It’s hard to believe three months have already passed since the South America Study Trip ended, and looking back, it’s difficult to sum up everything we saw and did. I’m extremely appreciative of the opportunity to meet with world-class companies and different Ivey alumni working in Latin America, and for that reason alone, I’ve encouraged members of next year’s MBA class to consider the trip.
For me, however, the biggest value add I took away from the trip was the intangibles that come with traveling with the same group people for an extended period. That might sound like the start of a leadership case, but when you hear as much as we do about the importance of the Ivey network, the relationships you build with your classmates take on a new importance. In a class of approximately 170 people, you’re inevitably not going to come away with as many strong relationships as you’d like. Between the rapid fire pace of the core module and the sectioning of the class into two halves, there were a lot of people I simply didn’t get to know as well as I would have liked.
The South America trip provided an opportunity to get around that issue, and I couldn’t have come away more satisfied with the outcome. For some classmates, it was their pre-Ivey experience in Latin American business climates that made them stand out. Whether it was developing hydroelectric projects in Peru or investing in Brazilian companies from a desk in Toronto, I often learned more about the country we were in from the person sitting next to me than I did from our tour guide.
For others, the trip simply provided a welcome chance to socialize with the rest of the class. Ivey draws from a diverse pool of candidates, and some members of the class have had family or professional commitments that precluded them from going out in London. The trip represented a fresh start in that regard, and whether it was on a beach volleyball court in Rio de Janeiro or a patio in Santiago, we got to see an incredibly positive and energetic new side of our peers.
In particular, I don’t think I’ll ever forget going to a soccer match in São Paulo between a Brazilian side and an Argentinean rival. The electricity in the stadium that day was indescribable, and I loved watching the Ivey contingent cheer as loudly as any Brazilian there. Maybe more than anything else, that experience gets at why the South American Study Trip is so valuable, and why if you’re enrolled in next year’s class or thinking about coming to Ivey, you should absolutely give it some consideration.
About Kevin:
Kevin hails from Toronto and, prior to coming to Ivey, worked in corporate development and investor relations in the mining sector. When he’s not in class, he can be found playing basketball with Ivey’s powerhouse intramural team.