11/09/2015

11/09/2015; 04:09:

It’s been a long day, today! But as always, let’s begin right where we left off!
6th September was the birthday of our CR and we had a blast- mostly on the Whatsapp group, but, well. Her new phone is now the latest topic of discussion. I spent a good part of 6th night ordering stuff online- mostly deodorants, for well, retail stores just don’t cut it anymore!
7th morning began with a few classes; later in the afternoon, there was a guest lecture to attend. It was mainly focused on the IT industry, more specifically, how it is changing the way most other businesses operate- everything from banks making lending decisions to sales people making decisions now relies heavily on large databases and automation of processes. In the evening, we headed out to Indore city, and got ourselves some nice pasta for dinner!

8th morning began with classes too- it was the last Accounts session and sir ended the course with a heartfelt speech- he’s really awesome! All the engineers in the class have managed to pick up the basics of accounting rather too well, all thanks to him! It was the last session of Business Communication too, and we indulged in verbal proposals- the product chosen to be sold was a yellow pencil-box, courtesy the lady on the first bench who owns said pencil-box. Creativity was at its fullest as people linked the yellow to the minions franchise and even quoted non-existent studies about the colour! After classes ended for the day, we headed over to see our MicroEconomics quiz papers. There was then an interesting talk to be attended.
At 5 p.m., the group leaders for the Industrial Visit groups made their way to the Old Auditorium, to pick industries. Now, we’d already made our expectations very clear to our group leader- he’d better pick an interesting industry, preferably one related to food. The session was clearly a success- we will be visiting an alloy industry, in the near future. In his defence, the group leader isn’t too responsible for this mismatch of interest, after all, the allocation was based on a lucky draw- where chits were picked out. Since it was Tuesday, Royal Sandwich was on campus- clearly, it’s making its presence felt- unlike the other cases whose discussion is limited to a session or two only, Royal Sandwich has been a constant, all through the OM course. It is hard to be buying sandwiches from them, without all the OM concepts, including bottlenecks, capacity planning and resource allocation, coming to mind.

9th, aka Wednesday began with a MicroEconomics class where we learnt about Externalities- the positive or negative effect that results as a consequence of another activity- and is most often not taken into account when the equilibrium is determined in a free market. You pay only for your phone connection, but gain from the positive externality that results from each individual who purchases one- giving you that many more people to call! Right after was the last session of the OM course- we all handed in a rather interesting assignment- a single-page write-up that documented our learnings from the course.
Post-lunch, we had an SMOD (Spreadsheet Modelling) Quiz, at 2:30 p.m. A password-protected data file was shared with us an hour before the quiz. The quiz itself was fairly simple, employing most of what we’d gone over in class. The collection of our answer sheets- excel sheets this time, took almost as long as the exam itself! After viewing our QT Mid-Term answer sheets and changing into business formals,we headed over to the Old Auditorium for a guest lecture focusing on Credit Risk Analysis and its importance. There are so many things going on in the world; just thinking about them is amazing.
Soon after, we headed back to the Old Audi for another session. The Industry Interaction Cell has decided to organize a series titled ‘Industry Deep Dive’ where, each session explores one particular industry, over the course of an hour. This first session was about E-Commerce. The person conducting the sessions is really nice- it was interactive and very helpful. We spoke about growth drivers for the industry, new happenings in the industry and the idea of e-commerce players shifting to be mobile-only.

Early on 10th morning, a pooja was arranged, to invoke the blessings of the Lord, for a successful second edition of Atharv! And, from the looks of it, it definitely looks all set to succeed! There was then class at 10:15- a nice change from the 8:45 routine we’d gotten used to for a while now. After classes, there was a guest lecture to attend- this whole week’s been pretty busy, that way. I then had a short nap, before heading to the Old Audi for session 2 of the Industry Deep Dive series. Today, we spoke about the FMCG industry and Consumer Durables. I guess the FMCG sector is very appealing, mostly because it is the easiest to relate to! Since it was Thursday- the day when there’s no Night Mess, we headed over to Globe@I, around 11:30 p.m. They had a special ‘Late Night Show’ and were serving up fried rice and chilly chicken. Soon after, our assigned study group collected in the library, to work on the marketing assignment. The case in question deals with a Fashion TV channel and its marketing strategy. After dividing up the work, some people headed back to their rooms while we continued to sit around in the library, getting some work done and well, doing other stuff too.
All through the day, Atharv participants have been arriving, roaming around campus- there were so many people around even when I walked back to my room at 4 a.m.! And, these Nukkad Natak guys have positively scary levels of energy. Even as I type, I can hear them practising, outside my window! And, they aren’t even right outside, they’re on Level 2 of the campus, near Mess 2. I can hear them, not just random cacophony, but, actual clear words.
Atharv’s opening ceremony is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m.; there are over 1200 participants, this year; looking forward to an interesting, crazy 3 days!