5 reasons to do an exchange term abroad

It’s been long since I contributed to this blog however this is a very apt occasion to make a comeback by describing the experience of an exchange term. For those uninitiated: PGSEM offers the students a chance (or 2 chances which I’ll explain later) to take one of their term in a foreign university. This is the same as offered to the PGP batch studying along with you and same to the extent that the rank list for choosing universities is common between the PGP and PGSEM students. For e.g. this year’s 2^nd ranker overall was a PGSEMer and he got to choose London Business School for his exchange term.

Anyways, exchange university selection process is a thrill in itself but to keep it short, around the 4^th quarter of your studies, you’re asked to choose if you want to take a quarter abroad. Now by 2 chances I meant that since PGSEM has 10 quarters so they get to opt 2 times for the exchange process (though they can only take 1 exchange term during the course). Based on your 1^st quarter marks, all students, PGP and PGSEM are ranked together and asked to choose the universities in order of the student’s rank. And don’t worry, IIM Bangalore has partnerships with most top institutes in all geographies.

Now coming back to the topic, what are the top 5 reasons for PGSEM students specifically to do an exchange term abroad? Though reasons below might overlap with numerous folks who have taken exchange term at different universities, ones stated below are strictly derived from my experience at NUS Business School, Singapore. Ordered from least important to the most important according to me:

Subject Choice is good reason for taking up an exchange. A lot of schools IIM has tie up with work in a university system and what I found exciting was that at NUS Business School, you have access to the whole university to choose some of the subjects. People can take up 1 subject outside of Business School in any discipline of their choice. Some people picked up Chinese language, some picked Music and so on. I ended up picking a course with school of design and environment out of my interest in Clean Tech. Even the business school would present you a different subject choice simply because they’re a different school with different faculty. To state it another way: It’s not needed that the foreign university is better, it’s better that there is more variety at your disposal.

Networking:  I feel that exchange term drastically increases your network. Especially when you’re a PGSEMer, you’re interacting with your batch mates in classes and to some extent after classes for extracurricular or projects. Being full-time in a hostel with a bunch of MBA students is a totally different experience. The friendships formed when you’re studying together, networking together (read partying) or eating together are fairly more involved. A totally new environment and new country helps your forge several new friendships in a short duration. Also since you’re studying full time, you could pick up even unpaid internships in fields that you’re more interested in and build your network further.

Diversity: Your network is not only large but more Diverse. Going into a foreign university during the exchange term, brings in people from various nationalities and various backgrounds. If two people had the same set of people they knew, the gain in network connections is not that much, but if the set of people are totally from different field and country, you gained a whole new network of friends. However perhaps scoring high on people you know is the least benefit of working in a diverse group. You learn a lot about team work, cultural sensitivity and tacit knowledge about dealing with a variety of people that’s much more valuable.

Career Services: Another important reason for me to choose exchange was for the career services that the exchange school provided. Let me clarify, this doesn’t mean that you’ll be sitting in placements in foreign school. What it means is that you can take help from career services of these schools to improve your profile, get your resume reviewed or even attend presentations from companies you’re interested in.

Taking MBA without work: Lastly but most importantly for a PGSEMer, an exchange term provides an opportunity to take your MBA without work. You’d note I didn’t use the word “Full-time” because for one I can tell is that the number classroom contact hours are exactly the same per subject either ways. What changes is that you’re much more focussed on the subjects and don’t have to switch context too much. If it was to me, I’d say PGSEMers are the most hardened MBA graduates who can balance more than any other full time folks. However at the same time, it’s a pleasant break to be able to concentrate on your subjects full time, pick up more subjects, spend your extra time in extracurricular activities and be a student again.

However at the end of the day, there is opportunity cost involved.  PGSEMers are constrained by their work commitments sometime and cannot take this unpaid break from work. Such long a break might even put your employment at risk. This decision finally rests on the person taking it and s/he has to fix all these. There are some schools which even give scholarships to IIM students and if not totally free, the trip costs reduce drastically.

It was a great experience for me and I hope some of the above reasons resonate with you and you take this exciting opportunity that PGSEM provides you.

Making History! A Conversation With Mr. Sumit Chowdhury

Entrepreneur of 'My Life Chronicles'

PGSEM 2005-08

www.mylifechronicles.com

1)    Why did you decide to start My Life Chronicles

The idea came to my mind while speaking casually to a couple of my PGSEM batch mates at IIMB. It was Dec 2008. My father passed away from cancer in 1998 and I left home right after that. My elder brother had left home earlier. Being a very organized person my father used to write journals regularly and keep all letters and other paper records neatly filed. On my visits to home town years later, I could see that those diaries and folders were gathering dust and even being sold away to the raddiwalla. I could not do much while on a short vacation but wanted to at least scan and digitize the old photos and letters. This desire led me to the idea of preserving individual and family stories and then on to preserving institute and corporate memories. When I googled I found that there is an organization in the USA called APH, Association of Personal Historians who are already doing this for 15 years. That was the time I realized that we Indians are poor preservers of our past and that needed to change and change fast.

2)    Tell a little about yourself - education, work, family - the story so far.

Born and brought up in Steel City of Durgapur, I completed my secondary education from St. Xavier’s, Durgapur and Higher Secondary education from Bidhan Chandra Institution, Durgapur. I went on to complete my BE(Hons) from REC Durgapur and chose to work at SAIL, Durgapur. This was the time my father was suffering from cancer and I cherish the time I stayed close to him. Father passed away in 1998 and I moved to Bangalore a year later in 1999 following my IT dreams. Infosys was about 3500 people and still a close family when I joined the company. I remember sitting close to NRN's cabin in the Heritage Building, Electronics City. Infosys gave me an opportunity to broaden my exposure and knowledge by sending me on various foreign assignments. This happened pretty quickly in my career and the rich interactions with customers helped shape my thought processes. I got married to Tandra in 2000, an alumna from my college. We moved to Banerghatta Road, very close to IIMB. We still stay here. Tandra works in Novellus Systems. We have 2 daughters, Ananya of 8 years and Anwesha 3 of years. 

In 2003, I went through this phase where I had a major urge to do a PhD in Operations Management (Sunil Mehta's book inspired me). I took the GMAT and applied to a few universities in the USA. Georgia Tech found me worthy of a scholarship and invited me over. Reality struck me hard as I realized the full impact of the decision. Leaving my 6 month old daughter and family for a degree which takes 5 years, by a conservative estimate sounded impossible. Taking them along meant sacrificing settled lives and careers. I sent a painful rejection note to Georgia Tech and appeared for the neighborhood IIMB PGSM program interview instead. This was the same time I moved from IT Delivery to Pre-Sales and Marketing at Infosys, hoping to focus on academics for a couple of years. 2004-2007 was a roller coaster ride juggling PGSM assignments, Pre-Sales RFPs and family. However, this is the time that gave me the confidence and courage to attempt something different, to start on an entrepreneurial journey. I felt I was not ready and to get a different perspective I challenged myself to join a completely different work environment. I joined Honeywell, an industrial automation giant working on New Product Development projects. I kept working on my entrepreneurial ideas and goals till the time I left Honeywell to start My Life Chronicles 3+ years later. My Life Chronicles has been a labor of love ever since.

3)    How did you manage the risks, how are you paying the bills

Having a working and supportive spouse helps. It has been more than a year and I continue to depend on her to meet our bills. However, I am planning to start taking a small monthly salary from My Life Chronicles to ease the burden.

4)    Are you happy 

I am having the most enjoyable albeit the most hectic time of my life. I am no more known by Infosys or Honeywell but by My Life Chronicles alone. This is a fundamental shift in thinking and can give entrepreneur nightmares in the initial months and years.

5)    Would you want to go back to Honeywell

No, unless I am compelled to because of financial or other pressures.

6)    What next

My Life Chronicles, I would like to believe, is at an inflexion point. I will be joined by partners in the next few months, partners who see value in what I am doing and who would like to share the risk. While stories of individuals is where my heart lies, corporate chronicles is showing a lot of promise. I am working with CRISIL (A Standard & Poor's co.), a well-known brand with a tremendous reach across India and even globally. In the process, I have been personally interviewing Senior Management and Board members of large corporate and all of them have been very positive about the idea. Making high quality memoirs and chronicles affordable and easy, still remains my dream.

7)    Advise to those who want to take the Plunge

Follow your heart but have a safety net. Prepare for the worst case, take your family into confidence and take the plunge. The 'right time' will never come. The right time is now. You are not going to die if you take the plunge!

8)    What role and importance would you attribute to PGSEM in your journey so far?

Without PGSEM I would not have had the confidence to venture out. Through PGSEM I have come to know a few people who have helped me with their thoughts, suggestions and encouragement.

9)    How did you evaluate the opportunity in terms of the critical elements of success? The competition and the potential market? Did you make a business plan?

This is a new concept in India. There was no data available as such. We did some primary research which didn’t throw up positive results. It was more of gut feel and the passion to do something I enjoy that led me to plunge.

10)  Any specific learning’s you would like to share with the budding entrepreneurs.

Meet as many potential customers you can and listen to what they want. Meet start-up founders and understand/learn from their challenges/mistakes. Moonlight.

Second Hand Learning

Sitting in a PGSEM classroom can be quite an experience sometimes, purely for its awe-inducing value among other things. There is no doubt about the fact that our professors are extremely accomplished individuals who have a wealth of knowledge to share. But sometimes you realize it is not just their knowledge but also that of the world’s foremost authorities on certain subjects that is being passed on to you in class. And that fleeting moment of inspiration (before intimidation follows) is priceless.

For instance, yesterday we discovered that one of our professors has studied under Narendra Karmarkar at the TIFR. Last quarter, we were taught by a professor who has studied under Nouriel Roubini. And it is good to know that we are getting to hear the ideas of these stalwarts somewhere through our professors. While that has the danger of mental tunnelling occurring due to the influences/hand-me-down ideas, it is important to note that it is probably better than not getting to hear these ideas at all. This second hand learning from international authorities has been quite a fascinating aspect of the course, whenever it has presented itself.

A few weeks ago, the Internet was abuzz with reports of the advent of Facebook reducing the degrees of separation in the world from 6 to 4.74. In our case, we are one degree of separation away from some of the best brains in the world and that is a good spurt of motivation any day!

Pehel 2011 - The Experience

The PGSEM batch of 2011 had their 3-day Orientation way back in May 2011 – 3 days of fun. As it came to a close, we were all planning to squeeze in as much rest and fun in the next 3 weeks before the classes began as possible. But the parting note from our seniors changed all that. We were to organize Pehel 2011 in the first 3 weeks of classes starting and the 3 weeks of our free time could be utilized very well for planning the event. Of course.

Pehel is the first event that a new batch of PGSEM organizes in IIMB. It’s a fresher’s event with a difference – the freshers organize it for the seniors and not the other way round. The seniors certainly provide a lot of guidance to the greenhorns but the logistics are completely left to the new batch.  Starting from the fund raising to the execution. It is hands-on business education!

So we started with a flurry of mails in early June to try and get the details of the event in place, starting with how to raise funds, given that external funding isn’t allowed. And when the mails got too chaotic, we realized why organizations have a certain hierarchical and team structure in place. We got our own core committee in place to co-ordinate specific items of the event and streamline communication/logistics.

Taking a cue from our senior batch, we also decided to go the t-shirt route to raise capital for the event. After getting many quotes we finalized on Amit Sharma’s Go Untucked as our vendor, finding the cost versus quality comparison to be good in their case. Meanwhile a few students from the class were busy designing Pehel logos and we finally went with Shalini and Vineeth’s Warli design since it symbolized our roots to be Indian and yet our vision to be forward looking in the use of a traditional art form to design a modern logo. One item checked off the list.

Meetings at Café Terra meanwhile were becoming more focussed as we got down from a high level plan to chalking out minute details and assigning co-ordinator roles for each. Ideas were collected for the events that could be performed and talent scouted in the class. Sometime in the middle of all this, the classes began, putting an additional demand on our time that was already split between work and running around for Pehel. Panic set in as the mid-term dates were announced in the first class itself and we realized we had very little time for Pehel.

After confirming the director’s availability and making sure the Director’s Merit List for our senior batch was going to be out, we set 9th of July as the date for Pehel 2011. The concrete date added more of a boost to the flurry as we got busy checking off item after item from our list of Pehel to-do’s. Days went by in a daze as we ordered for our t-shirts, finalized the event list, racked our brains for a good children’s event, designed and ordered posters/invites, distributed invites to the professors on weekdays, got customized gifts for the guests of honour, figured out audience gifts, rushed for children’s gifts, had music jams on Saturday evenings in the classroom, planned a skit in the last 2 days before the event and practiced on campus till 10:30 in the night.  It was like a hurricane sweeping through our schedules and getting everything done.

The D-Day dawned and we distributed the t-shirts that had been ordered. We were almost giddy to wear what has almost become the 2011 batch identity now and conduct the event. Even as we finished the last bits of tech runs in the auditorium, parents and seniors started to pour in excitedly on the IIMB campus and the show was on. An impromptu musical performance thrown in for good measure and Pehel 2011 was a great success with the mad-ads performance by the Mad Med Men, a skit by the stars of our class, kids jumping around on stage to the tune of Barbie Girl (a fashion show of sorts I must say), some audience prizes and a nice closing note with the batch singing KK’s Pal after the musical performance. The dinner and high tea, sponsored by the PGSEM office were great support and I am certain everyone was floored by the beautiful MDC Dining Hall that hosted us all. 

As is the case with most such events, it was overwhelming only once it was over – the magnitude of what we had really put up on stage. It was a wonderful culmination of about a month’s worth of effort. Every minute of it looks well-spent in hindsight. And our MBA has officially begun.

Voice of PGSEMer...

What better way to welcome the new batch to the blog than to put one of their creative work as part of orientation...

Creating Nostalgia: IIMB PGSEM 2011 Orientation Day 1

It was a Friday morning, dress down day at work, but I got into carefully ironed business formals. I picked up my laptop bag, like I do everyday, but also picked up a suitcase that had been filled until it was bursting at the seams. If it sounds like I was preparing to go on a business trip for an extended period, let me tell you I wasn’t. I was preparing to go to college…10 minutes away from home.

More than four months of a procedure – entrance exams, interview invitations, admission offers and the anxiety accompanying each of these – had culminated into this day. The 14th batch of the IIM Bangalore PGSEM programme was to be inducted into and oriented towards the Institute, the course. A 3-day residential event that we were all looking forward to, finally commenced this morning with breakfast and hostel check-ins.

Some things in life don’t hit you until you are in the middle of them. Like finally being an official student of IIM Bangalore. I walked in through the gates, pulling my suitcase along and taking in the campus anew, the greenery, the serenity, the sanctity that only college campuses can exude. I was completely in the moment until I reached the hostel blocks and stood in line for getting a room allotted. It was then that it hit me; I could now call this campus mine, that I was in there as a rightful occupant and not as a visitor. I suddenly relaxed and almost broke into a comfortable smile at the thought. The feeling wasn’t different from coming home.

For someone whose last memory of college was being on an NIT campus with peers of the same age and naïve mindsets, ready to take on the world, this felt different. The classmates standing in line, most of whom I was seeing for the first time seemed to come from all ages and in effect, from all levels of experience. They seemed somehow more grounded, more sorted. One immediately knew that this wasn’t going to be like the last time for more reasons than one. And the day’s proceedings reiterated that fact in every way possible.

We were allotted rooms in the Executive Blocks of the student hostel and for someone who had never stayed in a hostel it was a complete deviation from the stereotype that undergraduate level hostel had left in my mind…the ones where my friends stayed in college. I got a well-furnished front room in these well-designed blocks and the view of the striking green patch that is the football field was like a balm to my screen-strained eyes! I couldn’t enjoy the view for too long though and had to run back for the day’s proceedings!

The PGSEM senior batch students had the reigns in their hands from the start. Right from pointing out various blocks to giving out announcements through the day about the events lined up for us and acting as our bridges to the IIMB campus and community. Our day started with a welcome session by them where a lot of practical and useful information was given out regarding many things concerning out 2.5 year sojourn. It was more reorientation that orientation as we tried to dig up words like grades, GPA, assignments, group projects from our past college experiences. Through the day, we were appraised of various committees that co-ordinate activities for the PGSEM students. Before the orientation we had received an assignment and had been given a week to finish it. Somewhere I was secretly hoping that it would be something to just warm us up but they actually brought it up in the session and used it as a basis to discuss various aspects of classwork. To top that, the assignment marks were going to count towards the House Cup!

The House Cup is an event comprising of various activities – academic or otherwise – that we all are undertaking in groups over these three days and the group scoring the maximum points will lift the Cup. Just the task of coming up with a name and war cry for our group turned out to be quite a task commanding extensive discussions in our group. We ultimately got it done only at the last minute feeling quite stressed about it! But that was only the start.

The welcome session was followed by our registration process and an extensive discussion with the PGSEM Chairperson Prof. NM Agrawal. In the evening, the batch was officially inaugurated by a distinguished alumnus from Samsung, Mr. Dipesh Shah, followed by an Alumni interaction session. Each of these sessions convinced me that I had made the right choice with this course, going by how fondly each of these alumni spoke about the PGSEM experience. This was just our first day and already the slope of the learning curve seemed to have gone up a few notches.

The time post dinner was filled by the Student Affairs Council with more activities for the House Cup that began at 10 pm! Just when we were feeling we couldn’t even move a muscle after such a tiring day, we were able to pull out energy from some secret reserve and everyone participated enthusiastically in the know-your-group contest, Antakshari and Dumb Charades. We were behaving like a bunch of unruly school children that I am sure the seniors had a tough time dealing with. All the same, it was amazing to see our child egos resurrected, a concept Prof. Agrawal spoke about in the afternoon.

Just when we thought it was a wrap and time to hit the bed, something we assumed was our birthright after spending such a hectic day, that we realized that our seniors had no intentions of letting us sleep peacefully anytime in these 3 days. And so were given out more tasks to do – House Cup activities like writing blog posts, making a skit as well as an official case study! It is a godsend that the eat-outs on campus stay open till late and we prepared for a long night ahead by ordering some munchies from Park-N-Eat and getting down to discussion.

So yes, it’s 2 AM and I am determined to meet the deadline of 7:30 am for this blog post. Somewhere in these beautiful corridors, my group members are scheming for a skit. It is just a snapshot of things to come and it is going to be an exciting and gruelling time but it is also a time none of us will ever forget in life and this is nostalgia in the making. It is a Herculean effort working on this rather than be sleeping on that comfortable-looking bed but I’d prefer to be nowhere else but here right now – sleep deprived but excited in the hallways of IIM Bangalore. As a student of the 14th batch of PGSEM. Actually, just as a student. Let the good times roll!

~ Anupama 
   PGSEM2011

We wish the new batch the very best!

A 'Good' Friday

PGSEM 2009 student Sanjeev Kumar PS has a unique experience to share:

We have got inspired by them, We look upto them, we are proud of them... They are our Armed forces!
There is a program ongoing in IIMB for officers from Armed forces. Participants include guiness book record holders, commandos, brigadiers etc.  

PGSEM students hosted a buffet lunch for these wonderful people on Good Friday. The day really turned out to be literally a "good" Friday. PGSEM students met them in person to get inspired, listen to their leadership thoughts and of course to increase their networking.

As the armed forces shared their stories with pride, PGSEM students listened to them with great intent. There were stories of valour that were heart wrenching and at the same time inspiring. 

At the end of the day, it was PGSEM students who felt more proud to have spent some quality time with these great country men who have offered so much to our nation!

Introducing Voice of PGSEMer

Starting with the below post, we are introducing a new section on the voice of PGSEMers. In line with the 'Know Your Alumni' series, these posts will focus on insider views of PGSEM students on the course and their experience.

Hi from Venky, PGSEM 2010. Thanks to IIM Bangalore for conducting an excellent part-time MBA program meeting the needs of Software Professionals in Bangalore. Just to give a bit of background about myself, I am a techno functional person with project managerial skills and one of the co-founders & directors of 7 years old 150 People Company CRMIT(www.crmit.com) in Bangalore with a total experience of around 12 years in IT field. Though I have lot more subjects to go through in next 7 quarters, I thought of sharing how some of the subjects that I learn t in three quarters helping me in my day to day work

 In the first quarter we had Microeconomics, Financial Accounting and Strategic management. Microeconomics reemphasis the fact that delivering under constraints is the key challenge for any manager, financial accounting helped me to better understand my own company's balance sheet, P&L and cash flow statement and Strategic management provided great insights on different proven strategic frameworks available to formulate the right strategies for your company's needs in this competitive environment

 In Q2 we had Quantitative methods, Macroeconomics and Managing Organizations. Managing Organizations provided me techniques on designing a scalable organization as you grow and inputs on key people related challenges and solutions to handle. QM emphasized the importance of "numbers" in your day to day decision making and Macroeconomics gave me the understanding that management is not just about managing company, customers and people but also able to expect and manage macro economical fluctuations like Inflation, Exchange rate, Interest rates, Unemployment, GDP growth etc

 Now in Q3, we have Marketing, Law and Managerial accounting. Introduction to marketing is a great subject to understand better your company's strengths and weakness, competitive challenges, customers preferences and use them effectively as the base to segment, target and position your products and services. Law is an interesting subject to understand the legal framework, typical legal challenges you would possibly encounter with your employees and customers, ways of handling them and best practices to be followed in Contracting / licensing. Managerial accountings provides insights on managing your overhead expenses, effectively playing with your fixed & variable costs and provides a structured approach of budgeting, planning & control your operations to build an effective, efficient & profitable Organization

 In net I am delighted about choosing the right program that helps me practically in my day to day job and I enjoy every class conducted by excellent faculties of IIM Bangalore. I also got an option to do a 3 months exchange program with a well recognized college in USA and I am hoping to gain a lot from the same