Quarter 7 - Week 7

We have officially completed 2/3 of the course. Six quarters and six-point-six-seven weeks later, I can feel the half-formed horns on top of my head. I'm *this* close to wreaking havoc upon the world! It seems like ages ago, and yet, just yesterday that we finished 1/3 of this course (here), and here we are. I seem to remember soulfully promising myself on this blog long before the 1/3 point, that I would study hard, and imbibe the teachings of the learned ones. And yet again, here we are. What does that tell you? We aim for the heavens, even if there is no chance in hell of reaching there.

E-business Models and Strategies

A week of guest presentations, and very illustrious ones at that! The first, was a representation by Redbus.in. An innovative startup that gave IT engineers another reason to sit on their butts and yet do one of the most mundane and distressful tasks - book bus tickets. Online. We had some fun time just asking the guest speaker about why redbus did this, are they planning to do that, and how are they determining their way forward. It was a surprisingly frank dialogue, and the ease with which it was being explained made you wonder. What am I doing now? These guys are out there, using the same technology that I use, and they're having fun with it. Seriously, what am I doing now? Interestingly, these are amongst the first few entrepreneurs we see, who're still enjoying a powerful first-mover advantage, and this seems to reflect in the decisions they take, and the way they run the organization.

The second session was with a former PGSEM Alumni who's working with Google. That guy was so sure that we would be just like his batch folks, that he didn't bother asking us anything from the case. The rare situation where someone really understood us! And when the class was asked if they'd read the case, there was no one more surprised than this guy, when all the hands went up. I guess he forgot to take into account the fact that "impressing the guy at Google" always comes first. Always. Either that, or we're just very good students.

Anyway, so this guy talks to us about how Google goes about its innovation, and when he says Google, he's talking of its engineers. He talks of how everyone keeps the larger picture in mind, and went on to describe how the fundamental questions of strategy planning have now been "modified". The real cool part was when he talked of a few cases where Indians have actually innovated their way around the internet, to do some really interesting stuff. Stuff that would normally not have been possible. Whether it was a humble cab driver advertising his services to the world on Youtube, or the internet operator who accesses the internet by stringing his cell phone at the roof in an area which has no cable internet, and hence requires GPRS, all of these are very interesting tales. Makes you wonder, doesn't it? What ARE we doing?

Research for Marketing Decisions

Ok. I give up. I slept. It just got so boring! And that too when he was talking quant! How can anyone make quant seem boring??! It's maths for God's sakes! 2+2 = 4! What the hell?

All I seem to remember was that we were talking about univariate, bivariate and multivariate analysis. That seemed to cover the options of knowing how to measure the impact of more than one interdependent variable, on the outcome of a task. There was a quiz too, but the lenient prof as usual figured out a way not to tax us by giving MCQ, but then again, true to IIMB's style, the options were pretty hard to guess at!

Marketing Communications

More discussion on the role of Public Relations in the first session. More details on what all goes into it, why it is the way it is, what kind of a role it plays now. And yes, it's important.

The next session was supposed to be one on Digital Media, I was really looking forward to this one. Unfortunately, the guest lecturer who was supposed to come today, didn't turn up due to some pressing commitments at work. Too bad, hope this is cleared by next week. The prof anyway kept us busy by talking of product placements in movies and television, yet another innovative way of letting us consumers know that if we don't want to pay for cable, we better get used to seeing ads everywhere (Boost is the secret of my energy!). That's right, EVERYWHERE! Getting a little more in depth on the topic, we spoke on how the more blatantly visible the ad is, the more it sticks in the consumer's mind. It's a very rocky boat here. On the one hand, you get to keep the product in your mind, on the other hand the consumer hates you for ruining their viewing experience. Striking that balance is key. Sigh, doesn't look like ads are going to reduce any time soon.

And so we come to the end of 2/3 of the course. Here we are, 2/3 managers. We are alive, we are kicking, and we are yawning. And yet, we look forward to the remaining 1/3.