Is MBA from Indian institutes are really worth it?

This was the question that was left uppermost in my mind after my recent train journey. In this journey, I was lucky to spend time with 2 different kinds of people [classes/status].

In the first leg of the journey, I met one among the thousands of Indian Entrepreneurs whose absence would cause a catastrophe in this nation but soemone we will never notice. Yeah! One of the poor salesmen/shop owner who are very much part of this Incredible India.

His name is Pandi, and he earns his daily bread by selling tea & coffee to travellers. But the management concepts/theories he spoke just amazed me. He spoke about economies of scale, experience effects, logistics, Distribution channels, etc.. [Yeah.. most of the concepts, we, the Indian MBA students mug from their books just a day before the exams]. Here is a man who completely understands them but in no way polluted by this jargon speak. At the end, I was left wondering with the question 'Is MBA from Indian instututes really worth it?'

In the second leg of my journey, I was able to spend time with a few rich business magnets - 2 in shipping industry & 1 in geological consultancy. These people, non - MBA businessmen also raised the question what a MBA is really worthy of.

Certain points that were discussed were:-

• Is IIMs only for spoon-feeding the students who cannot match up to the realities of the business world or students who are in no way interested in management except for its huge pay packages?
• How does anyone without an MBA inferior to the esteemed IIM students when it comes to corporate world?
• How much does a MBA adds value to a person?
• Is the present Indian MBA admission system of letting in students right after their undergraduate colleges really working?

At the end, I was left wondering with the question 'Is MBA from Indian instututes really worth it?'

Readers, Atleast can you throw light on whether 'a MBA from Indian instututes is really worth it?'

IIM Indore rocks 'as usual' in the International arena

One of the good things about international competitions is that you get to compete with the best in the world and know your position vis-à-vis the rest of the world. L'Oreal e-strat Challenge is one such event.

Tit-Bits About L'Oréal e-Strat Challenge:

L'Oréal e-Strat Challenge is one of the world's biggest online business simulations. This international competition is open to undergraduate and MBA students in their final two years of university or business school. In its first six editions, the L’Oréal e-Strat Challenge has brought together over 132,000 students from 2190 schools representing 125 countries.

The International Finalist teams, the top undergraduate and MBA team of each zone win an all expenses paid trip to Paris to compete for the first place! The two most strategic, professional and convincing teams will win a trip to the destination of their choice worth 10,000€ !

IIM-Indore @ L'Oreal e-Strat Challenge 7:
This time around, there was an enthusiastic participation from IIM-Indore with around 40 teams participating in this esteemed international event. It is the not the participation but the achievement of the IIM-Indore teams that is worth a mention. Listing down a few:

• 3 of the top 8 teams in the end of the semi-finals in MBA category were from IIM-Indore [8 teams qualify for the finals, with the 'Only one team from each Zone' rule ensuring that only one IIM Indore team qualifies.. :-( ] Link : See Page No:24 in the pdf file - 'Top 20 MBA Teams'
  
• An IIM Indore team, Gothic Trinity leads the whole pack as they move to the finals on 18 April 2007
  
• Top 3 Share Price Index(Simulation Score) were reached by IIM Indore teams in MBA category [ Link : Final Results - MBA category : A PDF file]

With the whole heart, I wish & believe that 'Gothic Trinity' team would come back with this year title.

Personal Comments:
An interesting fact is that not all the 3 teams were from PGP-2. One of the teams, Bizzbeez comprised of all PGP-1 members (Robin, Sreeram & Sajeev). Next year, they would get another shot at this event! Though this game is essentially a strategy game, a lot of marketing is also involved. Personally I learnt more 'Marketing' from this game than from my 'Marketing - I' & 'Marketing - II' courses.

To read about the performance of IIM Indore in the last year's L'Oreal e-Strat Challenge click 'IIM Indore in L'Oreal's e-Strat Business Challenge 6'

P.S - 'Tit-Bits About L'Oréal e-Strat Challenge' is an excerpt from 'What is e-Strat Challenge?"

Clash of Titans - IIM Indore

With the whole campus left to PGP-I after the farewell of 2007 Batch of IIM-Indore, the sportscom decided to come up with an inter section sports meet - 'Clash of Titans' to prove that we are not only nerds but can play ball too. The following sports were shortlisted to find out the best section among the three

• Basketball
• Volleyball
• Cricket
• TT
• Badminton
• Football

Before the sports matches got started, all the experts were of the same opinion that the games would be a walkover for Section B and the only dispute was in how much Rakesh would prove a thron in their path. Alas! they forgot that there is an all rounder in Section A - Girish Nair.

With a great crowd turn-out, the volleyball matches kicked off the event. [To know more about volleyball matches in 'Clash of Titans' please click 'Volleyball in Clash of Titans']

BasketBall - Section B & C tied for the first place sharing the points with Section A losing all its matches

Rakesh's Special Jump(Observe the distance between the guys fighting for ball & their shadows)

Cricket - Here none of the other sections could match with the strong team that Section B fielded. Section C took the second place with Section A ending up last again

TableTennis - Section A proved that not only your talent but also your mental strength - calmness and composure matters in sports especially when both the players are equally matched.

Swapnil after a tightly contested game

Football - Before this event started, most of us were sure that Section - B fielding players who play more football than even academic activities would win the football matches hands down. But a Surprise again was waiting for them! Solid & ferocious defense by AKB combined with talented forwards ensured that Section A walked over with both the football winner title and inter Section Sports Matches title

Section-A FootBall Team

Badminton - With the winners getting decided even before the badminton matches got over, the badminton matches lost steam in the halfway. Section C won the event with Section A coming second

Few Personal Observations:

• High turnout in most of the matches[even at boring games like TT] was a surprise
• After a year full of networking and making friends, it was fun to watch most of us fighting it out for their respective Sections. [Should have more events of these type during the first term itself]
• Certain unexpected events in 'Tug of War' made sure that it will be the most remebered game even though there was no points allocated to this event.

Jaydeep Singh putting all his soul, strength & spirit to pull the rope

Photos Courtesy - Vignesh, PGP-2

Harry Potter CountDown Google Gadget

For Google Desktop Users Only

If you are crazy about Harry Potter as me, then this Google gadget - 'Harry Potter Countdown' is a must on your desktop. It tells us how much more time we have to wait to get hold of the upcoming book 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows'.

But anyway, applying the law of relativity, it looks as if the book release is an eternity away for me.. Hmmm.. Come on July quickly..

VolleyBall in 'Clash of Titans'

Sports Movies (however bad they were) have always been my favorites. The fact that even the underdogs/unknown can beat the favorites in any given day has attracted me like a magent to sports movies . Added to this my zilch participation in any sports event made sure that the emotions that a sports player undergoes enthralls me - anytime, anywhere.

So when the 'Clash of Titans - Inter Section Sports Meet' was declared, I was personally expecting 2 weeks of unadulterated fun. But never did I think that I would be participating in a game. But call it fate or luck, I ended up in the Volleyball team of Section - 'A'. It was one hell of experience that I am surely going to carry for the rest of my life.

’Clash of Titans - 2007’ had a great start with the First Volleyball game between Section A Vs Section B turning to be an absolute thriller. In Set 1, we (Section A) were comprehensively beaten by Section B with Abhishek, Kristoff, Amaresh combining beautifully for them. But by second set, we were able to exploit some weak spots in their game and won the second set. If anybody has expected the third set to be a nail biting one, it turned out to be much more. To make the story short, we found our Midas touch in the last minutes winning the set and the game. Aided by some injuries, Rest of the volleyball matches turned out to be a walk over for us. The only interesting part was that our Section proving that even Mcgrath has to learn sledging from us.

Now the good part - I walked with a cool 500 rupees for just standing idly and letting the other five players play their game. :-)

P.S - I know this is not an Olympic win to rave about so much but still this is an experience that I would never forget.

Story of an Alarm Clock

Most of this post is an excerpt from one of my comments in Sajeev's Post - 'Terror Strikes E-Block'. Don't have any doubts. The sleeper who was not disturbed from his slumber even when the powerful cracker(atom bomb) burst on his neighbour's room is Me. So I decided to narrate my life at College of Engineering, Guindy where my neighbours had a hell of a time with my alarmclock. [Posting it here since somebody commented it is good.] :)

"Once long ago, there was an alarm clock in the hostel room of a student studying in a dream city called chennai in one of the best colleges of the world. And this alarm clock had the rare ability to wake up the whole block when it likes to. But alas! it does this every morning... So when its music begins, everybody in the hostel will wake-up and run to the door outside the block to hear its most beautiful sound.. But for sometime, they will stand outside shouting, encouraging this alarm to sing louder. After a few minutes resenting the fact that the door outside was reducing the effects of this great musician, they would start to kick & bang the doors... After a few minutes of their turmoil, the owner of the clock will slowly get up.. Immediately the happiness of the alarm clock would go a notch higher, thinking it is going to see its fans who daily come to hear its beautiful music.. Alas! dup! the owner will switch it off... Now, it has to wait until the next day for its audience.... Hmmm... Still relishing those beautiful days.."

Everybody Loves Google

Today I was pleasantly surprised to read about a search for a snake in the Google's U.S. office in 'The Hindu'... that too in its Front Page. As someone in Tirunelveli where every other day, you hear about a snake(python) entering the government offices which are situated near the river banks. This was not a big news for me. Still The Hindu never found the snake entry in our very own Indian Government offices interesting enough to print. [But the Tamil Daily, Dinamalar used to print it as a half page story with a quarter page photo of the snake and its capturer]

This made me to search 'Why this huge interest in a company that is situated in a faraway land?'. Few reasons i was able to come up with for the buzz around 'everything Google'.

• Most of the students love it because our Copy+Paste assignment work become a lot tougher without it
  
• In today's world, the word 'online search' has become synonymous with Google. A ultimate dream for any brand manager
• An Underdog and a David fighting against the Goliath 'Microsoft'. [Though we don't realize that Google has already entered the realms of Goliath]
• Its Vision - 'organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful' supposedely conveying its concern for the welfare of the world

- A 'Google'Boy.... Showing his bit of loyalty to Google...