Quarter 3 - Week 10

Last classes for the quarter - check.

Tension - check.

Strong black kaapi - check. check.

I have to study for the exams next week AND get back to my projects. See, our Marketing prof sprang a surprise on us by saying that we should submit our project by Wednesday. That kind of derails my entire plan of what to study and when. Now, my brain newly filled with management-fundas like prioritization tells me that writing this "popular blog" is not really going to get me grades, and that I am better served off doing the marketing project. Another part tells me that I should go on, and then compile all this in a book and make thousands of paise with it! While both sides of my brain argue about what route to take, I am going to go watch a movie at the newly opened BIG Cinemas!

Wait. The second part won, so I am now writing this... Sigh. No movies for me while I'm in this course, damn it! It's a good thing that what I have to share now has left a lasting impression on me.

Law - Like I mentioned last week, this week was going to be a special one since we were having a guest lecturer. Our prof very kindly granted us the first hour off so we could sleep for an extra hour. What he doesnt know is if we get an extra hour, we're going to TRY to study, and then fall asleep during that time. Or maybe he does know that, and if at the end of it all, if we are anyway going to sleep... is there a point to the conundrum? Who cares.

Anyway, so the second hour we had our guest lecturer come in and talk. It's intriguing to note that even when our first hour is cancelled, some of us still manage to come late to the class. Must be in our genes. Anyway, so this person speaks to us about open source software, totally opens our eyes to the fact that making your stuff open source doesnt mean you should give it off for free (it is encouraged, but it's your software, do what you want!), it's just that its for the betterment of communities and that people get to change the software that they buy. Charge for service if you want, why charge for the software? or why keep it so closed and protected from the world? So we understood the fundas of GPL, LGPL, BTL etc. Fun topics. He too has this funny way of making humorous comments while keeping a deadpan expression. Maybe both our prof and he went to the same college, I dont know.

After our guest finishes his session, he calmly locks up his laptop and walks out of class. Our entire class, that is typically at their noisiest and roguish best during the breaks, is quiet. Why? Because this person is none other than Dr. Kalyan C. K. He was a top ranker at NLSIU, a prestigious law college in Bangalore, and also at Franklin Pearce Law Center. He is a distinguished and eminent scholar, having written international publications on IP, and even co-authored a book.

He is also 90% visually impaired.

You would never guess it by the way he took the class. He had a laptop that he used effortlessly, he was on the right slides, and talking the right content. It didnt in any way look like he was having any trouble. There might have been an odd instance or two, when someone asked a question and he would look in another direction, even our profs do that all the time. The guys who came in late to class didn't get why he was looking in the wrong direction even when they were pointing the right person to him, and when they got to know, they were all dumbstruck! His presentation was impeccable, his confidence and sense of humour shining through, it was impossible to believe that he might be having any difficulties at all. But after packing his laptop without any help from anyone, he took out his stick and used it to navigate all the obstacles in his way, and walked out of class without any help from anyone. It was at that moment as he was walking out, that I felt so ashamed and humbled. So many of us have no such impediments, and we complain about how we struggle through life. I find it hard to continue writing this, as I still remember the way he walked out of class, independently. He came to talk to us about freedom of software, the Free Software Foundation. The talk didn't rub off on me as much as the way he was living his life. Not letting circumstances pull you down, but working against it to live independently. This the first time that truth has hit me this hard. For I've just witnessed true freedom.

Marketing - Our prof continues to talk to us about Marketing Communication. He did sprinkle in a lot more of worldly wisdom this time. He does have a deep well of knowledge, no matter how often he throws in his bucket, he always seems to get out something to nourish us with. Anecdotes mixed with marketing topics for some reason keeps us attentive. He too mentions the point that what we do should be backed by strong research, "Soch ke kaam karo" he might say. I'm hearing this from all the teachers, I think they're trying to tell us something. Maybe they're trying to tell us that what we do should be backed by strong research. Duh! What am I, four? But maybe no matter how often they tell us this, we aren't doing it. So we might deserve the repetition after all. Sigh. He also talked to us about the properties of good ads - it should raise a question in your mind, answer it and then make you remember it. Smart. The next day we studied the importance of tradition. A lot more worldly knowledge followed. I like to think that he was trying to convey to us experiences that meant so much to him, that he just had to share it. We even saw a couple of videos where he was talking, and oh my God, no matter how much I had prepared for me to see him in a younger version, that image on screen really knocked my socks and shoes off! He had hair on his head for God's sakes! It's just so different! But his diction, expressions and gestures were the same then as it was now. Maintain that, and add an air of content and peace, that's our prof for you. This might be his last year at IIMB, I selfishly hope not. He's just too good a prof for other batches to miss out on.

In addition to the customary thunderclap, we also stood up as a token of gratitude and more importantly as a mark of respect, as he walked out. It's the first time we've ever done that for any professor.

Managerial Accounting - The last class is supposed to always be the easiest. I paid attention and survived. It definitely was easier than the other classes. Problem solving, actual concentration on the topic, all in all a good day. We studied Standard Costing today and solved a problem and a HBR case. This subject is beginning to grow on me. Rest assured, I definitely dont want more classes though.

Now, a very enriching and fulfilling week in summary. Feels good to be done with the classes. Calm time's over, the storm's about to start. Time to hit the projects.

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