Food Security- The procurement of food grains

Today food grains are provided to beneficiaries under numerous schemes, like PDS, AAY, APY, Mid Day Meal for students, NFFWP etc. The work of Food grain distribution to the beneficiaries is the last stage of the entire supply chain. It would be worthwhile to understand the whole process as it actually takes place i.e. beginning with procurement. As an example, I would discuss the procurement process for rice. This is meant to understand the entire supply chain along with the various stake holders involved at different stages. The supply chain begins with the procurement of paddy, its transport to the rice mills, its processing at the mill to extract rice from the husk and packaging and transporting to various parts of the country and the local stocking and distribution thereof for various schemes.

As with the other crops the freshly harvested paddy is stacked in the fields to begin with. The paddy has some moisture content present in it. The farmers are free to sell their product in the open market or to the Government which purchases it at the Minimum support price (MSP). The government procures its rice targets through the various cooperative societies and the state food and supply departments.

Normally the paddy sale occurs in the daily or weekly ‘haats’. Some learnings in the procurement are listed below:
o The cooperative societies were lax to begin the collection of the food grain. Lesser margins, political interests or understanding with the private traders could be the reasons behind this. Some cooperatives complained of initial cash disbursement from their own sources, in case if the allocation receipt from the state gets delayed to begin with. The competitors for procurement i.e. the traders make spot payments in cash and hence have a point in their favour unless the cooperatives carry sufficient cash allotment with them. This results in delay in making the MSP operational and the traders purchase paddy at a lower price

o Traders form procurement cartels to keep the procurement price down. Reasons learnt for low procurement price in free market are high moisture content, high dirt and husk content, high procurement cost from middlemen (who at times buy grains from the fields and sell them in haats and earn their commission) and high transportation costs (for sending rice to mill for processing) , poor grain quality etc. These factors may explain up to 10 % variation from the MSP but the market price without the Government procurement remains between 60-70% of MSP


o Even this purchase price gets driven lower if paddy from the neighbouring states, where procurement price could be about 50% of MSP, enters local market. Sadly, the market on its own it hopelessly inefficient without Government intervention. The reason being absolutely no bargaining power of the farmers, the poorer ones and their families living on the edge. If Government procurement is totally stop, it could invariably drive the procurement price so low that within a few cropping seasons it might lead to driving people out of farming. At times even cooperatives pay 5-10 % less than MSP as the rice mills don’t pay them 100% price and make deductions on accounts listed above. MSP, even in its distorted form, at least makes the farming sustainable for the small and marginal farmers.

o Presently barring a few states, most states are not able to produce paddy to meet their internal demand of rice. However, in the surplus states, where the availability of paddy makes procurement and transportation cheaper, numbers of large multinational companies are targeting the produce. This is affecting the FCI procurement in these places. In contrast, in the interior regions with no bulk availability of crop for purchase (making procurement costlier) not many players are entering for buying the produce of the farmers. This is further increasing poverty and dependence on the local traders. Ultimately, the Government procurement is the only hope of farmers in such areas.

o The performance of procurement of food grains by the Government agencies is dependent on the drive of the individuals involved therein and that varies hugely. At places individuals involved have developed close relations with the traders and act as their agents delaying the implementation of the MSP or even avoiding the start of the Government procurement (and thereby assisting the traders in procuring the crop cheaper).

o The procurement season continues for a few months after each harvest. Initially the poorest farmers sell their produce, followed by the medium farmers. Some large farmers do have financial capability to hold the crop for some time and wait for the excess to reduce and let the purchase price rise. Most of the traders also procure and stack the paddy in their godowns and release it for processing gradually so as to allow the market price to rise. Ultimately, most of the crop lands with the businessmen, traders or millers, who have the large financial power and resources and political connections. A part of the crop also enters the public Distribution System run by the Government.

In one of the procurement drives, when I had camped in a haat for the procurement of the food grains, I remember how I had to argue with the cooperative to open a procurement stall. The market price of paddy increased immediately by over a rupee per kg with the beginning of Government procurement, though the traders raised the price grudgingly. Some people still sold their paddy at a lower price to the traders instead of selling it to the cooperative as they explained that the cooperative had come due to official pressure and the next time the trader would harass the farmers in buying their produce. I remember one woman arriving with a bag full of paddy on her head while her 3-4 year old son was carrying some 2-3 kg of paddy on his head in a small bag. They had made unexpected gains that day and the mother had happily bought her son something to eat.

While I was astonished that such a small baby was carrying load on his head, my driver explained that the lady might have walked some 5-6 km with her son to sell her paddy. Her husband might be a day labour and the son was not only helping her in carrying paddy but was also protecting her (‘Maa-yer Rak-kha korche’ as he had said). That day I had something more to learn about our country

Solstice

Solstice is the home coming for the alumni, they are having party after party and the environment is electric. So I should not write about the words of wisdom we are gaining and am writing a bit about the evening itself.

I am just back from the Concert of ‘Indian Ocean’. Marewa, Kandisa, Bande, Kaun, the best songs of their collections were all there. From the melodies of the desert to the baul music of Bengal, almost everything was soul stirring (no jargon, I mean it).

Some generous souls had also sponsored free drinks and people had a good time. For the teetotalers, music itself was good enough to cause the intoxication. No wonder musicians accompanied armies to raise the tempo of the warriors during the war; some ragas can pump so much adrenalin into the blood.

I met someone from the first batch who has been coming at Solstice since then; it’s a wonderful home coming every time he said. Solstice is surely a great tradition for a young school; I hope it will strengthen over the years. And like yesterday, it seems the party will continue for the whole night.

Sorry for Interruption- Another Memoir

ISB is having ‘SOLSTICE- The Alumni Reunion’, beginning from today. I am back from the party to keep my promise, i.e. to blog on the party night. The DJ was playing some dull numbers when I was there and now he is playing some good songs (my Quad is closest to the new events lounge). So here is another of the memoirs, a long one, before I continue on the PDS in my next post.

Amit entered into the premises of the Cinema Hall. He was to conduct the training of the enumerators for the voter list revision work. The work at hand included revision of voter list of over 1000 polling stations of the Subdivision. Since hundreds of primary school teachers were being trained, the Cinema Hall was the only suitable infrastructure available in the town to conduct such a huge training in such a short duration.

During the training Amit explained to everyone that he would make it a point to visit each of the polling station area. So enumerators should ensure that they actually visit door to door to record the voters. After the training some of the teachers complimented Amit for the clarity in his Bangla and the pleasant surprise it caused. Some of them even requested Amit to visit their schools and address the students.

Very soon the enumeration work started. The initial few days were eye-opener. School teachers walking from house to house in the burning sun was a sight that made Amit appreciate the efforts his team was putting in that work. Political pressure and restlessness had started as rival groups had started commenting on the unexpected things that the revision could unearth.

However, the enumerators soon learnt that Amit was not only visiting their areas but also checking some of the houses for the accuracy of the enumeration work done. One of the visits was especially exciting. One of the enumerator had her polling station area close to her house. Once she saw Amit visiting her polling station area, she called her son from her home. ‘Babai, Dada ke paon choo’, was the order. By the time Amit could realize anything, the six feet tall Babai (who was in class XI as he told) was pushing the people around to reach the feet of Amit. That was embarrassing, some 6-7 years back Amit himself was in Class XI and here this boy was struggling to touch his feet. Though Amit tried to stop him, it was useless. The instruction of a mother to the son was the ultimate order for him. He would have beaten Amit had he tried to stop him from doing so.

The expected findings of the revision were written on the wall. Kalipur being an industrial town, people had been shifting across the housings once they got promoted or someone got transferred. There was huge duplication of names since people had not deleted their names from previous address. There had been some large closures of industries in the past and many people had left the place. But as the work was reaching its conclusion, it was clear that Kalipur had about 200,000 people on electoral rolls not present at their given address.

Once teachers had done their job, data was being entered into the computers at the SDO Office and a storm had been unleashed even before the draft roll was out. Rival political groups were accusing each other of large scale manipulations in the past and present. Senior leaders were giving interviews that they would not accept that severely truncated voter list. Senior officials were worried what that chaos was all about and if such a list could be published.

Amit had in the mean time been warned about possible constitution of a HC inspection committee against him for depriving some 200,000 voters of their right to vote. It was not clear how correct those rumours were. Then some people were arguing that roll revision was done every year, so how could 200,000 people vanish in one year. Others were laughing at the quality of the past work, when revision was done sitting under a tree and no one moved from house to house, and were congratulating Amit for his courage.

Some well-wishers suggested Amit to roll back the deletion and seek permission to revert back to the older roll and suspend the election clerk for the ‘mistakes’ and save his own skin. Amit’s election clerk was an old person, a perfect ‘bhadralok’, who had invited Amit some days back on his grandson’s birthday. Every evening he would remind Amit to go back to his home while he would volunteer to stay back at office during night to supervise the data entry. Ultimately both used to stay back and supervise data entry.

‘And they are advising me to suspend this person who has done nothing wrong, just as they are threatening me for an action for doing nothing wrong’, Amit would think.

‘Idi***’, he would smile.

He had also been called by senior officials to seek explanation on what was happening in Kalipur. Some of them were very generous and had advised to stick to his actions if he was convinced that there was no large scale blunder in the enumeration work. However, as the Electoral Registration Officer, the responsibility would be his and implications would be drastic if he were proved wrong.

‘Be very sure there is no error in your work, there is no harm in admitting a mistake if you have committed one’, some one would say.

‘I wonder you are still ok, it is not 500 or 1000; it is 200,000 voters gone in four Assembly constituencies’, some one else would remark.

After all the hard work in enumeration, those were weeks of sleepless nights. But Amit had done audit of all the booths where the deletion of non existent voters was huge. He was sure that whatever had been done was right. And there was no reason to betray all those teachers whom he had motivated so hard to visit each and every house thrice and who looked towards him. He only told people that if deleting 200,000 people was tough, to bring back the missing 200,000 people was impossible. They did not exist on those addresses, so there was no point of retreat whatever may befall.

Amit gave his charge as SDO of Kalipur on 1st of April upon his transfer. As a result of work of some 6 months, the final voter list of Kalipur was published on 7th of April, with some 200,000 voters less than the previous one.

Food Security and the Public Distribution System

In one of the previous posts I had written that I will discuss about the PDS. Since the topic is too exhaustive, I will break it down into parts covered over some posts.

(I) Public Distribution System is the physical implementation of the Government mission to provide food security for all. It is the means to the end i.e. the target of feeding over 1.1 billion people in India. Though many of these people are today self sufficient in managing ‘un-subsidized’ foodgrains on their own, a huge portion of Indian population is still dependent on the food subsidy.

(II) In opinion of a group of academicians, the subsidy and the corruption in the system of PDS actually distorts the free trade and thus harms the poor by indirectly raising the price of the food grains. The figures proposed by these people of allotted food grains actually reaching the right beneficiaries varies from 80% to as low as only 1 %. They opine, if left to market forces, the price of the food grains will adjust as per the demand and supply forces and elimination of corruption could even bring the prices down.
A fair point if it can be established by some mechanism.

(III) However, historically there have been few instances when such market forces have been efficient enough in case of food security to keep the prices low and distribution efficient. The reflection of this failure is evident in the famous Bengal famines during pre independence era where immense loss was caused by the failure of distribution system (and not lack of food grains). Going further down in history is the evidence of regional armies (corresponding to some state boundaries) attacking the neighbour to mitigate crop scarcity in their own region.

(IV) This points to the actual problem, which is the unequal distribution of food grain production, arising due to differences in rainfall across the country, differences in soil productivity and the differences in population density vis-à-vis local crop production.

(V) PDS, despite its weaknesses, has been able to transfer the grains from the surplus regions to the deficient regions. Not to mention that a major portion of the subsidy in the schemes is consumed in transferring the food grains from one region to another.

(VI) What could the prices of foodgrains look like without PDS is evident from the price ranges of Rs 15- 30 per kg for medium quality rice and from some Rs 30 per kg to as high as Rs 80 per kg for scented rice. However, the benefit of high prices rarely transfers to the cultivator i.e. the farmer, in our ‘free market economy’.

(VII) While working in the District and being involved in the procurement of food grains for the Government, I observed that the private purchasers or the middlemen delay the purchase of foodgrains from the farmers after the harvest of the crop. By this time, a vast majority of the small and medium farmers have spent their savings in cultivating the crop and many are under debt. Every passing day that delays the purchase of the crop from the farmer, also breaks the resistance of the farmers to avoid what is known as ‘distress sale’ of the crop. This purchase of the crop by the middlemen at throw away prices is avoided through the minimum support price of procurement declared by the Government.

(VIII) PDS not only provides food grains to the below poverty line people (through PDS) and the old people (Annapurna Yojana) and the poorest of the poor (Antyodaya Yojana) but also protects the poor farmers from distress selling their crop as they can sell it to Government at the minimum support price. (You are right if you are thinking of the demand and supply curves of Micro economics and the loss of the consumer surplus explained there)

(IX) However, the fate of the farmers growing cash crops (instead of food grains which have a support price) is evident in the form of occasional suicides by farmers when the market fails to buy their produce even at the break even point. The issue of loss of consumer surplus, to me, is also artificial. Since in the minimum support price some people who have surplus income are paying more for the Government procurement. This consumer surplus is much less than what people lose while buying the scented rice in the suggested ‘free market’. Certainly, the market price here is not a free market intersection of demand and supply curves. Instead it is a reflection of monopoly power of some in an unregulated market.

With this background in perspective, in my opinion, it is the PDS which has been the biggest binding factor of the Indian Nation State in the post independence period. We do see the rising tension between the states for distribution of river water during the sowing period, but the tensions are immediately subdued due to maintenance of the buffer stock of the grains and transfer of those before the situation aggravate.

So is this system perfect as it is? Is it really corrupt? And if yes, how does this corruption works and whether we can target it? Some of these questions have been pressing the Government, media and academicians consistently in the past and remain one of the prime agendas for Government for some time until a really workable solution is found. These and some more questions, like how have some large multinationals been able to tackle some of the issues involved through efficient supply chains?, I would discuss gradually over next few posts.

ISB's Sixth Anniversary

ISB had sixth Anniversary Celebrations on last Sunday. The young leader is six years old. Six years old amongst a large bunch of Indian and foreign B-Schools, and already counted amongst leaders on many fronts. That sounds great, and I am obviously happy for being here.

The acceptance of ISB’s importance is global and unequivocal. In the pre-placement talks of one of the top consultancy firms, the CEO sent a video recording addressed to ISB students, inviting them to join his firm. A good gesture undoubtedly, though not to overlook that similar address seems to have been made for three of the IIMs as well. In another pre-placements talk, the partner and the MD of another top consultancy firm expressed similar sentiments about getting the best recruits at ISB.

These things are exciting for us as the students of the current batch. I am sure that along with many other things what drives this passion for improvement is a small but mostly dedicated alumnus. ISB being a very young school we don’t have fortune 500 companies CEO as alumni but the level of commitment that many alumni have for this institution is exceptional. I am sure most of us will have something to pay back to the future batches too.

I spent one full year at IIMA (while I have spent some eight months in ISB) and have a lot of respect and fascination with that institution. People tend to compare IIMs with ISB, though there is hardly any similarity. IIMs admit students, a huge majority of whom are fresh pass outs of undergrad schools while ISB is as enormous pool of diversity and work-experience as one might get in India. But at the same time I feel that people who compare these B-Schools tend to compare ISB with the combined weight and impression that all the IIMs carry after their 35+ years of existence; that itself is a pointer to the success our school.

If I were asked to see IIMA and ISB as a neutral person (I am equally biased for both anyway), I would say they are perfect complementary sets. Academic brilliance and business aptitude respectively is the core of the admission processes, as I understand, for these organizations. Together, they can drive the world’s business in the days to come.

And if anyone doubts the synergies; please see the photographs of ex and current IIM wallahs at my quad in ISB, Gachibowli, Hyderabad.

The beginning of an end? or A new beginning

When I thought to write this post I pondered whether it is about exams, a new term or the auction of courses for the next term? Since those are the things we are doing here for most of the time, it appears that the remaining things have taken a backstage. Hence continuing with the ritual here I am. I plan to take 3 of the 4 marketing courses in the next term. With 5 FIN courses completed and a few available for the eighth term, I need to select some of the Marketing courses to work on the second specialization.

Moving ahead, I called this mail as the beginning of an end since as it looks now, sixth and seventh term will be mostly occupied with preparations and as they say here term eight is party time. Even today, I had a group meeting with the ELP client in the morning, had two classes, and attended a case preparation Video Conference session. What a nice way to begin the weekend, with a lot of assignments waiting to be done. But anyway, things move on.

For the information of believers of Indian Astrology, Jupiter moved from the Scorpio to Saggitarius towards the end of November. So now it is positioned in its 'own house', a place where the mightly planet loves to be. That should be immensely rewarding for people with a strong Jupiter on their horoscope. It means proud owners of their Golden Topaz should expect wonderful things to happen in the course of next 1 year. For the non believers, that should mean motion of a massive planetary body, in a different constellation of stars. And thus its Gravitational effect (remember Kepler's laws) on earth should still be different than what it was till some days back.

So it is the time to make a wish, if you have not already made one. Afterall, every changing phase of life takes us to a newer phase. And this is the right time to take the first step, just a bit to make that wish come true.

ISB Leadership Summit

Today we had the flagship event of the ISB, the Leadership Summit or the ILS. The event proved its prime importance, with various professional clubs at ISB participating in the 6 tracks that ran during the day. The who is who of industry was present ranging from the leaders in Retail and marketing, Logistics, Consultancy, IT, General Management, Real Estate, Energy and emerging markets. To make the audience have their choice of attendance, a total of six tracks were organized over three sessions through out the day.

The day began with the keynote address by the Chairman of BCG. That was followed by tracks whose topics ranged from Use of Technology in Education Sector, The Big Picture in Retail and Marketing, Talent as the Strategic Differentiator, Innovative and Affordable low cost housing, India’s Economic Growth: A Tale of Two economies, and Infrastructure Development: The Key to India’s Success. A key point in my opinion was the presence of a prominent communist political leader in one of the panels to bring in the diversity of the perspectives. I also got to meet two senior bureaucrats from the service: one accompanying his wife who happened to be a speaker on one of the panels and the other representing a development authority in the Real Estate track.

I enjoyed last few days assisting in the logistics, transport and protocol for the summit. So back to the good old ‘Protocol’ days making sure that the guest has the contact number of the liaison officer, the LO has the number of the vehicle, and the driver of the vehicle has the placard- so that the three ends meet at the same place.

Thanks God that every thing went well without a hitch.

Enter into the world of case interviews

The recruitment process at ISB has begun with the international recruiters having started their early stage interviews. To handle the interviews properly and be prepared for the arriving domestic placements, people are working overtime to patch up the gaps. In the phased transitions from one level to next, our batch has entered the phase of ‘Case Interviews’ preparation.

We are trying to structure our thought process for approaching the business problems. So for a hypothetical case situation of client’s decreasing profits in an expanding market, people began with a response of ‘increase the advertisements, handle the unions tightly and launch new product’. While initially it was difficult to convince the interviewee amongst us that the response was not really that structured, the situation has certainly improved over time. Today the responses have become more organized and the omnipotent 4P’s, 3C’s and Porter Models have begun to mean something for the first time. No doubt some alumni have been helpful in this slow process of gradual improvement. However, there is a long race ahead.

At ISB we had a big gathering last week for the TiE ISB connect; entrepreneurs and Venture Capitalists attended the same in good numbers. We have also started working for the forth coming ISB Leadership Summit (ILS), the flagship event of ISB with a theme India – Fostering Sustainable, Inclusive Growth for this year. The list of the speakers for the various tracks in being finalized by the respective clubs and logistics arrangements are being planned. I will write something more as we proceed.

And I managed to steal time to write this post, after writing three end terms exams for the fifth term in last two days (that meant had 2 continuous night outs) and with one more exam to write on this Thursday.

Diwali Photographs

Diwali in Photographs

The Festival of light arrived like a breeze and most people took a break from studies. For me it was some free time with the camera. I took some photographs with extended exposure in the dark and captured a few good photographs, or so I believe. I am posting some of the photographs.

I wish you a very Happy and Prosperous Diwali.

Another Midterm Gone.

Is it not what one of the Professors had once said ‘after my paper you will feel happy, if nothing else then for the fact that the paper got over’. And true, ‘Thanks God! The mid-term got over too soon this time’.

Usually after the exams parties are held. So now people are busy debating the Pros and Cons of the ISB administration’s suggestion of having time limits for the parties. We are lucky that there is no one around to implement the Court’s order. Most people, otherwise, would land up in trouble for breaching the decibel level beyond permissible hours (10/11 p.m. for open air functions). And there are laws of the land to enforce that.

Coming back to parties, for me those are small get together where people meet to socialize and forget work and worries for some time. The music is invariable soft and ambience sober. In parties that I attended, you could see the highest dignitaries- the youngest kids- moving around jerking their heads in contempt of the smaller mortals around. They were normally bribed by Probationers uncles and Probationer Didis (Gender Bias) by chocolates, which stuff their pockets most of the times.

So when mid-term and end-term are already there to add tension in life, one should stop worrying for nothing. World and people are still not that bad, may be the threats people perceive are more imaginary than real. And usually as I believe, first things first, get back to studies and no worries in life. And if this also appeared to be written without reference to context, it is not. Try to read between the lines.

Course Auction for the sixth term

We have not had the mid term for the fifth term and course auction for the sixth term is already on. There are some excellent courses available for bidding. And that is the toughest part of the whole exercise of which course to take and which course to leave.

Amidst difficult choices, I am planning to bid for the Investing in Private Equity so as to supplement the learning from the Project we are doing on the Venture Capital. Then, I am also thinking to bid for the Financial Statement Analysis to develop expertise on interpretation of financial statements of companies- Private or Public.

One of the courses, Indian Financial Systems will be of high relevance to me, so I will bid for it along with a course on Strategic Performance Management which has a bit LBOs, VCs etc. I am also planning to do a course on real estate. That makes 4 hours of classes on Mondays and Wednesdays and 6 hours of classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. So hoping for a tough term ahead with possibly five courses to have a relatively free 7th term...

Loss of the Talent- Is it?

It is preparation time at ISB so people are busy with their case preparations and resume preparation etc. along with the academics. I was advised by a young friend who reviewed my CV that I should get my resume reviewed from as many people as possible. Well, good old roomy at D-10 Aravali Hostel, IIT D and the next door neighbour D-9, both VPs at a haloed I-Bank in London have agreed to do the needful. A third friend, another VP, has already started pulling my leg and has forwarded his advance wishes to me for ‘graduating’ again.

It brings back the fond memories of the IIT days when we were preparing to get into our dream jobs. They were preparing for CAT while I was preparing for IAS. But our courses coincided for ‘stat, quant and verbal’ as they called it. I needed those subjects for the General Studies Paper 1 Question 1 and for essay writing. While doing my summer training at Orkay in Mumbai, where breakfast was served for 20 paisa and lunch for 1 rupee, I had saved some money due to the subsidized canteen. My investment was in the form of course packs, used by CAT aspirants, to enhance my speed in stats.

This had served two purposes; firstly I had become a bench mark for my friends who were writing CAT. They lamented that I got higher marks when I was not even preparing for that exam; they rejoiced that I was not preparing for that exam. Secondly, it was age old wisdom of Civil service aspirants to complete Stats portion of GS paper in 60 minutes if one wanted to complete that paper. I had completed that portion in flat 20 minutes and used rest of the time to build my essay type answers. The result was one of the highest marks in General Studies paper, the waterloo of IITians in that exam. 10 years down the line we are all winners, I would say.

So what brings me to an MBA course after so many years or why are the civil servants quitting the premier civil service, or are they? The same question was asked to me some ten times in last 2-3 weeks by the Assistant Editor of a business magazine.

I only know that three of my batch mates in the Civil Services exam went to Wharton and have not come back. That is a big B-School by any standards, I accept. But yesterday I saw a lady who had done her graduation from Wharton and is working in India now. She was here with her team to talk about their firm and various roles therein and various projects they undertake.

I had questions to ask, why working here after Wharton? Then there was someone from IITD, who must have been there around the time I was there. Again wanted to talk to him but the session lasted till 2.15 am so didn’t feel like delaying them for my curiosity. May be they wouldn’t have minded, I don’t know. But I know something for sure. They were working at 2.15 am to get the best people in their organization. And that explains the difference, may be.

I also know that if anyone believes that people are thinking beyond the Civil Services due to the differences in salary, then they are wrong. People knew the pay scales when they joined those services. They wouldn’t like to join as fresh grads in Corporate when their room mates in engineering college are VPs and Directors recruiting at the international level.

We will have to introspect to search for the reasons. May be some people had extra energy which couldn’t expand as much as they wanted in Government system. May be the horizon itself became small while people wanted to grow more. May be fresh air will reduce the feeling of suffocation. If nothing else, the hierarchies at newer places could be flexible and people would like to just laugh at the sense of humour of a colleague, instead of sirring him.

And about the fears of loss of talent, they are unwarranted. As long as people taught in best B-Schools around the world are interested to work in their country, there is no reason to worry about. No system owns the responsibility of ensuring development alone or monopolizes it.

On Education and Agency Problems

The Agency problem in management has been defined as ‘the managers maximizing their personal benefits at the cost of the share holders’ cost’. The cases of agency problems in education systems are as prevalent as in any other business, though have not been studied in such details so far.

Let’s take a case of a school created somewhere in rural area. Almost in all the cases, schools are born due to the vision of some committed individuals. In our country where need for educational institutions, of primary education or higher education, is wide spread. In such situation, it is the efforts of a few committed individuals, some local leader or influential person, whose efforts create school in a location preferred over equally deserving other places.

The owners lobby with the Government for posting of teachers in their backward area and if the school is a private one, they search for teachers on their own efforts. Managers and administrators are appointed for day to day governance as well. However, soon when the hue and cry subsides and the excitement reduces the agency problems begin to surface.

1. City based teachers gradually start commuting, to and fro, from city to village. They can be seen on ‘Intercity Expresses’ more often then in School. Soon they develop an apathy to the problems of the school and are more than happy if someone else is willing to share their responsibilities

2. Then gradually as the supervision reduces, the absence from classes (responsibility) sets in. But since this can be easily identified, role of teaching is often times sublet.

3. The responsibility of conducting the classes and running the school ends on the shoulder of quack teachers who gladly accept this difficult role. These quack teachers could be local unemployed youth or other caretakers

4. Over the time the quacks learn their importance to the school and the dependence of other stakeholders upon them and gradually they fill in the other vacuums. They soon realize that beyond teaching, they are also important for say selecting the students for a few scholarships or for grading of students. Owing to their position, many students may be willing to take private tuitions under them for better grades or position on merit list.

5. The managers too, assured of their salary, turn a blind eye to such events. Since I believe that they are too holy to share the booty with the quacks, it must be that they try to improve their earnings in the form of ‘leisure time’ by caring least for the problems of the school. ‘Leisure time’ after all is what the workers trade for money beyond a limit.

6. This continues as inspections are few and informed. During inspections the genuine teachers report back on duty and the quacks to their normal roles and the authorities are given an impression that everything is excellent.

7. The pass outs from such schools show strange deviations from their performance records when they enter the real world. For example a board topper from Agra, who got admission in a premium engineering institute on basis or her board marks, was soon dropped by the engineering college due to her poor performance in academics. She though had over 90% marks in her board exam while other students in the engineering college had much lower marks.

8. The reason for rise and fall of such students are the ‘quacks’ that distorted grading and inflated their marks. For example in the school examinations if a student not enrolled for tuitions would top, quacks helped their favourites (when they got the answer wrong) for following the ‘right approach’ in attempting the question and giving them full marks. Let’s say they created a plus 6 marks of advantage for their tutored by this. In the next exam when their student was better prepared they may pull other student down for not getting the exact answer by giving them a flat zero while they still deserved six marks for the approach.

9. Over a series of exams, the gains and losses of neutral students even out (Case of a drunkard moving a step forward and then backward and staying at his place), but for those for whom these benefits are aligned move many steps ahead just by ‘policy decisions’. In the worse form of agency problem, policy could be aligned to pull some one down as well, when the competition is high and the rewards like scholarships few.

10. These events don’t go unnoticed. Once people believe it is luck, then they assume it is coincidence and by third time most ‘give up’. Those who still try to report the things are branded as the ‘disturbing factor’. A few of such individuals may be seen trying to reach the DM or the DIoS for solving the problems.

11. Many (though not all) good students still reach the positions where they deserved to be- though after a lot of struggle. Most of those handicapped birds who reached the top of the tree by help of bull s*** end up being shot down. The real loser is the school as its product loses credibility in long run. The deserving students lose their good will for their school.

And the saga of education and the agency problems there in, goes on.

Towards the end of the Fourth Term

The last of the core terms i.e. the fourth term will soon be ending. Today the results for electives for the next term have been declared. I am enrolled in Options and Futures, Fixed Income, Marketing Research and Logistic and Supply Chain Mechanism.

One of the criteria that I adopted for selection of courses is the least weightage of marks for the class participation. As discussed in the meeting with out faculty mentor, someone commented that he got a 9.5 on 10 in Class Participation (CP) without having said a single word in the class while reverse is also true for some. Two marks here and there mean a full grade in the course, so its time to be more selective.

I have also enrolled for Experiential Learning Project with four other friends of mine. We are working with a Venture Capital firm on developing the term sheet models for the deals that firm might like to make.

As the term end comes closer, a sense of change- in the groups, teams and comfort zones- is looming large. One of the mail summarized the mood, ‘Wanted an IITian with a GPA of *.** to complete our group in courses X, Y, and Z’.

'Bandhan' and PDS

I am sure the last weekend was the busiest we can expect to have at ISB. I wanted to write something about two important events of the last week, but could not. Even though it is 1 week since we celebrated the event ‘Bandhan’ on the Independence Day, I am putting a few photographs of the event now. From sports, dances, drama and singing, the visiting kids participated in every thing and wanted to perform more, even beyond the timings of the programme. Some of the moments were specially very touching.

Then there was another event which became important from my perspective. The 8 members BCG team visited the campus with two Principals. In their previous visit some of us had requested for information about the actual projects handled by the consultants. So this time they were prepared with presentations on three projects: on launching a product, on the Public Distribution System (PDS) and one on the IT Sector.

What actually drew the maximum attention was the project on improving the delivery of the PDS. The first hand experience of Ashish on the topic and the information he had gathered working in the Orissa and Chattisgarh villages was eye opener for many. Despite all the complications, social sector remains one of the most exciting and tough sectors to work in. But the satisfaction of, may be, having been of help to poor, helpless Indians is immense.

I might write some of my experiences with the PDS after the end of third term next week. And that reminds me, time is flying at ISB. Only one more core term to go and then people will be opting for their specializations. Doesn’t that mean making some of the crucial decisions of life in next one and a half month? Any advisors?

On Cultural Differences

I think every good B-School has its own cultural trademarks. These traits are the ones with which people can associate themselves, years after they have left their alma mater. One of these ‘culturally differentiating trademarks’ at ISB is that of ‘dunking’. Since pictures speak more than words, I have put two photographs of the first ‘Day time Dunking’ of our section. And if you are confused what a suited- booted Paah Ji is doing in a swimming pool, then that’s dunking or rather having been dunked.

Normally the Birthday kid and his/ her study group members are the first ones to be dunked; until the madness rises when most people end up getting dunked. But what drove the Section to break the tradition of Dunking at Mid-night was the fear of Corporate Finance Mid-term exam. So the dunking seems to be appropriate in the sense that people are washing the (bad) memories of the just concluded paper.

Preparations are also on at ISB for the Independence Day celebration. The best thing about the events planned for this 15th August is the visit of a number of school kids along with some NGOs. People here are planning games, music, arts and what not for the kids. And I know being in the reception committee for welcoming the kids is a much needed change than being escorted to the stage set up for district celebrations in the Collectorate. After all the responsibility to organize a successful show is the responsibility of the ADM General.

It also reminds me of the events I had planned for the Independence Day celebration at the District Headquarter in one of my postings. Amongst all the other things, I was most impressed was the performance of a flute player who played almost divine music. After a few days I had called for him only to discover an untrained rustic villager who was out of earnings, job, shows and a group to perform with. His previous group having dumped him for all the attention he used to draw.

Ranjan had brought with him a lot of certificates along with newspaper cuttings showing his kuchha hut and stories from his village where he works as a day labourer in others’ fields. All I could arrange was to tie him with a professional group with the help of District Information Officer. Now Ranjan is staging shows again and has been to some foreign countries as well. At times if my mobile buzzes and someone cries for a few minutes before speaking a word, I know it must be ‘Babu Moshay’. After all, places have their unique cultural trademark.

Indian Railways' Turnaround: The story retold

Here ended another weekend which I passed clearing the backlog of studies. I just submitted my second assignment for the evening, though the one on Finance was due for Wednesday.

This week General Management Club organized a speaker session with Mr Sudhir Kumar, IAS. The presentation about the turnaround of the Indian Railway has already been covered by some other B-Schools. However, it still mesmerizes the audience. It was a good learning experience for many to see how the organization could earn profits despite providing services at huge subsidies. The fun is that the change was managed once again by the age old bureaucracy. May be when it comes to the ‘people skills’, where conflict of interests is common, bureaucratic experience has no parallel.

This weekend we also concluded the Leadership Development Module, making presentations on diverse topics. We also discussed and watched some of the famous oratory skills demonstrations in movies and literature. Al Pacino in his Oscar winning role in Scent of a Woman was the favourite of the class. But my doubt remains; how many times can one create such sensation and excitement in business boardrooms, through speeches that are made without ‘Re-takes’.

My immediate concern remains about my inability to find out time to complete two of my literary projects. And as Ghalib had said, ‘Hazaaron Kwahishen Aisi….’ Every time I promise myself to comeback to my incomplete tasks- I end up beaten by the speed of the time.

The Next Billion

In our Corporate Strategy project on Nokia India, we saw how Nokia could foresee in early nineties the forthcoming telecom revolution in India. Most of the other companies then would have found the idea of the illiterate villagers evolving in mobile technology users as amusing. Today, Nokia India is an important unit of the parent company, to the extent it even makes up for the lost sales in some other parts of the world.

There are a number of similar revolutions which have only started to unfold and their real impact will be visible in a few years from now. One of them is in the field of Agriculture i.e. in the procurement and marketing of the food grains. Some years back we were learning the ways to protect the small and marginal farmers, from distress sale of their crops, through the intervention of the Food Corporation of India (FCI). Today in parts of the country, FCI faces problem in meeting its procurement targets as market forces are paying more for the farm produce. ITC’s chaupals signify the tip of the iceberg.

In the field of Agricultural Commodities exchange, a lot of changes in the legislation along with the ways and means of food grain procurement could be expected in days to come. And to make the field more exciting, trade based upon the expected future prices of the grains could be common. And the prices could be governed by the global market prices instead of those dictated by the local trader in local ‘haat’ or ‘mandi’.

Beyond trade when we talk of services- ask the experts and they will enlighten you that in the days to come Government will be mainly involved in Health, Primary education, and infrastructure and defense sectors. But that is similar to the oversight of the basic facts about the telecom sector many years back; but which revolutionized the sector i.e. the importance of communications for millions of out migrating rural people.

So as long as the poorest of the poor rural people continue to pay more than the people in cities to the ‘quack doctors’, there will be necessity of organized industry intervention. And as long as untrained individuals continue to flourish with their ‘Montessori’ schools on Bangladesh border, there will be requirement for organized teaching institutions. This coupled with the fact that most Government employees have ‘permanent’ postings and politicians need re-election every five years, the delivery of the ‘official mechanism’ can be improved but at most ‘little’.

And it doesn’t take a genius to guess the magnitude of the ‘industry’ which is waiting to be organized by proper ideas and the knowledge of the grass roots; and about the size of the market, may be the ‘next billion’ for the first step.

The Third Term begins

We are into the third term at ISB. The last two weeks were completely devoted for the studies for the end term examination. And then a five day break in a 1 year MBA programme is a privilege that permits a quick 3-4 day home visit.

Many of us landed late last night and today morning at Hyderabad only to realize that there is an assignment waiting for a 6 am submission for the course in Entrepreneurship.

About the third term, we have Corporate Finance taken by Professor Bhagwan Chowdhry of UCLA and his reputation had traveled to this place before he arrived. And today’s lecture was a confirmation of his excellence, though we wait for more to learn from him. We will also have courses in Operations Management, Managerial Accounting and Entrepreneurship along with ELP and the continuing Leadership Development Programme.

And for a friend who asked to post more photographs, here are a few: One from the LDP session, another of the drawing room in our ‘Quad’ and another of the view from our ‘Quad’.

Another hectic weekend

This weekend was more hectic than I had expected. We had almost a full class day on Saturday. And Sunday was the French language class. In the mean time, there were two Modeling and Optimization assignments.

Amidst this I called on one of the seniors from the service. He had resigned from the service last year and is presently working as a Managing Director in a Private Sector company. Luckily his office is in Hyderabad and I wanted to learn about his experience of switching career.

There were two very useful talks in this week and three major consultancy companies have made an introductory round at the ISB.

Today I also participated in a Quiz of Marketing club. I got all the answers right but there were 5 other people who had right answers as learnt from the coordinators mail, and I was not lucky enough to get the chocolates. Chalo, better luck next time.

With Raikkonen making two back to back wins in F-1, life is becoming better every Sunday. Backlog includes an article that I have to write and a lot of studies. So let me try to catch up with the latter for the time being.

News Update: Entrepreneurs and Marketers

Last one week was intense for the budding entrepreneurs. There was a lot of brain storming for the Entrepreneurship course and the topics which the groups would like to take for their studies. The concerned club also organized a discussion forum where people seeking new ideas for opening enterprises could meet people who already have plans for future.

In Markstrat our team is now second amongst the 18 teams in Industry I, courtesy the failure of our most ambitious plan. As a group we are sad on the failure of our attempt to beat the much larger and resourceful industries 'E' and 'O'. But at least we are happy that we tried to win with a budget of 8000 against the teams with a budget of 25000. Yes, we couldn't do that and lost our first position in Industry 'I' in the process, though no regrets for the same.

The classes for foreign languages have also started and I am enrolled in French class. At the moment we are translating the instructions in English and Hindi scripts to make those understandable later.

Next week we will have the trial bidding for the electives in fifth term and the end terms are also approaching (OK, I shouldn't have said that as still over 10 days to go). But before that a lot of things are expected during and around this weekend and I will be back with those.

For there are no free lunches

Last year when I had heard this sentence for the first time in a Management Institute, I was actually taken aback. Our Economics Professor explained it as the (invisible) costs attached to the (visible) benefits. But the million dollar question was whether the free lunches are good to offer or receive. What intentions will the other person perceive in your offer of lunch? And I had no answer to it until recently.

In contrast to the business world, when we had joined as trainees in the Civil service we were expected to visit the house of the training District Magistrate, any number of times for any number of meals. We were told to not push our hands in the pocket whenever we had a cup of tea or coffee outside with a senior officer. Almost as an unwritten rule, the most senior officer would bear the bill. And then as I grew in the service, it was a wonderful feeling inviting the probationers over dinner and loading them with ‘pearls of wisdom’.

However, in last one year as I saw the repeated use of this sentence by leaders from industry and management academia; my confusion and interest over the issue continued to grow.

So when Sheshadri, Joint Collector of this district asked me to visit his home for dinner, I found my management training put to test. During dinner Sheshadri was trying to push some more rice and chapatis on my plate at every opportunity he could create. The other senior official who had joined for the dinner was equally friendly despite his seniority. By the end of the dinner Sheshadri had again started asking, when I was visiting his home next.

I had my doubts cleared that evening. In life people just don’t meet other people to maximize profits. Dinners are not meant to discuss business deals alone. Human beings being the social animal they are, feel happy with their friends. Most Indian dinners have no costs attached to them.

May be management, the way it is being taught and perceived, is a foreign concept. And these new ideas from other cultures also test our traditions and values at times. Luckily, by a large majority- we continue to believe in out traditions and are unadulterated by diffusion of these foreign ideas. At a different horizon, the width between the middle class Indian society and the U.S. return (elite?) Indians continues to widen.

And I don’t want to change myself from what I am. So rest assured, the lunch stays; if we ever meet- I will take you for a lunch.

MARKSTRAT 2

Monsoon has arrived in Hyderabad in full strength.

Amidst these showers some of the things that took place in the last 48 hours include the strengthening of our team position in Markstrat in Industry ‘I’. Our net contribution is a 12 thousand more than the team in second position. It was a tough decision session as we had changed our two top products and game could have gone anywhere.

Most of the clubs here at ISB have steadied after the elections of various Presidents and selection of the team members. Some clubs have even started their activities and brain storming sessions. Some interesting guest speaker sessions are also expected in near future.

One of our seniors from the previous batch Deepak Mittal, who was working as a TA for Economics course- before joining his assignment in BCG- took a farewell ‘knowledge sharing session’ today. He is leaving to proceed to join his company. Knowingly or unknowingly he was very helpful for many of us, as interaction with the senior batch is not easy in a one year MBA course.

Lastly, have you ever come across the great saying, ‘There are no free lunches’? Well! It is heard quite often in the management world. I will be coming with my experiences on the same in my next post.

The MARKSTRAT World

This note was long due, but the culprit for this delay is the topic I am writing about. I am talking about MARKSTRAT, the simulation marketing game, which is a part of the curriculum for the course on Market Decision Making.

There are ninety teams taking part in the game. The teams have been divided into 5 Industries A, E, I, O and U, each having their own advantages and disadvantages as in a real life market. There are 5 consumer segments each having its own characteristics. The teams are doing research to improve their products, developing their own strategies and learning from the strategies of their competitors and also launching new products.

And as the fate of the teams is changing after every round as per their net contribution, the Products of companies- stars, cash cows, dogs and question mark of the BCG matrix are also basking in glory one day and are flop on the other day. As a summary and as I always say, I am rediscovering Marketing and management. What could be more interesting than seeing your competitors go in red all the way? While you a business czar think aggressively of price wars and acquisitions and watch the novice falter on every step.

But as the game is progressing, the pressure is building up. After all, it is only a small contribution of 6000 Markstrat $ that separates us from the team which is second in Industry ‘I’. Whatever is the outcome -for me like many others- MARKSTRAT is more than part of a course, and we are spending disproportionate time on it aggressively planning for our future actions.

At the same time, Ziv Katalan, our Decision Modeling Professor from Wharton has covered the Monte Carlo Simulations using the Crystal Ball software. Now we are modeling our decisions on oil prices, options valuations, and have also revisited the old Newsvendor Problem.

On the whole this term is more intensive than the last but the component of fun has also increased. And in case if our team does well in the marketing game, I will write more about our progress. And if we do not do that well, I leave a clue for you, I adopt a non disclosure policy (The copy right to the last line belongs to our Accounting professor).

A long post, from the heart

Last one week was full of hectic activities on more than one front. Of course there was the end term that means that we are a 12.5 % MBA already (though this is not my joke but it is quite popular here on the campus).
But before that we had well contested elections for the student representatives for the next one year. ISB now has the President and 5 Directors for the various Councils.
Talking of elections, I cannot help but go back in time to the year 2001 when I was on Protocol duty with Mr. Lyngdoh, Election Commissioner during his visit to our district Burdwan. Being an IAS Probationer gives you unparallel opportunity to meet the Masters of their respective trade. So there we were all prepared with power point preparations about our readiness for elections and there was our boss, who just wanted to move to the field and get an insight from the grass roots.
In one of the villages, Mr Lyngdoh had commented about the political awareness in rural Bengal and that he anticipated something from his visit which could be of general use. Since the election was one of the very first when the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) were being introduced, one of the villagers had asked about the absence of an option on the EVM where vote could be polled for ‘none of the candidates’.
Our reaction was that in such a case the person should not go for voting. But the villager had explained to us that the political functionaries may press public to go for vote. However, the earlier Ballot paper had an opportunity to leave the ballot blank. EVM in contrast produced this Beep sound which could reflect whether the person had voted or not. And so there was needed this option to vote for 'none of the candidates'.
There were also suggestions on ‘Right to Recall’ the public representatives in case if they failed to perform. By now both these issues have been discussed at much higher forums a number of times but I know they had very humble origins, from the masses. And I had a lesson that day; never belittle the intelligence of the public.
However, during election soap box in ISB we hardly had 40 people listening to the probable candidates, and most of them were the friends of the candidates themselves. Another 45 minutes after that the auditorium was full with 400+ people attending a case study session.
People have their own priorities, I respect that, but I still believe that we will have no right to blame anyone if they fail to deliver as per our expectations. Then there was a signature campaign by a few for pushing their candidate into election during what was supposed to be the official voting time. Election was postponed by a day, probably to take a decision on the merit of the signature campaign. And someone pulled out of the contest amidst this nonsense chaos.
In contrast in 2001, after the day’s work, we had visited the grave of Sher Afghan, the Bengal governor and first husband of Mehr-un-Nissa, the lady who was later married to the Mogul king Jehangir and went on to become the Indian empress. Mr. Lyngdoh had read almost everything about Burdwan from the district Gazetteer by then. I had my own version of history arising out of the traditional romantic versions, being from Mogul town of Agra and a fresh pass out of the Civil Services Exam. I know my DM had so much faith in me that I was free to escort and talk to senior most officials, on topics ranging from elections to history, a privilege which most DMs would not allow even to their ADMs.
The evening had a party to end the day, hosted by the first lady of the District. There were officers in their formals, soft music was being played, and words of wisdom and advice were flowing. And for discussion we had the passionate Mogul ‘Prince Salim’ and his childhood love ‘Mehr-un-Nissa’ with all her charm, ambition and that mystery behind a woman’s mind and a valiant ‘Sher Afghan’, who probably had earned his wife and death for his integrity and bravery.
In the next few days we had conducted one of the smoothest elections with almost zero failure. EVMs were grand success, even if there were some technical snags, there were fixed or EVMs were changed. Elections are not to be stopped or postponed, until something drastic happens was the learning. It is just not a sin to postpone the election, it is blasphemy.
Some twenty days after that, the District Magistrate had a mail from the Election Commissioner about the successful conduct of election and containing the exact details of the Mogul and Bengal history, of which our district had had its role to play.

End Terms Knocking at the door

What happens when the exams are right in front of you? Does one tend to behave erratically and start blogging? May be or may not be but I did end up writing this meaningless worth in last five minutes.

A lame man and a blind man were friends and wanted to cross a busy road one late evening. The blind couldn’t see and lame walked slowly, so they stood waiting for the traffic to reduce. One old man wanted to catch a bus. He could see the bus-stop at a distance but still comforted himself with the idea of walking less and stood behind them, believing the bus ‘should’ stop for the lame and the blind. There started the queue and soon a sixty five other people were standing at a place where the bus never stopped.

As usual, the bus reached the bus-stop at the right time and the old conductor gave a call or two. But since no one responded he asked the driver to move ahead. When the bus passed the crowd, some wise men in the crowd waved their hands asking the bus to stop. The driver didn’t care to stop. He had this long standing grudge against the crowd that why the hell do they always stand behind the lame and the blind when the bus-stop is right in their sight.

Sadly that was the last bus of the day and the crowd started cursing the inefficiency of the Government Transport System. Realizing that some thing was wrong, the blind and the lame friends vanished from the spot. After another half an hour, a Tempo stopped at the place where the crowd was waiting for the public transport. As usual some people in the crowd pushed themselves in the vehicle realizing that that was the last option, if they had to reach their destination. The tempo happily moved ahead leaving a few others bewildered.

Moral of the story is that think twice before you stand behind the lame and the blind even if in your heart they evoke a lot of pity or standing in a crowd gives you a sense of security, for you never know where you might end up.

The First Test.

Our first Midterm examinations are over. They were a mixed bag for some. For some others, they were just what they would have wished them to be while a few of us found them rather tricky. Some of my friends were obviously tensed as the stakes are too high. So I was giving 'gyan' to one of my friend (OK, I take that liberty owing to my work-ex in the Administration and handling bigger pressure situations) that management is not all about cracking good grades. It is also a bit about handling pressure situations and unexpected disappointments and still coming out winner.

Australian Cricket team is the best example of management, I could quote. From their finding and grooming the right talent, to their determination, hard work, discipline and aggression, every thing has some management discipline deployed to its full potential. Call it JIT, six-sigma, it is all there and the result is that they are almost running a monopoly now. The Australian Cricket team never seems to be perturbed even after a few hiccups and still manages to win. While most other teams continue to be ‘a house of cards’.

And for those who want to know about the MBA in general- I can say (after having spent last one year in IIM Ahmedabad as a Fellow Programme student and now with my ISB exposure) that the study for an MBA degree is not a cake walk. To say the least, what has now become almost a proverb; it is more about handling the “pressure cooker” like situation. And these courses are designed as such so as to prepare the young managers for the future pressure of the Corporate world.

Somehow I feel that I have an advantage over most of the people here, and that is due to my grooming in Administration for handling the pressure situations. The pressure that I handled as a Sub Divisional Officer when I went ahead for the closure of a sick Public Sector Unit, against all resistance, was brutally painful. Then I passed sleepless nights for months when I had deleted about 2 lakhs voters from the 4 constituencies after the special revision of the electoral roll. My job was at stake, if I were proved wrong.

So when you risk your most prized possession - your job as an IAS officer- for the hard work of your team, those hundreds of enumerators who did that house to house enumeration, you learn to trust your team and also to handle the pressure. It is another thing that you end up becoming the Joint Chief Electoral Officer of the State for the conduct of the Assembly Election in flat less than four years after that. And that someone in those corridors of power tells you that ‘Bloody, you have been picked to do this job’.

Examinations can be tricky, for instance a question may tell you only that the costs are sunk costs, and not whether those sunk costs are avoidable or unavoidable. Of those two only one will give the correct answer- implies that only half the group would presumable get the answer right. So even if someone ends up loosing some marks, that is SUNK COST. What is more important is to feel inspired for the next battle, in the Aussie way of playing cricket.

Different people have different ways of preparing themselves for the next day, so some are partying again. But many are silently preparing for the marketing assignment and a few were solving the Accounting Assignment in the library. Parties help in networking for some and building ‘brand recognition’ which might be useful in days to come. There are others who are working hard for getting into the Dean’s List based on their Academic performance, for that is ‘their’ forte. Then there are many people in the party because they just want to dance in a big crowd and loud music.

But if it comes to my belief, I believe that there are rewards for everyone, especially for those who missed a lively evening and instead spent a dull evening in the library.

It is Examination Fever

It is one month since we arrived in ISB, which means one of the twelve months of our stay at ISB is already over. The time is running really fast and many of us could not believe that they have been here for one month already. It appears that we had arrived here yesterday only.

But that we are here for one month can be realized from the fact that we have our midterm examination on this Friday. The examination fever is getting higher with every passing day. After all this is the first mid term. Just now while I was coming back from the learning resource centre, I saw someone who reminded me of my school days when teacher used to scold us and we used to come back to home dragging our feet. The same old rosy cheeks, turned pale due to fear and punishment. It’s cute that examination still continues to be a terror.

And three of our instructors have finished their portion of the course i.e. the pre-midterm portion of the course. So from Wednesday, we will have three new faculty members taking our classes. Two of them are from Wharton, for Economics and Statistics, while in Marketing we will have a faculty coming from Terry College of Business, University of Georgia.

Right now when most of my friends are busy mugging, I just managed to find a few minutes to keep the blog updated. One more thing is that today I removed the crepe bandage from my knee and have already been scolded by a few friends for doing that. Any way I feel I am more comfortable without that bandage.

I will try to write about midterm or some thing else on the weekend. Right now it’s Examination fever.

Sailing with the wind

One and a half week into the first term and the term is 25 % complete.
How come?
It’s so because each of the eight terms at ISB is of 6 weeks, so the course is going very fast and there is Mid term on week end after this one.

After the first weekend people were longing for the classes to begin. Why? Is there any problem with them?
No. It’s so because there are problems with the weekend- Marketing Assignment, Microeconomics Assignment and FADM (Accounting) Quiz to name a few of them. So the consensus is that the regular classes are much better.

And when we are meticulously being taught journal entries, my disbelief that an accounting course as wide as ours can be completed in 20 contact hours is fading away. And that’s Professor Mark Finn for us- with all the delight he gets in teaching his class (you have to be in the class to feel it).

Then in the Class of 2008 when there are 8 Amits, 7 Nehas, 6 Nitins, 6 Gauravs, 6 Abhisheks, 5 Saurabh/Souravs, 5 Satishs, 5 Rohits, 5, Ashishs, 4 Sachins, Viveks, Vijays, Puneets, Prashants, Pankajs, Kartiks, Ankits and Abhijits each, no wonder to distinguish amongst three Puneets in our section, our Micro Economics Professor had to call me the ‘Quieter Puneet’.
It’s true Amit, most of us have few doubts by the end of the class so it’s more to learn than raising questions.

Any MBA course would be incomplete without a course in Marketing. Any marketing course will be incomplete without CP. (‘Class Participation’ for the uninitiated). And when there are 20% marks at stake for the class participation, the class is bound to look like a stock exchange. But this time our Professor stumped us by randomly selecting all the groups for the CP. People had to orient their thoughts at the shortest notice and even an eternal CP master Sourya Da was caught off guard.

So all of those who are listening and want to know about an ISB MBA, I can say that it is like a cool wind and you have to be really fast and alert to keep pace with it. And that is the real fun which our batch is enjoying at the moment.

Bye for now and C u soon with the next post.

First Class at ISB

Today was my first day in class at ISB in real sense. Since I was not registered for any of the pre terms or the preparatory courses, I was sort of relaxing and recuperating after the ‘orientation madness’ (the topic of the photography contest here- right). Only that my ligament injury is very painful.

Today’s class was special for me because our Statistics Professor happens to be from Wharton. I had this curiosity that when those schools have such exceptional reputation then is there really some differentiating factor. I must admit that I got to know one of the factors. Today’s class was much different from the types of class where you substitute values in equations and ‘EUREKA’. You discover you’ve got the answer.

And then in the microeconomics class we were reintroduced to microeconomics, very differently with the help of a trading game. So I reconfirm my joining ISB as a wise decision. As most people used to say, here you get to learn from amongst the best in the profession.

And continuing from my last post, the batch of 2008 continues to amaze me. For one full week our mail box was jammed with mails from people offering a helping hand or volunteering in club activities when no student body has yet been formed and even before the classes had begun. (Hmmm….. elections at the end of the first term)

Thanks God that the classes rushed to us. And with that came the wisdom and awakening that being prepared for the classes might not be such a bad idea. So for last three days the mail flow dried up like the municipality water supplies. Obviously those who started the readings must have finished reading those and so the celebration reflected in the party coinciding with the world cup final. And as usual I got to hear the loud music while this injury wouldn’t permit me being on the dance floor.
And as the party creatures blurred away in smoke, today there were different and determined faces carrying books and lap tops to their classes.

Being to class today also took me back in time, when another batch was flocking to LBSNAA Mussourie. That of the people selected in the batch of Civil Services ’99. And while some of my friends in Civil Services will be going to Mussourie this June and then to US for the Phase III training for the IAS Officers, I will have to miss the same.

And if I have sounded straight forward so far, I’m not and nor will the life allow it to be like that. Life continues to be wonderfully mysterious and confusing. It is like a lost mail, where you are never sure whether it ever reached the destination or not. And so when I was planning to take sports seriously in the next year, for CV point’s sake, I got this leg injury which will take less medication and more time to heal.

But the game has just begun, there is one full year to unfold before all of us, and I wait in excitement for the same.

Some photographs of the Orientation Week