B School

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Snapshots from Hell part2...Life at B School

Its been a week now at B-School, and already it seems like it has been ages. After a year of working, going back to college has not been such a difficult transition to make, in the sense of adjusting to a college environment. It was only a year ago when I was sitting in the canteen of Delhi College of Engineering, remembering all four years of college life, and only eight months when, I was sitting in the classroom at the Mysore center of Infosys, learning the tricks of software. So, the office to classroom transition has been smooth.

What new for me has been the jargon. "Networking" is now a key word, some say the most important word in the corporate world. Other key words include words from marketing jargon like "USP" or Unique Selling Proposition (whats your USP, is the first question seniors ask you here), or to the ubiquitous "value addition"(each and everything thing you do, has to have a value add associated with it).

But the most shocking part has been the orientation week. I mean you would only believe it if you experienced it. I mean throughout the week, we were waking up at 5:30 in the morning to be in time for the yoga sessions at 6am. For each minute that you were late, a run around the ground awaited you. This stretched on till about 7:30. So, we had about an hour to go back to the hostel, get ready, have our breakfast, only to came back again for the orientation sessions, which started at 8:30. Then started the sessions, which included introductions from the different departments and faculty here, to introductions by the plethora of committees and clubs here. They have a Placement Committee(which the seniors said is a Religion , not just a committee... ;-) ;-) ;-)), and different committees for alumni, international affairs, social service, and one each for all the different branches like Fin, HR etc. I mean there are more committees and clubs here than students. Finally, we had guest lectures from industry experts thrown in each afternoon.You had to listen to all of it, till midnight. But this was the easy part, for you could sit in one of the back seats and doze off.

The "fun" part started after midnight. There is no "ragging" at B-Schools. What they have is the "personality development program", PDP as it is called. The 'ragging" in B Schools is unlike the one which takes place in engineering colleges,it is most times very sophisticated. Seniors ask you about fundas of marketing, about USP's, ask you to think of ad campaigns for products. But at other times,it seemed engineering college revisited, without the obscenity of course. But who does not want some "healthy interaction" with the seniors, I mean singing and dancing at 2 am in the football field surely prepares you for your future corporate life.

So, it was back to hostel by 4 or 4:30 in the morning. A hours sleep, before the yoga classes awaited you. All this went for for one entire week. I will have to get used to this now, because as the teachers say, the PDP is there to prepare yourself for the "stress and challenges of corporate life". Now, that was one solid B School talk.

Comments

malaylakhani said…
good one... i was planning to write a blog but i think i should give a link to your blog in mine now :) ...
6/28/08, 8:45 PM
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