Quarter 6 - Week 10

Except for a couple of assignments, the last week of classes went by quite uneventfully. We still had one quiz and one guest lecture, but compared to the last few weeks, they went by easily. Maybe because it was the last week, so it's the extra enthu that comes up... whatever it was, it was easy gliding.

No standing ovations though, maybe it was the seniors' influence, they've been through this for 10 quarters... we had a few guys from our class giving an ovation, but they were drowned out amidst the hustle-bustle of bags being pulled up all around them. I miss the standing ovations...

Entrepreneurship and New Venture Creation

This week only had presentations from all the teams, 10 minute lightning pitches of their ideas. Some interesting, some not-so-interesting, but all-in-all, a sufficient easy-to-relax week of classes in ENVC.

Social Entrepreneurship

The prof invited us to think about how to bring about large scale change, and pretty much reminded us about the key lessons from the last few weeks. Spoke to us about how it's important to keep it sustained, of how the power ought to be with the people as they know what's best for them etc. etc. Since I already heard all this, not too much enlightenment in the last class. But one thing for sure, this is an awesome course. The kind of learning I've had in this class was worldly, not theoretical. This is the kind of valuable rare experience that I was looking forward to from IIMB, and I was not disappointed in the least!

B2B Market Management

The first session was all about reseller channels, and the kind of power struggle that can happen between a supplier and their channels. Not too much takeaway, maybe because I had already read the book for the day's quiz. So, though it was practical experience, it was very easy to draw parallels to the theory in the books.

The second session was about Aurolab. This is the technology, research and development and manufacturing side of the Aravind eye hospital. It's strange to sit in the same room as some of the movers in this enterprise, after all the case studies we've done on them. And they come across like normal people... with normal pains, normal worries. Except that when they talk of the actual problems, they're dealing at higher levels. But still... they seem human. This session was more of an interaction with the Aravind system, and our students obviously questioned and needled the two guests a lot! Why they did this, why not this? Reason for this... etc. etc. Again, not too much takeaway, I blame the last quiz! Made us learn way too much! ;)

International Business Negotiation Skills

The venerable prof still stays true to his tradition. Just like he did in Marketing 101, he brought a pack of sweets and distributed it amongst us on the last day of the course... he really stands behind that "ritual" principle that he keeps talking about. It was a slow and thoughtful wrap-up as he closed the class, and asked us for some highlights of what we got from the course. Sombre session, but it was interesting to see people come up with different insights on negotiations. Simple, so simple.

And so, I'm done. Through an insane stroke of luck, I dont have exams this quarter, quite a few of the others do. So a double weekend for me! All I gotta do, is finish two projects, and I'm all set to enjoy two weeks of pure bliss!