Quarter 9 - Week 6

About now the assignments start piling up. There are presentations, case deadlines, midterms and you're thinking 'Why God Why Did We Take This Up??". It's always fun listening in class, but when your pedal's to the metal, or in this case your head's nowhere near your bed, then you get to know your true self.

Consumer Behaviour

So we had our application exercise this week. That's another confusing word for a project. But unlike other professors, our prof decides that a few groups get to go through the grind early on. So we start chakki-peesing a couple of weeks back. Luckily for us, he didn't give us too much of a hard time then, gave us the freedom to decide what would be good to study, and then from our final set of options he selected a few questions that he thought would be interesting to focus on in class.

As it turns out, we didn't sleep for three nights in a row (Actually we slept at 1 AM, instead of the regular 12 AM.. but where's an MBA without the self-inflicted pain and misery. And complaining when in fact you get enough sleep.) And then the day before the assignment, a couple of our guys take a leave to solidify our discussions into a document for submission the next day. Till 3 AM, we're churning and reviewing the presentation as we can barely decide what should go in and what shouldn't. Leave us a chance, and we'll cram in 100 pages and turn in the report so that the prof goes through pain. But in our case, the prof has set a limit. 17 pages max! 3 for this, 3 for that, 1 for this, 2 for that... etc. So we had a hell of a time just deciding what should go in.

Finally the presentation happens, and yes, he likes it... but. Apparently we ought to go become strategy consultants for the company, since we did a great job on it... but then he reminds us, this was a consumer behaviour class.. and he would have loved to hear more about the focussed chapter. Personally I thought we used enough jargon from the chapter, but he seemed to be missing those few nuggets which would have been the crowning glory. Yes, the papers and issues we selected were top notch, but. Still, battle-scarred veterans that we are, two years later, we know how to not back down. So, the next assignment is going to be our last stand. Either we present to victory, or to get victimized, but kick some CB ass, we shall!

(Warning: Delirium due to lack of sleep. Just nod and move on.)

While the first session was three apexes by different groups, the second session was a guest lecture by a field veteran who's worked with Cleartrip.com. She helps us understand how decisions were made keeping the consumer in mind, and what kind of market they're dealing with. It was an interesting session, with a lot of questions from the attentive folks!

Strategic Leadership

In lieu of the midterm on Sunday (WHO THE HELL PUTS AN EXAM ON A SUNDAY??), no classes were held. Since no classes were held so that we could study, most of the students did their due by loafing around during that time. Some traitors were preparing for the midterm.

Personal Interpersonal Effectiveness Workshop

The readings were supposed to get easy, he said, it's an introspector's life he said. Any more reflections and journeys into the past, and I'm going to turn into a friggin' mess! Diggin' through all those old memories leaves a scar, we've got too many sharp stories in the dark memory box.

But it's useful, we're dealing with somethings that we shut out a long time ago, atleast I am. And the sentiments in the class seem to align with this too. This week we were dealing with how we look at ourselves, the happenings to us and how we respond or react to that. Do we play the victim (OMG! How could this happen to me??) Or taking some responsibility.. (Shit happened. What now?) There was another set of articles introduced as part of readings this time, from the concept of NLP. NLP basically talks about how people can overcome their fears and issues not by focussing on removing a root cause, but by modifying our reactions at the front end. So, in a nutshell, if we had a bad memory, then through some suggested exercises we replace the painful thoughts associated with it with some pleasurable thoughts. We'll soon find that we don't feel that pained anymore!

Seems too good to be true? Well, it partially worked on us, and we've only done something in two days. Imagine sitting through NLP for a long quality duration! They could potentially be made to think they're awesome and can change the world, and for all you know, they'll do it! It's a powerful tool, but in the wrong hands, it can be quite deadly.

Pretty rewarding week in all, and now I gotta go back and prepare for my SL midterm tomorrow. Sunday! Sheesh!