(You can read a blog post with photos at HTC Club blog)

I think I am one of the early VMware users.  It should be about seven years ago in 2003, when I was working as a pre-sales and post-sales specialist.  As a pre-sales, I often had to do product presentation and demonstration to potential customers, and I found VMware was a great tool for pre-sales, because by using VMware, I can easily run Unix/Linux/Solaris system within my Windows laptop, and I can then demo my product on various Operating System easily (or even simultaneously) just on my Windows laptop.  VMware also make great sense for post-sales job, because as a post-sales, I often need to troubleshoot complex technical problem for customers, and very often I want a “clean” Unix/Linux/Solaris system so that I can try to reproduce the problem, then by using VMware, I can install a new and “clean” Unix like system very easily and quickly within my Windows laptop, and I can also remove those “testing” system easily by simply deleting the virtualization file.  I remembered when I saw a “VMware Virtual Machine” running inside a window for the first time, it was simply amazing.  Wow, how can they do that, running a Linux inside of Windows?  So cool.  I immediately had a gut feeling that this company has great potential, and I began to keep on paying attention on VMware’s growth since then, till today.

Let’s go back to today’s visit.  A group of 10-20 Haas MBA students visited VMware headquarter (3401 Hillview Ave., Palo Alto) this afternoon.  The region is quiet with beautiful trees (after all, it is spring season now in California).  We are hosted in their cafeteria (I think they want to keep the visit pretty informal and relaxed), which is quite spacious.  And we were served by various nice fruit, coffee, soy milk and snacks, and free VMware Workstation and VMware Fusion license .

The VMware Campus Relations manager invited several managers from various functional group: Finance, Corporate Business Development, Ecosystem Engineering, Product Management and Product Marketing.  The visit was kick-off with a short introduction by a senior manager and then each different function group manager talk to our students at respective tables.

In the introduction part, the manager actually talked a lot from his own personal perspective: why he joined VMware four years ago etc.  He emphasized that in terms of size, VMware is not a start-up, either VMware is not an established giant company.   Exactly.  With 7000 employees and 2 billion revenue, VMware is a medium size company between a typical 10-20 people start-up, and a well established giant such as Microsoft, Google, Amazon or Yahoo.  And more importantly, VMware is in a unique market leader position and keeps fast growing.  I think this is particularly interesting for a certain group of MBA students who might prefer to work in a fast growing environment with entrepreneurial sense.

After the short intro part, basically it became a free talk.  We can approach any manager to talk about their team and specific job.  It was great to talk with different function group and get a comprehensive sense of how the whole company is running, and how each function group is running to fit with the corporate’s growth.

A great cool company and a great trek!  Huge thanks to VMware for hosting us, and very grateful to Haas Tech Club for organizing this event!

Here is that part of Liz’s speech:

>> Second half of O-Week welcome speech — intentions & conversations

Take this week to make notes to yourself of what’s important to you, what you want to focus on this year. Watch for your own stress points – what is likely to cause you to lose that composure, that effortlessness?

With that in mind, whatever you know now about what you want to focus on and what your likely stress points are, you want to take this week to set your intentions. As you are at the threshold, what do YOU need to get out of this year, what will you gain from this experience? And I don’t mean that you need to know exactly what career or job or whatever you want – plenty of us come here with the intention to figure out what lights us on fire. That’s an intention. Figure out if you’d like consulting. That’s an intention. Figure out what it takes to serve on a board, and if you could try that out. That’s an intention. Figure out if you can show a side of yourself that you’ve never been able to showcase before.

Each of us walks in with a set of intentions, but if we don’t set them down before we get into the smorgasbord of Haas, we risk deciding to take the approach of “try one of everything,” or worse the “I feel like I have to do it” mentality that causes you to do things you don’t want to / can’t / don’t have time to do. By setting your intentions early, even if they change mid-course, you avoid some of the perils of business school – the perils that can cause you to lose your intensity.

Without your intentions…well, the best thing I can think to compare it to, is that it’s like walking in to a grocery store with no list – something I personally do all the time. You walk in, you’re on the phone, you circle the aisles, you inevitably spend 3 hours on a task that could’ve taken 30 minutes, and you invariably walk out with a lot of stuff – a lot of tasty stuff even – but without the ingredients to make a single meal.

Haas is a grocery store – there’s a lot to offer.

To navigate it well, as you push your cart around, you want to know what you are trying to create – you need your list.
- To build a career you need a lot of ingredients – and you have a finite time to shop. Walk in with a grocery list, plan, and you’re more likely to walk out with what you want
- You’ll still want to have your eyes open for other ingredients, other things you wouldn’t have thought to try, or always wanted to try and see available for the taking…

But there’s one other thing that’s really important as you’re getting ready to shop the aisles of Haas, even if you do have your grocery list and you’re ready to keep your eyes peeled for fun new ingredients

There are other people shopping alongside of you. Your classmates, with their own plans and lists, may have something to share that will shape your own plans for something you could never have even thought to prepare on your own.

I was reminded of this recently at an event for our alumni leaders, who spent the day debating how we can help Dean Lyons push Haas to the next level. I was chatting at the end of the day with one of the recent alums who’s taken a leadership role in our alumni community. He was asking if I could get all of us, the current students, to start pushing out information on what’s being talked about on campus. And when I asked him what he meant, what information, he said – “it’s those conversations in between – the conversations between a few people after class or in the courtyard or over a beer. If you could package up those courtyard conversations and broadcast them out, that would be like being back on this campus. Those conversations define the cutting edge of thinking in such a range of industries. That is what I miss. That’s what I can’t get anywhere else.”

In this store, you are surrounded by people who are constructing their own fabulous plans for incredible lives, careers, heck even incredible weekend plans. The conversations that happen in between the meat and potatoes of classes and recruiting nights and consumption functions and everything else – those conversations can flavor what you are creating. The ingredients that others are adding to their own basket can make the meal that you are preparing even more exceptional. Use them, make time for those conversations, but to have them you HAVE to pick your head up you have to engage the people around you and not just be going for the ingredients that you think you need – they will be perhaps the most invaluable part of this balance that you’re trying to strike.

So now, before I close, if you haven’t written anything down yet – write this down.

Set your intention.

Make time for conversations that will flavor your own experience You are about to open that gift that all of you have given yourselves – this week, you go BACK TO SCHOOL. Your time is yours – life is good.

Welcome to Haas. Welcome home. I’m so glad you’re here.

Thank you.

Liz, thank you very much for the speech.

Liz Rockett, the second year MBA student, and the President of Haas MBA Association (the student government organization for the full time MBA program) made a wonderful welcome speech.  She mentioned an interesting metaphor that “Doing an MBA is like shopping in a grocery”.

(Disclaimer:  below are not the exact words from Liz, but rather my own understanding, so it is open to correction).

Doing an MBA is like shopping in a grocery.

I just have a very general feeling that what I want to buy at the grocery.  For example, maybe some sweet fruits, but definitely not too sour, but I really have no idea that it should be apple or orange or something else.  So I just look around in the grocery, and maybe sample something that looks like tasteful.  And I am not alone, actually there are many friends who are shopping together with me.  Some of them have tried that kind of orange, and they told me it is actually nasty, oh my god, then I want to try something else…

Translated to MBA words:

I just have a very general feeling that what I want to do after MBA.  For example, maybe consulting, but definitely not that investment banking, but I really have no idea that it should be  the firm A or firm B or something else.  So I just look around in the business school, and maybe in the summer intern I try something that looks nice.  And I am not alone, actually there are many first and second year MBA students who are “exploring” together with me.  Some of them have tried that kind of job, and they told me it is actually nasty, oh my god, then I want to try something else…

At least for me, this is an interesting metaphor.  :-)

Update on Aug 24, 2009:

Liz, thank you so much for sharing that portion of your speech to me as a new post “Intentions & Conversations“.