Meet The MBA Class of 2022: Chin-Hao (Michael) Chang, IESE Business School

Chin-Hao (Michael) Chang

IESE Business School, University of Navarra

“A people person who’s ambitious and motivated but sometimes lacks patience.”

Hometown: Taipei, Taiwan

Fun Fact About Yourself: My childhood dream was to become an NBA player and play with Michael Jordan (my English name actually comes from him) in Chicago.

Undergraduate School and Major: BBA Accounting at National Taiwan University; MS Accountancy at Simon Business School, University of Rochester

Most Recent Employer and Job Title: Manager, Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) at Tapestry Japan (a New York-based fashion retailer that owns Coach, Kate Spade, and Stuart Weitzman) responsible for sales and gross margin planning and management for Coach APAC excluding Greater China.

What makes the case method so attractive as a means to learn and become a better manager?

The case study approach would enable you to spark more new ideas and look at things from different perspectives throughout the discussion with peers who have various backgrounds (so diversity plays a big role here). It’s also more participative and fun—a great way to avoid falling asleep in the class!

As a manager, you’re often faced with open-ended problems, and the case method trains you to identify and analyze issues, evaluate alternatives, and finally make decisions, especially as you’re not working alone but with a team.

Aside from your classmates, what was the key part of the school’s MBA programming that led you to choose this business school and why was it so important to you? There was no single factor that solely drove my decision. For me, the case method, program length with flexible exit points, and class size are the three determining factors.

The case method fosters your business acumen, which is one of the most important things that we MBA students are seeking out of business school; this is something hard for traditional lectures to compete with.

The second one is program length. Most European MBA programs are designed for only 1 year, which is too short. “Transformation takes time.” said the former IESE Admissions Director Pascal Michels in one of his interviews, and I can’t agree with him more. Throughout the 2-year program, you’ll be able to explore more possibilities, have a clearer idea of what you really want personally and professionally, and build stronger bonds with your cohort. In addition, IESE offers two exit points to cater to different needs—it’s always good to have more than one option.

Last but not least, the class size. Smaller class size allows students to build closer relationships, but if it’s too small, the power of connection may be weakened. So IESE’s intake, which is around 350 each year, is perfect for me.

What club or activity excites you most at this school? Executive Simulation (EXSIM), a week-long “RPG” where people are assigned to a C-suite role and cope with banks, labor unions, etc.—as if you were running a real business! It’ll be a great testament to our business acumen, and to see if we can make difficult decisions under pressure as well as understanding our own management style.

Describe your biggest accomplishment in your career so far: In the second role as Chief Accountant of my first job after MS with Manhattan Hotel Group, I liaised with underwriters, auditors, and attorneys to complete IPO in Taiwan, which included signing off on the financial statements issued to Taiwan SEC. At the same time, I also led the due diligence and post-closing integration of a hotel acquisition deal and implemented a new accounting system that better fits regulatory requirements. All these happened within only 9 months.

What led you to pursue an MBA at this point in your career? My past education and jobs were all in accounting and finance. Ultimately, I wanted to become a general manager, not just a function lead. Therefore, getting an MBA was an ideal first step to bridge that gap. It was also perfect timing to go to business school considering my age (30 at the time of enrollment) and 6 years of work experience in the public sector (mandatory military service in Taiwan), a start-up, and a blue-chip—it’s still not too late to get ready for the next professional adventure after graduation and I have something to contribute to the class.

What other MBA programs did you apply to? I’m proud to say that IESE is the only school I applied for!

What was the most challenging question you were asked during the admissions process? Luckily, admissions officers didn’t give me a hard time throughout the whole process. However, I did find answering people management-related questions challenging as I had limited experience. So instead, I tried to present my answer in other ways such as managing a project and its learning and result.

How did you determine your fit at various schools? There were three things I looked at when assessing the fit with different schools (IESE ticks all the boxes):

First, there was diversity. As mentioned earlier, having inputs from people that have diverse backgrounds from yours would increase creativity—new perspectives and ways of thinking, and thus lead to better problem-solving. On the other hand, when encountering conflict of opinion, you would also start to consider where he/she is coming from and how it influences his/her viewpoints. Over time, you may find those points valuable. Even if you don’t agree, you’d become more respectful and learn how to accept differences.

The second one is life experience. You only live once! I wanted to go somewhere that I had never lived, or even traveled to before. I was born and raised in Taiwan, but earned my first master’s degree in the US and worked in Japan for 4 years; hence, Europe is the right place to go. Languages are also part of the life experience, so in non-English speaking countries, I also get to pick up one more language on top of the three (Mandarin, English, and Japanese) that I speak now.

Lastly, there was academic rigor. MBA students need to juggle many things at the same time; obtaining knowledge for sure is an essential part of that. Without clear and strict academic requirements, chances are that we end up learning nothing. Besides, it makes you feel both successful and challenged every day, and that’s the sign of making constant progress.

What was your defining moment and how did it prepare you for business school? The day before my university entrance exam in Taiwan, one of my teachers gave me a quote from a movie: “It’s your choice, not your fate”, and it has been driving me forward ever since. You’re the owner of your life and destiny: no one can decide anything for you and you also have to be held accountable for the decisions you make. In the coming two years, there will certainly be many failures and frustrations, but this motto will always remind me that I can make a choice anytime to make things better.

What is your favorite company and what could business students learn from them? I believe that the leadership shapes a company, so instead of sharing my favorite company, I will share a success story of AMD’s CEO, Lisa Su. Lisa joined AMD as Senior Vice President in 2012 and was promoted to CEO in 2014 when it was on the brink of bankruptcy. Over the past 6 years, she turned around the company, and the share price soared from $3 to over $80 today. She did two things: one was choosing the right market for technology, and two is discovering what AMD is really, really good at and focusing on that. These can be applied to not only a company but also an individual—you always need to evaluate where you’ll have more opportunities, understand your own strengths, and more importantly, maximize them.

DON’T MISS: MEET THE MBA CLASS OF 2022 AT IESE BUSINESS SCHOOL

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