It's Over...I'm Done....Peace Out

I failed my last final exam that I took as an undergraduate student. I scored a 66%. Honestly, I lost motivation. Plus, the fact that I worked over a 12 hours shift the day before my exam ate into most of the study time that allocated for the exam.  I'm not even mad because I sold two cars that day. I passed my final class with a B+! So, I earned an A in all of my college classes except for 3. I earned one B and 2 B+'s.  By my calculations, my overall graduating GPA is 3.932! That's high enough for me to graduate Summa Cum Laude, which means I'm graduating in the top 2.5% of the College of Business Administration. Reality of finally being finished comes in emotional waves. Is it weird that I'm so proud of myself that I cry?

I had a meeting with my favorite professor at UCF, Christopher Leo, after my final exam. He was my lab instructor this semester and it was the third class I've taken with him. He does magic tricks... that's how awesome he is. He was also my professor for a class I took my very first semester at UCF when I had a bad flare. When I was seriously considering quitting school, he gave me kind words of encouragement and showed understanding. If it weren't for him, I'm not sure I would have stayed in school. He is one of the very few professor's at UCF that took the time to learn my name. He always made time to talk with me after class. He had confidence that I could make it and that ultimately helped me decide to stick with school through my health issues. We talked about my current position at Classic Mazda and my future with the company. We also talked about a potential plan B for my career. We talked about graduate school. We talked about my strengths, which he considers my biggest strengths to be my interpersonal skills and my drive to do my best at everything I do. He even gave me his cell phone number and said I could call him anytime if I need advice with my career or graduate school. He is also allowing me to use him as a reference. He has confidence that I will find success where ever I go. I awarded him with a certificate of appreciation that I made especially for him. It said:

Be it Known that
Christopher Leo
during the course of my study, through personal sacrifice, selflessness, and without material reward, bestowed the support and understanding without which my graduation would not have been possible. This certificate is hereby conferred to honor and recognize the confidence, guidance, wisdom and assistance freely given in helping me attain this important milestone in my life!

He was so honored to receive this appreciation from me. I wish you could have seen his eyes light up!  He is one fantastic professor and I wanted him to know that someone appreciated his passion to teach.

Last Minute Lauren: The Finale

Procrastination has a firm grip on me. My team didn't finish our strategic analysis report until two hours before it was due last week. I believe that was my first "all nighter" in college. I finished my part by 3am and had to wake up at 6am to make sure my teammates were finishing their sections as well.  Honestly, I don't know what grade to expect on it. We worked our asses off on the first report before spring break and only got an 83%, so since we weren't as organized with this one I don't have high expectations.  I'll gladly take a 66%

Today my team had a 12 minute presentation to highlight our strategic recommendation listed in our report. We met at school at 8am, made our power point slides (which was pretty easy because it was just information we covered in the report), we practiced three times, and then I ran to the library to print our slides at 9:15am. Class and presentations started at 9:30am. Thankfully, we were the last team to go, so we were able to step out of class and practice one more time.  The presentation went surprisingly well. I was a little nervous because our CEO (our online professor) said that if the financial analysis section doesn't fully support the recommendation, the highest grade my in-class professor is allowed to give is a C. Since I was responsible for the financial analysis section I felt a lot of pressure to give my team any chance at a decent grade on the presentation.   After the presentation, my professor asked about five follow up questions to clarify certain aspects in our presentation and he didn't ask one question about the financial analysis section. I'm hoping that means I fully supported our recommendation with my financial analysis. The questions he did ask were answered with confidence by my teammates. I think we effectively bull shitted with outstanding confidence.

Now, I'm waiting for my professor to announce which team is going to The Great Capstone Competition. If my team gets selected, I don't have to take the final exam. However, if my team is not selected, then I'll have to take the final exam. I am three lectures behind on the video lectures and I'm four chapters behind in the book. I also have not watched any of the 5 "off the books" videos that will be covered on the exam. Obviously, I'm hoping to get invited to the competition so that I don't have to play catch to study for the final exam.

By the way, I'm impatiently waiting to get the grades on my team's strategic analysis report and presentation so that I'll know how bad I can do on the final, if I have to take it, in order to get at least a B in the class. 

School, Work, New Car Fever, and Health!

I made it!!! I took my midterm today for my one and only class and passed it with an 88%! I'm officially on Spring Break! Although I'm still waiting for my exact grades back from my team's industry analysis report and presentation, a huge weight has been lifted from my shoulders. I am performing well beyond what I even considered possible while juggling my new job with school. I can say I'll be graduating this semester with more confidence now. I'm still striving to earn an A or a B in this class so that I can graduate with the highest honors (Summa Cum Laude), but at the very least I'm pretty positive that I'll pass the class.

I ended the month of February with 5 cars sold, which is freaking awesome considering I worked less than half the month on the sales floor. My hope is that I can exceed my sales goal for the month of March. I've had the privilege to work with many fascinating customers. It's hard work, but I still love it!

I do have a confession: I am experiencing new car fever! I'm not financially ready to buy a new car yet, so that's controlling my temperature at the moment. However, the new 2016 Mazda6 GTs gave me the sensation of love at first sight. Talk safety to me, baby! Ooh la la...zoom-zoom!!! Just the smell of them raises my temperature. Don't let Loop Hole (my 2006 Mazda6) read this. He may get jealous.

My health has been the best it's been in a couple of years. My bowel movements are absolutely beautiful and regular! My stomach has been pain free. Praise, Jesus! I am beyond thankful for good health because I think I would struggle to keep up with work and school if I wasn't feeling as well as I am.

First Capstone Team Assignment

For the past three weeks, my Capstone team, Strategic Knights, has been researching and analyzing the retail grocery industry. Today, we had our first team assignment due, which consisted of our 15 page retail grocery industry analysis report and our 10 minute presentation about our analysis of the industry. The report and presentation are each worth 100 points, so we had 200 points up for grabs today. That's 20% of our overall grade. We managed to pull everything together with less than 30 minutes until class started. Thankfully, my team has quite a few superstar students and they make my job as team leader a hell of a lot easier than I ever dreamed was possible.

Strategic Knights: Raeann, me, Lauren, Gabby, and Elizabeth

We gave our presentation exactly as we had rehearsed it, with 20 seconds to spare on our time limit. Afterwards, our professor asked about five in depth questions. I think we answered four of the questions really well; however, we struggled with one question because the girl who had that part in the report that the question related to couldn't back up her statements with reason or resources.  Overall, I am proud of my team's performance. Our professor let us know that we got an A on the presentation, but the exact grade is not yet known. Plus, we have to wait for him to grade our 15 page report.

Having this assignment behind me is a huge relief. I don't have much time to relax though because the mid-term is next week. Hopefully, I'll get some down time the week after mid-term during spring break.

I'm Rocking At Life!

I am totally rocking at life this week! Don't get me wrong, I'm working my ass off to do it, but at least my hard work is being rewarded. I pulled a 96% on my first big report of the semester! That impressed me for some reason. It's a senior level class and the professor will not pass students that cannot write at a college level. Relief set in because I was unsure at how well my writing skills are since I don't write a lot of college level stuff as a finance major. Evidently, I'm an amazing college level writer. I don't think I ever got that high of a grade in English Comp I or II.  I know I write as a hobby, but I guess I didn't realize the quality of my grammar and word choices show my level of education.

Also, my team turned in a mission statement for our strategic business unit (lab) and my professor selected it as the best mission statement from all of the other teams that turned one in.  Considering that only one girl on my team sent me her ideas of what the mission statement should be, and everyone else left it up to me to combined it with my ideas (Oh, the responsibility of being team leader... gag me).  I came up with the following mission statement to guide us in what we do and who we are for the rest of the semester:

We conduct competitive analysis for firms and their industries to uncover sustainable, competitive advantages. Our continued development of employees allows us to integrate the various levels of expertise required to maximize the benefits of stakeholders and society.

Yeah, I am on track to finish this semester with a BANG!!! 

Also, I'm back at the dealership this week. Yesterday, I was only supposed to be shadowing. However, I had just clocked back in from break when a customer came in and all of the other sales associates were busy. I got to step up to the plate. The customer had been at the dealership the day before and my co-worker, Mary, had helped out then. Since Mary was with another customer I got to be put in the game. I ended up selling a car! It seems crazy, but I didn't know anything about the car because it was pre-owned. That didn't slow me down though. I discovered the features of the car with my customer and gave a kickass demo drive. I'm certain it was on the demo drive that the customer was sold. Shoot, I was sold. lol I convinced myself it was a good car for a good price. I even wrote up all the paperwork with guidance from my manager. It was fun!

What a Week

My first full week at my new job started today!  I spent it at human resources to attend a sales training meeting with Tom Ryan. He is a master of selling! I can't wait to learn more from him in February. Today he discussed the automotive industry, greetings ("No one will buy a car from you if they think you're a creep."), identifying needs, product presentation, demo drives, trial closes, closes, tension in relationships, how to handle objections, and many other topics. Sales training was rich with useful information. When we were given an hour for lunch, three other sales people (Mohammed, Eddy, and Meagan)  from Classic Mazda introduced themselves and invited me to lunch with them. It was great getting advice from them and getting to know a few of my new co-workers. I'm off tomorrow and then I work Wednesday through Saturday at Classic Mazda to work on getting Mazda certified.

I'm in the middle of writing my 10-K report. I've got eight pages and I'm sure by the time I'm finished I'll have about 18. I have a meeting with my professor tomorrow after class so that he can give me some feedback on what I have for my report so far. Hopefully, I'm heading in the right direction because the 10-K report is due in a week. I've been working my butt off because I want to have it finished Thursday night so that I won't have to work on it while Taylor's here this weekend. Since I'll be working while she's here I want to be able to spend non working hours hanging with her, not writing a report.   I can dream can't I?

My Final Chapter at UCF

I'm only taking one class this semester, Strategic Management, also known as, Capstone. The lecture part of the course is live streaming, which means I could attend class live or I could watch it online because it's recorded. I watch the hour and fifteen minute lecture every week online. The midterm and final exams are based on material covered in lecture, mostly from the book and other sources of material. The exams will be taken in the testing lab. The lab part of the course is a face to face class. The lab is where I'll be quizzed every week about what was covered in the lecture. The lab instructor will go over strategic case studies and my five member team will take turns with other teams solving different strategic dilemmas. The lab meets once a week for an hour and twenty minutes.

The class is setup like a corporation. The guy giving the lecture calls himself the CEO of Applied Strategy Incorporated. Class is called training meetings. My lab instructor is my SBU (Strategic Business Unit) manager. My fellow classmates and myself are the employees. We get paid in the form of grades, "grade income". Quizzes are called Interviews, etc...

Throughout the semester there will be 3 big projects on top of the exams and quizzes: 10-K Integration Project, Industry Analysis, and a Strategic Analysis. The theme this semester is the retail grocery industry. The 10-K Integration project is an individual project. Each member of my team had to select a different one of eight retail grocery companies that were approved by our CEO. I'll be doing my 10-K report on Sprouts Farmers Market, Inc. A 10-K is an annual report publicly traded companies file with the Security Exchange and Commission (SEC). I will be digging into the business analysis section of the 10-K, and then apply what I discover there to the industry analysis and strategic analysis frameworks developed in the training meetings(class). My 10-K project will be a 15 page analysis.   It's due February 3rd.

The Industry Analysis project is a team project, where each team represents a consulting firm. My team will use our 5 different 10-K projects on different companies in the retail grocery industry to write a 15-20 page industry analysis and give a 12 minute presentation about the industry. The goal is to conduct a competitive analysis of the retail grocery industry.

The Strategic Analysis project is also a team project. My consulting team will prepare a strategic analysis on Winn Dixie. This will also be both a 15-20 page paper and a 12 minute presentation. All teams will examine the same firm, and will address the same general strategic issue. The goal is to provide a strategic recommendation for the firm.

There are about 25 different lab sections for the course and each lab instructor gets to select one team from their lab to enter The Great Capstone Case Competition, which is the culminating event for this class and for my experience at the UCF College of Business. After hearing each team in the SBU labs present their strategic analysis, each SBU manager will choose one team from his/her SBU lab to advance to the semi-finals of The Great Capstone Case Competition. The SBU managers will be looking for teams that can think strategically and also work well together as a consulting team, and deliver a rigorous, competent presentation of those ideas. The selected teams from across Capstone SBU labs will be seeded  into several semi-final groups, and each team in each group will deliver their presentation to a panel of judges, comprised of experts, including members of the UCF Executive MBA program, UCF Business faculty, and/or executives from Winn Dixie. The judges will pick a winner from each semifinalist group to advance to the finals. Teams that advance to the finals will receive awards for their efforts. The finals will be judged by a panel comprised of faculty experts, industry experts representing the Dean's Advisory Council, members of the UCF College of Business Hall of Fame, The Wall Street Journal, and/or Winn Dixie.

My team is in it to win The Great Capstone Case Competition. I'm excited to work hard with my team throughout the semester in hopes of making it to the semi-finals and moving on to win in the final round. This class isn't like anything I've ever taken before. It's intense and complicated and I love it! Hoping for a successful semester!

PS: I was nominated by my team to be our team leader!  These days when I look in the mirror, I see someone that has grown so much confidence since the first semester at Valencia back in 2009.