Babson Experience

Well, where do I start? When we were first told that we had the option to not just visit Babson for our GIP but also share the classroom with students from all over the world for their summer programme, ‘thrilled’ is an understatement to describe my feeling at that time. We did have our fair share of troubles before reaching Babson, visa being one of the major ones but hey, all’s well that ends well right?

Everything from packing our bags to making sure that we pack the right kind of clothes, cross checking on the required documents, overnight calls with our friends trying to decide what to do on the weekends while we would be there to all the networking possibilities coming our way, everything was an adventure in itself. Before you could even process everything, came the day when we were leaving our homes to attend the Babson Build Programme due to start on the 10th of July, 2023. I’d be lying if I say that me and my friends were the ‘ideal’ group who made their plan strictly to and fro Boston but hey, that’s a story for a different day!

10th July 2023, the day of our induction. I still remember running through our dorm’s corridor, knocking my friends’ rooms just so we could settle on what to wear for our induction ceremony- of course we had to look our best! Right from the induction to our welcome dinner to the giggles across the hall with our new peers from all across the world, we definitely did feel like the main characters of our own stories. Moments like these remind you how, at the end of the day, every opportunity that you get in life can lead into something so beautiful.

Fast forward to our first day in class and I still remember, it was someone’s birthday, and our professor made all of us sing her a Happy Birthday song and honestly, what a great way to start our lectures. In all honesty, some of the lectures were really great, and some of them were below our expectations. One lecture that really stood out to me was Negotiations by Prof. Lily Crosina solely because of how relatable it was to my day-to-day business scenarios.

Not just academically but Babson Build truly provided us with a holistic perspective to our businesses. From speaking to people from all walks of life about our businesses to making friends in countries we have never been to till date, to making our newly made friends dance to bollywood music in America to learning basic greetings in multiple languages, the Babson experience truly gave us a lot of memories to cherish for life. The early morning rush to use the washrooms, the dilemma between whether to skip breakfast for an extra 30 mins of sleep, the excitement for the classes, the curiosity on what would we be served for our meals, the evening banters with our friends right outside our dormitories, the strolls across the massive Babson campus and finally, the fight with ourselves to go to bed ‘early’ to be able to make it to the first lecture the next day; Babson Build was truly a magical experience.

What was supposed to feel like 14 days of strenuous academic pressure felt like a breeze thanks to our peers and professors and before we knew it, we were on our final day giving our Rocket Pitches to mark the end of our time at Babson. What followed suit was our little graduation ceremony and then it was time for us to say goodbye to our new friends, our professors, our dormitories and most importantly, the best 14 days of my academic life. I would sincerely like to thank SPJIMR’s PGPFMB department for giving us the opportunity to be able to attend this programme and make connections and memories for a lifetime.