What they don’t teach you at a B-school …..
Posted on February 8, 2010
Filed Under Blog, Career Launcher, College and education, Entrepreneurship, Satya Speaks
The title of this article itself is clichéd and over-written. However, I guess it is almost like a love story. Every generation loves hearing / seeing a love story all over again with a fresh and contemporary perspective. Hence, I agreed to write this out by shaking off my own inertia ! May be, I owe it to the world for a long time to come…..
Let me share my thoughts from my own journey since that cannot be contested. Here are my share of insights on the topic. I entered a business school long ago. I stop short of saying, ‘in the Paleolithic age’. That was in 1991-93. I had squandered most of my teen trying to get to the Indian Cricket team and managed to get nowhere closer there. So, my safety parachute turned out to be CAT or MBA entrance exams just to make sure that I do not end up as a clerk on sports quota in some public sector enterprise !
In short, I reached an IIM with little knowledge but just one skill of cracking the DU exams through the 10-year question paper solving route. What does that mean ? I crawled the entire first team to under debit-credit, first chapter or two of ‘Kotler’ for marketing etc, when the batch was running at a speed of a Cheetah. At the end of the first term, my score card read ‘D’ against two of the easiest courses – Mktg and Prob/Stats. And, I was already making my way to the top of the ranking list arranged in the reverse order!
The journey was similarly traumatic despite my best efforts through the six arduous terms at IIMB. My best efforts got me a ‘C’ in my exams. By the end of two years, I managed to beat about 15 people in the ranking list – ranked around 150 in a batch of about 165 !
So, what were the things I learnt during my stay at an IIM ?
1. I learnt a few fundamentals (or at least the jargon) in areas such as marketing, finance, strategy etc,.
2. I learnt that I was in a large crowd of hugely competitive and gifted peers. My best efforts saw me top at the bottom. Anything less would have gotten me evicted from the campus !
3. To my relief, I did learn that I do have a skill or two that were valuable in my worldview and that I had in fair measure….Thankfully, I believed in my own insight.
To cut the long story short, my IIM stay provided me with knowledge that was relevant to appreciate management, business and a career in the corporate sector. Surely, what it gave was necessary for one to get started. Above all, it did give me the ‘thappa’ (Stamp) of being an IIM Alumnus. Most of the world believes that an IIM Alumnus cannot be an ‘idiot’. IF they come across one, he/she is seen as an exception.
What more is needed to be successful or happy in life ?
As mentioned, the management knowledge and skills that a B-school provides is necessary, for sure. However, it does not meet the criteria of sufficiency as you can imagine. There are a million or zillion things that are required to sail happily through ones life. A few of them that I could list here which can never be taught in a school are :
1. Self belief
Quite sadly, the education system globally is built on a rather dubious svaffolding called ‘Relative Grading’. This, in her design, works against adding to the self belief. And, no many in an competitive B-School have the innate ability to work around this institutional conspiracy. I guess this is considered too difficult or unimportant by the gurus in the B-school.
2. Dreaming
It is considered an unthinkable part of the syllabus. Even two decades after I have graduated, I have not found courses or mentor that allow youngsters to dream, to build fantasies of any kind, to imagine a world that they can build by not worrying about resources or limitations. Expediency, skills, ‘realistic assessments’ are put on a higher pedestal than dreaming.
3. Co-operation vs Competition
Successes in life are built around the word called ‘Cooperation’. Unfortunately, this is a non-existing and much loathed a term in a B-school system that is built on competition deep insider her DNA. Beating others to a game is a much celebrated attribute. The gifted horses get trained to do that and end up being champs in ‘gaming’ the whole field of performance. Looking for a Win-Win way of dealing with life remains a mere jargon learnt a B-school with neither imagination not belief to practice it in real life.
4. Choosing your own path
Success in life is about one choosing his or her own path. Every happy or success story is an illustration of this truth. B-schools do not look at themselves as ones who will facilitate this inside-out journey. Their allegiance to the courses and demands of the corporate sector is far higher than towards helping a youngster to move towards realizing his / her potential.
In sum, each individual needs to look at his own way of discovering the million things that he/she needs beyond the 36 courses delivered by a B-school.
While this is a piece in the context of a B-school, the handicaps of the system does not alter with other schools (higher education as well as K12) or with geographies (developed or developing economies). In many ways, a new era of delivering education with allegiance singularly towards the learner is waiting to happen.
In the meantime, the jobs will be back on the B-school campuses and life goes on!
Satya Narayanan R
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19 Responses to “What they don’t teach you at a B-school …..”
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loved the way the blog is written. specially this bit…. “By the end of two years, I managed to beat about 15 people in the ranking list – ranked around 150 in a batch of about 165 !”
Well said. I agree with the four things that you have listed. Grade point average (GPA) is the biggest myth in the history of institutionalized education.
But I think there are reasons some things are taught and some are not.
There is one more thing they do not teach. And that I think is the most important. Furthermore, I am inclined to conclude that is almost a part of they system in such an insidious way that it is not even seen as such and has the missing link that could explain a lot of things that are not taught or discussed at campuses of business schools -
That The Corporation is the single most powerful extra constitutional institution that touches the lives of an extremely disproportionate number of masses as compared to three constitutional institutions of the executive, legislature and the judiciary.
Further that The Corporation is a highly undemocratic, oppressive and tyrannical and almost militarily disciplined institution that is motivated by the sole criterion of making more money.
Therefore it is important to keep people busy fighting amongst themselves. The day they stop fighting amongst themselves and organize, which would inevitably be against The Corporation would be the day The Corporation’s power would be highly diluted. The single most important achievement of The Corporation (as an institution) has been successful bypassing of the Labour Laws which are now applicable only to the Government institutions and not to private corporations.
Since the scope of views that are permitted to be openly expressed and discussed within the highly disciplined structures of The Corporation are extremely limited with only the elite class of high level managers and strategists having the right to discuss them that too behind closed doors it becomes extremely important for The Corporation in order to maintain its power to systematically discourage free thinking, of which dreaming is an essential even most important part.
The virtue of cooperation is, in my opinion, alien to the entire rationale of The Corporation. This institution operates on purely selfish monetary considerations - to such an extent that this institution, which is hailed as a great advent of capitalism actually requires socialism to bail itself out when things go wrong. (How else could you explain, for example, the recent 700 mn dollar US bailout package for investment banks?) It needs people constantly trying to beat each other to the next target in order to get the next incentive or next increment which translates into pitting human beings against human beings to earn more money which is actually nothing different from the Roman Gladiatoral past where Gladiators were required to kill each other and the last man standing used to win his freedom. It is even sadistic to a certain extent, disgusting it certainly is.
B Schools do not encourage students to chose their own path because that is not the reason why B Schools exist in the first place. Their objective is to prepare highly trained people who can keep on serving the elite corporate and business class, who can fit into these highly oppressive and arbitrary systems, who don’t ask questions and who deeply believe in the idea of - ‘gain wealth, forget all but self’. They do not encourage finding your own path because they are simply incapable of doing this.
Good thoughts.
A sad trend in B-Schools these days is of clubbing placements with education. IIMs/top B schools are seen as placement agencies by a large number of students, rather than institutions of higher learning and research. I think this somewhat hinders free thought and pursuing one’s interests.
One is forced to take up electives that recruiters look for in resumes. Some people hedge themselves by taking too many electives and end up not doing justice to most of them.
The rat race for jobs ensures that a good number of students end up join industries that they may not be suited for/keen on joining.
Eudcation for education sake is dead in India.
Good thoughts.
A sad trend in B-Schools these days is of clubbing placements with education. IIMs/top B schools are seen as placement agencies by a large number of students, rather than institutions of higher learning and research. I think this somewhat hinders free thought and pursuing one’s interests.
One is forced to take up electives that recruiters look for in resumes. Some people hedge themselves by taking too many electives and end up not doing justice to most of them.
The rat race for jobs ensures that a good number of students end up join industries that they may not be suited for/keen on joining.
Education for education sake is dead in India.
A fine write Sir ..I believe that MBA is a language which is essential to be a part of this corporate world. Self belief, dreaming and choosing one’s own path is a greatly a matter of choice. And one can definitely choose to think beyond the courses offered by a B-school.
Good post..I have a few more thoughts to add..
1. Introspection : Students should be taught to introspect and help them identify their true calling
2. Win - Win : “Collaborate to compete” than compete at every level
3. Failure : Failure should be celebrated and it is the most powerful way to learn…Learning to fail, Accepting failure and learning from failure..
I went through the same thoughts when I was in school and am able to connect with you well…
Satya,
I loved every bit!
Just one word. Awesome ! Thoughts like this that question the fundamental approach to education in India/abroad if worth applause.
I am an alumnus of a particular IIM. I graduated as the third best student (from bottom though:-) but no complaints. And yeah I also managed two F(s) in the process. My poor performance was due to the fact that I never had the inclination to open the stupid management books.In my first class at IIM, we were asked to analyze Steve Job’s famous graduation speech at Stanford university. That speech was like a eye opener to me. The fact is that 20 min speech taught me more things than the 33 courses and a zillion other assingments and fraud presentations.
Completely agree with your school of thoughts.I just loved it.
I learnt during graduation,education was just a rat race.What matters atlast is self belief,confidence n trust in yourself,and following your dream.
Graduation just provided abit infn,but the real thing a man learns being practical,learning from his faults,his weaknesses,turning them into strenghts and not just following certain theories and being the topper(i was one):-)),
but eventually following your dream,
working out everything in life keeping in mind your goal, and definitely,not the rat race.
I CRITICIZE IT…
EVEN WHEN THE BLOG’S TITLE IS AGAINST B-SCHOOL, Mr Satya ,since is earning through test prep, he publicized again, did same mistake of mentioning/advertising same old 15 year shit “Above all, it gave me a stamp (thappa) of an IIM alumni..”……what is there in this blog is just 3 idiots movie impact….
Mr Satya, …everyone knows this that http://www.careerlauncher.in will have same attractive flash content, those attractive products - test gym and all, WHEN the impact of this movie ends on you……..You want to sell bicycles ,instead of honda city–all these will be mere words….
Rightly pointed out, Sir. You have pointed out many of the existing issues that are wrong with the current system. As you said, a new system which focuses more on the learning aspect needs to be setup.
But any thoughts on how do we evolve that kind of system ?
Rightly pointed out, Sir. You have pointed out many of the existing issues that are wrong with the current system. As you said, a new system which focuses more on the learning aspect needs to be setup.
But any thoughts on how do we evolve that kind of system ?
Regards,
PS
Rakes the mind, rakes the education system too! Such valuable thoughts, such valuable insight.
As it is turning out, IIM Grads are moving from the tag of “definitely able” to “differently able”.
But times are changing and IIMs need to re-invent their programmes & motives to not be caught on the wrong foot like HBS, Wharton etc. that have had to apologise for their alumni’s role in the fin. crisis.
Very well written! Effective use of humor to present the drawbacks present in the so called Ivy league colleges of today!
Huzefa Bala
Satya,
I, Vishal Gupta am forced to write to here my grievance after numerous efforts to contact Bharat Jain have gone in vain.
I was appointed as Quant Faculty at CL Panchkula in October 2009 by Ashima Jain and Bharat Jain. As you know the centre management was changed in Feb 2010. I was given a cheque dated 10 March 2010 for my salary for the month of January. Even after the two month delay the cheque bounced.
I contacted Bharat and informed him about the situation. He said that he would issue me another cheque. But he has been avoiding my calls ever since. This is absolutely unprofessional behaviour and demeans the name of Career Launcher as a whole. Its been too long and if the matter is not dealt with soon, i’ll have no option but to approach the court and will have to make Career Launcher a party.
I hope that you will resolve the matter quickly and prevent further damage to Career Launcher’s name. The owner of the CL panchkula premises has also not received his rent for January and we will be jointly involved in case any further action has to be taken.
Hoping for a quick reply.
Vishal Gupta
I could relate myself to it…….. having been through the same in IIMA not long ago. True, grades does not necessarily reflect the real capability of a graduate. particularly relative grading. nobody wanted the lower graders in the group assignments and submissions :).
It is not the same when I’m out in the industry. Money and business knows no grades. In fact nobody cares anymore for my grades though I’m hardly 6yrs since graduation.
I’m sure there are many more Satya’s out there with flying colors, who were once the not so hot graders.
There are innumerable occasions where the teachers do not evaluate their student on any other parameter than the routine one,prescribed by the system.Edison and Einstien are just two examples of genius not recognized by systemmatic education.The Guru Kul or the extended family of the Guru, could identify talent and nurture it.We need to develop a system where talent can be identified and developed, and this may become possible with the use of the internet.