The MBA Orientation was held on 27 and 28 August at the Cyberport Conference & Exhibition Centre this year. With a mix of academic and social activities, our new cohort of students received warm welcome from our Dean Prof Houmin Yan, Programme Director Prof Kevin Chiang, faculty members, alumni and current students in the Cocktail gathering and Banquet with insightful guest talks, music performance and interactive game. Students were also delighted to learn about the coming career-driven courses which will help them to identifying their future development in their career path.
Set SMART goals in your journey
Prof Kevin Chiang, MBA Programme Director warmly welcomed new students in the orientation opening remarks. He highlighted the importance of SMART goals setting and the difference between “Education” and “Training”. He wished students could be well-equipped through the preparation for the unknown and the known knowledge in their CityU MBA Journey. He also introduced some important milestones, especially the three global experiential trips along the journey so that students could plan their study schedule ahead.
Teamwork – one of the essentials to achievement
It might have looked like all social chatting and games, but the ice-breaking exercises led by professional trainers had a serious purpose – fostering teamwork. The two half-day activities were designed to give students a chance to get to know each other, while introducing them to team management and effective communication techniques. The new students were divided into groups of 7 or 8 mixed with part-time and full-time students. Diversity was not just accounted for students of different nationalities, also the languages, the experiences, the academic background, the industries, professions and the perspectives. Through case discussions, role play activities and games, a teamwork spirit was fostered to encourage students maintaining interactions among diverse classmates and enhance classroom learning in the long run.
Establish new friendships within our community
When it came to the evening magic hours, all students enjoyed gathering with our faculty, alumni, students and other new friends of our community in the cocktail reception and banquet. Prof Houmin Yan, Dean of the College kick started the banquet with a warm welcome to our guests, faculty, and students. Meeting students from a wide range of backgrounds and places, Prof Yan believed that the truly diverse community of the MBA programme helps foster different viewpoints in contributing and enhancing students’ learning experience.
We were appreciative of the invaluable sharing from our alumni Dr David Ho (MBA’99), JP, Group GM of Hong Kong Ferry, Mr Ken Lin (MBA’13) and Ms Nikki Cao (MBA’15), our Masters of Ceremony contributed about the MBA learning experience. From their sharing, many positive changes and improvements in the programme throughout the past few years were recognized.
In addition to alumni sharing, we also had our talented alumna Ms Frances Tang (MBA’05), the principal harpist of Hong Kong Symphony Orchestra and alumnus Mr Stanley Cheng (MBA’15) performing beautiful music and playing an interesting interactive online game with us respectively. Their performance gained a full house of applause and much laughter from the audiences. The highlight of the evening went to Mrs Stella Lau, Council of CityU (2001-2007) and Honorary Fellow of CityU who delivered an insightful speech on the five pillars of her success and her experience in education, which brought lots of encouragement to all of us and a fruitful ending of the dinner.
Unveiling the new career-driven courses and consultation services
On the second day of orientation, it is continued to be exciting with team building exercises and sharing with more alumni. More focuses were put on introducing the coming career-driven courses and services: One on One Career Advisory Service. For example: a new elective in “Industry Experts in Financial Markets” and the Professional Forum. Students had an opportunity to meet with potential career advisors who will help in their new page of MBA journey.
The 2-day orientation was the very first page of the MBA journey at CityU. We hope all new students were excited to start building new friendships and enjoy being part of our community. We are also very grateful for the guest speakers, faculty and staff members, alumni fellows, students and new students taking the time to join us, that made the event a successful one!
