Tuesday, August 22, 2006

We the Managers


From 2002 to 2004 I was always hit by tsunamis, unpredictable attacks of love and laughter. Two extremities of experiential management learning and foolish examinations. Wars of ideology, speculations over roles in case studies , hedging friendships with compassion and arbitrages of jokes . The University calls two and a half years of mine as mighty MBA. I would like to call it “Anubhav ki dhaayi baras”;with profound experience of creative schools like Moodal Manju and Pulli
If I speak in pure Physics terms, the fifty-nine human beings of my class-my classmates were born in the regions of space where the field was immensely intense. I cannot say that they are super humans but they have made glorious all the projects they have taken up, won all competitions participated and more significantly made the soil powerful by helping the poor and caring the environment. Nobody who have met them cannot forget them because of their simplicity and hospitality .
Im proud to belong to this batch of managers for the culture that we have imparted remains everlasting and the leadership that we have shown remains as a noble cause in the development of this institution. I wish the very best for DCSchool in the future…

I remember one of our guest, Mr.Alok Wadhwa, ex-CEO, Encyclopedia Britannica’s words about my class when we discussed a case on the Encyclopedia Britannica “your ability in identifying analyzing and articulating the problems facing Encyclopedia Britannica is at par with any expert opinion. Your suggestions; some already implemented, some being implemented and some which we haven’t even thought of; brings forth the clarity of thought within you. Unlike others you have expressed it in simple language and with humility too”


This is what distinguishes us from others; we are that simple and modest.

Paanch Mathlab!!!


Our college had a project with Grand Valley State University, Atlanta, USA was a matter of great help for our students in understanding the present global scenario of bussiness.the Hindustan coca cola India Pvt Ltd was facing a huge problem in Plachimada, Kerala.
Since the company’s Head Quarters was also situated in Atlanta, the company also took the case writing seriously. There are some situations in corporate life that we fail keeping up our companies aspirations, the case is one of them.
The team consisted of me, Prince,my class mate and a dozen students from my junior batch. We took the leadership and the other dozen took a little time coping up with us. They really didn’t like we joining the team. At that time we were having a little quarrel between our batch and their batch. But in a short time we became friends.
The target was to study the problem and put it in front of the students in the form of a case. The problem existed between the local people of Plachimada, the tribal people mostly and the company. The problem of water scarcity was huge in the area and the starting of the factory made the situation worse. This was the much talked about problem.
The team first met with the problem affected and anti Coke agitators. Then we met the management. These meetings, controversial in nature made a wave of conflicts in our mind.
Mr.Arun, the Librarian of DCSMAT and myself went in between to see many bureaucrats and know their opinion. Many, almost all were indifferent to us. At last tired one afternoon we went to the famous Palakkad Fort and sat on the historical and archeologically important fort, beneath a papal tree and we had a huge discussion over the issue and at last we redefined the problem from water scarcity to water pollution. We smelt an international conspiracy behind tarnishing the image of the company.
But we couldn’t understand the reason for it and didn’t understand why our people are so innocent. We went back and saw the factory and the plant manager gave a jumbo treat for us. He made a presentation as well. After that there was a question answer session as well we asked scores of question .I meanwhile asked a question as to why coke cannot stop running a factory which is not giving them any return for the last couple of years. The plant manager was upset over this question. He pretended to be over smart and answered very diplomatically that being MBAS you tell me why I shouldn’t close down.
But I felt that my question was not answered and I re- framed my question (thanks to Sreekumar’s Research Methodology Case studies) and asked. Sir, you have invested Rs 80 crore and for the last two years you don’t get a single paise out of it. This means that you return on investment remains zero and considering the inflation rate and the level of depreciation don’t u have any other option? even then his reply was the same as before.
Preliminary lessons of my Post Graduation in journalism had taught me that unless there is clarity, never stop asking questions. I didn’t give up, I asked the question again, but a little harshly, you are not able to solve a problem for two years and why don’t you close down a factory that doesn’t give you any return? This mode of my questioning annoyed him and he shouted at me that why I was asking the same question again and again. I told him that I need to ask him because I didn’t get a satisfactory answer from him. I was still calm and he wanted me not to ask questions any more. But I was determined to ask. When we are students we feel that all professionals should be ideal and none should be in a level below our expectation. When we come across such a person, we get irritated and try to thrash him. Here also same thing happened and we were irritated by him. Whatever question we ask he would just rebound it on us telling that you people tell me what should be done. Any way we squeezed him and we got what ever we wanted.
The first step in the case, an outline was written successfully and the process is continuing with new and new students entering the project.

Our Social Responsibility

“What are u looking at the slum children? We don’t see any beauty in them? Day after day you come here and see. Can’t u see the peace in their eyes? If you had seen a slum child in Germany, his eyes would be burning with the spirit of vengeance that I am dwelling in a slum because of the upper class people who have denied me my due, so his heart will be burning his eyes with vengeance. Here I see the peace amidst the poverty and this is the tradition of your age old culture .I don’t have to blame somebody for my poverty .I can myself bear with my fate and my soul be always upward.”
-Mrs. Maria Burgi (Research Scholar ,Germany)

The young generation of India is upset over the scenario of the social welfare in our country. This is the reason why I think why our President itself is so interested in the students of this generation. Almost all discussions in our sleepless nights tend to be in this direction of improving this condition of the people here. The people in and around our school itself, situated in a remote village in the interiors of Idukki have no chance of any exposure to the rapid changes of this new world. Their children dosen't know what this IT and ITES is all about. what to say if they want to see a film itself, they should travel 23 kilometers, regardless of the fact that they don’t have electricity and our infrastructural facilities, their children show enormous intellectual capacity and remorseless maturity.

I feel great respect to my classmates who introduced education to these children of Pullikkanam in our campus.’im a lot thankful to you, unless otherwise you had not given this chance, my children would never had got this kind of exposure to English language, the computers and these kinds of modern games, my daughter is very brilliant I know, but we have nothing to give her, even tuition to her.im grateful to the children here who has provided free tuition to them' says a mother who works as a plucker in the nearby tea estate.
it was another Sunday at the holy mass in the Pullikkanam church that the priest was appreciating the work done by my class mates to the society. Words failed for him to express his thanks and regards for the help they gave for building a wall 1350m long at the outskirts of Wagamon. Around 28 of them in the terrible heat was fully committed to their work.’I thank them all’, he said .'they came in despite caste and creed. This concern for the society is that is what is needed for the new generation’, he added.
The first three months of our stay in our school, we were in a hostel which was very far from our campus. This was in Wagamon which is a local town those days were very enjoyable as they were much interesting. Those days gave us amble oppurtuni6y to mingle with the local community who were very nice to us even

Pulli TV

All these began when we used to make fun of these typical reporting styles of the modern tv news channels, when we used to sit for food at the canteen. Somebody would ask hello reporter are u on the line?? Then he would reply ya im ...tell me...then the newsreader would ask what is the news at the library? etc...this continued until we invented the Pulli tv. The new venture of ours, the Pulli tv was so funny and inspiring for us. We wanted a medium to communicate to students, as they would be surprised to see themselves on the screen, we had just a Sony hadicam and an lcd-projecter for our help
My friends Lijomon, Manjith, Anoop, Cijo, Rins and Jayesh included me also in the team and we made many interesting programmes for the Campus, many of them, which could make them laugh. Students were thrilled by the vivid humor that we showered on them through Pulli. As marketers we can be proud that we effectively managed the brand Pulli(Pulli word basically derived from Pullikkanam).
Iam always fascinated by the charm and the creativity of my friends. They were very good in filming ,editing ,dubbing and screening. they were able to use new soft wares for this. Im especially thankful to Rins who created so many ads for us which made Pulli so popular.

DC School


Though my school
is the end of the road, it is the beginning of life for many of us. At least without doubt I can say that I was subjected to some changes there. There is a slight controversy when I say this, once my friend and earlier roommate Shaji send an article that u can create an MBA within three months-no time. Like what Krishna said in Gita that all what u need is the karma kushalata.. Then do we need these IIMs and Harvard’s for mass production of MBAs?...I’m not there for a debate, but all that I can say is that when we left DCSMAT after our two years of experiential learning we were not those persons who came over there two years before. When I visit the houses of my colleagues their parents say that they have changed a lot.
When I talk of my friends, I would be proud to say that almost all of them came out of their weaknesses successfully. Many of them belong to families of farmers, they are familiar to the traditional ways of farming and I often find my selves thinking that how successfully they link those management jargons to the real life situations in the farms or in the fields.