Day 23: June 20, 2009

Our day started with our standard 7:00 AM breakfast followed with a studio lead by Cap Gemini’s Matt White. Matt was an Accelerator coach in 2007 and continues to help us organize during the program and teach sessions on consulting. Today, his studio focused on Perceptual Maps, a strategic tool to map the transformation of a company or business unit over a period of time.

Following the studio, our teams spent the next 3 hours working on our Coca-Cola project surrounding corporate responsibility and sustainability. Teams were busy completing surveys of other college students and tabulating the results. As of this AM, we have completed over 1,500 surveys.

After lunch we worked on the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee (BCBST) / Gordian project. For BCBST / Gordian we are creating a business model that will help the insurance heavy weight use a social media strategy to engage consumers in conversations about health, wellness, and managing diseases.

We finished out the afternoon with a session led by Paul Frankenberg, CEO of Kraft Search Associates. Drawing on his experience as an Executive Recruiter and placement professional, Paul led a discussion on creating effective resumes. He suggested ways our Accelerator participants could improve their resumes as well as the types of profiles and candidates that human resources departments are looking for.

Dinner was ultra casual: hamburgers, hot dogs, grilled chicken and pasta salad by Charlie Bob’s. Good outdoor cooking on a hot June evening.

After dinner, we returned to the work on the BCBST / Gordian project. We ended the day around 8:30 pm and will take the morning off tomorrow before we start our last week of the program.

If you want to see our photo library, you may do so at http://picasaweb.google.com/VanderbiltAccelerator

Michael Burcham
Faculty Director, Accelerator 2009