Still there are a few realities that need to be told to the new breed of sales trainees. Knowing things in advance is always good so that Jor kaa jhatka dheere se lage. My friends, these are few of the things that you should be prepared for(Apart from traveling in a trolley with goats and life threats from competitors –

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So, my training is more or less over and here is my modest attempt to summarize what life is for a management sales trainee. The good things first:

1. Your business sustains livelihoods: From your salesmen to your distributors, from retailers to factory workers, from shareholders to your coworkers, you know that there are people who are dependent on this business. They are, in a small way dependent on you. Even as a trainee, the choices you make are important as they impact some of them directly (and in a big way). A smile from a retailer, a ‘thank you, Sir’ from a salesman, and you know that your job goes beyond the materialistic things of life.

2. Sales thrills: Sales gives you its own joyrides. You feel that you own that X% of this world. This ownership comes in many terms.. It could be the shelf-space, stocks, loyal consumers, sales-force spread across the territory. Then comes the thrill of numbers, if you are in to it, then the numbers belong to you. And when they belong to you, you chase them, you protect them, you plan for them and you try to achieve them and upon accomplishment you celebrate them..it’s fun.

3. Sales figures are not your headache, yet! Despite all the training and stints, the truth is that you are still in that so called ‘learning phase’. So people don’t really expect much fireworks from you. And even in the rarest of the cases that people do pull you over numbers, you just need a bit of thick skin to hear everything and conclude yourself by saying that you’ll try harder next time.

4. You hardly complain about quality if things are free. Your stay, food and numerous other expenses will be paid by the company.

5. Enjoy the ego trip: It’s a world of numerous hierarchy levels, and usually these levels are pretty hard to climb. In you mid 20s, you get a position which many others in the organization can only dream of occupying even in their late 30s. And it’s not the new age IT stuff, it’s a place where people really respect the chair that you hold.

6. Travel to new places: Explore and enjoy. You visit at least 15-20 new places in your training year. At least some of them are bound to be good tourist locations. You stay there at company’s expense and you wake up facing either the sea or a mountain range. How could you still complain about life?

In brief, take everything in your stride and move on. Dil rakhne ke liye to log ye bhi bolte hain ki Sales is what makes men out of boys : )

BTW, I can’t resist the urge to write the other side of this. So very soon, I’ll come up with a piece on perils of being a sales trainee : )

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Life is full of questions. We prepare for some of them, while few others just take us by surprise. While one can prepare for an exam, an interview or even the much abused ‘let the boy and girl talk for some time’ kind of instances in one’s life, there are few questions which will just prop up suddenly and will leave you wanting for answers. I am gonna describe one of such situation that I faced during one of the many non consequential interactions that I have had with my customers/retailers in this sleepy town of Kottayam (yupp thats my base for the moment, and for the un-initiated, its located in kerala.. n for the out and out lucky ignorant bastards, it’s in south India)

I remember an old joke about IT professionals. Which goes like this: A frustrated on bench IT guy vents his frustration on a poor restaurant worker. He says that after just 3 years of job he has a bank balance, car ..etc. Tumhare paas kya hai?

n the worker replies ki “Sir, mere paas kaam hai”

When I was in Wipro, we used to laugh our heads off over this.

I got myself into a similar situation a week back. Now I was with the route Supervisor(oops.. Team lead), completing my usual beat, interacting with retailers (mostly with the help of my TL) wherever possible.

We had visited about 20-25 outlets by the time. I was reasonably happy with the way things had gone till then, I had noticed quite a few things which would have ultimately help me in compiling a good report. So when my TL (OK for the IT junta: A TL in this sales business has little resemblance to a TL in IT field, We are talking about TL of hawkers/salesmen) went away to park his bike, I decided to engage the retailer myself. So here is how it went.

Me: Hello Cheta(means elder bro in Malayalam), Where do you keep Cigs?(looking inside the counter to check the stocking)

Retailer: (Gave me a puzzled looks)

Me: Wo mein company se(showing my ITC logo on the T-shirt)

Retailer: Still confused. said something in Malayalam.. which I could not understand at all(perhaps was asking what do you need?)

Me: (I looked for my TL..but he was not in sight.. I again tried my best) : Cheta, Cigarette company.. Scissors..

Retailer: Hmm .. you.. new supervisor?

Me:(Feeling rather offended): Nahi, m Area Executive

(Had it been earlier days, I would have said tht m an AUT and perhaps even explained that I’ll become an ABM after 6 months .. but not now, I am comfortable with whatever stint m doing and living through it)

Retailer: (with a disinterested look) Gaon kya tumhara?

Me:(kya mein gaon kaa lagta hoon?): UP, … Cheta stock OK hai?

Retailer: Haan, Iss se pehle kahaan kaam karta thha?

Me: ( what??): Iss se pehle IT mein thha.. Bangalore.

retailer: (Looked at me with renewed interest… came a bit forward): IT mein kya?

Me(looked back again to see the TL .. still no signs.. f*ck): Engineer

Retailer:(with a Smirk) Wahaan se yahaan kaise?

Me: Uske baad MBA kiya.. phir yahaan first job.

Retailer:(He looked at my condition.. my hair was in a mess, It was almost 3 and I was yet to even think about lunch, and then It was really hot outside and I was sweating like anything) Iss job ke liye MBA ki kya jaroorat hai?

Me: hmm …. hmm.. (30 sec gap)…. Learning

Rretailer: what?

Me: Kuch nahi,..yahaan manager banne se pehle dekhna padta hai ki ground mein kya ho raha hai. Aapki problem aaj khud se dekhenge to kal office mein baith ke bhi samajh sakte hain.

Retailer: (whatever) Idhar no problem.. sab fantastic. He he he (with a ‘kat lo ab yahaan se’ look)

I gave him a smile and looked for our product availability and started filling the tracker. Though I might have answered the retailer.. but deep Inside I was myself searching for few answers.

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Tomorrow I’ll have my last exam herein IIMB, and almost certainly the last exam of my student life. Phew..it’s been around 20 years of classrooms, teachers/Madams/AcharyaJis/Profs, exams, Vivas, attendance, practicals, projects etc..and finally all of this will come to a rest tomorrow.

Can’t help but devote half an hour to savor the moment and reflect back on all this, especially the last two years in IIMB. It has been busy like hell, I have missed out on lots of other nice things in life to be able to write this mail today

t me try and give a flavor of this, however tough it may be but let me try and recap this in a paragraph, whatever comes to my mind:

..entry in the college, lots of new faces, unexpected ragging on the very first day, managing between being a fresher at B-School and a week old marriage, shuttling between Insti and home, first quiz that had 10% weight age, getting to terms with this grade system, taking the printouts and running hard and reaching the PGP office just a minute before the deadline, end of first term, seeing how people get bracketed into their respective boxes within a few months, Summer placements, when one piece of paper was all you had to show someone who you are, feeling awful and disgusted, sitting like call girls, waiting for 3 days and hoping that some tracker will come and call me (for an interview), bruised ego, learning some hard lessons of life, ending up with 5 offers to choose from, rejecting all others for Reliance, life goes on..scoring no As and no C grades in 2^nd terms..only Bs..was I also getting bracketed and learning the easiest way of survival? Continued shuttling as no room was available here, leaving the home at 3 am on the days of exams, waking up one day just 15 minutes before one quiz and missing it, a slightly frustrating summer internship, back to college, participating in lots of competitions, lots of back to back night-outs, launching a website, spending hundreds of hours on the site, getting to the finals of CTS boardroom competition, Catching the flight to Pune for the final presentations after spending whole night in completing the BDMDM project, continuously worsening economic meltdown, the exchange term, CMS course and the satisfaction of being the number one team by a great margin, the IBP course, going to Singapore and those 2 weeks over there, coming back to face the placements term, extremely bad job scenario, tracking the CGPA to the second digit .. 3.14 to 3.07 to 3.05 to 3.02 to 3.11(/4) is how it went in the last 5 terms. Directi’s lateral process, CTS’s laterals rejection, overall gloom, a few rays of hope.

That’s how it has been; overall it was an experience I will never want to trade against anything. All the hardships that we all go through in this environment are worth it. I have seen a transformation within myself from someone with dreams to someone with a plan and confidence to achieve them, a better understanding of what I want in my career, and on a more cosmetic level..from a timid speaker to a decent presenter

Perhaps this crisis is there to help us, to let us do what we wanted to do in our life and not what was offered to us(I don’t know if any good job will be offered to me at all). Perhaps this was the day for which I am much better suited after these 2 years than I was before. Perhaps it’s a time to reject those easy choices and take the decisions that might not please the majority..perhaps!

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We all are led to the GD room, having chairs around a large table.

The GD :- GD topic was about a problem being faced by Mr Ambrose, principal of a small School.

There is a maths teacher in his college who was excellent in his job, since he joined the college, the grades of students in maths have improved considerably, and most of them no longer have any fear of maths.

He is fully focused and even helps students who need extra care through special classes.

But now all of a sudden parents of 10 students have complained against the teacher accusing him of Sexual misbehavior with their children.

Case asked us about the options ahead of the Principal in this case?

Well, as a group we started with the analysis of the problem, while 1-2 of the guyz jumped in with the solutions well within the first minute itself. I came up with points about the priorities of Mr. Ambrose, Like – First of all was to avoid a police enquiry by resolving the issue quickly and placate the parents ..take them in confidence blah blah.

Then the discussion focused on this teacher. Whether he can be allowed to work or not..or maybe if he can be allowed to take classes in school and aborting the special classes(as the incident happened in special class), or if we need a proof to take any action against a teacher having a great proven record. Whether to install CCTVs in every class room.etc etc.

I said that allowing him to take classes in the school alone will also be difficult as the atmosphere of the class will not be like it was earlier.

About Mr Ambrose’s options I said that placating parents of 10 students will be very difficult in this situation so he should talk to this teacher, tell him about the situation and assure him that without a proper enquiry he is not guilty in the eyes of management.. but being a responsible employee he should understand the situation and that he will be suspended till the enquiry is over.

I also came up with a point that we need to look about such incidents happening in large companies and that usually they have a zero tolerance policy(keywords matlab good funde) about such issues. This is a small school so they may not have any such guideline or proper rule to follow. Mr Ambrose should take it as an opportunity to lay down some rules and guidelines about what should be done in such kind of situations related to ethics/morality or criminal activities of teachers… blah blah

The Interview:-

Our panel had two profs (age around 60 years) .. one was a bit thin and serious(SP) while the other sir had a jolly attitude.(JP)

SP – You have mentioned something about Feather in my Cap award that you got in wipro.. tell me something about why was this award given to you?

Blah blah

SP – Is it just given from Project manager level?

Yeah (it was just the starting so jyada fenkne ki himmat nahi hue J)

JP – You have also written something about your father working in Dehradun on some Hydroelectric plant?

Yes sir ..blah blah

For how many years have you lived in this place?

Me – Almost all of my schooling has been done from there, Right from my first grade to class 12th.

JP(smiling) – Is it a beautiful place?

Yes sir , very beautiful. In fact its a hill station for tourists.

JP – What are the other places that you have been to?

Me – Sir Dakpathar, Dehradun, Mussoorie, Allahabad, Gorakhpur, Sitamari, Bangalore, then I have been to Sakleshpur for a trek, pondicherry(just before the infamous sting operation..lucky me :-D), Mangalore, Malape blah blah..

JP – Was it through college or company trips?

With friends..just casual tours.

JP – Which one is the most beautiful one?

For me, Dakpathar is the one, probably coz that’s my place J

JP – Have you find any cultural differences between your dehradun and >:Place>Bangalore>:Place>

Me – Sir, I would like to compare Allahabad and Bangalore, because of there stark contrast. In Allahabad life is different you don’t have so many engineers around you..low literacy rate..low labour rate..poverty ..ppl bein happy in what they are less materialistic blah blah..

JP – Allahabad is a spiritual city, so can you tell me something about that?

Me – (ohh spirituality ko to mein bhool hee gaya) blah blah ..talked about Sangam snan and that upto 30 lakh devotee take dip on occasions of moni amawasya or Kumbhs.

JP – So when 30 lakhs people take a dip, doesn’t it get dirty.

Me – Its already very muddy, so.. not much scope left.. laughs all around.

JP – No, what I meant is that people take dip in such polluted water, so y don’t they fall ill?

Me – Sir, as such if we see then they are just bathing and not drinking it..so there is no big chances for any illness.

JP – But maybe some skin related deseases..

Me – Actually it is not that much polluted, it is just coming through smaller cities like Bulandshahar and Kanpur(not small by any means, atleast for pollution)..unlike Yamuna which comes through a city like Delhi and then Agra etc.

And then after all we in our mythology believes the ganga water to kill all bacteria and remove diseases.

JP(getting interested now) – OK is this the spiritual belief that saves them, if I inhale polluted air will it not affect me if I have some spiritual belief about that.

Me – No Sir .. Spirituality can only give you a confidence and belief..blah blah..

JP – Ok what are the benefits of Spirituality?

Blah blah

JP – Does this mean that if I have mental strength then I can do anything?

Me – Sir, there are two cases –

1.I have the strength but due to my fears or mental weakness I will not be able to do that, in thius case spirituality will surely help me. It will induce the required self belief and allay any fears of failures.

2. If I don’t have the physical strength at all to do something then I guess that spirituality will also not help me much.

SP – OK bhanu so you are from MNNIT…. so in MNNIT, apart from studies, what else did you do?

Me – (stumped.. silent or 5 secs, I was doing well with JP..but what is this? First of all I am guilty of not studying that much over there.. and he is asking about what else??.. can I simply say that I didn’t study and did nothing else as well)

Aaaaa….. Skits.. continuous learning experience…. continuous pressure .. transition from a student to becoming industry ready..blah blah ..(real fenkupanti)

SP – So what are the benefits do you get by doing these skits?

Me – Nothing much, apart from the fact that people starts recognizing you- .. laughter all around.. you get to hear things like “look he was the guy who played the role of Osama”

Sp – Is there anything you learn from this?

Me – (thinking hard) – Yeah sir in most of the skits I played the role of Director and script writer, so leadership skills..team work, balance and how synergy adds to your work blah blah..

JP – Was thr any constant theme in your skits?

No..blah blah..

Sp – But it is not necessary that a good leader in skits will also be a good leader in managerial scenarios of industry..

Me – Yes Sir it is not necessary but they are somehow related, ultimately it is about team building and working with a team , explore synergy etc..

Sp – If I had to make a choice out of Set top box and DTH, which one will you suggest and why?

Me – Sir I will suggest DTH because of –

no issue with cable faults.. sometimes there is no power in the area from where you get the signal so you too can’t watch anything and things like this..etc etc

SP – OK but what about customer lock –in? Should not the government come with guidelines regulating the tarrifs?

Me – Let the market forces decide that..(y the hell govt need to jump into everything, n that too in ensuring that everyone is getting the daily dose of Ekta Kapoor serials at a nominal prize ..don’t they have anything better to do?)

SP – OK lets take it this way, should not the government set guidelines that only one type of disk should be used.

Me – No ..blah blah ..that again is similar to helping monopoly..etc(I missed the point he was trying to make, I thought he was trying to say that we will use only DD Direct disc kinda thing but in fact he was talking about having some common standards for enabling interoperability, so a DISH tv disc can be utilized to get services from DD if the need arrive.. realized it hours after theInterview )

SP – How many DTH satellites should be there for >:Place>India>:Place>?

Me – hmm..

Sp – I mean 1, 10 or 100 ?

Me – more than 5 for sure

SP – Can you name a few?

Me – I don’t know exactly but as far as I remember there was an INSAT – 2B launched in 2001, it had some DTH related components, now the PSLV launched in January this year also had some DTH related components. But I am not too sure about them..

[He said that that’s all he wanted to know.. in a tone that was like he is satisfied, but this INSAT 2 series was launched in 1992-1996 period , and after that we had 3 and now we have INSAT 4_ series, donno much but if he had any idea about it he must have caught it. But that PSLV launch in Jan was a fact, its another case that it didn’t have any DTH components.. but who knows? Kya pata hon bhi J . maybe I could have resigned saying that I don’t have any idea, but I just went ahead.. names of INSAT and PSLV could have gone well with the interviewers if they themselves didn’t have much knowledge about this, that is more likely as they didn’t stretch it after that .. or maybe it was just because of lack of time]

Sp – Compare Wipro and Oracle

Me – blah blah ..work culture..service company vs product company etc..

Sp – Competition for Oracle

Me – blah blah..

Sp – What do you know about banking product of I-Flex (acquired by Oracle)

Me – funde about Citi group’s earlier holdings and the related difficulty to get a share of the US market and how the Oracle’s brand name can help it to do so now ..

Sp – Compare FlexCube with Finacle

Me – blah blah ..mildly bluffed about how finacle was launched by infosys(like time and the strategy ..i didn’t have much idea but still wanted the answer to look genuine and impactful)..

That’s it..and my luck was sealed.

I did my level best, now lets see if my best was good enough.

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So it added some pressure as well, because for me somehow it was an interview for the big one. Lets start with the fateful morning of 15^th Feb itself.

This time I was determined to reach a bit early, as the PagalGuy forums indicated that the GDs are starting at sharp 9’o clock. I knew that reaching on time is as impossible for me as taking wickets is becoming for Irfan Pathan. The harder we both will try the more difficult and impossible it will get for us. But still I tried and induced my mind into believing that I have to reach there(again the familiar Monarch Hotel) by 8:30.

But I think that getting late is always in my fate, its an habit that I should meekly surrender to. Its an eternal law, Just like a S/W engineer can never find an intelligent manager, I can never turn out anywhere on/before time. Accepting the fact, at best I should try to minimize the damage.. because even if I try to change this, my luck will make sure to discourage me further ..just like the way it happened this time.

I was getting dressed when I looked at my mobile..it’s hard to read screen had “3 messages received” on it, believe me since when my love story has stabilized I only get 1-2 promotional messages per week, interrupted with 1-2 forwarded messages from friends/3 months(holi diwali types). So out of curiosity I decided to check them out. All of them were from ICICI they were like –

Msg1- the entered pin is wrong ..card will be blocked if tried more than thrice

Msg 2- 500 Rs withdrawn from your account/card

Msg3- balance enquiry done

I panicked as I had applied for an ICICI credit card(with some debit limit) and had not received it yet(a day before this also I got 2 msgs with saying wrong pin etc ..but I ignored them). Maybe it was already in some wrong hands.(and the guy now knew the correct pin as well)

Though I know that my fears were a bit stupid but frankly I am still not fully comfortable with cards, so I tried to call ICICI call center.. to my surprise they open their shops at 9’oclock for complaints. Wasted around 10-15 mins on this.

Then opting for the old trick I went in to the enquiry/new cards queue to finally get hold of a customer executive.

He confirmed that I have only one card in my name which is still to be used for the first time…that lead to a written mail from my side to customer care etc etc..

Time –8:35 a.m.

Rushed out of the flat, I had the Scooty (courtesy Sangs) to bank upon. Gave it the full accelerator..my tie was flying like a torn flag of a ship that was about to sink in the storm. You can understand the frustrations I went through while facing the Bangalore traffic and its jams when I was counting each and every passing minute.. Finally reached at brigade road(Time 9:05), parked/dumped the scooty wherever I got the space..thought about tackling the traffic police later incase if the take it to the station(wow! So much for sangeeta’s scooty, thats called gratitude :D) ran into the building..sprinted through the stairs..just to find another guy hesitantly getting ready to knock at the door.

Seeing me in this bizarre state he felt a lot better. Very similar to the feeling that I had when a fellow programmer had 11 bugs against his code within a day of QA taking it, while I myself had 9 or probably even more close to what you feel after scoring a zero in some test to discover that there is at least one more person sharing the regal score with you.

We were in the same panel(I was just so happy to see him with me that I almost forgot to worry about my own pathetic situation, .. standing outside a closed GD room which according to the attendant outside was closed since 8:55 am.)

At last we knocked(while he knocked .. I prayed.. [-O< ) A Prof came out, looked quite disgusted to see us there. I peeked in to see that guyz sitting inside had already written about half page of summary.. I knew at that instant that its gonna be really tough from now on.

We pleaded .. gave excuses of Bangalore traffic(which magically strikes a cord with anyone who has faced it even once) etc etc ..finally he went in to talk to the other Prof..and ..and EUPHORIA ..he signaled us to come in.

But just when I was about get in with a much relieved state of mind..the attendant asked me to come to a side., signaling in a manner that could have easily been mistaken

I was greatly annoyed.. asked him in quite a crass manner.. whats the problem?

He still asked me to come a step towards him..(now everyone from inside was looking at me through the door)..

I was really not amused and with my eyes straight on his face I advanced towards him..repeating my words ”Whats the problem?” :-L

He said in a contrasting low voice “Sir your zip is open” ..
WHAT??
Whew !!
OMG.. zipped the pants ..thanked the kind man. Cursed myself and entered in the room with a smiling face as if nothing happened outside.

Guyz who were in there looked at us coldly(saale ye kahan se tapak gaye..7 hee bande rehte to achcha thhaa)

He gave us the chits and told that we will get only 5 mins to read it and write the summary.(others were stopped after a couple of minutes)

The GD:- I opened the chit and the sentence written on it was –

“In business world, the rear view mirror is always clearer than the windscreen”

I knew that I had less time so tried to come to the point quickly ..the only point I could think of was about relating the windscreen to future and the rear view mirror to the past. I opted for the TATA example(as they had recently acquired corus) how there is uncertainty about their future while their past is certain and clear to all of us, was about to add something when we(both) were stopped.

Now the GD started.

The lines on which I was thinking were put forward by someone else..i knew that this is the time or otherwise I will be too late(even in the discussion :O )

I quickly came up with my TATA-Corus example to support this view.

This was well heard by the group(and hopefully by the profs as well) , but it started a flurry of such examples(you know everyone goes through ET with a renewed sense of interested in these GD/PI days.. taking every merger and acquisition as seriously as if the multi billion deal is done for the sole purpose of pushing the reader into IIMA through some backdoor entry)

This mayhem went on for about 5 mins ..the topic was lost in this GD in which the group suddenly became very much interested about all the mergers and acquisitions that have taken place in near past..i just contributed with the correct figures whenever I could. Then somehow it came back to track with someone talking about viewing this from competition point of view….like some competitors ahead of you(windscreen)and some behind you(rear view ) and tried to fit the analogy. Great diversion.

I felt that I need to get in again with something substantial.. realized that my mind is still working and came out with this bluff(purity guaranteed) –

“When we are talking about competition I would like to quote Michael Schumacher who once said that when he is on racing track he never try to see who is behind him, he believes in just focusing ahead to see who is ahead of him”

Didn’t try to relate it completely to the topic given..but still It had its impact..looked like I am talking some substance and got much respect from the group after this.

After contributing here and there in the end I again came up with one point relating this to entrepreneurship..like an entrepreneur is gonna have the road clear when he starts”(as he is the only one on that road).. but as soon as he starts to make big profits others will start to jump in ..making the road crowded and his windscreen/future less clearer than his rear mirror/past .. something like this ..

Group supported this and 1-2 guyz discussed further, I supported it with Indian aviation industry example..saying that Jet and AirDeccan had it easier as they had early advantage when compared to newer airlines ..most of whom are running in loss blah blah …

Overall a pretty satisfying GD(satisfaction of getting away with the bluff included)

The Interview:-

Interviews were very short, guyz were going in and coming out within 10 mins. Maybe the profs were worried about their lunch.

Finally it was my turn –

Both the profs were just typical middle aged(I mean around 50) profs. Not much to differentiate so I will call both of them as P. they were not much interested in the answers so I expect something similar from you as well, so I will not provide my full answers as such-

P – Tell me something about urself

Blah blah ..

P – What was this JOSH? (I had a certificate of the same)

Sir it was our cultural festival..

P – but it is about Volleyball

(WTF) :-S Sorry sir it was our Sports festival ..(hee hee ..great going)

P – Why do you want to do a management course?

Blah blah..

P -Don’t you get learning opportunity in ur work?

Sir I do get ..actually I learned a lot in my initial days ..but these days it is getting easier for me and there are fewer new things to learn now given my work constraints.

And about IIMs, I would love to have that great learning opportunity of 2 years..where I will have some of the most intelligent persons of the country as my class mates and will be taught by some of the best professors, in an area that excites me.

P-Don’t you have intelligent persons around you in your company?

Yes there are but you can’t compare all of them with the batch of IIM..different settings ..blah blah

P – Dhiru Bhai Ambani, Bill Gates didn’t have MBA weren’t they good entrepreneurs?

They were ..but they still had to learn the things in a hard way..for example Dhirubhai had to directly interact with small vendors/employees and customers in his initial days..he acquired his man power management/ HR skills through such interactions. A formal MBA can help in this process. And I do believe that DBA or AP would have become even better managers had they undergone through a formal course.

What do you know about entrepreneurship?

Blah ..blahh

According to you, who was a better leader, Azim Premji or Bill Gates?

Bill Gates ..bacause of vision ..etc

But Bill Gates was charged with AntiTrust law?

Gave some gyan over Antitrust ..like the parameters considered predatory pricing , customer lock-in etc etc ..and tried to say that all of them are debatable. Whether they are good or bad for open business is questionable..so antitrust is not a crime as such. Its just an attempt to control few things. A business decision can come under its scanner even if the company’s intentions were clear.

(Could have given funde about great leaders working for the junta that they lead)

Do you know that Bill Gates has adopted a village in India?

No

1-2 more questions followed ..thats it

very brief interview. They were just stressing a bit on why MBA kind of questions..apart from that they were keeping it really short. Maybe the profiles are going to play a greater role.

18th Feb, 2007

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Never knew that it is that far away.. almost drove out of City limits.. finally reached the campus at 9:10.. ran into the main hall, asked about this IIM GD/PI thing..nobody was aware of this

just then I saw a group of well dressed guyz going upstairs in a herd, followed them quickly, finally saw a Prof who was holding some papers, informed him about my coming(should I say arrival). He gave me a hard look and then ticked my name and told me that I belong to group number 3.

Straight away we were asked to enter respective rooms for the GD.

I just shuddered to think like what would have happened if I were late by few more seconds, I am sure that getting this info that the whole group has gone to the fourth floor was not easy. I mean nobody was there on the ground floor to inform this.

But then nobody expects that morons like me will descend there after almost half an hour of scheduled time(8:45)

The GD:-

I am trying to reproduce the case to the best of my memory, while omitting minor details(though it is possible to come up with winning points from those details in many of the GDs..but nothing of that sort happened here)

An IIT grad Mahesh joined a petroleum company. He had other offers as well but opted for this one as he was very much impressed by the company’s policies of giving emphasis on ethics and integrity. He was posted in heartland UP and around 100 dealers were under his area of supervision.

After getting a hang of the things for a while, he was displeased with the way things were going on. He sent a letter to the higher management about the complaints that he received from the dealers and customers about the inferior quality of their oil, He wrote that no customer wanted to put their sluggish product in their vehicles. He said that their product was quickly loosing its market to their rival and something needs to be done in this regard..blah blah.

Within a few days his Area manager called him, he asked him if he has sent a letter to the Higher management and said that the management is very displeased about this. He said that you need to send only the things that please them and not the truth, and that such things are never viewed in correct light…

He felt very disappointed and started thinking about if he should leave this job to join another company or about going for higher studies..

The topic asked us to discuss about what Mahesh should do..

The group jumped at the prospects of portraying the Area Manager as the real culprit and the need to talk clearly to the higher management..(someone even suggested to register a formal complaint against un-ethical behavior of AM).

I started with a mature sounding(or is it too cliché ?) pitch of looking at why exactly the AM behaved in this manner, what are his stakes in this-

1.He may actually have some links with adulteration racket.

2. and more naturally he felt bad about not being included in the process, after all Mahesh sent the letter without taking him in confidence.

I could not continue much as someone else grabbed the airtime. :-@

But I came back again saying that there is some fault in the approach that Mahesh adopted.. He should have talked to his AM before sending anything to the higher management, by involving the AM not only his report/letter would have had higher value in the eyes of management but he could have also won his AM’s confidence.

Only after confirming that he is not getting any support from his AM, he should have thought of doing something on his own.

Now more guys pitched in to find faults in Mahesh’s approach. We all came up with very valid points like

*He should have been more specific about the problems the product has rather than saying something like it is sluggish.

* Rather than saying that customers and dealers complain that …. , he should have attached their responses with his report to make it more authentic.

I also added that he should not make sweeping remarks against the product without much research.. like Firstly he should confirm if it is happening only in his area or elsewhere as well. He should –

Talk to his peers to know if they also feel the same.

See if they are loosing the market share countrywide(by going through reports)?

To this we added that the geography or climatic conditions of this area can also be a reason behind poor performance of this mobile/automobile oil.(too far fetched may be..but we were just giving more n more breadth to the discussion..)

[nobody really cared to discuss about how to tackle AM if he is really the culprit or discuss about leaving the company/higher studies point :D]

Finally we got the stop signal after about 15 minutes of discussion. Good one for me, contributed well enough and always remained active in the discussion.

The Interview : – Then the interviews started, but first let me introduce the panel-

LP- the Lady professor, about 50 years old.

KP- The kind looking Prof, about 40 yeaars old, was very helpful and polite in the GD.

I was quite skeptical of LP, coz of her stern and shrewd look.

KP started the proceedings,

KP: Similarities between Windows Vista and Windows 95?

(my first impression was that he is talking about Vista and Windows multimedia PC, probably there was some confusion.. I tried confirming it and he said yes, then as he still didn’t look convinced by this multimedia name I further said that is he referring to the XP variant that was released in smtime in 2004, now he was shocked and said that he is talking about Windows 95 and Windows Vista.. huff donno wat happen here..)

I started with differentiating between the two when again he interrupted by saying that he asked for similarities .

(Ohh.. am I having hearing problems or are they just playing with me? Maybe I lost the original question in this 95/multimedia thing.. anyway lets carry on)

Me:- As for the similarities both are GUI based, as a matter of fact with 95 itself MS started its GUI based OS systems ..prior it was command based DOS.. so we can say that being GUI based is one of the similarity.

KP: – what do you mean by GUI based?

Me: Explained(Menus, icons, mouse coming into picture etc)

(by the confusion about 95 and so I got an idea that KP is not a harcore techie as such, and maybe this question came to his mind coz Vista is recently released, I was founding this similarity question a bit awkward to handle, so thought of leading him to a territory that will be totally alien to him and conquer him in the process )

Me:- sir as I worked as a windows programmer so I can say that the basic windows architecture is going to remain the same.. I mean that though I am not sure about Vista(as if I am sure about 95 :D), but still there is something very common across all windows Opr Systems. Like for example the message passing, triggers and event handling, whatever we do with mouse is ultimately a event for the OS, and it handles it through an event handler function so these things will remain the same.

(KP was listening all this quite patiently ..nodding in between to let me know that he is getting it all..encouraging me to get further into technical fundebaazi..I just believed that actually he is not getting much )

KP:- Ok that is fine but can you tell me something on the marketing and sales front as well.

(this came as a spark, and this fool, who was loosing it badly till now got the control back.. the voice got louder and more assertive)

Sir, if we look at this from that angle, Vista is a major release for MS ..just like 95 was. I mean that if we look at releases like 200Me or Windows server/Multimedia all these were intermediary releases.(unlike 95,98 or XP)
With 95 MS hoped to change the PC landscape and in fact they did it, now with Vista as well they are hoping to do the same .. they are again claiming that with its enhanced efficiency and better GUI it will revolutionize the PC market. Blah ..blah..

KP – looking a lot more satisfied)U could have come to that point in the starting itself….

Me;- Sir being a technical person(ohho ..funde to dekho :D, please don’t take my manager’s views on this) and being from the windows programming background that was the first thing that came to my mind..

Now he started asking about various specs of Vista like minimum required memory etc etc..

I didn’t have much idea ..so I said about ideally it requires 2GB of RAM,

KP:- Do you mean that it will not install on a PC that don’t have 2 gb OF ram

Me:-No sir I was talking about desired config.. I don’t know the minimum config ..but I feel that till 512/256 there should not be much problem in installing the Vista though the performance will be pathetic due to its heavy graphics ..blah blah..

Some more question followed and I gave some non committal answers ..giving general funde.. He asked me whether I have not gone through the Vista launch(in India) news.

Me – I have gone through that sir, but probably the flashy release party that featured dances from Priayanka Chopra n Akshya Kumar were noticed more than the specifications.

Smiles and laughs all over ..

KP – have u heard about xyz?

.. NO

KP – Have you heard about Tablet pc? ..YES

WHAT IS IT?

Small portable PC, blah blah..

What should be the functionalities of Tablet PC according to you?

though I have never experienced it first hand ..but as a person is going to carry it with him almost always, so we can expect functionalities like calendar management, ability to save quick notes, ability to open various formats of documents etc etc..

What should be its size?

No idea .. should be small enough to be hold in one hand while operating with the other one ..and bigger than mobile

He further grilled me on this size and asked me to choose between A4 size paper(the board he was holding) or its half or fourth or ..

I betted on ½ of A4 size .. (had to ..no idea as such)

KP-OK have you heard about Windows Mobile OS?

Yes sir ..designed specially for the mobiles as there are limitations with mobiles wrt processing power and memory etc.. MS came up with windows mobile version5 recently

KP -What is the difference between this and Desktop?

Again reiterated the same points in different wordings and the need for specialized OS for mobiles..symbian etc

KP – What will be the difference in case of a word software?

Blah ..blah, clarified that both will be compatible to open documents with extensions like .doc or .txt etc.

And if the question is asked from the design point of view, then as developer I will try to keep it as light..i mean of smaller size and memory print as possible, keeping the limitations in mind.

KP – What will you consider?

Striping the flashy features while keeping it just as a reader.. like all animations or cascading effects will be removed to keep it simple and light.

KP seemed quite satisfied( or maybe fed up with this continuous globe from my side J)

LP takes over…

LP – Was there somebody else as well with the same name?

Nobody very popular as such, but yes as far as I relate this name there was a politician in UP with the name Bhanu Pratap, but not much sure..

Is he still active?

No, definetly not

LP –From which party?

Congress

LP –Are you sure?

Yes as he was active in 80s, and till 1989 we only had congress govts in UP, except one govt by then janata dal(though I wasn’t too sure about this JD thing).. so he has to be from Congress.

LP –Do you follow Football?

No..not much..

LP –OK bhanu then what are the sports that you like?

I like VolleyBall and Cricket

LP –OK assuming that you know something about VolleyBall and Cricket, tell me the names of players of some other sports?..

If I take tennis then Bhupati, Paes, Sania MirzaJ etc if we take football then Wayne Roonie, the there was Maradona from argentina then Ronaldo, Ronaldinho Carlos etc from Brazil etc, Shooters like Jaspal Rana ..etc ..

LP:- OK thats fine

LP-Have you heard about Orkut?

Yes

LP –How is it ? good or bad?

Definetly it is a great thing..talked about networking and finding your old friends etc.

LP –Who is owner?

Google

LP –Some other products of Google?

The flagship product is the google search, apart from this they have google earth, gmail, spreadsheets, answers..which is discontinued know, picasa etc.

LP –OK how is Outsourcing ? good or bad?

Good, creates value..lower cost and beter service for the company that is outsourcing and revenue for the one which is getting it. So over all good from the business point of view.

LP –What different types of Outsourcing?

Outsourcing within the country and Offshoring.. explained

LP –Only these two?

Actually that is when we look from the geographical point of view, we can similiarly differentiate on the basis of kinda responsibilities that are being outsourced. Like outsoursing of just the customer support/call center services, or maybe outsoursing of just one of the processes/modules , or in an extreme case outsoursing the whole manufacturing and other processes…blah blah

LP –What is BPO?(coming from answer)

Blah blah..

LP – (probably overwhelmed by my answer) OK tell me in a single word, what is the most difficult problem that the BPO industry is facing in India?

Employee retention (wah wah .. maza aa gaya)

LP –Second?

Data privacy

LP –explain

Explained …

Thank you..

Exchange of smiles ..

I came out with a real good feeling, kind of knowing that I should make the cut.

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