Sarsij @ AIM

The Crisis of Credit Visualized

2009-09-22T10:46:00.001-07:00

[Original source: http://crisisofcredit.com/]

Financial Engineering with a difference

2009-09-08T06:26:00.000-07:00

All those guys looking for a different mood of Financial Engineering in the real life, read the article below.......I am sure this is a great effort from the Economists and the Bankers (good Bankers, and not those i-bankers ;) ) to fund the education of the students going for their higher studies..........

read the story here

How can you best utilise your years at B-School?

2009-05-28T12:49:00.000-07:00

MBA students should clearly define their expectations from the b-school they choose to attend and pay close attention to issues such as finances, time and people interactions says Guest WriterSatyam Gambhir, a first year student of the Symbiosis Institute of International Business, Pune (SIIB). He also believes that peers and seniors at business school play a very important role in learning and developing a focused career plan.

With Indian business schools commencing classes from June onwards, this is the time for MBA aspirants to relax and realise. It is not a crime to expect good things to happen but b-school aspirants often have unrealistic expectations from the corporate world. A handsome salary package of Rs 9 to Rs 15 lakhs per annum and a good work profile are some of the justified expectations from a good b-school. Engrossed with thoughts of lucrative salaries and dreams of scooting up the corporate ladder, students either do not realise or prefer to not think about the hard work required. The jury is still out on the global financial crisis and it is unrealistic to expect good to happen in the current situation.

As far as the current market scenario is concerned, students should clearly define their expectations from the MBA program. Students should ask themselves the question - “What do I expect during and after the two years of study?”. Writing the answer and then discussing it with college seniors or alumni might give you a more realistic picture and you may be surprised by the results. Unknowingly, an aspirant’s expectations play a vital role in deciding a b-school. What you should do at business school.

Life at business school

Now that you are enrolled at MBA college, it probably comes as no shock that those bleary-eyed undergraduate college days of rolling out of bed just minutes before a ten o'clock lecture are over. A few small changes in the way you think and behave can make a world of difference in your overall enjoyment of the MBA experience. Enjoy this experience as you should—it's the key to the life you deserve! More than books and lectures, an MBA is about building networks and relations which can help you with work and its management, learning from a diverse set of peers, future jobs and helping the network nodes in return.

First, before you begin any graduate program, be sure you can afford to do so. Whether you have saved money or are subsidizing your education through some other means, remember that simplifying your budget now means fewer worries later. Cancel that gym membership that you're paying for every month — it is more than likely that there is a gymnasium on campus which is free or inexpensive for students. Cut down on expenses like watching movies or shopping for a few extra points on your credit card until your MBA expenses are clearly delineated. For that matter, be very critical from now of entering into any agreement that requires an additional regular payment. If you are funding your MBA with help from your parents or an educational loan then it is more than important for you to keep a check on your daily expenses.

Balance your time extremely carefully. One of the biggest considerations in successful higher learning is stress management. Besides the obvious factors that play into stress such as diet, sleep, exercise—there are equally crucial skills to incorporate. These include allowing yourself small pleasures and being honest with yourself and those around you about your ability to cope. If you find yourself flailing, even momentarily, lean on your support network. Remember that help is never far but in order to get it you must ask.

As an MBA student, I strongly feel that B-schools also need to introduce to their students some of the critical elements that invariably determine one’s success in the corporate world. A critical element that B-schools miss out on is the art of perception management. If you think your rise up the corporate ladder is determined solely by how well you do your job then you are mistaken. Whether it be plum postings, high grades in the annual performance appraisals or even offers from other organisations, individual perception is crucial — in some cases, it may even make or mar your career. Some of the common determinants of success are - how you project yourself in the organisation, how you communicate with peers, juniors and seniors and even how well groomed you are. These are qualities which a b-school will not teach and you will have to learn these during your MBA.

Managing across cultures and boundaries; coping with difficult times, an unreasonable boss, a mid-life crisis or a layoff and other similar real-life situations may not come easily to everybody and this is where guidance from the networking and seniors could help.

It is important to remember that you are a representative of your MBA program in addition to a representative of yourself and your classmates. A certain level of accountability is required of you throughout the program relationship. It is your responsibility to maintain the network for others and your benefit and not only for the latter. Learn about specific jobs, career paths, organizational cultures, and industries. Receive constructive feedback about personal and business skills. Obtain guidance about conducting yourself in business settings. Finally, create a career plan with your network and work towards achieving the stated goals.

Students need to understand the industry they want to work in, as well as the individual companies and their competitors. They must understand what the job is and be able to convince a prospective employer that they can do it on a daily basis. A B-school education is the critical minimum effort required to make a meaningful education in the world of business. It is the first important step, but certainly not the last.

Important issues for MBA graduates

A majority of MBA students view their degree as a means to a desirable job. How is a desirable job defined? According to a survey done in the year 2003 on 2000 MBA students in US, UK, India and Australia, a good job includes (in order of importance) 1. Interesting work 2. Good chances for promotion 3. Opportunities to develop abilities 4. Competent co-workers 5. Fair promotions 6. Enough authority 7. Good pay 8. Job freedom 9. Job security 10. Concerned supervisor. B-school accreditation status (AICTE or UGC and other bodies) and admission competitiveness are related, though not strongly, to the salary of students. Students studying in unapproved colleges consider a high salary as their most important concern during their MBA.

For fresh graduates, the expectations lie between good work profile and good salary package. However, MBAs with work-experience attach somewhat equal importance to all the points stated above. For some students of the latter group, MBA is also related to changing the current employer and current position. There are not many who wish to change the field of work and this is not suggested either.

In the current economic situation, going for an MBA or any other post graduate degree is a good idea only when one is not happy with the current job, worried about more lay-offs or is without a job. According to many experienced managers and professors at reputed b-schools, it is definitely better to take a break and improve skills rather than stick to a job that threatens you every day. Further studies are advisable for fresh engineers and graduates who are still waiting to join software and electronics firms. It is not justified to expect a salary of above Rs 10 lakhs from an average b-school. However, salaries after a b-school depend on several factors including work experience, knowledge and reputation of the college.

If you have secured admission in any of the top seven-fifteen b-schools of India then salary should not be a concern. However, if the reputation of your college is between ranks 16 to 30 then it is time for you to put in an extra 20 hours a week to cope with this fact. If the college is not included in the top 50 then you will have to work together with your college and your network for a secure future.

Irrespective of a college’s ranking, you can succeed by covering it up by adequate hard work and combining it with a proper industry interface. An MBA gives individuals a set of general management skills that lasts for a lifetime. This broad training transcends location, time and job type, and enhances current focus and specialization.

Satyam Gambhir is a student of the class of 2011 at Symbiosis Institute of International Business, Pune (SIIB) and graduated as an Electronics and Communication engineer from Apeejay College of Engineering, Gurgaon. Prior to enrolling at SIIB, he spent two years as a Manager Training at a software firm. He blogs regularly and has written in the past for business magazines. You can reach him at satyam.gambhir@gmail.com and provide feedback and suggestions.

[This article was first published at PaGalGuy. Read it here]

Interview Time

2009-05-21T10:12:00.001-07:00

Recently, after the declaration of the GD/PI schedule for the Indian candidates applying for AIM, I have seen a huge number of people seeing my advice on the same. All of them want to know certain common questions, and I have been patiently answering their questions just because of one reason - Last year when I had applied for AIM I got almost no help from anyone, because there was no help available at all. and I really dont want that my fellow friends should face the same troubles.

Also, I do expect that all those who clear the GD/PI process should be helping out other in the years to come. :)

Well, there is also a word of caution which I feel like mentioning, but no one is bothered to listen to the disclaim I put - All what I am saying is solely based on my experience, and it might not be the same for this year. But then who would want to hear all these words, when they are in a hurry to know more and more about question like - Whats a Case Study based GD? How will be the PI? How many people interview a candidate? How many would be sitting in my GD group? etc

But then we are all the same. Last year even I had the same questions in my mind, and all I could do was to get the limited help from the PagalGuy forum :)

Needless to say that AIM has started to get its due importance in India in past few years, and this year with 'economic slowdown' tag put on its face has surely attracted a much bigger crowd to this college than ever. Good for the institute, good for the candidates!

At the end I just wish that everyone should do his best during the interviews and group discussion. Stay Positive, because you never know what might sound good to the panel, and never lose hope. Hope to see many of you in my class beginning Sept 2009.

Update : Got to know through PaGalGuy forums that around 240 Indian candidates have been called for the interview. In all, there are 12o seats in the Sept 2009 batch. And if we estimate that around 50% of the seats will be filled by the Indian candidates, then we can safely calculate that at least one in every four candidate would be selected in the GD-PI process. Well thats looks pretty better situation as compared to the Indian B-School rejection ration, even at the GD-PI stage. So cheer up you guys and give your best shot.

AIM @ YouTube

2009-04-19T07:59:00.000-07:00

AIM videos, although not in huge numbers, are at YouTube. And its a pleasure to see that even under so much of academic pressure people do celebrate like anything. The major focus of celebrations (w.r.t. Indian students) remain to be Diwali Night.

anyway, check out these videos.........

AIM TV Advertisements

40th Anniv TV Ad

Will Banking become boring?

2009-04-16T11:30:00.000-07:00

while I am gearing up to pick up the Finance as a subject which could become a bread and butter for me in the times to come, after the MBA degree, but here is a gloomy report about the Banking sector as reported by the Economic Times(ET), India (16th April 2009). But gloomy, as it may appear, but I believe these reforms/corrections were always needed. And as the first correction in the IT industry appeared after the IT-Bust phase, same would happen with these changes coming in near future. Also, I would like to include that even now at this point of time when the IT industry has not been hit so hard in this down-turn, still, I would love to see some huge and much awaited reforms in the IT industry also.

Read on this eye-opening article from ET, must say, it removes a lot of hype and hoopla associated with the Finance domain.

For quite some time now, many of those who have headed for some of the best known business schools in India and abroad have done so in the hope of making it to one of the top banks — or “shadow banks”— of the world. Commercial banks apart, investment banks, hedge funds and private equity have hogged the lion’s share of graduates from these places.

Part of the motivation has come from the mouth-watering presentations made by the world’s leading financial firms. At top B-schools in the US, some firms were known to lay out a career path for graduates that led up to a million dollars in three years flat and up to ten million dollars in ten years’ time.

That path may have been strewn with 18-hour workdays seven days a week but it has still proved irresistible to many. The other element in the lure of financial firms has been the sizzle and fizz of innovation, the opportunity to dream up and sell exciting, new financial products.

This is set to change in the years ahead. Some of the change was already in evidence in the recent placement season at the leading B-schools in the country. The great names in investment banking that used to swoop down on some of the best talent failed to show up — because many are now history. At IIMA, one of the biggest recruiters this year was not Lehman Brothers but our own Union Bank of India. You could call it a revolution of sorts.

There is more change along the way. One of the few things that are certain in these uncertain times is that financial innovation, risk-taking and the profits and rewards that went with them will be reined in. That should cause the financial sector itself to shrink in relative importance in the advanced economies.

Financial regulation is in for a sweeping overhaul. In particular, three key elements of regulation are poised to change the face of the financial sector. The first is that capital requirements for banks and other financial intermediaries will go up. This will undermine one of the key sources of abnormal profitability in banking — extraordinary leverage. One of the revelations of the present crisis is that many banks and investment banks were operating at a leverage of 30 or more.

Hereafter, banks will find themselves subject to a regulatory minimum of capital that will be above the 8% required currently under rules framed by the Bank for International Settlements. This is the capital that is required to be set aside against “risk-weighted” assets. It is very likely that, on top of this, banks will be subject to a limit on leverage as conventionally measured.

As equity capital is costlier than debt, an increase in capital requirements (or a decrease in leverage) is bound to push up the cost of funds for a bank. This will impose a cost on bank customers — a lower deposit rate or a higher borrowing rate or both. Higher borrowing costs, in turn, will tend to depress output.

But financial instability carries its own costs: the loss of output as a result of a financial crisis can be anywhere between 5% and 45% of GDP. The judgement today is that the latter outcome is less preferable. Higher capital is seen as crucial to stability. Once capital requirements for banks go up, we should expect bank profitability to fall. The halcyon days of return on equity of 20% or more in banking may well be over.

Secondly, regulators are going to be far more sceptical about the supposed benefits of financial innovation. It is clear that the explosive growth in one innovation, securitised credit, laid the seeds for the present financial crisis.

Moreover, as a report prepared recently by the head of UK’s Financial Services Authority (The Turner Review) points out, innovation has spurred growth in the financial sector in ways that were either illusory or harmful. Financial sector value-added as a proportion of GDP in the UK rose from 5% to 7% in the period 1995-2007. Partly, this reflected the illusory gains in a rising market arising from mark-to-market accounting.

The review suggests that the surge in value-added was also harmful in so far as it arose from rents from complex financial products. The Review notes: “Wholesale financial services....grew to a size unjustified by the value of its service to the real economy”. There is talk of excesses in the financial sector.

It would be more accurate to say that the financial sector itself constituted an excess both in terms of its relative size in economies and the sort of returns it generated. It is unlikely that banks will hereafter be able to launch product innovations at will.

Thirdly, we must expect constraints on bankers' pay. Regulators will insist that incentives for bankers be based on measures of performance that better reflect risk and the long-term performance of banks. More importantly, higher capital requirements and lower profitability in banking will limit rewards in the financial sector. Outsized bonuses will not be passé but they will be more difficult to come by.

This is greatly welcome and somewhat overdue. Thanks to absurd compensation packages, financial firms (along with IT in India) have created huge distortions in the labour market. They have tended to lay a disproportionate claim on the pool of human talent to the exclusion of manufacturing and other sectors.

Will these changes in regulation — higher capital requirements, constraints on financial innovation and tighter norms for incentives — make banking a ‘boring’ sector rather like some regulated utility? Not really.

The management of risk that is or ought to be the core of banking will remain challenging and exciting. Besides, innovation is not just about product innovation, it is also about process innovation, finding ways to deliver products more efficiently to customers and broadening financial inclusion. While pay packages in banking will be less extravagant, bankers won’t be exactly starving.

What the emerging direction of regulation will do is strip banking of some of its hype, the glamour and danger that one associates more with adventure sports. Actually, the comparison is inapt. In adventure sports, it is the sportsman who pays dearly for his mistakes. In banking, it is the audience that has all too often ended up paying the price.

Two reports relating MBA and the afterlife

2009-04-04T12:20:00.001-07:00

Recently I was going through the article on The Economist which deal with the Management education and I was glued to thetwo reports.

First report was regarding the pay difference between the male and the female, not only in the short term but also in the long run, and sadly the difference keeps growing over the time. An excerpt of the report says

"Female MBA graduates not only earn significantly less than their male colleagues, but the gap grows over time, according to a paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research. The authors tracked the earnings of 1,600 MBAs who graduated from the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business between 1990 and 2006; they attribute the differences to choice of subjects (women took fewer finance courses), that women’s careers were subject to more interruptions, and that the women worked fewer hours than the men." (You can read the whole report here)

If take the same case study with a focus on the Indian MBAs, then the above observation would turn out to be quite understandble and logical. But it's hard for me to believe that the above report reflects the data of the developed countries, where women are equally free as their men.

The second report was a worry factor stating that how MBAs lack Quantitative skills, and the reasons associated with it. The article also discusses about what all MBAs lack, and how could that be corrected in the wake of this recession. And I guess this question must be asked by everyone who is willing to take up a course in MBA in near future. Read the article here

The Economist's Management Education corner can be found here : The Economist's Business Education

Who Wants to be a Manager?

2009-01-26T05:36:00.000-08:00

Recently I was reading an article by Abhijit Bhaduri (did his MBA from XLRI long back), and he has recently shot popularity with his book - 'Mediocre But Arrogant' and its sequel 'Married But Available'. He has been taking care of the Human Resources since last two decades and has been quite vocal about the issues at work place.

This article, which I am going to paste here is all about asking questions to yourself - 'whether you want to be a manager? If yes! Then answer some of the questions first'. Continue reading his aricle below -

Like the rest of the planet you started off your career at the bottom of the food chain. Everyone around in the office knew you weren’t expected to accomplish anything important in the first few days or even months. You were paid to just exist and crib - which you did in plenty. You cribbed to other low life around you and complained that you were underpaid and overworked even while you took long coffee breaks and longer lunch breaks. You complained how unfair life was treating you because you were doing all the grunge work while your manager got all the attention.

You complained and you dreamt - of being a manager. You imagined the good life of a manager. You ran errands for all the important people. Those people who call themselves “Manager” were the charmed lot and the envy of the bright and eager trainees. So when you went back to the hole in the wall room, you lay on the bed, stared at the ceiling and wondered when you would become like that person in the hallway running your own empire. For all the recently hired Trainees, having the power of life and death over your life seemed such a cool job to have. What you did not know is how that manager got his/her knuckles rapped when someone in the team slacked off and did less than sterling work. You did not know the nights that person spent tossing and turning deciding whether to distribute an impossibly small increment budget across all the team members or to give someone a a lot more and displease the rest and ruin team morale in the bargain. That Job Title seemed to be ultimate in aspiration. You prayed for the day when you would move from being worker bee to being a MANAGER! Like that game show, you want to play Who Wants to be a Manager? Being a first time manager is not easy. You will tell me that you have been reading every article in the management section of your newspaper. Your bookshelf now boasts of Jack Welch’s wisdom, The Art of War and a country made revolver. Clearly you are eager to go off in all directions. Let me pose a few questions:

How many of the team members work for you because it value adds to them professionally? Are you able to articulate the tasks into clear chewable size buckets? Does a conversation with you throw more light than heat? After working for you for a year would they say that they are now more valued as professionals than they were before? Do your team members grow because of you or despite you. Does your giving them on going coaching and feedback have anything to do with their professional growth? Some managers are good at attracting talent, but cannot retain them. Trust you are not one of them.

Would your team hire you again? Are you able to explain to the Young Turk that he/she is not ready to take up the next big role without the person feeling cheated? Despite terrific performance in the current role can you tell the top salesperson that he is not ready to be a Sales Manager because the competencies needed in the other role are different. If you got to know in advance, that the bright eyed and bushy tailed Trainee in your department will not get a promotion and get a smaller pay raise as compared to trainees (all hired from the same college last year) in other departments, would you give your team member a higher raise just so you don’t become unpopular? After you spent a year leading your team and they had a chance to decide whether to renew your contract as a manager, would they?

What am I driving at? Being a manager is about making choices. If you have a strong need to be popular with everyone, you will find it tough to be a fair manager. We all like to be loved and be popular. In any role that involves making choices in favor of one person or group versus the other, the favored group may adore you even as the others stick pins into voodoo dolls. Making choices is not for the faint hearted. That is why politicians, managers and leaders fail despite best intentions. It is good to be able to fairly listen to two opposing views and yet vote in favor of one, as long as the payoffs outweigh the price of that choice. Each decision will make someone unhappy. Learning to live with disapproval is a tough life lesson. Many parents have learnt that the hard way that kids want you to be a parent not a friend and the best outcome is if you can be a friendly parent. But be a parent you must! The first time managers also veer between being a friend and being a manager. It need not be an either/or choice. The decisions taken could be driven by logic and data while being implemented with a touch of heart. A first time manager who finds it tough to handle disapproval runs the risk of changing managerial decisions to appeal to the lowest common denominator. If asked to distribute a merit increment budget across a group of top performers are you still able to reward the top 10% disproportionately and still maintain the team’s cohesiveness? If you have said no to most of the questions raised above, then maybe you are better off not playing (at least not yet) Who Wants to be a Manager?

Asian MBA rises in preference as US and Europe reel under crisis

2009-01-15T03:25:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer : This article has been picked up from PagalGuy

This article gives a lot of strength to the fact that - In future all the action lies in Asia. And Asia would act as a hub of all the business opportunities in the times to come. Read the article below........

Could the booming economies of Asia be the place to study if you want to avoid the economic downturn in Europe and North America? David Wiliams of TopMBA.com peeps in and uncovers a lot of counter-intuitive trends.

It certainly looks as if this could be the case as many top schools in the region are experiencing a boom in applications. “Our application volumes are up in a classic counter-cyclical way,” says Jennifer George, Associate Dean of Academic Programs at Melbourne Business School. “They have risen thirty percent on previous years, in just the same way as they did when we went through the last economic downturn in 2001. People start to want to improve their skill level in a tighter market or decide to invest their redundancy pay-out in an MBA.”

The counter-cyclical idea is based on the observation that business schools do well in times of economic difficulty as people attempt to take shelter from the downturn while simultaneously preparing themselves to be best placed when the upturn comes. What’s different about the situation in the Asia-Pacific region is that the economies and employment opportunities are continuing to boom.

“We have definitely received more applications from people coming from North America,” says Lawrence Chan, Director of Marketing and Student Recruiting for MBA Programs at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. “People with decent jobs, some of whom may originally have been from Asia, are coming here because they see the opportunities in this part of the world. For our part, we are really pleased with the employment opportunities taken up by our 2008 cohort, many of whom have achieved their employment goals, while some of our 2009 graduates have already received offers.”

“Firms in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Sydney and Singapore continue to hire strongly and activity has gone up compared to three years ago,” agrees Professor Chris Adam, Postgraduate Programs Director at the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM) within The University of New South Wales. “It is the people who are going back to Europe or North America who are seeing see a cooling of the market.”
Credibility

But studying in Asia Pacific is about far more than placing yourself at the center of an economic boom. Obtaining an MBA in the region is becoming increasingly attractive as people realize they can get a top-ranked business education for a fraction of the cost while also developing their networks in a part of the world that has become an economic powerhouse.

Karen Ma is Head of MBA Marketing and Admissions at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). “We have noticed that interest in Asian business schools has increased from all over the world in the past few years and particularly in the last year,” she says. “Our own rise in applications is partly due to this general interest and partly due to our performance in the rankings. Applicants realize that they can get the same high-quality education at HKUST, very often at a portion of the cost of US or European programs. Most importantly, candidates now see more opportunities here and want to develop their careers in Asia afterwards. Going to an Asian school to learn about Asian business and develop regional networks becomes an obvious choice.”

HKUST and the China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) have both leapt into the magic top twenty of the Financial Times (FT) ranking of Global MBAs in the last couple of years. And a look back at the FT rankings since 2000 shows how these and other Asia Pacific schools have broken through to become globally significant. The Indian School of Business, Shanghai Jiao Tong’s Antai College of Economics and Management, Nanyang Business School, the National University of Singapore (NUS) and the Chinese University of Hong Kong have all made appearances in the rankings in the last few years.

The QS list of Global Top 100 Business Schools tells an identical story, with the number of Asia Pacific schools included leaping from ten to 23 between 2006 and 2007. Furthermore, when you compare the top ten in the QS list with the FT rankings from the past two years, it becomes evident that four key cities account for the vast majority of the well-regarded schools: Shanghai, with its central position in the Chinese economic book; Hong Kong, with its mature, UK-influenced economy and access to China; multicultural Singapore with its infrastructure, governance and position in the center of the region; and Sydney, with its cosmopolitan atmosphere, financial center and post-Olympic exposure. It is no surprise then that both Insead and the University of Chicago have located their Asian campuses in Singapore while the Asian branch of the University of Ontario’s Richard Ivey School of Business is to be found in Hong Kong.

Regional trends

Schools in all these cities are to varying degrees offering their students access to and an understanding of the economic powerhouses of China and India. And one of the characteristics they have in common is the emphasis they place on providing their students with the opportunity to take part in exchange programs, so allowing them to experience a semester in a part of the region they want to learn more about. AGSM for example has 26 exchange programs to choose from.

Maintaining the diversity of the cohort is another common concern for the top schools. “Our broad aim is to create a highly multicultural education and to produce global managers who can manage cross-cultural teams,” says Lawrence Chan at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. “We have students from sixteen countries coming to us and 80 percent or our students come from outside Hong Kong. Even the part-time program now attracts foreigners.”

Another counter-intuitive trend is the increasing importance of the specialist MBA in the region. Many will remember consultancy giant McKinsey’s famous 2005 claim that China would need 75,000 more leaders and managers in the next ten to fifteen years. And it is well known that much of the demand for MBAs from India comes from people who have specialized in technical subjects such as IT, finance or engineering and who now to wish to broaden their skills. Nevertheless, there is now a strong demand for MBA programs that themselves are tailored to a particular area.

“We are seeing more of a demand for specialization,” says Associate Professor Susanna Leong, Vice-Dean for Graduate Studies at NUS Business School. “This is something we have tried to resist for quite a long time, but students do want it and so we now have specialisms in healthcare, real estate, finance, marketing and strategy & organization. Another demand-led trend is a move away from the traditional two-year program towards something that can be completed in a year.”

One major difference between the Asia-Pacific and the North American or European experience is that people in Asia are less likely to be sponsored by their company, even for part-time or Executive MBA programs, perhaps because the workforce is much more mobile and the sponsoring organization is less likely to recoup the benefits. Non full-time programs in places such as Hong Kong will therefore be designed to avoid the necessity for participants to take any time off work.

Will India still be a land of opportunity in the face of global economic slowdown?

2009-01-13T05:36:00.000-08:00

Amidst all the doubts of India getting hit hard by the recession because of the ripple effect coming from USA and Europe, there are some people who are still hopeful and not only hopeful but are confident of that India will still be growing.

" Sir Martin Sorrell, who founded the world’s second-largest advertising and marketing services group WPP in 1985, told the Next Generation India Summit in London recently that he is confident his business in India will continue to grow."

Continue to read the remaining part of the story from INSEAD's Knowledge portal here

My personal take on the issue is -

India wont remain unaffected by the recession, and the growth rate of the nation would be definitely hit hard. But the good news is that since India is one such market which could be still considered as a orthodox economy. Despite all the positive approach towards globalization, India still has some strict rules for all the global players, and hence the impact would be felt slightly lesser. India is one market where the internal demand and supply plays a major role [excluding the fields like IT]. And foreign investment is mostly in the fields of infrastructure and the IT, which will definitely see a down-turn.

And with governments all over the world taking all possible steps in supporting their economy to pass this phase without much pain, the good times are not too far, and I believe it would go any further then 2010 when life would start to settle down, and definitely India would start to recover once again to the same growth levels.

So the itch period would not be more than a year from now, and then things would be back on the same growth track.

Despite poor placements, no effect on Indian MBA application numbers

2009-01-04T06:23:00.000-08:00

While graduates and professionals across the world are flocking to b-schools to escape the hardships of recession, Indian b-schools paint a different story. Despite reports of corporate layoffs and a grim placement scenario at India's undergraduate and engineering colleges, Indian b-schools have not shown a marked increase in the number of applications received for the 2009 admission season. This is good news for you as an MBA aspirant because the competition to get an admission in top b-schools is not about to get any tougher. PaGaLGuY.com speaks to b-schools and engineering colleges to find out why India paints adifferent picture than the rest of the world.

Test taking trends for MBA admissions abroad seem to imply that there is an inverse relationship between the economy’s strength and B-school enrollments. The number of test takers for the Graduate Management Admissions Test (GMAT) from July 2007 to June 2008 was the highest number since the test was established in the 1950’s. The second highest number was in 2002 after the 9/11 attacks which severely weakened the American economy. Further, the numbers of Indian visas for the United Kingdom and Australia have also significantly increased in 2008.

“The economic slowdown will affect MBA applications for foreign business schools as only candidates with work-experience apply to such programs. If pink slips are handed out then it is natural for people with work-experience to strive to do an MBA at B-schools abroad. In India, the scenario is not the same with fresh graduates constituting up to 85 percent of applications at a business school and I do not really believe that the economic slowdown has significantly contributed towards a spike in applications,” opines Professor JK Mitra, Head and Dean at Faculty of Management Studies - Delhi (FMS).

FMS, Delhi has interestingly enough with 75,604 applications recorded a rise of just over 14,000 applications for 2009-11 admissions while an increase of all of 21,000 was recorded for 2008-10 admissions. “Freshers usually work in sectors such as IT and IT enabled services before enrolling in an MBA program and some shrinking has happened in these sectors but nothing noteworthy as such. The recession may have had an impact on this year’s applications but that can be deduced only at the time of GD-PI when candidates will be asked about the options they had at their disposal before opting for an MBA. Intuitively speaking, I think about five percent of the 20 percent increase that we have recorded in admissions will be due to the recession. The remaining portion would be because of simplification of the application process with a provision of online payment being provided from last year onwards and an increase in awareness of the school,” Professor Mitra goes on to explain.

By November it was clear that the world was in the middle of a global economic slowdown. CAT 2008 was taken by over 2.75 lakh MBA aspirants. Applications for institutes such as Management Development Institute – Gurgaon (MDI) and International Management Institute – New Delhi (IMI) which accept CAT scores were open till November 15. TA Pai Management Institute – Manipal (TAPMI), FMS - Delhi and Institute of Management Technology – Ghaziabad (IMT) were MBA colleges that had application deadlines of December 1. “I appeared for CAT but do not think that I have scored enough to get admitted to an IIM. Apart from CAT I did not write any other MBA entrance test as I had thought that placement from IIT Delhi was guaranteed. By November, news of the economic slowdown had come through but I still thought that getting a campus placement from IIT would not be an issue. Placements here began on December 1 and I haven’t got placed yet. There are five to ten people whom I know to be in exactly the same situation and we regret not having filled application forms for MBA. Placements have been very surprising with companies promising to recruit ten-fifteen students and eventually hiring about two or three people. A lot of us are trying for off-campus placements and have begun approaching companies for jobs,” says Ankit Gupta, a final year student at IIT Delhi. The gravity of the placement situation can be gauged from the fact that a world renowned company such as Schlumberger Limited recruited three students from the institute and then proceeded to revoke the offers.

Applications for 2009-11 admissions at TAPMI have in fact witnessed a minor drop with respect to last year. The business school received 4,500 odd applications for the past two years but had recorded 7,500 applications for 2007-09 admissions. “The last date for applying to TAPMI was after CAT and with coaching centers providing comprehensive analyses after the examination, students are in a much better position to judge the schools at which they stand a realistic chance of admissions and hence go about applications in a very systematic manner. Low marketing may have contributed to applications to TAPMI not increasing. Students also have not taken the recession seriously as the Indian economy has not yet been affected in major manner. Actually, MBAs are oblivious of the world around them till placements get affected!” said a member of the admissions committee at the institute.

IMI - Delhi has recorded an increase of 2,500 from admissions in previous years with 10,000 applications being received for 2009-11 admissions. “A big factor behind this is that for the first time we closed our admissions before CAT. Nowadays, with CAT analyses available soon after the examination, people know exactly how much they will be scoring vis-à-vis cut-offs at Indian business schools. We closed our admissions before CAT because we wished that more students apply to IMI. Also, a lot of ranking surveys have a parameter of number of applications per seat and a high number of applications is necessary to score well in this regard,” explains Dr CS Venkatratnam, Director – IMI.

IMT - Ghaziabad and Indian School of Business – Hyderabad (ISB) are two institutes which have reported increases of ten percent and 40 percent respectively wherein the rise in application numbers is also influenced to an extent by a larger intake of students from 2009 onwards. At IMT the number of seats across its branches in Ghaziabad, Nagpur and Dubai has increased by eleven percent while ISB plans to ramp up its seat intake from 440 to over 500 students if not 560 which is what the institute claims to be seat intake for which the business school was initially planned. Interestingly enough at MDI – Gurgaon, the number of seats has increased from 180 to 240 from 2009 onwards but there has not been a significant increase in applications. The institute has received 25,000 applications for 2009-11 admissions which is a marginal 2,000 higher than the applications received for the previous year. “The reason behind this may be the fact that the last date to apply for MDI was a month or so earlier. It is also possible that since we have a relatively high cut-off requirement for admissions, the application number for MDI has stabilized,” comments Professor Subir Verma, Chairman – Post Graduate Program in Management at the institute.

“The number of students appearing for SNAP this year is 1,10,000. This is an increase of 20,000 from last year and in my opinion, this is an expected increase and not a significant number. As for whether the economic slowdown has impacted applications, that can be inferred only when the applicant pool is analysed and quality of students determined. Personally speaking, I do not expect any drastic change in admissions for this year,” says Professor KS Subramanian, Director – Symbiosis Center for Management and Human Resources Development – Pune (SCMHRD).

A spokesperson at Ma Foi Management Consultants commented, “Industry pundits as well as HR professionals feel that each and every industry vertical has been severely hit because of the economic slowdown. Students graduating from business school in 2009 will definitely have a tough situation at hand. The scenario will get much better in the next four-six months and drastically improve in two-three years from now. This is the best time to apply for admissions at a B-school. With the job market the way it is, people are not looking for jobs and hence they should certainly go ahead with their plans for MBA, enroll at a B-school, forget about placements for now and focus on the course curriculum at hand.”

The 2008-10 batch of students at top Indian B-schools such as IIM Ahmedabad and IIM Calcutta consists of an overwhelming 90 percent engineers. With placements at the IITs being severely affected and a lot of engineers not having planned for an MBA and relying on plum placements from IITs, how should the cream undergraduate talent of the country handle the situation? “The economic slowdown has resulted in lesser number of companies visiting campus and making lesser offers. Also, a smaller number of finance and consulting companies has taken part in recruitments and hired fewer students. The scene is dull as far as placements is concerned, on campus and off-campus. Notwithstanding this, it may be worthwhile for a student to take up a job rather than spend a year exclusively for CAT preparation and have a year’s gap in the resume. The placement process is slow this year and while it usually winds up in February, this year it may extend to March or April,” commented Lt Col (Retd) Jayakumar, Deputy Registrar - Training, Placement & Public Relations Office at IIT Madras.

“This is not the year to make deductions. Even if changes are identified, they may not be the ‘right’ changes. Next year’s admissions will make a lot of issues clearer. I look upon the slowdown in a positive light and firmly believe that some level of self-correction was required in the system,” concludes Professor Subramanian of SCMHRD, Pune.

All about getting into AIM,Manila

2009-01-03T19:58:00.000-08:00

[Disclaimer : This information has been picked up from the PagalGuy web-site. This interview was conducted by PagalGuy.com and was published on their web-site on 1st Nov 2008. The same article can be read here]

Adhering to the case study method in its pure form makes W. SyCip Graduate Sschool of Business, Asian Institute of Management, Maniladifferent from other top business schools in Asia, says Associate Dean Ricardo A Lim. According to him, the current worldwide financial crisis will take a toll on glamorous jobs available after MBA. Read more about AIM Manila admissions and placements in an interview with Mr Lim.

What is unique about AIM Manila's MBA in contrast with peer b-schools?

AIM’s uniqueness among Asian B-schools is case-based learning. Few schools in the world practice the case method in pure form: AIM, HBS, Darden, Ivey are probably the ones left. In Asia we continue to be its main proponent. AIM is one of Southeast Asia’s few AACSB-accredited schools, and other schools in the region such as HKUST, Tsinghua, and NUS will acknowledge AIM as the leader in case education.

We feel that other styles, especially heavy framework and theory-based ones, may be too rigid and linear. The case method is the opposite: robust, flexible, and quite capable of handling complex, circular problems. In the case method students tune in more to the present and look forward, are more responsive in ambiguous situations. Such ambiguity is the hallmark of today’s interconnected world—see how rapidly the subprime meltdown happened! This was not at all a linear event.

Finally our minimum criteria for acceptance is therefore two years for the MBA, and six years for the MM. AIM believes that its experienced MBA and MM students gain knowledge and skills best with participant-based learning methods in discussion, simulation, game, and field exercise mode.

What is the difference between the MBA and MM degrees? How does an applicant decide which one to apply for?

The MM is a mid-career program for managers with at least six years’ experience. The MM concentrates on building the students’ leadership capabilities and strategic formulation and execution skills. The median age is about 35, typically married with young kids. Some younger students with requisite experience do opt for the MM, with its more strategic levels of discussion. The median age, however, is much higher, so students should factor this in their decision making.

The MBA meanwhile is for younger, but not fresher, students with two years’ experience. The average incoming batch age is about 25. The MBA focuses on building functional area skills such as finance, marketing, operations, communications, accounting, enterprise development, strategy and ethics, and other sundry skill areas. Some older students with highly technical, non-management backgrounds may to learn about other management functions, also the MBA.

The AIM website claims the MBA program to be 'participative' and conforming to Henry Mintzberg's beliefs on MBA programs. Please give 3 examples that illustrate this, contrasting them against how those 3 situations would be handled in a regular MBA program in other b-schools.

In the MM and MBA we make students do a “walkabout.” This is based on the Australian aborigine custom of sending young men into the bush, to fend for themselves. In the AIM version we send students out on a mission of self-discovery. They stay away for a few weeks on projects of their choice—the professor should not interfere in this choice, nor are there pushed to do a corporate internship. Instead we ask students do something risky, very challenging, something they have not done before. The experience must be transformational. Students can build a well for a poor Filipino village, or start a reading library for a local community; one student decided to take dancing lessons, not having the experience in his entire life: he became quite a competent tango dancer! The lessons learned are not at all textbook, but in Mintzbergian fashion, the student learns from visceral experience, which makes learning sticky and permanent.

Mintzberg also wrote about how managers spend time kibitzing, walking around, communicating, and not necessarily thinking and planning. This is the way we learn, the way we make sense of the world. That describes the day of an AIM student: a continuous building and creative destroying learning cycle of evening discussion with can groups, the “learning” team of buddies that catch each other; the next day’s round of cases, typically 3 per day, 1.5 hour sessions of intense communicating, exchanging. There could be field work, group presentations, mock board room scenes, role plays, improvisational exercises.

Mintzberg believed that a true MBA student was international. Compared to our Asian competitors, we are probably more heterogeneous in class composition. AIM has active bilateral exchange programs with about 35 schools each year, in the US, Europe, and Asia. Our students get a chance to see other cultures for one semester, and AIM students in Manila interact with non-Asians as well: this semester 35 students, about 1/3 AIM’s total student body, came from Europe, South America, and Asia to enroll at AIM.

What differentiates the AIM MBA from that in NUS Singapore and ISB Hyderabad (India) ?

You ask an unfair question, because I cannot answer without seeming to be trite or envious. Both schools have tremendous research, and better, an illustrious history of faculty members. I cannot also claim to know about the latest innovations of these two good schools, which are surely plentiful. I do know that the profile of our MM class matches more closely to ISB, with its short 1 year duration; NUS’s MBA corresponds more closely to our MBA.

Where do we differ? I once again invoke the case method, which I am sure both NUS and ISB practice, but in limited fashion. Another difference is we have been around since 1968, much longer than either school. The result is that we have wider business and alumni networks. We have practitioners on the ground in virtually all Asian countries, as well as Europe and the Americans. It is a very
tight, helping network that takes great pride in the AIM brand.

Please explain briefly the admission procedure for the AIM MBA and MM for an Indian applicant.

Do browse our website for specifics, but in short, we accept a GMAT or XAT or AIMAT entrance scores. Applicants must have the minimum number of years experience, 2 for the MBA and 6 for the MM; must answer the four or five essay questions; submit one recommendation each from work and from school; marksheets from college; a CV. We shortlist Indians beginning December, and we conduct face-to-face interviews in India in February and May.

Is AIMAT different from the GMAT as an exam? Why did AIM choose to have its own admission test when GMAT is already an internationally accepted standard?

We offered AIMAT as a lower cost alternative to the GMAT in the eighties, and in countries where the GMAT was not as accessible. Accessibility is no longer a large issue, and indeed GMAT is an international standard. AIM does accept GMAT scores.

Can Indians apply using GMAT?

Yes. In addition since January 2008 we have also accepted the XAT, per agreement with XLRI. We are hoping to also take CAT scores in the near future.

Does an AIMAT application have advantages over a GMAT application?

None. The two are highly correlated.

If a candidate's GMAT score is better than his AIMAT performance, can he apply using the GMAT only?

If a student takes the AIMAT, we automatically count the score in the application. Yes, if the AIMAT score is bad, we do see it; one cannot “withhold it,” unlike a GMAT. Having said that, one could submit a good GMAT score after taking a bad AIMAT. We recognize that people will sometimes take a bad test, and submitting more than one score may actually help.

Note that while test scores are important for breaking ties, say, for equivalent candidates they make up only 20 pc of total candidate scoring. The remaining 80 pc is based on undergraduate mark sheets and school performance, applicant recommendations, the quality of answers to our essay questions, and our face to face interviews in India, typically in February and May.

How many applications did you receive for each of your August and December MBA intakes last year? How many of them were Indians? How many Indians got shortlisted and how many made it to the MBA batch? How much is the intake in each of the two months?

We are a small program. Each year we plan to take about 130 - 160 students only, spread 2/3 – 1/3 over our September and May batches. Last year we received a total of about 500 applicants for our August and May (not December) batches last year. About 250 were Indians. Of the 250, about 160 were shortlisted for interviews. We ultimately accepted about 120 Indians, of which about 20 appeared in May 2008, and another 84 appeared in September 2008.

Which countries do most of your students come from? Is there a quota for each country?

Filipinos used to be the majority (about 50% of the student body, but now about about 65 pc of our MBA student body and 35% of our MMs come from India. We have no quota, though we do try to consciously get a balance of different countries in our mix.

There seems to be a clear and open focus to attract more Indian students at AIM, given that your website mentions India frequently and has separate India sections for loans. How do you limit the class from becoming 'too Indian'?

India is far too large a market to ignore: we share a common language, English. (We only hope we can get the type of interest in AIM in China as we do in India, but language is a problem; China also does not offer the same generous financing as Indian banks). We both put tremendous value on good education. The Philippines itself is becoming a major business partner with India, eg its common interests in trade and services such as the BPO industry.

The limits is a tough question. We do not consciously “limit” the number of Indians, though we may try to push applicants to a different cohort (in our case, we have a May offering) to balance the load. We also filter out students who are less experienced by telling them to work some more, and defer them to future batches.

Our Indian students also vary greatly by location. Unlike Indian applicants of 20 years ago, our current applicants are far more world-traveled and savvy. About a fifth of our students were actually deployed to the US and Europe in their jobs.

So far we like the results: we have developed a strong, loyal cadre of alumni all over the world. They are our best brand ambassadors, especially given their current stature in Indian management.

How much does the MBA and MM cost including all expenses?

We estimate MBA, total tuition, fees, dorm, and extra living expenses should come to about $ 36,000 for the 16 months. This allows for air travel and entertainment. The MM program of 11 months will cost a total of about $ 30,000.

Which countries do your Indian students end up working at after MBA? How much is their average percentage jump in post-MBA salary compared to pre-MBA?

Most Indian students end up working in India, Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong and Indonesia. We don't have records of the salary range of the students before their MBA. Though the salary range of MBA Indian students after AIM is US$ 24,000 - 84,000 per annum.

In term of the sector percentage, consulting companies hire 7 pc, Consumer Products 3 pc, Financial Services 23 pc, Manufacturing 3 pc, Media/Entertainment 5 pc, Petroleum/Energy 2 pc, Real Estate 2 pc and Technology 37 pc.

How do you see the job market shaping up for AIM MBA students in view of the current economic crisis? It is said that South East Asia will be in focus for some time now. What steps is AIM taking to cash in on the wave?

It will be tough. And the bad days are not over. From what we hear, this subprime crisis might only be a prelude to a bigger and badder consumer credit crisis. If this should happen, we hope it will be when market confidence and liquidity will have been restored.

The first industry hit are of course financial institutions. It is early days as we try to sort out what happened in the last two weeks, but we might redirect, deflect the career plans of graduates slightly. Rather than travel down “normal” corporate or investment banking jobs, we might re-route them to, say, risk management. Since 2006 we have built in the FRM as an alternative to the CFA. We might spur them to be flexible, to take non-bank jobs that may initially be only tangential to real finance, e.g. project management, brand management, analysis and research. All these accrue in any case to future finance jobs.

All other industries will be hurt across the board, of course: services like BPO and consulting will probably take a short term hit and slow hiring; the recession may mean fewer marketing positions available.

If our students can stay patient, they will win. What may be missing are the glamorous consulting and investment banking jobs for now. But there are many other jobs to do in this crisis: new product development, outsourcing, restructurings, reengineering (in a good sense of the word), organization development and training: all need savvy MBAs.

There is some light even at this early stages of the crisis. I’ve spoken to AIM grads in Finance positions, CFOs and Treasurers and analysts alike. They believe that while Southeast and South Asia are not immune to the global recession, we might be more resilient than the Westerners think. Because of the 1997 Asian crisis many Asian governments were better conditioned. In retrospect Asian central banks like the RBI may have at first seemed regulatory-happy, but now it turns out they were more prudent. Asian economies have put in more risk safeguards than run-and-gun Western economies. Our use of credit is strict, our savings rates are good, and our consumption is still in control. We continue produce our goods and services more efficiently than Western firms, and our quality is getting better. Asia may actually have a quicker turnaround to recovery than one might think.

AIM .... starting it out!

2009-01-02T00:47:00.000-08:00

AIM is the short name for Asian Institute of Management located at Manila, Philippines. As the name itself says - it's a management institute. And for all those, who still don't know, I got selected for its MBA degree course some time back, and now I am planning to join the course in September 2009.

I am starting to blog here with several reasons at the back of my mind, and some top the list reasons are as below......

- While I started searching for information related to AIM, it was difficult, and I could spot only few pages on the internet with desirable information. And that was absolutely frustrating. I really don't wish to see others in the same trauma. This page would primarily serve as a information gateway to AIM related things, and my life at AIM as a student. And if I happen to complete the course successfully, then I would continue to write as an alumni of the institute (but trust me, there is a huge IF there).

- I have got this opportunity to do MBA after a long wait (and hence some work-ex adds into my account, by default!), I wish to share all those experiences and frustrations, and also some borrowed stories from friends.

- Being an Indian how does it matter to be on the either side of the MBA college gate, I wish to explore and share my views on both. I am more interested in the Indian angle to it, hence writing my own experiences.

- I have heard a lot of MBA-trauma stories (not sleeping for 2-7 days, quizzes, presentations, finance, marketing etc etc)......I wish to face all and share it with you all.

- I also want to give my own views on whether one should be actually opting for MBA or not!

- the possibilities of all the domains of MBA, and the MBA on the whole (I still have huge doubts in this area, trust me, and I myself need some help from every corner of the world). (while I was preparing I always thought that what would an HR do? or what would an marketing guy actually do to sell the product etc, these kinds of doubts will be clear after going through the posts. You see, I am genuinely trying to clear all the smoke around MBA).

- After the recent meltdown stories I have got two strong influences from almost all my friends and I wish to track the story on both the lines. First, Studying finance will go out of fashion (even some of the Finance pass-outs say this). Second, Doing MBA in this recession time is the best thing to do (most of the college counselors are saying this in their interviews.) {I am going to explore both the statements in the times to come, and wish to share my thoughts on the same}

I believe I have set the mood of the flow of topics and the expectation level with this post, and the real action would begin soon. I would start with my initial days when I had just heard about the word MBA and will take you through the other stories relating to my MBA aspirations......all this journey from my past till present will have to continue until I actually start attending the classes which will happen only in Sept (I still have eight months with me......so expect a good number of posts in between). Keep coming back!