By David Okenquist M'06
January 2006
It was a dark, overcast Sunday evening. Leaning against the counter, a lonely receptionist named Jacques stared at us as we waited in the lobby of the Tim Hotel on Rue d’Avron. Once everyone arrived, we stepped out into the chilly January evening in search of something to eat. Greeted by men and women strolling by with long baguettes under their arms and cigarettes in their mouths, we began our adventure … ah, Paris! 
For two weeks in January, 21 students made their way through the streets of Paris and Barcelona, absorbing the sights, sounds, citizenry, business practices, and overall culture of these two European cities. A combination of Full-Time, Fast Track, and Evening students were led by Babson College strategy professors Jay Rao and Carlos Rufin. The aim of our travel abroad was to understand the strategy, innovations, business methodology, challenges, and rewards of operating in a global, and oftentimes entrepreneurial, environment.
Our visits within Paris were focused mostly on larger, multinationals such as Disneyland Paris, Renault, Accor Hotels, and Plastic Omnium, with a visit to a unique, small pan-European advertising agency, RMP Advertising. Paris provided us with full mornings and early afternoons of company visits and debriefings by the professors on the bus. Yet our evenings were free to explore the city and to experience what Paris was really about. Our sampling of the culture knew few boundaries, as we took in such tourist spots as the Eiffel Tower, Champs-Elysees, Arc de Triomphe, and the Louvre, while at the same time found small out-of-the-way cafes and bars, Moroccan restaurants in the Latin Quarter, and shops with character lions on the sleeves and velvet jackets whispering to be bought.
After a full week in Paris, we took a two-hour flight to Barcelona. The night we arrived, FC Barcelona, the local futbol (soccer, to us Americans) team was playing; we had to go. The match provided a packed house of more than 90,000 intensely focused fans, reacting with every shot upon goal, literally as if their lives depended on it. We had the opportunity to visit with the management of the futbol club a few days later and hear how this local team has not only turned around their club’s financial and on-field performance, but how they plan to continue to expand beyond the Barcelona city borders. In Barcelona, we visited with more distinctly Barcelonan and entrepreneurial institutions: the investment and savings bank La Caixa, the family-owned Torres Winery, the Barcelonan division of Oxfam—Intermón Oxfam, and business incubator Barcelona Activa. Characterized by a very entrepreneurial environment, Barcelona provided our group the opportunity to hear from a new generation of business leaders succeeding in improving the welfare of the city, their inhabitants and visitors. In keeping with tradition, Barcelona still observes the “siesta” midday, which allowed us the time to explore the city in the daytime—and then again late at night.
Overall, the experience within Europe provided our group the opportunity to see how businesses are adapting to the changing nature of a globalized world. As Thomas L. Friedman discusses in his new book, The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century, the world is drawing closer together not just through large multinational corporations but by individuals, connecting businesses and trading information and best practices. The sooner we all understand, experience, and embrace this smaller, changed world, the better prepared we will all be to aid each other and build upon the opportunities around the globe.
