You know that you are not made for consulting when...

Over one month into the course and the only buzz word that can give ‘Networking’ a run for its money for the ‘buzz word of the month’ title is ‘Consulting’; thanks to the ELP season. Btw... 'Election' isn't a buzz word (or is it?).

Meanwhile, the aspirants are digging deeper into the text books and course material and reference books and the internet and the library and what not! And those who know that they would never make it – like me – are writing stupid blogs even when all the three assignments for the week are in the “about to begin” stage!

The hopefuls are also seeking gyan from all channels to decide on “what they want to do in life”, which is good in my view. But for those who have still not made up their mind on whether or not to go for consulting, here is my bit of gyan...

You know that you are not made for consulting when:

1. You thought Mckinsey was just another burger chain like McDonalds

2. You believed in the idea that “grades don’t matter, learning does”

3. You got rattled by the sheer vocabulary of the questions in your weekend assignments [same pinch!]

4. You thought business travel included sight seeing

5. Finally, you thought the purpose of locating ISB at Hyderabad was to treat you to a culinary fest of biryanis and kebabs all over the city [All those who have been frequenting Shadaabs and the Paradises, beware!]

MBA Experiences of a Nerd: Part 3

Pre Script: 1) Don't ask me where is Part 2... Part 1 is here

2) We all know editing is a boring job to do..

“What is the margin?”

I saw the opportunity window.

I knew the stakes. I knew its importance.

A flash came to my mind and the word “20 Percent” echoed repeatedly in my ears. I looked around and saw 50 hands waiting to pounce on it like a tiger.

I was also ready with the artillery. I moved my hand and pointed it sky high to gain the rewards associated with it.

I knew it’s my turn now. I was prepared for it. I had to perform, as it might be the last chance.

“What are its advantages?”, he pointed at me and asked

“2” I answered immediately with full confidence.

“Sorry? Advantages?” he looked confused.

“Bastard!!! How you can change the question. It’s against rules. It’s not fair” I started murmuring in my mind.

He was still looking at my face and waiting for the answer. I panicked and looked around but couldn’t find any help. Finally, gulping all my respect, I replied sheepishly

“I wanted to answer your previous question”

“It happens”, he assured me with calm on his face “What are your views regarding its advantages and disadvantages”

I knew the answer, I even have few good examples related to it but the momentum once again overtook me and I uttered “Margin is 2”

He smiled and moved ahead with the class. I looked around and everybody was falling from his/her chair, trying very hard to control laughter. I wanted to dig a hole in the ground and hid myself there but damn even the bloody ground was made of hard cement. The guy sitting next to me sympathized

“At least you were honest man!”

I realized that I have touched a new low in my life and spoiled my reputation permanently in the eyes of Prof and class. Any how, I just gathered the left over few pieces of self-respect from ground and went into a shell.

My mind began to wonder I had almost spent 1 month in ISB and what I had done? I was just moving very fast with the flow; running furiously from SV to Atrium, Atrium to LT’s, LT’s to group meets, group meets to rec center and so on. I was just slipping in this fast paced trough of ISB.

I remembered I came to ISB with loads of confidence and determination. What happened to that?

Suddenly my mind was connecting the dots backwards and started thinking

April 2011

I was standing outside the gates of ISB on my bike and looked on the bold lettered words inscribed on the pillar “INDIAN SCHOOL OF BUSINESS”. I felt proud and realized that I am finally going to be the part of this institute. I cherished that moment and wanted to savor it for long. Anyhow, I moved my bike and entered inside the campus of ISB. The lush green scenery and a biker’s dream road were welcoming me with open arms. I took a round of the beautiful campus and finally reached my SV (Student Village). It was way better than whatever I had dreamt till now. A big tower was standing in middle with beautiful lawns and small student buildings surrounding it. As I entered, I witnessed a huge human sized chessboard, a basketball hoop, a coffee machine and a registration desk.

After registration and other formalities, I went to the Atrium where Dean of ISB was briefing the class of 2012. I was thoroughly impressed by his speech. And, the fact that I’ll get free dinner after the speech was just making it more delicious… I mean beautiful… whatever, I was very hungry that day because of the hard work and all my memories are heavily influenced by the food I ate that day. Anyhow, my love for ISB was strengthening every new second I was spending on the campus.

Finally, I head towards my comfortable room to enjoy the 5 star facilities provided in the quad. I was checking the registration documents and suddenly my eyes stopped at a welcome party invitation. I was feeling on top of the world till I reached end of the invitation. It mentioned dress code in the end. The dress code was “shorts and tie”. Now, let me tell you all “shorts” is unofficial dress code of ISB. There is already an undeclared competition going on between guys and gals of ISB who wears more “shorts” and whose “shorts’ length” is shorter and as of now guys are way ahead of girls in this competition. Its not as if I’m complaining or I’m not enjoying it but its just because of the fact that I don’t have shorts. It’s my blog and you know who will be shown in good light here. Anyhow, for those guys who don’t have shorts and don’t like to wear them, it was the testing time. I tried to ask some alum with full sincerity and stupidity

“What about those who don’t have shorts?”

“Do whatever you can do. Your legs should be visible!” Alum replied

I was confused… what they have to do with my legs. I even tried to have a re-look at them but I was still not convinced. Anyhow whatever it meant, let’s shift the focus now. I somehow went to the party folding my pants till my knees and gave the alums whatever pleasure they wanted from my naked legs :D

The orientation week started and I was all geared up. Alums put up an outstanding show in conducting an orientation week and building team spirit with in different sections of ISB through sports and other games. Well one of the prime reasons for my liking is also because of the fact that Section F won all sporting events convincingly…. <Yeah.. we have earned the right to brag about it every now and then>

Anyhow I stumbled on the word “Networking” in ISB and was really appreciating its importance till I was introduced to Speed Dating… Oops Speed Networking. When I entered the atrium, there was a big battlefield filled with all the gladiators. All gladiators had a single motive: extracting every bit of information inside you in 2-3 minutes. There were hundreds of them and I suddenly started feeling nervous. Some how I dared to enter the arena and lined up in a circular speed-dating event.

I met a guy first. He was also equally frustrated by the bastardization of networking and we cracked a good 2-3 jokes about it. Suddenly, one of the alum blew a horn and told us to move. I was thinking, what the hell? I was enjoying the company and there was some real chance of networking here but now I am forced to move ahead. May be I am slow but the truth is I take some time to form a bond or network; at least 5-10 minutes. But anyhow, we all were part of the game there and we had to follow rules. Moreover, the next in line was a girl. It answered all the questions that have been arising in my mind till now.  I moved and introduced myself to her. We started well with first 2-3 icebreakers in introduction. But then she asked me

“What are your MBA goals?”

She stumped me with this question. I had some how dodged the interviewers with this goal stuff and got admission in ISB (that too in re-attempt). Now these goals once again caught me in catch 22. Should I say as usual “who cares” and make fool of myself in front of her or should I repeat those mugged goals... I was confused. I finally decided to go ahead with the second option and gave some rosy goals to her. I was feeling good and confident about myself after that answer. But before I even finish appreciating myself, she threw a next googlie “What are your hobbies?”

I suddenly started feeling low about myself. “What kind of person I am?? I don’t even know my hobbies!!”

Before this bad feeling depress me any further, I saved myself by uttering few common mugged words of cricket, badminton, and other blah blah stuff. Alum blew a horn again and within few minutes I actually understood the power of 2-3 minute rule and even started appreciating it. There was one more girl waiting next and I was more than motivated to move ahead.

She started the conversation with all the unrelated things and my performance suddenly enhanced in the game. It was all well when she changed topic and asked me “Do you have a girl friend?” Now I was stumped once again. Now again the same catch 22 cropped up whether to look like a loser or a despo. I choose the middle path and told her that I had a girl friend but she dumped me. Suddenly I realized my folly for not thinking ahead and what if she asked why? Thankfully, she didn’t go that far and diverted the topic. Suddenly the alum blew a horn again and this time I was told to change the circular row as well. Now there was the same girl I met earlier standing over there and I didn’t had enough energy left in me to go through the same session again? I was fully prepared to answer this time why should I tell you if she asked me which industry/function I am targeting. A friend called me in between and I took a big sigh of relief. I left that Speed Networking thing right away and went to a place I love the most “CCD”.

Some how after running across the campus at least a dozen times every day, orientation-week ended. If I remember correctly, I was still in my senses even after a physically and mentally tiring O-week. Let’s fast forward and move ahead two weeks to check my low mental state.

May 2011

I was running heavily to reach the afternoon class on time. I woke up late at 1:00 PM and it meant no breakfast or lunch or brunch or whatever we call it. I suddenly remember there is a Quiz today worth of 5% marks and I have not even prepared anything. I tried to curse myself for not studying but the pain in head due to sleep deprivation reminded me that I have submitted a marketing case study in the morning at 7:00 AM after the night out. Anyhow I cursed ISB, in the end, for putting my ass consistently on fire from last 2 weeks and ran towards the class.

After the class, my study group reminded me that we have 2 more assignments and one presentation due tomorrow. I shook my head few times, cursed ISB once again and went to the LRC (library) to prepare assignments. I suddenly remembered that all pre-reads have shifted to post-reads and exams are due this weekend. I was panicking “How are we supposed to do all this stuff?” Finally, I concluded that ISB is not meant for average students like me.

I logged into internal portal to check my quiz marks. They were way below mean. Now these statistical terms of above mean and below mean are of great significance in the life of an average ISBian. Till now I have been dealing with percentages in my life and anything above 60% is considered very good. Here even if you score 80% marks, you are not sure how you performed until you know mean. This has forced people to come up with complicated and sadistic prayers

“Oh God, please make this paper really tough and let me know all the answers.” Now if god listened only first half of prayer, then we all are screwed. And even if god somehow listened full prayer, there is high probability that he will not be able to comprehend the complexity associated with it. And, how in a world god will force prof set such an exam that is difficult and the praying guy knew answers as well. Anyhow lets not fall into the complexities of such prayers. Let’s concentrate only on statistics of above mean and below mean. For few conventional intelligent and topper materials, above mean is the average thing. But for average students like me, above mean means slogging your ass off 24*7 and being extremely lucky consistently in all the exams. Anyhow there is big fuzz in ISB that grades don’t matter. So, I think I can save my reputation by giving some spiritual gyan that I don’t fit in this rat race of grades, I don’t care for them and other kind of crap using the same grades don’t matter bull shit.

A new devil called Class Participation has cropped his head in ISB and it had caused several causalities in the campus. It is a game where you have to raise hand when you have some qualitative point to contribute in the overall learning of class and you will be marked for it. But in the class of overly qualified and enthusiastic 70 individuals, it is highly unlikely that everybody will get a chance to speak in the class. Above all, TA’s after a point of time stop even monitoring the quality of participation. So, new rules of the game are you have to raise hand… some how get selected among 70 raised hands… and finally speak something to get marked for the day. Just like cricket this game also has different phases. In the initial 1-hour (opening overs) people raise hand and answer when they have any point to make.  In the next 30 minutes (middle overs) hand movement get faster and people start feeling anxiety. In the last 30 minutes (Slog Overs) all hands are permanently up and every body is standing in the middle of the pitch with complete bat lift to hit the ball right out of the stadium as soon as they get any chance and then look at the TA with an innocent question- “did it count?”

I was thinking how I became the victim of this devil when a sharp voice woke me up

“Are you not going to next class? Let’s go have a tea”  a friend asked me.

I looked towards him but before I could say anything, he grinned

“what’s the margin!!!”

----- to be continued-----

The Presidential Elections

Time pick the President of the Student Body.


<from my article for Alma Matters>


Who should stand?
Everybody had an opinion. “Dude, you should run for this, you’re the kind of person who can do this stuff”, “You should stand for president, we need more women leaders” and so on. But only 11 brave souls stepped up to the plate. And another assault began.
Considering it was the first election on campus, people weren’t sure what to expect. While some presidential manifestos were spoke about missile cruise ships others spoke about night-canteens at each SV. While some had venn diagrams, others had self-portraits. And while some said they will decide on who to vote for, others said they will decide who to campaign for.

Vote for Congress Me

We had all heard stories about Presidiential campaigns from previous years; none of us were prepared for what hit us next. Nothing! All the hype the last batch sold to us seemed to have made everyone conscious of “over campaigning” and the candidates stayed rather sober for a while. I say again, a while.I believe they were doing their analysis of the batch.

Assumption: The class of 2012 is approximately Normal

Implication: I can create a 95% confidence interval to understand that no one has a clue as t who they will vote for. Damn, this stats stuff isn’t working.

Cause of failure of model: Do we look normal to you?

Next, lets attempt Economics: If I am able to maximize the students utility, they will vote for me. How do I maximize it? Lets offer them cycles on campus, 100% placements, night-canteens, better food and Cindy Crawford. Sorry but the students are smarter than that.

Next, good old marketing: Segmentation is the first key. Did you know the ISB students can be broken in the following vote banks – IIT, anit-IIT, women, CAs, senior citizens club, those young kids, smokers…. You get the idea. 

Lather it up

Presidential Soap Box: Why is called the soap box? Answer

What is the purpose: Any one can write a manifesto sitting in the comfort of his or her own quad. I personally recommend usage of the “Web economy Bullshit Generator” (after you remodel it to use B-school buzz words like networking). It takes real courage to stand on stage and justify it. It takes even more courage to stand in front of Shiv and alumni who have made it their life’s mission to hurt you in the quick fire round. 

The soap box was looooong, but it really did separate the boys form the men… no offense to the lady candidate, but separating the girls form the women just doesn’t work as an idiom. 

Now that the foam has subsided

I am not sure, but I guess this was a major reality check for all the candidates. One dropped out for personal reasons, while the others decided to compensate for the lack of campaigning before the soapbox. At one point, I was walking to the atrium and forgot which candidate said he would be there. When I reached, I realized, most of them are there anyway! 

Enough pull, time to push. The candidates start meeting us after lectures. First mover advantage is a huge factor here. The first one to talk to me after I’ve attended a 2 hour session on how to account for intangible assets is the one who annoys me the least. I’ll atleast remember your name. The next person to hold me back form my coffee, I’m just getting cranky now. If a third person attempts it, the class will trample her/him. For what it’s worth, the first candidate (not from our section) who spoke to us after class was the one who won the election.

Round 1

Secret ballot was an interesting concept. Please note, I say “was”. Everyone knows how the election works, but some people miss it because they decided to have an extended lunch break. All in all, smooth process… except for the booth capturing.

The results come out and I hear section G was quite happy and celebrated in class because two candidates from their class got through into the final four. Why it is a big deal is beyond me, but I realize understanding human emotions isn’t my biggest strength. I do want to understand how they found out between class… was some one using their blackberry in class?? Wink wink, nudge nudge

More Khemka sessions

A panel discussion this time. Unfortunately, the soapbox was such an assault on the senses plus the fact that assignments were due, only 40 decided to show up for this. Not %age, 40 people (the number’s maybe slightly understated, but there is no way you would know for sure, you weren’t there :D)

At this point, the “I knew I should have stood” crowd started raising their voice again. The rest of the batch continued ignoring them.

Final Round: Fight

This is when campaigning got innovative. It was now all about talking to the student body about why it is important for them to vote and based on what parameters. All this, while getting some face time. The last voting, there were discussion in the voting line about who to vote for. This time, it was more silent. Not sure what it means, but it was interesting to note.

All done, and the result is………. I’m sure there is another article to cover this bit.

Is the Marginal Revenue on Cialis’ Balance sheet normally distributed?

If you can make no heads and tails out of the title of this blog then I can say with 99% confidence that your GPA after term 1 will lie in the interval {0,AGPA-1} where AGPA is Atma’s G.P.A. (yeah the guy who talked of the bull).

Coming straight to the point, here is the incisive analysis of our life at ISB so far:

Life (Week 1) = A + ACP + D + F + W – (2/51 million)

(All variables are in millions of man/woman hours, except the numerical constant at the end which is in INR)

Following are certain pictures we all can possibly relate to:

A for Acads

 A.C.P.  (Nuff Said)

D for Dunking @ ISB

Read a special bureau report here if you have not yet done so.

F for food @ ISB

  

W for Wildlife @ ISB

 

 First Week at ISB in a nutshell: The meteorite that hit our comfort zones . . 

(Conceptualized this blog entry while struggling with 2^nd question of Eco assignment, so please forgive/appreciate the brevity of my effort, or the lack of it)

Dis-Orientation Week

---------From the Article I wrote for Alma Matters, the ISB Alumni News Latter (http://www.isb.edu/almamatters/fromtheclass.html)--------

From Musical chairs in the finance room to email flames, (Dis) Orientation Week 2011 had it all. The first 2 weeks done, and we already feel like we’ve been here forever!

Registration Day:Finally, first look at the mad class we are going to be! The year starts of with shady dancing on stage, in Khemka. After we sufficiently entertained the O-week team, we were allowed to proceed to registration. The one part none of us got was the musical chairs in the fee payment section. Why was it necessary for us to keep sliding across those benches?

The party that night was very polite, for a while… then we had a bevarage overload. A clear sign of the impending liver assault. And we got grief from the O-week team for leaving before 7am. We’ll show you…

O-Week:Not sure who designed the whole O-week, but if the point was to make us realize that 4hours of sleep is a luxury, congratulations. At the end of the week, we already felt like we had been on campus for a year.
The highlight of the week had to be the traffic light party. No, not because it was so much fun, but because it looked like a damn Christmas party. Everyone seemed to be in red. Rather embarrassing showing up in green. Yes, we stayed till 7am this time. Alum reactions ranged from “We’re glad we’re leaving this place behind to a batch like yours” to “Sob… sniff… sob.”

Then finally came time to start section parties, where the alums managed to convince some morons in my batch that it was an ISB tradition to drink a mix of every intoxicant present in the room. Lucky for them, liver damage is covered by the mandatory medical insurance…wait, is it??
Do you see a trend here yet? No? Let me spell it out - loud music and drunk folk!!

Also, don’t touch the bull. If you touch the bull, Atma will shoot you, in the head, even if he has to do it from Mumbai! If I have to hear another story about “don’t touch the bull,” I will shoot some one.

Pre-Terms:No one knew what to expect, but we were hoping to be surprised. Surprised we were. Being taught Business Statistics by an accomplished jazz and blues singer, who also happens to be a professor at IIT-Chennai qualifies as surprise. More than that, the LTs are an amazingly comfortable place to sleep. It’s like they were designed to make us pass out. I was still polite and trying really hard but some people realized their bags make good pillows.
Alcohol is a current asset and a long term liability; sleep is accounts payable. Let’s see you balance that sheet!

Email spam – I don’t care what is considered as good, bad or ugly. But it is ridiculous to see people mailing the entire batch to inform us about a lost blackberry cover. Oh wait, I can see some one raising their hand in to say, “I agree with his point.” There are no CP marks in pre-terms.

Talent Night:Every one took jolly pot shots at “diversity” at ISB. No matter how many different types of monkeys you get on campus, they all thought of the same theme. There is a significant population who believe cross-dressing is a “talent”. I’m not complaining, just stating facts. Whatever makes you happy.

Jokes apart, I got along with my class thanks to all the practice section. Who ever started Talent night – thank you. Who ever decided to make us party from 11pm that night to 7am and then scheduled mandatory sessions at 9am – I hope your sadistic desires were satiated.

The quitter section:Not the people who decided to move to the IIMs or other B-schools, this is about those moron smokers who assumed they would quit while at ISB. The only thing they managed to quit is buying cigarettes! Those who said they won’t drink, were throwing back shots. The gang that was going to lose weight discovered Hyderabadi biriyani.

Now that term 1 has started, the whole batch has automatically sobered down. The same crowd from 5am at 08 Lounge is now inhabiting the LRC till 2am. The “arbit CP“ gang sobered down. And most importantly, no one knows where the bull is.

This is going to be a great year! I hope to write to you all about the good, the great and the rest.

The Other Side of View ...

Pre-Pre Script: Some one didn't like my post... And deleted it from the ISB Blog... So, here I am once again trying my luck... :D
Pre-Script: I live up to my reputation of not editing what I write... Moreover it is difficult to edit and do a spell check when you don't have word ;)

Hi All,

It has been more than 2 months when I take contributing rights for this blog and here comes a post straight from the guilt of my heart. I was taking 2 months break and I had few plans. One of the plan was to write few posts for this blog and spice it up. But here I am, sitting on the same couch from last one and a half month and still wondering what happened to all my plans. In my defense, I must say I'm lazy and this world cup made me much bigger couch potato than what I was. Even a significant growth of layers of fat on my tummy didn't bother me, what are the chances of a small piece of guilt perturbing me when I can't even see it. But as you see, I can put the blame of my growing tummy on my parents but this guilt has no takers. So, here I am sitting on the same couch and writing my first post in this blog.

For introduction, I was one of the few confident aspirants of ISB who has full faith in his abilities and was 100% sure that only God's miracle can get me an admit in ISB. If you are interested, you can read an incomplete lazy post of my MBA story (But please don't ask me, why I haven't completed it yet? I don't want to give birth to some more guilts). And, to make efforts from my side I have bribed all temples and gods in my home (Better known as city of temples. So you can see the relation). And what even Wiki Leaks is saying now Bribe works in India; finally, tough ISB ad-com lose to Gods and I got my admit.

While I kept rubbing my eyes and reading the admit letter for few days, I (a FB addict) was some how directed to the FB group. I was excited and started reading every one's long introductory posts and how every body experienced that great news. Initially it was fun and my heart was fully responding to those posts with wows and aaahhhs but people gave me so much of overdose that even a guy who was considering himself privileged to read all this started feeling lost in a big desert. Some kept on bragging about themselves, some started asking dumb questions, some started proving their diversity, some wrote about their hobbies, some wrote about their madness for sports, some told about dance, some showed their knowledge and some showed lack of it, some argued for the sake of argument and some gave insightful point of views, some people started helping other guys and some jumped unnecessarily even when they don't have anything meaningful to offer and no one needed that help. Then the group took an interesting turn and people started posting almost anything they find. I once even saw few old songs of Kishore Kumar sent on my mail id via this FB group. Some grew their confidence and started posting a countdown of no. of days left to leave their jobs. What on earth any one has to do with this information every day that a guy now has 10 days or 9 days left to leave his job? Then few people wanted their better halves to join this monster as well. As if they don't want to suffer alone and their partners should also go through the same pain of spam. Though what they write on paper was a noble idea that their partners will also get to know their fellow batch mates and future friends. But what they don't know is that it is practically impossible to know any one from this FB group of 500 free people. Any how my above thoughts should not be taken in a sense that I am complaining of all this spam in FB group. I am in fact one of those who have lot of free time and enjoy reading spam and do other useless things which pass their time easily. So, you all must be wondering what the hell is my problem? And why am I criticizing?

First of all some people are born to criticize. You show me a thing with 10 positives and 1 negative. Trust me I will point the negative thing first without any effort. But that is a personal problem and not the subject of this post. The problem is that it gets difficult for the otherwise confident guys (confident guys but on the other side of the shore) like me who got an admit in ISB with the help of a bribe to find the real info in the group. There will be some such confident guys in R2 as well and I thought my experiences of reading every crap post of this group may help them not to get lost in between high talks, herculean achievements and useless junk. The problem with us is that we believe what ever we read. This one mistake can be injurious to health and may result in lot of diseases like sulking, losing self confidence, missing important info and losing track. So, here is a survival kit for guys like me in this group of extra ordinary gentlemen and ladies.

You need to understand that this is a group of 500 future MBA's of India's best B-School. They got an admit by presenting their profile in such a way that they made it look outstanding, different and diverse in a pool of 4000 extra-ordinary aspirants even though they do the same old Engineering, IT, Banking or any other job. So, believe me people here can present a crap in such a way that it will look the brightest star in the sky. So the first rule goes believe what you see and not what you read or what you hear. And, here is a list of few statements (on left side) and their true meanings (on right side) just to make you feel confident:

I'm writing a book --> I've a lot of impulses and out of those impulses, one is the itch of writing. I might have started writing it or might only have thoughts of it.. who cares.. Let's say I'm writing it..

Hints: Look for past tense... Ignore anything ending with "ing" or present continuous...

I was blah, blah and blah in my college --> I actually don't have anything else to brag.. so I'm sticking to my college which I attended 5 years back...

I'm rich --> I'm needy and need attention...

:-) , :D, :P ... all smileys --> I'm trying to be funny...

I'm attending blah, blah and other unrelated or not understandable blah --> I'm free and jobless... And attend whatever crap I get on net...

I drink blah, blah and blah --> Believe Me... I'm hap and coolll... And, this is the only way I can show that thing here...

I'm from IIT ---> Yes.. I've a angel circle over my head... And I think I'm more eligible and better than all of you...

I hate IIT --> I'm jealous...

I play badminton for fun --> I can handle racket and might touch the shuttle if it comes slow and loopy right near to my racket...

I can dance a bit --> I danced in every single marriage of my community...

Words like "Intro", "I'll be last", "excited", "Energy" --> Please ignore my post

Words like "Laptop", "Windows", "OS", "IT" --> They are actually different synonyms of word "confusion"

Posts on "Pre-Term" --> Yes... You dumb fellows... I did it...

I'm a Vice President/MD --> I'm working in a start up or my own company... And, yet I felt a need to brag about it... So, here I am...

Well the list is long and I am lazy. Moreover, I don't want people to kick my ass as soon as they saw me in ISB. So my brain and my ass is pleading me to stop here. If you don't like or don't agree to some part of my post, I was talking about those who brag.. We all know.. you are not that person... :D

Post Script: The above post was on a lighter note and not for any generalization :P (See I put a smiley as well)

Round 2: "still not mature" thoughts on the batch

Just about when everyone settles down and the excitement is dying and people start having fun on the FB group, Round 2 results. ting! ting! ting!! In 2 days, I received 500+ mails from the group. 


Renewable Energy: If "diversity" was the single most used word during Round 1 intros, "Energy" was it for Round 2. How can there be so much excitement? A group of 500 people, about to enter one of Indias most prestigious B-schools, finished their bachelors at least 2 years ago and all of who have hit puberty around a decade ago.... still acting like hyper-active catholic-school-girls, jumping and screaming. 
I know... it's not necessarily a bad thing.


I might be the last: Every one after member number 450 mentions in their intro  "I might be one of the last" if not "I'm the the last". OK. You're the last. I can't afford to buy a trophy right now, I'm jobless. I've made a list of you, and on campus, I want to ask you why you thought that was important in your intro and the best reason gets a chocolate. Don't get me wrong, I said much worse in my intro, it's just that I'm confident you can't find it on the FB group. You see "I was one of the first".


Penny wise, Pound Foolish: 

• Number of discussion on loan - approx 1,000. Number of discussions on laptops - minimum 5,000. 
• Financial implications of Laptop - Rs. 50,000 at most (for people who paid more, the people who paid less are going to arrange for psychiatric help, unless it's an Apple, ofcourse). Financial implication of Loan - Rs. 14lakhs to Rs.20lakhs, depending on how smart you were before ISB and how rich your daddy is.
• Associated time period for Laptop - 3 years at max. Associated Time period for Loan - minimum 5 years.

The mathematics of this is all skewed.

Even in B-school, windows can't just be part of the house: The smart ones bought Mac with Snow leopard, the rest had to install Windows 7. 
Anybody who has installed windows before knows the heart-ache associated with it. 3 days minimum of actual installation (most of it spent hitting your head on the table) + Add to that downloading the OS (another 3 days on a 1.5 kbps connection) + some non-IT folks (including the fake engineers like me) + a FB group = the worlds most wasteful way of killing time. It was like explaining Java to my granny! One man deserves special mention here, he almost made the installation look humanly achievable. You know who you are. 


The cost of Hernia: Everyone coming to ISB seems to have extra baggage, pun intended. The baggage of immediate concern can only cause hernia and a severe depletion in wallet size. Another hot topic on the group. Pay the Airline extra or hire a cargo truck? Well, both have been done, and you'll be glad to know, the best solution is to not bring that much stuff. Moving on to the other baggage......


philanderers and monophobia: The fear of being alone was quite visible in the number of people who wanted to travel together, book the tickets together, book the taxi to go to book the tickets together together... you get the drift. More importantly, a random statistic was thrown out - apparently the divorce rate in ISB was high in one batch many many years ago, but no one knows which batch. All facts in this blog are unverified and not-verifiable, hence verified numbers will not be posted. While I'm sure this caused a lump in the throats of some, others found  it important to compare it with the national average of other countries! Some even found it necessary to make it into a Bollywood love story type thing and spoke about how many more people found love in b-school. I actually do recommend this article, read it along with your mom (whether you're single or married). Apparently, in bschool, the ones who arrive alone find company and the ones who have company leave alone. 


Pre-terms: To revise or not revise that is not the question. Whether to intentionally fail the Assessment tests is more important. Any fool can study a little and clear them and if s/he does, then s/he can not attend the pre-term, hence you must fail. Simple, isn't it.


The questions section: No, The "informative" questions haven't stopped. Yes, this section is now going to be made part of every entry I make. Maybe, next time i'll actually copy-paste the question. No, the seniors will not sell you their left over shampoo. 

Gyan: No matter how div*&se we are, Round 2 admits have asked the exact same questions Round 1 admits did. It isn't their fault, it's Mr. Zuckerberg's. Him and his useless Facebook! Future batches who might be reading this, please have all useful discussions in Google groups. Those are archived and available for the greater good of mankind. 

I need to head out now and load some of my stuff into one of those trucks these guys have booked. Thanks to those who did, I have more stuff than can fit in one car! Be back during the week of 17th Apri 2011.


Disclaimers: 
* It wasn't about you
* It really wasn't. 


PS: If you want that chocolate  Mr/Mrs "I am the last", and you can't wait till college starts, FB-Mesage me why you said it.

Ready for School

"If the geeks of ancient India are to be believed, it all began, all of creation, including all of life, all of Facebook and all of the telecom spectrum, from a primordial state which the Gautama dude later called 'suchness' for lack of a better expression. Because this fundamental condition from which all matter and energy is created, is beyond all expression, all language, all being and all non-being. Put in scientific parlance, it is a non Cartesian state of infinitely curved space-time continuum which do not yield to the postulations of classical, relativistic or quantum physics. Every ISB application, like all things manifest, is therefore born of such 'suchness' in the metaphysical as well as scientific sense. So at the most fundamental level there is no statement, there is no purpose and there is no tangible relationship thereof.”

In a desperate attempt to stand out from the Indian/IT/Unfortunately-Male crowd, you thus fill out a Statement of Purpose half inspired from the Upanishads, half plagiarized from Deepak Chopra and almost all bull shit, click the submit button and as a cursory afterthought, curse yourself for overdoing it. Yet again buddy, congrats.

You curse yourself for that fateful day months ago, when you decided to tag along your colleague to the obscure Christopher University (name changed for fear of legal assault) to attend a 'part time mba' sales pitch. You curse Prof. Tom Weismann (name changed for fear of physical assault), HoD Marketing, for handing you a FREE copy of the Kaplan GMAT guide with the assurance of a seat, in his words, coveted by future business leaders across America - 'provided you clear a score of 500, which I am sure you can with due diligence'. Having made futile attempts to give away the book to innocent passersby, you shove it into the darkest recesses of your least frequented closet, for fear of taking the GMAT by mistake and landing up at the aforementioned college even by accident. Kaplan would inadvertently be salvaged by your unnecessarily meticulous wife, and placed repeatedly in line of view. Almost as if to remind you of your worst failures years ago at the hands of the desi version of the GMAT, whose name even Voldemort would dare not mention. Slipping into bouts of self pity, you curse the GMAT, That-exam-whose-name-shalt-not-be-uttered, contemporary management thought, the utilitarian education system and the whole edifice of capitalism for rendering your life miserable. You curse Harry Potter for no particular reason. You curse every one under the sun and the One presiding over it. (You remain extra careful not to curse your wife)

Weeks pass and you begin to develop a kinship with Kaplan, finding use for it as a headrest, a paperweight, a chopping board and occasionally as a dumbbell. At work you begin to seem a little less there. At home you begin to seem even more absent. Then one fine day, for no apparent reason (detractors might point to a missed promotion in the March appraisal cycle) you decide to Just Do it, in the Nike sense of the phrase. You Do Kaplan, you Do Manhattan, you Do Princeton and in your spare time you do their maternal aunt as well. Three months later, with ample help from your karmic forces you've “Yay Done it!” and you feel on top of the world. You curse everyone all over again, this time with a typical MBA attitude and smug jubilation. You feel a bit like Ricky Ponting, so you try to pull yourself together. You now dare to raise your sights a bit higher. From Bharatidasan college of Management your greedy eye now dares to cast itself upon the fabled hallways of ISB.

Now sitting in your cubicle, with your Thailand born American client of Caucasian features screaming in your ear for another failed deployment, you realize to your horror that not only had you badly screwed up the SoP, in all the excitement you had made the fatal copy-paste error of no reprieve - you had mixed up your responses to essays 3 and 4. You write a profusely apologetic email to Ad Com requesting them to switch your essays 3 and 4 from the backend. You realize that the ad com surely knows better than to select someone so full of bullshit, let alone an unusually careless and worst of all, overly apologetic person from the Indian/IT/Wish-I-were-a-lady community.

But one fine morning, waking up to the offer of admission, you are reassured yet again that you have prevailed despite all odds. You are convinced of a long standing self allegation that you are indeed God's chosen child. Humbled and overwhelmed by a universal sense of gratitude, surprise!, you clench your fist and curse everyone all over again, putting the latest cuss words to use, this time just for the fun of it. But you keep the volume low so as not to miff your sleeping wife.

Then tragedy strikes. The dudes start a Facebook group to ‘facilitate interaction and networking’ (ahem) among the class of 2012. The social networking ignoramus that you are, you join in anyway if only out of compulsion to impart your infinite wisdom and superlative vision to the perhaps less gifted of your future class mates.

Having published the odd piece online which received a record breaking 7 hits (though that includes your immediate family and two neighbors), you had anointed yourself a worthy successor to Rushdie. Now you find that your batch mate has published a national best seller. You had prided yourself for being a war veteran having survived several successive failures in You-know-which exams years ago. Now you rub shoulders with gentlemen who fought and won real wars and who shoot infiltrators in the valley for target practice. You thought of yourself as a consensus candidate for the Nobel Prize in physics because you had once suffered the Brief History of Time and happen to know the full form of GSLV. Now at the canteen you might bump into a true blue scientist working on the Chandrayan mission. You heave a sigh of relief that the zen monk at ISB is thankfully from the class of 2011, now that you are an exalted spiritual master in your own right having survived the odd guided meditation video on Youtube.

In numerous other ways the facebook group continues to make you assume a little less about yourself. You think about them all - entrepreneurs, creative artists, the omnipresent IITians, super studs (err…as in students) and you find your self-esteem making an auto correction. For some obscure reason you do not curse by instinct this time. Instead you feel a sense of gratitude. You feel grateful to all things and people including Prof. Tom Weismann for conspiring to put you in the company of, at the risk of sounding kiss ass, such an illustrious peer group. Amazing as it sounds, you even feel grateful to your own wife, and for some apparent reason you fail to recollect.

Having come to the fringes of reality at last, you rest your case. You surrender.

You are NOW ready for school.

In Limbo..

The movie Inception has been making rounds in my heads since I watched it a few days ago. Cannot help but compare how our lives are going the Inception way.
Consider this:  Right now ISB appears to be the reality and this wait has kept us in Limbo ! We try getting kickbacks to the real world (read ISB) through the FB page, and people who are already there in the real world (our seniors). But the kickbacks aren't strong enough to take us out of this limbo ! Guess the real kickback is going to be the O-Week which will formally bring us on the ISB world ! :-)

But Hey Wait ! The ISB world will not be real either ! Will it ? It will be a dream within a dream scenario again with ISB this time as the dream and the Corporate World as the reality. We will be slogging out against each others Projections till the Placement month of January, hoping for a good kickback again, this time to the Corporate world with fatter paychecks and a mind full of gyaan ! And it takes no Extractors to find what's going on in the dreams of 90% of the batch! Shhhh.... Its Consultancy. :-)

Hey wait again ! Lets get this thing a little more complex ! Is corporate world the reality? Where do we head to after a hectic days work ? Friends, families and may be ourselves? But we already have them with us now ! So why are we getting ourselves these kickbacks for the coming year ?

The reality check is that good salaries shouldn't be our kickbacks ! New friends and good relations could be  better kickbacks in the long run !
The reality check is that we shouldn't slog against each others the coming one year ! Thriving for knowledge could be a better kickback !

And to lighten up the mood, here is a cartoon I made based upon the idea suggested by Varun Sayal. If you like the cartoon, you can join in at Arbit's Facebook Page for more.

Arbit Choudhury, hailing from www.arbitmba.com will join as a management student at ISB this april !  A student with big dreams and bigger mouth, replete with jargon, Arbit will try making mockery of management concepts and theories. Ideas for the Arbit strip can be sent across at arbit[dot]mba[at]gmail[dot]com
 

Premature thoughts on the batch

So, the first thing we did after we got our admission offer emails, was to setup a Facebook group. We could have had a Google group or yahoo and all that other communication overload, but nothing would have propagated the nonsense factor like FB, which is why FB groups rule. Yes, we are the FB generation of India, deal with it. 

Our FB group was rambling centre. A rambling center that I'm greatful to; it helped me understand my batchmates better. Since FB is barely searchable it is impossible to verify the "facts" that I have mentioned here, and hence I urge all of you reader to believe me without questioning.

Based on my extensive research:

Dancing: One of the earliest discussions on the group. About 400 people out of the 150 at present, like to dance. Another 50 want to learn how to dance. I think we have everything from Bharatnatyam dancers to "exotic" bollywood dancers. We will break down the dance floor, quite literally.

Hate IITians: This is quite a large group. Infact, most women are part of this group. They just hate IITians. I don't specifically blame them, they are IITians. Within 2 days of a particular lady posting an anti-IITian post, there were 200+ comments on it. The funny part wasn't the open hatred for IITians, but the desperate attempt by IITians to garner some love. In the end everyone agreed to disagree, but the reputation of IITians on campus had taken a bad beating by then.

Gambling: Of the 150 people on the group, I'm quite sure 140 are gamblers, including me. The game in vogue was Texas Hold 'em poker. We even had 5 people who had chip-sets which they pledged to the ISB Class Of 2012. The good news ofcourse, only 10 people knew how to play. 2 people offered coaching classes and we had our first bidding war. We also had our first gyan session with people warning against price wars. Ofcourse, the opportunist bastard in me saw another way out. I'll take free classes for who ever wants and then rip them off during the game. Not sure if my bathcmates are dumb enough, but worth a try.

Sports: Here is an interesting one. The number of people who have an opinion about Nadal vs Federer matches = group size (150). The number of people who play tennis = 5. People who've heard of Bolton Wanderers = 15. People who've heard of Real Malorca = 4. We actually have a basketball team, including subs. People in this batch love to run. Mumbai marathon enthusiasts apart, i'm waiting to see how many run because they're late to class. Not sure if we have a wicket-keeper for the cricket team yet, but round 2 will have to really add up on those numbers. As of now, I can remember only 2 people who said "cricket" on their posts.

Anxious people: Lots of people were in denial. They thought they didn't get into ISB. That is the only way I can explain the number of people who were anxious about the new admits website link. Some people were very freaked out that ISB forgot to send the link only to them!!

Couples and Families: Of the Round 1 admits, most people are married! I tried to understand how many, but then quickly achieved the label of "looking for girls" guy. I don't deny it, I do find women more interesting than men. The more interesting part is the number of people who hate families. People didn't want families of the Class of 2012 admits to be part of the face group because of concerns like seriousness of discussions, dilutions of networking and "i think it's a bad idea". All this while people were discussing their favourite drinks on the same group. 

Alcohol: Based on 2 back to back posts in the group, there are more book-readers than alcoholics. euch!!! Even at one of the meets in Bangalore, I was the only one drinking in a beer-cafe till one kind lady decided to give me company. I'm sure this will change once the course starts. Of the people who do claim to drink, their tastes are quite expensive. I can never afford to drink with them or maybe they'll all come down to my level - I think Atniquity Blue is premium whisky.

Networking: Why does everyone in b-schools say networking?! You're going to live with these monkeys for a year, it's not networking, it's called being social!! The most accurate way of summing up networking is here - http://thecoldcall.blogspot.com/2010/02/youve-got-friend-in-me.html. Yes, I'm a cynical b@star&.

Gender Inequality: The women in this batch have *way more* attitude than then the men. I'm going to do my very best not to get on the bad side of some of them women. While this might seem like kissing up to a few readers, I think of it as survival instincts.

FT Rankings: The rankings just came out. ISB - 13. IIM A - 11. SLAP in the face. Ouch. Life will move on. We will continue to find reasons why we are better than them and every non-MBA human will continue to not care.

Enfiedlers: 2. Yes, a dismal 2! One is a woman, which is adding to my earlier point of women with attitude. Both not sure of bringing bikes to ISB. Other bikers, 0 as of now. 

Dumb Questions: I don't intend to be rude (wink wink.. nudge nudge), but some people post the dumbest of questions on the group. If you don't have a relevant question or something valuable to add to the group, no one is going to mind if you shut the hell up. You do not have to go out of your way to ask a dumb question. That is referred to as "desperate class participation". They might allow you to put up pink curtains, but you should really ask ISB, not the new admits!

PS: Yes, it is important to toss my opinion about the batch around; simply because of the entertainment potential. 

PPS: The point of this post - to capture the current state of affairs before the Round 2 admits join in.