Right from day one, a sizeable population of PGPX students have been very actively pursuing entrepreneurship. A few very active special interest groups have already been formed and these groups are taking a serious shot at starting something on their own. Entrepreneurship is the hallmark of most successful MBA programs and IIMA PGPX has left no stone unturned to facilitate the same.
We have a very successful multi millionaire entrepreneur who has himself been a gold medallist at IIMA in the late seventies, taking personal interest in each and every one of us. Not only does he hold so called "brain washing" sessions to persuade students into taking up new ventures, he has personally been driving students with clear directives on entrepreneurship. Right from the day PGPX commenced, he has set base on campus. Even spouses of participants have not been spared. They are equally being involved in various activities such as training to set up schools and starting small ventures.
Students themselves are not far behind. We have among the students a few already successful entrepreneurs. One of them has already set up a successful chain of book stores, made successful commercial movies and so on. These students are doing their bit in motivating and helping others work in similar lines. With barely any breathing space between assignments and quizzes, we still had a bus load of students travelling as far as Baroda just to see how a real factory works. At the end of the course, I am sure we will have among us many who will make the others proud by setting their own trail.
Showing posts with label iima. Show all posts
Showing posts with label iima. Show all posts
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
Term 1 Part 2
The first term is almost divided into two logical halves with some of the subjects getting over halfway through and new ones getting added. The new subjects that were added naturally had new professors. In the last few weeks, we have had two such subjects and the reason I am writing this blog is the professors that are teaching them. Even after one month of enjoying the great pedagogy, the professors still are managing to amaze us with their very special way of teaching.
The first one is strategic cost management and the professor impressed us so much that we are actually looking forward to the classes even with sleep deprivation and all that. To give an idea, he has worked in almost all the continents of the world in senior managerial roles, had been a gold medalist in his CFA and had left as a senior manager at Rolls Royce before quitting and joining IIMA. The examples and summaries that he gives in the class are so relevant and to the point that one of a fellow student was referring to them as a revelation.
The next is a new class on operations management. The professor has the capacity to wake up Rim Van Winkle from his slumber. He started a seemingly insipid subject saying that by the end of the fifteen sessions we are going to attain the nirvana that Buddha achieved. He also explained the various uses of the textbook such as a pillow, an exercising equipment and lastly as a tool for learning things that lesser mortals wanted to know. In short, he said that the case method to teach operations was being used in IIMA and this is probably the only instance in the entire country. As a result, no textbook could give us the knowledge and wherewithal to handle operations anytime in the future.
Well, even after all the rigor and torture that we have been subjected to, I would still give my good night's sleep to attend these enriching lectures - even from my orbit of Pluto.
The first one is strategic cost management and the professor impressed us so much that we are actually looking forward to the classes even with sleep deprivation and all that. To give an idea, he has worked in almost all the continents of the world in senior managerial roles, had been a gold medalist in his CFA and had left as a senior manager at Rolls Royce before quitting and joining IIMA. The examples and summaries that he gives in the class are so relevant and to the point that one of a fellow student was referring to them as a revelation.
The next is a new class on operations management. The professor has the capacity to wake up Rim Van Winkle from his slumber. He started a seemingly insipid subject saying that by the end of the fifteen sessions we are going to attain the nirvana that Buddha achieved. He also explained the various uses of the textbook such as a pillow, an exercising equipment and lastly as a tool for learning things that lesser mortals wanted to know. In short, he said that the case method to teach operations was being used in IIMA and this is probably the only instance in the entire country. As a result, no textbook could give us the knowledge and wherewithal to handle operations anytime in the future.
Well, even after all the rigor and torture that we have been subjected to, I would still give my good night's sleep to attend these enriching lectures - even from my orbit of Pluto.
Thank God It Is Friday?
Zombied! Yes, that is what has happened to most of us here at IIMA at the end of the first month. The frequency of my posts must have conveyed a clear message to those who have happened to notice the timestamps on the posts that something is amiss. Amiss is an understatement, I say.
The barrage of assignments and quizzes have started to take a real toll now. Capacity to focus on fast moving distant objects is swiftly diminishing. From the orbit of Pluto that we at the back benches have positioned ourselves in, the happenings of the class have become akin to some fast moving distant object on which our hold is getting real slack.
Last weekend seemed a welcome relief. We were anticipating a quiz on management decisions and we got one on financial analysis. And guess how we performed in the quiz! The very next day had another surprise in the form of strategic cost management quiz. But, whatever happened, we were left with two quizzes less and that prompted us to venture into the outside world Friday evening. Yes, we actually managed to find time to enter civilization and watch a real movie in a real theater. Most of the time I was pinching myself in the theater. Dinner followed and we came back a happy bunch. We reached campus in the midnight hoping for a decent game of football and guess what we encountered. The syndicate room welcomed us with the rest of the classmates struggling with an assignment that had to submitted the very next day! We ended up sleeping at 4 AM in the morning barely finishing the assignment. Fridays, we soon understood, were meant for another world, another people.
The barrage of assignments and quizzes have started to take a real toll now. Capacity to focus on fast moving distant objects is swiftly diminishing. From the orbit of Pluto that we at the back benches have positioned ourselves in, the happenings of the class have become akin to some fast moving distant object on which our hold is getting real slack.
Last weekend seemed a welcome relief. We were anticipating a quiz on management decisions and we got one on financial analysis. And guess how we performed in the quiz! The very next day had another surprise in the form of strategic cost management quiz. But, whatever happened, we were left with two quizzes less and that prompted us to venture into the outside world Friday evening. Yes, we actually managed to find time to enter civilization and watch a real movie in a real theater. Most of the time I was pinching myself in the theater. Dinner followed and we came back a happy bunch. We reached campus in the midnight hoping for a decent game of football and guess what we encountered. The syndicate room welcomed us with the rest of the classmates struggling with an assignment that had to submitted the very next day! We ended up sleeping at 4 AM in the morning barely finishing the assignment. Fridays, we soon understood, were meant for another world, another people.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Salesman Calling
The week saw us donning the hats of market surveyors. Students of different groups went out for market surveys of different products as part of a marketing assignment. Some were interrogators, some mere observers. Some were roaming vegetable markets, some TV showrooms whereas others were checking out second hand bookstores.
I belonged to a lucky group who had to survey TV buyers. Or so I thought! Lucky because we had the air conditioning working in our favor which probably the vegetable market guys were sorely missing. But then it is peak summer with IPL in full swing. We ventured out in the afternoon hoping to catch up some sleep later. But alas, empty showrooms greeted us. After spending two full hours of general loitering, better sense prevailed and we soon beat a retreat to the dorms.
The second session was planned in the evening and this time we could see some light at the end of the tunnel. We sneaked into a showroom and caught hold of an unsuspecting customer the moment he signed across the dotted line. Though taken aback, he seemed to be sympathetic and the IIM badge also helped to an extend. However, the store manager had another opinion of the whole affair. He intervened hastily and made sure we shifted our rendezvous to a suitable spot outside of the store in question. Nevertheless, we could complete our survey and returned with a handful of data to ponder over. The egos were busted in the process and the respect for salesmen in general took a significant boost.
I belonged to a lucky group who had to survey TV buyers. Or so I thought! Lucky because we had the air conditioning working in our favor which probably the vegetable market guys were sorely missing. But then it is peak summer with IPL in full swing. We ventured out in the afternoon hoping to catch up some sleep later. But alas, empty showrooms greeted us. After spending two full hours of general loitering, better sense prevailed and we soon beat a retreat to the dorms.
The second session was planned in the evening and this time we could see some light at the end of the tunnel. We sneaked into a showroom and caught hold of an unsuspecting customer the moment he signed across the dotted line. Though taken aback, he seemed to be sympathetic and the IIM badge also helped to an extend. However, the store manager had another opinion of the whole affair. He intervened hastily and made sure we shifted our rendezvous to a suitable spot outside of the store in question. Nevertheless, we could complete our survey and returned with a handful of data to ponder over. The egos were busted in the process and the respect for salesmen in general took a significant boost.
The week that rocked the boat
It has been almost two full weeks of classes already and to most of us, the outside world and its memories are fast diminishing. The last week in particular has been particularly harsh. The smiles are fast shrinking and dark circles are getting prominent by the day. I could see a couple of fellow classmates catching up on lost sleep in the cool comfort of the back benches. My sympathies are with those who are in the limelight of the front seats.
To give a perspective, we had in our plates a surprise test and a submitted assignment with just two weeks of classes. We also have only four more assignments to be submitted this Monday. Some lessons in time management IIMA is going to teach us! The last two weeks have also seen close to six sessions of four heavy duty quantitative subjects each and people have started confusing one subject for the other already. The breakneck speed has not only broken our necks but also a considerable amount of optimism from our lives.
But some of us are made of sterner stuff. We still are holding on to our share of midnight football and Joos doses. [For the uninitiated, Joos is a cafe in IIMA that remains open well past midnight.]
I am sure the weeks to come will see the 86 unsuspecting souls being subjected to more inhuman torture. But life has its brighter side as well. The saving grace is the break on May 26th that we all are eagerly awaiting. Till then midnight football will hopefully keep us alive.
To give a perspective, we had in our plates a surprise test and a submitted assignment with just two weeks of classes. We also have only four more assignments to be submitted this Monday. Some lessons in time management IIMA is going to teach us! The last two weeks have also seen close to six sessions of four heavy duty quantitative subjects each and people have started confusing one subject for the other already. The breakneck speed has not only broken our necks but also a considerable amount of optimism from our lives.
But some of us are made of sterner stuff. We still are holding on to our share of midnight football and Joos doses. [For the uninitiated, Joos is a cafe in IIMA that remains open well past midnight.]
I am sure the weeks to come will see the 86 unsuspecting souls being subjected to more inhuman torture. But life has its brighter side as well. The saving grace is the break on May 26th that we all are eagerly awaiting. Till then midnight football will hopefully keep us alive.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
First few days at IIMA
Finally my MBA journey started on 8th April 2010 when I boarded the Indigo airlines flight for Ahmedabad from the Bangalore airport. At the airport, I met a couple of classmates who were all excited and anxious at the same time about what lay in store for us at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA). We were all well-fed with fables about the rigour of the course and this was probably the most important thing playing in our minds.
Now, that I have mentioned about the rigor of the course, let me give a brief introduction of the course itself. IIMA had launched a one year full time MBA program in 2006 called PGPX which is meant for professionals with substantial work experience. The entry criteria are a GMAT score, essays, profile and a minimum of 27 years of age. The acceptance rate is less than 10 percent - even less than Harvard or Wharton business school. The course is designed to include a very rigorous academic curriculum divided into 5 terms of about 2.5 months each. One of the terms is an international stint of academics and industry immersion.
It need not be said that coming from IIMA, this is probably one of the best one year MBA programs available in the country and hence it attracts the very best of MBA aspirants of Indian origin from all over the world. Consequently it is one of the toughest courses to get in - with average GMAT score of 714 (in the current batch), international experience of about 4 years on the average, a stringent screening process and an equally grueling interview.
We reached Ahmedabad in the afternoon and soon realized that the heat in terms of the rigour of the course would get stiff competition from the scorching heat of the city itself. Probably the temperature was around the 40 degrees centigrade mark and the cab driver who drove us to the campus informed us that it can only get worse.
On reaching the campus we soon were basking in the glory of being part of the great legacy of IIM Ahmedabad. To be a student after a gap of 10 years was a thrill in itself. We soon found ourselves in the student's canteen and immersed in the regular chat and tea session. The one great thing that we all agreed was being part of a great mix of students who have excelled in their own fields of work. I am not sure if such a mix can be expected in any business school at least in India.
Later in the afternoon, we got ourselves registered to the office and were presented with the most unwelcome gift we all had anticipated but never quite prepared ourselves for. The mountain of books that were handed over to us probably called for a mini truck to be accompanied with, as it was humanely impossible to carry those with your bare hands. Morale had taken a serious beating.
But we were made of sterner stuff and a morale maintenance committee was constituted in no time. The committee made immediate plans of organizing trips to movie theatre, cricket matches and even nightly football sessions for the next few days because it was only Thursday and classes were to start only from Monday. The next few days passed in a breeze.
Monday saw a grand opening ceremony where even spouses and small children took part. It was really an amazing experience to see some very serious topics being discussed and intermitted by cries and laughter of little ones. Lunch followed and then the dreaded entry to the actual CR 11 - classroom designated for the batch of PGPX. Thus started the journey of 86 ambitious and highly talented group of young men and women for a year of rigour and fun.
Now, that I have mentioned about the rigor of the course, let me give a brief introduction of the course itself. IIMA had launched a one year full time MBA program in 2006 called PGPX which is meant for professionals with substantial work experience. The entry criteria are a GMAT score, essays, profile and a minimum of 27 years of age. The acceptance rate is less than 10 percent - even less than Harvard or Wharton business school. The course is designed to include a very rigorous academic curriculum divided into 5 terms of about 2.5 months each. One of the terms is an international stint of academics and industry immersion.
It need not be said that coming from IIMA, this is probably one of the best one year MBA programs available in the country and hence it attracts the very best of MBA aspirants of Indian origin from all over the world. Consequently it is one of the toughest courses to get in - with average GMAT score of 714 (in the current batch), international experience of about 4 years on the average, a stringent screening process and an equally grueling interview.
We reached Ahmedabad in the afternoon and soon realized that the heat in terms of the rigour of the course would get stiff competition from the scorching heat of the city itself. Probably the temperature was around the 40 degrees centigrade mark and the cab driver who drove us to the campus informed us that it can only get worse.
On reaching the campus we soon were basking in the glory of being part of the great legacy of IIM Ahmedabad. To be a student after a gap of 10 years was a thrill in itself. We soon found ourselves in the student's canteen and immersed in the regular chat and tea session. The one great thing that we all agreed was being part of a great mix of students who have excelled in their own fields of work. I am not sure if such a mix can be expected in any business school at least in India.
Later in the afternoon, we got ourselves registered to the office and were presented with the most unwelcome gift we all had anticipated but never quite prepared ourselves for. The mountain of books that were handed over to us probably called for a mini truck to be accompanied with, as it was humanely impossible to carry those with your bare hands. Morale had taken a serious beating.
But we were made of sterner stuff and a morale maintenance committee was constituted in no time. The committee made immediate plans of organizing trips to movie theatre, cricket matches and even nightly football sessions for the next few days because it was only Thursday and classes were to start only from Monday. The next few days passed in a breeze.
Monday saw a grand opening ceremony where even spouses and small children took part. It was really an amazing experience to see some very serious topics being discussed and intermitted by cries and laughter of little ones. Lunch followed and then the dreaded entry to the actual CR 11 - classroom designated for the batch of PGPX. Thus started the journey of 86 ambitious and highly talented group of young men and women for a year of rigour and fun.
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