Empowering diversity: Rustem's journey with the EDHEC Global MBA

Hello, my name is Rustem Ospanov. I am originally from Kazakhstan, but since then I’ve lived in several countries. I'm trained as a physicist. I obtained a doctorate from the University of Texas, Austin for work and particle physics.

I've decided to do an MBA because I felt a strong interest in learning how to work with teams. I find the thing that excites me the most in my work before is working with people, seeing them grow, seeing them develop and seeing the joy of accomplishing together. I've looked around for several programmes and had a very good resonance with an MBA at EDHEC that it's in the right match in terms of people, in terms of what the school offers.

Our cohort is very diverse. They say that it's a diverse cohort, but you realise that only after several months because of diversity on several levels. One, it's obviously diverse in terms of countries, professions and ages, where people come from, nationalities. But once we started working, I realised that there's an enormous diversity in terms of sectors, preferences, how they work for people, plans afterwards. So the diversity I would say is significant across multiple dimensions. At the beginning we didn't understand well each other because each one comes from different background, having some set of expectations, how to do things. And as we go along, we get to know each other better and better. I would say the quality of teamwork increased and what I also value is the fact that you get to experience several teams. I think I've been in at least four or five teams so far already and you can see each single team’s dynamic is different. That's what I also find interesting. But for me, as I go along, I get to know about other people. The quality of teamwork has been increasing and to the point that now when I work with a team, it's just the joy to get things done together.

I find that one of the most helpful aspects of the career service at EDHEC is an attitude, an approach for how we can go and explore what we want to do. So we're given tools to know how to ask questions, how to offer value in every interaction. So the networking is not about asking people for things, but it's going out and finding out what people do and then understanding what you're most excited in what they do. So I think this ability to reach out and understand what different people do in it, for me, was the most valuable aspect of the career service.

My experiences in 3 words would be freedom, excitement and dreaming.