It’s been a week now since Yang and I have returned from Harvard Business School. We were there for the AIGA Business Perspectives seminar, an MBA-style crash course in business basics including the basics on strategy, marketing, finance, and so forth. Case studies. Lots of reading. Excellent company in both attendees and professors.� I think many of the attendees – representing their various employers like Starwood Hotels, Starbucks, Gap/Old Navy, P&G, J&J, etc. – were there to gain a better understanding of their business associates. It’s how the seminar was billed by AIGA (to help you things “through your clients’ eyes”). While this appealing, as a business owner myself, I no longer have any problem seeing business problems as my clients see them. What I found in these classes was a new clarity on business issues for People Design, helping shape what’s next for us. Yang and I feel like we’ve learned via the School of Hard Knocks in our 10 years ramping up BBK Studio. These HBS classes were enormously enlightening for me and the seminar, while expensive, was worth every penny.
