MBA - Raison d'être
Yes, I got done with my engineering, then joined one of those IT services companies, and now am almost close to completing my MBA at IIM B. Ok.. good till now.. so what?
Why did i do what i did? Where am i heading to? What am i gonna be doing years down the lane? All these questions had to come to me only when I'm ending the course? damn it!
Lets structure it out a bit. Wot was the purpose of me joining IIMB in the first place? Hmm... to think about it.. it was more about cracking CAT. I enjoy challenges, and somehow i was not convinced that I could do that badly in my first attempt at CAT. The more serious i became about CAT, the more interested i became in solving those tiny little 1 min CAT problems... the way i strategized, the way i managed my time! What began as another aptitude test, for me turned out into something that i became passionate about. Well after the results of CAT 2005 was out, and my BLACKI performance, i was kinda lost... now that i took up the challenge and sorta managed to crack it... now wot? then came thing called 'facing the interviews'... for some computer geek who was happy with coding... (and of course for someone who was good at it and luved it!)... getting started to prepare for the MBA interviews was like a rude shock. Now that i had come this far, i though, ok wot the heck, might as well do some prep and give a decent shot at it. And so then it happened, somehow IIMB found a fit in me.. (rather fortunately considered me as one of those 250 odd students with the potential to make it big... something that even i at that time had not realized)
Bottomline: IIMB happened more out of my taking up the challenge of cracking CAT rather than out of ture interest in pursuing MBA.
Now that 2 enduring years have passed by, i'm still sitting and pondering. What did MBA do to me? What did IIMB do to me? What did i learn in the past to years?
Thus started my search for the true purpose of an MBA. What must i do with the gift that i have been provided with?
In this context, i went through the mission statements of some of the leading B-schools in the world...and i'v put them down:
Harvard Business School:
"To educate leaders who make a difference in the world"
Stanford Graduate School of Business:
"To create ideas that deepen and advance our understanding of management and with those ideas to develop innovative, principled, and insightful leaders who change the world"
MIT Sloan School of Management:
"To develop principled, innovative leaders who improve the world and to generate ideas that advance management practice"
Wharton Business School:
"To apply unparalleled intellectual resources to prepare business leaders who fuel the growth of industries and economies"
Yale School of Managment:
"To educate leaders for business and society"
Duke Fuqua School of Business"
"To provide the highest quality education for business and academic leaders, and promote the advancement of the understanding and practice of management through research"
NYU Stern School of Business:
"To deliver the highest quality management education to the brightest business students in a dynamic environment of mutual learning, teamwork and support"
I couldn't find a mission statement specific to IIMB, but form the HRD ministry's website, the mission statement for the creation of IIMs A,B,C was as follows:
Notice the difference in the missions of Harvard, Stanford, MIT Sloan, Wharton and the rest... the consistent theme: "Building business leaders who will change or make a difference to the world". This is conspicuously lacking from that of the IIMs. Not only IIMs, but the other Indian B-Schools are more like the breeding ground for corporates to just come and pick up talent. I wish these colleges would move away from encouraging this concept and try to instill and impart knowledge and a culture that would favour entrepreneurship. Train students to be people who would use the skills that they learn to make the world a better place to live it. Create businesses, transform businesses, create new lines of businesses that would create employment opportunities... that would feed families, that would make an impact! The purpose of education should be to help the world and also yourself in the process, not to help just yourself by sitting behind a desk and rake in millions for yourself. Life is short, make it meaningful for at least a few others.
True there are a few who give a go to placements to venture out into the open... but these are a handful...few and far apart... maybe 3 to 5 out of a batch of 250-300!
At the end of this you would be gawking at me saying.. yeah..ok.. but wot are U gonna do about it? Well i have certain things in my mind, and i hope things go well. I'v sorta tried to map out my career path... its sorta becoming less hazier, the only thing that i'm certain about at this point is that i would be going into the teaching stream towards the end of my corporate life... so as to share the knowledge that i would hopefully have gained over those years... to try to "bring up people who would make a difference to the world".. and more importantly "to make them believe that they have the potential that they can change the world!" ... hopefully :-)... and hopefully i won't let down those profs who saw some potential in me :-)
Why did i do what i did? Where am i heading to? What am i gonna be doing years down the lane? All these questions had to come to me only when I'm ending the course? damn it!
Lets structure it out a bit. Wot was the purpose of me joining IIMB in the first place? Hmm... to think about it.. it was more about cracking CAT. I enjoy challenges, and somehow i was not convinced that I could do that badly in my first attempt at CAT. The more serious i became about CAT, the more interested i became in solving those tiny little 1 min CAT problems... the way i strategized, the way i managed my time! What began as another aptitude test, for me turned out into something that i became passionate about. Well after the results of CAT 2005 was out, and my BLACKI performance, i was kinda lost... now that i took up the challenge and sorta managed to crack it... now wot? then came thing called 'facing the interviews'... for some computer geek who was happy with coding... (and of course for someone who was good at it and luved it!)... getting started to prepare for the MBA interviews was like a rude shock. Now that i had come this far, i though, ok wot the heck, might as well do some prep and give a decent shot at it. And so then it happened, somehow IIMB found a fit in me.. (rather fortunately considered me as one of those 250 odd students with the potential to make it big... something that even i at that time had not realized)
Bottomline: IIMB happened more out of my taking up the challenge of cracking CAT rather than out of ture interest in pursuing MBA.
Now that 2 enduring years have passed by, i'm still sitting and pondering. What did MBA do to me? What did IIMB do to me? What did i learn in the past to years?
Thus started my search for the true purpose of an MBA. What must i do with the gift that i have been provided with?
In this context, i went through the mission statements of some of the leading B-schools in the world...and i'v put them down:
Harvard Business School:
"To educate leaders who make a difference in the world"
Stanford Graduate School of Business:
"To create ideas that deepen and advance our understanding of management and with those ideas to develop innovative, principled, and insightful leaders who change the world"
MIT Sloan School of Management:
"To develop principled, innovative leaders who improve the world and to generate ideas that advance management practice"
Wharton Business School:
"To apply unparalleled intellectual resources to prepare business leaders who fuel the growth of industries and economies"
Yale School of Managment:
"To educate leaders for business and society"
Duke Fuqua School of Business"
"To provide the highest quality education for business and academic leaders, and promote the advancement of the understanding and practice of management through research"
NYU Stern School of Business:
"To deliver the highest quality management education to the brightest business students in a dynamic environment of mutual learning, teamwork and support"
I couldn't find a mission statement specific to IIMB, but form the HRD ministry's website, the mission statement for the creation of IIMs A,B,C was as follows:
- To provide for training in management and related subjects for persons from, industry institutions and bodies and associations connected with Industry and commerce.
- To meet the needs of Indian industry and commerce in respect of upto date information on management through research and publication of Indian management literature with particular reference to programmes of business enterprises in the country.
Notice the difference in the missions of Harvard, Stanford, MIT Sloan, Wharton and the rest... the consistent theme: "Building business leaders who will change or make a difference to the world". This is conspicuously lacking from that of the IIMs. Not only IIMs, but the other Indian B-Schools are more like the breeding ground for corporates to just come and pick up talent. I wish these colleges would move away from encouraging this concept and try to instill and impart knowledge and a culture that would favour entrepreneurship. Train students to be people who would use the skills that they learn to make the world a better place to live it. Create businesses, transform businesses, create new lines of businesses that would create employment opportunities... that would feed families, that would make an impact! The purpose of education should be to help the world and also yourself in the process, not to help just yourself by sitting behind a desk and rake in millions for yourself. Life is short, make it meaningful for at least a few others.
True there are a few who give a go to placements to venture out into the open... but these are a handful...few and far apart... maybe 3 to 5 out of a batch of 250-300!
At the end of this you would be gawking at me saying.. yeah..ok.. but wot are U gonna do about it? Well i have certain things in my mind, and i hope things go well. I'v sorta tried to map out my career path... its sorta becoming less hazier, the only thing that i'm certain about at this point is that i would be going into the teaching stream towards the end of my corporate life... so as to share the knowledge that i would hopefully have gained over those years... to try to "bring up people who would make a difference to the world".. and more importantly "to make them believe that they have the potential that they can change the world!" ... hopefully :-)... and hopefully i won't let down those profs who saw some potential in me :-)
posted by Bobby at 9:30 PM
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