The consulting sector always held an allure for Johannes Schaedler.
Growing up in a small town in western Germany, he developed a keen interest in business while navigating high school. Eager to learn the intricacies of the commercial landscape, Johannes enrolled in a bachelor’s degree in business administration and immediately sought opportunities in consulting upon graduating.
“It’s a great career in the sense that you get to know a lot of different industries and a lot of different subject areas within a very short time, and that really helps you to better understand how the world works,” he says.
Johannes spent time in Singapore during his studies, and when looking for opportunities, he felt embarking on a consulting career in Asia would bolster his learning with an interesting cultural experience.
However, as a key commercial hub attracting professionals from Asia as well as Europe and the US, Johannes quickly discovered that Singapore was a highly competitive market.
He realized he needed to find a new path if he were to achieve his aim of becoming a consultant in Singapore.
A unique MBA opportunity
As he considered his next steps, Johannes felt further education would allow him to boost his resume and improve his chances of getting hired abroad.
While searching for degrees, he encountered a unique opportunity: the Nanyang-St Gallen Double Degree, a double Master's program offered jointly by Nanyang Technological University, Singapore's Nanyang Business School (NBS) and Switzerland's University of St Gallen.
“To get a degree from a local university in Singapore, that’s just a massive foot in the door into the local labor market,” he explains.
Johannes enrolled in the program, spending the first year in Switzerland before embarking the Nanyang MBA journey.
The MBA learning environment
After arriving at the NBS campus, located just outside the center of Singapore, Johannes was quickly struck by the unique learning environment offered by the Nanyang MBA.
The program immediately immersed students in a range of practical opportunities. An orientation week saw students building kayaks and competing in water sports activities to develop a collaborative environment. Likewise, Johannes took part in several case competitions where he and fellow classmates competed against other schools to solve business issues.
“These kinds of things made the bonding phases less awkward because everyone was coming together,” he adds. “It was a great experience.”
As a predominantly campus-based business school, Johannes welcomed the opportunity to live and study alongside his fellow Nanyang MBA students. This created a sense of community among the cohort, with students participating in social events organized by the school, while also organizing their own.
“The social life during the MBA was quite an experience for me,” he says. “One thing that comes out of this, and the great thing about NBS and the cohort being so international is that you have friends all over the world.”
Developing the skills to excel in consulting
With a highly interactive classroom experience, taught by professors from a variety of industries, the NBS MBA boasted a core curriculum as well as a wealth of elective modules, which allowed Johannes and his fellow students to tailor their study experiences.
“I got to look beyond the horizon of typical core business courses. I’d studied business during my bachelor’s and my master’s, so that was a good opportunity to expand beyond that,” he explains.
He took modules in areas ranging from private equity and venture capital to the art of negotiation. NBS also holds a unique position as a top business school within a leading technological university, specializing in areas such as technology, innovation, and sustainability. Some modules therefore leveraged this by taking an interdisciplinary approach, merging business with technical learning. Throughout it all, professors emphasized practical learning and team-based work, Johannes says.
“One of the big surprises was just how interactive it was. I found it interesting to see people’s different perspectives on certain topics.
“The MBA classes sharpened my way of thinking, because we had so many discussions and interactive exercises, and that helped a lot with my communication.”
Regular case-based teaching helped Johannes improve his problem-solving skills, while learning about business within the context of Asia’s commercial landscape gave him a better understanding of the trends defining business in Singapore and beyond.
He was able to put all of this into practice when shortly after graduating from the Nanyang MBA, he landed a role with the multinational management consulting firm, Oliver Wyman.
Now, more than a year into the role and two years into his journey in Singapore, Johannes spends each day navigating unique problems for clients, with opportunities to travel across Southeast Asia, including in Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Taipei, and Hong Kong. He feels the MBA was integral to achieving his goal.
“NBS gave me that foot in the local market. So that was really the crucial factor in ensuring that I was able to join consulting in the Singaporean market.”