ROI

One of the most widely used terminology in MBA admissions. Your parents look for ROI when they spend money for your well being & education, you look for ROI when you spend time & money for your girl friend with whom you’re serious for a future, and you look for ROI when you invest time and healthy sex with your spouse (or sometimes from your GF also!!!)!!

So the above are not true yeah, so then why this misconception about MBA or any education for that matter? Now even if it is true, the above 3-4 cases of ROI mentioned, you get your supposed ROI in 1-2 years? Your parents get ROI when you get a job, i.e. after at least 21 years!! You get ROI from your girlfriend after at least 2-3 years (okay agreed now that this is a short time, but then what is the rate of break ups after this supposed fast ROI?!!). You get a ROI from your spouse (or maybe GF) after at least 1-2 years after marriage only. Again this is small time but then blame the way GOD has made nature and the reproduction process for humans!

MBA education is an investment for a lifetime, not for 1-2 years immediately after your course. Okay agreed you have loans to repay, you have other commitments to keep immediately after MBA. But then given the state of things in India and anyone who is knowledgeable in the MBA circle, its terms and terminologies and the colleges, the top 40-50 under any ranking, one should be knowing that the average salary in almost all these colleges is easily 5-6lakhs (okay, so don’t believe me, go and check for yourself). But then come on this is average salary, which means there are some with salary figures above this also - 7lakhs, 8lakhs or maybe 12lakhs & above. So why can’t you be that person?  You don’t trust yourself? You’re not confident? If not then you don’t have any right to be an MBA grad or at least the time has not yet come for you to be one. Maybe you need more time in the industry with some work experience before you understand the importance of MBA and its exact purpose. Maybe you need to rethink on why, when and from where MBA?

The whole issue of ROI from MBA crops up from the fact that education is privatized in India; it is a business these days!! Get it done with, and its sure shot way to glory and fat pay packages! For the colleges, it is just a way of earning money! So what happened to our culture and our traditions? In all other cases, even where it’s not necessary we put the credit or blame on our culture and traditions. America is better than us, but then we’re better than them because of our culture. Remember that scene from the bollywood movie, Swades?

हमरे पास कुछ है जो उनके पास नहीं है, और ना कभी होएगा

क्या?

संस्कार और परंपरा, और जब तक ई हमरे पास हैं तब तक हमरा कोई कुछ नहीं बिगाड़ सकता, हमरा देश दुनिया का सबसे महान देश है

हाँ भाई, संस्कार और परंपरा हमारी सबसे बड़ी ताकत हैं 

So then, what happened to this sanskar and parampra now? Our education system was never like this. It used to be gurukul system, where no one looked at ROI. Children used to be sent to the gurukul for years till they complete their education. It may be more than 10 years also!!

Bottomline: ROI is a misused term. ROI is not in the short run, but in the long run. Your MBA degree will add value and give you the desired “ROI” and also the capacity to repay your loans. But, but, but…Only if you are best at what you do and are confident about yourself. So get yourselves some of that before you speak about ROI!!

Persuasive Speech

Many students and professionals are required to hold some sort of speech either regularly or at some point in their educational span or career. The context of the speech may vary, but more often than not, the purpose is to motivate, to persuade others to action, to get something done. But it is easier said than done. For a persuasive speech to be effective, you have to accomplish a difficult task: persuasion! It's much easier to write an informative speech or ceremonial speech than it is to write and deliver an effective persuasive speech that changes someone's mind or behavior.

What makes a good persuasive argument? Why are some people more persuasive than others? Is it simply a question of good looks, a good speaking voice, or that so-called intangible quality, charisma? Paying attention to good presentation techniques will certainly improve the polish of your presentation, but simply making a smooth delivery while ignoring content will not persuade your audience.

In fact, there are several techniques, which, once mastered, will improve your persuasive speaking skills tenfold. Persuasive skills are not just restricted to the podium but can help when on job interviews, or making presentations in class.

Below is a small attempt I made in a persuasive speech for the paper Advanced Communication Analysis as part of my MBA curriculum at FORE School of Management, New Delhi.

The Situation

AMPS Corp. (fictitious company) a leading manufacturer of consumer durables, has been the market leader in various segments for more than 10 years. Off late it has been losing ground steadily, and competition has been penetrating into its target markets. As CEO of the company it is your duty to persuade the employees to devise new ways and methods, for the company to stay ahead of competition and continue to be the market leader.

Transcript of the Speech

Good Morning ladies and gentlemen

Today I stand before you bound and unable to move. So is each one of you as part of this  organization. As the saying goes, "Wisdom and intellect is every man's friend, ignorance and illiteracy, are his enemies." Each one of us, as a member of this great family are bound by multiple enemies, the most prominent among them being ourselves, our ignorance!

A circus keeps a baby elephant from running away by chaining it to a stake. When the animal pulls at the chain the cuff chafes its leg, and the baby elephant concludes that to avoid the pain its best stay put. But when the elephant grows up, the circus still chains it to the same small stake. The mature elephant could now pull the stake out of the ground like a toothpick, but the elephant remembers the pain and is too dumb to use the new set of facts—how circumstances have changed. The tiny stake keeps a two-ton elephant at bay just as effectively as it did the baby.

We too are tied back and unprogressive, like the elephant, with age old practices, systems and processes. From a small baby we’ve grown to be mature and the market leaders. But still we have not understood the circumstances and changed our decisions accordingly. Over the past few months, I’ve shared with you what I’ve heard from our shareholders, operators, developers, suppliers and from you. Today, I’m going to share what I’ve learned and what we have come to believe as a dogma.

How did we get to this point? Why did we fall behind when the world around us evolved? This is what I have been trying to understand. What I’ve learnt and understood is not shocking but pitiful. I’ve understood that we are bound by not just one chain, but many of them. While our competitors were innovating and surging ahead, we have been too dependent on old facts, on outmoded conventions, or are still basing decisions on what worked twenty years ago. We fell behind, we missed big trends, and we lost time. At that time, we thought we were making the right decisions; but, with the benefit of hindsight, we now find ourselves light years behind. There are decisions to be made, changes to be made. But we’ve not. In the meantime, we’ve lost market share, we’ve lost mind share and we’ve lost time.

I believe at least some of it has been due to our attitude inside. We added more chains, some of them imaginary, to immobilize ourselves. I believe we have lacked accountability and leadership to align and direct the company through these disruptive times. We had a series of misses. We haven’t been delivering innovation fast enough. We’re not collaborating internally to break the chains that hold us down.

The chains that bound the elephant prevented it from moving forward and taking a step into a future with immense prospects and freedom. Now, we are also in a similar situation. But we have a second chance, an opportunity to step forward and explore the future. We need to work on a path forward — a path to rebuild our market leadership. New developments at R&D and implementing industry standards for our processes and products can open up a new path for us, to sustain, to be the best we can.

I would like each one of you to step forward, step forward to where others have dared not venture even in their dreams, to put together your thoughts, develop and innovate new ways and processes, to redefine people’s expectation of the services or products we offer, to recapture the lost market, to make up for the lost time. When we share our new strategy with the world within the next few days, it will be a huge effort to transform our company. But, I believe that together, we can face the challenges ahead of us. Together, we can choose to define our future.

This is Ajai Govind G (Section B, Roll No: 191065) signing off for now. Be back later with more!

Do get back with your valuable feedback (good or bad) and suggestions and inputs on how to improve.
My LinkedIn profile: http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=64264667&trk=tab_pro