ISB "These are some of my favourite things"

The past 2 months since I joined HUL have been a lot of fun. I have clocked some serious air-miles over this period. I have been to Gurgaon, Mumbai, Varanasi, Balia, Jaunpur, Renukoot and Bangkok. Each of these places was an adventure. The fun of being in a FMCG marketing firm and especially HUL is that one sees all those Kotler fundas unfold real time. But that is a different subject the aim today is to write about what all I fondly remember about ISB. Come to think of it this is more to bring closure to the experience called ISB. The things that I remember from ISB are a mixture emotions and sensory experience that ISB is. So here goes, the LRC at 8 A.M with the spiral staircase bathed in the sunlight filtering through the glass dome on the top, the satisfaction after entering the last line on an assignment, watching rain drops fall in the ground outside my studio while I sipped a cup of piping hot tea, the open drapes in the class room while Prof. Rajeshwar Upadyay went over Lessons from world literature, a great sense of achievement just walking up to the Academic Centre from my quad, a sense of a welcoming home while heading from the Academic Centre to SV2 and the late night (I mean really late night) walks with Rano, the lunch group (Srav, Karthik, Jaggu dada and Sneha), the offer from HUL, the graduation day, the squash court and the twinkle in my parents' eyes when I graduated. ISB was a blast- a source of lifetime memories.
The year at ISB will keep coming back to me every time a cue gets thrown at me like the raindrops knocking at my office window right now!

ISB MAKES A SPLASH IN FT GLOBAL RANKINGS

28/01/2008 is one date that everybody from the batch of 2008 will remember. They would remeber what they were doing when they got to hear the news first. The news was the huge splash made by ISB in Global Rankings. ISB came in at 20th in the global rankings in one of the most respected rankings- The Financial Times rankings. It is no mean achievement. To be part of ISB at such a time and see history unfold is something that I will cherish forever.

There was a celebratory lunch at the Atrium and the entire batch broke into an impromtu chant- "ISB ROCKS" "ISB ROCKS" "ISB ROCKS" and rock its does. I have a feeling that celebrations would continue for some time to come.

It is also time to think about the power of a dream accompanied by a zeal to achieve it. The sense of achievement the pioneers of ISB must be feeling must be awesome. The collective conciousness of the ISB must be rejoicing. The support staff, the faculty, the Governing Board, the student body, the spouses, the alumni and the recruiters have all contributed to create a way of life that ISB represents.

So thank you all those who preceded me at ISB and welcome all those who would join the ISB dream in years to come.

Congratulations!!!

LEARNING BEYOND THE CLASS- AIKYA

Has been a long time since I wrote a post. So here goes- yesterday was an eye opening experience. We were invited by our Aikya family for dinner. Aikya family is the family away from home. These families are the elite families from Hyderabad's social circles. This gives ISB students an opportunity to interact with the finest families of the Hyderabadi society. The one lesson my Aikya family patriarch gave me was- "Never, Never associate yourself with a looser". The negative energy of the looser is strong enough to bring you down. Reminds me of the STAR WARS funda- "May the force be with you". The force here is the positive thought that you generate and the positive thought that those around you generate.

The other aspect was how small the world is. Six degrees of freedom hit home yesterday. One of the business partners of my Aikya patriarch is arelative of mine. This is an amazing coincidence. So I am a huge convert to networking. You never know which happy coinincidence you would stumble on around the corner.