Showing posts with label Courses. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Courses. Show all posts

Friday, August 14, 2009

I Think Therefore I'm.... Single :)

Disclaimer: The following piece of literature is a satire and an attempted application of MBA concepts to real-world. The author is not responsible for feuds resulting or arising out of the text though he would be interested in knowing about them ;)
Disclaimer 2: The analysis is believed to be gender independent and universally applicable :)
The ‘product’: Depending on the consumer characteristics, the product can be high involvement product or a low involvement product. It may not be generalised but the product’s use as FMCG is not socially desirable. Thus, for the purpose of simplification of analysis, we shall assume the product is a high-involvement product and is intended to be used as a consumer durable. The product has a high-maintenance cost associated but the perceived lifetime value is higher than the costs involved. Thus, the product has a high aspirational value.
The ‘purchase’: The purchase decision is generally non-impulse though the primary point of contact with the product has a high impact on the final purchase. The purchase can involve extended information search. Alternative evaluation, though, is restricted, often by the terms and conditions mentioned by the product. To meet the alternative evaluation requirements the consumer often observes flanking brands to be satisfied of the genuine advantages of the evoked set. General consumers like to try the product before deciding the purchase. Only surrogate attributes are used for evaluation during trial. The trial period can involve high monetary, emotional and temporal costs. Elimination-by-aspects is the general rule used for final decision. Sometimes, consumers do trade-off important attributes for the less important ones and thus actually use compensatory decision rule in conjunction with elimination-by-aspects. In many cases, the product is deemed faulty and discarded without any damages sought. Packaging has a high impact on the purchase decision. The consumer seeks out the product and hence the place dimension of the product mix is insignificant at the point of contact. However, for all further decisions, proximity is a highly desirable trait. Group impact on decision-making is very high and co-branding strategies are often successful.
Post-Purchase: Post-purchase dissonance is often delayed and not instantaneous. Display of post-purchase dissonance is restricted. Consumption guilt is often absent. Disposability of the product is very low. Hence, in cases where post-purchase dissonance or consumption guilt exists, the product is put to a no-use state before being slowly discarded. The duration of the no-use phase before disposal (and replacement) is highly dependent on attribution. Depending on the individual consumer, the product may sometimes be replaced immediately with a new one but more often than not, the second purchase is characterised by a prolonged period of analysis of previous use, and an in-depth study of the consideration set elements for making the second purchase.
MMM
P.S.: Go Ahead, Guess the product :)
Disclaimer 3: The author has limited knowledge of the product. The analysis performed is based on secondary data.
Credits shared by: @ng, Kutti

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Of groups and MBA...

Dear Blog,

It’s a part of every subject. It’s a part of being an MBA. It’s a part of working as a manager. It’s a part of being a social being. It’s a part of life. You cannot work alone... God created the man and then realised man’s identity could be harmful for the weaker, his mistakes, and the errors in the otherwise six-sigma universe. He then thought, “Let me create the need for social recognition, the need for affiliation.” Just to ensure his point was well hammered, he also created one Maslow and then a few OB teachers who taught man the importance of group work. And thus, individual pursuit of excellence was curbed to make way for group development.

All fine till now. But then, as with all other things, man took this noble intention to the extreme and decided he needed to build and enforce this group behaviour in every aspect of life and in MBA terms, part of every course evaluation. Thus were born groups and group assignments in management. With those groups came the complex group dynamics. Who forms the groups? Who takes the initiative and includes whom in the group? Including one person may not mean anything but saying no to anyone means doubting his capacities and what is more, it demonstrates your unwillingness to work with a friend if not your inability to work in a team. But including a person means alienating someone else who does not want to be with that person or in not-so-rare and not-so-extreme cases actually doubts him/her. And caught in this are those people who simply do not care what group they are in!!! Their sole objective is to ensure the best they can do individually, enrich the group that they are in and few cases, try to cover-up for the weaklings should there be any. This does not mean that they do not want to be with their favourite group (the concept of impartiality is slightly flawed by its very definition) but that they would be equally comfortable with anyone else...

Thankfully, despite all his efforts, God could not embed a culture of group discussions in humans and thus these were used as differentiating points for recruitment!!!

Waiting for a group-less course,
PP

Saturday, December 27, 2008

Reflections – Part II (Term 2 @ XL)

 Dear Blog,

Just as I had started settling into the rhythm of 8-hrs sleep per day, a rude awakening call was given to me by the damn reminder in my mobile: September 21. Time to go back to the 3-hrs sleep days... Time for second term @ XL...

The first week, as in the first term was pretty normal. Some teachers were yet to return from their other assignments and hence I was “free” with other pursuits. That joy wouldn’t last for long though... And even in those few days, I had to prepare for the SIPs. Squeezed in between was the great XL Diwali...

Two GBMs... One for the introduction of non-conventional placement opportunities (which I must say gave rise to more concerns about fewer opportunities and the tough times ahead than the “opportunities”) and the other for introduction of the senior teams for the process (to reassure and mend the dent left by the previous GBM)... I’ve already described the process in great depth in other posts [1, 2, 3, 4] and thus will not venture details here... By the way, there was also the famed GBM which I shall not mention here...

Then came Ensemble 2008

A place for the best minds from all-over India to meet. Sad, but for the few OTS events, hardly any XLer would have “Ensembled”... The Sudoku challenge, the fin-quiz, the face-painting competition etc. were the saving grace. Else, it was just the various associations and the few lucky teams selected to the final rounds (names withheld due to obvious reasons). The reason behind the best in the field not being called upon and the job left to few “selected” members escapes me... What is more... genuine help is frowned upon and looked at with scepticism (I surely hope, in few isolated cases)!!! As the great Bard put it, All’s well that ends well...

Then the realisation suddenly dawned, not the SIP or Ensemble was what I was here for... The existence of project deadlines and tests hit me hard. That I was able to squeeze in time for everything was in itself a great wonder... My prior experience with PPTs and excel sheets did prove to be handy... Before I realised, the end-terms had dawned, just as I realised, they were over.

My learnings from this term:

  • There is logic behind great organisations being so great... 3M and Google surely did not know they were to change the entire content of case studies and presentations. 
  • Facts are artefacts... Rare... General knowledge is not very general... Not very well known to people. Any assumptions thereof will be the point of discussion and example for many discussions and possibly even Group "Discussions"!!!
  • History is indeed written by the victors... and so is a successful marketing strategy! The loser can only wonder, “what if...”
  • If you do not know a thing, keep quiet. If you know it, more so...
  • Market never runs efficiently... Thus, it becomes the role of finance managers to take the blame for all the bad judgements of all the people. Who should be blamed for all the economic evil that the world is going thru... the brilliant economists and MBAs or the common junta who just can’t calculate the price of a financial instrument... (well, they are not expected to... but shhhhh... who else can we blame)
  • Under Sec 1(aa) of the College Student Act, any dissent against boring subjects is henceforth declared unlawful. The right to strike has, with immediate effect, been withdrawn. Any violation of the above nature may be dealt with in a manner deemed strict by the offender. The award of punishment will be discretionary in nature.
  • Democracy gives u only one right... The right to remain silent... Everything else can and will be used against the right...
  • Once again reiterating... Friends are the biggest assets... unfortunately, no accounting standard allows them to be  written off in the balance sheet as they bring no liability with them... Pacioli was wrong here...
Bringing the curtains down on an eventful term...
PP

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

An interesting course...

Dear Blog,
Today's entry has been written more in awe than anything else.. 

Well... It requires a special talent to teach history to students of applied science in a way that they study it like the way they study science... and not just study but enjoy it too. Well, today’s test was a subject in that category... Generally regarded and surely perceived as boring piece of history with no practical relevance and surely not application. Well, this course surely changed my view... Not only do I find it very practical, but it was more like the only logical subject I had this term... Rest all were pretty much, well, history :) (No offence to those studying history.. but it just is not a science for me... Obviously historians differ)

Today's paper was a culmination of wat has been a very informative series of 20 sessions and a more than welcome break from the enervating courses I've undergone...

I always thot organisations were formed out of a brilliant idea (or a lucky one) and that they grew just coz stagnation wud lead them to decline and in gen human tendency is to keep growing and never be satisfied... Never knew there was so much of science behind how and why they grow into what they grow into. Never thought the ESOPs were anything beyond a retention gimmick which nobody but a few lucky ones gained from... Never thot any happening in the ET cud be linked to the psychological and organisational aspects and not pure finance!!! This term I gained a new lens to view international news with and it sure presents a more real picture than what I used to see.

Thus ends, a very interesting course and prob my second most interesting course in XL...

PP

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

The FM test...

A blog for a test??

Surely you must be crazy Mr. Aggarwal... Well, it was no ordinary test... It was the test of FM.

Background:
FM is one of those subjects, where you miss one class and you are lost throughout the term. Well, that’s what happened... In the first class, we started portfolio management with the Markowitz Model. I got lost in the first three slides (Damn the Greek... Damn Mathematicians... can’t they use X and Y... why do alpha, beta, sigma come in... And those summation signs mean “THE EnD”)... And the whole class was a blur. Everything was based on the first few moments and I missed it.

Now the "Preparation":
For two hours, I pondered over where to start. I finally thought, a big-fat book, it must have something... Decided... The book shall be starting line...

  1. I looked at the book. Known script... Good... Alien Language... (Dead end)
  2. I looked at the ppt... “Wasn’t this the same thing with those alien characters... What I cudn’t get then, how can I get now??” (Dead end)
  3. Repeat One... Get anything?? No...
  4. Repeat Two... Get anything?? No...
  5. Go to pidgin (fancy program as sub for gtalk)... See if anyone else is getting anything... 
    “Na... not started... will do tom”
    “U nerd...”
    “Plsssssss”
    “Shut up. Me and FM...”
    “Joking???”
  6. Repeat 3, 4,5 till u get something... 
    (the loop continued for a while)
  7. Get up next morning...
  8. Roomy knows something... My great roomy... Tells me basics... Confidence up.
  9. Read Markowitz model ppt... Lost again... (Dead end)
  10. Repeat 3,4... Already post-noon. Need to do something. Resolve. Start reading chapter 7. Not so alien after all... On to chapter 8. Lost again!!!
  11. Roomy Zindabad... Confidence up.
  12. Read Markowitz model again... yippee... makes sense... remember later... go on now... on a roll...
  13. Read CAPM ppt. Wow... lost again... Sleep.
  14. Get up. Read the notes everyone is studying... (if comps can reach human efficiencies, I dunno... but humans (some... or is it just one???) sure have mastered the art of converting speech to text)
  15. Go to test.

The test:
Not bad at all... think hard... Generally, I am in the first batch to get up and leave... today is different... think hard... think of various possibilities... not bad at all... I do know some FM (ok at least the stuff in the paper)

Post Mortem: Ya right... my answers are probably wrong given the extra-thinking I did...

Moral of the story: It doesn’t pay to think extra. Efficient market hypothesis is anyways not always applied by all people... its best to go with what most ppl think is true...

MMM