Great Lakes Term 5

Most eventful term. There were so many activities + events happened that I got barely anytime to study and even hit my blog. My whole term just went into organizing International Entrepreneurship Conference scheduled on 13th Jan, 2010. But, it was fun to do all that.
Damn, I think I read least in this term. At least I should pass. :P

Great Lakes Term 5 (25th Nov to 15th Jan, 2010)
Course Name	Facilitator	Positives	Delta (No negatives)	Any Comments
FSAV-1	Gerald Lobo, Professor & Arthur Andersen Chair in Accounting Department of Accountancy and Taxation Houston, Texas	Do anything you want. Calm Prof	A major disaster. I could not grab even a single bit. Boring.	There will be no change in voice tone for 3 hours. Monotonous. Change Prof please. Rating; .5/5
Global Financial Strategy	Dr. Krishnan Dandapani	Among few of the good finance/strategy Prof. Lot of energy and very good lectures preparation and informative notes. Good experience. Nice thing is he tells complex concepts in highly simplified manner.	None	Good Prof. Should come for few more subjects.
Pricing Strategy	Dr. Ram Krishnan, Professor of Marketing, University of Miami.	Energetic, Charming with a great sense of humor. Make jokes anytime anywhere and laughs even on him. Nice teacher. Great course with good concepts and lot of practical applications. Must take for all MBAs	None	Loved the Prof. Would like to do Ph.D - Marketing under him
Strategic Cost and Profitability Management	Uncle Bala (‘Padmashri’ Dr. Bala. V. Balachandran Professor Emeritus of Accounting Information & Management, Kellogg School of Management, Founder and Dean, Great Lakes Institute of Management)	Who else could teach the course better than the Uncle Bala who is among the highest echelon of the Accounting. Touched concepts of most of the business areas.	The lectures were too less to absorb all concepts and get a lot out of the subjects	The energy level of Uncle Bala is just unmatchable. His each and every word motivates you to the core and puts so much confidence in you.
Services Management	Dr. V.S.Mahesh, director of Centre for Service Management at the University of Buckingham, England, which he founded in 1993. Over two decades of corporate experience, at Tata Administrative Service, Board of all Wipro companies as Corporate VP(HR).  A fuller profile is attached.	Good course for MBAs aspiring to go to service sector. Prof is the world renowned for service management research.	Classes are too less and too long.	Lecture on Threshold of motivation was very good. Guess that he can teach Human Resource Management very well.
Strategic marketing	Prof  Xavier, Great Lakes	Great facilitator. Enjoyed his witty comments.  Good classes and great method of mixing students’ presentation with lectures.	Sometime classes got boring.	Good facilitator with a great sense of humor.

EDF - eShop

Started with eShop initiative at Great Lakes through Entrepreneurship Development Forum (EDF, I am the member of the committee). Just read on. :)

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“The best reason to start an organization is to make meaning - to create a product or service to make the world a better place” - Guy Kawasaki

Do you wish for a “fundoo” Great Lakes T-shirt which showcase your EGO-ideal OR do you wish to gift your loved ones a nice Great Lakes gift?

Your wait ends here. EDF has started an exciting new initiative eShop. eShop will assist you in every way to shop anything a Great Laker vie for. All you need to do is inform EDF about your requirements and we will help to get things done for you at any cost.

So what are you waiting for, start buying things you always wanted to.

CLICK HERE TO ORDER or AUCTION from EDF website (beta phase).

Please mail to edf2010@greatlakes.edu.in for any special product or bulk order you want and we will get back to you asap.

FAQs:

1.       What are the objectives of EDF eShop?

Answer: To encourage entrepreneurship among Great Lakers as well as outside Great Lakes and encourage all Great Lakers to participate in the EDF initiatives. It will be a great learning for Great Lakers involved in eShop.

2.       Are you taking any extra charges for so much of a help?

Answer: EDF is doing this all on NO PROFIT basis for every Great Laker. However, the idea is to commercialize the same outside Great Lakes.  Any profit made there will be used on EDF operations and Karma yoga’s Social Entrepreneurship activities.

3.       How will I be benefitted from buying goodies from eShop?

Answer: We are trying to use sales on volume model for standard items. Also, we will form strong continued relationship with various vendors which will help us in getting value for money. However, if you think the price is more than the cost, kindly inform us about it.

4.       So, what are main things you are planning to keep in eShop?

Answer: Few of the things are:

a)      For Great Lakes: T-shirts (for sports, committee, competitions), Mugs, Bags, Wallets, Bottles, Diary, Caps

b)      Social Entrepreneurship/Karma yoga – Helping villagers to make goodies: Paper/Jute bags,  Toys, Handicrafts, Agarbattis etc

c)       Great Lakers auction: Used items like calculators, bi-cycles etc

d)      EDF Advisory Services

e)      Sports goods: Cricket bat, Shuttle-cock, Rackets, football etc

5.       Who are your potential customers?

Answer: Our main customers are:

-          Great Lakers (including Alumni)

-          Committee members

-          Admin/Academic department to gift the guests/visiting faculty

-          Other B-school students coming to Great Lakes for participation

-          B-school aspirants(especially Great Lakes aspirants)

-          On success à Scale-up eShop to OUTSIDE WORLD

6.       Sounds Great!! What are the future plans of EDF eShop?

Answer: We are planning to make it BIG. Few of the future plans are:

-          Take the eShop outside Great Lakes

-          Vertical Integration - Increase the varieties of goodies

-          Online shopping cart

-          Customizing goodies on orders quantity and timely basis

-          Partnership with firms

-          Encourage to buy more through emails and newsletter

7.       All this looks interesting to me. Can I become part of it in anyway?

Answer: Sure, eShop is looking for new members who are passionate about the eShop idea and would like to make future plans a reality. Mail at edf2101@greatlakes.edu.in in case you are

interested to join us.

Happy Shopping,

EDF Team

My Space Journey and Customer Services

I saw a nightmare tonight...I hired a spaceship for the space adventure trip for my family for 3 days. They took us on a great tour for 2 days. We enjoyed Moon, Mars etc. After 2 days of tour, the driver asked for the payments as he needed to refuel. Happy from my last 2 days tour, I gave him full 3 days money i.e. one day money in advance. The next day when the spaceship came at my home, he was late then they took a full round of the city by road. They had cigarettes, guthka everything as these local bus waala do. Finally when I asked what the hell they are doing still on earth. They told me that they can not go because of some problem in the spaceship which may cause danger in space.
I felt cheated. I asked for my money back. The driver said that they don't have any money as it has been given to the owner. There was a lot of altercation. Finally, evening arrived, exhausted we reached back to our home. The last day has just messed all fun of whole trip.

Well that was a nightmare...but this is the condition of Services in India...There are hell lot od promises when you go with money but once that money has been handed over, the show ends. Then, you see the real picture.
There is a lot of work and improvements still to be done on customer service part in India.