Financial Modeling

Abstract

When Eric Clement graduated from the University of Oxford Said Business School executive MBA program on his 37th birthday, he was searching for the new Eldorado: jobs in the high-octane private equity industry. These were simply the most sought-after jobs out there – pay was high! The first-born son of Panamanian-American parents now had the degree, knowledge, and experience to make it happen. But then he was offered a job in a government organization, where he would hire fund managers to make investments and where he would have to focus on the social impact of his investments. He was intrigued. Growing up in a middle-class suburb of NYC, Eric knew how difficult it was to move up the socioeconomic ladder. He had been working since he was 11-years old, and because his parents were not from the U.S., he didn’t have the social contacts many of his friends did, which could open up career paths he had never heard of. Could he use the finance skills he had acquired throughout his career to improve the lives of underrepresented people so they wouldn’t have to go through what he did? What if a hard-core finance chap like himself stepped into a world where finance acumen was rare and tree-hugging plentiful? What if he took the opposite seat at the negotiation table, effectively hiring the people he wanted to join, and got them to behave and act responsively? What would happen then?

The movie

Probably a world premiere. This movie is a standard business school case study turned into a proper movie. The case covers financial modelling, real estate, valuation and impact investing. The script was co-written by an academic (Prof Ludovic Phalippou) and a professional writer. The case study has simply been cinematized. The characters are all professional actors (rather than practitioners being interviewed). The overarching vision is the creation of content that is more engaging for students. The goal is for students to prepare for class discussion and group exercises seamlessly by just watching a short movie, rather than by having to read a lot of material. The students should also feel extra stimulated because the movie makes the case more palatable, more reel. Students should be more eager to go and solve the issue faced by Eric and his team after watching the movie.

Authors