“News from India : of positive action, steely endeavour and quiet triumphs ~ news that is little known ”

http://www.goodnewsindia.com/homepage.php

Came across his wonderful website from Chakkarapani’s Post.

“…It is a site run by a one-man-army - a 63 year old Shri D V Sridharan, whose mission is to show-case the heroic efforts of thousands of little known men, women and institutions, while skirting celebrities, politicians and publicity-hunters….” [Chakkarapani]

Many of the stories are truly inspiring, but have been neglected media attention. I am happy that I came across this website and I salute the efforts of Mr. D.V. Sridharan. I am posting this here as a humble contribution towards popularizing the website…My main intention is not to just popularize the website, but to expose these wonderful steely stories to the world..

Somedays back I took the personality type tests. One among them is the famous “MBTI Personality type test” [Myers Briggs Type Indicator]. Most of the B-schools makes students to go through this test and make them understand their personality type and help them to fine tune themselves. This helps students to understand their strength and weaknesses.
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Yesterday, I downloaded Apprentice - 3, Episode 6 and watched. This week’s task was to create an ad for a new PlayStation 2 video game called Gran Turismo 4, a racing game. Each team was given a bare 20 foot wall and a graffiti art conveying the ad had to be drawn on it.

Magna Corp (book smarts) won the task. Networth faced the boarding room. Tara was fired for her poor vision and conceptualization.

Well, Apprentice is going in a predictable fashion, with Book smarts on 3 and Street smarts on 3.

As of me, I am enjoying the show as usual. My initial short-list of 4 candidates [John, Craig, Audrey and Kendra] are still on..So far so good. But Bren looks like one smart and matured guy, so keeping a watch on him. Craig is becoming doubtful…Forthcoming episodes will answer that..

Lesson learnt this week: Art of Listening

The Google adsense is turning out to be a disappointment. At the current rate, I will get my first payment only after 5 years..That should give a clue..Will continue for some more time and then lift if off, if it doesn’t work. Sometimes, it shows Public charity ads(!!). I believe google doesn’t pay for that..

Two days back my parents went to a temple in Thiruvannamalai (A famous Shiva temple). On full moon days, the devotees circle around the mountain (15 kms). The act is called Girivalam (To come in circle). My parents also came around the 15 kms. Since there was a huge crowd, the buses had to stop 2 kms away from temple. So totally they walked nearly 20 kms. My mom has problems in leg and she is only going to aggravate her pain.. I called them up and shouted for doing such things (Well, out of care). As usual my mom say something and I go silent.

Mouth ulcer is still troubling me. Yesterday I almost got fever because of the extreme pain. Today, I feel better.

Planning to watch “Meet the Fockers” tommorrow.

I must say about the Tool called LinkedIn. It’s a social networking tool. It’s a network of “TRUSTED” connections. Put in short “It’s a online service helping professionals find and connect with one another more effectively”. You can invite your close colleagues to be part of linkedIn and be part of your network.

Vasanth invited me to LinkedIn way back in 2003. Back then, I just registered and didn’t use it much. Later one day, I started exploring the website and spent one day to invite most of my contacts to LinkedIn and requested them to be part of my network. Out of 100 invitations I sent, 52 have linked with me. I am planning to update my network slowly with new found friends, ISB students etc., You can also ask your colleagues and friends to provide endorsements about your work. The more endorsements you get the better it is when potential recruiters look in your profile.

Somedays back one of the current ISB student invited me to join his network and I was amazed to see that he has around 50 ISB students & alumni in his network [up to 4 degrees]. Some of them are in very good positions like Senior Managers and likes..

Have a tour of linkedin here.

https://www.linkedin.com/static?key=tour_1

There are other tools in the market like Ryze, Orkut etc., But LinkedIn has better user-interface and as the website says it fits more to the upper-echelon of professionals [Executive level]. Apprentice 2 winner Kelly purdue is also a LinkedIn user!

I am planning to investigate Ryze and Orkut sometime next month. After all, these networking tools are going to be part-and-parcel after MBA.

Looks like Economic Times has published an article covering a glimpse of ISB Placements. Detailed reports are expected to arrive by March end.

You can find the scanned copy of the paper clip here.. I couldn’t find a online version of this news. Initially, I was apprehensive about publishing here, but then since the news has been published by ET, there should be no problems. This is just a first report..[Courtesy: yahoo groups, couldn’t resist checking the groups ]

The Extract:

“ISB Set to Churn out Globe-trotting leaders.
Economic Times, hyderabad, Feb 23 2005.

These ARE exciting times at the ISB Campus with the placement process at its peak. Early trends indicate that the average salaries that ISB grads would command would be much higher than Rs. 9.05 lakh per annum last year. This is because the number of overseas postings are likely to go up and also the fact that the class of 2005 has 20-25 students who have work experience of over eight years.

ISB Director (career advancement service) Shalini Sethi told ET, “A clear trend this year has been that many Indian companies are into lateral hiring for critical positions like business development in overseas locations. There are many challenging oppurtunities for students in the senior management positions and leadership roles.” Many of these job postings are for international locations like China, European countries, the US, Singapore and London. The whole placement process would be completed by March-April.

Some of the Indian Companies making International offers include Lupin laboratories, Birlasoft, Asian Paints, Satyam, HCL and ITC. It is perhaps a result of the fact that many Indian companies, both in manufacturing and IT, are looking at diversifying their operations to global locations. International offers are also trickling in from foreign companies like LNM, Duetsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Novartis, HSBC, Carrier Aircon, Euro Swiss and Marakon. Indian offers are coming from companies like BCG, AT Kearney, Inductis, E&Y, Colgate Palmolive, Coke and J&J. The B-school has attracted nearly 100 companies with 350 job postings so far.

According to ISB’s student profile, nearly 20 students would be eligible for positions like functional heads as they already have over 10 years of work experience.

There are 60 others who have experience in the range of 5-8 years. The batch of 2005 has 273 students of which 52 are women. Lateral hiring is somewhat a new concept in India with most B-schools accepting students who are either freshers or have just a couple of years experience. Since ISB attracts professionals from diverse sectors and rich experience, the placement process at the campus is long-drawn and case-by-case…”

Looks very promising. Detailed placement reports will be out in a month’s time..Hold on till then!

I have been living and breathing in yahoo groups for past 1 month. I have decided to take a break as I feel I am becoming addicted to the forum!

I managed to complete some tasks. I bought some gifts for my recommenders and cards as well. I have completed the draft version of reference letters. Will finalise it and get it approved and signed from my clients and from my director sometime next week.

I am planning to cover some aspects of basic accounting, quantitative methods and statistics, so that I can save some expenses in the pre-term front. But I am finding it difficult to get materials online. Buying any books is out of question as the books are extremely costly in belgium. I will present some links as and when I collect some.

I am suffering from cold and mouth ulcers. It’s very painful and very difficult to speak. So practising ‘mouna vratham’ (silence) currently!

Only a month remains for me in Belgium. Time is flying very fast!!!!

“..Some of the biggest names in IT are heading towards Bangalore once more, but now it’s the brightest minds they seek - not cheap labour..”

http://www.newscientist.com/special/india

The website NewScientist .com has dedicated a special section focussing on India. Read on..Thanks Rohit Khanna.

Yesterday, I got my hands to Swades DVD through one of my friend here. I am glad I saw the movie. My first impression was “A movie well made”.

But I hope Ashutosh Gowarikar’s movie doesn’t bring all NRI’s back to India thereby stopping all the forex income for Indian government

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Today I received some information in the yahoo groups regarding the Food expenses in ISB..

“..The food charges at ISB are as follows.

You will be charges @ Rs. 55 for breakfast, Rs.86 for lunch and same
amount for dinner plus taxes if you take buffet meals. This implies the
total cost will be 55+86+86= 227/- plus taxes @ 8% = 245 per day. The
total food costs come to Rs. 80,850/- for the full course of your stay
at ISB. This has been the charges for last four batches at ISB…”

Rs. 250/= per day for food is expensive! As long as the quality is maintained, it’s ok. Apparently, this is the cost for previous batches too. One good thing here is the pay-per-meal scheme. So, If I miss a breakfast, I need not pay for the breakfast! [During my undergraduate days, it was a shared expenses, so even if I didn’t had food, I end up paying..Also I end up paying for some heavy-weight eaters!]. In that respect it is better. I have control of the option now. I also heard that there are food outlets nearby, which is good. When I am not busy, I can save some bucks by eating outside

UPDATE: Some information regarding non-buffet meals.

So, that brings down the cost to Rs.120 per day and the cost to Rs.40,000/= per year. This is a relief news..More options, more peace

ISB has partnered with local dealer in hyderabad for Laptops, and offering the incoming students the options provided below.The Models are IBM Thinkpad. The prices are one of the lowest offered anywhere in India, or Singapore. Nice effort from Indian School of Business. Many students are now thinking to buy the laptops from ISB.

Specification Description

Option 1
Model R51
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The loneliness is slowly killing me…The enthusiasm on the work front is rapidly decreasing as the project is almost complete.

I have planned so many things and still they are not executed. Hoping to see off many things in the weekend. Need to buy some gift to my recommenders. Have to obtain reference letters from workplace and client, which will be helpful in job interviews. Have to book the flight ticket from chennai to hyderabad. Have to contact banks and find out more details regarding loans. Need to start cleaning up my place slowly….

Today, I got my application for google adsense approved. Let’s see if it brings me some pocket money…It’s almost 2:00 a.m and am still awake [Practising for the life ahead in ISB ]..Time to hit bed..

Foreign placements from IIMs surge 600%

“…Students at IIM-A and IIM-C were offered a total of 32 foreign placements in countries like US, European Union, Hong Kong, Singapore and mid-East this year as against a total foreign placement of just five last year.

Additionally, the pay-cheque being offered this year is impressive too, with maximum salary offered for foreign placement being $80,000 per annum to a student of IIM-C.

The highest domestic salary so far in the lateral placement is Rs 14.5 lakh per annum, which went to an IIM-A graduate. The laterals for any institute start much earlier than the finals since most of the placements are for middle and top management level and hence require longer duration…”

That’s impressive…Placement figures for ISB are expected to be out by the end of this month..

On the other side of the planet, more interesting things are happening. Read the following news article

Come home with US MBA & pay less.

“…A new scheme being devised by a number of America’s toniest business schools aims to do just that: a loan forgiveness programme specifically for students from emerging countries who want to return home and work, usually at pay scales much lower than the MBA average at such schools…”

Isn’t that encouraging? Definitely it will motivate more MBA aspirants to look up for American universities without financial fear…

Two days back, I had a duel with my driving instructor, due to his wrong instructions which almost led us to accident. I very clearly heard from him to go straight while we were waiting for a green signal. When the green signal came and I went straight ahead, he said “Hey, why do you go straight, I said turn left..”.We were almost hit by a vehicle because of the momentary confusion that followed. He never accepted that he told to me go straight. The entire session was filled with some misunderstandings. At the end of the class he was not happy with me, I was not happy with him.

Today, before beginning the class, I had a small talk with him and explained him clearly that I want his best effort to get me passed. I also granted him my complete trust on my part. This eased the cold-war and what followed was one of the best teaching I have ever had in my life. He even started giving me some valuable tips, which he never care to tell his students. His interest in getting me passed was appearing rather obvious in his face. There were couple of instances when he gave wrong instructions today, but he corrected it immediately. On my part, I put in some effort by re-learning all the traffic rules and imagining mentally various scenarios that can happen on the road. At the end of the class, he was happy and I was extremely happy.

Amazing what sorting out things can do!

Somedays back, I received the link from one of my friend.

Digital South Asia Library.

“…The Hensley Collection is comprised of photographs taken during World War II by an American serviceman, Glenn S. Hensley. The photographs, numbering almost 600, were given to the University of Chicago Library by the photographer. The text accompanying the images is derived from notes written by Mr. Hensley.

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http://mbaideas.blogspot.com/2005/02/great-debate-is-settled.html.

Read on and you will find answers to many of your questions…

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Somedays back, a current Student, Tahseen Jamal of ISB ‘05, presented the following Analogy.

y = mx
y = e^x

He used this to emphasize the importance of MBA in one’s career. While y=mx represents a linear growth without MBA, y=e^x represents an exponential growth. What he effectively means is that MBA provides an oppurtunity for exponential growth (not just money, but responsibilities, roles, learnings etc.,). Even though the growth will be slow in the beginning with an MBA, the growth will be faster in the longer run.

I personally found his mathematical approach very interesting. But I would like to analyse it bit more deeply. Let’s assume that ‘y‘ represents the growth, ‘x‘ represents the number of years and the function/equation as such determines the growth pattern. Also let’s restrict the value of x to 60 [age until one retires].

In the case of y=mx, the ‘m‘ determines the growth potential. If ‘m‘ is high enough, then it might happen that y=e^x might never cross/overtake the y=mx pattern. There are certain cases in which the growth is super linear. E.g., Possessing a skill set which is very rare. ‘m‘ is determined by your skillset, passion, focus and other personal attributes. In the absence of MBA, these are the attributes that pulls one to great heights. This proves the cases of achievers who don’t have MBA.

On the other hand, MBA cannot necessarily be represented by y=e^x. Since ‘e’ represents euler number of 2.73 (a constant), I would modify the equation to make it y=m^x. Now, the value of ‘m’ is a variable. If the value of ‘m‘ turn out be less than 1, you can see that the growth retards! (This proves the case where a person with MBA turns out be a under-performer). In this case too, ‘m‘ determines the actual growth pattern. The personal attributes, vision, goal, passion and effort determines the ‘m‘. Well, what does this all mean?

MBA will give your results, only if you have your ‘m‘ factor right. If you blindly believe that MBA degree will give you a boost in your career, then you are doomed for sure. In the end, it’s YOU who is going to achieve. If you have the right ‘m’ factor and if you have an MBA, you will definitely achieve your goals and will be extremely successful.

Coming to the end of the ramblings, I would like to present another set of equations presented by the same student.

MBA - Passion - Effort = Stamped Paper in hand

True MBA > (Strong Passion + Effort + Hardwork + Commitment) >> Stamped Paper in Hand

I am aware that this is a debatable topic, so please feel free to bombard the post with your comment missiles..

“Easy on your break..Easy on your pedal..Go to 4th gear now..Look over your shoulders…Don’t ride on your pedals…Watch for pedestrians from your right..”. Typical instructions that any instructor from driving school would give. When I went back to start off my remaining lessons, I found that the previous instructor has left his job (received a better offer from rival school!) and a new instructor has been assigned to me. The new one was from Scotland who has settled in Belgium, so English was in his genes. But the teaching styles are so different, that I felt like starting from scratch. To add salt to the wound, the vehicle that I practiced 6 months before is not available anymore. The new car has totally different layout in terms of gear shifting, indicators, lights etc., At the end of 2 hours, I find myself wanting in practice. Actually, I don’t have problems in driving as such..But the problem lies in interacting with real world, remembering the rules, doing many things at a time ‘fluently’ and ofcourse in finding the correct ‘biting’ point of clutch..I have left my hopes..Will just take up the remaining classes for fun!

Couple of interesting things happened during the lesson. He was telling me, “Use indicators when going to the road from parking or overtaking”. Immediately a person from behind me overtook without using his indicators! Instructor handled that by saying “He is flunked” . On another occasion, he was telling me to keep on the right and not to cross the middle line. Immeidately, a car came from the 90 degree turn on the wrong side. Again his comment was “He should have been flunked”. 5 such similar contradictions happened. It was fun..

I couldn’t make it to the office by 6:30 a.m. By the time, I reached the office it was almost 8:00 a.m. Just told my boss that I will compensate by working extra hours this week..

On the ISB front, I received an email from Admission committee urging students to apply for loans by March 5th. They also provided contact information for each banks. But I am planning to fill the initial installment from my savings. I will take the loan only for the second installment, in September.

I also received my membership for the “The Colloborative blog of ISB” (Thanks Sumit). You can expect my scribblings soon in the quasi-official blog of ISB.

I remembered that today was Valentine’s day only after seeing couple of forwards from my friends. Incidentally, I went to office in a green shirt and laughed to myself

Just noticed that I have been blogging almost for every single day since January 24th. Let’s see how far I can go….

Pasting this link from Sumit Dhar’sblog.

http://sumitdhar.blogspot.com/2005/02/tech-job-opportunities.html.

For all the techies out there, awesome job opportunities at the Technology Division of a top US based Financial Services Company. I can personally vouch for the opportunity and the company. If your resume matches the details given below and you are willing to relocate to Bombay, please send me your resume at sumit.dhar at gmail.com. The resume should NOT be longer than two pages.

Position: Technical Project Manager

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It’s scary to think that I will not be earning for the next one year. My heart will find it tough to believe that salary will not be credited at the beginning of each month. I might send even a reminder note to my boss asking him to credit the salary
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Today was one of those days, when my patience was challenged, when things didn’t go as expected. I had many problems to address and many holes to fill in the workfront. The first task that I picked for the day, happend to be a time-consuming job. After doing all the changes, when I was ready to test, the system complained a compilation problem. Someone had changed a code yesterday and forgot to check-in (damn!). Got it fixed and took the fresh code and did the whole process again. This time the Virus scanner which was scheduled to run on Fridays, starting scanning my system, absorbing all the strength of my PC. It took me sometime to figure out the reason. Stopped it and then proceeded with my work again. This time the complete build process went fine, good. When I deployed, my Application server complained that database has some tables missing! Someone has modified the database schema..Got it fixed. Looked at the clock, it was already lunch time. Great! I haven’t done anything yet and the morning sessions is over..Whom should I curse? myself?? my PC?? or the situation?? I had my lunch and planned my activities for the afternoon while munching the usual vegetable sandwich that I have 5 days a week, 12 months a year! I decided to leave the troubling task and get on with other tasks..Came back and started off with the remaining work. 6 out of 7 tasks were over like a breeze in an hour. Then, I took the menacing task and everything went fine this time. I have completed the tasks for which 3 days were allotted! The day which started off on a bad note ended in a good note. I feel very satisfying and am looking forward for the weekend as a reward.

One of my bad habits in the past is that I tend to take problems as a challenge to my intellectual capacity and never leave it until the job is completed. Many a times, I have suffered heavily, as I had to work longer hours. I didn’t change until it affected me in a big way.

From then on, I follow a simple principle. I leave the job that is troubling me momentarily and take up some job which will yield positive results in a shorter time frame. The satisfaction gives me the badly needed mood-shift and provides some enthusiasm. I take up more of such tasks. Finally when I am done with all the jobs, I take up the time-consuming job which tests my patience. Exactly the same happened today.

My fellow IT counterparts can relate to what I am talking about. Also, at times a seemingly simple problem completely drains our energy by evading all our debugging skills. Being on the IT field, these are the kind of challenges that one faces, day-in and day-out. All these will be fun for the first few years, but will slowly turn out to frustration and a state of desparation. These are the minor moments which sometimes make me hate my profession, which has otherwise been fantastic so far.

So far 70+ Round 1 Admits have introduced themselves. The diversity in profiles is quite amazing (age, education, work experience, hobbies etc.,). To get an idea of the diversity, have a look at some of the professions of R1 admits.

“Aerospace Engineer, Marine Engineer, Pilot, Doctor, Structural Engineer, Oilfield Services, IT [Banking, Telecom, Retail, Treasury], Copywriter-cum-journalist, Biomedical Engineer, Chip designer, Communications Engineer, Fashion designer, Architect, R&D centre manager, Manufacturing, Automotive, Sales & Marketing, Entrepreneurs [Textile machinery, Defence(?), Education], Auditors, Market Research, Military…”

Many of the students also have sound educational background with degrees from IIT, REC, BITS, State premier colleges etc., The GMAT scores go as high as 780 and strike an average near 700. Profiles of R2 Applicants are quite promising too. Age of students range from 22-36. Overall, pretty good diversity.

A discount of 11,700 Rupees is given, if the payment is made in one installment. So approximately the expenses for one year in ISB comes to around 16 lacs. I am pretty much clear about how much loan to take!

UPDATE: Some of the areas where I have saved (or can save) are laptop (50,000). I am expecting to save around 25,000 - 30,000 in the food expenses. The Miscellaneous expense of 50,000 will never be fully spent, So I can expect to save around 25,000 there. Overall, I think I can deduct 1 lac from the expenditure, which brings the figure to 15 lacs to ME.

22/Feb/2005: The Pre-term course are now costing 9,000 as against the initial estimate of 4,000. Introductory Accounting - 4000. Quantitative methods - 2,500. Business Statistics - 2,500. Also, I forgot to include Rs.20,000 towards the IT support fee. I will update as and when I encounter new hidden costs.

I stumbled upon this funny link today. The person has made some research tools using Google API. Some of the tools are worth trying. For example “PageBoost” displays a computer generated “Review” for your website based on the contents, links, colour scheme etc., Here’s the review for my blog

“…I just saw . Five-star. Don’t get me wrong, I expected the creator to work within these quality standards. If only my aunt would have a splendid page like that. What a high-quality page! It must have taken months to design the page. Seeing Way2Top , I’m simply out of words.
There are 67,700 characters in the source for this page, which is a great length for Chinese users. The URL has 27 characters. This length scores best in usability studies. Very, very good. The color scheme is impressive. The page contains 175 links, a stable amount.
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The document is highly accessible. If God would create web pages, this is what they would look like.”
— John Hamilton, WebReview Online

Funny!

Yesterday I was reading “Ask yahoo” section and came across an interesting question.

“What are the communication code words for the letters of the alphabet (e.g., C=Charlie, V=Victor, T=Tango, etc.)?”

In answer to the question, the website mentions about “Alpha Bravo Charlie” code used by NATO (that we witness in hollywood films and military operations). The 26 code words for the corresponding 26 alphabets are

“..Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot, Golf, Hotel, India, Juliet, Kilo, Lima, Mike, November, Oscar, Papa, Quebec, Romeo, Sierra, Tango, Uniform, Victor, Whiskey, Xray, Yankee, Zulu..”

Hey…it’s nice to see India in the list. The code words brought back memories of me calling the Help Desk of my client in Belgium.

During my initial tenure in Belgium, I had to frequently call the Help Desk and ask for their support. First thing they will ask is my name. I will say “Bharani”, in a clear, well-paused voice. They will reply back saying “Can you spell it please?”. I would say “B..H..A..R..A..N..I”. They wouldn’t understand. It’s because of the confusion in the way Dutch alphabets and English alphabets are pronounced. In Dutch “A” is pronounced as “A” in “Affair”. “H” is pronounced as “Ha”, “E” is pronounced as “I”, “I” is pronounced “E”, J” is pronounced as “Ya”, “F” is pronounced as “V”, and “V” is pronouced as “F”…So, I deviced my own way to clarify the confusion. I started using Country names for each letter. My reply from then on was “B for Belgium, H for Holland, A for America, R for Russia, A for America, N for Netherlands and I for India”. No confusions from then on..I have been using the same whenever I have to call any service in Belgium and whenever I have to spell my name. It works charmingly.

Another difference is the way the say numbers. How would we normally read “EUR 129.38″?. One hundered and twenty nine Euros and thirty eight cents. Here, people read as “One hundred nine and twenty euros and eight and thirty cents” [Exact translation from Dutch]. They say the units digit before the ten’s digit. Another difference is the usage of comma and dot. They use comma and dot interchangeably. “12,49″ is 12 Euros and 49 cents..Different practices in different places.

Raja Banerjee, ISB Class of 2005, gives an account of first 2 weeks of ISB such as Registration, Orientation, knowing your pals etc.,

The ISB Experience:
Day 0: Registration: You get a jute bag with ISB logo, filled with brochures, telephone instructions, class schedules, ID cards and a planner. The planner will become an integral part of your life, adorning the wall of your room. The rest will disappear with time and you will never miss them. You will get your laptops configured and will be done with the formalities for the day. Evening will be free to interact with the other students.

Week 3: First Term: This is the one everyone warned you about. You are under pressure to do class participation, finish assignments before due dates and read up cases. Your very first assignment could be a regression one, and you don’t even know what it means. Well, this is just the beginning. Tighten your seatbelts and get ready for the year ahead.

“…Weighing more than 100 pounds, Flint’s camera captures images at 4 gigapixels — a resolution high enough to photograph four football fields and capture every single blade of grass. When printed at maximum resolution, the images are as big as billboards, but render the finest detail….

The biggest prints could theoretically measure up to 48 feet long and 24 feet high — all from a single shot. But for practical reasons, Flint’s biggest print to date was 21 feet long. “Most places don’t have enough wall space to hang them,” Flint said. “It’s as high as you can get. The only way to get higher is to stitch multiple images together….” [Wired]

Take a look at the gallery yourself to see how much detail is being talked about. We are seeing 6MP, 10 MP digital cameras in the market. And we see here 4 Giga pixel camera!! That’s 400 times more resolution than consumer digital cameras!

Cool! BTW, Today I received username and password for accessing the “new admits” page from Indian school of business. The link currently hosts couple of FAQ’s regarding accommodation and IT as well as a discussion forum.

Apprentice 3 has begun. 3 Episodes are already over. This season has been tagged as “Street smarts Vs Book smarts”. Somehow most of the people get a feeling that Street smarts are real smarts. Well, I’ll tell you, Street-smart being a book-smart is the deadliest combination.

Some of the candidates that I think will make it to to final 4 are [in order of preference]. Let’s see how my Judgement is. Ofcourse, If I see two more episodes, I can say even more authoritatively..but anyway..

John
Craig
Kendra
Audrey

Many candidates who were impressive on their biography have disappointed. Most notably, Brian. Man, he is such a abrasive person that he blew himself out.

As usual, “lessons learned” are archived in NBC website.

1. Training is Key: Broad-based and Job-specific
2. Communicating in Stressful Situations.
3. Dealing with Negative Team Members.
4. The Creative Brief: The first step in Marketing

BTW, from the fourth season Donald Trump will not be starring. The fourth season will have “Martha Stewart”, another person living the “American Dream” [Read rich lifestyle]. It’s interesting to note that Martha stewart was sentenced for 5 months in September 2004 for her fraud in stock trades!

UPDATE: Looks like there will be two versions of Apprentice from next year. “Apprentice 4″ starring Donald Trump and “Apprentice : Martha stewart” starring Martha stewart. Interesting!

Today, I was chatting with my father. During the conversation, he became silent. I didn’t hear any voice from him. Then he started speaking. He said he remembered about his tough childhood days. My grandfather (Father of my father) is such irresponsible person (Even today, no one in my family respect my grand father to the core of heart. They respect him just for his age and importance in the family hierarchy). He received Masters in 1940’s. But still very irresponsible. He wasted all his money in Gambling and Horse races. All this inspite of being father of 5 children. He didn’t educate his children and he insisted on sending his children to work. My father somehow studied on his own while working and received his diploma. He was telling how he used to celebrate his Diwali. He will receive some bonus(will be one or two rupees) from his shop he work and that will be taken away by grandfather. No sweets, No new dresses and no crackers. Just Prasadam from temple. Amidst heavy struggle he received his diploma and started his job as a simple Electrical repairman. I have heard many times how he would have loved to study a lot and how his intelligence has been wasted (My father is very intelligent). He spent his own money for his marriage. Well, he said he is very happy to see me in good position and he is proud about my decision to leave my job and go for higher studies. This brought his memories back. Normally he wouldn’t say anything, but I was moved to hear these words from my father. My mind is engrossed with thoughts of family back home from then on..

Only I know how much he has sacrificed in his life for us. The great thing is he takes care of his father better than all other children. Even when my grandfather met with a painful accident damaging his ankles, my father did everything for him right from cleaning up daily his wounds after surgery to paying all his hospital bills (I didn’t complete my education then and we were in real tight financial conditions). My father has been a real role model for me (My mom too, but that’s another tale, To me she is the greatest mom in the world). My deepest motive since my childhood has been to take care of them both with utmost comfort. To say that many of my decisions in life happen with these memories in the background is understatement. These has also been my fuel behind my endeavours.

Also, I was honestly thinking about following the footsteps of Ramkee and Raja. But after some thinking I think I will not commit myself to anything. Just blog whatever comes to my mind and at my own convenience. May be someone else in the ISB PGP will do that…I will blog random ramblings, as that is what is giving me happiness…

Have a look at the high-resolution Image of ISB entrance. You can clearly see the student villages on either side. Infact it is the blown-up pic of the image I have at the top of my site.

The Original Image

An alumnus shares some thoughts on how to successfully tackle the admissions interview at the Indian School of Business.

“…Have a long term plan laid out for your career, and try to connect your work experience & need for an MBA with this long term plan. This communicates that you want to join business school for the right reasons. You would be surprised how many candidates think of an MBA as an end rather than a means to achieve long term goals. You must have a great reason for

1. Wanting to do an MBA

2. Wanting to do an MBA from the institution you are applying to.

Highlight what is different about you, and communicate it effectively. This difference can be in terms of companies/industry you have worked in, or in terms of unique challenges/situations you have overcome. It could include hobbies and personal attributes, amongst others. Just remember to back these up with solid examples.

You are applying for a business management degree, so respond like a manager. Think big, and give examples of how you have demonstrated leadership and initiative. No one wants to hear how you spotted a missing decimal place in a thousand lines of software code.

You will be asked at least one question where you have to state your opinion on some world/current event. Choose your opinion, and stick to it. Do not change your mind half-way through because you feel the interview panel disagrees with you. There is no wrong answer. The interview panel wants to see that you can hold your own, and communicate your point of view maturely.

Be prepared:

1. Go through your application and resume, identify your weaknesses, and be prepared to address these. The interview panel will know what your weaknesses are and grill you on these.

2. Take mock interviews with friends/colleagues.

Be consistent in your answers and try to remain calm.

If you don’t know something, do NOT bluff.

Dushyant Khare graduated from the Indian School of Business in 2003…”

Today I received the information CD for admitted students, from Indian School of Business. The Disc contains lot of videos featuring current students. The students are representatives of various clubs and activities in ISB. Most of the students had excellent english skills. I believe they took conscious effort to present themselves very well. The Disc also features a photo-slide show capturing the lifestyle in ISB. Gave a pretty good idea of ISB life. There was a sample video of Jagmohan Raju’s class.

In couple of weeks a detailed information pack will be sent out. It will contain details of orientation, pre-term, housing arrangments, IT requirements, checklist of actions etc.,

As my days in Belgium draws close to an end, I thought I would record my experiences here in my blog.

(more…)

During my stay in Belgium, I came to know about the flourishing diamond business in Belgium, especially, in Antwerp, the hub of Diamong cutting & Polishing. Historically, Belgium and Isreal are considered the kings of the “Large stones processing”. But In the last two decades, Indians are dominating the business. When I visited Antwerp, I happened to see how Indians are dominating the business [especially gujarathi’s or ‘gujjus’]. I was curious how Indians are so dominating in a country like Belgium that too in Diamond processing and how they overcame the dominant Jews? I had insightful discussions with my Indian colleagues here and got some viewpoints then. I am also presenting the link which will prove the ‘might’ of Indian diamond processing industry.[Dazzling Success]. No wonder Diamond merchants are called “Dream Merchants”!!

A very interesting analogy between Indian software industry and Indian diamond industry:

“India’s diamond industry handles 80 per cent of the global polished diamond market, and earned $8 billion last year (compared to software’s $ 10 billion.) So why do we hear so much about IT and so little about the diamond business? Well, try talking to someone in the diamond industry. It’s like pulling teeth.

The remarkable thing is, like with the software industry, India does not produce much original or branded diamond products. [Times of India] “

In fact, the curiosity reached it’s height when we witnessed one of the costliest marriages held in the planet,[ before Lakshmi Mittal toppled it with 30 million pound marriage of his son] by certain Vijay Shah, a diamond merchant in Antwerp. He spent roughtly 10 million pounds for the marriages of his children. He literally transformed a building into Rajasthani palace. Some of my colleagues, who stay in Antwerp, were awe-struck & dumb-struck and they explained how lavish the Indians spent and how rich their dresses, so on and on…It was a good feeling..

Each time, I go to India, my mom asks about diamond very curiously. How much does it cost? Do you have learnt to identify good diamonds (No way!!]? How is the finish? etc., So I went around some shops just for seeing the prices and pieces. I went in atleast 5-6 shops and no body cared to ask me why I am there? [I was the only customer in the shop..may be the owners knew that even If I buy, I won’t buy more than a ‘dirt’ sized diamond !]. Well, it was a different experience. I asked my boss (who is an Indian) about diamonds. And he mentioned to me that it’s always best to buy diamonds from India and we can pick and choose at ease and comfort…

A description of Catering in ISB by a current student.

Foodie to foodie- it doesn’t get better than this!
Food is something you will definitely /not/ have to
crib about at ISB (Oh well, till post-placement
boredom sets in at least)!

Cheers,
-Ranjit
Class of 2005