The end of the beginning

Following Friday's dinner at Christ Church Saturday was given over to our not quite graduation ceremony. In Oxford you actually graduate some time after your degree is conferred at a ceremony organised through your college but conducted by the university. As a result graduating the whole class together is impossible.

So we have our not quite graduation ceremony. There are speeches - by the Dean, by the guest of honour (George Mallinkrodt, President of Schroders), by classmates and by the course director. The best speech was, of course, that from the classmate. Spencer's speech was pretty much like this

Big Opening
Year at SBS
Inspiration
Finish

It doesn't look much like that, but trust me, it was great.

Then we stood up, walked across the stage, took the applause of our classmates and that was it. We're MBA's. No more lectures, coursework or studygroups. No more reading lists, case studies or question sets. No more class discussions, football team or conferences to organise. I will miss this life a lot.

So out into the world we go, many of us destination unknown, but as Spencer pointed out, it doesn't matter where you start - it's where you finish that makes the difference.

This blog finishes here. In the next few days I'll tidy up the website, post a guide to the archives and of course that all important link to my next project. I hope you've found reading this useful - I hope that somewhere in amongst the football, politics and pop songs I got in some useful advice.

In two weeks time I'm off to Amsterdam to try and be a European. It wasn't what I planned when I came here, but to my mind that was the whole point. Good luck and best wishes for all your futures.

Signing off

Martin Lloyd, MBA
Class of 2003
Said Business School