Learning the French way of business banking

The Insead File: George W Bush once famously said that the French have no word for entrepreneur. I have to admit I'm starting to see his point.

France doesn't do convenience. Entrepreneurs have their hands tied by strict labour laws that limit business opening hours.

As a result the French have stolen Britain's national hobby - queuing - and made it their own. Businesses seem unable to hire sufficient staff to meet customer demand and, as a result, France simply isn't growing at its trend rate.

Little wonder, then, that both of the leading contenders for April's presidential election are promising to reinvigorate growth should they win.

Much to the relief of the French business community and Insead's free marketeers, Nicolas Sarkozy has acknowledged a need for a more business- friendly environment, and has promised targeted tax cuts to encourage entrepreneurs.

Ségolène Royal, meanwhile, is threatening to revoke recent laws that make it easier for companies to hire and fire. For Royal's Socialists, it seems that the meaning of entrepreneur really has been lost in translation.

Entrepreneurship is a concept that's fully understood at business school.

In fact, Insead, a graduate business school in Paris, actively encourages and promotes entrepreneurialism, offering MBA participants several courses in the subject.

I've always believed that leadership ability stems from a mix of nature and nurture, so it's little wonder that I'm learning some key leadership lessons in this truly global environment.

Theory suggests leaders must be excellent communicators, yet the practical implications of this theory only become clear in a multinational context.

Contradictory as it might seem, I'm beginning to view my fluency in English as a disadvantage.

Non-native speakers listen more attentively and speak very concisely and as a result they communicate with an impressive degree of accuracy.

However, adaptability is also a key leadership quality, one which I hope I'm displaying as I try to adapt my communication style to a multinational environment. You never realise how many colloquialisms you use until you are forced to speak without them; hopefully I'm becoming a better communicator as a result.

We're also being taught to recognise differing leadership styles through assessments such as Myers Briggs profiling, which uses a questionnaire to classify personality preferences, such as introversion and extroversion.

Most of my class seems to share common personality traits, such as extroversion and a tendency to think rather than to act impulsively.

According to a psychologist friend, we'll all be cured if we regularly recite the following prayer: "Lord, help me to try not to run everything, but if you need some help, just ask."

The first few weeks of the MBA would test even the most organised student, since those seeking summer internships are already interviewing with prospective employers.

The campus has been visited by numerous investment banks over the past few weeks, each offering more challenging job opportunities than the last.

However, students seem to judge the merits of prospective employees by the quality of free gifts they offer, not by league rankings or industry standing.

Several banks made the appropriate choice of handing out extra-large branded Thermos mugs, each capable of carrying a pint of caffeine. It's hard to think of a more suitable gift, since the hours worked by junior investment bankers are legendary.

Apparently the investment banking interviewers are also trying to scare away uncertain candidates with warnings of 100-hour work weeks, but if I were interviewing, I'd be more frightened by the fact that one or two of the interviewers were apparently still modelling themselves on Gordon Gekko. Who knew red braces were still fashionable?

The bankers should know better. No self-respecting MBA is scared by the prospect of a 100-hour week, which is rapidly becoming the norm as we face into our first set of exams in early March.

The MBA is undoubtedly a fantastic learning experience, during which you learn both from textbooks and classmates, but increasingly it is becoming clear that the degree is a test of stamina, a rite of passage which, if completed, confirms to your employer that you can cope with an incredibly stressful workload.

If you can sit the equivalent of the Leaving Cert five times in a year, then the boardroom will hold few challenges.

The most powerful motivation for passing the test comes from the fear of being labelled what our statistics lecturer calls a "third-standard deviation idiot".

I'm no statistician, but even I understand that fewer than 1 per cent of all observations fall more than three standard deviations away from the average.

The fact that no one wants to be known as a one-in-a-hundred failure should see us all through the first round of exams.

Now if only my French classmates, my French landlord, and my local French baker would let me forget that France beat Ireland two weeks ago, then I might start to enjoy Paris in the springtime.

Niall.S.Dunne@gmail.com