back after long time....

I'd infact forgot about the blogging stuff till my friend reminded today! hope to update the exciting happenings....and there are plenty of those!

New beginnings!

3 months into my new journey, and it has not yet daunted my enthusiasm a bit....china continues to amaze and challenge my wits, over and again....

Have I succeeded in learning mandarin? The plain and simple answer is no....
My boss always used 3 months as a thumb rule for evaluating progress on a new initiative. He used to jokingly say that if we can't bring about a change in 3 months, we probably will never....

Have I made any progress? This is debatable. I can atleast say that now I have a clear idea of how to go about learning this language and blessed with all resources amassed over the last 3 months.

The discussion with my mentor Henrik (who's become a CEO of an MNC at Shenzhen) has renewed my determination to learn mandarin. As my aim is to jump into the business bandwagon revolving around china, it's more critical to learn the language. It was quite motivating to find him talking in mandarin so fluently (for a European, its nothing short of magic).

It's been quite a long time away from the blog, hope to write more often, maybe even on a daily basis.

adios

Every good thing comes to an end!

Holidays ended finally! missed the marketing and statistics classes today as I skipped sleep yesterday and successfully submitted innovation challenge business plan. now keeping fingers crossed! now need to put efforts in infocomm and gap case study! and need to mug up lot of materials before we head for 'Confluence' in India. need to cut down the parties and chats which is taking much of the time! also need to allocate significant time resources for social venture club, inherited a great legacy, need to build on that and pass on the baton to my successor of MBA07 with great elan.

I found a wonderful book to read: Individualized Corporation by Sumantra Ghoshal and Christopher Bartlett. As with other activities, reading a number of books at a time has become a norm nowadays. Other books in my study are 75 Greatest Management Decisions and Blue Ocean Strategy. The first one is really interesting, it provides glimpses of great decisions which impacted great corporations such as Sears, Mckinsey, Ford, Apple, Microsoft, Toyota and many more. Also talks about interesting incidents such as Marlboro friday. Highly recommended for business school students and managers.

Interesting read... worth it

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24hours in a day are not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and 2 cups of coffee.

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls.He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar.Of course, the sand filled up everything else.

He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous "yes."

The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.
"Now," said the professor, as the laughter subsided, "I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things - God, family, children, health, friends, and favorite passions -- things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, house, andcar.
The sand is everything else -- the small stuff.

"If you put the sand into the jar first," he continued, "there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

So...Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness.Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups.Take your loved one out to dinner. Play another 18. . "Take care of the golfballs first -- the things that really matter. Set your priorities.The rest is just sand."

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented. The professor smiled. "I'm glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend."

holiday blues!!

i know i'm not doing any justice to this so called blog, but again life was on a roll these days. any mba school is full of activities, need to socialize and network till u drop dead! and ceibs is no different! u get invited to parties, ktv (karoake), clubs, housewarming....and on top of that i've also enrolled in couple of business plan competitions! lost count of time and date! then the last but not the least, assignments and group case discussions! anyone surviving the mba grind is sure to be made of some stuff! no wonder, corporates pay top $ to mba grads!! so between all the commotion, blogging was relegated to a corner. oops! need to call home! almost a month....need to set my priorities right, lest i'm damned!

hey, i'm the first club president of MBA2006. The Social Venture Club. tis the most active club in the school running lots of fund raising programs and charity works and also CSR stuff. all the previous club presidents enjoy iconic status now and i'll have my hands full all year round.

any leader is only as good as the people. so, first thing was to get an excellent cross functional and diversified team and all are pretty passionate about social venture club. see the photo of the executive committee.

tis me at the centre, with terry on the left (Exec VP), Evelyn on the right (Chief Mktg Officer). Standing L to R : Jim (VP Events), Kevin (VP CSR), Lily (CFO), Michael (VP IT), Alex (Media Director), Leon (VP Community programs), Masa (External Affairs Director). the last but not the least, linda, who is a member of the club and just came to cheer us.


meanwhile, also contested for the post of external affairs director of student committee and miserably lost. i'm happy it went to the right person Rafael. he's just amazing and resourceful.

thanks to chinese independence day, we're having holidays here, for 8 days. know what, even companies are closed, lucky guys!! i really fancy working in china now, so many holidays in the corporate world!!

the real work begins now, going to IIM ahmedabad in november for participating in confluence, CEIBS is the defending champion, real hard task to live upto the expectations, The Group : Rafael (Mexican), Jurn (Dutch), Julio (Spanish), Jared (Chinese) and me (Indian), a truly multinational team with diversified background. sure, will have lot of fun. others, watch out! (just kidding!!). the event has got business plan, essay and other on the spot competitions. last date for submission of essay : 5th oct, b plan : 8th oct

the next one, innovation challenge, this yr being organized by Darden b school. again, in a cross functional team. we've terry (american), larry (chinese), sheridan (australian) and katrina (chinese). the challenge is to increase revenues and bottomline of M&M choc candies by appropriate and creative "store within store" model. m&m is really a fun loving & iconic brand, a very practical and interesting challenge. we brainstormed for 3 hrs non stop and it took a toll on everyone. overall gud experience, pooled lots of creative ideas, never knew that i had so much creative juice left. last date for submission : 8th oct

the 3rd one, infocom essay. top 3 indian and international students gets honored by President of India Dr A P J Abdul Kalam! Wow! last date for submission : 15th oct

also need to submit the Biopure marketing case and write the Leadership story right after the break....need to catch up on accounting and statistics! these 2 classes are giving me nightmares now....

holiday is no longer a holiday!! but i'm not complaining!!

had to skip zao can(breakfast) and wufan(lunch). now hen jie(very hungry), going to kfc for a quick grub....

Zaijian (Good bye)

A short break

I dont have classes today morning, so catching up with you guys !! Our classes commenced yesterday with Prof Ridolfo's Business writing & Presentation. I must admit that here's a laoshi (means teacher in chinese) who can amuse the students in an otherwise boring subject. Our dean introduced all faculty to us and they're impressive, and from different countries with PhD from top schools. Then we'd marketing and statistics classes during the later part of the day, had a tough time keeping awake (tis almost 7 yrs since participated in a class and it reflects). Oh, also managed to attend LEK consulting's PPT. A medium size firm, they're into strategic consulting (only touch points are with top management and the board), so they say (that's what all consulting firms say, anyway). Surprised to see very few people from 2005 batch, guess they're so impressed with LEK that they couldnt make it.

But the key learnings from the presentation is : man, you just need to be proficient in mandarin or else you're screwed. So planning to engage a private chinese tutor, it costs lot of money, but guess worth all the money and effort. So expect to find few chinese words in future entries.

Zaijian ! (Good bye !)

Shanghai blues !!

so finally sort of convinced myself to update the blog. sometimes my time management just sucks !! anyways i landed in shanghai on 25th morning enroute bangkok. had a great massage at the bangkok airport, worth the money, but heard tis cheaper downtown.

initial impressions on shanghai and ceibs !!

well, u know chinese can be great hosts and so far havent seen a single person with a red face, gals are pretty cute and quite open, packed all my misconceptions for the time being !!


Ceibs enjoys good reputation in china and asia pacific and this year we have close to 33% international students out of 165 odd students (guess the final figures are still awaited), even if we discount overseas chinese, it should be close to 25 % international representation. we have people fm korea, taipei, singapore, japan, usa, ireland, germany, poland, switzerland, spain, argentina, chile, mexico, canada, italy etc etc (hope i addressed all the countries, if not dont find fault with me, 2 am in the early morning after a party isnt the best time to blog for any sensible human, but who cares ? am i really sensible ?)

we've been having non stop parties for the last 5 days and guess this is the way bschool life works. well, atleast here it does.

classes are yet to start and we're still undergoing the marathon orientation of 4 days and tomorrow is the last day of orientation followed by the barbeque. and u know what, i'm going to the chinese karoake and plan to sing a chinese song, the chinese way....wonder about the state of audience....anyway Ivy was bold enough to invite me and admire her guts for that....

more later, now going for sleep. Ooozzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz