Monday, 4.3. - A different day

The day starts totally different from the routine we have got used to. After 2 weeks of absolutely gorgeous weather, the climate is much cooler after some heavy rain showers that went down over night and still go on during the morning. Secondly, Felix finds out that two Laptops (one from DB and one from GIZ) have been stolen out of his room. We suspect a guest who stayed for one night from Friday to Saturday and did not even pay when he left. So for Felix, the rest of the day is busy with a hell of administrational work and experiencing the Fort Portal Police universe – Michel from the Dutchess kindly accompanies him and offers help wherever possible. Our expectations of the PC’s turning up again are limited, however, investigations are ongoing.

I am picked up by Oliver Schmidt at 8:30 and we move up to the university since today the Banking ‘department day’ together with students from the management course is scheduled. We have a tight agenda and kick off with Priscilla’s presentation on Product development and management, which gives student a good basic insight of what a product is and how it can be managed along its life cycle.

Her presentation is followed by a breakout session with 5 student groups who are asked to think of exemplary products and present them in a 5-minute pitch in front of the class – which gives us all a great time in hearing from very innovative banking products and a magic telephone!

Creating new bank products

Breakout session

We conclude the session with a short break and continue with my presentation on the organisation of product management, sharing not only some insight on organisation theory, but also how to apply it to the task of product management in selected business scenarios along the product life cycle.

Organisational aspects of Product Management

After lunch in the classroom we continue with a session on career development in the banking industry with an extra loop into social media such as facebook, myspace, and linkedin. After a quite extensive group discussion on the pros and cons of facebook, we conclude the day with a presentation from Daniel as a senior ex-banker and – representing Felix in his absence – my final contribution on social networks as well as important aspects that should be taken into consideration when going for a career in banking.

After more or less 7 hours sitting together in one room with a group of 40-50 people no one opposes against calling it a day and we all head for home.