Showing posts with label Education. Show all posts

The last 12 months have easily been the most eventful period in my life so far . There have been some unforgettable experiences , over-the-moon periods , down in the dump despair times and of course just the fun of the exciting life in the city and not a village . But taking into account everything, it has been the most enjoyable spell irrespective of successes and failures.


The Good :

There is no guessing what occupies the top spot. The entire experience, preparing , trying to make sense of completely random terms in the Economic Times , making new friends , "selling myself",learning about Mr.TKGR (the above-God authority) - all this compromises what I call the B Experience .

But I should say something that I enjoyed more would be the summer of 2008 , which is more or less responsible for the above mentioned result.Working for 2 months with Arun and Kaushik , the benefits of learning while you work , the chance to visit the campus of IIM Ahmedabad ( which now unfortunately has become the taboo word ) and of course the chance to see a lot of surprised faces when being told that I was still a student who was trying his hand with work in the firm . It truly was something which changed me in all terms and will probably be a part of my introduction to anyone for a few more years to come.

Even though its significance has been lost in view of the present situation, getting the job at Morgan Stanley was another thing which gave me an "unrecoverable" high. I had people abusing me for the grin on my face while walking on the roads for even a week after the results.At that point of time, I was completely overwhelmed by the same.

The Bad :


Even though , it should not be counted as bad if you get paid for doing nothing except occasionally being asked to do something which even Zimbu, the monkey could probably do,PS 2 falls in this category for me. But fortunately, the people and the firm are really a great place to spend 6 months and it has been a mixed bag to say the least.

Despite spending 4 ( ok, not 4 , 3.5 ) years in Pilani , there was absolutely a lack of "emotion" if I can call it that when I left the campus. Most people have been taken aback by my obvious relief on leaving the place.Like many of my previous posts, it is always the people that made the place so enjoyable for me and I shall be ensuring that I get more of those moments with the people whom I spent those 3.5 years in that village in Rajasthan.
Unfortunately , the times have changed since the time we were on campus for our placements.

This semester has been particularly bad for many friends I know and I am sure everyone will find / make their own way out of this messy situation, if I might add , all that it takes might be some patience and compromise for better things to happen to you soon.

The Ugly:

Fortunately/Unfortunately this happens to do with only my sports affiliations .

Arsenal F.C has progressed from bad to worse in this period. The signing of the wizard Andrei Arshavin must have injected some sense into the all-knowing, kids-loving Professor we fans hope. Development or not, the club needs to progress and it is the time to make a few inspired signings rather than harp on the talent present in the academy. 16 year old Luke Freeman is not going to win us anything next season.


I shall still call him by the same name I always refer to him with : His Royal Highness Roger Federer is going through his worst slump of form and for the love of the game I hope he returns to his stylish and devastating best.

Formula 1 is being hijacked by teams who previously had nothing significant attached to them. Ross Brawn is a technical genius beyond doubt , but I do hope that things return to normal soon and more importantly Scuderia Ferrari getting things back in place.

That ends what is a brief description of how my last one year has been. Though , I am not celebrating my birthday or anything of that sort , I just realised that the technical 1 year - 365 day period for which I have mentioned the activities above will be coming to a close soon.

P.S:

1. Of Course something are just priceless , such as the 5 months in Hyderabad , where I have had the opportunity to meet so many people, weekends spent just watching football and playing UNO , learning a few nuances of poker - everything has made this a really enjoyable experience .

2. I co-hosted a quiz last week for the K Circle with Psyche(less popularly known as Vijay ), Hyderabad Chapter whose review can be found here, written by dear friend Praveen. Thanks to him for portraying the quiz as not the complete disaster it actually was.

The wait has ended and the title must have more or less given it away . I have made it into IIM Bangalore for the PGP Batch of 2009-2011. What I feel at this moment is relief, more than anything else .After all this, I wouldn't have really wanted to go through this entire process again, fortunately I don't have to . This post if any longer wont make much sense and I stop it here.


A special thanks to the Great Man Above .

P.S:

The madNavin most of you know is in some other dimension and cannot be reached at this moment due to the state of euphoria he is in. This post is by his alter ego : N Madhavan.

The long wait has not yet ended for me. The results for admissions to IIM Bangalore have come out and I have been Waitlisted for admissions with WaitList No : 48 . I do not know whether this is something which I should rejoice or be dejected about, for my next 1 year is still a mystery to me . My results are such that when told to someone they do not know what would be the right thing to say . It is very evident to me that most of you are stuck without knowing what my chances are and whether this result is good or bad. Frankly , even I have absolutely no idea as to what I should expect based on such a result. To help you interpret my chances here are a few facts:

Fact 1 : I am amongst the last 5 candidates to be shortlisted by IIM B in the General Category (52 is the total number )

Fact 2 : This Waitlist no does not indicate that 47 people not taking up their seat would result in me getting admission. The admission panel is smart, they have already given 23 buffer offers from whatever I know and this would mean at least 70 people turning down their seats for me to stand a chance of making it .

Fact 3 : Last year , the Waitlist moved till 46, with a probably lesser number of buffer calls and a lesser number of seats. This might indicate that my chances are better and I hope they are .

Besides the above facts remain the choices that people make . The growing popularity of IIM Calcutta and its outstanding finance expertise is also going to be a factor which will influence my results .

Today, I know that there is an extremely high probability that I would either be amongst the last candidates to make into the institution or be amongst the first ones to miss it . The latter will be a very difficult fact to digest, rejection is simpler to face , but knowing that probably not guessing one answer in the verbal section might have resulted in me making it will haunt me . Whatever the result, I still have hope to hang onto for at least the next 1 month or so and at the end of it I will be a different person.

P.S:

1. The Killer - I will be getting an admission letter from IIM Bangalore, I hope it turns out to be more than just a souvenir .
2. Congratulations to everyone who has cleared the final hurdle and heading to the best B Schools in the country to spend the next 2 years.

Before Nov 16, 2008 :

I knew that in all probability I would be spending the next 1 or 2 years working in Morgan Stanley , something which seemed really exciting at that point of time and I was more than happy to take up the same .Even though before I had reached campus for the semester I was intent on taking CAT seriously and trying to continue with education , the "dream job" offer changed my mindset.

Nov 16, 2008 - Jan 9, 2009

After what I thought was not a complete disaster as expected on the day of CAT, I harbored hopes of a few calls, with the more important question being whether any one of them would be from the big ones. As the days went by and I kept hearing scores of 200 and increasing, I had doubts as to whether anything good would come out at all on Jan 9th .

Jan 9, 2009 - Feb 23, 2009

When the results did come out , the time-tested weightage to academics pulled me through for a call to one call that mattered - IIM Bangalore . The next 45 days were a mad rush with me trying to get things in place and get them perfect and polished for the big day . The 4 hours spent in IIM Bangalore on the actual day was not the way I had dreamt of it, with a GD that was more than peaceful and an interview which was completely out of the blue. I did come out of the interview room with a big grin on my face , but that was more because I knew I had given my best shot, the preparations were over and now all that remained was to wait for the results

Feb 23, 2009 - Now :

Despite all the post-mortem analysis,PagalGuy visits to see how other competitors fared , I am presently back to a preparation phase. Preparing myself for the Chequered flag , trying to be ready to digest the message that will popup on the results page. Whatever the results , I will have to brace myself and face it. Easy to write and say,but when it does dawn on me , I have absolutely no idea how I will take it. To be honest,before this there has been nothing else for which I had put such a dedicated and concentrated effort to achieve.Unlike before when I was all geared up to work in Morgan Stanley, that would be a disappointment for me now.At the end of highly engaging discussions with Praveen and Psyche, fellow "wait-ers" hoping that April 10 comes sooner , the only conclusion that I could draw was that there is only so much we can do, the rest is the "secret ingredient" , give it whatever name - Luck,Destiny or Fate.

All the best to everyone of my friends and competitors who are expecting ( some including me - dreading ) and hoping that their efforts do not go in vain.

It is bigger, it is better and it is back. For all those who need introduction , last summer I pursued a Business Development Internship with AKVenture , an IIM A startup. So, as all good things normally do, it is back for the summer of 2009. Interested applicants can download this document . To all those who have any second thoughts , please forget them and this will be one summer which you wont forget. If you need any personal insight from me, I have already blogged enough about the same and feel free to contact my by e-mail or any other mode convenient for you. Please pass on the news to your circle of friends/batchmates/juniors about the same.

Ok, now for googles sake : Summer Internships 2009 , Internships in start-ups
(I am not a techie, and anyone who has suggestions on how I can make this better can educate me about the same) .

Even though I did spend my last summer in the same city , what I am seeing this time is a very different one from what I saw last time around. Now this is not my way of saying that Hyderabad has changed / improved / developed a whole new face in the last 6 months . The last time I was here, I seem to have spent my time in "Hyderabad", presenty I am spending my time in "Cyberabad" . Now, to people who are unfamiliar with the city , Hi-Tech City is not a synonym for the city , but a landmark / bus-stop / railway station , where as you can guess IT-boom-ed (Looks like noone realy wanted to spend too much time thinking about a "localised" name! ) . This is the place where you find all the offices - MNC/Desi, big/small , cost-cutting/still in profit , you will be getting the hint I hope.

Naturally, the place is populated with engineering graduates from all over the country and everyone of them want to take the fastest escape route out of their jobs . Even though there is a lack of idea as to what to do next, most are very clear with the fact that they do not want to be continuing with their jobs after the summer. So, the probability is very high that you person sitting next to you in the daily mode of conveyance, share-auto is a competitor for the very seat that you aspire to be sitting in 6 months from now, be it an IIM, XLRI, ISB,Stanford, UIUC, Berkeley or any other institute you can think of.Basically, everyone is a "fund" in his own terms and I have got to meet a lot of such people through work, casual interactions(read bump-ins) and IMS classes. I have really enjoyed their company and hope to meet more interesting people during my stay here.

Unlike your school/college where the very mention of the name creates a bond and some sort of connection to any stranger who is from the same place and you did not know before , corporates are a different playing ground. Every share-auto packed with 6 people in space for 3 will have at least 4 people from the same company , but there is no-chitchat , casual smiles and nods of acknowledgment. For that matter, even company shuttles follow suit , very little talking, with everyone seemingly eager, enthusiastic and looking forward to getting to work .


The stay being made more enjoyable by the fact that there are friends are in the city , I have some knowledge of places and am more than capable of handling the ever smart auto drivers with this limited city-sense of mine . The recovery-period after the B interview was quite long and I still find it difficult to have conversations without mention of it and worries about the results , that the waiting period is reducing everyday is the only thing that gives me some joy. A lot of things here help me to keep my mind off it , wonderful weekends where I more than happily put my stipend put to good use tops the list .

P.S:
The recent surge in my friends circle for quizzes and activities on facebook indicates to me that almost everyone finds work to be minimal :) . But one thing which surprised me is the page below.




I mean is this some kind of weird joke being played by Facebook as an advertising trick ? If that is not the case, the "friends" and "admirers" are welcome to prove me wrong and throw some light on it in any other form.


P.P.S:

The last post received a lot of attention and a thanks to everyone for your opinion and a special thanks to those who found it good enough to share on their respective twitter/blog accounts .

Saturday
I had reached Bangalore 2 days in advance , some last minute things pending as always , I needed a pair of shoes to complete my wardrobe for D-Day and this was purchased from Koramangla. The fact that I was not carrying sufficient cash resulted in me bumping into Shashank , Mandeep and Vaibhav out of the blue in a street corner in Bangalore . Shasank's interview experience lead me to believe that the route would be clear of academics and it was a "feel-good" interview that was going to take place .

Sunday
2 visits to the temple and no prizes for guessing what I was asking for . The typical last day with a rush to read everything I had written in my one-stop ready reckoner, ironing of clothes and polishing the shoe.

Feb 23rd , 2009:Judgment Day

The day that India had been waiting for years altogether , history would be made today. No, obviously it's not me being referred to here. I tried to see whether Slumdog had already received any oscars before I left home - Resul Pookutty and the maestro A.R.Rahman awaiting the judgment of their work, while here I was about to put my case forward for the same to a different panel for a different reason.

7.50 am :
No, this was not the time I left from home. I had reached the campus by now and was heading towards the M-Block, the scheduled spot where the jury was waiting. I saw competitors everywhere, one outside the gate, one signing in the register just before me and another already sitting in front of the rooms.Everyone had come prepared to plead their cases and put their best foot forward to ensure a future stay within the same walls.The list in M-14 had two "Naveen"'s and one "Navin" and one "Neetha Joy" , one person from the fairer sex in the group, might lead to some order in the GD, I hoped.

8.45 am :
The bonding process had begun , but surprisingly only 5 people had turned up till 10 minutes before the scheduled time.I guess some of prayers had been answered after all, the GD was going to be the easier part. So, it was only to be the 5 of us yapping our way to glory for 15 minutes in the GD . I played the role of the " enthusiastic fresher " who was keen to interact with everyone with the group.

9.15 am :
Prof NarayanSwamy called each individual as per the order in the list, ensured that we sat at the right positions and no it was not a U shaped table with the panel sitting in front of you, it was to be a round table conference with 5 people and the panel sitting in one corner of the room making observations . Prof Bhattacharya greeted us and explained the ground rules to us. So, the fun began, the Case Topic : In light of the current Recession, job losses or pay cuts . What is your stance and what do you think should be the approach of companies ? We had some one paragraph of facts on the same and were asked to start after 10 minutes of preparation time.As soon as the signal was given, I was out of the blocks, starting off the GD, trying to lay a basic structure and define the questions which we were attempting to answer through the discusssion. It did not look like anyone wanted to take the stage from me and I had to go on talking for around a minute before someone took over from me. Through the course of the interview , I managed to speak many times throwing in some management jargon about the "80-20" rule, manufacturing sector's impacts, performance based pay scales and moving employees up the value chain. And while the lady went on one more of her "I have read this article about blah blah" we were asked to stop in what was almost less than 15 minutes , but then we were not really keeping a count and we did seem to have run out of content.

As the other Naveen.C had put it , it is very difficult to "ace a GD" , so I believe I contributed well, had enough to speak about and managed to just write a decent enough summary filling the space they had given me to write. And now, I had to wait, I was the penultimate person in the list and would have a good wait before I had my interviews .

Amidst all this, I remembered that history might have been made and was elated to know that Slumdog did sweep the Oscars and both Indians - Rahman and Pookutty had indeed won the oscars. So that was a good day for India , would it be the same for me ? Would it be possible that I could carry off the interview in a similar fashion to what I had done in the GD ? Half an hour down, the first person with 19 months of work-experience comes out and says the dreaded word : "Academics" ! I was stumped , but I hoped it was not the case with everyone. Naveen C had an interview on Carnatic Music and Naveen N had an interview on his work-experience and again a course which he had done almost 5 years before .So,what would it be for me - Navin M ?

The Real Thing

Prof NarayanSwamy(RNS) came out and called out for Navin M , it was time for me to present my case . I walked in greeted Prof Bhattacharya(MB) and waited to take my seat . So, it began , the jury was out and I had to present arguements in my favour and as it turned out, they tried to flatten everyone of them .One thing which I did do before taking my seat was place my extra-curriculars file on the table in front of them. A file with all my certificates tagged and assorted with the hope that at some point this would draw their attention.

MB: So, Navin . 94 % in 10th, 96 % in 12th and 88.6% in Pilani.( Now , I was dreading where this was heading towards ) Where does that leave you in your class ?
Me : Sir, I think I would be 7th or 8th in my class, I am not exactly sure .
MB:In a class of ?
Me:108 students who did the mechanical courses with me ( Technically,our batch is only 80 in number, but then there were dualites who were passing out with us as well and 108 I am sure was the number in our attendance sheets and besides that sounds better than 80 :))
MB:You are in BITS-Pilani, why are you in Bangalore for your interview ?
Me:Sir,I am currently interning with Oracle,Hyderabad . All students of BITS-Pilani take up an internship programme called Practice School 2 as a part of our curriculum and since most internship centers are in and around Bangalore I chose to give Bangalore as my center for the interviews
RNS decides to poke me , the facebook way in a mild fashion
RNS:What is a mechanical engineer doing at Oracle ? (Smiles around)
Now, that was a free hit for which I had prepared for
Me : The internship stations are alloted by the institute keeping in mind various criterion. I believe that the institute found it apt to allot Oracle to me since I had been placed in the IT arm of Morgan Stanley. This would probably be a good experience for me in the case that I miss out on IIM Bangalore and have to work with Morgan Stanley.
RNS: Is this a programming job with Morgan Stanley?
Me: The profile offered to me is that of an IT Associate, but I am not completely sure about what would be the kind of work I am doing.
RNS: Do you think you will like it ?
Me: Sir, I have an interest in Object Oriented Programming cultivated through my 12th standard where I secured excellent marks and merit certificate for the same. This knowledge is what helped me secure the job, but as to how much I will really be "enjoying" it I am not sure right now.
RNS : It looks good on your resume doesn't it ?
Me: Sir, it just a fact really , I am not sure .
RNS: Just a fact huh , Tell me Dont Mechanical Engineering firms come for placements in Pilani ?
Me: Sir, I managed to get a job with Morgan Stanley on day 6 of the placements schedule and the placements norm dictated that once a student gets an offer he ideally opts out to give others an opportunity. Especially with the current situation I thought that would be the best thing to do.But, later on when Exxon Mobil visited the campus and was in the open for all slot, I did sit for it and secure a job with them .
RNS: So, you have an offer from Exxon Mobil as well ?
Me: There are a few formalities to be completed with Exxon before the offer is confirmed as such ( The fact is that I did get a job with Exxon and I knew it on the same day as my CAT results, so when the HR female called up CAT was one of the various excuses I gave for not making a commitment to Exxon, when she was kind enough to inform me that the results were out. I had no other go, but to tell her that ok , I have got calls and that is where I would ideally be spending my time. After that I have not been contacted for these "formalities")
RNS:And what would be your choice ?
Me: In the case of not gaining an admission from here , besides the above 2 offers , I also have an offer from Lootstreet.com, a start-up venture whose founders are from IIM Ahmedabad and with whom I interned in the summer of 2008. I would want to get more details on the same before I make a final decision.(2 Minutes into the interview, no mention of Lootstreet, I had to take a gamble here and hope that they would pick it up)
RNS:So you have not yet decided what to do , is it ?
Me: Ideally I would want to be in IIM Bangalore and not decide from the above .
A pause before MB decides to get back to me
MB:Navin, I see from your eligiblity sheet (Oh no , please dont see anything in that !) that there is a # in a few of your courses and that you are "Debarred to register" for it. Can you tell me what that means ?
Me:Actually sir, students in Pilani are given an option for repeating the courses for which they are not satisfied with their grades . But, these courses which you mention are Study Oriented Projects which we take up in different semesters. For these, we take up the time and other resources from the professor under whom we are working and hence the institute does not permit us to repeat these courses (I was really lucky to pull that one off,the eligibility sheet given to us was something which noone really pays much attention to beyond the first line)
MB:Ok, so I see that you have done courses on Probability and Statistics(No,please dont go down those lines) , Operations Research, Optimisation Theory,Numerical Analysis and Production Techniques, do you remember anything from all this ?
Me: Sir, Probability and Statistics is there somewhere in the back of my mind, but I dont really remember everything we did in the course.
Smiles from both MB and RNS
MB: Already, ancient you say, what about others ? When did you do it ?
Me: Sir in my second semester, first year.
MB: Is it , wasn't it later ? (Takes a look at the grade sheet and nods in agreement) .What about Numerical Analysis ?
Me: I remember that Numerical Analysis had something to do with the calculation of approximate values of functions , there were different methods like Runge Kutta Method, Newton Raphson(!) Method . I just remember them as names and cant really remember the exact algorithms of each of them. Optimisation Theory and Production Techniques are courses in which I remember the basics that I had read.
MB: So, what do you do in Optimisation ?
Me:We try to achieve a given condition such as maximize or minimize a function within a given set of constraints. We can solve these problems by different algorithms such as simplex or dual simplex.
MB:Do you know what these problems are called ?
Me: I think they are called Linear Programming Problems , but I have my doubts and I am not sure whether Linear Programming is another approach to solving the problems or is the name given to them.
MB: Do simplex and dual simplex come under Linear Programming ?
Me: I am not really sure about that , I remember that we also solved problems graphically, not very sure about the names.(trying to pull off a sheepish smile)
MB: I am still not able to get you, so take a piece of paper and explain to us what you really learnt in OT .(This is not something I had hoped for to happen in the interview)
RNS:Ok, take this paper and explain it to us with a problem you have solved before
I try to take out a pen from my pocket and 3 of them come out.
RNS: Navin, Why do you carry so many pens around ?
Me : (Smiles) Sir, just in case, backup,you never know and I slowly get to writing down the problem they had asked me to.
Sir, there is a function z which we are trying to maximize say z = 3x1+5x2+8x3 given the set of constraints 2x1+7x2+4x3<=30 , 5x1+6x2+7x3<=40 and 3x1+4x2+9x3<=50. We can use the simplex algorithm to solve these problems by introducing slack variables and so on. MB: Can you explain to me what the variables X1,X2 and X3 mean ? Me: They could be basic or non-basic variables depending on our solution MB:No No, In real terms, some real-life example Me: Sir, they could be the costs involved in running a company, say X1 could be the HR costs, X2 could be the operating costs and X3 the material costs/miscellaneous costs (All this with the hope that they would take one of these terms that I am talking about and forget Optimisation ! )
MB: (Smiles) Are you sure this is right ?
Me: Not completely, but I think this could be one possibility.
RNS: Wait , you said these are the costs right , and what have you written here that you want to do with the variable z ?
I had initially started off with maximize and my example had been in the opposite sense.
Me: Sir, with respect to the example I am stating it would be minimize, any company would want to minimise the total costs involved in the running of the organisation , I forgot to change that.
RNS: Thats what I thought as well, why would anyone want to maxmize the costs ! Anyways, continue.
MB: So, what are the co-efficients you have mentioned in the equation ?
Me: Sir, they could be the weights assigned to each variable and how significant they are in the final contribution.(Now his smile has become much more evident)
MB: (Looking at the grade sheet) This is is 3-credit course right ? So how many hours does that translate to ?
Me: Three hours a week and a common hour to clear doubts and solve additional problems.
MB: And how many weeks does your semester run ?
Me: Sir, August to Decemeber , around 24 weeks (that was random and I would not know the implications of this till later)
MB: Are you telling me that all that you learnt during these 72 hours and the additional problem solving session was just simplex and dual simplex methods ?
Me: No, sir . We did solve a lot of problems on the same with different special cases , learnt the same through matrix methods and also moved on to different classes of problems later.
At this point of time, RNS decides to adapt a BodyLine approach, coming out with something that could have lead to me being forced to Retire Hurt with serious injuries.
RNS: Navin, are you from the BITS Pilani in Rajasthan that we all know of or is there some other place where you studied and we are not aware of ?
I managed to break into a smile or something else close to it, to avoid any other evident feelings from appearing on my face .
Me: Sir, I am from the same BITS-Pilani you are talking about and I apologise if I am showing my institute in the wrong light here and projecting a wrong image about it. The fact is that the real-time examples that you are asking me is just not striking me at this moment.
RNS: But I thought that you being a mechanical engineering student with such good marks would grasp these concepts easily and be eager to explain this to me . It does not look like you are interested in Mechanical Engineering, is that the case ?
Me: No sir, the exact answer seems to be slipping my mind at present and I am not able to recollect the answer to this specific question.
RNS: Would you be able to answer the same question when asked in a casual environment ? What would you say if I asked this question while we were taking a walk in the park ? (This was nothing close to a walk in the park for me! )
MB: Navin, dont feel stressed, answer casually .
Me: No sir, if I know the answer I can answer the question when asked in any environment . At this point of time, the answer is not striking me.
RNS: What was the grade you made in this course ?
Me: I made a B in optimisation
RNS is still not clear about my grade
MB helps me out
MB: A is the highest right ?
Me: Yes, sir . An A is the highest sir a 10 and a B is the next an 8.
RNS: So, did you get all your marks by copying or something ? MB breaks into a smile
Me: No sir. I have had to work hard for all the grades and marks that I have made .
RNS: But it does not look like you can appreciate the applications of it , so dont you think whereever you join - Shell or anywhere else, it would be better for you to gain some experience and join an MBA later ?
Me: Sir, if it turns out that I dont make it here, I might learn while I am working. But I believe that I will have enough chances to interact with people with diverse experience in IIM Bangalore's selected batch of students and I will be approaching them to ensure that I learn anything that I have missed out on because of the lack of experience. Also, with such reputed faculty available to help me out, I believe I can learn things faster .
RNS: Is there anything else you studied in the course and you are confident about ?
Me: Other things we studied in optimisation was about Production Centers and Distribution Centers for a company.Costs involved in transportation between each of them is given and we try and arrive at a solution where the demand is met at minimum cost . Simultaneously I was drawing a table of the question and demonstrating it to them
RNS: Do you know what such problems are called ?
Me : Transportation Problems Sir
RNS: Ok, anything else ?
Me: We also learnt assignment problems where we had to schedule a certain number of tasks among a given set of employees such that the objective is met in the best fashion
MB: What do you mean by "best " fashion ?
Me: Sir, since this is a mathematical approach I do not think we can qualitatively say that the results will be best, the algorithm is such that we minimise a certain entity : in this case man hours .
They seem to be satisfied with my efforts to put across my limited knowledge of Optimisation Theory.
MB:Ok Navin , where else have you got calls from ?
Me: Sir, only Bangalore and Shillong have called me for the interviews.
MB: What was your CAT percentile ?
Me : 98.8 Sir
RNS: In the case that you do not make it to Bangalore and get an admission from Shillong , will you be taking that up ?
Me: Sir, I have not thought about that , I will probably have to look more details about Shillong .(What the hell, who was I kidding here, I decided to let diplomacy loose ) But I do not think that I will be joining it if that is the case . Since I have time on my hand and I think I am made for IIM Bangalore, I would learn from my mistakes if any I have made this year and come back and give it a better shot next time around.
RNS: But it looks like you put all your effort in making it to the institute and dont really do anything after that ?
An 8.86 in Pilani and still he says this .
Me: If you give me the chance to join IIM Bangalore I assure you that I will be making the best efforts to ensure that I put to best use the facilities provided to me by you.
Smiles
RNS: Giving an assurance is one thing and proving from what you have already done is something else
Me: Sir, I believe that I have done it to the best of my abilities and I have to work hard for an 88.6 in Pilani.
RNS: It looks like everyone else relaxed by the time they reached their final year and you just got away because of that.
Me: That is not the case sir, I am a part of the first set of students who entered BITS Pilani through BITSAT .Most of us had aspired to join the IIT's and missing out due to various reasons. All of us had high aspirations and ambitions for our future and most of us were working hard to ensure that we achieved what we wanted.(Batch of 2005, stand up and fight for your pride ! )
RNS: Fine, so what are your other interests ?
Me : I have been an avid quizzer since primary school. A quarter-finalist at the All Asia Bournvita Quiz Contest and Champions of the World, I also take interest in hosting quizzes, literary events for an interested audience. I am also a sports enthusiast and a passionate fan of Arsenal Football Club, Roger Federer and Rahul Dravid .
A brief pause, RNS smiles at me and I smile back .
RNS : So why do you want to do an MBA Navin ?
Me : It is my belief that the 2 years that I spend in doing my MBA will change me as an individual. At the end of this period, I will be a wise, mature and accomplished person who has the knowledge to make the right choices from the different opportunities available to me. This would also be the best way to achieve the targets that I have set for myself in terms of career in both the long-term and short-term.
Finally, one question I had prepared for and a line I added intentionall with the never-ending hope that a bait works for once in the interview. They decided to relent.
RNS: And what are those ?
Me: I want to enter consulting after my degree since this would give me the chance to work across different industry verticals, work on projects across various sectors and with time find an area of interest I would like to specialise in. In the long run, I would like to start-up my own organisation , it is just one of those things on my wishlist and I think would be a memorable accomplishment .
RNS: But you do not need an MBA for that, you can learn on the fly.
Me: Sir, but an MBA from an institute like IIM Bangalore with its diverse peer group and renowned faculty would be teaching me a lot, exposing me to different perspectives and I think will be extremely useful for me . Besides, the kind of experience that I will be getting after a degree from IIM Bangalore would be the best place for me to learn on the fly different aspects about the running of an organisation.
RNS : What about your schooling, where have you studied ?
Me: Till my 10th standard I was in Bhaktavatsalam Vidyashram, Chennai and for my 11th and 12th I moved onto DAV Senior Secondary School , Mogappair.
RNS: So you have done all your schooling in Chennai ?
Me: Yes sir
RNS: What do your parents do ?
Me: My father works as a Manager(Electrical) in Container Corporation of India at Delhi and my mother is working with the Railways Tribunal , Delhi as an administrative staff.(Thats the closest I knew about my mother's designation )
RNS: So, both are in railways huh ?
Me: Sir, ConCor comes under the Ministry of Railways, but I am not completely sure about its status as a part of the Railways (Now this is because of the fact that my mother gets free travel passes, while my dad doesnt , so I was pretty sure there was some difference )
RNS: Was he working in some other arm of railways before he joined ?
Me : He actually worked with Central Warehousing Corporation and moved over to ConCor after going on a deputation.
RNS: Ok, you were telling you joined through BITSAT right ? So what is your rank in the same ?
Me: According to the institutes records, my rank would be 340 .(That is my id no and my seniors had mentioned at some point that it was my rank, though it does not take into account many people who dropped out and joined IIT's and NIT's )
RNS: And how many students took the test ?
Me: Around 50,000 students in the year I took it I think
RNS: And where was the cut-off for Computer Science ?
Me: (Very confidently coming up with a number) The last student to get Computer Science had the rank 216 Sir
RNS: Oh, it goes down so low ?
Me: Sir, students have certain preferences, many opt for electrical, instrumentation and mechanical above computer science
RNS: Yes Yes, that is fine
Me : Actually sir, BITS still has a system of giving admissions to around 35 students from states based purely on merit.
RNS: Even after BITSAT ?
Me: Yes, Sir. So 340 might not be the exact rank, there might be a slight variation .
RNS: Ok , Navin. Do you have any questions for us ?
Me: Sir, I have heard a lot about the student exchange program in IIM Bangalore and it giving us a chance to interact with the best business brains across the world at B schools around the world. Can you tell me something more about the same ?
RNS: That is something where after you join, you give in your preference about various institutes with which we are associated: . The institute will be making a decision based on your options and previous performance and then allot you the same. You can either take it up or decline it after the results.We actually have tie-ups with more schools in Europe and anyone who wants to go abroad will definitely get a chance.
Me: Sir, Isnt Stanford a part of the list ?
RNS: No, what we have with Stanford is just a short 2 week program where students from here go there and a few of them come here. It is not graded .
Me: Fine, Sir. I had spoken to a senior who had the opportunity to visit Stanford through this program.
RNS: Oh, a current 2nd year student ?
Me: No Sir. He passed out last year , working in BCG currently, Gautham Krishnan.
RNS: Ok, Good luck Navin .
Me: Thank you sir, turn to MB and repeat Thank You sir .


AfterThoughts :
What could I have changed about the interview ? I dont think there was much scope for that, they seemed to be too interested in testing my optimisation. The fact remains that Optimisation Theory is not the only thing I have done in my life :) . Despite the overall tone of the interview, I have not lost all hope, I brought them down to the Why MBA standard questions had a few smiles in the 20 minute duration . Rather than a 10 minute chit-chat, it was a 20 minute long session where they either saw me crumble or decided I will fit in. What was the decision I will be knowing only later .

Unlike my other posts, this is one where I would want you to leave a comment with your verdict and comments on what I could have done better, I would greatly appreciate that.

For all those who google for the same: IIM Bangalore 2009 GD/PI experiences.

P.S:
The title credits rest with the master himself, Kaushik Mukherjee. People who know me will know that I am really pathetic at naming as my previous mundane titles suggest.

It was a wonderful summer which included a great experience at lootstreet, getting to meet Harsha Bhogle, the slightly more consequential fact being that I got thrashed by 2 cricket "pundoos" ( nerds to those unfamiliar ) from Anna University who are now my good friends, catching up with long lost friends who have suddenly become scousers  ( Praveen ) and getting introduced to more interesting things , like the Hyderabadi Biriyani for one. I am back in Pilani and the usual laziness attached to college accounts for the lack of activity and the uncanny similarity to a Sloth as explained by Kutts last year at a similar stage. 

The Internship at Lootstreet has been a wonderful learning place for me so far and in particular , I had an opportunity to visit IIM Ahmedabad last weekend. The trip was for the IIM Ahmedabad Entrepreneurs meet 2008. The meet intended to bring together all the entrepreneurs who had graduated from IIM A and hence try to pass on some valuable information to the current batch of students. The visitors list at the conference was a long one with many familiar ventures, but not-so-familiar founders - naukri.com,makemytrip.com,Subhiksha and Sintex to name a few.

The 2 day event was a good place for old friends to catch up, to network and get mentored by people who had done it all.There were a few panel discussions on start-ups, ecosystem etc and I managed to throw a question during one of them which was about the involvement of a VC with a start-up - 2 things about which I had minimal knowledge before May 19, 2008. It is not everyday that you get to be in a gathering where there are people(that too many in number) whose net personal worth runs in excess of Rs 500 crores and sit down and talk with them as well ! I believe that this visit has prepared me to interact people with experience in the corporate sector without any fear , which I hope gives me some additional advantage during my Placements and interviews that I will have to face over the next few months.


Through the course of my stay at Lootstreet, I have managed to gain a lot of knowledge about almost everything to do with a start-up, some bit on management,business development, interacted with a lot of people at different levels in their organisation and the best ways to get things done. The trip to IIM A was one more great experience that this internship has given me. To visit an institute where you aspire to be in the near future and meet a few of your "potential" seniors and interact with them is bound to be something that drives you further to make sure that your dreams come alive . At least for me, that has been one of the take-back's from the meet. As I stepped out of the campus on Sunday evening, I could only hope that this was not the last time that I walked out of those gates.

I have been working for nearly a month now and am forced to reflect on what Srihari predicted around a year back that I will turn out to be a workaholic once I start working . Sadly, I have realised that he might be correct. Maybe it has something to do with the excitment of my first "job" or the experience of being in an alien city with nothing else to do , the truth remains that all I have been doing since I reached Hyderabad is work.

Despite the fact that I have been enjoying my work and have been singing it's praises to most people I know , I am surprised at the energy levels with which I turn up for work everyday morning. I am enjoying the work, but am I really supposed to be ? I am yet to use any of my permitted "off" days and am always thinking about the work that might be affected if I dont turn up ( working in a firm of 5 members, it really matters if 20 % of the workforce is off on a day ) . I am more than happy to stay back late to ensure that work is completed or take part in brainstorming sessions till 8, even though it takes me nearly 1 hour to travel home in a cramped bus in the usually "chaotic" Cyberabad traffic.

Over the past 1 month, my only "hangout" spot has been from the R.T.C bus footboards and the only places I have visited in Hyderabad besides my office are the ones where I have accompanied my boss Arun Balakrishnan on his bike on "official business" . Saturday afternoon's are reserved for team lunches at our office and when a plan had to be put off , I ended up sitting alone in a family restaurant with absolutely no-one to call for company .Believe me when I say that Hyderabadi restaurants are totally paisa vasool for heavy eaters , but a complete loss for a BITSian like me whose appetites have been destroyed by the messes - one Hyderabadi Biriyani is meant for a family, not for a person , try how much you may you can never finish it alone.

All this to me looks like symptoms of the disease " Workaholism" and I have seriously decided to fight this chronic disease ( as a first step, I am using official internet for non - official purposes :D ) . I am hoping that the enthusiasm does not last forever and does not repeat with my future endeavours at employment.

The Supreme court of India today passed a verdict that will change an existing education system for the worst according to most of the student population which will be affected by this, but for the best according to the government which enforced this rule. Reservation in IIT's and IIM's the premier Engineering and Management institutions of the nation respectively has just shot up to a very insignificant share : 49.5 % . For a detailed news article you can probably go here . Prime time News channels must be running their debates and polls on this as I write and heated debates must be on at various points across the nation. The 500 page verdict thankfully does not try and impose this rule in private institutions, like this one from where I am going to recieve my graduation certificate (which the government wanted to by the way).

Reservations were introduced in the constitution by Dr.B.R Ambedkar, currently hailed as the father of Dalits and The SC's and ST's. I do not think he intended it to grow into this "vote bank politics" scheme of things as it runs now. The idea was to roll back reservations 50 years after independence because that was the entire point behind the scheme. India had made a plan to move ahead by making sure that there are no longer backward people 50 years from then. But today, we keep moving backward. I hope I am not attributing the following quote wrongly to Mr.Narayana Murthy " India is the only country where people want to be called backward and proud of it " . It just about explains the scenario. No government today would risk losing its chance of winning the next general elections by modifying the existing reservation scenario for the "forward " movement of the nation.

Sadly. all this is leading to a very disheartening situation. The worst hit are students whose best efforts to make it to the best colleges is being thwarted by the government's moves. Many deserving students are missing their chance to get the best education that the nation can provide them.How can we call these the best institutes of the nation if it does not provide fair grounds for students to gain entry to it ? How can their quality of education be judged if they are not providing it to the best brains in the country ? How can India with all this complain about Brain Drain ? How can students who have been deprived of good education be the pillars of the nation tomorrow ? Above all this, How can this "reserved " candidates live upto the standards of others if they are given a concession to make it there in the first place ? How can these "special" ones be the best equipped to put to use the so called advanced infrastructure that the government has established? Will the IIT's and IIM's have the same respect as before in the world outside if 51.1 % students are of one standard and the other 49.9% at a different plane ?( On the lighter side , will intros in IIT carry "Merit/Reserved Quota" from this year ? )

Getting down to the "better" part of the ruling, the "creamy layer" of the OBC's have been excluded from this judgement. But,does this really affect the process at all ? A majority of
these "categories" are in the government sectors, mostly again by the concession that the government provides for them in their jobs. A few others maybe in the business sector. Both fields where the actual "status" might be Below-the-poverty line according to their salary certificates/ affidavits while they live in bungalows with the most posh of facilities. Will the college facilities visit each home to determine whether they are "creamy" or "dirty" ?


The government seems to be making a concession for the special ones at every walk of their lives right from their moment they are born. They have backdoor entries into the premier institutes , government jobs and even promotions in them. How can the nation then blame the educated for failing to contribute to the nation when all that they do is push us backward and backward. Not all of us will be what SRK was in Swades - none of us are willing to do anything for the street we live in, leave alone the nation.


My intentions is not to state that "I am Proud to be a BITSIAN" .Sadly In Fact , at this point of time it is to state that I am not proud of being an Indian.

It is not exactly as the title suggests , there is no prom night on the campus of BITS Pilani, but this is probably the closest people might ever to get to the American equivalent , which is for students passing out of high school. But in the "Indian" scheme of things it would even be a disaster to consider anything beyond a school-organised farewell, where most girls try their hand at the sari for the first time .

The event that I am talking would be the momentous occasion - Batch Snaps . This is the time of the year when all 3rd yearites on campus, spend a lot of time trying to look civilized, change their appearance to look good on those "to be preserved for life" snaps and go around begging for formal attire. Once people start pouring into "Skylawns" at the appointed time, it resembles a mela ground with the only things missing being a merry go round and the ferris wheel. A few crushes are revealed and the equivalent of asking anybody out for a dance would be to take a snap with them to always remember our crush during college. We do have our own set of enterprising people who prefer to turn up for this occasion in very "high spirits". Then there is the discrimination based on physical features - height order which determines where you stand in this very important snap . Once, that is done there has to be a detailed analysis to make sure that everybody is seen from every angle , so in all around 45 minutes in front of the lenses and under the mercy of Lord Surya. The show goes on till everybody has taken a snap with whomsoever they know on campus or till the charge in your battery run out ( of course ,now it is possible that you could now contract out your snaps to the Department of Photography on campus, who would ensure that these special moments are never forgotten due to the want of a camera ). Pappuji thrives on the treats that are being thrown around, though I do have no idea of how he keeps track of who has ordered what single handedly on such a hectic day.

The funda behind this idea is that like every other thing, BITS offers a unique experience of college life. This semester is the last 5 months that the entire batch of soon-to-be engineers will be on campus together with us taking shifts in doing an internship for one semester in our final year. The college authorities politely remind us through this process that we are nearing the end of our stay here and might not be around with many of our friends . In many cases this semester maybe the last time we even meet them before we diverge off to pursue our own future . So, yes indeed this is an occasion to celebrate, get ready for and enjoy a few hours before you get back into your room and realize in order to pass out, you still need to wait for another year and give the test the next day as well :).

P.S:
Dedications to all my batchmates and to the institute which has given me my current identity - 2005A4PS340.

Credits :
Vikram Chari insists that it be mentioned that he is enterprising person being referred to in the post.

Long time, but thats what your 3rd year of college is supposed to be all about. We are finally getting to learn what we actually came here for - Engineering and started leaving the sciences alone after 3 semesters of almost pure sciences. Call it different, call it new or call it whatever, but it is indeed truly bugging to have a system which gives you no clue whatsoever as to what you might do all your life till your almost there at the end of it and have truly madly lost interest. And boy when they come, they really want to hit you hard. I am pretty sure that any 3rd year BITSian would agree with me on the fact that the institute somehow manages to make a test schedule that saps the life out of you.

Now that I actually have a taste of engineering, I have reached a decision that I cannot be an engineer for nuts. At least thats what my course results have been telling me. With tests designed to test your speed at the calculator and permissible errors of upto 100 %, I am really wondering as to how different it is from what every school boy wants to become nowadays. At school I used believe that engineers are people who require intelligence, need to apply their brains and face something challenging to solve everyday.But the truth from whatever I seem to be learning so far looks nowhere near that. Its just a mundane thing where you should know which set of formulae you should refer to in a standard databook and this could well be the dream job that many of us had in our childhood.As of today, most of us around here, even those who took a particular discipline of engineering because it had been their dream since the day they took their first step have given up and decided that this is not going to be our forte.


And college life, well I am experiencing a completely different thing around here. Living in a village for 4 years with only your friends around and at many times not even them teaches you a lot of things. A new set of people to call friends, 3 years of lugging your own trunks, wounds and egoes around the place, cleaning your own room at the end of every year ( staring at all the junk and wondering what made you not throw it away then), "Interaction" sessions, growing from a rookie to novice to amateur to an almost professional at many things, College life ( - acads )is fun for most part of it. If not the books, I am pretty sure the maturity and independence we gain by the time we leave this place will help us throughout our lives to face challenges.


P.S:

I have a critic who says my writing style is "uninteresting", can anybody else review it for me please. This is one of the fields at which I am still an amateur and would like to get better soon ( to add to the list of alternate professions that I can jump to - once they start calling me an Engineer :D ) .

The difference between "Teachers" and "Professors" just cannot be said enough. Despite the fact that our Professors are much more qualified and learned, I am sure that most of us would have preferred the teaching style of the school teachers and also that we would have learnt much more from them than from the gruelling of our professors in college. Even though they used to stare back at us when confounded with doubts and come up with the forever dependable replies such as : " That is out of portions " and " Such Questions will not be asked for your exam". We could always get away with a laugh in the class , the back benchers could enjoy their snacks , listening to cricket commentary or in todays world of GPRS equipped mobiles check the mail , browse the net and what not. Then we were those 'innocent' kids who could always be spared with a good scolding and the familiar " Do not repeat this in the future " accompanied by a an attempted but never threatening cold stare.

When we join college, we do expect our professors to behave a bit differently, for after all they are paid more and we are 'matured' . But the attitude is just too difficult to handle. Especially in a college such as mine when professors are supposed to be the only ones to whom a student should go in case of any problem. They are supposed to be friendly, accommodating and understanding. Out of the some 300 odd faculty here ( I hope the number is close to the actual value ) , an extremely small number would fit the bill above and a tag of students favourite. Most of the professors derive pleasure by laughing at students and pointing out that we do not know stuff which they know by virtue of the 5 or more degrees in their resume. A few of them even try to impart the knowledge that they have gained by stuffing up everything into our heads and get disappointed when we cannot perform in the examinations. Why do they have to try so hard to teach us these things, if we will anyways learn ithrough the next step in our education ? Then there are those chaps who possess so much of an ego that they do not even consider us worthy of standing in front of them , let alone gain knowledge from them. They look at us with disgust as though we are some vermin from the earth. The best of all these highly qualified professionals come forth when a doubt is asked, the answers given just leave us dumbfounded. Most of the times it is their practical experience over so many years that gives an answer for lessons completely defied by theory. In other cases, the answers that they give are just to make sure that we never ask a doubt again, either they give up a huge explanation from one of their Ph D papers or just outright insult us telling that it is a basic concept that we should be knowing( from where God Only Knows ). An answer that would have been recieved only by bitsians : " Please come to my chamber during the Chamber consultation hour" during which there is a 99 % chance that the room would have a lock on it.

What prompted me to write this was a simple incident : In BITS, we have to submit an outstation form when we leave campus to the hostel warden. As it goes with any laid down rule this is never followed and they cant even find out for there are so many places where we could be in .But still there do exist fools like me who make my father send a fax whenever I visit him and make it a point to inform the warden. So, this time around I went to the warden's house at 9.30 to give in the form . He replies "I usually take these only till 9.00 pm .Please come back at 7.30 tomorrow morning and submit". Damn it, he was standing right in front of me and all that he had to was sign the form. Who do they think they are, kings who rule the land ? They are supposed to help us in case of trouble and not keep troubling us for such simple formalities . If they cannot be accommodating, why take up the responsiblity ?


Professors do not have a few extra horns with which they can torment students. But they are trying to frighten students like any raging bull would do to a new inexperienced matador. I would any day prefer learning from a school teacher, who would work hard to clear any of our doubts rather than duping us with high level nonsense. They used to care for us, not treat us like slaves !!

P.S: The hit rate has been simply amazing for me, what magic can some stupid piece of poetry do ! Finally the hit counter is not increasing by just me checking whether there have been any visitors .:)