Sevdije Asanovski

I always had a tough time deciding what I want to study and work with in the future, but something I was always sure about is that I want to study and work with people from vastly diverse cultural, social, and ethnic backgrounds. CBS (Copenhagen Business School) was an easy choice for me because not only I could work in an international environment I could also choose a program that would allow me to work in different fields that would satisfy my diverse interests.

When it comes to the academic content, I choose SEM with a concentration in tourism and hospitality, over the other programs for two reasons: The first being, the more general academic content of SEM and the second reason being my love for travelling.

Coming from a small town where everyone knows each other I was a bit worried about how well I will manage to make a good first impression on my new peers. This was something new for me because in general I never had to worry about that before.

Something else I was also always worried about is how does CBS expect me to dress up and more so how will the other students perceive me because of it. Would they think I’m hard to approach if I choose to wear something more formal or would they think I do not take my enrolment in SEM seriously if I don’t?

Before I applied for SEM, I heard a lot about the good image that CBS has and how widely it has been recognized as well as for its competitive environment. This of course in a mind of an “excited soon to be student in a new city” created very big expectations that sometimes were also a bit intimidating. Considering that and my experience so far, I can comfortably say that CBS and SEM did exceed my expectations, not in the way that “SEM is perfect,” but in the way that “SEM Is all that people say it is, but it is also a program where students can enjoy their student lives”

The most exciting thing about SEM is that it allows the endless possibilities I could work with, even though I have my specified concentration. The world of service businesses is big and limitless, and SEM feels that way as well… You have many people from different backgrounds that have chosen different concentrations, but we all are still united as SEM.

What excites me about this program, is also what I find a bit challenging. SEM offers endless opportunities, but sometimes too many options can be challenging especially for someone like me who still does not know exactly what they want for their future. Imagining myself in the future, career vice proves hard sometimes.

When it comes to the academic content of SEM, I enjoyed some courses more than others. Taking Foundations as an example, when it came to its contents it was not a course in which I learned a lot of new concepts and theories, but the way professor Ana Maria Munar conducted the classes and the exam that followed complimented each other so well, that I gained much more than just “new information” and that is the knowledge to analyze. Further, a course like Methods II was content vice was a bit challenging to me in the beginning, but professor Andrea Baldin was so understanding and patient with us students, that he managed to help me overcome the challenges and I started to enjoy this course a lot afterwards. On the other hand, the course Managerial Economics and Introduction to Management Studies were the most interesting course for me because they provided new knowledge, unknown to me.

In CBS what I found hard at first, and still do but not to the same extent, is understanding what is required of me in the exams. Taking the Methods I exam as an example, I can say that I put the most effort into this exam and did not do as well, because of the combined stress of doing my first exam and not knowing how to analyze what was required of me.