B-School Lexicon

In my 1.25 years of so called "B-School" Life, i observed certain phrases which was like gospels for the people living out here , so this is one of my humble attempt to mention some of those as to pay tribute to this wonderful and innovative B-School Lexicon

1. Bull-Shit : We, the people, in b-school somehow feel that it is more fashionable and kool to swear in english although there are various hindi substitutes available to that. So, one of the most common used word is bull-shit. When i first heard the word, i was a bit amused. Traditionally, in india cow-dung is popular, but why bull-shit is so revered in b-school parlance. Be it teacher, be it students , whenever they have to ridicule something, the first word which comes into mind is "bull-shit". I am seriously thinking of watching a bull shitting carefully, and may be attach a photo for you people also, so that we can demystify the code.

2. Fuckin : If there has to be a word , which is most abused in any language, it has to be this word. The power of this word is awesome. it could be noun, adverb, helping verb and adjective. There is no scenario which cant be explained by this word. Paper was "fuckin" tough, i am "fuckin'ly happy"... The usages are infinite, from the most momentous occasion to the most pissed of occasion, this word will never leave you alone. ( And oh Yeah !! there was a band performance by the college students, and they are using 'fuckin' almost 5 times in a minute, so no college song is complete without it )

3. It Depends: The beauty ( or u may say curse ) of MBA education is that seldom there are right answers. This helps students a lot, when they were basking in their blissful ignorance. Whenever you caught off-guard by a teacher , asking a question, the safest answer is "it depends". Coz there is no situation that cant be moulded as favorable or unfavorable. So basic tenet of MBA , don't be sure on what you are doing, and when you can not convince people .. confuse them..

4. "Case ki summary bata de " : We, the people, in B-school are always very hard pressed for time. Be it for playing tennis, watching movies , doing bakar and ohh yeah sleeping ( wait a minute.. i heard a lot about sleep deprivation in B-Schools.. make it very clear.. IMT never sleeps.. but IMTians do...) , that we hardly get time to do other stuffs. It seems that our professors do not understand our precarious situation. Heap of Case studies ( Typical HBS one .. with pages>20 ) keep on mounding in our rooms, and 99% of the times, we could not get time to go through them. So, what to do in class ??... Thankfully 1-2 holy souls had read the case, and before 5 minutes to class... the common request is " Bhai .. Please case ki summary bata de.."

5. "Meri Proxy Laga dena " : When i was a young kid, i was told by my parents that god is omnipresent, and they look at every good or evil deed of us. After coming to b-school i realized that we mortals can also possess same powers. People could be present at more than 1 place at a single moment of time. Giving and requesting for proxy is one of the most holy ritual of b-school. The bonding between "proxy-bretheren" is unfathomable to comprehend. Sometimes, i feel afraid that people may not get affected by "multiple-personality disorder", not even knowing which name they are representing. Any ways, this is the blood for the life in a B-School, else you would find a long queue in front of prof's office looking for their attendance.

6. 'Lunch/Dinner mein kya hai ' : when i first went for higher studies, i was surprised that why that dining place is called mess. Then somebody told me that anything you get there would be a 'complete mess' , and that's why this place is unequivocally called mess. To give credits, our college has a good mess, and a hard-working mess committee too ( which sends menu for a fortnight with due diligence..). But do not get misguided by the items on menu, you may find a helluva of difference in what was written on menu, and what you are tasting right now. As of now, the favorite item is rajma.. which i think they boiled for on month in advance. So, every time , some body asks "Dinner mein kya hai" he is hoping against hope.. that today he may get some good thing to eat. The safest answers to questions are "Chhole aur Rajma".. There is 90% probability that you may be right !!!


Disclaimer: All the views expressed by author are personal and experienced in personal capacity. No offense is intended to the mess-connoisseurs, who find it best place to eat, or to the people of "yo-Gang" for whom 'fuckin' is second name for god. Also i might have missed some of the key-terms in my analysis.Please feel free

'A happiness'

A wave of happiness swept the whole IMT yesterday when almost everybody who took any level of CFA cleared it. Everybody was happy for himself or any dear. Feelings of the people sending the congos were really overwhelming. The charm in their minds could actually be made out from the words they uttered. Really happiness is such a flash which can indulge everybody around. Even a bit of that flash can refresh your minds, body etc. of anything stale or bad located in any corner of your mind. I sometimes think why this happiness is so momentary. Why this happiness does not last that long.

I think happiness, sadness or any feeling you come across indulges your mind for some time and then resides in your mind itself. It resides there as a layer. These feelings, layer after layer, make the unconscious mind. These feelings stay there as they are and last really long.

To search any feeling that is there in your mind like a layer, you will have to first uncover the layers above that feeling. Beneath, you will find the feeling you desired for. Once found, you can do anything with that feeling like you can play, enjoy, make a fun of it, etc. Once done, it will automatically go again in your heart but will stay at the top of the stack of feelings. So the next time you want to search that feeling you will not have to go that deeper. You will be able to find that somewhere at the top. That is a wonderful way to keep your happinesses fresh.

This way you can enjoy a happiness multiple times and reach the conclusion that happiness is not a flash that just sweeps across. It is something which lasts really long. It is only that we don’t know where it stays.

It is not that hard!!

N here comes the second blog.. which actually comes at a time when nothing other than derivatives can dare to penetrate your mind. For the guys who are not much friendly with derivatives, I will have to define ‘derivative’. Derivative, as a subject, is something which is introduced in the curriculum of PGDM to increase the number of finance subjects. Derivative, as a activity, is something which has been there in world for long centuries. It finds its mention in various writing written by the people as early as Aristotle, Plato. Even in the small towns people engage into derivative practices without knowing that what they are engaging into actually sucks the MBA students. Does that mean despite studying business all the time we feel hard in understanding the simple business concepts or that Darwin’s theory of evolution, which says that human’s brain is becoming complex day by day, does not hold. I have not done any research to go with the latter so I assume first one to be true.

The question here is why we feel hard in understanding something which might be very easily and comfortably understandable in somebody else. I think that underutilization of your processor and overutilization of the hard disk is one of the primary reasons. We always try to fill one thing or another in our hard disks and hardly left with any ‘computing power’ to use the processor which is why we feel hard in processing anything. We do this without realizing that by using the processor we can make as much information as we want from a particle of information but no growth is possible in the information without the processor. It connotes that adequate utilization of processor is far more important than the overutilization of hard disk.

The reason for spending so much of power on our hard disks is that we always try to convert our RAMs into hard disks. We are always apprehensive about the retention of data in our memories without realizing that our memories are the types of RAMs(which are quite volatile), rather than the hard disks. So the effort to refresh the data in the RAM is actually the wastage of effort.

What I suggest is that we should always think before spending even a bit of our computing power on anything because it is actually a very critical resource and it should be put to use as optimally as possible.

First blog without knowing to do blogging

This is the first blog I have ever written. While reading various blogs written by so influential the people I realized I hardly know anything about anything. Then, I asked myself if I knew anything about the people or the System around. After giving many nights to these thoughts I realized that knowing anything and doing anything are completely independent. I realized that I don’t need to know anything to write. The knowledge which serves most of the purposes is the raw knowledge. It is the knowledge that is embedded in your mind through the experiences of your life. It is the knowledge that comes handy when all information acquired from the books falls flat. It is the knowledge that we call, in our b-school language, as ‘global’.

Sometimes people ask why I think that ‘global’ is more important than the knowledge which we acquire from the books. I answer that the answer lies in the word ‘Global’. Global is something which knows no bounds. No territory can control anything which is considered to be global. The territory that I want to refer to here is the territory of the books, the territory which makes us conceive that we are safe only within that territory, the territory which makes us think that our thoughts have some limit, the territory that bounds the unlimited potential that the upper 1.5 KG part of our body has. This territory makes us believe that we would be superior to somebody if we have read two more books. Had these beliefs really been true I would have been better informed that Mr. R J Masalamani(our strategy teacher) because I have gone through my strategy book and Mr. Masalamani, I believe, would not have opened it once even.

Here the question is, if Global is more important than Local, then why do we need to have anything local. I believe this again is a method introduced by our highly intelligent ancestors. According to this method, a lot many local things are continuously inserted in our minds and we are asked to assimilate, understand and retain these. This is a method to test if:

· we are able to assimilate anything global that comes our way in our life.

· If we can actually make a sense of that global thing that comes our way.

· And if we can retain any global thing that comes our way.

I believe that this method of checking us is very important to manage the chaos in the world. If we don’t have the caliber for three points stated above, we should not be allowed to move up the ladder of success and if done so, we can lead the world to the chaos.

Kissa Kahani Ka..

Guest Lectures, to be frank, are generally a mundane affair. A speaker from a reputed organization comes.. Accolades are lavished, people clap.. and soon after a power-point presentation starts and people enjoy siesta, only to be disturbed by the claps in the end. So, when i was to attend the guest lecture of "Consumer Behavior".. i already had planned to make up for my lack of sleep.

In between the routine talks, there was one particular moment, which stimulated me. He was asking what is the most influential theme of communication, and all of us are giving answers which are consistent with the marketing jargon to which we are highly exposed day-to-day. His simple response was " story telling"... and yes it is the most influential tool for communication.

If we look it on a bigger scale, all our beliefs come from telling and listening story. What are religions ? A grand collection of stories to be the best. Why panchatantra is so popular ? because simple moral values are depicted through perfect sweet little stories. Stories are the way to help the audience relate to the incident and feel the consequences as if it were their own.

Take example of children, in their younger age of development, values are imparted to them by the means of story telling. Imagine saying to a child " Telling lie is bad ".. or " Hurting others is bad "... and they will reply " ok... but wats the big issue.. why it is bad... what are the consequences !! So, the stories and fables are constructed where there is a protagonist depicting the same behavorial patterns as our child can imagine, and then we can make him understand the consequences by telling him the fate of that protagonist .

People in general, do not change much from their childhood days. They still need a story to be stimulated by some marketing communication. That's why you might observe that most of the successful brands are the brands which have a story to tell. If you have heritage associated with the brand, nothing could be better than this.. but if you do not have , you have to construct a story around it. Just type "balbir pasha" in you tube and you can witness how creating a story can send the message across more effectively..

So next time when you have to market something or market yourselves, think of some story.. because its not the product, its not the benefits, its about the story by which you can engage your customers...

P.S. By the time i wrote this, our football team has done very well to play 2 very good competitive matches, and now we can tell this story for other sports too.. to motivate people.

Surrogate Nationalism

By the time i am writing this...streets in Spain must be jam-packed, and millions would be shell-shocked in the dutch-land.. yes 'Paul,the octopus' was again right, and beliefs and superstitions cut across each and every border of this world. An ardent dutch supporter, it was tough for me to swallow the bitter pill, but among all the things which shocked me the striking one was the amount of attachment people have with these foreign teams.

One of the scene of the night which shocked me most was the moment when the Spain national anthem was played down, and people sitting next to me actually got up... although they may feel ashamed doing the same for their own national anthem. Statistically speaking, we Indians have nothing to do with the world cup ( although i read somewhere that 'jabulani' has some material made in India). In the FIFA ranking, we are 133rd or 134th or whatever.. we actually do not care. Even if we take Asians as our identity still we do not have representation after the round of 16.

But still, come the world cup, we have a big screen in amphitheater, people with their divided loyalties , and i bet 1-2 must have wept for the Netherlands(i was very close to it). I wonder whether same would have been the scene if a WC cricket final was going on.

Final, to say the best, was competitive not beautiful. If any one would have got the chance to see the 3rd place match between Germany and Uruguay, it was the match of the tournament for me. May be some time reduced expectations allow players to play freely with their natural game. Anyways today Spain deserved it, they were marginally better than Holland.

The only thing consistent in WC'10 were the predictions of oracle octopus. I am sure maneka gandhi would be having a close look on the matter. After all, too much attention on him may infringe his right of privacy, but he is undoubtedly the biggest star of the world cup. Spaniards surely will exclude eight-leg creatures from their menu at least for a short time. From no onwards, when the football game goes to extra time or penalties, call the octopus.. at least it will prevent heroes from turning villains... hail the genius !!!

Ecoball

Good to see Netherlands and then Germany making it to the final four. By the time you would be reading it, Spain shall make it too. But I could not find justification in supporting any of them. All throw their hearts out in the field, only to lose or win by some chancy goals. The truth is, I hardly know more than one player from every team and have not followed the club football ever.

So I thought and came to a conclusion : It'll be better off for the world if an European nation wins the cup. Put the economist's eye and you will be happy to agree.

The Euro crisis driven by mammoth Sovereign debts of many EEC members is looming large. Investors have started washing their hands off Euro. It's falling wrt. Dollar and other currencies and thus, the costs of repayments are getting higher. This discomfort is supposed to be healed by implementing austerity measures and rolling back of govt. stimulus. But the conditions have not improved with close to 20 percent unemployed population in many countries. The squeezing of money will actually affect demand adversely. A long recession resulting from deflation seems a possibility.

If any of the three wins the world cup, things can be lot optimistic. More so Spain, which is reeling under the Fiscal deficit of 11.4 percent needs spirited hope and actions. Needless to say that a Football world cup win in a sports crazy nation usher in a grand celebration lasting weeks.

Lets be hopeful that it will provide a much needed cushion to the treasury and more time to think. As we all know that

- Lots of beers will be boozed

- Festive occasion will grace population

- Families will spend on entertainment

which will generate taxes for the exchequers and income for people.

Crisis in Europe will affect developing world (say, India) adversely as exports will go down due to shrinkage of demands. Contrarily, imports will increase as the European currency will be relatively cheaper. Thus domestic production will suffer high competition due to technological imbalance. Moreover, lower interest rates in European countries will attract ECBs from corporate world. Indian banking system will be pressurised to compromise. Sub prime crisis in America may have not shown it's direct effects in India, but it has unsettled the public.

When debts range in thousands of billions of dollars, a world cup win will hardly titillate the foundation. But, the motivational self-esteem oozing out from the mega achievement shall inspire politicians, bureaucrats and the 'aam aadmi'. They'll be expected to act in their country's utmost interests.

Loss of words

It was final year of PGDM (Finance) for them at The Management Institute, Bagiazad. New batch had joined in and the B-school was back in life! Jatin and Romin were in pensive mood, sitting in the mess during the dinner hour. Gulping down the Chinese food and updating themselves with score of the WC football match, both went for puff...followed by a walk around the park.

Jatin says, "I remember last year I was mad about blogging. The creativity enthused by the marketing classes and insightful case studies spurred me to write. I had participated in blogging contests centering on different marketing themes. Building on it, I diversified to write about other issues. The craziness was such that I dared to start new blogsites for operations, economics, finance and even word of the day. Many people often ridiculed the exercise. You, who's as passionate towards blogging had been there to contribute. It's soooo enthralling. It was another matter that the warning bells rang soon. I was found wanting on the basic knowledge of Finance and thus, turned my interest towards it. It was proven by track record that I liked numbers. But, I believe a lot of effort from my family was the driver."

Jatin turns philosophical, "Now I am into the sea of Finance, swimming among the numbers and trying to form a life boat out of them. It's not easy since they are attached with the mesmerising formulas, which in turn are to be explored deep into the sea. Finding the roots is the key. Thus, the need to learn 'YOGA' to stop breath for a substantial time and dip in. Ha! Ha! No joke! Try it and you can feel the difference."

Romin feels weird to link Finance and yoga. He enjoys his sutta and adds his own piece, "Brain has transformed into a calculative mood with adherence to all the constraints. Interaction with people has decreased considerably. Life seems to be coming a full circle and the true self is now back. The PGDM programme is a sort of change management for me. I have been a recluse for large part of my academic career. The idea here was to open up and express myself to people. Be a known person, that is. The main difficulty arises when the socialization gets into the psyche and I deviate from studies. It happened here too and I had to change back to what I was good at. Understand the concept better than anyone else...deep down. It involves a lot of mental exersion. Something like forgetting the world when you and your book are together."

He concludes, "Look at the way Marketing guys spend their 24 hours. They read one book and write answers for 3 subjects. And we, immersed in books all the time. Finance and Marketing are two different sides of a same coin. People who are equally good in both of them can be considered Geniuses."