Who created Valentine's Day ?

It was the last year at school. And it was Feb 14. Pretty awful. I passed out into phases of immense chagrin when I heard of friendship day, valentine's day, mother's day, father's day, doctor's day, engineer's day, poodle day, alarm-clock-that-never-rings day broken-needle-eye-with-unpassable-thread day....It was the one of those days that day. Hell! It was one of those days everyday now! It was difficult to find a normal Sunday or Monday in the calendar. And its not specifically easy to remember 365 different day names.

The class yesterday was not quite as interesting as I wanted it to be. The prof was saying something about exchange rates and then something about Tony Blair. Tony Blair has no currency left... That was about the only thing my mixed up mind could make out.

Why? Why is this happening ? Get me the old calendar back. Whole worlds of emotions were being compressed and done away with on single days. Wanna say thanks to your mother. Wish her on Mother's Day! That's it! You have done your job. You are a great son to have, she will surely tell herself. Why is this happening?

Tony Blair surely had enough money. He must have got that for the article he wrote in the economist. The prof was appreciating it for the third time now. I hope the economist did not pay profs...

Perhaps.The world was going beyond my miniscule IQ, when I suddenly hit upon it.. It was not that great, but in school days, I really thought I did make a discovery and it made a lot of sense.

I saw a handout nearby. An interview of Anil Moolchandani. Someone was obviously sleeping in the marketing class. It was an interesting interview. Always listen to your customers, was the age-old marketing or rather business mantra I remembered.

I would gleefully go around asking people,

"Who created Valentine's Day ?'

An nonplussed answer would often be "St. Valentine", "The western world", "A pair of queasy lovers","A pair of queasy lovers with lots of spare time", "A pair of queasy lovers with lots of spare cash", "Who cares!"...... and so on.

But can a business shape consumers. Perhaps yes. Perhaps no. But no sociologist today would deny the the impact of marketing on modern consumerist societies. Give the consumer what he wants.. or perhaps you can even tell him what he wants. I proceeded to a specific question in the interview...

Perhaps one answer was close.. however, I would soon delightfully scream "You are wrong! Guess what ? It's Archie's and Hallmark!" (Yes I know I turned cynical pretty early on. No need to rub it in!)

How are you planning to achieve the vision you have set for the Company?
We would like to be what we are - the leader for years to come. We will be responsible for creating occasions, so that people will find a reason to greet each other and keep in touch.

I would receive an amused smile and would smile in return. We lived in the marketer's world.

Mr Anil Moolchandani, Chairman-cum-Managing Director, Archies Ltd... I smiled as I remembered the last year of school..

Marginal loss.. Magnified!

I overslept today. For an hour. How does that matter you may say. Bad, but not inexcusable! You got to improve or you will suffer sometime. I'd heard that before.... but the suffering sometime came to me today.

The one hour I lost, also ensured my absence in a 'surprise' quiz of 15 marks. The quiz was simple: multiple choice and no negative marks. In the hypercompetitive environment around here, it effectively ensures a minimum loss of 3 grades. Yup 3 is the minimum, perhaps that will finally put me across the 'C' barrier that I never wanted to cross.

I lost a grade last term because the marketing professor wanted to take a vacation and I noticed his mistake only after he left - one day late. This term one hour of sleep has potentially put me down by 3 grades. That's a total of 0.20 credits on my final grade sheet. Gone, kaput, down the drain, without even bidding adieu. Let us see what the future count will be..

The day when I first.......

By the time you become 22 and are still in college, you don't expect doing many many new things. Yes, you may try subtle or not so subtle variations of what has been done before, but to try something completely and radically new, never experienced before is what requires a substantial amount of.. what do we call it... Lets say courage, guts, acceptance.

I went or rather ventured with a brave heart to conduct a market research yesterday to Saharaganj (yes, they have malls ending with ganj here!), Lucknow's only mall. Market research! Those two words are perhaps the most voluminous for a guy who has to, as my friend put it, go around ' subtly begging' people for their honest opinions. Remember the irritant pest troubling you for a survey you shrugged off last time ? Well... I was asked to fit myself in that role and remembering the way I usually treat MR souls.. I wouldn't give myself much of a chance. My whole group was there, supporting each other.

Together, we evolved a strategy. We targetted only those people sitting single or in groups of two where the other guy was busy talking on a phone. When we ambushed our target, the first action was to brandish brand IIM. Then to request for 2 minutes of his time for an 'important study' we were doing. For the first time in three months, I realized the advantages of lucknow being a slow city. We got hit-convert rates of 80%. A mumbai or delhi would have hardly given us 10% convert rates. But people in Lucknow have lots of time, especially for IIML people :)

A learning experience? You bet! The amount of ego I had to deflate to request people, even with the kind of positive responses I received, was in an experience in itself. I can now vaguely begin to understand when they say, 'One year in sales can change your life!' And as far as MR is concerned, I am gonna give a treat to the next fellow who asks me for two minutes of my time!

Of placements and ppts..

Bumps hurt. They hurt bigtime when inflicted by a frustrated team of footballers, who mistake you for the spherical contraption they kick around. If its your birthday, don't even ever venture near such a place!

That apart, finally submitted the CVs yesterday. The CVs for summer placements. The placement process consists of many companies coming to offer summer placements to IIML students. While it appears almost flattering that so many people want to 'enhance relations' and 'build lasting associations' with you and your institute, it all goes down the drain when you actually attend the PPT or the pre-placement talks.

The usual session goes this way:

"Our company is the biggest and the bestest!"
"Work for us!"
"We will give you the best experience of your life!"

After the sales pitch is over....

"What kind of positions are you offering ?"
"Hmm.. We promise you a project leading to a cross-functional and broad based experience."

"Which places would we work?"
"Depends on the project. Though the project and not the location preference should be your greatest priority. Try and get a project which offers a learning experience."

"What projects are you offering?"
"Depends on the business dynamics at that particular time. We try to offer live projects affecting the company decision-making real-time."

PPTs are a great experience for all upcoming managers. They tell you how to say something without actually meaning anything.. :)

The week gone by..

Second term at the outset is has a scope for far more trouble than term1. The profs are strict'er', no filler courses, add to that committee work and summer work and you can think of starting to imagine what I am going through. We would have to work for a sort of live project on DWO, daily readings for FM, MANAC, MM. Will have to also conduct a consumer survey for MM. Lets see how it turns out.... For the present, I am enjoying the first (and perhaps the only) day when there would be only one lecture tommorrow!