This is a review of P5 and graduation at INSEAD. It’ll probably help if you went back and read all the reviews thus far (P0, P1, P2, P3 and P4). Or not. Maybe you like reading book chapters in a random sequence. Don’t let me dictate what you should or shouldn’t be doing.
This post is a recap of the wind down of arguably one of the best years of my life so far and understandably it is going to be all over the place and a lot of it may either seem very esoteric or incomprehensible, but what can I say? This write up is a means for me to pen down fond memories of this place and bring some order to the scores of thoughts running through my head right now.
Coming back to the end
Coming back to the last term was, in a way, fairly uneventful. A fair number of folks still had some pending and leftover interviews and recruitment related conversations that went on. There was the random company that had an online session or two only to bookend their conversations with the fact that they weren’t hiring at that point and giving us the same old weary advice about how to look for a job. Nothing drastically changed between the end of P4 and the start of P5. While I had taken a break and spent some time in the wonderful country of Italy (obviously gaining weight eating pizza, pasta, lasagna, risotto and gelato), a lot of batchmates opted to optimize their time and use the break to continue their recruitment outreach efforts. I did not see value in that because I could sense the tiredness from doing the same work over and over again setting in, but hey, if it worked for them, it’s all good.
Personally, I think I came back a little rejuvenated from the break and ready to take on some more recruitment work. I also think the break from the space physically was the most beneficial and getting out of this bubble of campus and the same people (I promise I love you guys, I just needed some space, that’s all) was very helpful in ensuring that I could some perspective into what I wanted to do.
Approaching P5
Way back in January, I had visited a major German company in Munich where we met an alumnus who had a very interesting piece of advice for us. At the time it seemed absurd, but the essence of what he said made sense around this time of the year. His advice was essentially something he’d not done and was more of a cautionary tale. He said to us,
Don’t miss out on P5 in the hopes of looking for a job. You’ll get time after college to look for a job, but you will never get P5 again.
After the first week or so in P5, one fine morning when I stepped out of the shower recapping my to-dos for the day, it suddenly hit me that the rent I’d paid the previous day was going to be the second last one and that meant that there were only 7 weekends left. Only 7! A single digit number of weeks and weekends was not something I had thought would ever descend upon me so fast and that’s when this piece of advice really hit home and it changed my approach to the term. I decided to step off the gas on recruitment and enjoy the here and now of the people and the place much more and just soak it up and marinade in the experience of living in quaint French town with some of the smartest people I knew.
What I ended up doing
Made the best of it.
If I had to summarise this time, that’s how it would be. Making the best of it, if you know me and looked at any of my previous posts, was not attending every party but doing the little everyday things that I grew to enjoy and knew that I would not get back home. Some of them included:
- Not eating lunch alone: I’d find someone new each day so as to make sure I was caught up on how everyone I cared about was doing and what they were looking forward to in the coming weeks
- Not talking about recruitment: we all knew it wasn’t the best so might as well have just not spoken about it and instead celebrated when someone shared good news
- Saying yes to more things: my answer in life to a lot of things was usually a no or an I’ll-think-about it. I changed that to yes. Not a yes with an asterisk but just a good complete yes
- Being less productive: I stopped measuring the success of my days in number of job applications submitted or coffee chats had and instead measured it in whether I did anything worth of remembering
- Getting the sun: we were lucky to have our last term in the wonderful French summer and that meant scrambling to grab whatever sun we could as we battled overcast skies
- Lots of hosting: I was in no mood to wait for plans to be made and so I ended up hosting a lot of dinners and chais at my place (making great use of the wonderful kitchen and living room we had). Worked very well because for every one person who couldn’t make it, we had two who were a bit too eager to join
Of course, I wasn’t too true to these ideas every single day and there were days I stayed indoors and just read my novels (shoutout to my librarians at the Doriot and Tanoto research hubs for excellent fiction shelves). Everyday wasn’t picture perfect, but such is life, isn’t it.
Each time someone said, “This was so much fun, we should do it again,” it was a bittersweet moment because I knew there would be limited opportunities to recreate these moments.
Bidding adieu to Fontainebleau
One of the saddest things for me to have done in this time was saying bye to our little village. At this point, France is the second country to host me and whether they like it or not, I now count it as my second home. I have become very fond of the place and am filled an appreciation for the French way of life including, but not limited to — eating cheese and bread along with lunch, enjoying the sun during lunch, consuming baguettes, picking a side on the pain au chocolat v chocolatine wars, saying bon apetit and many more non-food related habit too. The point being that I have a massive debt of gratitude to the country, its society and people who have been outstanding hosts to me in my time there.
All of my routines in the village were so well set that by the time I left, I knew and took comfort in the tiniest of things. I’d be suspicious of out-of-town vehicles parked on my road; concerned when I did not see familiar cars in their usual spots; I knew my cashiers enough to recognise them on the streets and had go-to folks at the thrice-weekly farmers’ market. All of these gave me a massive, indescribable sense of familiarity and comfort that only a place like home can give one. Saying goodbye to that has been rather difficult, I won’t lie.
On a side note, this year, Fontainebleau celebrates its 80th anniversary of being liberated. A part of these celebrations were hoisting pictures from their liberation day at points on the streets where they were taken to give them a this-street-that-day feel. I found it quite humbling to see how the streets I walked with such a carefree attitude were once overrun by troops, trucks and tanks as a part of daily life. To have grown up so far from the theatre of war was a privilege I had never acknowledged. I am treating this as a reminder to live up to INSEAD’s motto of Business as a Force for Good and ensure that world I live in is better for future generations.
Winding down
Graduation day was finally upon us. Dressed in our resplendent gowns and seated in a greenhouse of a marquee tent, we had a wonderful ceremony where we celebrated all our batchmates and their families, kids and partners who were equally instrumental in helping us achieve our dream. The ceremony had several great speakers, and I took away with me our commencement speaker’s words, “…go find your mountain and climb it.” I’m in search of my mountain and I’m confident that with the year I’ve had I’ll be able to scale it easily and then find the next one and the next one after that.
For more thoughts on the end: a post on LinkedIn.
This has been one of the best years of my life and I am all the better for having attended this fine institution. It has made me a better person than who I was and I emerge from it a more tempered, tolerant and respectful individual. I also emerge richer in terms of the people who I now have in my orbit. Truly, the real MBA is the friends we make along the way. I’m ready to take on whatever life has in store for me next. There’s no doubt that it will be super exciting and a great deal of fun!
Thank you for being a part of this journey and may our paths criss-cross in the best of ways for the years to come.
