Monday, July 23, 2007

Any Time Money (ATM)

In the classes of financial accounting, we learnt how to maintain journals and ledgers. The professor gave practical examples, but this art and science of commerce is not that easy, unless you are a B.Com. At one time, I used to keep an account of all my expenses; but I have been happy-go-lucky for a long time now. Now my sixth sense does the account balancing. But some disturbances happen in case of some unexpected events, like lending some money to friends. This is what I did yesterday. My sixth sense was not in guard it seems, therefore when I was returning back this evening; I got to find only a twenty rupee note and some coins with me. I paid my auto-rickshaw fare of Rs 18. (that was debit to expenses account and credit to cash account, if I show off some of my learning) Now some coins remained with me. In the financial capital of India, with only some COINS in my pocket at 10 PM! To have some fun, I purchased one ice cream from the road side vendor. Now I didn't find it motivating enough to count the remaining coins and show off my calculation skills. Did I feel insecure? Did I feel broke? No! Because I had that card in my pocket ' ATM card: apne account ka power!

The way ATMs have changed our attitude towards money is amazing. Ten years back, the fattest wallet was the richest; now that having maximum number of card holding slots is. Call it Automatic Teller Machine or Any Time Money, ATMs have made our lives easier. I remember once I had to borrow money from my bun-makkhan-wallah in Lucknow, because I went out of cash on a national holiday. Now, I just head towards the nearest ATM.

The location of the ATMs also speaks volumes about the quality of banking services of a particular bank. In Thane, I could find two SBI ATMs in my range of movement, one in the Bank building itself, and other in a very neglected building, in a very neglected corner of a very busy market. But the ICICI ATMs were almost everywhere, near Railway station, at the Anand theatre, and one at the entrance of the street leading to my apartment.

Private Banks have taken the experience of ATMs to such a distance, that we can hardly call them ATMs. Along with dispensing cash, the small corner room consists of cash and cheque deposit counter, complaints, requests and suggestion desks, phone banking centres, and many others that I don't use or know. Recently ICICI had started demand draft by phone facility. The philosophy is not only to save costs, but also to enhance the customer satisfaction and delight.

ATMs are just one aspect; the prospects of phone banking and internet banking are tremendous. But the penetration of such facilities is the point of concern. These are things of the future, but how long will it take to get to reach the aam adami?

One of our professors said that banks in the coming time will penalise those customers who go to the bank's brick-n-mortar branches. This would be a horrible situation. We have already fought the government's decision to extract a surcharge on cash withdrawals above a limit. Any step which leads to giving monopoly powers to banks is very bad. Any system should be able to protect the weakest of the customers. ATMs are nice, but the brick-n-mortar branches are equally important. Otherwise the invisible hand would get a bad face.

© Rahul

Friday, July 20, 2007

It will also pass

This moment will also pass is a small realisation, but in many conditions it is a critical one. Last month, I went through one experience which made me realise this.

I had to make two trips between Thane and Vile Parle on a single day. At the end of the day I was tired and was returning by train. It was around 5 PM when my train on western line stopped at Dadar station where I had to change train for central line. The train came, fully packed, as usual. I too was able to board the train, pushing and being pushed like animals. I was able to find a place inside to stand on my feet. Two minutes after the train started, I realised that my mobile phone was not in my pocket. One co passenger gave a call to my number and it showed switched-off: a sure indication that it was stolen. Still, I searched it on the floor, whenever it was visible, in a foolish belief that it would have fallen somewhere.

As the train reached Thane, it was raining cats and dogs, as one of my colleagues used to say. I tried to get an auto, but to my horror, no auto wallah was ready to go to a "not-so-far" distance. My experience with Mumbai rains told me that there was no benefit staying somewhere, as water had started logging on the roads. I had to be on the move. For 15 minutes, I tried to get an auto, but no benefit. It was a very painful situation. I started walking. No bus passed which could have dropped me to my destination. My leather shoe started giving away last year I had lost another loving shoe. I kept walking, realising again that my umbrella was also not enough.

For 25 minutes, I walked in the heavy rains, on water logged roads, and without a phone. I tried to get an auto on the way, but no one agreed to drop me. It was really a miserable condition.

10 minutes after I reached my home, all my pain and discomfort had vanished. I was happy and comfortable as ever. Then I realised nothing is for ever. If we are having a hard time, it will also pass.

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Why to hold ourselves back?

Recently there was a small debate on whether we should intervene when people behave irresponsible in public, or should we mind our own business and hold ourselves back. These are three incidents from the last three months when I couldn't hold myself back.

Incident I:

To reach the Elephanta Caves from Mumbai, we need to catch a boat from the Gateway of India. It is one hours ride. I was on board one such time, when I noticed a guy finish a bottle of drinking water. He was about to throw the bottle in the sea, when I intervened and asked him not to throw it in the sea, as it made the sea unclean. He was with 4-5 friends of his, and they were in jovial mood. But he obeyed and interestingly fixed the bottle in the ceiling of the boat! After some time, one of his friends brought a bottle of cold drink and asked him to finish it. He finished it, and before I could even think of intervening, he suddenly threw it far away in the sea!

Though we worship trees and rivers, in our practical lives, we care least about our environment. I could have sat back, and enjoyed the wind; but I intervened. Shouldn't there be some societal pressure on us when we behave irresponsible in public?

Incident II:

I was waiting for my bus. It was a green street in Thane, and there were young trees planted within protective fences. A boy of around 12 came and started picking leaves of a young Ashoka tree. He was making a stack from the collected leaves, for playing. I reached him and asked him not to cause harm to the tree, as it will die without its leaves. He didn't understand me; I think language was the problem. Then I asked him that if he wanted leaves, I could give him plenty. I raised my hand and broke a bigger and greener branch from the big tree above. I gave that branch to the boy and asked him to play with this and leave the young tree. But he shrugged me off, and said he wanted that Ashoka tree only. My bus arrived, and I left in pain, as the boy continued breaking the leaves of the Ashoka tree.

If everyone holds himself / herself back, how would the new generation understand, what is correct and what is not?

Incident III:

I was waiting for my train at Patna railway station. There was one seat vacant on the bench I was sitting on, so when an old couple arrived, the man offered the seat to his wife. After some time, I noticed a splash of water on the floor. Then the old lady asked her husband to go fill up the empty bottle. How could she throw water on the floor like this! I tried to control myself, as I respected her age. But I couldn't. I asked the lady, whether she had deliberately thrown water on the floor. She said that it happened by mistake. If the case were otherwise, I would have given her a lecture.

I couldn't hold me back.

Many times in my daily life, I have hold myself back; due to many reasons. I can remember one such incident.

Incident IV:

Patna to Motihari by road took only four hours this time, thanks to the four-lane highway being constructed. Almost all the buses run movies on the TV aboard. Earlier, we used to enjoy at lease two complete movies. This time, when we were 15 minutes before Motihari, we noticed that the sound of the TV had become very less. It was a movie of Akshay Kumar, in which he had struggled throughout his life, being a police officer, to catch the murderer of his father (So typical Bollywood). The climax had arrived, but the TV was mute! One man shouted at the conductor to increase the volume. He didn't obey. After a few minutes, one more man asked the conductor to increase the volume. This time, the conductor replied that the TV was about to be shut off. Then the driver shut the TV off! This time, there were no protests. We all knew that the conductor and driver had been non-sense; but no one protested further. I too hold myself back. It was 15 minutes of quite journey afterwards before we reached our destinations, still wondering what happened to Akshay Kumar.

We hold ourselves back mainly not to get into any trouble. But imagine a situation where everyone holds himself back. Do we need to break our molds at times? Do we need to be unreasonable at times? GB Shaw shows the way:

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to him. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

B School Rankings in India

Anyone who aspires to be an MBA, must have searched the net for B-School rankings. Even those who have no direct interest in B Schools, browse through the newspaper and magazines reports and special features for rankings and placement figures. And the media helps by creating a hype, by projecting the placement figures which are always scaling up. One fine morning, the headline is: ISB graduate gets 1 Crore as starting salary! The nation wonders, and boys can see something in the eyes of their fathers. Expectations rise.

B School rankings have not always been controversial. The controversies started when the B Schools starting pushing their brands and marketed themselves in all possible ways. They consistently objected in the rankings where they were ranked lower than their immediate competitors. There has been some undercurrents, that some rankings are fixed.

MBA coaching institutes play a major role in shaping public opinion. Lately, the coaching institutes have gone quality conscious, they won't put any one up or down because that affects their credibility. TIME [Link] is one such institute offering preparatory classes for CAT and other management entrance exams. TIME had come out with a new concept: they won't rank the institutes, but they will categorize them. Here is the ranking according to TIME: [Link]

India‘s Best B-Schools

The Top 90 management institutes in the country have been divided into five broad categories. A numerical ranking often does not have a sound scientific basis. The parameters and, more importantly, the weightages given to these tend to be extremely subjective.

A qualitative analysis of a B-school on pre-determined parameters can however give you a more comprehensive picture. These parameters include placements track records, quality of faculty members, quality of students, quality of infrastructure, image of the institute, etc. However being based on perspective, the resultant rankings too, are thus subject to many fierce debates. T.I.M.E. has used its extensive student database and years� of experience in the field to categorise the top 90 institutes.

Given below is the categorisation of the Top B-Schools. Please note that within each category, the B-Schools are listed in alphabetical order � there is no ranking or grading WITHIN each category.

For each institute included in our list, it is the flagship course of that institute that has been considered for the purpose of the categorization. For example, while the IIMs have different programmes, it is the PGP programme that has been considered for including the IIMs in the top 10.

As a part of the selection criteria, a number of management institutes also include a minimum percentage of marks to be scored by the students in their graduation for the students to be eligible to apply to such institutes.

Broadly, these categories are meant to aid the students in applying to institutes. Within a category, the institutes are of approximately the same quality. Of course, the categorisation is only indicative and students should make independent inquiries before taking a final decision about which institutes to apply to.

The Top 10 are the so-called ‘Ivy-League’ institutes that every student dreams of getting an admission into. Many of these institutes are comparable with the best in the world. Indeed, some of them regularly feature in the lists released by international business magazines. These institutes invariably have a 100% placement record. Even the not-so-good students at these institutes manage to get very good jobs on account of the rub-off effect of the institute.

The “A+” & “A” categories of institutes are those that fall into the Top 35. They offer a high quality of education in terms of faculty quality and infrastructure facilities. These institutes usually have a 100% placement record. Only the poor performers at these institutes may have some difficulties regarding placements. Some of the top students at these institutes should be able to secure placements that are comparable to those offered at the Top 10 institutes. Most students should be more than happy to join these institutes if they are able to get admission.

The “B+” category of institutes offers a consistent quality of education in terms of faculty quality and infrastructure facilities even though these may not be comparable to those of the top institutes. These institutes are successful in providing placements to their top students, especially those with good communication skills, but do not have a 100% placement record. A student at one of these institutes would have to work extra-hard to secure a good rank and high marks so as to enhance his placement chances.

The “B” category of institutes are those that are well regarded at a local level. These institutes may not provide too many national level placement opportunities but are generally successful in providing placements to many of their students with prominent local companies. 

“TOP TEN” Category (in alphabetical order) – India‘s Best Management Institutes

1.   Faculty of Management Studies (FMS), Delhi
2.   Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad
3.   Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Bangalore
4.   Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Calcutta
5.   Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Indore
6.   Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Kozhikode
7.   Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Lucknow
8.   Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad (one-year course)
9.   Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies (JBIMS), Mumbai
10. Xavier Labour Relations Institute (XLRI), Jamshedpur

“A+” Category (in alphabetical order)

1.   Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), New Delhi
2.   Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi
3.   Management Development Institute (MDI), Gurgaon
4.   Mudra Institute of Communication, Ahmedabad (MICA) (for Marketing/Advertising)
5.   Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), Mumbai
6.   National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE), Mumbai
7.   S.P. Jain Institute of Management and Research (SPJIMR), Mumbai
8.   SJM School of Management, IIT, Bombay
9.   Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (SIBM), Pune
10. Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai

“A” Category (in alphabetical order)

1.   Bharathidasan Institute of Management (BIM), Trichy
2.   Fore School of Management, New Delhi
3.   Goa Institute of Management (GIM), Goa
4.   Indian Institute of Science (IISc.), Bangalore
5.   Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur
6.   Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras
7.   Institute of Management Technology (IMT), Ghaziabad
8.   Institute of Rural Management , Anand (IRMA) (for Rural Management)
9.   International Management Institute (IMI), New Delhi
10.  K.J. Somaiya Institute of Management Studies, Mumbai
11. Sydenham Institute of Management Studies and Research and
      Entrepreneurship Education, Mumbai
12. Symbiosis Centre for Management and Human Resources Development (SCMHRD), Pune
13. T. A. Pai Management Institute (TAPMI), Manipal
14. University Business School (UBS), Chandigarh
15. Xavier Institute of Management (XIM), Bhubaneswar

“B+” Category (in alphabetical order)

1.   Amrita Institute of Management (AIM), Coimbatore
2.   Birla Institute of Management Technology, NOIDA
3.   Chetna’s R. K. Institute of Management Studies and Research, Mumbai
4.   Department of Commerce and Management Studies, University of Pune, Pune (PUMBA)
5.   Department of Financial Studies, University of Delhi South Campus, Delhi
6.   Great Lakes Institute of Management , Chennai (One year Course)
7.   Hyderabad Central University (HCU), Hyderabad
8.   ICFAIN Business School, Gurgaon
9.   ICFAIN Business School, Hyderabad
10. ICFAIN Business School, Navi Mumbai
11. Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), Kolkata Campus
12. Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Management (IISWBM), Kolkata
13. Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur
14. Institute for Financial Management and Research, (IFMR) Chennai
15. Institute of Management Development and Research (IMDR), Pune
16. Institute of Technology & Management (ITM), Mumbai
17. Kirloskar Institute of Advanced Management Studies (KIAMS), Harihar, Karnataka
18. Lal Bahadur Shastri Institute of Management, Delhi
19. Loyola Institute of Business Administration (LIBA), Chennai
20. National Institute of Technology (NIT), Trichy
21. Nirma University Institute of Management, Ahmedabad
22. S.P. Jain Institute of Management and Research (SPJIMR), Dubai Campus
23. SDM Institute for Management Development, Mysore
24. Symbiosis Institute of International Business (SIIB), Pune
25. Welingkar Institute of Management, Mumbai

“B” Category (in alphabetical order)

1.   Alliance Business Academy, Bangalore
2.   Amity Business School, New Delhi
3.   Bharatiya Vidyapeeth, Pune
4.   Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi
5.   B. K. School of Business Management, Ahmedabad
6.   Christ College, Bangalore
7.   Delhi School of Economics, Delhi
8.   Faculty of Management Studies, BHU, Varanasi
9.   ICFAIN Business School, Bangalore
10. Indian Institute of Forest Management (IIFM), Bhopal
11. Indian Institute of Planning & Management, Delhi
12. Indian School of Mines (ISM), Dhanbad
13. Institute of Public Enterprise (IPE), Hyderabad
14. Institute of Technology & Management (ITM), Bangalore
15. Institute of Technology & Management (ITM), Chennai
16. MBE Program of the Delhi University
17. Osmania University College of Business Management
18. Pondicherry Central University (PCU)
19. PSG Institute of Management, Coimbatore
20. R A Podar Institute of Management, Jaipur
21. School of Communication & Management Studies (SCMS), Cochin
22. SIES College of Management Studies, Mumbai
23. Siva Sivani Institute of Management (SSIM), Hyderabad
24. Sri Ram College of Commerce, MBA-GPO, Delhi
25. St. Joseph‘s College of Commerce, Bangalore
26. Symbiosis Institute of Management Studies (SIMS), Pune
27. Symbiosis Institute of Telecom Management (SITM), Pune
28. Xavier Institute of Management and Entrepreneurship (XIME), Bangalore
29. Xavier Institute of Social Sciences (XISS), Ranchi
30. Xavier Vignana Jyothi Institute of Management (XVJIM), Hyderabad

But there are some who would love number game. Many institutes, magazines and newspapers come out with numbered rankings.

With the popularization of internet, a new medium has come up: internet based preparation aids. These websites make use of all the features of the internet. UrPercentile [Link] is a very good site. It is based on the power of Yahoo Groups [Link]. Here, members get daily practice assignments, which they have to solve and send the answers to the group. Next day, the solutions will come. In case of any doubts, the moderators and other members of the yahoo group will help the person. It is a strong network. It is promoted by the MBAs from IIMs and other top institutes.

Let us see the B School rankings provided by UrPercentile. [Link]

1.                  Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad

2.                  Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Bangalore

3.                  Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Calcutta

4.                  Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Lucknow

5.                  Xavier Labour Relations Institute (XLRI), Jamshedpur

6.                  Faculty of Management Studies (FMS), Delhi

7.                  Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad (one-year course)

8.                  S.P. Jain Institute of Management and Research (SPJIMR), Mumbai

9.                  Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Indore

10.              Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), New Delhi

11.              Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), Mumbai

12.              Management Development Institute (MDI), Gurgaon

13.              Institute of Rural Management , Anand (IRMA) (for Rural Management)

14.              National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE), Mumbai

15.              Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Lucknow

16.              Xavier Institute of Management (XIM), Bhubaneswar

17.              VGSOM, IIT Kharagpur

18.              IIT Delhi

19.              SJMSOM, IIT Mumbai

20.              IIT Kanpur

21.              IIT Roorkee

22.              IIT Madras

23.              Fore School of management, Delhi

24.              Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai

The complete ranking list up to All India Rank 101 is available at their site at the link mentioned [Link].

There are several rankings available and many of them are not fair. If you personally ask me, I would recommend these two, because I know both of these personally. I believe both rankings are fair. The differences between these two rankings, if any, are because they are prepared by two different sets of junta. TIME ranking is based on the experience of the institute's faculty and feedback of the students selected from the past from the institute. And the Ur Percentile ranking has been prepared by the moderators, who are MBAs themselves, and know the inner world, something beyond the hype.

Monday, July 9, 2007

Your take on HR

We had our first lecture for HR, Human Resource and Behavioral Sciences to be precise. The professor who came up to take the class is an industry veteran, with around three dozen years of work experience. He has worked for small Indian family businesses, as well as in big modern firms. No-brainer that we were to be showered by his wisdom. 

He asked two basic questions in front of the class:

1.      How do you define the HR as a department, to a layman?

2.      What is special about HR, that we need a separate department?

We had a hard time ahead. Starting from "managing human resources", the junta fought to satisfy him. But no way! At the end, he described the HR function in a manner most unexpected.

He explained that the work of the HR function is the same as that of a mother while bringing up her child: Feeding, nurturing, developing, correcting, counseling, etc. He emphasized a lot on this mother-child relational aspect.

But I think differently. I believe that the HR is just the facilitator of the management policies. It is just a "facilitator", not an organization as a whole. At the end of the day, the line managers are those who make or break the company's culture. The problem in comparing it with mother-child relation is that the employees begin to think as if the HR department is "responsible" for "all" their problems. So if a boss doesn't treat a subordinate well, the subordinate will think that the HR department is not working. As employees, we forget to think that we need to bring the issues in front of the HR people, before they can help. In my case, when my HR manager came to know about some issues between me and my colleague, he called us and counseled us. But it can't happen every time. Of course at the end of every year there are performance reviews, where the problems in the organization get reflected. But I have noticed that the employees "expect" a lot from the HR department, and the main reason behind that expectation is that they perceive the department in line with the "mother-child" relationships. What is your take? Do you think that the mother-child model for the HR function is OK? If yes, to what extent? 

Now is the time to open up the text-books.

Saturday, July 7, 2007

Perils of distance learning in India

Last month, I appeared for the final exams of my PGJMC (Post Graduate Diploma in Journalism and Mass Communication) from IGNOU. I had filled up their online form, marking my centre of examination as Thane, in a hope that my centre would be conveniently near my residence. But I discovered that Thane was a huge district, and my centre was at a school in Tarapur, Boisar, which is famous for its nuclear power plant. I reached the centre in time. That had made me woke up at 4 O' clock in the morning, and change trains once. The centre was an IGNOU study centre built up by a trust from Tatas. The examination hall was the same hall used for audio-video trainings. Places were marked for 20 students who were to appear for the exam. A girl was already waiting in the room, deeply engrossed in her last minute preparations. The exam was to be of three hours duration. 

To my surprise, not a single other student turned up for the exams. The examiner came with sealed question paper, and after some rituals, we were allowed to write the exams. The girl was writing her last exams for MBA. But only two out of twenty actually turned up: only 10%! Ultimately it turned up that I too couldn't appear for two out of my four papers because of unavoidable reasons.

The perils of distance education in India are two:

1. Lack of quality educational institutes offering distance learning.

2. Low enrollment rates because the distance learning courses are perceived inferior than regular courses.  

3. Lots of joining students are actually disinclined, and drop eventually.

To our amazement, all of these three points are interrelated. There are some individual institutes like Ignou and Symbiosis distance learning, who maintain a level of quality in their courses. But there are far more number of one-room institutes who sort of sell out the certificates. I have completed a diploma in industrial safety, and I can say that not only the course material was not up to the standard, but the final exam was like a formality. Ignou is an exception; its course materials are of very good quality, written in a narrative manner to facilitate distance learning, it has study centers all across India, and their final exams are rigorous. For example, for my PGJMC course, I received 20 books, had to submit 20 assignments in one year and had to appear for an examination of 4 papers. Otherwise, despite having thousands of colleges, India has not yet fully exploited the potential of distance education. 

To make the matter worse, there are a number of disinclined students who join the courses offered by correspondence. Later, either they change their mind and join some other courses, or they drop out and start a business. The housewives, who take up some courses, may find it hard to continue, eventually dropping. The only loser in all these cases is the distance education system as a whole.

If the present situation continues, the private institutes may drop the idea of running these courses. Or, they will make lesser investments in maintaining the quality of the courses, to make the process economically feasible. A vicious cycle will thus start rolling.

Government can play a very important role here. Distance education plays a very important role in a country like India where both the literacy rate and enrolments in higher education are very less. Institutions like Ignou, though they continue to be beefed up with government funds, must continue. Some inquiry should be made in order to understand why exactly distance learning is not very successful in India. The practice of self correction and continuous development will make courses from these institutes much sought after.