goodthingsattheend

Noooooooooy'd at GREAT LAKES

2006-12-28T07:50:00.000+05:30

Well, the best thing to happen till date in chennai :)
I was really surprised to see a maganinomously famous face at the GREAT LAKES - Yale conference, last weekend. I could recollect that this was the face, I identified in a visual round of a quiz few years back, the lady at the helm of a VERY FAMOUS BRAND, and making indians proud abroad, especially proving that GLASS CEILING and all is crap and bull shit :)
the fourth most powerful lady on PLANET, and the lady who had guts to draw parallels between United states and "middle finger " , and many more !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! INDRA NOOYI
Yess, she was with us ,and after watching her speak, i think PEPSI made the best decision in history :))))

Ms Indra Nooyi in all praise for
Great Lakes!

(Or)

Ms Indra Nooyi emphasises on
“Global Mindset, Indian Roots”

Chennai, December 25, 2006: The PepsiCo Chief Ms. Indra Nooyi, emphasized that everyone should cultivate a global mindset and a local insight in order to make a mark in this globalized economy. Ms Nooyi, who is acclaimed by Forbes magazine as one of the world’s powerful women, made a special appearance and delivered key note address at the Yale – Great Lakes Center for Management Research’s International Conference on “Global Mindset, Indian Roots” held in Chennai. Ms Nooyi, who epitomizes the theme “Global mindset, Indian Roots”, felt that it was time for academia and research to come with more contemporary methods of ‘predicting future behavior’ of consumers by observation, by cultural focus and by ethnography rather than using the traditional methods of qualitative research.

Ms Nooyi commended Great Lakes Institute of Management for having an excellent international focus. Ms Nooyi said she was very much impressed to see Chinese language being a part of curriculum, a feat which even eminent universities doesn’t have. Ms Nooyi, alumni and also a Board member of Yale, commended Great Lakes Institute of management for partnering with Yale. She said that ‘Yale’ is very dear to her heart and she would extend her support for strengthening this initiative.

Dr Venkat R. Krishnan, the Director of Yale - Great Lakes center for Management Research, speaking on the occasion, said that the center aims to promote, facilitate and advance India-centric management related research which contributes to the development of basic and applied knowledge in the field of management. He said that this conference will act as a bridge that links scholars around the globe with India as a common interest.

Apart from Ms Indra Nooyi, several illustrious thought leaders and professors of the world shared their views in the conference. Dr Seenu V. Srinivasan of Stanford University, who is regarded as world’s foremost authority in marketing research, expounded the technique of a using ‘conjoint analysis’ as a method to predict future behavior. Prof Paul Prabhakar, Dean of FSU spoke about the DNA of a sustainable business enterprise. Dr Sudhakar Balachandran, who was awarded the outstanding faulty award at Columbia Business School, spoke on Share holder value maximization. There were many interesting case studies/talks by Dr Suj Krishnaswamy, Dr Sridhar Moorthy, Dr Rama Shankar, Dr Siva Nathan, Dr Ashok Vasudevan and Dr Neharika Vohra. Paper presentations from many well known schools like Indian Institutes of Management – Ahmedabad & Bangalore, Indian School of Business-Hyderabad, IIT-Khargpur, IIT- Chennai etc also attracted the audience. Prof Sriram, Executive Director of Great Lakes thanked Ms Indra Nooyi and all other distinguished professors for making such thought provoking speeches.

Great Lakes finds Great Location :)

2006-12-01T11:07:00.000+05:30

Heyyy
i have a great news to share with all the guys,
please do read it !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Great Lakes Institute of Management Announces setting up of own Campus

~ Great Lakes Setting up own campus on ECR road ~
~Announces New Chair professorships~

Chennai, November 30, 2006: Great Lakes Institute of Management, a leading B-School, with an objective of offering world class education, has announced setting up of its own campus on the East Coast Road of Chennai. The three year old B-School is currently being run in leased premises. The B-school invested huge money in acquiring the 14 Acres land in the serene East Coast Road which is the new knowledge corridor of Chennai.

The new campus will be a sophisticated, full fledged one with all modern amenities. The institute plans for a total built up area of 1,80,000 sft and out of it 1,25,000 sft will done in the first phase. The campus would be a complete residential one with facilities like hostels, amphitheatres, electronic classrooms, auditorium, staff quarters and spacious playgrounds. The design of the building is ready and The Institute plans to start the construction activity in couple of months and wishes to start complete operations by 2008 academic year.

New Chair Professorships
Great Lakes Institute of management, which was started by illustrious academicians of US along with the support of Indian Industry bigwigs, aims to become an Institute of excellence in Management education in India with in 2 years. While the new campus infrastructure catapults the learning ambience, the institute is also focusing on the enhancement of its knowledge capital by taking new faculty on board. In addition to the existing chair professorships, Great Lakes announced few more Chair professorships. Mr Gopal Srinivasan, MD of TVS Electronics and Mr KB Chandrasekhar, Chairman of Jamcracker Inc donated Rs 1 Crore each for setting up the prestigious chair professor ships in two domains. Three more chairs in the areas of Finance& Banking, Infrastructure, and technology are also on the cards.

Marketing Focused school
The Institute, during the visit of the marketing legend, Dr Phil Kotler, announced that it has identified its core competence in the area of marketing and that it aims to become a marketing focused school. With this, Great Lakes is following the footsteps of premier US B-Schools which are known have focus in one area. Its no wonder that Great Lakes, which is closely associated with Kellogg chose to become a marketing focused school.

Giving the rationale for focus on Marketing, Prof Sriram, executive director, said that Great lakes has an unparalleled intellectual support from the illustrious marketing professors of the world. The legendary Dr Philip Kotler visited Great Lakes and will be associated with research for the next 5 years to support the center in all forms. Dr Seenu V Srinivasan, the Adams distringuished professor of Marketing Research of Stanford University, regularly teaches here. In addition to them, Dr Paul Prabhaker, the Dean of the School of Business and Economics. Fayetteville State University, North Carolina, has keen involvement in the operations of the institute.

To take marketing focus much further, Great Lakes, along with DrPhilip Kotler, announced setting up of “Kotler-Srinivasan Center for Marketing Research” for enhancing marketing based research in India. This center receives financial as well as Knowledge support from both the stalwarts on which the center is named. A member of the Academic Advisory Council of Great Lakes, Dr. Kotler is involved with their key research projects at this B-School. This center is the second research center for the school which already houses Yale-Great Lakes Center for Management Research, promoted jointly by Yale University.

About Great Lakes Institute of Management
Great Lakes Institute of Management, a premier Management school started in partnership with US based schools, aims to seek, mould, polish and develop leaders with changing times. The institute has adapted the best features of the American management education adapted to the Asian values and ethos. With the commitment and focus as enunciated here, their objective is to offer world-class program, designed to help each student realize their full potential. Great Lakes Institute of Management, recognizes that India tomorrow will be shaped by entrepreneurs who can creatively leverage knowledge, skill sets, business processes, technology and intellectual capital.

For Media Queries please contact:
Mr Vikranth V
Great Lakes Institute of Management
Tel: 044 42168228, 0 98847 20840

Im Baaaaaaaaaaaaccccccccccccckkkkkkkkkkkkk

2006-11-25T22:20:00.000+05:30

Frens, now there are lots of things happening at my college, apart from good things happened to me during my internship

Check out these links

www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/headlines/srinivasan_mktgcenter.shtml

And BTW L'Attitude, the annual fest by Great Lakes is gonna be on Jan 5th & 6th.
Please check out the blog or website for more details.
http://www.glakes.org/lattitude/index.html

Yale - Great Lakes Research Centre

Yale - Great Lakes Research Centre Presents the first International Seminar on "Global

Mindset Indian Roots". With an aim to promote, facilitate and advance India Centric

Management Research, the centre through this seminar will try to bridge the links between

Speakers from across the Globe.

Papers for the same are invited on the above mentioned theme. For more details pls. log on to
http://www.glakes.org/research-center.htm

HIBERNATION TERMINATED !!!!

2006-10-27T20:48:00.000+05:30

Guys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
first of all please excuse me for not updating my blog !!!!!!!
believe me,its been really hectic these days.I wrote 3 months back, and u have every right to thrash me :)))
well, things have been great, lots of exams,i cant believe tht 1/2 MBA is over n tht too so fast. GOOD!!!
time since i wrote my last blog, 3 terms r over and right now im doing an internship in bangalore with a company called REACH Technologies.Its a great experience, n the best part is here interns report to CEO (small company though),tht makes life easier n tough
er tooooo.

Going back to college days,last couple of months have been fantastically great. lots of courses, lots of profs, lots of exams, n lots of fun
I will keep update my blog regularly with all the fun I had these days (it will take me sometime to put the incidents in the paperoooooops weblog :)))) by the way its not an excuse). Gettin back to corporate life is a boon as well as a bane, boon insense we dont have to study n do assignments aftr goin home, bane we hardly get time to go home :(((((
I left office at 4 in mornin yesterday, so u can imagine!!!!!!!!!!
I promise , i will update my blog every week frm now on

HEY GUYS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Former American President Mr.Carter is comin to India, to help out Tsunami-affected ppl, and
he is goin to take help of great lakes students toooooo,
thts really good, dontu think so.Uncle bala is also goin to accompany him.....
More on this, i will keep updating u folks,
for now bbbbbbubbbbbbbbbbbyyyyyyyyyyyye

BRAHMAN INSIDE

2006-06-30T18:34:00.000+05:30

Philosophy is boring but it made me understand something about Indian culture, that I was not aware of.But strictly speaking I cant see at as an academic subject, thats the reason I got screwed up in the exam.Well I had lots of company tooooo :))
Dont get surprise with the word "BRAHMAN", its nothing but the worldly soul, i.e god.
Philosophy is too much into my head these days and as a result I am using these words. Please excuse me.

Lets get into the "good" part.Last couple of weeks had been wonderful, again
with exams, results and again exams.Not "good" part though.We had exams of strategy,marketing, accounting,philosophy and macroeconomics.I am not bothered about results though.After the respective exams, we freaked out big time,watched couple of movies, went out to eat to good places like Noodle house,Kaaraikudi (chettinad style) and for a surprise no beer since last 3 weeks.
Life was getting too monotonous with all the exams, academics and
assigments. We were looking after for a brain-teasing break, and suddenly we heard that our college events comittee is going to conduct a Biz quiz. WOOOOOOOOOOW.IT cant get better than that, I was excited at the thought.I had couple of friends with whom I decided to form a team.As you know there aint any preparations to be done, thats the best part :)))

THE DAY

THE DAY arrived and as many of them even I was excited.There was this team in another section which was considered to be the best, it had one of my close friend, we call him bulla.I dont think anyone gave my team a look.But that doesnt matter.ITS great to be an under-dog.Asusual, prelims took off.25 questions,15 mins, all decent questions , but again we didnt answer too many.I thought the story is over for us.After exam had a drag, just was waiting for the announcement for top6 from 30 teams.Meanwhile I tried dedicating "CHOPSUEY" to my friends in class, to find that it wasnt available in jukebox.hehehehehhehehehehehehe
Results were announced, asusual bulla's team was 1, then so on till 5.I was sure that we didnt make it , but then the beautiful girl announced "BRAHMAN INSIDE", whhhhhhhhoaaaaaaaah, it was my team, and we were bloody sixth, but anyways I think it was decent.
Quiz started, 6 rounds,got screwed in first round.we were waiting for a round which had trivia regarding businessmen, and it happened to be the second.Nobody thought we could screw other teams and eventually we lead the round.Samething repeated till 5rounds.we were topping the quiz at that point.

RAPID FIRE...... I hate this round, I could say that the round was so different this time, that we barely scored any point, and moreover we lost 10 points in negative.It was so embarrassing,but I think its a part of game.We didnt blame anyone,except for our luck.As expected bulla won the contest, and full praise to him.Overall , it was a wonderful event after a longtime, and made an impact over fellow friends.Mileage creation, they say :))))

After such an exhiliarating day,we had to study for the final exam of philosophy.Back to the square again. Hey friends, I will update my PAGE 1 group photo, and also the quiz pics very sooon.

Entertainment Ka TADKA

Asusual, I thought I will post review about a movie.This time its Krish.
well, hmmmn,errrrrrrrrr, what to say.Its an awesome movie for indians.I dont think there was any movie which was shot so well in Indian cinema. Awesome stunts,great screen presence by hrithik.Movie is worth watching once. Kids,will love it like anything.
Some people may not like it, due to highly Indianised first half.But dont worry, these are people who blow whistles if its SPIDERMAN and criticise if the samething repeated in Hindi.
Full marks to hrithik.Movie will be a runaway hit in chennai, because of its heroes similarity to the TAMIL superstars rajini and vijaykanth.
I also happened to watch MI3.Stunts are great , and we hardly get to watch anything else in the movie. Tom cruise is first rate.Maggie Q sizzles !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

5 P's and one 'A'

2006-06-16T12:47:00.000+05:30

Well, for most of you , 5 P's is confusing, but for all the MBA grads also its little confusing.This is because, during their academics they have heard either 4 or 7 P's in marketing. Hmmm, you are correct this 5th P is something related to me and the one A is related to the 5th P. I know its getting little bored with all these numbers ,then let me get into the stuff right.
First of all, sorry for being late in posting,now I am putting a disclaimer that I would be updating the blog once in 7 or 10 days depending on my free time.
Last fortnight was a very interesting and stressing one due to loads of assignments,presentation preparations and exam scares too.Finally,my wish came true, when I was in marketing class, getting taught by Dr.Paul prabhaker Sir, making it more interesting.All of we guys were enjoying the lecture to the maximum, marketing always fascinated me, and now there is anything else that can really divert me from being a marketing guy.Asusual, we got the assignments and this time it was to work on any "Company" and get the details about the marketing and business concepts. Thankfully because of my team mate we have decided to go for "AIR DECCAN" and the worst I decided to be the marketing project co-ordinator.Lots of eye brows were raised when I told that I wanted to be , but out of modesty no body put up any resistance.MBA teaches people to be decent , u know, and I was confirmed about that.Apparently, I had to work out and make sure that everybody is passing the information.It wasnt difficult since noone was working and asusual we all started working on the final day(For the first time I finished my part well ahead in time, and it made sense to all,and I also worked hard for that, may be because of interest in the subject)
Before all these events I was very happy to having passed the Philosophy with a C grade(However its no where near a substantial achievement).

THE PRESENTATION DAY

Presentations were supposed to start at 7.30 in morning, and since this was my first official presentation I had butter flies in stomach.We were supposed to come in formals, and I always follow formal suppositions(Is there any word like this?????).8 presentations were there and mine was the 7th making it more difficult.Presentations started with Tata motors,tata steels,TMB,Airtel, Kotak,Jet Airways.My turn came, and I already saw lots of people were bored and some of my friends yawning like hell.I was unhappy to see, the content of others presentations being good and the content for our presentation was not much and it depended on me and my frens presentation.Now you cannot wait to hear what happened,I know......
I always believe in delivering a presentation, which is listened to. Inorder to wake up my frens from sleep, I started asking some questions about Air deccan, and people got up and knew that something was happening.Then I started delivered it, finished it.I made it enough hillarious and funny to keep people engaged. I heard a huge applause to our presentation. I was not sure whether it was a sarcastic one, but I took it as a positive.Everyone congratulated me saying that my presentation was the best, if not the content.On peer to peer evaluation our group scored well.I was happy, and my team was shocked.They never thought I could do that.So all I can say is expecations are set now............hehehe

Now did you understand what "A" stands, I take it for appreciation.Even Dr.Paul, congratulated me personally for my presentation.That was like a honour for me.Now enough of my trumpet blowing,lets getting into the other things.

Hey frens, forgot to tell you that we got our HP laptops.Its one sexy lappy.It costed us around 55k, but I felt its worth that.Now that we got our laptops we were supposed to put more effort and do more assignments.
Financial Accounting course has started and Dr.SuryaSekhar from US is making sure that we understand GAAP(Generally Accepted accounting principles, accounting style in US).We have worked on may balance sheets of companies like CISO,Intel and GM.Its very interesting but at the sametime confusing.5 classes and we had an exam, I did well and my balance sheet balanced well but with a wrong amount(effect of ENRON discussions).I was little relaxed, and it was saturday.
Alreay our group guys started cribbing sessions and it made no sense in not going to a pub. We went to a place called "DIESEL", pretty decent , with decent music.Had loads of fun, head-banging, virtual drumming and back to home.
Sunday morning, at 8 macroeconomics class .................................

A group , One Mallu, and rest all studs

2006-05-23T09:11:00.000+05:30

(Disclaimer:Whatever I reveal about mallu, its my personal opinion, and the conclusion is drawn after stratified random sampling of mallus,and ESV(Expected stupidity value) is optimum)

After getting screwed royally by Rocky(U better understand who was tht),we decided to have fun.Let me introduce some of my frens here. First comes the super stud mallu,after coming to college, I have heard only 2 sentences from him, one "mujhe beer peena hain" and doosra "main yaha kyu aya hoon".He will strictly practice , a cribbing session for 1 hour daily about the second sentence.Well , thats why I call him mallu, indeed he is a mallu.Name :Rejesh.
Few more bulla(the stock broker and brother of lakshman), kartik ganesan(the cool guy and LORD of Rings),hari(the silent man),ajay(future vijay mallya),noor(water freak, and the kodak man),roshik (next management guru),ashwin(confused, signs of genius) ,jagan(new guy, yet to know his strengths),hardeep(intelligent sardar, no its not an oxymoron)
The decision by all: Lets party at BIKES & BARRELS. Its a famous pub in chennai.
The medium 1 car, and remaining bikes.(No barrel though)
Mallu said he knows the place and thus would help us find the place. And I didnt know how i agreed to believe him. But sometimes you never know. We decided to follow mallu and rest as you know is "mystery".Mallu takes us through almost all parts of chennai, and suddenly stops in front of the pub and calls the other group to find out where the place is.
We entered the place, and to our shock, we were ostracized and were thrown to upstairs since we didnt have so called girl friends. How can they expect us to have some , when all the partying girls in the class are a part of PAGE 3 gang?
We had to stand and have some beer, it was not tht much fun, except for the beer. But however mallu was again shocked by the prices.We decided unanimously that we would leave the place and go somewhere else.If in chennai, that other place is always "beach".
This time, I was dead sure not to follow mallu. So me and bulla decided to follow jagan and Ajays car. But somehow we lost the route, and again were roaming the city.
After around half an hour and 20 calls, everyone traced us.From there reaching beach was in some minutes.
Thats the first time I have seen "SEA" from very near distance and also first time I entered into sea water.
The fun started on beach. We were dancing, removed all our shirts and started getting into water. Running on the beach, playing with water, and pulling each others legs. It was like a welcome break for all.But there was something missing, Ajay was not there.To our happiness, ajay was back and also with some beer.If someone wants to know what is so lovable about beer , u shud have it in chennai and u wud know its kick.We had lots of foto sessions and u wud be seeing the fotos.
After an hour of aqua-time pass, already our hunger was on fire.The next decision, Biryani at STAY WEL.What a way to end the day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We really had fun. hey I forgot to mention one more thing from mallu. While returning from beach, mallu was driving his bike without his shirt, and the entire crowd on the roads were berserk with the monster on pulsar.I saw some folks running away.!!!!!!!!
(Im sorry Mallu)
Again at the end of everything, mallu started cribbing about "again there is a class tomorrow :)))))))))"

smiles
sachin

Macro(economic) Jolt !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-05-11T09:04:00.000+05:30

Macro(economic) Jolt !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You must be thinking whats this JOLT all about. Even I am yet to find answers about that. Thats the talent of a prof like 'Dr.RAKESH SINGH'(former NMIMS prof,again a highly acclaimed teacher and scholar too.I have heard that he is god in economics,and he says that he knows only 40%. I respect his modesty).
We (all students) thought that the going was little tough with both philosophy and statistics, then came the actual shock, and we all are yet to recover from the jolt.
I would like to add something worth reading here from a slide shown by Dr Singh

"
A student of business with tact
Absorbed many answers he lacked
but acquiring a job,
he said with a sob,
HOW DOES ONE FIT TO ANSWERS TO THE FACT?
"
I assume that I dont need to explain it. Brains which are little smart can comprehend its meaning.
Macroeconomics was the class about, and it was the first class. We were asked a lot of questions including our expectations from course, fundamental unit of analysis and lots. We were even given a case to ponder on. It was indeed an interesting one.I have heard of incipient screwing , but experienced for the first time. I discovered this word during my REC days, this term means that getting screwed but you get to know only after you are out of the situation.
We were exactly in the same situation.We thought we had a good time but over a cup of coffee after the class, we were sure that we are screwed.
Dr.Singh is one of the smartest prof I have seen. He was threatening us, as the sametime was theoretically polite. I especially liked his "Deadlines are sacrosanct" statement.
He gave us a whole assignment on National Income, we have to analyse the National incomes from 1990 to 2006, and need to submit on wednesday.
He also wants us to do a project, on any given 3 topics. I am not interested in telling you all the topics but, the topic our group chose is "India in Electronic media in 2025".
Now you can understand why I was cribbing. We have no other option but working on it. If you say whats so "GOOD" about, when I am cribbing about it, I think that its going to be good learning for me. Since coming from IT background, I have rarely tried to understand various economic theories. Now I dont have any option but understand them:))
Each course in a term is going to have 20 contact hours with profs, but we were to told to do 80 hours of preparation for those 20 hours. So you all understand the situation.

Guys tomorrow is another hectic day. We have to start working on the KARMA YOGA project, where we need to find some powerless people and work with them for their empowerment. We need to take care of that for next 3 months.This is part of philosophy.

I think its hightime to shed the serious academic 'goodies'

Entertainment ka TADKA

"Na jaane koi , kaisi hain yeh zindagani
Hamaari adhuri kahani
"
If you are wondering that this is my sher(not tiger),you are totally wrong. This is a song from movie Gangster.We friends have watched this movie out of our busy schedule, and it was like an awesome break. Movie was good, with some wonderful acting by shiny ahuja and the leading lady. I must say for all those guys interested in watching pretty babes, this heroine is awesome.Songs were awesome, especially the above mentioned one.I really love the 'rock'ification of hindi songs, and the bangladeshi singer James rocks here.For all those , who wants to get entertained, do watch this movie. But for all who expect happy endings, avoid this.
Well, I will stop for now. Need to work on probability so that I avoid any incipient ----- Well you all got it :)))))))))

wishing you good times

sachin

Work hard , rest is "Jujupi"

2006-05-06T12:26:00.000+05:30

Well, if you want to know what Jujupi means, then you should ask its meaning to any Rajanikanth Fan or Prof.Dr.P.K.Viswanathan(Currently teaching us Business Statistics, a very renowned prof, and an awesome teacher.His "tam-glish" keeps everyone sleepless in class, I mean its very humorous).
It means, simply , "simple". First of all, I sincerely apologise for being late in updating my log.I am having a tough time, getting into class after a gap of almost 3 years,
and concentrating in the class. And I must say I am succeeding in maintaining my concentration levels in place.
Jokes apart, I have a serious thing to say, and probably the first discussion of a bad thing happened. I am offering my sincere condolences to Pramod mahajan(I believe it was because of his KARMA, oh god im getting 'philosophical').A great leader and person indeed, and I was his fan too.
Back to class, last couple of days was a miniscule manifestation of more profound things to come.I had philosophy and business statistic lectures.Where philosophy was into, educating us about the spirituality, importance of religion , duties, karma which are described efficiently by vivekananda, and are mentioned clearly in updanishads
Business statistics was into the back-to-square of mead,median, standard deviation stuff.
Whatever it may be, one good thing about philosophy is that , it makes us the Indians feel proud about our culture,how different we are from others,and how well can we use Indian philosophy to be efficient leaders. However I do not believe in the concept of testing someone in philosophy, but as our prof Dr.Venkat krishnan says, we are a part of a model and we need to follow. So we are here not only understanding the philosophy but also reading and studying to get good grades.The best part during the lecture was students trying to contradict vivekananda and prof defending and convincing us by his counter arguments.

Statistically interesting

Now comes the other one, business statistics. This lecture is full of number crunching and data analysis.The best part is the assignment which asks us to analyse any one particular Indian stock , and its performance in last 800-1000 transactions.Well, as many might have guessed, our work group decided to work on Infosys stock.
Hey I forgot to mention that, our college believes in "Test individually, rate groupwise" theorem.So it is up to us to make sure that, before any class we guys in a group need to be prepared for any questions.Coming back to assignments we need to finish it up by 20 May. It looks like a lot of time, but its not the only assignment which we have, there are some other which are following............... :-((

Chronology of Good Times

2006-05-02T15:18:00.000+05:30

Thankfully, through out my life I didnt had many bad times. So, since I promised to tell you only the good things, first let me start with something good happening to me.After working in corporate world for two and half years, I have joined Great Lakes institute of management. To know more about my college please go to
www.glakes.org

Let me tell you the events we had after joining this institution.First of all I am very happy to reiterate that I am studying in this awesome place which boasts of some stupendous names associated with it.

First day

"You have come here for educating yourself not to be taught by us"
This was the first clarification given to we all new MBA grads joining at Great Lakes institute of management,chennai.
However at first glance I thought there is not much difference in both the terms but now gradually I am picking the different nuances.
First day started with some verification of the certificates, then we had some fun with seniors. And to our surprise the very next day (20 April) we had guest lectures by 2 CEO's (one CEO of Grundfos, a multi billion dollar company manufacturing centrifugal pumps and systems for water applications , and other CEO from DEXTERITY an IT company).These great people discussed on organizational behaviour and corporate jungle.They were more than happy to answer our questions.

OUTBOUND

The next 3 days we had been taken on an outbound to a beach resort. This was a well needed ICE BREAKING Session. We had loads of fun and games. It was both mentally and physically draining. at the same time fun.During the second day, we had an interaction with CEO of Orchid chemicals, and Mr Lakshminarayanan , CEO of CTS. Everyone was awestruck with the way the Mr Lakshminarayanan discussed some of the key aspects like market evaluation of company. It was a great learning, since even after having worked in corporate world, market evaluation was something which not many were sure of.

Outbound went well and we were back to chennai.On Monday (24 April) we had a session on how to approach the Case studies by Prof Sriram. He explained the differences in approach to case studies by different B Schools, and made us tense when he told that we would be following the Harvardian way of approach. The same day evening we went to IIT madras where we had an interaction with CEO of Sanmar group(This initiative is called "MEET THE CEO").

25 April, Tuesday

Formal inauguration day of our batch. Dr Bala, the founder of great lakes was present. He was at his usual best.

We also had Mr Ravi Venkatesan , MD Microsoft India. He is a Harvard alumni and he while appreciating us also discussed about the importance of IT in indian development. The best part was the way he stressed the use of IT in rural development (geographically as well as demographically).

26 April,Wednesday

we had Uncle bala(thats the way he likes us to call him), discussing the objectives of the course and how he is going to lead us.

He also emphasized how the institute is run by students. Then came the seniors, who exemplified the above thing when they discussed about various committees like admissions, library, events, gravity (great lakes magazine), great lakes consulting, food, sports, Finance study groups, Operations study group,Branding and PR commitee etc. Each student has to be a part of atleast one commitee.

I am planning to be in 2, Great lakes consulting and Events.

27 April ,Thursday

The graduation day of the seniors. Adi godrej was the chief guest. The venue was Taj Ball room. Seniors were looking royal in their black gowns.Uncle bala was excited to see his nieces and nephews entering or re-entering the corporate world, with mush passion and knwoledge.

28 April,Friday

I think the most special day so far, we had an interaction with none other than RATAN TATA. I was impressed by his humility, his passion and his commitment towards excellence in various fields.Some great people say that, you can learn a lot from people, and there are lots of learnings one can have after meeting RATAN TATA.
Humble yet smart, shy yet straight forward, great listener at the sametime a great orator.

Meanwhile we had couple of philosphy lectures, where we had to understand Upanishads, Vivekananda's life. The professoe here was Mr Dr Venkat Krishnan (earlier he was with XLRi for 9 years). He told us , inorder to understand the culture of any country, it is very much necessary to understand the underlying philosophy, tradition.He believes that reading the books on asian management style do not really help to understand the underlying culture. He is very great admirer of Prof Robert J Bies from stanford who also states that understanding philoshphy is the best way to understand the culture of any society . The course objective is to educate us on Leadership and power. This can be achieved by doing a field work, where we have to work with powerless people and need to show positive results, since we are powerful than those set of people. This entire coursework has to be done in 45 days.

Also we have some interesting things lined up.Philip Kotler, father of marketing is going to visit us on July 18. Mr Jimi Carter, nobel laureate for peace, is going to take our help in a noble cause, where he is going to build 10000 houses for tsunami affected people. We have to lend our help to him for 2 days in October. But anyways would update my log very often.

I think by now you must be totally sure of my weblog name :))))

Let me know your comments

SACHIN

The nomenclature

2006-05-01T19:32:00.000+05:30

Well, for many of them the nomenclature of the blog needs some kind of explanation. I promise that I would make my blog 100% readable , with no flashy words borrowed from barrons nor with mind twisting (rather mind -aching) topcis. It will contain only the good things happened at the end(of day/week/month depending upon my time), be it in my own vicinity, politics, entertainment , sports and anything under the sun.

Guys please wait up for my first post. Pessimistic minds will be thinking that this guy didnt have much good happening in recent times, but for all those pondering in this fashion, its the problem of quantity I have. So let me make it concise and post it, so that my oath remains satisfied.

Good times for you always

Sachin