Vision For Life

Term1 ends!!!

2006-06-08T21:11:00.000-07:00

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!!!

2006-05-19T12:30:00.000-07:00

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!!!

2006-05-16T08:19:00.000-07:00

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!!!

2006-05-14T00:47:00.000-07:00

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

2006-04-29T09:43:00.000-07:00

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

2006-04-22T23:41:00.000-07:00

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

2006-04-20T04:13:00.000-07:00

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

Finally at ISB

2006-04-17T08:00:00.000-07:00

Haaaaaaa. So finally I am at ISB. This is my first blog from ISB. I joined ISB on 15th April but could not post anything due to problems in B'lore my laptop was stuck up.
I just cann't explain the feeling of being at ISB. Everything here is amazing. The infrastructure, support staff, library, facilities etc etc...Above all the alumni is just great. People are so helpful and willing to mingle.

First day(15th April) was registration and just meeting around with people. With so many people it's very difficult to remember names. So I have decided to remember few names everyday.

Yesterday we had dean's address and the talk on profile of class of 2007. People have amazing experience and they all have list of great achievements. There are Patent holders to beauty queens and body builders to toppers of university.

Today I met my core study group. At ISB this group comprises of 5-6 people and the group interacts very closely during the core terms(term 1-4). The group comprises of S, R, D, M and P. S is IIT grad and went into banking straight out of college. R and P are from IT as am I. D has finance background and M has experience in psychology background. Really looking forward to learning a lot from these guys.

Alums are organizing a gyan session later in the night. Going out to attend that...

Last day at Adobe

2006-04-13T22:12:00.000-07:00

Today is my last working day at Adobe systems. I cann't describe how I am feeling today. At one hand I am so much eagerly looking forward to ISB and on the other hand the feeling of giving up a cool life is haunting me. But I guess you have to come out of this feeling of comfort to explore the much more exciting things that are possible. ISB is definitely one place worth being. This reminds me of the book "Who moved my cheese", which I read some time back. This is a great book. You must read this book especially if you are afraid of change and think you don't want to move out of the comfortable life,that you living. (BTW. If you are interested, I can borrow you a copy of this book.)

Adobe Reader in Hindi

2006-04-11T23:57:00.000-07:00

Adobe (My current employer) recently released the preview version of Adobe reader for Hindi. This reader has the UI chrome in Hindi and has some good capabilities to search Hindi PDF files. It really looks cool. You can try this software for free
here. (Disclaimer: Please do read release notes as it's not a released product.)

What do I want from life...

2006-03-31T02:24:00.000-08:00

I have been wondering over what all I want in my life.
Although I have a well paying job and have "apparent growth" in my career but I am increasingly feeling quite unsatisfied. A hundred times in a day I remember that one day I am going to die and what is it that I want to or rather have to finish before I leave this world. It has been over an year that I have been looking for answer to these questions.

I have been getting various ideas in different directions and every time I see somebody successful I think that's what I want. But would achieving what someone else has achieved satisfy me? what is it that would make me truly happy and successful in my life.

I do not know now. May be I will get to know or may be not.

But I must first find out how can I define what success is to me. What I truly want to do in my life.
Do I want to be someone who is
Rich
Gets top position in a company
Satisfies needs of relationships
Makes a difference in the society
Has lots of friends
Innovates great things

What else?
Anyhow I am now determined more than ever to resolve this internal conflict and find a real answer for myself.

On a totally different front, I have made a resolution to read at least one book a month…

I am here...

2006-03-31T02:18:00.000-08:00

I am one of admits to ISB for their one year couse starting 15th April 2006. Although I created this blog long back but my habit of procrastinating work kept me away from blogging regularly. Now I have resolved to blog regularly about my life in general, about ISB and my learnings at ISB.
To introduce myself. I am Alok Goel, graduate of Delhi College of Engineering (1999). Worked in HCL Technologies for 4.5 years and currently working at Adobe Systems (last 2.5 years).

first blog

2006-01-19T20:13:00.000-08:00

test blog...