Conversation ....

Two days back, we (Shashank, Tarun and myself) were discussing career options and work life balance post MBA. Like any other day, Shashank is in high spirits with a Fosters in his hand and Tarun came up with an excellent story he came across.

A child of a high paying parent is deprived of his father’s time and attention. On a day, over breakfast, the conversation goes like this:

Child: Dad, how much do you get paid for an hour?
Father: 5K an hour
Child: Hmmmm …. Can you give me 4K.
Father: What does a kid studying first standard got to do with 4K. blah blah…..

and rushes to office after breakfast. This guy thinks over the conversation during the course of the day and makes up his mind to give 4K to the kid. By the time he returns home, the kid is lying in his bed half sleep. With no intention of waking up the kid, he places four 1000 Rs notes by the side of the kid. The kid wakes up and takes a 1000 INR which he had collected from long back and gives 5K to his father and asks him to take out on an evening for an hour. Very moving. Isn’t it ?

The moral of the story is not so difficult to make out. But, the most difficult challenge I guess is to manage work-life balance.

Last post continued...

I thought I would post one very funny conversation which took place over dinner today.

I was having dinner with two buddies of mine and we were discussing how life could be if one gets married while at ISB. One of us interpreted it as marrying a gal who is doing her MBA along with you at ISB. He came up with advantages like staying together in studio apartment instead of two shared apartments and thus saving some money. Then one of us came up with “The chances of marrying a girl at ISB are very minimal. Even if you start building a relationship, you never know if the girl is responding to your efforts (to build a relationship with her) or if she is networking with you”. :) :)

First few days @ ISB …

I must say that the last few days are quite happening with something or the other going on in the campus. Right from 12-April to this hour, something or the other goes on in the campus. It could be folks socializing, informal events to formal events. I believe all this is to prepare our batch (Class of 2009) to the roller coaster ride (one of the speakers in the orientation session described this as walking on a high speed conveyer belt with nothing to protect you from falling off side ways. You have to balance yourself and maintain pace with the conveyer). One of my favourite quote/phrase of the orientation week so far is the statement made by Dr. M Rammohan Rao (Dean, ISB). He was referring to the quote by his professor during his Ph.D days. The essence of the statement goes like: If you make a prediction, predict something which is not going to happen when you are around. If the prediction goes wrong, you will not be around to take the beating :). Along with the statement, the manner in which it was told made the entire auditorium burst in to laughter.

Registration was organized extremely well. It did not take more than an hour and half for me to complete the entire registration process. The first Sunday on campus is no holiday. We had presentations and a session on the first model (three legged model… though it is not directly related to our course) of our MBA on a Sunday :(. I guess this is an eye opener for all those who got used to five working days a week. However, I am not sure if anybody realized that all this was happening on a Sunday. That’s what sets the organizers and the speakers here apart.

Section events got kicked off today with treasure hunt. By the end of the day, everybody was wet because they were either sweating in the hot Hyderabadi sun or they were dunked in to the swimming pool. Our team managed to complete treasure hunt in two hours. We are not the winners for sure. I think we fall in the median 80% of the teams :)

Some of the information we came across during the orientation:

1) The next batch going to be 500-550 strong. Construction for the new student village is underway.

2) Avg. GMAT score for the class of 2009 of ISB is close to (if not more than) schools like Harvad, Wharton etc

3) ISB is aiming to be a pioneer in business research in India and APAC. I also believe that the focus is mainly on emerging markets.

One more thing, if you are male IT engineer from Bangalore, you are the most common species here. You are sure to find lot of your comrades here.

Finally....

Finally, I am idling here in the hanging chair in the balcony of my house and wondering how awesome being jobless is. I am having a pretty relaxed time enjoying ghar ka khaana. This luxury is not going to last long as my classes are going to start next week.

Quite contrary to the last few days, the first half of the last week has been extremely crazy as I had to travel back to India and complete all the relieving formalities. Just an hour before the scheduled pick up by taxi to airport, I managed to drive 30 miles (to Nashua) and pick up a delivery from DHL. While driving, I was just hoping not to be caught by cop which would potentially kill my schedule. Finally, I managed to reach airport an hour and half before departure time. The best part of the journey was my co-passenger. Never before during any of my journey/travels, I had a female co-passenger sitting next to me. But, this time around, a girl (that too a blonde (4.5)) is sitting next to me. Surprised, I cross checked my seat number with boarding pass three times to verify if I am looking at the right seat number. I was right. Unfortunately, the feeling did not last long. I had to trade my seat as one my colleague was sitting alone. The journey was kinda adventurous as the waiting time in Frankfurt was just 50 minutes and that too the connecting flight does not depart in the same terminal. Fortunately, I managed to hop in to the connecting flight at the right time and my baggage also reached Bangalore safely.

My relieving formalities also went smoothly. Almost everybody I met in the last few days of my work at my previous company know about ISB. Considering the fact that ISB is still in its first 10 years of inception, it is quite an achievement. But, ISB needs to do some sort of brand building as not many abroad know about ISB.

Finally, the placement report of ISB for 2008 batch is out. The report can be accessed here. I also applied for educational loan with Andhra . Life is made easier for we guys. I completed the loan application form in just 30 minutes (ofcourse with the help from a staff). I also managed to open a savings bank account and get a pass book with in just an hour. I must say that I am very impressed by the service I got from the bank (take note private bank enthusiasts)