Category Archives: isb

2 days of effort down the drain…

Its always hard when you put in a lot of effort in doing something but it doesn’t work out well. In that event, the one consolation you have is that you did give it your best shot but it wasn’t meant to be.

However, even harder task is when you spend a lot of time preparing for something, to the exclusion of a lot of other things, and don’t even get a chance to have someone look at your work. Something similar happened today. I worked on preparing a presentation (for a company interview, what else 😉 ), but got eliminated in the first round itself, while the ppt was actually scheduled for the second round! It is ironic though, spending so much time on something that you know you may not even get to present.
Anyway, thats what the internet is for: sharing ones work without having to undergo distribution charges for the content! So heres what I did prepare, a study on some features that could be added to the multi-protocol IM service: Meebo (Now my previous post makes sense as well I bet!).
The presentation is a bit incomplete/simplistic, because I of course expected to be able to explain it all in much greater detail, but hey, feel free to leave your comments.
Most of the revenue assumptions/estimates are in an embedded excel as well as a word doc with a hypothetical blogpost introducing one of these features.


PS: Awesome background/font template credit to Amit Goyal.

So much to do, so little time…Term 6

Ok, so this is going to be summary of the fast paced Term 6, simply because I don’t have much time to write a detailed post on each event. And that’s the whole point of this rant, time!

Term 6 started off pretty slowly with not much to do except all the events that we had this time. We had the Venture Capital Investment Competition, in association with the Kenan-Flagler Business School @ UNC. This was an internal round and the winner from ISB gets to participate in the Asia Round that we are organizing for the first time sometime in Feb. The winner of the Asia round then gets to goto UNC to participate in the finals with students from among the top B-Schools in the world. So this was kind of a trial run for us in preparation for organising the Asia round. I was handling all the logistics and I can tell you, it wasnt an easy job. It did go off without a hitch though, so no complaints.


VCIC Internal Round
Parallel to the VCIC, we also had the Energy Conclave organised by the Energy and Manufacturing Club on the same weekend!

Next, we had the RBI Governor, Dr. D Subbarao on campus to talk about the impact of the recent crisis on India and our future growth.

Dr. D Subbarao @ ISB

Then we had the ISB Leadership Summit, ISB’s flagship event with over 30 speakers coming over to speak on multiple panels, all on a single day. It was an interesting experience, with the sad part being the choices we needed to make on which discussion to attend. I settled for a very interesting panel discussion where Mr. B S Nagesh, the MD of Shopper’s Stop, spoke on his experience with Indian Retail and its growth over the years.

Mr. Nagesh on Indian Retail

Then of course, we also had ISB Day celebrations as ISB turned 8, with a cultural program over the weekend as well, with some great performances by students, staff, families, you name it!

ISB Day- The Acapella Band!

In between we also had the finals of iDiya, the social entrepreneurship competition, with teams of working professionals from all over India competing, and the top 6 teams attending mentoring workshops at ISB. One of the highlights of the competition was the session on Responsible Leadership by Rahul Bose, who besides being an actor, is involved in a lot of different things, from the Indian rugby team to his NGO.

In addition, pre-placement talks have started, with companies coming to campus almost everyday to deliver their pitches. There are some really interesting roles up for grabs, and resumes are being polished, and interviews being prepared for.

And last, but definitely NOT the least, we have Solstice 2009 this weekend. The biggest fun event of the year, when ISB alums from all over come back to school for 3 days of partying with the current batch.

WHEW! So much for being short, I am already out of breath.
Oh, and this is just a single term at ISB!

PS: Originally posted at http://isbweblog.com/2009/12/15/so-much-to-do-so-little-time-term-6/, and edited by Amit Goyal, our friendly ISB weblog admin.

Baraat @ ISB

Amid the chaos of life at ISB, you make friends in the short while who last for a lifetime. And there are occasions where you get a chance to celebrate with people who you share so much with in this one year. One of our batchmates, Nikhil, recently went off to get married during the 6th term. He plans to go off on exchange to New York, and apparently his parents decided the risk was too great and preponed his planned marriage 😉
Unfortunately, very few of us could make it to Indore for the marriage (during a term weekend). However, we did do the next best thing this weekend and celebrated Nikhil’s marriage ISB style with a dunking (of course!). The slight addition: A proper Baraat at night with a horse, dhol, basically all the necessary ingredients for the marriage party of a dear friend. It was a fun night, maybe the best yet!
Though photos cant do it justice, the following Youtube clip has a compilation of pics showing the fun we had:
Heres to you Nikhil and Priyanka!

Three parts to Life @ ISB

No, this is not the analysis of the different study terms we have here at ISB. What I am looking at is the three kinds of things we end up doing on any given day. The first thing you are warned about at ISB and you are expected to do is, well, study. Attend classes on the weekdays and try to finish assignments on the weekends. The weekdays actually end up being a lot more chill than the weekends, since we only have classes for 4 hours 4 days a week (in the core terms at least).
The weekends are much more hectic, with multiple assignments due early in the mornings. Most nights are spent completing the assignments, with scenes of people running all the way to the boxes placed in the atrium to submit them at the last minute, to people sitting on the submission box to stop anyone taking the box away till their group arrives after printing the assignment! Time, however, is snatched away for outings after a night-out or suddenly formed movie plans.
The second part of life here is the social part. This includes all the speaker sessions we keep having on campus, with a choice often required between multiple sessions going on simultaneously. That’s when you need to prioritise ruthlessly. Of course, then there are all the cultural events, weekend parties and short outings to just chill out and relax. And yes, we have a dedicated Student Life Council charged with organising such events, and they really do one helluva job!!
The third and equally important (Yeah, right!!) part of life here is…. sleep. Yes, something that we get precious little of much of the time. On an average, so long as you manage 5-6 hours you are good. This is also the most flexible component in the course, and the only place where you can compromise.
You can decide that you don’t care much about your grades, but that doesn’t mean you can just chill out. Attending classes is compulsory, and the same is the case with the assignments, unless, of course, you want to risk failing the course.
What invariably ends up happening is that sleep is usually the only thing you can be flexible on if you want to do everything else. For example, today there was an interactive session with Rahul Bose. So in addition to classes, studying/preparing reports and the session, if I want to write this post, that’s another half an hour of sleep sacrificed.
PS: Also posted on www.isbweblog.com, ISB’s official student blog.

Contemplation….old friends and the world outside ISB

Theres nothing like sitting in front of the 24hr CCD (yes, we have one on campus…) in the cold, at 1AM at night, coffee in hand, doing nothing, but talking on the phone to a really really old friend. I know there are deadlines to meet, people to see, but theres nothing like talking to someone after such a long long time, someone whos not from ISB, someone not bothered about what assignment needs to be finished this week.

It makes one think about the world outside ISB, about old friendships/relationships, things to do that dont involve pre-reads/cases/assignments/speaker series/case competitions/resumes.
Yes, I know I am supposed to be busy, working away, but you know what, the one thing you can always adjust in ISB is time, with sleep the only thing thats going to take a hit, the only thing one can compromise on here in ISB in fact!