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  • My First year of FPM at IIMB

    It was been just over an year since I joined the FPM at IIM Bangalore. I find it interesting to reflect often on the journey I travel, this time I decided to go one step further and write them down. For some it might be a reflection of their own, for some it might complement their own experience – What ever the application or utility of this blog, I feel its important to move towards sharing what we know [Yes! this is one of the key learning I have in the year].

    I went into the program with a set of biases, and ideas. These have undergone a transformation as I learnt more from the research process; sharing these would be in my opinion of help to others too. I shall attempt to get a greater emphasis on these as I write here.

    For ease of recollection, I shall model the learning to align with the academic structure of program itself. So the heads I would leverage are not the learning, but from the term in which I possibly got them. None of the learning might be complete in itself, knowledge is always evolving and often your explicit actions are the drivers.

    Before the term began
    Once I had gotten to know about the selection for the program, I took an active interest in meeting up with some senior FPM students whom I had interacted with earlier in different roles. These conversations didn’t just help me get to know about some interesting and engaging courses in their perspective were important for me; the conversations also helped me create a mental map of what to expect in the first to years. There was also some key mental barriers that I had to look out for in the period of FPM, I have made a mental note of these and hope to realize them when I am at the cusp of making these decisions. With a very brief preparation done, I felt I was ready with the information to get started with the journey.

    TERM-1
    I was sitting in a classroom as student after a gap of 5 years. It took almost the whole of the term for me to get accustomed to the preparation I had to do for a class and attempt to get to the thought process/rationale of the approach that was being discussed. Of the four courses I had taken, there was only one course that was dealing with some empirical learning.

    I had been working as an academic assistant for nearly an year before I joined the course and was craving to do some independent work, this gave me an opportunity. I decided to try my first exploration on the research journey in this course – the result was in being able to develop a model based on an interview. I ain’t sure I would ever be building on this, but the experience and the ground this course set up to learn about research itself.

    When I entered the FPM program, I think I was over-focused on a specific problem, but I quickly realized it was also holding me back from absorbing the maximum from the courses. If I was to become a good researcher, I had to move beyond the attachment I had with the idea I wanted to pursue. I decided, I would think about the problem to work on after completing the 2nd year. There was no requirement for us to begin the research right away. This I guess was an important decision that I took-up early on, I feel I have begun absorbing from the discussion much early. 

    As the TERM-1 ended I was left with a feeling that I hadn’t taken enough from the course work. I knew I had made some intellectual progress from where I had begun, but I felt wanting… As I reflected, I felt I had to make more time to read and improve my preparation. The class discussions can be leveraged well only if I prepare and form my takes on these. I decided I had to focus on these aspect for the next term.

    TERM-2
    While the first term offered courses which were foundational and broad based, this term at least for my area was heavier than the first. I had taken 5 instead of the 4 in the term. The courses in the term were foundational to the area of specialization here. Specifically for the field of strategy we had 2 course – classics and content (A). Given my interest in entrepreneurship, I also took a course on entrepreneurship – these three were heavy reading courses. One of the remaining two courses dealt with research methods in organization behavior and the last one was on econometrics.

    Given my work load, I had to take the call of which courses I would take to be of slightly lesser on intensity. I decided to do it on econometrics, since there would be further courses with higher intensity, I could possibly pick this up later. If I miss this chance on the remaining four course, I was sure, I would never get to redo them. This call helped me focus my reading to be on these four, without feeling bad about the choice I was doing.

    As mentioned earlier, I had my biases when beginning the FPM course towards Strategy. The classics course transformed my perspective of strategy. From viewing strategy to be top-down (which had been reinforced by the way the cases in my PGP were designed, and which never were in synch with my experience) it had now gotten me to see that this was only one body part of the elephant that strategy was!!! The scholars who studied strategy had left a mark on my life here – my respect for the field itself grew multifold! I can definitely say, I now look at things very differently from where I began the course with.

    I clear felt, I had to slow myself down. Apply myself to the field – the rest would take care of itself. I decided to tackle the journey of first two years of coursework differently – I now knew what was to be the focus was picking up the competencies which could help me become a scholar/researcher rather than mere passion or zeal.

    Thinking on what I could pick up from the course in the present term, I decided to attempt a good literature review. The experience was extremely enriching and helped me get the confidence to move on and seek the next challenge. I felt, this focus helped me feel better about myself and the effort there in.

    Despite the shift in focus shifting from a narrow topic to picking up skills, I was still seeking opportunities where I could attempt experimenting on my research area of interest.

    TERM-3
    My search for an opportunity to work on the idea I intended to explore further was realized in one of the courses – I was also intended to extend my skill from beyond mere literature search based paper to something more empirical. I began working on building on towards a good term paper. Building cause-maps was a skill I picked up, though the paper didn’t have much literature review it highlighted that with a focused effort, we could do a lot of interesting work even during the courses.

    I another course during the term, we happened to accidentally find a reading we had in the earlier term. I found that the understanding improved as we attempt to read these papers again after you get a better understanding of the field. I think, this is an interesting approach and I should do it as a more deliberate practice – read the papers for a better understanding with a new context in place.

    I was next looking forward to the Summer break – I felt I had to do something really empirical.

    SUMMER BREAK
    The initial idea with which I went into the summer break was pretty vague, but as a surprise, I had an opportunity from the prof with whom I had decided to work during the summer. He was organizing a workshop and suggested we could leverage the audience to attempt an experimental study.

    This opportunity got me to think of an experiment design, develop the necessary collateral and then administer the experiment. This was followed by the experience of data entry of the data gathered and then the analysis. The entire experience was interesting not just in conducting the experiment and improving the collateral material, but also going the full extent of writing a paper based on the data and then presenting it to an audienc
    e.

    Looking back: The journey thus far has been an exploratory one thus far. My greatest take away is the shift towards competencies that I intend to build during the course work. Sometimes, you have to slow down so much that you see the world move and then know what is actually happening.

  • Follwership – Barbara Kellerman

    An average book, no great insights. Sort of boring, and heavy read!
    The concept of followership and its interpretation itself was found to be difficult possibly since we have discussed about leadership all along the way thus far. 
    Brief summary of the book below

  • How to Solve the Crisis of Mismanagement – Ichak Adizes

    Read this book as part of a course during my FPM course. An excellent book!
    This I would say is a must read for any business/organization consultant or wannabe business/organization consultants. I made a short presentation – embedded below

  • Entrepreneurship as a Learning Journey

    The enormous learning is often a by-product of any entrepreneurial initiative – either at an Individual level or at the corporate level – an exponential rate of growth in ones learning is guaranteed. While one could argue, that any learning is extremely personal, there is sufficient generalizability in the pattern of events that lead to the learning; and so there is a great amount of categorization of learning possible from such vast and varied experiences.  

    Entrepreneurial Learning is simply the learning accrued as a result of entrepreneurial venturing. Such learning could be categorized based in multiple ways – based on the process of learning, or the target of feedback, or agency of learning etc. Looking at any single dimension would make the understanding desperate and wanting for comprehension. 


    Basing on the feedback from learning contributing to an enhanced understanding of one of these factors, I seek to categorize entrepreneurial learning to be about a:

    1. Learning about self
    2. Learning about Venture
    3. Learning about Interfaces

    While we might gain an understanding of the self, or business, or interface management from many individual experiences; Entrepreneurial experience definitely contributed to learning about all three. May be the following diagram could capture this point.

    To help understand the context better, let me give you an example from my own experiments. I shall use the same as we move ahead to help you relate with the categories.

    ——
    My first start-up experience in brief:

    My choice of venturing out on the entrepreneurship journey was based on gut-feel. When I had left my first job at efi to pursue my MBA, I was definitely contemplating about entrepreneurship sometime in the future. My intern-ship at a Startup gave me the confidence to try it out myself. Even before I had completed my PGP from IIMB, I was already on the streets trying to sell products/service and see if there are any potential buyers. One of the first realizations I had was about the drastic difference in the markets – Mumbai (where I was doing sales & looking for alliance partners as an Intern) and Bangalore (where I as trying to do a similar act). As I attempted running though the entire educational chain from K2PG (Kindergarden to Post Graduate colleges. Yes – I extended the K-12 norm to even higher levels in the educational hierarchy), I realized there were certain markets where I wouldn’t like to work in. 
    My closer interactions with the education system got me to identify numerous lacuna in the system itself. I began asking myself if the product I was trying to sells – an assessment tool would do any good to my customers? Would it in any way solve the problem I sensed the system had?. As I thought iteratively, I realized I wasn’t feeling comfortable selling a product that I believe wasnt serving to fix a problem. Yes I could go ahead and still sell it an make some money, but if I am not going to be confident about the product I sell, should I even sell it? My doubt took the better of me and I began thinking of different ways to solve the fundamental problem. 
    In the mean time, my partners and I thought it was good for us to shift to a focus on the UG-PG, where there was a lot of perceived demand for fine-tuning skills that be useful for the placements. A few months into this and I had a similar doubt – was I trying to polish something where the base material wasnt yet treated well enough and ready?

    This got me to consider looking at fixing the problem possibly by being part of the system. I decided to get into teaching – I worked as an adjunct faculty at a few MBA colleges, and also helped a few friends who were trying to work towards improving the quality of teaching at a rural school. This attempt gave me greater satisfaction! 
    —–

    The remainder of this blog explains what each type of learning would cover. 


    Learning about Self:
    It wouldn’t be unwise to claim that the only thing that is constant through the journey of entrepreneurship is the entrepreneur. Entrepreneurship is the journey of an individual/team through the ups and downs of conceptualizing, building and managing the venture that one creates. Such an experience is also a journey of self-exploration. The Individual evolves as the venture evolves. As events surrounding the venture unfold, the entrepreneur at the helm of the venture the individual mental fames are rewired from the feedback received. The learning about oneself takes one of the following forms:
    • knowledge about ones preferences and dislikes
    • capabilities that were hereto unexplored
    • strength to endure dejection and failure
    • tenacity to withstand differences in opinion
    • development of Strategic Thinking
    ——
    Reflecting on my experience: 
    From the above brief, you would have already sensed that I seem to search for impact of anything I do. If the impact in my eyes is seemingly significant I would love to put in my efforts behind it. This was a realization that I possibly would never have gotten wasn’t it for the various experiments I was doing with my career. 
    Another learning I have – may be from the constant reflection I have had is about the need for preparation! Yes preparation – I wasn’t to who believed in preparing with a lot of effort behind what I do. But, as I began preparing for taking classes at the different schools/colleges, I realized there is so much control that preparation comes in with. I today swear by the need for preparation – preparation not for a specific task, but more to enhance my capabilities. The tasks and challenges might be different so specific preparation is only the tip of the iceberg. It is really the work I perform on my capabilities – sink in more experience that makes be appreciate what I really need to focus on.
    ——

    While the learning about oneself is an important and significant portion of entrepreneurial learning, the individual entrepreneur also learns significantly about venture management. It is true that this experience of managing a venture would be complementary and supplementary to ones own journey of understanding oneself. This is a complex area and I guess I am better off staying away from it – given the causal ambiguity involved. The next section looks at venture management and the learning accrued therein in greater detail. 

    Learning about Venture Management:
    The venture an entrepreneur creates is the embodiment of individual aspirations, and commitment towards the venture creates attachment that is often the source of effort one puts towards developing capabilities suited for the venture and its subsequent growth. 
    • Business Model Development
    • People Management
    • Financial Management
    • Product Development 
    • Operational Management and Improvements
    • Marketing/Sales & Distribution Management
    ——
    Reflecting on My experience:
    While trying out the various experiments with venture types to see which was the specific forms of a firm that might be suited, I realize the benefits and drawbacks of each of these. What form suits what stage of the venture. 

    There were also experiments on the business models that I could think of for the venture. While there wasnt any single business model that I could scale up – since I havent been with my own firm for that long, I believe I have seen quite a few firms experiment with their business models while I was experimenting another career move as the Manager(Ops) at NSRCEL-IIMB. I picked up a few key skills to see when to pivot/preserve an existing business model; when to think of scaling up etc.
    ——

    The description above is extremely venture focused, and isn’t complete without mentioning about the learning that emerges from working at the boundary/interface between the venture and its environment. The next section looks at this in greater detail. 

    Learning about Interfaces:
    The growth of a venture is not a lonely journey. Interacting with the environment is a crucial part of venture growth. Sales and Marketing are not just the only avenues of such external interfacing, it moves beyond to realizing the negotiation and control one can exert in the context. Following is a list that merely scratches the surface, there are definitely more avenues where such interfacing would happen. 
    • Raising Finances/Investment
    • Structuring Vendor/Customer Agreements Deals 
    • – Terms of use
    • – Privacy agreements etc
    • Intellectual Property protection
    • Media Interfacing
    • Managing Exits
    ——
    Reflecting on my experience: 
    I must admit I havent had the experience of raising funds from external sources, however I have worked closely with a number of firms at NSRCEL in the fund raising and disbursing process and have got a good appreciation of how deals are structured, what form the key clauses, what is negotiable and non-negotiable clauses etc.
    ——

    The above discussion tried to categorize the learning based on the feedback received from the experience during the entrepreneurial journey.  To summarize the following diagram would be useful. 



    I know, each of the topics above could have an in depth blog in their own right, may be its something I could do later. This discussion however leaves us with an interesting set of unanswered questions – Can we capture this huge variety of learning in some form and use these to grow the entrepreneurial ecosystem further? If yes how do we go about doing this? Can there be any agency that attempts to capture and transmit such learning?


    I attempt to answer these questions in my next blog. Hope you enjoyed reading it – do feel free to write back to me or leave a comment with your thoughts on the topic. 

  • In tribute of URA…

    Dr. U R Anathamurthy (URA) passed away yesterday and there has been a lot of discussion about him in the media, his contribution to the Kannada literature and being a new-age thinker and also about his version of development. It was as if a co-incidence that I was wondering on the influence he as made when one of our professors at IIM Bangalore and also a well known Kannada author – Prof M S Sriram shared URA’s foundation day address in 2013. 
    For the ease of the readers of my blog I have shared the video below.
    I loved the piece where he spoke about the three kinds of hungers (not the biological hunger)  of our time:
    1. Equality
    2. Modernity
    3. Spiritual
    I missed listening to his speech on the foundation day, but rest assured I missed listening to this speech live! This is an absolutely scholarly speech (much different from what I had heard as part of the SPICMACAY national convocation that we had organized at MAHE in 2005 – I feel I was so myopic and possibly stereotyped much early).
    The speech is one which has absolutely influenced me – while I continue the search for purpose of what I have been doing. I can now get a better perspective of what I intend to do by positioning it in the context of these three hungers. I guess it has also sparked a sense of zeal into what I want to do. 
    What I also see amiss in my training is the strength of such a strong scholarship – I aspire to gain one such – I just wish I would be able to get myself trained thus.

  • The Butterfly in me… finding my purpose

    Chomp! Chomp! I moved few inches ahead,
    Chomp! Chomp! I ask my self where am I going…
    Chomp! Chomp! I seem to be getting nowhere by wondering for a purpose…
    Wandering almost every day – searching for a no purpose!
    Chomp! Chomp! I continue to feed on as I still wander in my search…

    Waking up every day; even before the first rays of the sun knock on my eyelids…
    I ask – “Is this the purpose of my life?”, or sometimes… “Is there a purpose for my life?”
    While it seems as if I make a daily progress… a few inches ahead!
    I still wonder -Is this is the right direction?”
    Move I may in any direction – I still hog – Chomp! Chomp! Chomp! Chomp!

    Ages of this purposeless wandering has gotten me to believe-
    It  is this that is the purpose – Chomp! Chomp! Chomp! Chomp!
    There is something in there that tells me – “IT CAN’T BE”… or may be “IT IS”!

    But still, I continue my search…. may be there are answers at the end of the day…
    A doubt lingering in my ears – “What if you have accepted this to be the answer very quickly?”

    The Chomping seems to have got the better of me…
    The feeding has bloats me, and more so my ego – “I am the biggest guy around, don’t you see?:
    My moves slow down almost saying – “there is no more of you I can carry”
    But having identified with my ego can I still go Chomp! Chomp! Chomp! Chomp!

    From the edge of my eyes I see others like me – chomping a longer than me
    The doubt lingers in again – “May be there is where it all ends?”
    May be – they know where they want to go…
    May be – they would get bigger than me…
    May be…

    I slowly see myself change – I no longer move ahead…
    I intend to move now – not to Chomp! but to find a purpose that is beyond Chomp!
    But here I am – not moving…It is almost like life has come to a stand still
    In my own world I feel this is my destiny –
    “There is no more a direction, no hunger, no purpose”
    Looking back, I ask – “Was there something that I could have done different?”
    Answers there are many, but I move no more… to act and change…
    I am now folded into a cocoon…

    Lying in here… 
    Nothing of the world interests me, I am bound to this tree… I have all the time in the world to think…
    This is possibly where He wanted me to be…
    but I still ask myself – is this the purpose of me…
    No rationale can help me find peace, when I haven’t understood the purpose to be,
    Living off my fat from the chomps I had the Only energy I now have is to ask myself –
    I wonder – Is there any greater purpose in life? What if I don’t find a purpose in life? I have to make peace with my past – find a rationale that helps me pace peace…
    I just hope I had a second chance….

    I try to move – but there is not much of a space –
    my cocoon is all the space I have,
    I fear tearing it for the fear of not knowing my purpose
    and being lost again only to think of chomping as my life’s purpose.
    my thoughts are now tiered of thinking about accepting the fate…
    I see I need some thing more to do…

    The turbulence in my mind, doesn’t let me rest in peace,
    The curiosity wants me to catch up with life… I know…
    There is a world outside this cocoon that covers me…
    I have waited long, in here, with no motion and almost no action…
    I wish had wings to fly… Fly I will and explore the world

    The wings of hope strengthen with each day I stay here…
    It is as if I am only eager to fly… not walk any more!
    But wasn’t it the slow walk that allowed me to chomp as much as I wanted?
    May be I should just wait for the cocoon to disappear and begin walking again…

    But no! wait I feel there is something I haven’t got yet!…
    Walk I will only on this terrain, fly I will over different terrains….
    I would rather try flying and failing than just waiting here in this cocoon…
    After all, life is meant to be experiencing different things!

    Isn’t the Cocoon is really my creation?
    Does it really exist? or, Is it me who thinks it exists?
    It possibly is my imagination and not the cocoon that is holding me in here…
    I have to challenge my limits….a struggle is ensured…
    But I will fight, It is better than having just accepted the action less life here…

    After days of struggle, I see the cocoon slowly giving in,
    I see a faint light from the out trying to enter my eyes…
    Its such a pleasure to see what I had been so long waiting for…
    may be its time to push my wings and break it open…
    hold on I no longer can… I want to fly not walk any more… I am so excited…

    As my wings tear open the cocoon…
    I feel the mild wind fluttering through my wings…
    I just open them up and… lo! I am off from my cocoon…

    The cocoon that so long bound me…
    The cocoon that gave me time to look beyond my immediate…
    The cocoon that strengthened by wings…
    The cocoon is now gone… no more  it exists…
    The legs that helped me walk – are only my resting pads…

    I am no more of what I was… But, I am now a free butterfly
    not chomping any more, but extracting the nectar from any beautiful flower I see…
    I feel free – almost unbound!

    I still haven’t found a purpose, but I feel free…
    I still find nothing in the goal, but the process of freedom that gives me the strength to go…
    Its in enabling others realize their aspirations that I realize my purpose…
    Being a part of converting the potential to performance… is where my beauty comes from,
    My beautiful wings now have a beautiful purpose…
    May be I simply allow them realize their purpose..That is what makes me free…

    – Chi
    [Pc: the internet I have given the link to the actual source for those who are interested in finding it out :)]

  • Organization’s role in newcomer stress reduction

    In the last byte, we looked at what a newcomer could do ro reduce the stress and make the establishment phase as smooth as possible. It today’s byte, we look at what role the organization could play in the scenario.

    Careful recruitment and selection is definitely the first step that the organizations can take to ensure that new recruits are in tune with the organization’s culture and the expectations are rightly set.

    The early job assignments that are given to new recruits could be those that t new comers can experience success in, this helps improve the self-efficacy and adjust to the new job more effectively.  Research has also found that new comers who face early job challenges successfully tend to be higher higher performers.
     
    Feedback and encouragement during this phase form a crucial ingredient of the smooth relationship. The immediate circle of the new recruit, i.e the immediate supervisor, peers, other newcomers, support staff are important sources of support during this encounter.
     
    During the change and acquisition phase, rewards play a major role. Organizations should tie the newcomer’s rewards as explicitly possible to to performance. Feedback as mentioned earlier is crucial, and it is advisable that the new comers should received daily, consistent feedback. This also communicates that the organization is concerned about their progress and wants to help them learn the ropes along the way.

  • Individual actions to reduce stress when joining a new organization

    In the last byte, we looked at the sources of stress during the socialization process during the establishment phase. In today’s byte, we begin our discussion on easing the transition for a newcomer from being an outsider to an insider to the organization.

    Making a transition from being an outsider to an insider in an organization smooth involves both the individual and the organization to take up certain set of actions. We begin with the individual actions in this byte and move to the organization in the next. 

    A newcomer could ask for the negative side of  the job if they are to get a more realistic perspective of the same – specifically the stressful aspects involved. Other employees too could be a good source of such information. It is often the case that newcomers underestimate the stressfulness of job demands and don’t adjust well. Additionally, providing those around with a honest and accurate information about ones own weakness is also useful from the newcomer’s perspective.

    During the encounter phase, newcomers must prepare for reality shock – realizing that slight depression is natural when adjusting to a new job can help reduce the distress felt there in. This could also help the newcomers to plan ways to cope with job stress ahead of time. 

    Newcomers should focus on seeking feedback and improving their job performance during this phase. 

    We next look at what organizations can do to reduce the stress felt by newcomers.

  • The Socialization Stress in Establishment Process

    In the last byte, we discussed about psychological contracts. In today’s byte we discuss about the stress that comes along with the initial socialization during the establishment phase. We also leverage on the discussion on socialization we had earlier – link here.

    During the anticipatory socialization phase, the new comer to the organization is seeking information from various sources about the job and organization – ambiguity is one of the major sources of stress during this phase; this could be resolved by providing access to accurate information. It is during this phase that the psychological contract mentioned earlier is formed (so both the parties involved should approach it with good intentions of living up to their end of the agreement).
     
    The anticipatory phase creates expectations in the mind of the newcomer, and during the encounter phase these expectations are put to a reality check.  The demands of the job in terms of role, task, interpersonal relationships and physical settings become apparent. It is possible that when the expectations aren’t validated to be true – the newcomer experiences a shock.
     
    An approach that a few organizations take in this scenario is to allow the new comer to adapt – say two, three months for them to reach certain level of independence. If the adaptation to the settings hasn’t been possible for the newcomer they would begin receiving negative feedback from their coworkers.
     
    In the last two phases of the socialization process, the newcomer begins to master the job demands and gains control over the job.

  • Psychological Contracts during the establishment phase

    In the last byte, we began our discussion on establishment stage of career-stage model. In today’s byte, we look at the concept of psychological contracts in a bit more detail.

    A psychological contract refers to the implicit agreement between and individual and an organization that specifies what each is expected to give and received in the relationship. 

    Expectations of receiving salary, status, advancement opportunities, challenging work etc that meet an individual’s need is what he/she expects. Organizations on the other hand, expect to receive time, energy, talent and loyalty from the individuals they employ to meet their needs.

    Psychological contracts form and exist between individuals – during the early stages, newcomers form attachment relationships with many people in the organization. Each person they meet is a potential source of a psychological contract.

    The psychological support that a newcomer looks for could be any of the following types.
    1. Protection from stressors
    2. Informational
    3. Evaluative
    4. Modeling
    5. Emotional