Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Prepping for case competition

The next two weeks are nutty. I have always had a drive to win. I don't like not winning, and the reason is not actually for the "glory" or the "bragging rights." I like winning because it means I challenged myself and it was worth the effort.

That being said, I don't win very often. Athletically, I was ecstatic when I finished about a millionth in the LA marathon. And I actually didn't engage nearly as much as I could have in high school competitions, like debate or other things. I won a poetry contest once, that was pretty neat. And I did win elections for my youth group chapter. That is about where my glory starts and ends. So now, as I get older and I am more confident in my abilities, winning has taken on a certain self-fulfilling notion.

On Friday, I am participating in Pepperdine's Value-Centered Leadership Lab Ethics Case Competition. I have assembled a team that I am damn proud of. And the best thing is, we all are "in it to win it" as one of my teammates said. Sean Gray, Jeff Kraft, and Noreen Okarter make up the team and we each bring unique perspectives to the case. The most nerve-wracking part is being able to analyze a case in only 1 hour. Not just analyze, but prepare a presentation on this analysis.

Today, I met with my other case competition team. I am on a team that is being sent to Baylor University to compete in their ethics case competition. This competition, we are locked in a room for 24 hours to work on our case. It's obviously a very different format. Today, as we met to discuss a practice case, it took about 3 hours to really lock down what we were going to do. This scares the life out of me in regards to Friday's competition. Can it be done?

Clearly it can, as this same format has been used for a few years now. However, sticking to a process will definitely be key. We didn't do that nearly as much today, and as formulaic as that is, it will probably be the only way to jam through all that information effectively. This is getting to be a bit of a ramble, but I'm just excited to work on these two case teams. As a burgeoning consultant, I better be good at this or I'm in the wrong field. Time to test out my skills and see how I fare.

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