Maastricht, Workshops, and Stuff...

Earlier this month, I spent a week in Maastricht attending a Global and Cross-Cultural Management Workshop for my PhD research. It was a super intensive course, but informative and, to my surprise, a lot of fun. My academic background is happily humanities-based, so my recent foray into management has been stimulating. Had you told me four years ago that I'd end up teaching and researching management stuff, well, we'd have had a good laugh.

Which is not to say that I don't have my issues with management theory, cross-cultural research, whatever you want to call it as I'm not quite sure yet. A lot of my suspicion is instinctual, though. It's the same feeling you get when you walk into a party and figure it's just not going to be the place to you. Something about the way it looks, tastes, and feels just doesn't seem right. However, like most parties, if you stick around long enough, keep an open mind, and talk to enough people, eventually you have to admit that you were at least a little bit wrong. Certainly, last week gave me plenty of reason to admit that I've been wrong about some aspects of cross-cultural management. The other folks attending the workshop were wonderful to meet, get to know, and even have visit. Hopefully we'll stay in touch (if any of you ever read this)!

Unfortunately, my five night stay in the Netherlands' most southerly city did not allow much (any) time for sight-seeing. We went for a walk one day after the course, but we were far too busy to really see the town. I did discover a nice apartment to stay at, though, that was right in the center, quiet, clean, and comfy. So, I'll pass that along and hope that my travels take me back to Maastricht some time when I'll have more time to look around!