, iBot and the shame of it all is that the one invention he is known for in the UK (if any) is the Skegway.

And the story doesn't end there, Dean has also solved drinking water problems in the 3rd world. Poor drinking water is the worlds biggest killer. National governments and intenational bodies have thrown huge amounts of money at research to try and solve the problem (some estimates at $trillion!!) without resolving it. And now Dean Kamen has a solution. As a group of 16 engineers we walked round Dean's company in awe.

I really think it was a life changing experience to find out that there really are people in this world who have the drive, genius and money to make big changes happen: another great example of this being Ewin Marion Kauffman and the legacy he left in the Kauffman Foundation.