FAS with Sandeep Gokhale...

        In general... any speech filled with Jargon, management fundae and illogically sounding twisted oxymorons are referred in MBA style as GAS(Garbage Analysis Systems). The word GAS can be used either as a noun or also as a verb for example ...
        "Let us all GAS together at the paper.. after all Relative grading shall definitely GAS us across."
        Somehow something which has emerged as a totally opposite subject is FAS (Financial Accounting Standards).. Oh yeah...i know you must be wondering after my previous totally diabolical stand on anything concerned with Financial subjects, what could have done me in ??
        The answer my dear friends... was Sandeep Gokhale..
        A brief introduction ...Mr.Sandeep Gokhale, Senior V.P of Vedanta Resources (known earlier as Sterlite group) prior to this was the Business Development Mgr for Jindal Steel. Currently he also takes classes to students across various insti. on subjects related to Finance; and is currently taking the subject FAS for us :)
        Here was a person who took us 4 Straight hours of class with only a 15 mins break.. on a sunday morning ... he took a abysmally low point in our day to the zeniths of F.A understandings ....
        Suddenly as if there was a magic charm I have started adoring P&L statements, Cash flows and all other financial instruments...
        The really wonderful aspect was that S.G started with the theoretical part, and then took a tangential practical example (mostly from his Work-exp) and then went to the next tangent and then so on and so forth.. ultimately forming a perfectly round shape bringing us back to the initial understanding !!
        He gave us amazing insights into Taxation, depreciation and everything connected with them..
        Did u know that the company has to file a min depreciation if in case they have to declare dividends ?
        And I really adored the practical example he gave of how the share prices of Tisco did a See-Saw, though the core competency of the group increased substantial..

        All hail S.G :)

        p.s: SPJIMR does have it's own share of experienced Full time faculty, whose CV if i have to list, would have occupied this entire page.... but it is just I haven't been exposed to their classes... and after the first experience with a thorough industry experienced faculty... raring for more

P.G Labs....... Re-inventing yourself !!!

       Personal Growth LABS, as christened in SPJIMR.... these are a culmination of theory and practical exposure to Team dynamics, self realization and conflict resolvability.
       After the entire onslaught of our foundation exams, it was a more than welcome break to head off as an entire group towards lonavala on a 4 day team-building exercise, involving Ice-breaker events, trekking, assault course, event management and a helluva lot more.
       Apart from these various physical activities, what really made sense to me was when we discussed about various OB related theories and how exactly we had applied these without our own intrinsic knowledge, few of the idealogies were simply mind-blowing....
       And of course, as the Adage goes... "Better experienced than informed" i personally feel that P.G labs is one of the finest experiences of my life-time which cannot be expressed in mere mortalish words.
       We went as 164 distinct indivuals but returns back as a single entity... and i guess, it really reflects on the success of the P.G Labs


       The Theory behind P.G labs which is being formulated can be expressed as succintly in the following diagram :

End of foundation ... beginning of ??

        I still quite vividly remember the day, 21st of June and in midst of a team meeting at Hewlett Packard i got a call with my excited sister on the other end... yelling "You got your foundation books..... there are three of them, each with the width of Harry potter's Goblet of fire and length full-scape"

        Strange as that may sound... that was the ultimate truth.... these were monstrosities in the name of management books and we had to finish reading them for the pre-foundation tests (failing these means rolling back on the baggage and the fees)

        Of course.. the above parah.. was hardly anything remotely associated with reality.

        Pre-foundation exams were cleared by all of us holding on to a minuscule manuscript called the "DOCKET" which was sent along with these books summarizing only key concepts required (more so like the "made easy series" in engineering)

        And then came the Foundation...
        These goliaths in the name of books were but sugar-candy as we started reading them... fluffy and sweet.

        The course content for our Foundation can be outlined as follows :-
        a)Financial Accounting (Author:Stice & Stice)
        b)Micro Economics (Author: Manikw)
        c)Quant. mgmt (Author: Ken black)
        d)Managerial Communication
        e)Intro to Case methodology
        f)What management is ? (book review of the same : Joan Magretta,Nan Stone )

        Being engineers, we did what we do best... "LAST MIN studying" and ironically, i was suddenly enamored by the beauty of each of these books and currently after our foundation exams have finished I have taken up re-reading of these for beyond academic purpose (how un-engineer can i get ;) ??)

        Talking about being un-engineerish, we finished all our assignments on our own (without Paulo Alto's help... in case u are wondering this phrase of mine... paulo alto is the research center for XEROX), and group-works were finished within the specified time-frame.

        Overall memories of the foundation course flood me as a premier training grounds for the un-initiated of us into the world of Ledgers & accounts, Marginal utility & oligopoly, sample case study initiatives and better communication (oral & written)

        Of we go unto P.G LABS .... a 4 day outing after slogging continuously the past entire week for the foundation exams; unwinding SP STYLE

And you have been "AD-MAPPED"...

ADMAP - STRIVING FOR EXCELLENCE
Assessment & Development of Managerial & Administrative Potential,or as the Junta at SP refer it with it's cute & sweet abb. "ADMAP"; is not just a course but rather the way of life in SPJAIN....

        ADMAP is a home-grown program of SPJIMR that has continuously evolved to its present form over the last several years. Fostered under the guidance of our HON. DEAN Dr. Shrikant, M. L. (one of my personal inspirations as i joined SP), this program is more like having a practical approach towards administration by involving the students into the working architecture of SPJAIN as such; students shall be assigned to various committees (either randomly or based on their preferences) and then together with the faculty in-charge they shall forge across an entire year trying to innovate and implement their ideologies.

         Agreed, that the concept is not novel.. but what really caught my eyes were the range of committees that have been created, the diversity not-withstanding the work profile and opportunities that each offer is truly bombastic (if i am permitted to use such a word)
         We have committees ranging from PRCom(public relationship) to Infra COM(Infrastructure), each of the specs (i.e finance, marketing, IM) have their own individual spec. SBUs(Strategic Business Units).

         Numerically speaking this year, we have around 23 core-committees along with a few more special interest groups such as LIFE (environment forum), Media, et all which are not mandatory to join.

         The activities that each and every committee has to be involved during the entire academic year are not exactly pre-defined and usually depends on the energy levels of each committee, but nevertheless both the scope and the budget being alloted for each of the committee is not bound.
         Usually every Com. would have it's own specific Event, e.x: each of the SBUs have their own flagship event, in the case of Info. Mgmt. they have Bhavitva, which involves a industry panel discussion and various events which are out to resolve the current issues plaguing the IT field so on and so forth.

         Now it would definitely be inappropriate if i stop with the workings of ADMAP with only the practical level discussions... behind ADMAP has evolved a really massive theory, bordering closely on OB(Organizational behaviour) & BP (Business Practices) and further on we also have nine modalities (modules) to be finished by the end of our first year in ADMAP;it would be worthwhile to note that the best of the brains of the institute are working behind making this course-work really path-breaking... and believe me... it really shows.

        p.s: I got into Entre COM (Entrepreneurship Committee), which was my second choice after CIG (Consultancy Interest Group) ... lets see as the flagship unfolds.