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Chicago Heights
In “The American way of life” Ashley Montagu described Hell as the pocket edition of Chicago. Well, Organizational Behaviour Professor Tara Wernsing tells me that she doesn’t care about Chicago’s corrupt and dubious past. As a Chicagoan she just loves the vibe of the city, although she now lives in Madrid.
In this video Prof. Wernsing uses Chicago skyscrapers to talk about leadership. Among other things, she says that the one thing leadership and these amazing buildings have in common is that they both require dreamers and realists.
Something else Prof. Wernsing said off camera is that she has a feeling that there is a third career out there waiting for her. She doesn’t know exactly what but she is sure that some big change lies ahead. It’s incredibly interesting to hear her talk not only about her field of expertise but about life in general.
In addition to all this, she loves to run and practice different kinds of personal defense…
Beijing Opera
Although this video runs for just three minutes, it actually took six months to shoot from the moment Operations Management professor Cui Zhijian and I first talked about it. It wasn’t because I thought it was necessary for Prof. Cui Zhijian to go to Beijing to do it, or that we needed support of other actors or an orchestra…It was because I knew that he was going to need the right make-up artist. As you know, the masks they use in Chinese opera add a great deal of drama and meaning to the proceedings, but finding a make-up artist that could do the job properly was no easy task. He asked among his connections in the Chinese community in Madrid, and I did the same with my Chinese professor and friends, but to no avail.
It was only by chance that I met make-up artist Eli Serrano García, who appears briefly in the video. A colleague of hers came to IE to do the make-up for another video, and when asked if she would be able to do it she replied that she couldn’t but that she knew someone that might. Mission accomplished!!!
On another note, the images of Beijing you’ll see were shot when I went to Beijing this April with IE Dean, Santiago Iñiguez. Unfortunately there was no way Prof. Cui Zhijian could join us. You can’t have it all.
P.S. Prof. Cui Zhijian is a Beijinger who has also lived in Paris and Canada. Ich bin auch ein Beijinger!!! It’s a real pleasure to listen to him talk about operations and the Beijing Opera. By the way, the second opera he sings is Ba Wang Bie Ji, which was turned into the film “Farewell My Concubine”. The film won the Cannes Palme d´Or. Excellent!!!
The Cook
One of my all-time favorite films is The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover by Peter Greenaway. It’s a great story and the cinematography is excellent. I would’ve loved to have been able to render my own small homage to this film, but unfortunately there are no thieves I can think of around here to work into the script. The cook only won´t do!!!
Joking aside, I’m delighted to say that what I do have is an excellent cook, namely Leadership Professor Balvinder Powar. He is not only capable of masterfully mixing ingredients to create a delicious dish out of almost nothing, but also of using cooking as a metaphor to talk about leadership, Gandhi and life in general.
I enjoyed listening to Prof. Powar as much as I enjoyed tasting the dish he prepared during the shoot. I just love Indian food…
P.S. If you get the chance, try the Indian food at Tandoori Station, where we shot this video. You’ll like it, believe me.
Take Me Way Up
I’ve known Entrepreneurship Professor Max Oliva for some years now, and he’s always struck me as someone who stands out from the rest for one reason or another. When I first knew him it was because I thought he was insultingly young for what he was doing and saying. My mistake, of course, because he always gave due and intelligent consideration to everything and knew exactly what he was talking about. More recently, it was because when I proposed to him that we shoot this video he immediately said that he would like it to be about skydiving.
Well, as you know, parachuting, or skydiving, is the action sport that involves exiting an aircraft and initially letting gravity take its course as you plummet towards earth, and then using a parachute to slow down the latter part of the descent. Well, the older I get the more I enjoy more earthly pleasures, so I confess that I didn’t have the guts to jump with him. I did, however, get to share in the excitement all the way.
Enjoy his beloved Mexico, the impressive skydiving shots, and everything he has to say about skydiving and entrepreneurship.
Viva Mexico!!!
The Fourth Man
When I went for a coffee with Arbitration and International Commercial Law Professor Justin Swinsick to get to know him a bit better and talk about what kind of video we could come up with together, he told me he was going to Vienna with an IE student team to attend an international law competition. The first thing that came into my head when he mentioned Vienna was the film “The Third man”, and when I suggested that as a theme for the video he answered right away that he loved Orson Wells, and that film in particular.
I don’t remember exactly how the title “The Fourth Man” occurred to me. Anyway, it was clear that we both wanted to render some sort of homage to the film, whose screen-play was the work of a writer we also enjoy and admire, namely Graham Green. I have to say that Prof. Swinsick gave an excellent performance, staying in character the whole time. I am sure that when he teaches, he is every bit as eloquent.
I really hope you enjoy watching this video as much as we did making it. Check out Prof. Swinsick’s intelligent insights into “The Fourth Man” as he talks about law and justice, and truth and love.
Photo Professor Justin Swinsick in theotherphoto.blogs.ie.edu
