MBA: Year One (Part 1)

Exactly one year ago, the classes for the MBA 2008 (December) batch started. I recall our first class was Language of Business (LOB) under Prof. Larry Tan. I did not know everybody then, especially with folks who did not attend the fast-paced Pre-MBA Program. I'm sure people felt that way too. Another thing I remember was thinking "I haven't been in a room with this many Indians." (Of course, this thought was trumped when I went to Infosys in Bangalore for my Action Consultancy three months ago.)

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No one would admit it, but each thought their section was better than the other.

Our class originally had 101 people and we were divided into two sections: Section A and Section B. I went to Section B, and the rumor was Section B folks was the "sub-par" section. At some point in the first year in school, I kinda believed that-- I heard how competitive the Section A folks were, being more assertive in case discussions and more open to critiquing others in the case rooms. But to my surprise, we got feedback from faculty that our class had better quality discussions over-all. So much for my inferiority complex. :P

Speaking of that little rivalry, we kept tabs on how much early morning classes each section would get scheduled. By my rough estimate, our section got more classes in the ungodly hours of the morning. (Just kidding, they were 8am classes.)

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The honesty of the batch was tested at one point during our first year. It became an issue of fairness versus solidarity and it was an experience where everyone did not come out unscathed. Some people actually think the issue of dishonesty was not resolved at all.

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Another issue that people got involved in was the "Beer Bottle Throwing Incident." After one of the beer-drinking sessions here, several people in our class were summoned after being tagged by security staff as people guilty of throwing beer bottles in the school pool. This case was kinda weird because it implicated people who are obviously not guilty-- like who were in the party but did not drink, plus there were no clear cut evidence or first-hand witnesses, so it was thought of case of Gestapo-like justice. The case was solved when everybody who alleged to be as guilty wrote an apology letter.

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While everybody is more concerned with their own Management Research Reports (MRR) now, a few months ago, people were sweating blood to get decent grades and were worn out from beating deadlines. One of the beatsticks on the batch were the Written Analysis of Cases (WAC) on almost every Fridays. I'm not a fan of working from 5pm to 8am of Saturday, but I defended the WAC when it was under fire.

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Here's a Section B exclusive: The Backseat Boys (Rajat Gorawara, Kanishka Bhargava, Abin Sarkar and Sandeep Sharma) provided some of the most insightful and the most knuckle-headed class participation during case discussions. Who can forget the "idea that cannot be stopped" quip in Development of the Enterprise (DE)?

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There's more to come. I'm sure you have your Year One story, please do share!