Way2Top

Came across this good article about Case Studies and steps to analyse a case study…Will be helpful for potential MBA grads..

“..Little can be learned from a case without preparing it carefully and discussing it with others. Cases are not designed to present you with a right answer which you can memorize in the hopes that you will remember it if you ever encounter a similar situation. Similarly you won’t gain much from listening to what others think is the right answer. The learning comes from actively participating in the search for solutions. Cases are the raw materials that permit simulation in the classroom of actual discussions carried on informally among managers.

Preparation: Cases require more preparation and active participation than most class activities. How much you get out of a case discussion depends heavily on how much effort you put into preparing it before class. Many students confronting cases for the first time are overwhelmed; they see so many factors that come into play. Facts are confusing and ambiguous and often incomplete. This guide is intended to help you walk through the critical steps.

Informal Discussion Groups: After preparing a case by yourself, it can really help to meet with a group of other students to talk about a case before class. This will give you a chance to test your ideas on others and learn about other perspectives about the case.

Participating in Class Discussions: The purpose of the class discussion is to test others ideas so that together students can reach a richer and deeper understanding of the case. The role of the discussion is to moderate and create an environment in which contributions of individual students build on one another to understand the problem more fully. The instructor’s role is not to answer. The instructor may highlight, synthesize the issues and help shape the discussion.

The quality of the class discussion depends on the quality of the students’ preparation and participation in class. The class should be considered a team of colleagues that has been asked to work together to solve a challenging problem. This requires good team members to push ideas and support them. Good class also requires an emphasis on listening; others will raise ideas you hadn’t thought of and you should be prepared to change your mind and incorporate new ideas when you find them persuasive.

Try to have your ideas build on the comments of others. Don’t be afraid to be challenged or to be wrong. Sometimes students leave a class discussion discouraged because many issues and arguments that were raised that they had not considered before class. Remember that no case would be worth discussing if it were simple and straightforward enough for you to have figured it out on your own.

The classroom should be a place where you can test ideas and learn from each other. Finally enjoy yourself. There should be a lot of satisfaction in struggling with a complex problem and through your efforts, coming to a better understanding of it.
…”

http://web.cba.neu.edu/~ewertheim/introd/cases.htm

Can’t wait for the First Case study in ISB !

I watched Apprentice -3, Episode 7 today. This week’s task was to build a minature golf course and manage the business for one day. The team that makes the most money wins. Audrey led the street smarts (Networth) and Stephanie led the Book smarts (Magna). Street smarts lost the task and Audrey was fired for her immaturity and lack of respect among team members.

Two weeks back Stephanie was accused by the whole team for displaying negative attitude. After returning from the boardroom, she apologized in an emotional tears and offered better cooperation to the team. Today, she won the task in an excellent fashion. That’s what I call as come-back. Audrey on the other hand, worsened the relationships with the team and got herself doomed. Sometimes, you need to think about others..

I was glad that Carolyn was back. The more I watch her, the more I like her personality. Initially, I didn’t like her that much, but now I like her and respect her a lot..

Lesson learnt this week: Creative Marketing: Thinking out the box

It was almost a week since I cooked, so I cooked Dhal fry, White kideny beans curry(I donno how it is called in Hindi,Rajma??) and potato fry and Rice.Had a full lunch. The cooking will last for dinner and may be for tomorrow too

I went to Antwerp for doing some window-shopping. It’s been a long time since I visited the electronics super market [Media market]. Lot of new products have arrived. It’s amazing to see the technological growth that’s happening now-a-days. No matter how latest you buy your product, it’s going to be shadowed in 2 years and may be obsolete in 5-10 years time…I bought a Flash-based-Mp3 player for my brother. He was asking for a USB Flash drive for a long time. I saw this deal where Creative MuVo TX FM [512 MB] was sold at 100 Euros. Bought it. Hope he will be happy to see much more than just Flash drive..

Next week, lot of things SHOULD be completed. I don’t want to postpone till the last moment and pressurize myself. The important thing is to transfer my saving to India. Euro is hovering around 57 Rupees…Well, it’s fine if it doesn’t drop further..[though It will be nice, if it increases further ]. Pushing my boss to credit the settlements before March 15th…

Just saw my statistics, and the visitor count has already touched 7000. Not bad. I carried over the same counter from my previous blog. Today I received confirmation that my previous blog is gone for ever ..I had some good posts there..Was hoping to recover them somehow..Anyway, I learnt my lesson and backing up my current blog on a regular basis..

Eagerly waiting for the ISB Placement report. I am interested in finding the industry wise placements especially in Consulting sector. The foreign placements would be interesting to watch too…Hope ISB publishes the details before March end..

I had my Driving test in Belgium today. The test comprised of 2 parts. A Manoeuver part and On-the-road part. The Manoeuver part consisted of parking in between two vehicles in reverse, Coming out of garage, Turning back in a narrow road, Passing through a narrow passage in reverse. I successfully cleared it. Having passed this phase, I was asked to pick a card from a bunch [for choosing the location of test]. I picked up a card and was happy to see a neighbouring town come up on that.

I was ready to begin the next-phase. This time there were people accompanying me in the car. There was an instructor to my right, an examiner on the back right and a translator on back left. The instructor was there just to use emergency brakes in case anything went wrong. He may not do anything else, otherwise a beep will be heard..Since the examiner gave the instructions in dutch, I had to take the service of Translator (had to pay him 30 Euros for that!)..So it was a full house in the car. I carefully digested the instructions that came through translator and acted accordingly. Everything was going fine until I came across a market fair. There was a traffic diversion and I couldn’t decipher which path to take. Examiner was silent. I noticed a No entry sign and decided to turn left. I overlooked a direction arrow beneath the no entry sign. Due to this I ended up taking a wrong route! Due to the nervousness caused by this, I turned to the left in the next junction, without using indicators. Though I was sure that no vehicle was behind me, it is a serious offence to turn so without indicating. I knew then and there that I am flunked…The remaining part of the test went lifeless, mechanical. Towards the end of the test, I stalled the vehicle and I had to restart the vehicle..I totally lost my cool, and did many minor mistakes..one-too-many…

After the test, the examiner announced his results with reasons why I failed. He was ok with all my other mistakes, but not using indicators while turning was a serious offence and he was not ready to overlook that. He failed me on the “on-the-road” test..Fair enough!

I have a certificate which says I have passed the Manoeuver part but failed the Road test. I don’t have time to take the test again, as I am leaving for India on March 24th. Atleast I utilised the oppurtunity well by learning to drive a car. If I had practiced with my own car, I would have passed. Lack of practice is the only reason I can attribute the failure to…It’s a pity that my company which decided to sponsor my test couldn’t provide me a car temporarily to practice…No regrets anyway…Was an experience

I received my reference letter from Client Director. He was pretty happy to give me the letter and wished me success. I will be getting the reference letter from my boss next week.

I collected some links for Pre-MBA. Unfortunately, I couldn’t go through any of these websites, as I have enough work. It might be useful for others:

http://www.quickmba.com
http://www.netmba.com
http://davidmlane.com/hyperstat/
http://www.access.wvu.edu/class/acctutor/tableofc.htm
http://www.kr04.net/
http://people.hofstra.edu/faculty/Stefan_Waner/RealWorld/pdfs/QM1Notes.pdf [Thanks Venkat]
http://www.simplestudies.com/Downloads.htm [Thanks Asha]
http://www2.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/pglasserman/B6014/
http://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~adamodar/ [Corporate Finance]
http://webprofesores.iese.edu/PabloFernandez/INDEXtables.html [Valuation Methods]
http://planetmath.org/ [Statistics] [Thanks Vineet]

I have initiated a mail in groups, requesting people to share the links they knew..Would be finding more soon..If any of you know any useful links for MBA prospectives, kindly leave a note here..

I had downloaded quite a few audio books two months ago. I am listening to them during the free-time I get. Important among them are “7 habits of highly effective people”. Steven covey himself has done the talking here. He is pretty articulative person. Just listening to him, glues one to his lectures..Another topic is “How to make friends and influence others”. Another very good book. Wish I had listened to this book earlier. Rest all are like “How to read body languages, how to read people’s minds, how to increase quality of sleep..etc.,”…I don’t think I will ever get time to listen to these. But Someday these things might come handy..

My driving test is on Friday. I am going to the test with 0.1% hope of passing. I have never gone to any exam in such a frame of mind..Would be interesting to see how things unfold on that day…

Signing off…Going to bed early today..

Round 2 Admission results for ISB are announced. Some made it, some didn’t. Some of the candidates I bet on didn’t make it too. The competition this year was tougher than previous years, even more so in Round 2. The general opinion is that the profiles of R2 Applications were stronger than Round 1. I will have to wait for knowing the diversity in Round 2 as not many are registered in the yahoo groups.

There has been sharp criticisms about ISB giving enormous importance for GMAT and not evaluating the application as a whole. But I think ISB did a fair job in evaluating the candidates. When the applications are very strong, selection becomes very delicate. One cannot set a objective selection criteria. There has been some casualities in the form of some deserving candidates being left out, but I believe it is far less compared to the many who got in. I hope the selection process will be fine-tuned in future to satisfy as many people as possible.

From this years admissions, I sense that Academics, GMAT and Essays have played a major role more than anything else. Interviews were used only as a means to confirm the integrity of the application. Towards the later part of the admission process, some candidates reported about increasing stress-patterns in the interview. Some were interviewed through telephone and some were interviewed personally. Some had key people in the panel, some had alumni’s and non-key people in the panel. Going by this, I believe Interview was just given a lesser weightage.

In the coming years, ISB might increase the seats (may be 500+??). By then, I hope students from non-traditional backgrounds will have a fair size of quota to compete for.

So, the admission episode of the year 2005-06 is finally over. The spirit and feeling among admitted students is fantastic. The onus is now on us to take the legacy of ISB one step (or multiple steps!) forward. Hope we will be able to do justice to that while upgrading our skillsets personally and professionally…

22 more days to go in Belgium..Sometime back, days were moving very slowly and I was trying to propel myself forward, now the days are flying past in express speed…no matter how hard I press the foot on the brake!

Huh! I managed to blog every single day in February..I will do the same till March 15th..After that my blogging will be sporadic..