When corporate experience encounters with Guanghua's thoughts,

When the wisdom of professors collides with the inspirations of fresh blood,

When enterprises, professors, and students assemble in the IPP,

What kind of story will be created?

What outcomes will they produce together?

Today we are going to share with you

Testimonials for 2020 Guanghua School of Management MBA IPP @Panasonic

Part 1: Testimonial from Enterprise

This is the third year Panasonic has participated in the MBA Integrated Practicum Project of Guanghua School of Management, Peking University. The professor, MBA students, and teachers at the MBA Project Center have worked up to high standard as always – they are professional, rigorous, meticulous, and responsible. In the early stage of exchanges, the team members came up with many new ideas, enabling us to discover more possibilities. We are looking forward to the final plans of the two teams.

The senior management led by CEO has paid high attention to this year’s IPP and nailed down “healthcare and senior care” as the topic, which is a key area of our future development. They have also coordinated relevant departments and resources in advance, laying a solid basis for the project. At the same time, BU chiefs, key employees, and young frontline employees also participate in the project and undertake tasks together to push forward the IPP in an all-round way. MBA students and young employees form groups, which gives the students better access to directly leverage the resources.

We have communicated with the students on an open and candid basis as to the problems and difficulties in the development of the health and senior care business, and provided comprehensive information such as that about the headquarters in Japan, internal data, and paid research reports. Throughout the process, we take into full consideration of the actual situations to help these high-caliber talents better combine their theoretical courses with practice. Additionally, our HR team has strengthened coordination, given regular feedbacks, and provided training opportunities to help hone their leadership, decision-making, teamwork, and other related skills.

We are deeply impressed by how meticulous and rigorous the professor is, who has put forth timely and targeted opinions in relevant specialties that instrumental in helping us address our problems. The MBA students have practical experiences in many fields. They demonstrate high levels of initiative in the process and can actively coordinate the resources of all sides and give full play to their creativity. It is from them that we see the directions and criteria for future employees.

Part 2: Testimonial from Student

Team Name: Team Kaizen

Members: Jiaze Wu, Yuemiao Pan, Cheng-Han Sher, Giovanni Soldini

Panasonic takes Integrated Practicum Project (IPP) extremely seriously by offering us one of their most precious resources: time. We are well-impressed by Panasonic’s initiatives and eagerness to include not only us but also their management team, from related product line managers to senior executives, into every major discussion since it kicked-off in April. Unlike previous years, everything has gone virtual since February 2020. However, there has not been any discount on either efficiency or effectiveness on IPP. We are given an ample amount of opportunity to fully engage with their employees on a weekly basis freely via ZOOM meetings and WeChat groups. The response time from Panasonic is extremely quick with tailored constructive feedback that allow us to switch gears at lowest possible cost to achieve continuous progress.

As a new initiative and change this year, Panasonic requires a few of their employees to be included in our team and act as our Panasonic counterpart. This makes us feel much more involved and connected with Panasonic throughout the entire project. The senior management team also treat us much more than just MBA Candidates from Guanghua, but one of “them”. This helps us to be able to really see in Panasonic’s perspectives and collaborate with them as one business unit. A major part of making this possible is Panasonic’s HR team, whom glued us together by scheduling in valuable meetings with important stakeholders within Panasonic. This is a profound step forward as we can interact and receive direct advice from various management levels to move the IPP forward.

Every member in our team has a slightly different career path post-MBA. Regardless which industry we ultimately choose, what matters most is exerting strong business ethics and critical thinking skills together with the people whom we work with. At the end of the day, it is about how we can create long-term sustainable value for our clients, with our teams, and within ourselves. We each have a duty as global citizens to incorporate what we learn not just from IPP but also the entire MBA journey into our lives wherever we go – and ultimately, as future global leaders.

Part 3: Testimonial from Professor

Professor Yu Zhang, Department of Finance, Guanghua School of Management

The first time I led a team to participate in the Peking University Guanghua MBA integration practice project, I soon realized the benefit of this special project for MBA students and even the Guanghua School of Management. If the purpose of imparting theoretical knowledge and introducing cases in the classroom is to help students understand business issues and get familiar with solutions, then the IPP is a mock exam for students.

The test questions are multi-faceted. On one hand, the students need to quickly absorb the profound thoughts of managers and employees of the enterprises like a piece of dry sponge; on the other hand, it is necessary to give full play to the catfish effect, think out of the box, and brainstorm. How to gain insights into the competitive edges, operating environment, and development goals of the enterprise in the shortest time? How to bring forward a business proposal? How to make a business proposal innovative and practical? How much value will be created if the proposal is put into practice, and at what cost? How can the team members play an active role, and the team leader divide responsibilities and encourage the members to forge synergy? How to maximize the value of business proposals to the enterprise? All these are great challenges for MBA students.

It is gratifying is that the MBA students have adapted to the basic roles in the IPP within two weeks. By listening to the experiences shared by Panasonic’s managers and discussing with employees, the two teams have gathered a lot of information and preliminarily determined the direction of their business proposals.

This year’s IPP has gone virtual due to the pandemic. Computers have made face-to-face communication possible. Being unable to take field trips somewhat hinders the students from getting access to the specific information about the enterprise, products, and teams. However, online communication makes it possible for them to do research without being there physically and makes investigations as flexible and frequent as necessary. The IPP amid the pandemic may offer inspiration for external business consulting, and that’s what we’re waiting to find out.

The two outstanding team leaders, Chen Liu and Jiaze Wu, have united their team as one and led their team to initially determine the direction of their proposal aligned with the interests of the enterprise. The other members on Chen Liu’s team – Qianyun Shi, Xinyu Wang, Jiaqi Liang, and Cheng Zhao – are full of passion. They have brainstormed, worked out a number of potential directions, and discussed with the Panasonic team many times to identify common requirements. The other members on Jiaze Wu’s team – Yumiao Pan and Cheng-Han Sher – raised thought-provoking questions during effective communication with the Panasonic team. Giovanni Soldini has also contributed a lot despite the time difference and the raging pandemic in Europe and will hopefully put forward more proposals from a global perspective later.

About IPP

The Integrated Practicum Project (IPP) is a required course for full-time and international MBA classes at Guanghua School of Management, Peking University. It is an education-industry partnership aimed at building a practice platform to help solve the practical problems at enterprises and improve the comprehensive management skills of MBA students. The basic framework of the IPP, an experiential course, is as follows: After completing the core courses, students go to the selected enterprises in teams to carry out business projects under the guidance of professors. They need to come up with proposals and hand over consulting reports to the enterprises and professors. Each project revolves around a real-world topic designed and provided by a particular enterprise based on its own needs in order to solve actual problems. In the IPP, the teams can provide strategic, marketing, human resources, financial, and other solutions to help address the management problems of enterprises in transition and devise business plans for the development of startups or growing enterprises.