Day 7 in The Netherlands started at the Waternoods museum outside of Rotterdam. The museum is centered around a flooding event that took place in 1953 which took thousands of Dutch lives and submerged a significant portion of the country. The flooding was caused by a large storm that had broken through some of the dykes. A dyke is a man made structure that is put in place to keep bodies of water from entering areas inhabited by Humans. The museum was both an educational center and a place of remembrance for those who lost their lives and property. Even though the outside of the museum is unassuming, it is one of the best presented museums that I have ever visited. An added bonus was the beauty of the surrounding area. When finished with the museum visitors can walk along a dyke and there is even a bordering farm. At the farm I was able to stop by some cows again. Although extremely informative and interesting there was no connection to Business at this site visit. 

The next site that we visited was the Delta Works which is one of the storm surge barriers that was build in the wake of the 1953 flood. At the Delta works we experienced a 360 3-D reenactment of the flood. It was very dark and loud which did a good job in immersing me in the night of the flood. We also learned about the engineering that goes behind maintaining the dykes. We took another boat tour at the Delta Works to get a closer look at the storm surge barrier. It was cool to get up close to windmills, they are a lot bigger up close than I expected. Our tour guide Jaan said that this experience was for engineering students so again there was no business concepts at this site visit. However being able to see the storm surge barrier was a cool experience given its importance to the Dutch way of life. Our chaperone Frank told us “hope is not a plan” which is one business concept I can take away from today. This quote is speaking on enacted vs espoused values which is an important decision to make when evaluating a company. When investing or looking to work at a company it is important to compare espoused values (company’s wishes) and their actions (enacted values). So far the trip has been engineering centered and focused on sustainability. I am hoping in the final days of the trip we can dive into the process of bringing concept to consumer as it is something that I am interested in.