среда, 30 июня 2010 г.

Education – relaxation above all!

In July the School will graduate its first alumni! A honorary title of the first alumni will be received by Executive MBA students.

On passing such a long and interesting way, Yuri Eremenko, Director General of Tekhnosila, one of the students, shares his impressions.

About the purpose of education:


Why did I join SKOLKOVO? I was asked this question by Full-Time MBA students half a year ago. I began to think then and realized that when I had joined the School, I had got some thoughts about it (I joined to obtain knowledge), but when I had met other students, I’d started to apprehend the process in a completely different way. When I got to know people, I understood that they were a very good circle, very good friends and there were very good professional ties. I’d thought before that I knew everyone I needed to know. Now I understand that I was wrong. My colleagues say that even my character has changed.


Work and study:

The study does not affect the work – you miss only two business days and two days off once a month. I manage to stay in touch all the time. That may annoy teachers. I have time to reply to messages, coordinate something, and make some decisions. Immediately after a regular module I get back to business and start to implement something new at once. Some people were annoyed with my absence from work and study, they understood that as soon as I was back, there would be some changes. The most striking example is that after one of the modules we restructured a work of our HR department.


пятница, 25 июня 2010 г.

понедельник, 21 июня 2010 г.

Innovation Design Lab

Late last week SKOLKOVO and Intel signed an agreement on creating a joint Innovation Design Laboratory. It is to be headed by Dmitry Repin, SKOLKOVO Start-up Projects Director, and Kamil Isaev, General Director for Research and Development at Intel Russia.


The key principles that underlie the work of the Design Lab will be Design thinking and Human-centered design.

At the final educational module Full-Time MBA students create their own start-up project, and now, being entrepreneurs, they’ll be able to rely on a serious technological platform and get an important experience accumulated by Intel Corporation.

среда, 16 июня 2010 г.

Ruben Vardanian: there comes a time when talents are important.

Ruben Vardanian, President of Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO, gave a talk in “Real time” programme on FinamFM.
We offer you Ruben’s brightest statements about a current world situation, a status of education and the SKOLKOVO School.

“The 21st century will witness a struggle for the best human resources. Modern technologies and transport infrastructure allow people to live around the world. People will choose the best place for their family and themselves. The time of resources is passing by. There comes a time when talents are important.

The world increasingly becomes interconnected. It’s highly important to understand what goes on not only in one country, but also in countries with different cultural and business traditions. It’s very important to have knowledge that helps you make decisions in great uncertainty and with a lack of information, because we live in the environment where rules of play are neither clear, nor definite, there are constant changes, it’s not so obvious as we would like it to be. But nevertheless people succeed. And the question of how one can succeed in this environment is of high importance …”

“If you look at Harvard Business School and its curriculum even today, you’ll see that MBA students have about 750 cases for two school years: two-three cases about Russia, 15-20 about China, 7-8 about India. But they have a poor notion of the actual situation in those countries. Moreover, they live in the environment that was originally formed on a different qualitative level including jurisprudence, infrastructure, information, access to various resources. For instance, it strikes me that all Chinese cases absolutely ignore the role of the Chinese Communist Party, its influence of business. It’s absurd, because if somebody wants to do business in China, they should understand that Indian bureaucracy is also hushed up.

From this point of view, a student who graduated from a prestigious school is prepared to work at good corporations, good countries and is completely not prepared to what is going on fast-moving economies

New training course

You have already read about a trip on the Kruzenshtern sail boat scheduled for SKOLKOVO students for the end of this summer. 

To find out more about such an uncommon undertaking, we’ve spoken to a man who knows about sailing and has been on such trips a few times – Dmitry Repin

- Please can you tell us, why such an uncommon way of opening the programme for new Executive MBA participants has been chosen?
- We had a unique opportunity to gather first Executive MBA graduates and those who would start education in September.
For those who finished an EMBA course this is a good opportunity to be aboard Kruzenshtern, share their educational experience, analyze their personal achievements, as well as give new-comers a right message and inspire them for the entire educational process.
This programme is aimed at understanding a notion of “success” not in a monetary sense, but in a broader sense of the word: what you can call an achievement, what you can call a trial. And the way it overlaps a striving for your goals, both personal and business.

- What is a primary message of the programme?
- A sailing trip is a serious physical challenge that requires both moral and physical efforts. The participants of the programme will be fully occupied in activities on the boat: mast rising, working with sails and other various exercises that cadets do. In fact, they will have the same experience that the first discoverers of countries and explorers of new lands had. On the one hand, it places a man in an uncommon position. On the other hand, it’s an opportunity to see other people and work in a team. All those things should be interpreted in a business context: everyone manages his company or a small subdivision. In addition to understanding oneself it’s also necessary to understand objective processes – sea practices that have been polished for centuries and how it conforms with HR management and risk management. This is an important aspect of the programme.

понедельник, 7 июня 2010 г.

Making strategic decisions

All of us have to make decisions – prompt and non-urgent, far-reaching and not so much. However, decisions made by directors are always noted for high responsibility both to the entire company and to its clients, employees, founders.

Therefore it’s highly important for a director to be capable of making prompt strategic decisions under any circumstances, and that skill will be daily in great demand and enhance a success of the talented manager. Meanwhile it should be noted that a decision-making process is more intuitive for some people and purely analytical for other people.

To help you balance these two approaches and learn to make effective decisions on any level is an objective of an open programme Executive Education aimed at making strategic decisions conducted by Zeger Degraeve, a Professor from London Business School.

The programme is aimed at practical study of methods and models that help to arrange a systematic process of making important business decisions in the company. The programme will cover a complete set of essential instruments for prompt decision making. At the same time procedures of performance evaluation of the decisions made will be developed.

The programme will take place on June 15-16. For more details please visit SKOLKOVO web site

You can find more information about Professor Zeger Degraeve from a short video:

Qi of your Business

Why the SKOLKOVO students practice Qigong, live at Taoist monks’ and learn to meditate
Article by Anton Saraykin in Forbes


We’ve just returned from Shanghai. A successful two-month practice at a Chinese media company is over, and now we have started working over new projects here in Russia. I’ll give a detailed report in the next post. As for today, here is a story about one of the strongest impressions of my study in China.
In early May the People’s Republic of China celebrated Labour Day. Like in Russia the country doesn’t work several days in honour of working population. That’s why we made for the Sichuan Mountains, 1500 km from Shanghai. We spent four days with monks there, familiarized ourselves with Taoist practices and tried to understand the Chinese culture better. We also found out why more and more successful Chinese businessmen are anxious to be received by Master Lee, a local Taoist healer.

Taoist monks have been improving in spiritual practices in a temple on the mountain of Jin Yong in the province of Sichuan. This Chinese traditional teaching along with Buddhism has greatly influenced the culture and world-view of the Celestial Empire. One of the currents of Taoism is so-called “Taoist yoga”, or Qigong practice. It is based on a notion of internal energy Qi that both a man and nature have.
There were four of us, SKOLKOVO students, and we were the only foreigners in that place. On our arrival, hospitable monks treated us to local dainties – cow stomach skin and pig’s brains that we cooked ourselves on a special frying-pan. But on the following days our ration was limited to water with rice, mountain leaves and tofu.

четверг, 3 июня 2010 г.

Campus SKOLKOVO: town in a town

Winston Churchill once said, "First we shape our buildings, then they shape us".
This is probably the most exact and precise expression that reveals a meaning of the outstanding concept of the Campus SKOLKOVO as well as love and care, with which the founders of the School embodied that concept.

A campus is a central place of any school, so it was highly important to make it comply with bold purposes of SKOLKOVO.
The Campus has been completed in three years – a record short period in Russia. It was built for themselves after all, for students who are leaders of the future.

A key role in the building process is played by Emil Pirumov, Managing Director of the School. We spoke to him about the Campus, its creation, a future life of the students and touched upon a subject of the innovation center to be built next to the Campus.
Emil Pirumov recollected to have arrived at the construction site covered by sprawling dandelions three years ago. It’s only photos that can remind of that time now. Today we can see a cutting-edge architectural building here!
- Please can you tell us, at what readiness stage the Campus is now? When will it welcome the first students?
- We expect students to come in September, but early June the School staff are moving here. The Campus is at the completion stage, a stage of final decoration, remodeling and improvement. What is the difference between my work and the work of subcontractors? A subcontractor does and leaves, but I build the school like for myself. Therefore even now I make workers remodel something. It may cause inconveniences to the staff for some time due to the works being performed, but the result will be a quality that meets our expectations, status and ambitions of the School.

среда, 2 июня 2010 г.

SKOLKOVO infosession in a new format

A SKOLKOVO infosession was held last week in a new double format. As usual, visitors could listen to Wilfried Vanhonacker, Dean, speaking of the School. Moreover, all guests had an opportunity to have an informal chat with Full-Time MBA students over a cup of tea or coffee.

Those, who came here for the first time, listened to a presentation made by Wilfried Vanhonacker with interest and were able to find more information about the educational process first hand. Wilfried as usual created a friendly atmosphere, got acquainted with all the guests, made a lot of jokes and at the same time spoke seriously of key activities of the School.


Those, who had been to SKOLKOVO infosessions before, took pleasure in chatting with Full-Time MBA students and asking them various questions, primarily about their impressions from studying and changes in their life during the educational process. Young people have been studying since September, it’s already 8 months, so they have got a lot of impressions. The students tried to share that spirit of leadership that SKOLKOVO gives rise to as well as their emotions.


The infosession was visited by FT MBA students Julia Davis (USA), Sebastian Schauman (Finland), Dmitry Yurchenko (Belarus), Sultanbek Khunkaev (Russia). It is only last week that the students returned from China and India where they had participated in corporate projects for local companies. That was a great topic to discuss too.

вторник, 1 июня 2010 г.

SKOLKOVO invites you aboard the legendary Kruzenshtern

SKOLKOVO announces a unique project for students of a new intake of Executive MBA!

Submitting documents for SKOLKOVO EMBA programme till June 15 you will get a chance to make a 6-day sailing trip on the legendary barque Kruzenshtern!

From August 29 - till September 5, 2010 the third class of EMBA students together with the first EMBA class alumni will sail from Bremerhaven (Germany), where Kruzenshtern was first launched in 1926, to Klaipeda (Lithuania).

Kruzenshtern  is one of the biggest sailboats in the world. Sailing on Kruzenshtern - is a dream of many people. And SKOLKOVO offers this opportunity to its students.

A special programme will be made up for the journey that will include training in sailing under real conditions conducted by the Kruzenshtern crew as well as an educational programme from SKOLKOVO.
For more details please visit our site

Start a new stage of your education with an unforgettable voyage!

The information session of Moscow School of Management in Kiev

The information session that was held by the Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO in Kiev on the 21st of May can be rightfully recognized as the session with the highest number of speakers and visitors. The infosession was visited by over one hundred guests, and we were happy to welcome all of you in spacious wide halls of InterContinental hotel. Most visitors had already known about SKOLKOVO due to availability and openness of information in various sources and came to hear about the School first hand and speak to SKOLKOVO representatives in person. It was nice to see your interested faces, yet unknown to us. We hope however that some time later you will become an integral part of SKOLKOVO School’s history.

The floor at the infosession was first taken by Dmitry Repin – who was generally cheered for talking with the audience in English. Dmitry told about basic principles that underlie the innovative School of Management SKOLKOVO. A key issue of his speech was an idea of Learning by doing. The other day students returned from China and India where they had guided corporate projects meeting the challenges at local companies. Before that the students had worked on projects in the Russian social and government sectors. Now they are to guide corporate projects in Russia and the USA as well as to create their own start-up project.