A Rotman EMBA Diary: Classmates Become Family

Networking is something that every MBA understands. It’s either a necessary evil—if you’re apprehensive about meeting new people—or it’s just a way to meet new people, get a job, learn about various industries or simply get noticed. However, for Andrew Davidson and Abhimanyu Sood, two EMBA students at the Univeristy of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, networking didn’t just help them meet new people; it helped them to build a new family.

MBAs who attend Rotman immediately become a part of an extensive alumni network. “The network you gain through the school’s alumni is global,” Andrew and Abhimanyu told The Globe and Mail. “Interested in the Australian market? We found more than 70 alumni there who can be accessed with a few clicks of the mouse.” But the alumni network is only a piece of the puzzle; the rest happens inside the classroom.

In the weeks leading up to the start of the Rotman EMBA program, the school places emphasis on relationship building between classmates. Every MBA in the cohort is invited to several networking events, which begins the introductory process, but then, throughout the 13-month cohort program, the relationships grow far deeper.

“Our cohort spent countless hours with one another … and the relationships built have gone to levels deeper than many of us had originally expected,” they said. “As a class, we were about 70 individuals with a similar mindset that had committed to the program and all the pressures therein. This alone helps to forge something more than a professional acquaintance.”

For Rotman EMBAs, it’s the intensity of the program that helps forge the deep connections. Every student is put through difficult or odd situations—whether because of work, family or school—and is forced to rely on someone else. Plus, when you’re in such an intense situation, blowing off steam is vital. “The class went to karaoke, Toronto Blue Jays games and countless patios and dinners. In these interactions, we forged ever deeper relationships.”

At Rotman, when you get your MBA, you don’t just gain a valuable network of peers. You get a family. “To us, our network looks something closer to a family. As one student put it before boarding his plane for home: ‘I have gained 63 cousins.’”

regions: Toronto

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