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.

Great Lakes Term 4

Very tiring term. Truly, LIP course was the major reason of it but even then this was all worth it. :)

Great Lakes Term 4 (5th Oct to 22nd Nov)
Course Name	Facilitator	Positives	Delta (No negatives)	Any Comments
Business Analytics	Dr Purba Rao	Very sweet and nice prof.  Good documents so that you can always refer later. A good knowledge of her course.	Sometime she starts interacts on one to one basis with students while whole classes of around 130 students are gossiping.	Nice experience to be taught by the Prof.
Consumer Behavior	Dr. Siva K. Balasubramanian Harold L. Stuart Professor of Marketing and Associate Dean Stuart School of Business, Illinois Institute of Technology	Good course. The book which was given is great.	Unable to relate the course material other than book with the course.	The course could be made more vibrant and interesting.
CRM	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.
Distribution and Sales Mgmt	Prof VK Murthy	Best lecturer in marketing we ever got. The prof is the best in class. No gyaan, no bakwaas, only practical aspects and realities of sales job. No big assignment and case studies. Case studies and writeup were small but intelligently crafted.  Very professional too.	No delta	Would love to sit for his class anytime.
Investment Banking	Prof Ramanujam	Gives a lot of time to students to interact and resolve their problem.	Could not understand even a single bit about investment banking. Case studies were too large and made no sense to me. Moreover case studies were more about strategy rather than IB. Moreover, the sessions were meant for finance experts not for amateur like us.	Keep less case study and more basics.
Leadership, Influence and Power	Prof Venkat R. Krishnan	Aah…here comes the subject and the Prof I almost rever. The Prof has an amazing method of teaching. Moreover he is best prepared for his lecture. The course is just not about business but about our overall life of us, organization and society. Few concepts were enthralling that you will just keep on thinking for many days about the same.	NONE except that there is a lot of compulsory reading which make you burn mid-night oil whole of the term. But it’s worth it. J	The subject is the best you may get at great lakes. I will recommend this subject to all MBA students. You understand nuances of working into the organization and day to day politics.
Quintessentials of Doing Business in the 'Middle Kingdom	Prof G Venkataraman	Nice Prof. Some stories about china were quiet good.	Was not interested much to learn more about China.	Such subjects could be great if students here have time. We have no time left to enjoy such arts/culture oriented subjects.

Great Lakes Term 3

A very tiring yet the most memorable and eventful is Term is over.

Great Lakes Term 3 (10th Aug to 25th Sept)
Course Name	Facilitator	Positives	Delta (No negatives)	Any Comments
Human Resource Management	Dr. PVR Murthy,a Product of IIMC (FPM) with close to 30 Years experience in HR- currently CEO, Exclusive Search Recruitment Consultants, Chennai Mr. R Shantaram, XLRI Product with close to 20 Yrs rich HR Experience Ms. S Vijayalakshmi, a product of XLRI, currently with Unilever Ms. Vidhyaa M, a product of XIMB, currently with Orchid Pharma Mr. David Nallathambi, a product of XLRI, currently VP HR with Standard Chartered Mr. V Balaji,Head HR with HCL -BFSI	The course has been experimented first time at Great Lakes in which 7 HR managers/heads from top companies of India were invited to give session on Human Resource Management. The sessions were full of practical knowledge about industry HR practices through the vast experiences of the industry experts. Most of the sessions were like open session - "coffee breaks" where any kind of question was welcome.	Due to many facilitators, the course was not well organized. Lectures were not well connected with each other. Less Student connect due to less time available with each facilitator.	The course was a big time experiment. However, the course was successful to let student take-away the experience of HR experts. I liked the lecture of V. Balaji and Orchestra video showed by him in his class
Investment Analysis	B Venkatesh, Founder of Navera Consulting	Among the best course of the Term 4. The facilitator is just awesome. He doesn’t deliver you the bookish knowledge instead gives you the practical insights about what really happens in the market. His personality, voice, tone and expressions all are in complete alignment of his ideas and thoughts that he deliver.	Bigger class size	Awesome facilitotor. Very professional. The kind of person you would like to be.
Information Technology for Managers	Prof . Sunil Rai (NMIMS)/Prof. Sundar Raj	Didn't get much problem due to my IT background. The presentation system was good to make all 262 participate.	The second half of the course was highly research oriented and theoretical, which made course tiring to study. For non-IT, the course was incomprehensible.	Research studies could have been avoided instead the future of IT in simple term and language could have been introduced.
Market Research	Dr Bharadwaj	Great course and the facilitator. Practical and interesting. Smaller class size	Slept sometimes due to information overflow.	Good course. Lot of information in last few quant lectures.
Organizational Behavior	Prof Jayavelu (IIMK)/Prof Irudayaraj (XLRI)	The course was full of common organization/leadership/team issues and operations. It’s exciting to see that intellectuals have done so much about human and social psychology. What all thought process happens has been penned down by people already.	Prof Jayavelu was not able to establish great rapport with students. Conflicts happened into the class. First half of the course just went without much learning.	Prof Irudayaraj is a great facilitator for the course. This XLRI professor could motivate and mesmerize from is simple yet effective small lecture. Great learning from him. His way of teaching just makes subkect like Org Behavior so interesting. Hope to have complete course by him next year. Feedback has been given.
Strategy	Prof Sriram	Fun to read varied strategies of top business honchos and resolve the complex business issues just by simple but out of the box thoughts. Prof Sriram is a great speaker. All cases what we discussed were on tips.	The cases were too old and did not bring the vision of the future changes and strategies which is about to come. Few strategies are obsolete to follow in current scenario.	Actually my expectation from the course was a lot more. How the strategy are created from scratch? how to select strategy out of many option?
Mandarin (Chinese)	Prof. Devakunjari	Great teacher. Should write a book - "Chinese made easy" from his written hand-outs. Lot of material collected to master Chinese anytime.	The course has become boring due to same pattern of pedagogy from last 2 terms.	Teaching style is too motherly and caring. Highly lovable teacher. The pedagogy should have many flairs like videos, Chinese guests to keep the interest level high among students. Anyways I can proudly say that I know Chinese.

Microeconomics in Real Life – Household TV

By: Varun Khandelwal

Indian Television Household industry is a great real life example of application of Microeconomics. Till late 80s, Indian Manufacturer like Crown, Salora, Texla, Oscar and Beltek were the market leader of Black & White TVs in India. However, advent of Color TV technology which was great substitutes of obsolete Black and White TV led new market leaders like Videocon, BPL and Onida emerge in TV market. This is a great example of Threat of Substitutes (Color TV overruling B&W TV market) and significant impact of Technology on firms.

Below is the industry analysis of the TV market incorporating Porter’s Five Forces model:

Till late 90s Videocon, BPL and Onida enjoyed leadership and apparent oligopoly in the TV market. However, advent of MNCs such as AIWA, Akai, LG, Philips and Samsung changed the landscape of TV industry. Especially Akai and AIWA which used to work upon procurement/assembly based model brought upon the cut-throat price war in TV market. For an instance, earlier prices of Color TVs used to be around Rs 20,000 for a 21’ TV. However, Akai and AIWA through its smart operations and marketing strategies brought down the same TV cost to almost half. Moreover, it brought concept of TV exchange for the upgraders and rebuyers leading to same TV cost mere Rs 5000. At the same time, world leaders like LG and Samsung started Sales on Volume strategy to push their quality product in Indian market.

From the above table it could easily be observed that with increase in demand the nominal price of TV has decreased significantly and hence obeying the Demand-Supply rule. New Technology advent and price war also led to significant shift in Demand and Supply curve many times. Another point to note is that demand of TV is highly seasonal in India. During festivals and marriage season, there is always a high demand for TV. TV market has become highly competitive market and the life cycle of any new TV has become too small. Currently, TV industry in India is undergoing tremendous changes in terms of Technology and customer segments. New augmented features in TV, becomes in expected and generic within months. New technology based television like HDTV, LCD are replacing traditional color TV very fast. The few important things TV manufacturing/marketing firms should keep in mind are:

1.       Research and Development and Innovation are the key to become successful in TV market.

2.       Quality and trustworthiness is important. TV is still bought by majority consumer for a long term basis so they want good quality.

3.       Smart Pricing strategy is required to have an edge among so many competitors and no product difference.

4.       Consumer Segmentation is important for every TV

5.       Increase in disposable income in India will lead to further increase in Demand of TV.

Hence, we can observe practical application of microeconomics in Household Television industry of India.

EDF website is UP!!

I am excited to tell you that a great mile-stone has been achieved.

The long awaited EDF website (beta phase J) has marked its entry on Web. (Please open the attached link)

The website is Great piece of Innovation as it uses only free Internet applications/technology.

Few features of the website are:

1.       Maintenance is just free of cost.

2.       The website is based on Web 2.0 technology.

3.       Any number of people can contribute to the website at the same time.

Next steps:

1.       Inauguration of the website: Mark the right date and call esteemed guest, once all below things are done.

2.       Content for the Website: I have kept few old content in website. Please contribute. I will give admin rights to the people who wants to contribute.

3.       Linking with www.greatlakes.edu.in :   Already in contact with Web com. It will be done after all things are proper.

4.       Products: T-shirts procurement for EDF eShop. Ayush is working upon it.

5.       EDF logo and Brand name for EDF: I have kept an old logo for EDF for the time-being.

Few brand name which I thought for “brand EDF” are:

a.       “Enspire”: the name is made of “En” from Entrepreneurship and “spire” from Inspire. Basically it conveys the inspiration for Entrepreneurship which is probably the goal of EDF.

b.      “Seed”: A seed gradually becomes a big tree.

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