At Warwick Business School's London Offices in the Shard with London MBA Club, UK Akamon Alumni Association and University of Tokyo Undergraduates.

Together with London MBA Club (a club for Japanese speaking MBA alumni in London) MD Sarah Parsons co-organised an opportunity for University of Tokyo Undergraduates to visit the Warwick Business School's (WBS) London offices in the iconic Shard building for an information-sharing session with London MBA club members.

Every year, globally minded Todai* students come on a Study Tour to London and visit Japanese companies to find out about the life of an ex-pat and working in the UK, supported by the UK Akamon Alumni association. Taisuke Atsumi, a long-term UK based Japanese ex-pat, Todai Alumni and Insead MBA Alumni and representative from the London MBA Club, whose members are Japanese speaking MBA Alumni in London, along with Shoko Tanner, a WBS DBA candidate and also a representative of the London MBA Club and Sarah organised this session with the aim of allowing the Study Tour participants the opportunity to talk to other London MBA Club members (including some MBA Alumni from Warwick Business School) about how MBAs had influenced their careers and to gain some inspiration for their own future career choices.

Sarah presenting on cross-cultural business communications

Sarah did an introductory session covering her experiences of cross-cultural business communications between Japan and the UK, an overview of some important UK Japan collaborations and an insight into how MBAs can support with global working for Japanese candidates, followed by a Q&A session, during which the students asked many questions about the MBA experience and general careers advice and also discussed some aspects of MBAs specific to Japanese candidates. The session was joined remotely by a Todai Alumni, who used to work for Marubeni in the UK and is now Assistant Director for the Ministry of Environment in Japan.

Everyone enjoyed the amazing views from the 17th floor over the River Thames and the City and it was also good to see participants from WBS Global Online MBA taking modules at the Shard on that day, many of whom had flown from all over the globe for these modules.

*Todai is the abbreviation known in Japan for the prestigious University of Tokyo.

**Warwick Business School runs some of its MBA courses from the Shard alongside Executive Education courses, a newly launched Warwick Enterprise Start-up Programme and many other outreach events. WBS will also be hosting a reception including a talk about Shogi (Japanese Chess) on May 8th co-organised with the Japan Society of the UK. See Japan Society website for more details.