Doing well at a B-school: Academics

This is the first part of a series of Doing well at a B-school articles I plan to write. Today I'd share my experiences and insights on what I felt may work academically at ISB or in any B-school. Halfway through the year I realized my follies and felt the need for these precious tidbits from seniors which are difficult to get in a 1-year B-school. A disclaimer before I begin: these are just my personal thoughts. Please don't come back to me if any of these strategies don't work.

Exams: The so called easier subjects such as for Strategy of OB are actually tougher to score at because the TAs have specific guidelines on points in the answers. So you have to really follow the class well to understand professor's points of view. The hard core fin subjects have very high spread so be sure to practice practice and practice sample questions. After the first 2 terms I just couldn't get myself to study the day before the exams coz of fatigue or burnout or whatever. This is a disaster. I changed this during the last few terms to great effect. So make the most of the day before exams. To set expectations, a general rule of thumb is that about 8 marks above average guarantee an A (at least at ISB).

Assignments: Well this is really tricky and there's no right answer. Few electives in fact have only assignments that decide the grade. So just work hard in them I guess. For core terms, they generally don't matter so for subjects which have >80% weightage on exams you are better of ignoring assignments (where spread is very low) and concentrating on exams.

Projects:For most projects, using some fancy frameworks to analyze the issues really help. Also try to bring in concepts taught in class. Very importantly, if the project is in slide/PPT form, and you've to submit both hard and soft copies, you must put in some animations irrespective of guidelines. Sometimes presence (or absence) of animation (whatever quality) makes the difference.

Class Participation (CP): The much abused part of B-school life, CP hardly matters during core terms in the overall scheme of things. In electives, CP does make a whole lot of difference due to very high spread. But a word of caution. Please don't blabber or ramble if you have nothing substantive to say. I have seen numerous people who constantly jabber get very low CP marks wherease a few well thought out points win very high marks. And, it is OK not to speak in a few classes, really!

These were just few things that I felt I could have benefited from if I knew them from the start. If you are just starting out on a B-school, do remember that grades follow learning and learning follows enjoyment. So don't forget the enjoy the b-school experience in class or outside.

The Grand Finale

The ISB stay is finally over and I'm back home. The last week was really special. There were lots of parites, outings, get togethers, etc. Monday we went on a trip to the interiors of Hyderabad to see the workings of Basix, a Microfinance institution (we had a course on MF this term). On Tuesday, I went to Little Italy with V.
On Wednesday, my parents came over. Next couple of days were spent waiting for the 8th term results to decide our final CGPAs and the dean's list, etc. The city had curfews due to some communal tension so we had to spend few days indoors. Then on Friday, there was a special dinner party thrown by the dean for Dean's Listers and other awardees. It was great to have my parents over for this event. Thereafter, we had a fantastic graduation party replete with booze, kebabs, DJ and the like. Hats off to the SLC (Student Life Council) for doing a terrific job during the year. They were innovative, passionate and resourceful throughout. We had free Red Bull (which saved many of us from sleeping during a 4 hr Comp Strat marathon xam) during exams, puzzles arranged in the LRC, SV crawls (where people crawled from one student village to another drinking all the way) and many more such amazing events which made our stay here really special.
Finally on Saturday, the 3rd of April,2010, yours truly became an MBA. In the momentous occasion, Shri Kapil Sibal, the hon'bl Union Minister of HRD awarded the graduation certificates to our batch of 568 graduating students. We started the year with a strength of 579 folks but lost some due to various reasons. The convocation was held in a semi-temporary pandal structure constructed on the AC6 lawns. The students on the Dean's List (top 10% by CGPA) sat in the first row (in order of rank), followed by the Young leaders and the torch bearers (60 odd). The rest of the batch followed then in order of last name.
It was an amazing feeling when all of us graduates walked to our seats greeted with standing applause from all the relatives and professors.
The ceremony itself was an elaborate affair in which the Dean started the proceeding with a "trademark" speech. Thankfully there were no references to "monkeys". The dean of MIT's Sloan School of Management was also here to mark the occasion of MIT becoming ISB's 4th associate school. So after speeches from 2 deans, Rajat Gupta, the ex-McKinsey global CEO (ISB is his brainchild) spoke a few terse but weighty words on his mantra for success. One particular statement that's etched in my memory is that "whenever in life, you feel comfortable, change the scene." It effectively means always break yourself and keep reinventing. Stability is the enemy of growth.
we were treated with Kapil Sibal's semi-political monologue on various factors of life. He concluded with a self composed poem ("a gift to you students") on the Banking crisis which was received with much enthusiasm from a few of his political aides.
Finally, the certificates were handed out in order of seating. I use the term "certificate" very loosely because it was only a sample copy and the actual certificates and transcripts were given to us about an hour after the ceremony (in order to avoid mix ups). Off course Mr Sibal didn't know this and proudly displayed the certis during official graduation photographs for the first few students. Fortunately he was told to mend his ways thereafter and other students managed to pose smartly for the photos with certificates that didn't have "sample copy" printed across them. Since the whole distribution took a lot of time, the students invented some entertainment for themeselves by cheering for each repeated surname at a time...we went "Singh, Singh, Singh..., Sinha Sinha, Sinha...", etc. Even Rajat Gupta and the other guests burst out laughing.
The last person L Vyas (by order of name) got the most rapturous applause of his life when the entire batch just burst out with all remaining energy.
After thanking our relatives for their patience, support and best wishes during the past year, we tossed our hats and became MBAs.
Private photo sessions followed after the ceremony with friends and family.
The batch MMX (2010) thus took shape. We have arrived!

At night had a fabulous dinner with all students along with relatives.
To cap off wonderful evening, SLC organized our first party as alums of this amazing institution. I partied till the wee hours of the morning as this was our last night together. I got to say good byes to most friends and to those whom I couldn't, here's bidding adieu to you-I'll miss you all. This year, without a shadow of a doubt, was the best of my life and if there ever was a life changing experience, it would be the year at ISB.
Over and out from the batch of MMX, ISB