IBH 4AB6B: Assignment #6: Final Reflexive Paper

Bharti Bhardwaj

400132858

Dr. Karen Balcom

April 22, 2022

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Question 2:

In my first year, I was not very confident in what I was doing with my life. I did not

know why I chose to join the IBH program, or what I intended to do with my education. All I

knew was that the program description, and the course offerings seemed unique and intriguing

based on how they were described - specifically the “integrated” aspect. I used to look at things

with a very tunnel vision perspective. I used to say, “If I can’t figure out what career path this

degree can offer me, I should leave.” Along the way, I was primarily taught business and

humanities concepts separately rather than having courses with both elements together. Back

then, I wasn’t able to see the value in learning the foundations separately before blending these

concepts together in my final year of university. I expected more integration earlier on in the

program. I would like to make reference to this statement posted by the DeGroote School of

Business: “The Integrated Business and Humanities (IBH) program blends traditional business

education with the critical thinking and communication skills of the Humanities” (DeGroote

School of Business, n.d.). Based on this statement, I feel that I have achieved the goals of this

program as my critical thinking skills have vastly improved, along with my understanding of

business concepts. Now that I am almost done with my final year of university, I would say my

experiences, in retrospect, have taught me to trust the process and to be more open-minded. I

now understand how important it was for me to learn the foundations separately before blending

them together, and maybe I shouldn’t have been so critical in the beginning. As a result of

becoming more open-minded, I believe I have come to integrate business and humanities by

trying to understand various perspectives in my professional life, and not just the ones I think are

most important.
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With this realization, I became aware that with many of my life experiences, I seem to

lack patience. I always look for immediate rewards and purpose in what I am doing, but fail to

understand that both learning, and unlearning can be a long process. I have a tendency to think

that if I was taught something, then that perspective is usually the right one. When I worked with

10C this year for my term project, there were many challenges along the way. I would say,

however, the greatest challenge was having to unlearn what I knew about corporate marketing

strategies, to adapt to the perspective of a non-profit organization. Since I was always exposed to

concepts of marketing for large companies, it was challenging for me to figure out how to help

10C. They have a limited marketing budget. They have a 1 person social media team. They

simply do not have the same resources I was used to working with. At one point, I thought that

this project would be unsuccessful because of the various limitations imposed on our group.

Eventually, however, this experience encouraged me to analyze different perspectives. I had to

understand that 10C’s marketing goals are not necessarily the same as what a fortune 500’s

marketing goals would be, or what I would want them to be.

This situation required me to be more open-minded when our community partner would

decline our ideas, because I was so fixated on what I was taught about marketing. I eventually

learned that for an organization like 10C, I had to blend my knowledge of business and

humanities together and think critically about how I could support them. Part of this included

hearing perspectives besides my own. Our community partner’s perspective and her justification

as to why we could not do certain things allowed me to better understand her goals, 10C’s goals,

and through research, the goals of their members and the community. By looking at various

perspectives outside my own and my group’s, I was able to propose more appropriate strategies
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for our final deliverable. I blended my current knowledge of business and marketing, with

adaptations made to fit 10C’s resources.

Our humanities courses teach us to think critically. Our business courses offer

foundational skills that will help us in the worlds of hr, marketing, finance, and accounting.

Learning both are essential in preparing for the job market. “Openness to learning” was a key

pillar taught in our IBH 1AD3 course, which definitely took me the longest time to master in

practice, as reflected in this paper. I am no longer someone who has tunnel-vision, like I had in

my first year. As a result of my experiences, especially working with 10C, I feel I have integrated

business and humanities by being more open to other perspectives, and challenging my existing

knowledge. I plan on applying the openness to learning pillar for the rest of my career where I

will make an effort to understand different stakeholder perspectives when achieving company

goals. The knowledge of my humanities courses have elevated the way I conduct business and

work in a professional setting. I look forward to continuing applying my business knowledge,

along with the valuable lessons my humanities courses, specifically IBH 4AB6B, have taught

me.
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Works Cited

DeGroote School of Business, Integrated Business & Humanities. (n.d.). Future Students |

McMaster University. Retrieved April 22, 2022, from

https://future.mcmaster.ca/programs/ibh/