Done and Dusted! :)

Those are the exact words a close friend commented when I graduated. I now have a Masters degree in Marketing and Technological Innovation with a 3.41 GPA. Ideally, I would have liked for the GPA to be higher(honestly, it could have been a lot higher) but it's done now. Time to look forward to the future :)

Time to find a job first :D

Anon writes

Ok, so a couple of things -

1. The MBA is only an end to a goal, not an end in itself. I don't know if this is right, but it seems to me like you're basing (have based?) your whole life around the MBA. That's insane!

2. A 5-year plan to get an MBA seems ludicrous to me. Sure it's a great degree, but there's plenty of other things that you can do with your life.

I do not mean this in a derogatory or offensive manner, and I hope you take it as such. All the best.

Anon, No offence taken :)

I agree it does seem like my entire life is based around it. You are right when you say that the MBA is the means to an end-- in this case the end being Entrepreneurial dreams. I see the MBA as a quicker stepping stone to those dreams.

As for the 5year plan, its working out pretty well so far-- I have another sem before I finish a Masters degree in the US which has been an awesome learning experience and one I highly recommend to everybody. I hope to land a job soon and the financial freedom of a job in the US will afford me chances to do many things that would perhaps not be as possible in India, some purely because opportunities for those do not exist in India.

In short, I am doing the many other things that I could do with my life, yet all the while keeping in mind that at the end of the day, I still want an MBA :)

p.s. I really should stop replying to comments as a separate blog-post no?? :D

Rise in GPA!

WooHoo!!

My grades are out and pretty spectacular when compared to last sem. I took 3 courses and have 2As and a B giving me a sem average of 3.66 and an over-all average of 3.33!! That's waaaay better than the average when i finished my Engg degree so in that sense, this degree is certainly helping me cover that weak area of my app. i hope to graduate with a 3.5+ GPA and with another 700+ GMAT score, that effectively takes care of my Acads! w00t!!

Now,to work on my work-ex.

Hear ye, hear ye-- Experienced Product Manager seeks exciting product development and product management job :)

VP-I.T.

It's now official--I am the new VP of IT!!

Of the Indian Student Organization @ WPI :) And i seem to have won quite comfortably.

As with all executive level positions- Fancy Title and Not Much Work.

There was a speech night where nominees had to give a speech as to why they were the best candidate for the job. I wont say much about that, but i will say that it soon represented Indian Parliament on any given day. CHAOTIC. Quite an experience that was. Hopefully, next year, things will be different.

If i'm around till then that is.

Case Studies.

Up until I came here, I had had no exposure to the case study system. As such, i didnt really know how it worked. A few people i asked said its basically a bunch of notes regarding a particular topic and then there's the cold-call. Most people i spoke to didnt talk so much about the case-study as they did about the dreaded "Cold-Call" I suppose that's a valid enough fear considering that you are in top-notch school and the pressure to sound good is omnipresent.

I've been in my course for nearly 5weeks now. 2 of my courses, Entrepreneurship and Marketing are case-study based. The same proff takes both classes. He only cold-calls in the Marketing case. Luckily, i've not been called in the marketing class, and i've invariably landed up well read for the Etr class.

But the American system of education is interesting to say the least. Highly recommended. I'm in a full-time course with a lot of free time yet i'm not as prepared for my other classes as i should be(it helps that my proff for Etr and Mkt is also my advisor :D )

Opinions on Case-Studies
Its been interesting. Sure its a long read and the numbers at the end of it are often a meaningless jumble of figures, but sometimes the end-notes make for interesting reading(Did you know that by the time he was 17,Dell was earning 18,000 a year! in 1982!!!)
Am i enjoying the case study? You bet!! Proff Kasouf throws out interesting questions and then has us students battle it out with each other(umm we are graded on class participation but that's not important) the quality of ideas put forth is enlightening. My class is not a bunch of students in the same program but a mix of people pursuing different prgorams. So there are a coupla MBAs, a physics major, mech major, Me, an engineer dude with some 15yrs of work-ex thus ensurin he's Head, of whatever, freshers etc etc. There's a lively discussion which the proff augments with notes and videos. He's requested us to not look at how the case ended and to a large part people dont or atleast those that do, are honest enough to admit that they did and this is what they had picked before lookin it up.

Of course,i'm only reading 2 cases a week so i dont know the work-load in b-schools. But for now, Case-Study method it is! :)

List of B-schools

LOL! does it really matter? If i'm only going to apply in 3-4years time, then the whole world is my application arena :) i have 3-4yrs to really research the schools i want to go to and then decide if i really want to go there. I'll be 31 by the time i hope to enter and that number could be a deterrent at some schools. Will it be worth my while to research those schools now?? How do i know these schools wont show a marked preference for younger candidates??

With the economic crisis worsening this year in the US, i believe the competition at b-schools is only going to get worse. While i'm glad i'm not part of the race this year, I can only speculate how it'll be in the years to come. Placement stats for those graduating next year should make for interesting reading.

Potential Q to ask b-school Ad-Com: Explain the puff in your placement stats :-p

Step1: Fix my Grades

Check.

I am now officially an MS-MTI(MS in Marketing and Technological Innovation) student at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute,MA. I graduate Dec,2009 hopefuly with far better grades than i graduated with for my undergrad :D

I've got interesting courses in the entire program. A lot of them look like MBA courses so this should be fun. I have the option of taking courses online as well as in class but i've ensured all of my classes for this semester are classroom. I'd love to get a real good feel of the american education system. Classes are Monday, Wednesday and Thursday evening.

Courses i'm taking this semester
Principles of Marketing
Economics of the Firm
Organizational Behavior
New Venture Management and Entrepreneurship

I have some GA but would love a job to supplement that(Kaplan, ManhattanGmat, Princeton are you'll listening??) Additionally i can start working full-time after 9months and am also looking for an internship during the periods of April-July and longer if possible (seriously, somebody gimme a call :D )

p.s. Cannot believe i'm adding an additional 16months of studying when i swore the MBA would be the only degree i would get after my Engg. Man, the things we do to achieve our dreams :)

The 5yr Admission Plan

So why a 5 year Plan??You know Who I Am. Despite the impressive(??) looking resume there are a lot of weak areas in my profile. Kunal insists that I have a rather unique profile and that i only didnt get in because of sheer procrastination at app time. Be that as it may, if I ever want to go to a topMBA, its time to beef up my profile, iron out the weak areas etc.

All MBA Apps are divided into 3 basic categories :

1.Who you are a.k.a Profile
2.The GMAT Score
3.Your Essays and Reco Letters.

To a certain extent, points 1 and 3 are inter-linked. Who you are, is represented in your essays. Stuff like GPA, extra-currics, interests, non-academic achievement, social service are shown in your resume and subtly yet clearly shown to the Ad-Com in a variety of ways.

Each point is crucial in your app. Each point can be a make or break deal. Well, ok, not the GMAT so much. The GMAT helps your app be reviewed favourably but after that its all you. And yet, as you can see from my BU feedback the GMAT is used to distinguish between candidates with similar profiles. Given that Indians seem to be raising the ave score for themselves(much to the dismay of other applicants) its no surprise that a reasonably decent 710 is almost clearly not good enough if I'm an IIM. However, within the 5yr plan, the GMAT is not on the horizon for another 3yrs. Let's see where Indians take the average by then.


The aim of the 5yr plan is simple--5yrs from now, I should be admitted to a top MBA program.

This is by far the most ambitious, focussed, long-term plan i've come up with. And its one i intend implementing. The MBA has been a dream i've harboured for a really long time and by Jove, I'm definitely going to get it.

So why the 5yr plan?? Because every area in my profile is fractured and could do with the beefing up.

Education As with most Indians, I am an engineer. However, my acad performance is the weakest link of my profile. My performance/GPA is downright horrible and only another course with a reasonably decent GPA would make me a competitive applicant. There are other additions to this that are beyond the scope of this blog(Hint: Indians, dont you'll love the ATKT system?? It finally caught up and bit me in the ass though :| )

Work-Ex For the first 2yrs of my life, it's solid. Honest IT engineer. Working in a start-up. Low pay, good responsibility.
After that, it all goes down. Join a start-up. "Work" for 7months and have nothing to show for it but the other part-time job i did.
Quit that to join another start-up. Once again, nothing much to show.

Extra-Currics Zero. Nada. Nothing here folks move on. Ok, i do have the Moderation of forums to show, but I doubt that'd qualify as extra-currics. I'd have to actually do something concrete which I haven't. Yet.

So, those are the 3 Main Areas to be worked on over the next 4years. I intend applying in the 5th year of the plan(just like the Indian government's 5yr plan :D) and should hopefully have better news than last time.

Wish me Luck :)