Quarter 2 - Week 3

Last week, our Business Statistics prof gave us an interesting assignment. Given a bug database (I dont know how he got it, the source remains a mystery) he asked us to find out all the information that we could, given this database. As an example, we could find out how long people took to fix bugs, whether the developers were working effectively etc. etc. The techie in me wondered "What the hell?! People are fixing bugs, and you're not happy with that?" The answer to my own question dawned pretty soon, "It might be loathesome to sit and look at all this, but you probably want to find out if they can do something better or faster. Or you can find out if someone needs some help, but is probably too proud to ask for it. Or in the worst case, probably isnt even aware that he needs help". The manager talk has already begun... is it a good sign?

So this "fun" assignment comes with a catch... use open source database and all from Open Office. AND run some queries using SQL. Apparently, we have all the time in the world to learn up SQL and figure our way around Open Office for the first time. A part of me thinks he's doing it to keep the pressure up on us, to add those inherent capabilities that these IIM products are famous for - time management, prioritization, the works. Another part of me says he's doing it because he believes open source is a good thing, and he can spread the word in one way - bringing it to his work, i.e. us. And probably we can spread the word in our own way.

Right, so this was last week when this assignment was given to us, and I've spent almost 20 hours just figuring out how to use this damned software. Staying awake late, working on it in office (and feeling suitably guilty about it), waking up early, I'm slowly getting used to it (Question to self: Why am i here again?). Still, when Friday came along, I was feeling reasonably good. I had gotten a chart or two out, and my partner and I were ready to do some serious sifting.

The classes started off with Macro economics, we have now entered the realm of Aggregate Demand. This is basically the total demand for goods and services within an economy. We're going through the Keynesian(pronounced keen-see-yun) model, made up by the guy who brought the US out of the Great Depression. Fancy accomplishment, that. How did he do it? He told everyone that to build the GDP of a country, you need to spend-spend-spend!! To all of us techies, when the formula was shown on the board, it made sense. If you spent, you got a whole lot of GDP since that extra spending keeps circulating in the economy. If you save too much, then nobody buys stuff, and if no one buys stuff, then jobs are not there, and if jobs are not there, then nobody buys stuff. Vicious circle!! We understood how the US is a consumer-spending driven economy, China is an export driven company, India is an investment and services driven economy... if even one external factor is affected, everyone dances! We slowly have begun to appreciate the roles played by the consumers, the investors/corporates, and we had just begun understanding the role the government plays. What gets me, is that we dont seem to be noticing anything other than monetary stuff that can be valued. The implicit advantages/disadvantages, the stuff that can not be quantified or rather we dont want to quantify is nowhere in the picture. It's all about the money... well, it is Macro Economics after all.

Managing Organizations was pretty cool this week. On the first day, we studied a case of two companies - one very process oriented, good, cheap and effective, though it treated its employees like "horses" with blinders as one of our classmates remarked in a light vein. The other company had people who mixed with each other, spent enough time understanding every one's work and not just specializing in their own. Communication was awesome in this company, yet they were slower than the first company. During the discussion, we noticed that when presented with the chance of building a new design, the second company did better as they were more flexible and communicated well, while when it ultimately came down to production, at the end of the day, the first company got the contract. A sad story, in my opinion, where in the second company did quite well in getting their act together and thrived on the uncertainty of the project, but lost it in the end because they didnt have the cost effectiveness of the first company. And here, I learnt my first real lesson about organization structure. While an employee would love to work in the second company, a person would want to be the CEO of the first, where everything was clear and streamlined. I learnt that a company should be structured based on the industry it is in, so that it can thrive. Hurts to know that you cant have a fair and fun company, if you're in an industry which requires cost-effective measures and extremely high quality. It doesnt let you experiment with new ideas, or concepts purely because it puts your current system at risk. Sigh.

Business Statistics - what can I say? We had a quiz on day 1, and yours truly got battered! I dont know where my brain went for a walk at that moment, because it sure as hell wasnt in my head when the quiz was going on. Must have fallen asleep, due to the lack of sleep from the last week. We started studying random variables. These aren't really "variables" in the terms we use it in comp sci lingo. These are functions. Basically, we try to figure out our payouts(what we can get) considering the different results that can occur due to probability. The example given was simple - consider there's a fraud happening in a company, and you've been called in. Would you analyse each and every transaction to see where the fraud is? What if the cost of the investigation is so much that to check each and every fraud, you'd probably have to shut down the company as that would be far cheaper. So, this somewhat talked about how you "hedge your bets" carefully. I wont say I totally understood what the guy was talking about. Two days went by in a blur of formulae, and examples that seemed to make sense when he was talking about it. Man, that guy is a jack rabbit. I dont know how he manages to move around so fast, it's really difficult keeping pace with him. I must grudgingly admit - he's brilliant, seems well read... it's difficult to point fingers at inspiring figures like that. He can actually get away with taunting us, which he does, just because we're in awe of him. Awesome! Anyway, we've finished our assignment, somehow, let's just hope that he finds our queries enough. BTW, the results for that quiz on Friday came on Saturday - did pretty bad. The prof told us not to worry, it's apparently legacy. All his first tests, no matter how easy it is, people suck at it. Make me feel a little better.

Good thing the tests are best three out of four! :P