A better way to do things...

I had an amazing trip to India! We covered the country by air, train, bus, car, subway, shuttle, rickshaw, and foot. Definitely a trip I will never forget and one that forged some great friendships with fellow HBS students.

I took lots of pictures on the trip, and wanted to share this humorous chain of events I captured. I consider this to be symbolic of evolution... or of how productivity evolves into greater and smarter methods.

Step 1: Monkey gets 2L bottle of orange soda


Step 2: Monkey opens 2L bottle of orange soda


Step 3: Monkey tilts soda onto ground so as to spill it. Note, smaller monkey watches this unfolding.


Step 4: Bigger monkey drinks his spoils by sipping the soda from the grass. Efficiency... maybe 20% of the soda captured? But since he gets the full 2L to drink from, that's still a satisfying slurp!



Step 5: Smaller monkey, left thirsty, sips the drops left in the bottle cap. Then notices that a little bit of soda is left in the bottle due to the bigger monkey's inefficient drinking methods.


Step 6: Smaller monkey, who can't throw his weight around to get the drink in the first place, nor afford inefficiency in his habits, comes up with a better and more efficient way to drink. He finishes off what the bigger monkey treated as waste.


Step 7: Yea, I'm a small monkey, but so what? Don't act like you've never seen a monkey before. Don't you have something better to do?



What can we learn from this 7 step process?

• People/monkeys/companies that are big and don't have to save every drop will tend to waste resources, have low efficiency, and stick with "if it's not broke - don't fix it" mentality.
• People/monkeys/companies that are small and don't have the luxury of wasting resources, will find ways to innovate, find new solutions, and other means to increase efficiency.
• It is limited resources in this world which drives us to improve ourselves. Never be satisfied with the old ways of doing business.
  

End of semester.. and some thoughts on consulting

Only one more semester to go...it's a cliche... but I have to say "I can't believe it's nearly over." Last year I discussed what HBS students do over the winter break. This year is of course no exception. Most students are traveling, and mainly overseas.

I'm going to India for almost three weeks with three sectionmates. Despite India having a population of over a billion people, I have no doubt that I will be running into other random HBS students on a regular basis. I don't know how many HBS students are going to India, but it's probably in the hundreds, and everyone tends to go to the same sites. It's interesting to see that many HBS students take a vacationing interest in countries perceived to have the hottest growing global economies: India, China, and Brazil. I take it as a positive sign for the global interest of people here and would be curious to see a study of trends in HBS overseas travel. I wonder if there would be any sort of correlation with GDP growth, and whether it is a leading or a lagging indicator.

I also want to share some interesting articles I've read recently. One is from an HBS 2010 graduate who posted some really interesting statistics on the top employers of HBS graduates and particularly insightful numbers on management consulting hires over time at HBS. For the actual statistics, you should check out the InsideHBS.com blog.

Another really interesting blog is Our Consulting Problem, a case of a Kellogg/HBS husband and wife team who decide to quit their management consulting jobs and do something completely different with their lives. The subject of whether one with little prior business experience "needs" consulting after business school and whether the option value generated is worth the time invested is a topic of regular discussion here (or at least with my circle of friends). Anyway, the essay on Option Value is both funny and highly descriptive.

I recently spoke with a very senior partner at a management consulting firm who is also an HBS grad. His firm had given me a full time offer and we were chatting about how I was thinking about the decision. Perhaps because I am considering such starkly different options, that I am also willing to be very open and transparent about it. He claims that he enjoys his work so much, that he was "shocked" when I told him that relatively few HBS grads going into consulting do so with passion for the business. About the only thing HBS students are less passionate about than consulting is doing investment banking, so it is very ironic those are the top two most common jobs coming out of HBS. These truths may be rarely discussed outside of business school, but they are readily recognized from within. Perhaps people who enter those businesses eventually learn to like it or change their outlooks; I'm not the person to speak about that.

Everyone is always speaking of finding their "passion." The catch is of course, that nobody can find his or her passion by searching the web or reading books, not any more than one can fall in love by simply searching dating sites or looking at magazines. All this leads to some very dynamic forces; heavy pressure to achieve great things and change the world, while at the same time dealing with short-term forces that challenge our better judgments about ourselves. I suppose these dynamics will never change for those of lucky enough to attend this school, so in that regards, HBS is a good place to practice!

Relatively few people come to HBS because they genuinely want to be a consultant or an investment banker, yet the overwhelming forces here places most people either in those positions or on the edge of them. It is a very difficult force to fight. Some of us are still hanging in there.

Bantayan Island - Travel Idea for Family Travel

During holiday time, there are a lot of families consider to go to visit Bantayan Island. Based on my opinion to travel to Bantayan Island is the right decision for family travel. It is a beautiful island, in which it is not too crowded, so, it is a best place to enjoy your holiday with your family without any interference from the crowd.

It is suitable season to make a picnic to Bantayan island. Bantayan Island has good care for the landscaped gardens which are organized very beautiful, so that adds the convenience for the visitors who want to enjoy their holiday.

There are many coastal areas where are very suitable for sunbathing, swimming, surfing and enjoying the very pleasant weather. for me, a very memorable thing in Bantayan Island is a calm atmosphere and no trouble at all in there.

Bantayan Island is an island that has a normal temperature throughout the year. so you do not need to worry to make travel with your family to get there, because the air temperature in the Bantayan island is perfect for the comfort of our bodies.

Kolkata Traffic

My goodness... I've died and gone to traffic hell.

Or maybe not.

Traffic in Kolkata is something that I am at a loss to adequately describe.  So many cars.  So few lane markers, and those lane markers that there are seem to be completely optional.  Pure, utter, hot, humid chaos:

Every vehicle, except the one that I am in (as a passenger, I'm not crazy enough to even try to drive here) is packed to the gills with commuters:

Folks are hanging on for dear life, and everywhere that you look there are signs that cars and buses don't always play nice with each other:

But somehow, perhaps through the graces of India's 35,000 gods, it all seems to work.

Traffic actually flows.

There is no gridlock.

People actually get where they need to go, and my guess is that they actually get to and from their homes to their work just as fast or faster than commuters in any other large city.

What's going on here?  It certainly looks chaotic, and it certainly sounds chaotic. Many large trucks have "HONK!" painted on them to encourage those in their blind spots... but it seems that Kolkata drivers need no encouragement to use their horns.  It's a constant din of beeps and honks.

The answer is the Kolkata drivers themselves.  They weave and accelerate and honk as if they were born to do so.  Watching them maneuver in mass is reminiscent of watching a stream of ants make their way through the jungle.  No regimented spacing for these drivers.  No set lanes.  No regulated speeds.  Just the inherent instinct to go forward persistently, pausing only for those who would otherwise hit you.

It works.  Lord help me, but it works.

Let the summer begin...

I wish I could take more time to write about some of the great experiences here... I'm writing them down as I go and will hopefully have more opportunities to share them with you. This post will be more of an update than any great insight.

We had our last final exam yesterday which concluded a 5 day period of 5 hour exams each day. My section had an end-of-year-dinner at a local Cambridge restaurant (which hosted about 70 of us), and then most of us went on to party the night away with about 300 other HBSers at a Boston club. These kinds of big Boston parties were a relatively routine occurrence during the school year, but I generally didn't leave Cambridge on weeknights. I felt however that finishing the last final and our amazing first year warranted a little bit of an extra celebration. What a great way to finish off the year! I feel very close to my section and am so grateful to have met so many wonderful people here. I really underestimated the value of the "section experience" when I first applied to HBS. It's been integral to my entire experience.

Tomorrow I fly to Israel for a student led 10 day tour with 80+ of my first year classmates (that's about 9% of the class). Another large group is doing a Japan student led trek, and other students are going home for a week or two before starting their internships. Some students are even starting their summer internship next week so they can have their vacation on the back end. Summer break is 14 weeks and most internships are 10 weeks, though some (like myself) are doing two internships. I have 2 weeks off on the front end, then 12 weeks at Goldman and BCG that will take me straight into my second year.

I hope to continue updating the blog over the summer with more lessons from HBS. For those of you who have emailed with questions... I will do my best to get to everyone. Thank you for the great feedback.

Let the summer begin!