What they do not teach in IIMA

I went to IIMA after three years work experience. Campus placement was not easy for those with work experience as our names did not figure in the short list of leading companies who were on “fresher” only mode. Most of the oldies got offers much after the crème de la crème were placed.

My final interview was a different city and I flew for the first time. The interview with MD was informal. I was offered a cup of tea in a stylish manner ( I had to do half the process of tea making without spilling. Over the years I have managed to avoid such tea drinking as I have not developed the spit an polish demanded of a a true professional . I prefer the overboiled ready to drink tea ).

Everything went well .MD asked me about the job I held before joining IIMA. Then the tide turned churning the tea I had consumed. MD popped an innocuous question - Now that you have completed MBA from IIMA, if you were to go back to same job, how differently would you do it ? “ I did not like the job”  would have been my response under less ceremonious occasions but I was forced to marry a bit of “management “ I learnt and blurt out a response. I felt out of my skin for a few moments. Luckily discussion moved to simpler topics.

There was another googly that day- this was  from director – business development. A question I should have anticipated but did not. I sweated out a feeble response which was far off the mark. The question again was  innocuous – Why do organisations need managers ? What role does a manager play ? I got to know the answer from him. This gentleman was from IIMC and I was wondered whether it was a “clash” of superiority which prompted this question.

The MD and Director-corporate felt their questions did not merit a cogent response and I got an offer of appointment ! It is a different story that  I did not join the organisation and took another “dicey” offer- not a topic for public discussion !

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Coconut, the wonder fruit - Nostalgia !

Image
An article in BBC News on line saying coconut is a wonder fruit  has brought up a lump in my throat. As kids, we used to love watching coconut climbers doing their job. I would say they were the early Nadian Comanecans.The global public had to wait till 1976 Montreal Olympics, to get an acrobat exhibit the coordination and aesthetic beauty of coconut tree climbing in the form of Nadia Comaneci. We tried to emulate the free style method of the climbers but ended up with bruise marks on our chests, calf muscles and inner thighs. The higher our freehand climb took us, deeper were the bruises as we used to "give up" in exhaustion and hug the tree dearly to slow down the  fall. The payment for the climbers was partly cash and partly in kind - it was related to the number of trees climbed and not related the yield. So in summer months, the cost per tree comes down as the yield is much more. In the lean months, it was a tug of war between grandma and the climbers as th
Read more

School days

I found the first follower of my blog- Thomas Mailainathan ( Jegharaj ) my school mate as well as my college mate. We studied in Madras Christian College School where I was in Malayala medium in 6th and 7th standard and then shifted to English medium. Thomas M was in English medium through out his school days. We were in different sections. I got to know Thomas M in NCC Airwing in 9th standard. We attended a 10 day camp together. The toilet facility at the camp being bad, we used to eat very little food to avoid nature's call. Water was also in short supply and I took bath only twice during the camp. He won a corporal rank in second year of NCC and became a sergeant in third year. Holding a poorer rank , I ended my NCC stint in thea two years. We spent the five years in College of Engineering in the same section. I had met him on a few occassions in early 80s after graduating from college. He did surface through our batch yahoo group. I got to know him better as a famly man and bre
Read more

At war for cricket

I have worked in private sector all along. I have no idea what it would be to be in a war scene or war like situation. I have seen curfew over en extended period of time in 1985 at Ahmedabad and was literally under house arrest unable to move out of our apartment building in 1992 in Kanpur for three weeks after the Babri Masjid was razed to ground. Those were tense days and they tell me how tense and terrible to be in the midst of war both for armed forces and the civilian population caught in the crossfire. I am getting such a feeling now on the eve and during the one day cricket match between India and South Africa at Jaipur. There has been traffic checks in all important junctins for the last three days. Police forces including reserve battalions are all over the place. The ticket sale has not been too good what with so many level of checks of persons buying the tickets. The process was to be an entirely on line affair but was so slow that some tickets were diverted to over the coun
Read more