Wednesday, August 17, 2011

A Story-Lover's Delight


All of us have a list of reasons why we want to pursue business education. I’m sure this one doesn’t figure there, at least it wasn’t on mine. Now I wonder why.

Q1 is drawing to a close and so far, among other things, the MBA experience (and in that the PGSEM experience with its primary focus on knowledge) has been one big delightful storybook.  On the very first day itself, we were told the story of Marie Antoinette and how she was thought to be crazy just because she seemed to be proposing what was a primitive version of the Bottom Of the Pyramid concept! I sat in class wide-eyed like a child, having come into class expecting graphs showing demand-supply curves but listening to French history instead!

In the 2 months that followed, we’ve heard many stories – the story of how Japan’s history has brought it to the state that it’s in, the story of oil, the story of Classic Coke and the stories of many corporations in the form of case studies – some talking of businesses that broke new ground, some of failed ideas and some of phenomena that changed our lives. There were stories of simple kind hearted people who built great institutions like Aravind Eye Care and there were intriguing stories like those of the Cuban Missile Crisis (delivered in a two hour movie session with the film The Missles Of October : ) ). But they were all fascinating. For someone who loves listening to and telling stories, it’s been a pleasant surprise to find a treasure chest in the classroom.

The next time I recommend PGSEM or MBA in general to anyone, I am going to put this as the topmost reason why someone should go for business education. Before anything else, it becomes enjoyable just because it takes us back to the time when storytelling was a major part of our lives. And hopefully all these stories will influence us enough to be able to create big stories ourselves in the future!

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Harish Hande, MD SELCO at Eximius 2011 - IIMB's Entrepreneurship Summit

It was a fitting finale to Day 1 of Eximius 2011 @ IIM Bangalore. I am referring to the keynote lecture by Harish Hande, MD Selco Solar. His thrust on helping asset generation for the rural poor rather than just selling to them struck me as crucial.

Starting on a humorous note with ‎"At IIT Kharagpur I ragged Saurav (Prof Saurav Mukherjee), Arvind Kejriwal ragged me and now he is ragging the country ... " Harish Hande, Magsaysay Award winner went on to highlight the areas SELCO works on and how his journey started.

He focused on the importance of market linkages, technology and financial products for the rural or urban poor. "I told him straight on his face that the concept was exploitative. You take money from the poorest at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BOP) and pass it on to the wealthy top of the pyramid without enabling any asset creation at the BOP", Harish Hande referring to his conversation with Prof C K Prahalad on Fortune at the BOP.

A recording of the talk here:  http://www.justin.tv/eximi​us2011/b/292491928



How SELCO is spawning off entrepreneurs:

Friday, August 12, 2011

Eximius 2011 starts in less than 15 hours!!!

Eximius 2011, The The Entrepreneurship Summit of IIM Bangalore starts in less than 15 hours!!

Participate in contests ranging from B-plans, Workshops, Pitching to VC to Panel discussions that will bring out the entrepreneur in you!! with prizes worth Rs. 15 lakhs to be won!

EXIMIUS is an open summit and registration for all the events is free.

Visit us @ http://eximius-iimb.com/index.php

FB Page http://www.facebook.com/Eximius2011

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