Quarter 8 - Week 7

You know, when you really think about it... it's like a wave. Assume you were somehow seated at the top of the wave, lazily creeping towards the shore. And then, all of a sudden it begins to rear its head while increasing its speed, closing the gap between itself and the shore like it's life depended on it. It's silence for a short while... and then all of a sudden it goes crash! Something like this quarter. The weeks have been passing smoothly, and now you suddenly feel the speed... and you wonder, are you prepared to understand the heady stuff. Because it's all going to crash down on your head in a couple of weeks...

Ethics and Business Management

This week the topic was on consumer protection and the legalities of dealing with the end users. There appear to be three major ways of looking at it... the first says that the onus of responsibility in the buyer-seller relationship lies on the buyer, as it's nothing but a contract. The buyer better understand what he's getting into. The second says that the onus of the responsibility lies more on the seller. And the reason for this is that in today's day and age, the buyer can not be expected to truly comprehend the depth of the product. Do you really know how your laptop works, it's inner working? And the third is more from a social front... even if the seller has taken all the care he could, if there are any issues or ill-happenings, the seller has to compensate the buyer by taking full responsibility.

Honestly, I think there's a pretty big problem here. The moment we choose ONE of these options, the other side has enough reason to wash all hands off and act irresponsibly. And mixing one with the other is difficult, where do you draw the line? At what point do you say, this is common sense, protect the seller... or this is unfair, protect the buyer? Who draws the line? But then, ours is not to judge each and every situation now. Looking at the framework we had, we looked at a couple of cases, tried to apply them... and then left it at that. Not very convinced with the solution, but hey, as long as I've understood the application of the framework, the rest lies to practice. There was also some time spent on Advertising Ethics, but considering all the learning I've had from Marketing Communication last quarter, I'm totally against the accusations there. Of course some people use it for bad, but given a tool, the usage whether good or bad is determined by the user, not the tool itself. Advertising is not a bad thing, the guy who prepares the advertising, he's the one we need to look at.

Managing Off-shored Software and IT services

We had a guest lecturer this week, it was very interesting to know that this prof and our actual course prof were the ones who were a part of the origin of the PGSEM programme. It's so cool to be listening to the professors who started the programme, to hear from them why they started it. And it was also insightful to see why they felt that the programme was not what they hoped it would be. As it turns out, you can't have the optimal output from the programme, if the optimal input is not there. The course was expected to start with the support of the industry, and as you probably can guess, our corporate heads were quite slow and unreactive to the programme. Kinda makes you wonder who's side the corporates are on. It's almost like they hurt themselves, by sheer inaction.

Anyway, leaving the sad stories out... this week was about partnerships. One, the infamous case of the Denver Airport, and second the growth of the ODC along a value chain. The first dealt with why the project didn't come through as initially expected. Despite the contracting to an experienced, respected firm, the project was still doomed. And it has been studied ever since, year after year, in every business school. The main problem? The major partners in the contractual agreement were looking out for their own benefits rather than the welfare of everyone involved.

The second session, while actually meant to be about how ODCs evolve along the value chain, was taken over to discuss Peopleware by popular vote in the class(Mainly because most of the class didn't read the case study or the reading, but who's going to tell the prof?). But before you begin to consider that the session was of no value, you should have listened to what the prof had to say. From personal experience, of over 20 years, consulting, starting ODCs, this prof tells us what are the basic principles we need to keep in mind. Common sense, you'd guess, but hardly common... you still see many companies struggling to rise up because of the basic mistakes they make. Funny thing is, if you're in their position, you're not sure if you'd have done the same.

A good weekend, especially since there was a holiday at work. The learning was something that'd stay with you for a good long while, and you look forward to your own time to experiment.

Quarter 8 - Week 6

Have I mentioned our new automated attendance system? It's very annoying! Here we are, loyal Bangalore citizens, trying to adhere to Indian Standard Time and come exactly 10 minutes late to class, and here's something that's not allowing me to swipe in after 8:05 AM. And so every weekend morning, scores of people drive at breakneck speeds across Bangalore streets, to reach the college within the specified time. And if that's not bad enough, the clocks are 5 minutes fast! That means, if we want attendance, we gotta be there by 8 AM! Sheesh! We might as well come on time! What kind of role model are we trying to portray to our coming generations and teams?

Having said that, there's no better feeling than rushing into class and swiping, just to find that you made it at 8:04:57 AM (which in reality is 7:59:57 AM). You'll have a silly grin for the remainder of the class. Stick it to the man!

Ethics and Business Management

The two cases this week were pertaining to the role of directors on a board, and the whole issue of corporate governance. The funda's pretty simple. You own a private company, your problem, your liabilities. You own a public company, it's the public's problem, public's liability. So you hire a board, who represent the millions of shareholders who are waiting each year for income. Now this board is meant to have some sort of motivation to think and choose a direction effectively, so you're probably compensating them for their time, and giving them a few stocks at it. In turn, these guys will provide a direction to the managers in accordance with what's best for the public shareholders, and the managers (Starting at the CEO) manage the company.

Interestingly, all the cases discussed - WorldCom and Satyam were examples where some gapla has happened at the senior management level. Maybe the CEO has been hiding important information, maybe the finance team is showing elements that portray that the company's doing well, when in fact it's sinking, and maybe the auditing firm is doing less auditing, and collecting more revenues under their proverbial mahogany desks. Which is what happened here in these two cases. First, the board appeared to go along with crucial decisions depending on whatever the CEO said, then there was some dubious entries in the books of the org which were certified as "smells fresh" by auditors. And then we wonder why's our money going down, when the market WAS going up, as was the praises for the company we invested in. And so, the sessions revolved around what boards can do, what kind of active role are they expected to play, and finally the framework for ethics comes through on what are the ethical actions the companies in these situations should pursue.

Managing Off-shored Software and IT Services

First off, we had an article that described what are the spiralling effects of outsourcing, and how the form of contracts in place can affect the working relationship. So we look at how negotiable the contract is, how clear it is, and how easy it is to interpret it. Based on these, we were able to identify where to use strict contracts, and where to allow for lenient contracts depending on the work involved.

The next two sessions were case driven, though I must say they had more to do with strategy rather than outsourcing. One was on Lenovo's global beginning, and the other was on Infosys' plans forward and how it needs to move up the value chain. Honestly, I've had better case discussions before. These cases were a lot more... freeflowing. Don't get me wrong, while the class was in progress, everyone's involved in the conversation and talking from their experience. But at the end of it, you wonder, "what just happened? What did we learn?" Reminder to self: Ask the question to the prof in class next time.

Overall, it was a chilled out week. Even though we had classes on Sunday as well. The project's going at it's own pace, so no complaints there. Let's see how things turn out. It's another three weeks to the end of Q8!

Quarter 8 - Week 5

I seem to be really slacking in terms of these posts. The effects of a whole year of classes appear to be showing through! All we need to do is hold it together, just for another four weeks. Nothing that appeared to stand out this quarter, so, life is on auto-pilot.

Ethics in Business Management

This week, we continued to deal with the issues surrounding the environment. Looks like it's a pretty big topic. (It better be, businesses have been ruining the environment for more than a century now!) A couple of cases this week, the first was about a company that was trying to cut costs in chip-production. And turns out that their competitors had already begun outsourcing to cheaper countries where the wages are low, regulations even lower, and so the company could afford to stay within the requirements of the law, without paying the current costs. So then, the basic question that arises is should you go and do your business in another place, just because it can be deemed legal there? Sure, you might be just within the reaches of the legal requirement, but you would know that you're harming the environment anyway. It's not like the earth is a lot more tough and resilient in the Phillipines now, is it? This is also the time our prof takes the time out at the end of the class to say, the options that are available to you in this case are NOT the only options... as a manager, you need to also consider alternatives that might not be present in these sets of cases. That's why you're getting paid anyway.

The next case was more to deal with the troubles an energy corporation had to deal with. The story goes that this corp found a junglee area with no people, and only junglee creatures. This area has a hugeee repository of natural gas right under it. So the corp goes about trying to get this gas out. While they're getting the gas out, environmentalists find out that there is a close-to-endangered species (not yet endangered, but close.) that lives in the area. And the poor thing was apparently in a very uncomfortable place. Too much noise from the drilling locations, lesser amount of plants and therefore food for this bird, so the environmentalists took up their cause. On top of it, this area was also a migratory location for deer and other wildlife, and these animals were also getting significantly affected due to the drilling. Now, the corp comes up with a unique solution of a different mode of drilling which could be used to reduce their footprint on the land. But they want to operate all around the year, instead of stopping during migratory season. So the question arose, in man's quest for cleaner and more efficient fuel, which will also save foreign exchange reserves, should it care much about the indigenous wildlife? A little here, a little there, and let me remind you, we're only looking at a framework here, and not passing personal judgements... we find out what was the more efficient option and then, rest with it. All till the next news story comes along, calling us callous capitalists and then changing the textbook!

Managing Off-shored Software and IT Services

Cross-cultural management was still the order of the day. A lot of theory and articles on studies that people have conducted that show differences amongst people. Nothing much to talk of here.

The second session was to do more with contracts. How do contracts get drawn, are they flexible or need to be, are the requirements clear or vague, and what are the potential implications of the various combinations between contracts and initial requirements. Interesting little framework which led to a very weird battle between a student and the prof. about something, which I unfortunately slept through. I think the end out of it was that this was a framework and is bound to have a couple of loopholes, and Indian companies apparently need to get more assertive. Looking back, especially at the second part of the conclusion, I now wish I had stayed awake.

All in all, an uneventful week. The oft-spoken-about calm before the storm?

Quarter 8 - Week 4

The effects of this week's classes were so strong, that this post didn't make it till Thursday! We had classes on Friday, Saturday AND Sunday. It's the anomalous quarter, where we just have nine weeks of classes, so we make up with two Sundays to match a week. I see the weeks rushing by, and I realize... it's just another 5 weeks to a well deserved vacation! The same time, next month... I'll be so chilled out.

Ethics in Business Management

This week had some flashback memories, as we studied about Demand and Supply and some of the other basics from MicroEconomics in our first quarter. But this sessions put a twist on it. At the time, we had studied about how you would charge people differently based on their capacity to pay, and on the power a monopoly and oligopoly have. And now, we hear about why most of these are unethical. Goes to show that the stuff we find ethical and awesome in quarter 1, might not necessarily be so. Wonder if the converse is also true?!?

The last session was about ethics and the environment. It revolved more around the ways in which we harm the environment, and how people are now waking to the fact that we need to preserve and maintain the environment. It's our responsibility. It was a good class where we saw various aspects from the angle of nature.

Managing Off-shored Software and IT Services

The week had a lot to do with respect to understanding cross-border issues. One of the articles was on "Following the Sun". It discussed how people could efficiently get a product quicker out of market, when teams in different parts of the world work around the world on a single project. The remaining sessions were more about Cross-Cultural Management and the types of issues that can crop up.

It's also the time when we realized that the interim reports for our course-required-project was due. And so, me and my team-mate get together and hash together a report based on our findings so far. It's a good feeling when we do some sort of work on our project, feels so much more.... deserving... than our regular projects! :)

Quarter 8 - Week 3

It has been an eventful week, the more prominent ones were unfortunately not the best we've had so far. A very well-liked professor passed away this week... one who has earned the deep respect that most of the students accorded to him. Personally, I've found him to be the most philosophical and abstract professor I've seen thus far. He was primarily attached to the Marketing discipline, but he seemed to have a special corner for Organizational Behaviour. He taught us Principle of Marketing in Quarter 3, and International Business Negotiation Skills in Quarter 6. A fine professor, whose voice emanated from his soul and touched ours as well.

The second event was the final event put forward by our seniors, who've made their peace with one another, and the college. Actually, I could live with this one... it's not so bad. They were taking up our seats in all the courses anyway. But they were pretty kind-hearted, they didn't want to bother any of us juniors, so they went ahead and put forward a send-off party for themselves, with events conducted by them for their families and professors. An interesting way to say bye to the college. Their presence, though abhorred, will be missed.

Ethics in Business Management

A problem with a course like EBM, is that it is really hard, I mean REALLY hard to agree on whether the judgement on a case was right or not. You see, on the one side it looks like the organization had the best intentions at heart, on the other it looks like they didn't do enough good of what they could do. So you actually have two camps in class, fighting each other on the fact that the accused was right/wrong on what they did. The case was that on Unocal and their decision to continue to pull oil from off of Burma's coast, and who had conveniently turned a blind eye when Burma's army was clearing away land from rebels when the pipeline had to go through that. The confusion was on whether Unocal was justified in claiming that they were ethical in their dealings, and were not involved when their partner, the Burmese government/army was doing this. In fact, they justified their presence by saying that they were providing health and education support in the region that was close to the pipeline, so they were actually doing a lot of good.

The prof must be finding it really hard as well. The guy is so sure, that "this party" did something wrong, or "that party" should be held responsible, and when he tries to explain his reasons to us, there is always atleast one bunch in the class that's disagreeing with him. And they proceed to explain why. The crescendo was reached when the prof was putting various tabulations on the board on who did what correctly/incorrectly, and you could see that he wanted to put four ticks in one box, but when he asked the class where to put it, the majority was on the other. You could see him struggling within his mind whether to correct the class again or not, but then he just sighed and put the four ticks on the other box, and three ticks in his. That was actually pretty sweet. Profs don't usually bend to the will of the class, but such is the nature of this subject.

The next day, he was better prepared. Didn't do as badly as the first session. Right at the start, he mentions that 'guys, we need to look at this objectively, keep your personal thoughts on the case aside, and ONLY look at it from the framework. You will have enough time to debate such topics long after. As you saw yesterday, even after twenty minutes of discussing this case, it is still just as, if not more gray than it was before we started. So stick to the framework.' Looks like the class got the message, because a few times when there was strong potential for disagreement, the class just kept quiet, as the framework made it clear as to where the balance tipped. The prof seemed to go home a happier man that day.

Happiness aside, the framework learnt this week was with regard to property rights. Apparently a bunch of our oldest philosophers had very different views on what constitutes right to property, ranging from John Locke to Karl Marx. And the case we discussed was that of the provision of treatment for AIDS in Africa. Funny case that... a few American companies came up with the cure but it was so friggin' costly for use in Africa and they weren't willing to subsidize it. Thanks to a loophole in Indian law, a few Robinhood pharma companies here went ahead and, ahem, built a cheap version of the drug and began distribution in association with Doctors across Borders. American companies yell "friggin' piracy", while Indian companies say "Cross-border disasters!". Being an Indian, I don't know, I couldn't help feeling proud of what these guys did! Was it wrong, well, I don't think so! Luckily, the framework kinda agrees!

Managing Off-shored Software and IT Services

Profs tend to be pretty good at predicting what the class is capable of. Last week, when this one asked how many of us read the case, only two hands went up. So he thought, ok, these guys are not going to read what I give them, so let me just give them a micro-case this week. So when he comes to class, fully prepared to see the same two hands when he asks "who read the case?" imagine his amazement when all the hands go up. I swear, he was so happy! If only there were tears of joy, but alas, there weren't. Totally would have made for a good Bollywood movie. It isn't lost on me that the students actually should be insulted that the prof thinks we don't read cases, but hell, it was such a happy moment.

The class dealt with the different phases of outsourcing, and how the balance of power tends to shift along the duration of the partnership, and the micro case given dealt with something similar. The second session was more to do with how you should control intellectual activity like software development, against how you would control manual activity like factory production. The various types of control systems were being discussed and the typical pros/cons of the same. The class came about lively here, as they were talking of the different ways that their company uses to handle such situations, especially when the customer wants to manage the resources directly, but their company resents external control of their own resources. Kind of portrays to anyone outside that the company is incapable of managing its resources effectively. Doesn't go down well with Indians now, does it?

A very interesting week with a lot of ground covered. I'm already beginning to enjoy this quarter.

Quarter 8 - Week 2

The corridors are a little quieter, they're a little more spacious. With a couple of the batches graduating and far fewer of the 2008 batch amongst us, there's almost a little dulling of the energy around us. Oh well, lesser hustle and bustle at the tea shop and lunch counter for us. Every cloud, silver lining, therefore profit etc... blah, blah.

Ethics in Business Management

The first session was a continuation from the last one, on the basics of ethics and a simple framework. We were trying our hands out on a case, that of Enron, to figure out if what happened was ethical or not, and who was to blame. After pulling it a bit here and there, the class almost came to a consensus that the founder was the person who was most to blame (no surprise there, but hey, we applied a framework... what did you apply? Common sense, sheesh, mere mortal!)

The second session brought back some reality to the class room. The prof asks "How many people go through the readings?", and a few hands slowly climb up in the air. The vast majority on the other hand is studiously examining their notes, or name badges, as going through that will undoubtedly bring us the knowledge from the readings. The prof is obviously less than amused, and in a good-humored manner makes us all stand up... hold our right hands in the air... and solemnly take a vow to read all cases in this course henceforth. I don't know about the others, but I'm now actually motivated to read the case! Now to see what comes first, integrity or sloth! Coming away from all such things, the learnings from the day involved understanding the different views of ethics, and how they've evolved. How it's possible to look at a particular scenario from multiple views, and then come to a more informed conclusion on whether or not the route taken to the decision was fair, and just.

Managing Off-shored Software and IT Services

For the first session, we had two REALLY big cases to go through. And I can understand why, they're apparently Mega-Contracts. It was very interesting to see the nuances that people go through when they're trying to form a long term partnership or contractual agreement. The levels of bargaining, the bi-yearly refinements to the contract, the advantages and disadvantages of off-shoring tasks, and how to choose when to offshore them. All of these make for very interesting readings.

The second session was more to do with understanding contracts and services from a financial angle. For e.g. what are the possible long term effects from doing off-shoring, like is it possible that the other party might be in a far stronger position than you're in right now, to almost take advantage of you... or if this is a service that you require frequently, in which case you MAY be better off in acquiring the company itself. A lot of interesting nuances, and views on these, based on which yet another framework determined what we should look at when we try to off-shore or acquire a company.

The week belonged to frameworks, showing us how to use particular frameworks. I just worry that we might take these frameworks too seriously, too seriously and miss the evolving market out there. At least it's encouraging to know that we don't accept such frameworks easily. If there's one thing that we've learnt at the IIMB, it is to question. Question carefully, and choose the right question. For that will bring you the answer. And so endeth the drowsy midnight lesson.

Quarter 8 - Week 1

The last quarter for the year, and it feels like I'm on the cusp of something huge. I would have completed two years by May this year. That's.... some... accomplishment! I've taken a lighter load this quarter, two subjects and one project. So it feels a lot more aaraam-se compared to the other quarters. Traditionally, Q4 has always been the "soft quarter", the courses are more the pondering-types rather than the hard-theoritical types. My choices reflect the type of courses offered this time around...

Ethics in Business Management

I've always been told that Ethics can't be taught, it is imbibed, mostly in your formative years. I look at it a little differently. A person would take a course on ethics under two circumstances. 1. He wants to understand ethics more deeply, so he can be a better person morally. 2. He wants to break the rules, and is looking for practical loopholes. I like to think that I fall under the former category! :D

We've already done one case study on Ethics, it was based on slavery in the Chocolate industry. Apparently, 50% of the world's production of cocoa beans happen in Ghana and on the Ivory Coast. And the labour is mostly children, who have been enslaved after being kidnapped at a young age. Their living conditions are atrocious, and their plights miserable. So, after a lot of hullabaloo, people covered the event in major newspapers and television broadcast, and the case ends with a statement of the current status. Apparently people still buy chocolate.

We followed it up with an analysis using a framework that was taught. And we found, that except for the poor kids who were enslaved, everyone else, including the chocolate farmers, traders, bigtime US chocolate manufacturers, retail and distribution and the regular global consumer were ALL morally responsible for the unfortunate events. So the prof concludes saying that everyone has a choice to buy stuff, and you could choose not to buy, but even then many times, people continue to buy shirking off their moral responsibility. Additionally, what seems unethical to us, might seem all right to people in that condition. So it's not fair to look at ethics through a single lens, you need to apply it to the region and its customs, and then decide what actions should be taken.

Managing Off-Shored Software and IT services

A slightly more soporific course that seems to cover how we're doing currently in the off-shored space and what we can do to better manage it. We started with a simple understanding of which countries are known better for what type of outsourced/offshored activity. Our second session while focussing around this topic, ended with an understanding of India's competitive advantage, and if it is possible for us to sustain it. You'd be surprised at the result we arrived at! ;)

Here's to looking forward to a chilled-out quarter, with chilled-out activity. All assignments are individual, for the first time ever! Looks like this can be a nice fun quarter after all! Who says you can't relax at the IIMB?