BAH comes visiting & more learnings...

This week saw campus visits by a few more companies, again primarily to recruit P4s. Still these presentations provide an invaluable opportunity (to P1s such as myself) to learn about the respective companies first-hand. One of them held particular interest for me: Booz Allen Hamilton.

Yes, this is a consulting firm as well and I know I expressed some apprehensions about consulting firms being a fit for me in one of my earlier posts. Yet, there were several reasons why BAH looked good to me, not the least of which was a strong technology focus and emphasis on telecom. So, I walked into the presentation with a sense of keen anticipation. For a change, I had researched the company well in advance and had a fair idea about what to expect and where to probe.

The presentation was conducted by a Senior-VP (China Operations) & Partner, a very proper Englishman who had spent his entire professional life in the Energy sector. I found his presentation exceptinally good. Crisp, clear and very informative. A model consultant! He pointed out the pros and cons of the organization and made an objective, precise comparison between BAH and other leading strategy consulting firms. One of the pros caught my (and incidently, everyone else's...) immediate attention.

A significant drawback of working as a consultant is that while you get to strategize and plan plently, you rarely get the satisfaction of seeing out the implementation of your plans. Quite often, a consultant is not even aware of the full outcome of his suggestions. This can be pretty frustrating, particularly if you have been in the "implementing" business all your life (as I have) and relish the thrill of execution.

This appeared to be a differentiator for BAH. BAH consultants apparently, work regularly with industry management on the implementation of their initial assignments: and nowhere else does this hold true than in telecom. Several such instances were quoted, including the strategic reasoning behind the recent merger of two major wireless vendors. Now, consultants aren't supposed to reveal the identity of their clients, and our visitor stuck religiously to this decree...but I'm guessing Lucent-Alcatel. Impressive...

Well, more food for thought and I am on an information-accumulation phase right now. Speaking to the P4s, I get the feeling one of these information pieces is going to be vital in the not-so-distant future.

Jammin' n' quizzin'...

All right! I'm really happy today...no, I didn't have a great meal; no, there isn't a break from school and no, I didn't just speak with my girlfriend. This weekend, a few of my classmates and I finally got around to jamming for the very first time.

We managed to rent a studio downtown, complete with lead & bass guitars, a drum set, microphone, speakers, amps, the works. And then...it was time to rock n roll! Started out with "Smells like Teen Spirit", and "Paranoid", 2 songs about as archaetypical as you can find, but not bad songs to get the old music waves flowing. Then forayed into a host of other songs as well and finalizd another 2 for our next session. There was another band from school as well and we ended the evening jamming all together on probably the biggest rock anthem after "Stairway to Heaven": "Sweet Child 'O Mine". Awww, it was 4 hours of rock bliss...just G-R-E-A-T!

At the end of it all, the guys were all so ecstatic that we were running across roads violating traffic signs, shouting, gesturing and basically, making a complete ass of ourselves. For those amongst you wondering what the fuss is all about, please keep in mind that we are in SINGAPORE. I'll leave it at that. Anyway, its pretty mild in the realm of rock n roll decadence.

Speaking of "...Teen Spirit", few of the guys didn't know why the song is named as it is and I'll take the liberty of elaborating on this point as I did with them. Teen Spirit was the name of a cheap deodorant for women back in the mid-80s. Apparently, many of the girls in Kurt Cobain's high school used this deo regularly. I don't know whether the smell turned him off or on, but that is the story. Anyway, it was all great fun...really was. And the music wasn't bad either...for our first trial.

On a completely different note, I just went through our first "test" in the form of a Prices & Markets quiz. Its really not a big deal but the event, at least for me, is symbolic of our coming. In a program of just over 10 months, there is no such thing as a senior batch and we'll all be out of here before we realise it. So, such events, trivial as they are in absolute terms, demand a certain significance when taken in the right context.

Cheers to that and many more to come !

India, diversity and lessons from OB...

Its been 3 weeks of classes and many of the students are starting to really open up. Speaking of the term "student", this place takes this term to a whole new level. There are some pretty impressive people going around as students here. These are people with SERIOUS achievements under their belts. Its a whole new paradigm and the bar is so very high.

I just had an interaction with one of these "students" that epitomizes this. This is an individual who has spent a significant part of his life travelling around the world and has some amazing insights to share. So we got talking...and turns out, he has spent some time in Bangalore, India as well (but of course!). Having lived there for the last three years myself, we got talking.

Now as is customary in such exchanges, one does have to hear the culture-shock related incidents. Bad roads, lots of people, inefficient bureaucracy, corrupt cops...you get the picture. Except in this case, it wasn't so for the plain white-man-bitching reasons. This was a guy who was genuinely frustrated at how these things were preventing India from reaching its true potential. No seriously, if YOU, the reader of this blog, are tempted to roll your eyes and move on to another blog, hold on...and hear our discussion out.

What plagues India today? Lofty question...this one. Especially coming from me...I don't even pretend to understand the all the socio-politic-economic complications behind this question. Still, lets pretend I am a 10-year old looking at this issue purely from my perspective. Population? Pollution? Poverty? Corruption? Can I apply an 80:20 here? Perhaps doing so would be naive...but allow me.

We can't do anything about our poverty. As my micro-economics professor says, this is effectively a "sunk-cost". Population, we live with...lets call this the "fixed cost". Pollution is a bi-product. So, what can we change? You get the picture...Corruption might not be the worst place to start. Of course, nothing new or ground-breaking in what I profess here. But how? This was the subject of my conversation with my classmate.

We have today an excellent Prime Minister. A man whose credentials and capability is unquestioned. But I do not envy his position. He spends his time working with a coalition of cast-based parties, religious interest groups, communists...you name it. The flip-side of democracy, they call it! Well, its a pretty significant flip-side, wouldn't you say? Whats the other side like? Or is blaming democracy just an excuse. India's political landscape today bears a striking resemblance to pre-WWII Germany. Several parties, most without a tangible ideal, and NONE with any real hold. So, they either struggle along with a coalition OR put up no fight at all when an entity such as the Third Reich comes along. Now, presumably, nothing like that is brewing in India, but aren't there lessons to be learned here, my classmate enquired?

Any Indian will counter this point, as I did, that the diversity in India is such that a voice is needed for each. Hence, society's diversity is reflected in its government. That is fine...but here's a point: should this diversity come together only in an entity as high as the country's parliament? Something is WRONG here. And there may be arguments against this: remember I am trying not to over-intellectualize the issue.

We need to push this amalgamation process to a lower level...sort out the differences innate within diversity down at the state and maybe even district level. Perhaps the honchos who run the show at our top house would be focused on what they really need to be that way...just perhaps.

More thoughts to follow on this and of course, a trivial blog entry will barely begin to touch the surface. But let me just end with an intriguing fact my OB (Organizational Behavior) prof shared with us, which makes for an interesting analogy with India's demography: For all the talk of the benefits of diversity, the AVERAGE world-wide performance of homogenous teams around the world is significantly better that that of heterogeneous teams! This is not a conjecture or opinion: it is a fact. But here's hope: the very best teams in the world ARE diverse and heterogenous in nature...its all about sorting one's differences out, respecting one another and looking beyond...and it CAN BE DONE!

Team Profile and professionalism...

Ah, the Team profile preparation for LPG (Leading People & Groups) is finally over! This was meant to serve as a handbook detailing the goals, rules, processess, etc of my study group for the first 2 periods. The cover page of our endeavour is shown here and man, does it ROCK!

While I profess my relief at having realised this task's completion, I must confess it has been a keenly interesting experience; indeed one whose utility many of my classmates have probably not realised yet. I can safely say that when I finally went to bed in the wee hours of this morning, I stayed up for nearly half an hour thinking about all that had gone into the preparation of the profile doc. The final document is impressive, but that is beside the point.

The process of its preparation brought out a few skeletons that had already begun to embed themselves within the confines of Section A1, Group 12. Issues of equitable contribution, punctuality, etc came to light in the most stark manner possible and I for one, am glad this has happened now. Personalities, cocooned behind the masks we all brought with us to INSEAD and the group, were pulled off rather urgently and genuine identities emerged, nearly all for the good. Lines were drawn and accepted.

In spite of this (or perhaps due to this), the professionalism of my group mates has really come to the fore...not once did anyone get defensive. We all came to INSEAD hoping to learn and grow in every possible way and cheers to the guys for displaying their magnanimity in practising this!

We have miles to go before we sleep...

Buddy lunch and its ramifications...

A couple of days ago, 2 of my batchmates and I were invited to lunch with a "senior" of ours (December 2006 class). Daniel introduced himself as a French-American (which I must admit, left me very curious as to the kinds of contradictions Daniel must have had to face over the last few months). Tact and a rush of sanity prevented me from broaching the subject...

Anyway, the lunch was a class-wide initiative by the senior class to increase contact between the 2 batches. I looked at it as a terrific opportunity to learn the dynamics of how INSEAD works...in terms of electives, campuses and of course recruitment. I have started my course in Singapore, but at some point will transfer to the France campus. Now exactly when this should be done seems to depend on so many variables, it puts the Demand curve well-nigh to shame! In addition, of course, there is the small matter of the INSEAD-Wharton exchange program to consider as well.

Daniel had several interesting points to share, not least of which was the apparent lack of academic challenge in Wharton ! Now, I realise that a 2-year MBA cannot be compared to INSEAD, but the comment was extra-ordinary. Apparently, the only students who head to Warton are those committed to gaining employment in the US (mind you, this might be a very generalized statement...much like the results of my recent MBTI test). Of course, noone is exactly handing me a Wharton exchange on a plate, but I was wary of this move to begin with. His comments have nearly pushed me to the edge.

As has become customary these days, most of the discussions I have are opening doors. When, if ever, will some of them start to close? Patience, boy. In addition, there was the not-so-comforting thought that the P1 load will feel like a holiday compared to P2/3. I look forward to P4 already.

Enough for today, I gotta rush to Holland Village and check out a local Singaporean rock band perform...saw them last week as well and man, do they ROCK !

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and Mrs. Fields' cookies...

This week saw our class having to take the well-known MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type indicator) test. For those unaware, this is a well known psychometric test used to approximate different personality traits. Seemingly innocuous, it is used by companies around the world. It attempts to answer things such as whether a given individual is an extrovert or an inrovert? Do you rely only on hard data to make decisions or are you an intuition person who believes in overall impressions and that certain X-factor? Do you find high levels of planning and organization an asset or a liability?

I had taken the test once before rather casually and honestly, remember nothing of the result. This time, though, I tried to be as honest as possible and the restult that ensued did not partiularly surprise me: ENFP ==> Extrovert, iNtuition, Feeling, Perceiving.

Now, rather than just explain these results to us, the prof. undertook, what I feel, was a very effective way of driving home the truth behind some of these readings. I mean, c'mon, most of us gave very little credence to such tests. But the prof put together some groups of people with similar results and other groups with very different results and asked them to talk things out. Of course, we did not know each others results beforehand.

Groups with extroverts seemed to have plenty to talk about and ended up discovering similar interests (such as getting outdoors, etc). Groups of introverts ended up spending several minutes looking at the roof wondering what they were gonna eat for dinner ! The discussions with the most depth, however, transpired between a mix of extroverts and introverts. Simple...yet remarkably effective. To me, this was just another example of the effectiveness of simplicity. Keep things simple and moving, they always say.

The other intersting experience was a case study regarding different leadership styles. Putting it simply, some leaders (and organization cultures) are process-oriented while others are people-oriented (Of course, the very best today employ right doses of both). Now, we all know how important it is to "feel" for your employees, but they can be no arguing that a pure people-centric approach is not scalable. Processes are a necessity as companies expand even though its such a bitch sometimes. Anyway, the discussion was about 2 cookie selling companies in the US in the 1980s: Mrs. Field's cookies v/s David's cookies.

I'm not gonna go into the details of the actual case, except to mention that Mrs. Fields people-centric approach, considered revolutionary (...or stupidly naive) in the 80s opened up a new management mantra, one that is regularly used by companies today. The prof ended the discussion by welcoming two sales-ladies from the actual Mrs. Field's franchise in Singapore of today ! And they proceeded to serve a cookie each to every student in the class...free ! WOW ! The whole class was blown away...talk about the Midas touch and I suspect Mr. Minarelli earned himself a few admirers today...

Consultantcy firms come visiting and a few learnings for me...

In addition to hosting the first set of classes, last week also saw several visits from some of the world's top Management and Strategy consultantcy firms in the world. McKinsey & Co., Bain & Co., The Boston Consulting Group, Arthur D Little: you name it, they were here. Their primary intention was to recruit from the Class of December '06 (my seniors), but we were invited to partake in their presentations as well.

In recent years, Consulting has become such a pre-dominant occupation, it is considered a part of the "top three" sectors for professional managers; industry and finance being the other two. Firms and profit-seeking economic entities regularly need "experts" to analyze every facet of their business. Be it something as specific as inventory turn-over or something as fundamental as strategic market placement, it is often the consultant who brings in his expertise to help get companies back on track.

Now, having been in the telecom industry all my professional life, I was keen to get a feel of the Consulting lifestyle. I had heard several stories, ranging from the excellent renumeration schemes to the horrific lifestyles. Since consulting firms earn reveneues primarily by "billing" their employees, utilization becomes a key driver for success, much in the way services outsourcing works. Hence, firms are constantly looking to bill consultants. Having said that, a consultant's job is unmatched in terms of the exposure he gets to different fields, organizations, geographies, etc.

My personal goal and primal motivation for seeking an MBA remains the desire to work in a Strategic Planning role for a telecommunications company. To this end, the erudite around me claim that a couple of years of Strategic Consulting might be just the thing for me. The exposure and wisdom that this offers could place me very comfortably in my eventual (desired) position. That doesn't sound too bad, even if the hours do suck. But see, here's the problem: say, I get picked up by Bain & Co., who have tons of consulting assignments in the Airlines industry. Whether I like it or not, I will have to consult for the Airlines industry. Now, I know about as much about the Airlines inustry as my dog does about Lord Zeus. Not a problem: I will learn. But wait...what happens to that Strategic Planning role for a telco? Hmmm...deeper disussions and thought processes await my attention...

A night-out in Singapore...

Had my second night out in Singapore since I arrived and I like what I see. Singapore has an assured, vibrant night-life. There are quite a few areas, some more reputable than others.

A few of my INSEAD classmates and I headed out to Clark Quay, a bustling oasis of restaturants, bars and nightclubs. After an eternity of searching for the "ideal" restaurant, we settled for an open shack by the river. The food was terrible, but the ambience was nice. There was an even a coolish breeze blowing, which was a break from the normally humid climate. Post-supper, we headed into one of the better known clubs - The Attica. My 2 Greek friends were quick to point out that this was named after the ancient Greek locale. Not that there was any particular resemblance to the original, but who cares...

Now, Singapore's nightclubs are curious in terms of the mix one finds within. You see plenty of Oriental (read - chinki -- I apologize for the political incorrectness, but the desi in me fails to conjure up a better description) girls, most of whom are there to have harmless, clean fun. And then there is the atypical middle-aged European (read - British)...balding, overweight and eyes full of lust. Mind you, thats not all you find, most of the people are like me...but somehow, this combination sticks out like a fur-coat in Jakarta. Its interesting to stand by the corner and observe (VOYUER sic !).

Having said that, the music is good and entry is pretty inexpensive. Definitely worth a chekout...I look forward to more such breaks of socializing in the midst of the hectic study schedule. Ah, cheers to that !

First week over and reality has hit us all !

Well, the first week of classes just got over and I now know first-hand, what doing an MBA in a year means from a top B-school really entails. The FMV (Financial Management & Valuation) class today went so fast, I thought Mike Tyson had punched (and bitten) me.

Barely had I come to terms with Time-Value-of-Money that we were dissecting the concept of Zero-coupon bonds. The same class had us calculating the Yield-to-Maturity for such Debt securities. Man, I need to catch up and fast. The amount of reading to do per day is almost ridiculous. And of course, we get these pleasures at a cost of Euros 45,000 no less !

Yet, there seems to be an eclectic mix of quantitative courses (FMV, Accounting), some analytical ones (Prices & Markets) and some "softer" courses such as "Leading People & Groups". The latter, subjective as it may seem, is probably most important in the long run. The professors are amazing. Wow ! They are all seasoned, honed to the nail.

All in all, I am really happy with my decision to come to INSEAD so far (D-UH -- no brainer !) Whichever way it goes, this is gonna be a hell of a ride...

A new beginning...

Though this post comes about 2 weeks late, it is still relevant. My first days at he INSEAD Business school and what do I say about it?

Course I only got to know I was through about 3 weeks before class was to start...not the ideal preparation, but then better to have at least that than say a day !

I am getting adjusted to life here and classes (and the accompanying massive workload) is just around the corner.

Campus is terrific, if just a little small. Housing is a nightmare ! Everyone is smart, but a lot aren't really sure what they wanna do. The diversity is unmatched. Truly amazing...I have a Swedish techie, an Irish accountant, an Austrian consultant and a Greek marketer as my groupmates.

Virtually no American students which is sad, cuz I think they still make the best MBAs. No Chinese either which is so intriguing, I think someone ought to research that.