Term1 ends!!!

I am now 12.5% MBA:-)) Term 1 is over and it's all fun till monday, that's when term2 starts. Yesterday I collected course packs for term2 and gosh...They are huge. So I guess term2 is going to be much worse than term1.
I have strategized for term2 and decided to do pre-reads for all the classes. This should prevent any last minute catch ups. Let's see how much I can adher to this.
ISB information sessions at different places across the country are about to begin. Will post the schedule when it's finalized.
BTW ISB would no longer accept GRE scores as admission criterion.

My suggestion to prospective students: Start early to prepare a solid application.

Paradox of open book exam!!!

Had a long tough day. It has been just 3 weeks that classes started and today I had two exams in same day. Ironically the most dreaded statistics exam was ok but the apparantly easy economics one took the breath away!!!

ISB has this concept of open book exams where you can take in any number of books in the examination hall and refer (Though only for very few courses and economics is one of them). I thought this would be a cake walk but damn it was nightmare. There was no time to refer to books. If you refer books then you loose time and would loose marks for that matter.

Sometimes what you think is easy turns out to be difficult...

Half time of term1!!!

It has been over a month here but it looks like I came here just couple of days back. Half of term 1 is ended and 3 professors (Economics (Amit), Statistics (Bob stine), Marketing(Asim Ansari)) are done with their part of the course.
Our section hosted a fairwell for them and in reflection I see that there is so much more in life to learn:-))

Next comes Mr. Jagmohan Raju (Wharton) for rest of marketing. I am very excited to meet him. Jagmohan himself is a brand name in the industry and I have heard that he is a great man to listen to!!!
This weekend we have two mid terms and interestingly these are open notes exams. Exams with your notes. Haaa Haaa...

Inside the pressure cooker!!!

First sorry for not posting for so long. Life is suddenly changed. It has never been that hectic in life. We have term1 going on right now and there are 4 subjects
1. Financial Accounting
2. Marketing Management
3. Managerial Economics
4. Statistical methods for making decisions.

I must say one thing!!! MBA is really terning out to be a real AHA!!! experience for me. I have never been able to appreciate the concept of Statistics in my life as I am doing now. I can see statistics can be applied to almost all parts of life. In my software days I had saw defect control but never appreciated underlying philosophy.
Professor Bob Stine (who teaches statistics) is amazing.

By tomorrow morning my group needs to submit an assignment in accounts and economics and then mid terms in next weekend.

I would try to post some interesting learnings of ISB as well.
Well right now it's election time here and will cover that in next post...

End of pre-term

ISB offered pre-term courses in three subjects 1. Accounts 2. Statistics 3. Quantitative Abilities.
These were meant for people who do not have prior knowledge in a specific area. However I ended up doing all the pre-terms more because I wanted to get back to class room feeling. Afterall it has been 7 years that I have been in a class.

I must say that Statistics (taught by V Nagadevara IIMB) and Accounts (Mubeen Rafat) teachers were amazing. The most important characteristic of Prof Nagadevara was to bring out the statistics concepts from real life examples. Even though I have engineering background I never assimilated the concepts of stats but this class was definitely different. Prod Mubeen could successfully teach accounts to engineers:-))

BTW I managed to get some photographs of last 2 weeks at ISB. Enjoy!!! (Credit to all ISB photographers)

End of orientation

Orientation of class of 2007 ended yesterday. Numerous events we held during the week and points were given to each section. Already a sense of bonding is developing between people here.
My section (D) stood second in the final points tally. Kudos to section D people who bounced back from 5th position (out of 6).

ISB organized career perspective forum yesterday. It's an annual event held for new batch. Guests were eminent speakers in their field and it was enlightening to hear their views on what success is. Everybody had his own view of success. Hearing them was an "AHA experience" for me. Because I have been struggling to discover definition of success for me as well (Refer my post below)...

My next post would be on LDP. This is a comprehensive leadership development program at ISB...

Gyan gyan and more gyan

Oh my god!!! I had just heard that life is damn hectic at ISB but now I understand what it means. You need to be here to realize that. Last few days and alumns did a great job in handling over all the stuff to batch of 2007. There were gyan sessions everyday till late in the night and I did not sleep before 2AM any of these days. I must say batch of 2006 did a great job by focusing clubs at ISB and that's what transpired in their placements. BTW on wednesday we threw party to bid farewell for class of 2007. Will try to put up some photos when I get these