As the year 2010 is coming to an end I would like to reflect some of the main highlights of this year. This has been a tremendous year and I am sure many more important things have had happened this year, but these are some of the things which got my attention and hopefully yours as well.
Movies (I watched & liked):
Inception
The Social Network
Ironman 2
Toy Story 3
The Town
Gadgets & Electronics:
Dawn of the tablet.
Apple draw the first blood in the business of tablet by introducing - iPad. The new iPhone 4 was introduced as well.
Smart phones - iOS Vs Android: The battle continues.
Science & Technology:
Facebook become more widely used, linking up most of the planet (approx 500 million users & growing). Zukerberg became the Time magazine person of the year. Donated 100 million for the NJ education system.
Craig J Venter announced the first self-replicating synthetic cell
Politics, Economics & Finance:
Unemployment rate – 9.3%
Gold touches new high - 29.7% up ($1420+)
GM back to business. IPO raises around $20.1 Billion.
Wikileaks gain momentum and adversaries.
US Indices performance:
DOW Jones - 11% up
S & P 500 - 12.7% up
NASDAQ - 17% up
Personal Front:
I decided to write this blog
Inception of the idea to pursue an MBA
Become more aggressive on learning and reading front
Wishing everybody a wonderful and prosperous 2011.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
The Code
We always have this notion this thought that all the stories related to Wall Street are about who makes how much, the ongoing financial saga and the everlasting insiders trading. We always consider Wall Street to be very personal and conservative about what goes on inside its 4 walls. How about something new and refreshing? How about knowing something which is not exactly but somewhat resembles to the Mission Impossible series or to one of those sequences of 24?
The Fact:
I’ve been following this story over the web for quite some time and every time I read something about it I feel as if I am reading the script from one of the high adrenaline thrillers or one of the cyber crime movies from the Hollywood. There is this person (highly skilled computer programmer) smart enough to steal this very important software code from one of the World’s biggest financial organizations and then try to run away with it. The organization turns out to be smart enough (smarter than the person who steals it) to trace the digital footprint of this hacker and reports this incident of the code theft to the police. This hacker is on the run. In this act of cat & mouse chase, the hacker was smart enough to hide the copy of this code on one of the backup server’s overseas. The Police officials ultimately get hold of this person and now he is waiting for the trial. We actually don’t know what will happen after the trial as it is scheduled to be held sometime next year.
Prologue:
In July 2009, the first news started was out that there has been a security breach at one of the finest Wall Street organizations. That one of the high frequency trading (HFT) code has been compromised. The HFT software code is nothing but a combination of complex algorithms which is used to incorporate high frequency trading. The code is very sophisticated and is capable of doing millions of transactions with a blink of an eye. Codes like these has been always dealt with skepticism by the common man as these codes are known to be lighting fast for complicated transaction and can be notorious as well to bring down the whole system (for more information see Flash Crash that happened in May 2010). Someone who is in possession of this code and know how to use it can change the face of the market before anybody knows. The breach was nothing but an act of theft which was done successfully by one of the chief programmers of this organization. This fine act came just 3 days before the programmer was about to leave this organization for another lucrative offer.
Each & every word after this is purely an assumption. May be this is the result of me watching too many movies and my mind started to think like that.
Epilogue:
March 2011, after the final trial all the evidences points against that the hacker and he is guilty as charged. As a result he hands over the code to the cops and they hands it down to the financial organization. Hacker goes to prison. The code is safe again and no damage done. In this scenario everybody is happy: the financial firm, the cops and the common people like me who read such stories and try to analyze. As normally as it happened in the movies, good guys won bad guys lost and you & me gets our well deserved entertainment. Problem resolved & case closed. Problem resolved? I don’t think so. We all just forget about that copy of the code which is still out there on one of the backup server’s overseas. I have doing some interesting analysis of what might happen to that code which is still out in the open. I am sure there are number of other things which one can decide but this is what I come up with:
Scenario 1: Someone might get his hand on the code. Finds it useless and deletes it.
Scenario 2: This someone turned out be another hacker who fine tunes the code, fix the bugs if any, makes it more powerful and sell it to the another financial organization and make millions.
Scenario 3 (my favorite): The hacker (who is unaware about the owner of the code) invested these millions dollars (which he earned in scenario2) in the same bank who owns the code. The bank crashes and he lost everything.
Scenario 4: In these times of open source, one of the open source evangelist gets this code and made the code public.
Scenario 5: The code is in the hands of Wikileaks and they try to expose it.
Scenario 6: The bank anonymously helped the hacker (who steals the code) by bailing him out. Give him couple of million dollars for pulling off this show of stealing the fake code and distracting people from the wrong doings of the bank.
Conclusion:
We live in this World which is now very well connected, thanks to the internet revolution. We cannot imagine how someone can use unrecognized holes in the web to their advantage. How vulnerable is the information out there in open and how someone can twist and turn that information to cause untenable damage. Moreover this is just a heads up for the information security that anything can happen and more stringent processes needs to be in place to put an end to this.
Puzzle:
I usually give out the names of the concerning parties in my blog. This time I won’t give out any information upfront. There is this very small puzzle which you all need to resolve to find out the reality behind this. The name of the bank who owns the code consists of 2 words and one of these words rhymes with 33.33% of the letters in the word saxophone. I hope you get the name of the bank. Once you get the name of the bank and willing to read the articles on the subject & to know the name of the programmer who compromised the code plus more interesting details, you need to choose smart key words from the blog above and try to make use of this site - 1 followed by 100 zeroes (this should not be tough, thanks to the internet age).
The Fact:
I’ve been following this story over the web for quite some time and every time I read something about it I feel as if I am reading the script from one of the high adrenaline thrillers or one of the cyber crime movies from the Hollywood. There is this person (highly skilled computer programmer) smart enough to steal this very important software code from one of the World’s biggest financial organizations and then try to run away with it. The organization turns out to be smart enough (smarter than the person who steals it) to trace the digital footprint of this hacker and reports this incident of the code theft to the police. This hacker is on the run. In this act of cat & mouse chase, the hacker was smart enough to hide the copy of this code on one of the backup server’s overseas. The Police officials ultimately get hold of this person and now he is waiting for the trial. We actually don’t know what will happen after the trial as it is scheduled to be held sometime next year.
Prologue:
In July 2009, the first news started was out that there has been a security breach at one of the finest Wall Street organizations. That one of the high frequency trading (HFT) code has been compromised. The HFT software code is nothing but a combination of complex algorithms which is used to incorporate high frequency trading. The code is very sophisticated and is capable of doing millions of transactions with a blink of an eye. Codes like these has been always dealt with skepticism by the common man as these codes are known to be lighting fast for complicated transaction and can be notorious as well to bring down the whole system (for more information see Flash Crash that happened in May 2010). Someone who is in possession of this code and know how to use it can change the face of the market before anybody knows. The breach was nothing but an act of theft which was done successfully by one of the chief programmers of this organization. This fine act came just 3 days before the programmer was about to leave this organization for another lucrative offer.
Each & every word after this is purely an assumption. May be this is the result of me watching too many movies and my mind started to think like that.
Epilogue:
March 2011, after the final trial all the evidences points against that the hacker and he is guilty as charged. As a result he hands over the code to the cops and they hands it down to the financial organization. Hacker goes to prison. The code is safe again and no damage done. In this scenario everybody is happy: the financial firm, the cops and the common people like me who read such stories and try to analyze. As normally as it happened in the movies, good guys won bad guys lost and you & me gets our well deserved entertainment. Problem resolved & case closed. Problem resolved? I don’t think so. We all just forget about that copy of the code which is still out there on one of the backup server’s overseas. I have doing some interesting analysis of what might happen to that code which is still out in the open. I am sure there are number of other things which one can decide but this is what I come up with:
Scenario 1: Someone might get his hand on the code. Finds it useless and deletes it.
Scenario 2: This someone turned out be another hacker who fine tunes the code, fix the bugs if any, makes it more powerful and sell it to the another financial organization and make millions.
Scenario 3 (my favorite): The hacker (who is unaware about the owner of the code) invested these millions dollars (which he earned in scenario2) in the same bank who owns the code. The bank crashes and he lost everything.
Scenario 4: In these times of open source, one of the open source evangelist gets this code and made the code public.
Scenario 5: The code is in the hands of Wikileaks and they try to expose it.
Scenario 6: The bank anonymously helped the hacker (who steals the code) by bailing him out. Give him couple of million dollars for pulling off this show of stealing the fake code and distracting people from the wrong doings of the bank.
Conclusion:
We live in this World which is now very well connected, thanks to the internet revolution. We cannot imagine how someone can use unrecognized holes in the web to their advantage. How vulnerable is the information out there in open and how someone can twist and turn that information to cause untenable damage. Moreover this is just a heads up for the information security that anything can happen and more stringent processes needs to be in place to put an end to this.
Puzzle:
I usually give out the names of the concerning parties in my blog. This time I won’t give out any information upfront. There is this very small puzzle which you all need to resolve to find out the reality behind this. The name of the bank who owns the code consists of 2 words and one of these words rhymes with 33.33% of the letters in the word saxophone. I hope you get the name of the bank. Once you get the name of the bank and willing to read the articles on the subject & to know the name of the programmer who compromised the code plus more interesting details, you need to choose smart key words from the blog above and try to make use of this site - 1 followed by 100 zeroes (this should not be tough, thanks to the internet age).
Thursday, December 9, 2010
The Blame Game
I believe everyone impacted by the current economic situation is eager to know what caused this event. I am no different and still searching to find out the reasons what made the most stable economies of the world kneel down on their knees? What factors triggered this collapse? There is a plethora of information on the web, hundreds of books and articles are published on this sensitive subject. Different people have different views. Some are knowledgeable enough to predict what is going to happen next while others are a mere charlatan. In a sense they all are busy playing the game which the situation demands. Confuse the people on the main street, bring new theories and discard the old ones, and most importantly never keep the ball in your court. In short and popular term – The Blame Game.
I read one such article (sometime last year) which is interesting enough to be mentioned on this blog. Let me start with a brief description and we will see how one class of professionals are held responsible and getting most of the blame for triggering one of the worst financial crisis ever known. Quants or quantitative analysts are the professionals who are pretty good with mathematics and related fields, like physics and statistics. Nearly about 2 decades back these quants were invited by the wall street to make sophisticated and efficient financial models based on their ostentatious knowledge of mathematics, probability, statistics, physics and computer science. Various investment banks, insurance agencies and other financial institutions hired these so called geniuses. Things were going pretty good, markets were booming, banks were making tons of profit, Wall Street executives were making millions. All in all the financial models which most of the people were not able to understand, including some of the smart Wall Street managers & CEOs were mesmerizing the world. We all finally found some really good and profitable use of mathematics and physics.
David X Li was one such quantitative analyst who entered Walls Street with the hope of making things even better. Chinese by origin and academician by record, Li achieved double masters, one in business and another one in actuarial science. Actuarial science is the field of mathematics & stats which is used to assess risk in insurance and finance sectors. Li obtained his PhD (Stats) as well. He earned all the 3 degrees from one of the famous Canadian universities. While working on the Wall Street Li came up with this amazing mathematical formula – Gaussian Copula function which makes use of the mathematical copula. Li derived this formula while working on one of the problems of actuarial science known as “the broken hearts” – which states that life expectancy of an individual decreases after the death of their spouse. What a interesting theory? The formula initially used on Wall Street to assess risk of various security derivatives, CDS (credit default swaps) and creeping from all those financial intricacies reached the final destination to assess the risk and set the price for mortgage based CDOs (Collateralized debt obligations is a kind of asset based security). CDOs played an important part in the current financial crisis and most of the damage done was somewhat related to CDOs. According to many, Li’s formula served as one of the primary reasons why the CDO market was not able to calculate the risk properly and hence failed. Li’s formula was one of the very hot topics as now people got this one name this one person and this one formula to blame. Did Li’s formula jumpstart the financial crisis? I will not comment on that. What I know is that there are many smart people who are sitting in those financial institutions who just used this formula without even validating its impact. What they loved about the formula till it got broke is the simplicity associated with it and its capability to earn trillions of dollars. CDO market grew from $275 billion in 2000 to the staggering $4.7 trillion till 2006. Amazing, isn’t it? Tax payers & home owners are you listening?
If Mr. Li’s formula is responsible for killing the wall street, our stocks, our home values, our 401ks and our dreams, then I guess Mr. Alfred Noble is responsible for all the modern wars as Noble was the inventor of dynamite and somewhat today’s weaponry is the derivative of that. We cannot point fingers and held the inventors responsible for things they came up with. Us being the end user, it is our job to validate what he/she has introduced and depending on that we need to make a decision to use that stuff or not (keeping our greed out of the equation). We all need to put greed in the backseat or throw it out of our lives (even better) and start thinking about the human value. This has happened in the past and as the things are proceeding, it will again happen in the future. There are many more Gaussian copulas or similar formulas making rounds in the world and other places of significant importance. How many of them has actually been validated, how many of them are something else apart from being the gas for the greed machine? If things did not fall into place I am pretty sure we will have this conversation again. God Bless the mankind, at least we all can hope for that.
I read one such article (sometime last year) which is interesting enough to be mentioned on this blog. Let me start with a brief description and we will see how one class of professionals are held responsible and getting most of the blame for triggering one of the worst financial crisis ever known. Quants or quantitative analysts are the professionals who are pretty good with mathematics and related fields, like physics and statistics. Nearly about 2 decades back these quants were invited by the wall street to make sophisticated and efficient financial models based on their ostentatious knowledge of mathematics, probability, statistics, physics and computer science. Various investment banks, insurance agencies and other financial institutions hired these so called geniuses. Things were going pretty good, markets were booming, banks were making tons of profit, Wall Street executives were making millions. All in all the financial models which most of the people were not able to understand, including some of the smart Wall Street managers & CEOs were mesmerizing the world. We all finally found some really good and profitable use of mathematics and physics.
David X Li was one such quantitative analyst who entered Walls Street with the hope of making things even better. Chinese by origin and academician by record, Li achieved double masters, one in business and another one in actuarial science. Actuarial science is the field of mathematics & stats which is used to assess risk in insurance and finance sectors. Li obtained his PhD (Stats) as well. He earned all the 3 degrees from one of the famous Canadian universities. While working on the Wall Street Li came up with this amazing mathematical formula – Gaussian Copula function which makes use of the mathematical copula. Li derived this formula while working on one of the problems of actuarial science known as “the broken hearts” – which states that life expectancy of an individual decreases after the death of their spouse. What a interesting theory? The formula initially used on Wall Street to assess risk of various security derivatives, CDS (credit default swaps) and creeping from all those financial intricacies reached the final destination to assess the risk and set the price for mortgage based CDOs (Collateralized debt obligations is a kind of asset based security). CDOs played an important part in the current financial crisis and most of the damage done was somewhat related to CDOs. According to many, Li’s formula served as one of the primary reasons why the CDO market was not able to calculate the risk properly and hence failed. Li’s formula was one of the very hot topics as now people got this one name this one person and this one formula to blame. Did Li’s formula jumpstart the financial crisis? I will not comment on that. What I know is that there are many smart people who are sitting in those financial institutions who just used this formula without even validating its impact. What they loved about the formula till it got broke is the simplicity associated with it and its capability to earn trillions of dollars. CDO market grew from $275 billion in 2000 to the staggering $4.7 trillion till 2006. Amazing, isn’t it? Tax payers & home owners are you listening?
If Mr. Li’s formula is responsible for killing the wall street, our stocks, our home values, our 401ks and our dreams, then I guess Mr. Alfred Noble is responsible for all the modern wars as Noble was the inventor of dynamite and somewhat today’s weaponry is the derivative of that. We cannot point fingers and held the inventors responsible for things they came up with. Us being the end user, it is our job to validate what he/she has introduced and depending on that we need to make a decision to use that stuff or not (keeping our greed out of the equation). We all need to put greed in the backseat or throw it out of our lives (even better) and start thinking about the human value. This has happened in the past and as the things are proceeding, it will again happen in the future. There are many more Gaussian copulas or similar formulas making rounds in the world and other places of significant importance. How many of them has actually been validated, how many of them are something else apart from being the gas for the greed machine? If things did not fall into place I am pretty sure we will have this conversation again. God Bless the mankind, at least we all can hope for that.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
The Landmark
The story I am about to narrate is very close to my heart. One of the reasons to write this blog is directly or indirectly related to this fateful and eventful tale. I mentioned this story as eventful as dates are important in this narration and we’ll come to know as the blog unfolds.
Some people believe that things that goes up fast comes down fast, especially those things that are big & heavy. The protagonist of this story is a person of the scientific background and does not believe in this statement. According to him, things without proper explanation and relevant proof are not worthy to turn your attention to. We live in this world full of uncertainties, where anything could happen with a blink of an eye and most of those things happen without any proof or explanation. At that point science & mathematical proofs sounds meaningless, all the books & articles that you’ve read and all the knowledge that you’ve acquired over a period of time does not make any sense. Is that possible ever, when nothing matters and reality sucks?
In the spring of 2007 (March to be precise) after a long day of work the man drove back to his house. While he was driving many thoughts cross his mind. I definitely need a break and it’s been a while when I took one. How about a visit to Florida or shall I go for Las Vegas or someplace else in the west coast? Hard to decide the location where he would like to spend the quality time with his wife and son he reaches his home. He discussed the plan for his well deserved vacation with his wife and told himself he will make a small travel project and plan everything well in advance. The man told his wife that the weekend of Memorial Day will be perfect for this. The wife agreed. After much discussion both of them decided a common destination - BIG APPLE. Let’s do it, NYC is the most happening city in the world the man exclaimed with a sparkle of joy in his eyes. With a destination in place we now need to find a good hotel and the plan for the sightseeing the man told his wife and she nodded. How about a vacation package from Expedia, Travelocity or Hotwire the man asked his wife? The wife said whatever we have to do we have to do fast as that being a long weekend all the good hotels will be booked well in advanced. You are right, the man responded and without wasting any minute he was wandering the web with all the good deals for this trip. The results from those travel sites started to pop up - hotel for 2 adults & 1 child in downtown Manhattan for 3 nights and the return flight tickets, all for this amazing price, we’ll take it. This is an excellent deal, the hotel is awesome, right in the heart of Manhattan, the man told himself.
The flight was on time and the weather in the NYC looks good. They checked into this massive & classic hotel which stood on the Madison Avenue & 45th street in the heart of midtown Manhattan. After taking the tour of the Empire State Building they took the cab for Times Square. This was too much fun they told each other. How about a walk from Times Square back to our hotel, the man asked his wife? Sure, but are you completely aware of the route back to the hotel, the wife asked? That’s not a problem the man replied we can ask someone. One of the NYC street vendor were kind enough to show them the way back to their hotel and the vendor told them that if they ever wanted to walk from the Times Square to their hotel they just need to keep this landmark in mind. The landmark, the man questioned. Yes, the landmark, the vendor replied. You see that big building, the one which stands in the dark night with the white crown, this is your landmark. Just follow this building and this will take you to your destination. This building is indeed our landmark, the man said. What a grandiose structure and conspicuous architecture, he thought. The walk that night was fun. For the next two nights they followed the building as their landmark, and every time they take the stroll they always discussed about that building. There are lots of amazing buildings in NYC but this one in particular building caught their attention. This landmark, this building watched them every night as they walked towards it. With lots of good memories the trip was over. I am all charged up after this vacation and ready to go back to work, the man told his wife on the way back home.
Life was going fine and fast and before they knew it the summer was gone. Winter started followed by spring that welcomes the month of March 2008. On March 17th 2008, the man reached the work place and started to check his emails and opened a separate window for checking the business news on CNN. The economy is not in good shape he talked to himself. News after news keeps coming and all indicate the economy is in shambles. While browsing one of the web pages he came across this article which he could not believe. It felt like the sky above his head gone missing. To most of his shock & bewilderment the landmark is gone. That building that used to guide him back to the hotel in NYC, that building does not exists, the name associated with it was just history. This is a predicament situation and we all are neck deep into this. While driving back home from work he could not stop thinking about the landmark. Whatever goes up fast comes down fast, this is just another quote, another way to express the views, everything is just fine and everything will be fine, he keeps talking to himself as moves towards his home.
For most of us, the story explained above was the official introduction to the Economic, Financial & Housing conundrum. Trillions of dollars vanished, Millions of jobs were gone, hundreds & thousands become homeless, may be more. The effect of this economic quake was so drastic that till date we are getting the shocks and jitters. The aftermath of this meltdown was just alarming. To the shock of most of us, that epicenter which triggered this economic tsunami was none other than but the landmark. The landmark that mentioned in the story helped the man reach his destination, but today this landmark is nothing but a big concrete boulder, an unavoidable hindrance in the path of millions.
The landmark (the building with the white crown) was none other than the building of Bear Stearns (one of the very first primary financial institutions to fall). The classic hotel mentioned in the story is, Hotel Roosevelt (which is right next to Bear Stearns) and the man (as mentioned in the story) who is still trying to find out what happened to his landmark and why all this is happening, why no one took responsibility for such a disaster, is the none other than but the writer of this blog – me.
I dedicate this post to all the people who lost everything to this financial meltdown, who lost their jobs, their homes, there happiness, their dreams and their hopes. My heart, my mind and my blog all goes out to them. Everybody keep on telling the same thing, one landmark is gone and the other we will be resurrected. When & how, nobody knows. Till then follow your heart as it will be your best GPS. You don't need any landmark if you follow your heart. Your heart will be your best guide and you won’t miss your destination, rest assured.
Some people believe that things that goes up fast comes down fast, especially those things that are big & heavy. The protagonist of this story is a person of the scientific background and does not believe in this statement. According to him, things without proper explanation and relevant proof are not worthy to turn your attention to. We live in this world full of uncertainties, where anything could happen with a blink of an eye and most of those things happen without any proof or explanation. At that point science & mathematical proofs sounds meaningless, all the books & articles that you’ve read and all the knowledge that you’ve acquired over a period of time does not make any sense. Is that possible ever, when nothing matters and reality sucks?
In the spring of 2007 (March to be precise) after a long day of work the man drove back to his house. While he was driving many thoughts cross his mind. I definitely need a break and it’s been a while when I took one. How about a visit to Florida or shall I go for Las Vegas or someplace else in the west coast? Hard to decide the location where he would like to spend the quality time with his wife and son he reaches his home. He discussed the plan for his well deserved vacation with his wife and told himself he will make a small travel project and plan everything well in advance. The man told his wife that the weekend of Memorial Day will be perfect for this. The wife agreed. After much discussion both of them decided a common destination - BIG APPLE. Let’s do it, NYC is the most happening city in the world the man exclaimed with a sparkle of joy in his eyes. With a destination in place we now need to find a good hotel and the plan for the sightseeing the man told his wife and she nodded. How about a vacation package from Expedia, Travelocity or Hotwire the man asked his wife? The wife said whatever we have to do we have to do fast as that being a long weekend all the good hotels will be booked well in advanced. You are right, the man responded and without wasting any minute he was wandering the web with all the good deals for this trip. The results from those travel sites started to pop up - hotel for 2 adults & 1 child in downtown Manhattan for 3 nights and the return flight tickets, all for this amazing price, we’ll take it. This is an excellent deal, the hotel is awesome, right in the heart of Manhattan, the man told himself.
The flight was on time and the weather in the NYC looks good. They checked into this massive & classic hotel which stood on the Madison Avenue & 45th street in the heart of midtown Manhattan. After taking the tour of the Empire State Building they took the cab for Times Square. This was too much fun they told each other. How about a walk from Times Square back to our hotel, the man asked his wife? Sure, but are you completely aware of the route back to the hotel, the wife asked? That’s not a problem the man replied we can ask someone. One of the NYC street vendor were kind enough to show them the way back to their hotel and the vendor told them that if they ever wanted to walk from the Times Square to their hotel they just need to keep this landmark in mind. The landmark, the man questioned. Yes, the landmark, the vendor replied. You see that big building, the one which stands in the dark night with the white crown, this is your landmark. Just follow this building and this will take you to your destination. This building is indeed our landmark, the man said. What a grandiose structure and conspicuous architecture, he thought. The walk that night was fun. For the next two nights they followed the building as their landmark, and every time they take the stroll they always discussed about that building. There are lots of amazing buildings in NYC but this one in particular building caught their attention. This landmark, this building watched them every night as they walked towards it. With lots of good memories the trip was over. I am all charged up after this vacation and ready to go back to work, the man told his wife on the way back home.
Life was going fine and fast and before they knew it the summer was gone. Winter started followed by spring that welcomes the month of March 2008. On March 17th 2008, the man reached the work place and started to check his emails and opened a separate window for checking the business news on CNN. The economy is not in good shape he talked to himself. News after news keeps coming and all indicate the economy is in shambles. While browsing one of the web pages he came across this article which he could not believe. It felt like the sky above his head gone missing. To most of his shock & bewilderment the landmark is gone. That building that used to guide him back to the hotel in NYC, that building does not exists, the name associated with it was just history. This is a predicament situation and we all are neck deep into this. While driving back home from work he could not stop thinking about the landmark. Whatever goes up fast comes down fast, this is just another quote, another way to express the views, everything is just fine and everything will be fine, he keeps talking to himself as moves towards his home.
For most of us, the story explained above was the official introduction to the Economic, Financial & Housing conundrum. Trillions of dollars vanished, Millions of jobs were gone, hundreds & thousands become homeless, may be more. The effect of this economic quake was so drastic that till date we are getting the shocks and jitters. The aftermath of this meltdown was just alarming. To the shock of most of us, that epicenter which triggered this economic tsunami was none other than but the landmark. The landmark that mentioned in the story helped the man reach his destination, but today this landmark is nothing but a big concrete boulder, an unavoidable hindrance in the path of millions.
The landmark (the building with the white crown) was none other than the building of Bear Stearns (one of the very first primary financial institutions to fall). The classic hotel mentioned in the story is, Hotel Roosevelt (which is right next to Bear Stearns) and the man (as mentioned in the story) who is still trying to find out what happened to his landmark and why all this is happening, why no one took responsibility for such a disaster, is the none other than but the writer of this blog – me.
I dedicate this post to all the people who lost everything to this financial meltdown, who lost their jobs, their homes, there happiness, their dreams and their hopes. My heart, my mind and my blog all goes out to them. Everybody keep on telling the same thing, one landmark is gone and the other we will be resurrected. When & how, nobody knows. Till then follow your heart as it will be your best GPS. You don't need any landmark if you follow your heart. Your heart will be your best guide and you won’t miss your destination, rest assured.
Monday, December 6, 2010
GMAT Update
These days GMAT is taking most of my time. I have completed Quant and Verbal portion and now I need to revise what I did for the last 10 weeks. Time to start practicing the problems, reviewing the notes and hard coding various quant formulas and equations in the brain. SC is the one portion about which I am still not confident, so need to work on that. All in all I should say that GMAT is the very first step for getting an MBA and believe me it’s the one which will not only test your quant & verbal skills it will test your time management skills too (which is very important for a good manager). What matters on the GMAT is how effective you are in laying your study plan to the point you execute it, how you divide your time based on your comfort level for each of the quant and verbal sections and how you make use of the time wisely between work and the GMAT prep.
Before putting the plan for the GMAT, I faced a tough time deciding the books I should consider. There are myriad of forums and blogs suggesting the books and other prep material for the GMAT. At times this plethora of information is too much for an individual and at time this data mining is excruciating & time consuming. I guess we all know where we stand in terms of our present quant & verbal skills and this should be the foundation for consulting/buying the books for the GMAT. I knew I had pretty rusty quant skills and for the verbal I knew it would be a challenge to take up SC, RC & CR without the basics. Based on this information I short listed the books which I am using for my GMAT prep. Here goes the list:
Quant (PS – Problem Solving & DS – Data Sufficiency)
Manhattan Series - Quant:
1. Number Properties
2. Fraction, Decimal & Percentage (FDP)
3. Equations, Inequality & VICs (VICs – Variable in answer choice)
4. Word Translation
5. Geometry
Verbal (SC – Sentence Correction, CR – Critical Reasoning, RC – Reading Comprehension)
Manhattan Series - Verbal:
1. Sentence Correction - SC
2. Reading Comprehension - RC
3. The Powerscore GMAT Bible Critical Reasoning – CR
Apart from these I also bought OG11, OG Quant, OG Verbal (OG – official guide from the makers of the GMAT).
Primarily these are the books on which I am going to concentrate. I bought some more books for the additional practice exams, more on those books in a later blog.
I have read in some blogs & forums that some people started to develop this hatred somewhere during their prep period and this hatred act as their power booster for the GMAT. This feeling brings out the best in some individuals. For me I have this simple logic which I have followed most of my life, hate it or love it if you want to succeed in any point in life, if you want to conquer those unfathomable dreams then hard work is inevitable. I agree that luck will play an important part in our life and will drive some of the life’s main decisions too. To support the Luck factor in the equation, there is one of the quotes from the movies I like: “Chance favors the prepared mind”. Which movie? – Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (Watch it. One of the best from Steven Seagal)
Before putting the plan for the GMAT, I faced a tough time deciding the books I should consider. There are myriad of forums and blogs suggesting the books and other prep material for the GMAT. At times this plethora of information is too much for an individual and at time this data mining is excruciating & time consuming. I guess we all know where we stand in terms of our present quant & verbal skills and this should be the foundation for consulting/buying the books for the GMAT. I knew I had pretty rusty quant skills and for the verbal I knew it would be a challenge to take up SC, RC & CR without the basics. Based on this information I short listed the books which I am using for my GMAT prep. Here goes the list:
Quant (PS – Problem Solving & DS – Data Sufficiency)
Manhattan Series - Quant:
1. Number Properties
2. Fraction, Decimal & Percentage (FDP)
3. Equations, Inequality & VICs (VICs – Variable in answer choice)
4. Word Translation
5. Geometry
Verbal (SC – Sentence Correction, CR – Critical Reasoning, RC – Reading Comprehension)
Manhattan Series - Verbal:
1. Sentence Correction - SC
2. Reading Comprehension - RC
3. The Powerscore GMAT Bible Critical Reasoning – CR
Apart from these I also bought OG11, OG Quant, OG Verbal (OG – official guide from the makers of the GMAT).
Primarily these are the books on which I am going to concentrate. I bought some more books for the additional practice exams, more on those books in a later blog.
I have read in some blogs & forums that some people started to develop this hatred somewhere during their prep period and this hatred act as their power booster for the GMAT. This feeling brings out the best in some individuals. For me I have this simple logic which I have followed most of my life, hate it or love it if you want to succeed in any point in life, if you want to conquer those unfathomable dreams then hard work is inevitable. I agree that luck will play an important part in our life and will drive some of the life’s main decisions too. To support the Luck factor in the equation, there is one of the quotes from the movies I like: “Chance favors the prepared mind”. Which movie? – Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (Watch it. One of the best from Steven Seagal)
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
4 days of Thanksgiving
I missed 4 days of my GMAT prep studies and now I am back to my study table. As far as the studies goes, I am half way in the CR bible (Ch: 8 to be exact). CR Bible as the name suggests is `The Bible` to understand basics of CR. The book covers all the rules for CR (fundamental & advanced). I will try to pick up OG11 (Quant Diagnostic) soon and with that my marathon to solve the questions will start. 29th Jan (my date with GMAT), is still less than 2 months away. I am hoping things will work as per the schedule I’ve planned, but those 4 precious days are gone.
I don’t know if I’ve enjoyed/wasted/or taken the much needed break in last 4 days. Here is to summarize the valuable time I’ve spend:
26th Nov – Black Friday shopping (Grab those 2$ DVDs and 5$ Blu Ray – Walmart Rocks)
27th Nov – Black Friday Hangover + some more shopping
28th Nov – Tired of shopping (Watched TV and Die Hard 4)
29th Nov – Yiiii Hooooo Cyber Monday (Did not bought anything though)
I did the math on my schedule (till 30th Nov) and it seems I’ve not studied for the total of 10 days (My GMAT prep started on 27th Sep). I hope I score well on the GMAT otherwise these 10 days will haunt me for a long time. Anyway it’s too late to take any stand as these days won’t be coming back.
I don’t know if I’ve enjoyed/wasted/or taken the much needed break in last 4 days. Here is to summarize the valuable time I’ve spend:
26th Nov – Black Friday shopping (Grab those 2$ DVDs and 5$ Blu Ray – Walmart Rocks)
27th Nov – Black Friday Hangover + some more shopping
28th Nov – Tired of shopping (Watched TV and Die Hard 4)
29th Nov – Yiiii Hooooo Cyber Monday (Did not bought anything though)
I did the math on my schedule (till 30th Nov) and it seems I’ve not studied for the total of 10 days (My GMAT prep started on 27th Sep). I hope I score well on the GMAT otherwise these 10 days will haunt me for a long time. Anyway it’s too late to take any stand as these days won’t be coming back.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Kellogg - Info Session
I attended one of the Kellogg’s part time informational sessions sometime back, and it was one hell of an experience. I must recommend that anyone who is interested to pursue the MBA or as a matter of fact any program should pay the visit to the school of his or her interest.
The informational session took place at the E Superior Street campus near the lake shore drive in downtown Chicago. I reached just in time and the class ( I choose to pick the word ‘class’ as by no means it looks like an informational session, the surroundings and the environment looks like more of a lecture session) was full. There was a very short and simple speech from Kellogg’s adcom and before we were able to adjust our self to this environment we were divided into teams. 10 minutes into the session and we all are experiencing how the business class looks like. One of the very strong points about getting an MBA from Kellogg is their hardcore team work and this session is not different. My team was having 5 members (I don’t recall their background but they all look sharp). All the teams were given this task to come up with an ad for the animal shelter and we were asked to support this ad with the slogan that will act as our marketing punch line. Soon everybody was busy working on their ad and we were given around 10 minutes to complete this task. I suggested the slogan for my team which got the approval from the other team members. All of us we were chatting and discussing as we all know each other for a long time. I can now see the team work in action in the business class and how the idea gets amalgamated. This activity was fun and after 10 minutes the spokesperson from each of the team presented their ad. After this we have this presentation about the school, (I would call this a marketing slide) which was full of lots of information. All that information can be gathered from the Kellogg’s web site as well.
There was a QA session followed by the presentation, where 4 current students from the PT program answered the questions. I was quick enough to ask my question as due to time constraints some of the attendees were told to meet the adcom in person for all their queries.
I asked this question during the QA session: “Is there anything the students would like to change about Kellogg?” I don’t recall on top of my head but I guess they gave me some diplomatic answer for that.
Out an out it was a fantastic experience. The members of the adcom looks friendly, the presentation was good and the event was worth spending the Friday evening.
I am happy about the slogan which just clicked with the team and it goes like this:
“We all understand the language of Love and the animals are not different “
We say good bye to each other and came out with the hope of returning to Kellogg (not as information gatherers but as information seekers).
The informational session took place at the E Superior Street campus near the lake shore drive in downtown Chicago. I reached just in time and the class ( I choose to pick the word ‘class’ as by no means it looks like an informational session, the surroundings and the environment looks like more of a lecture session) was full. There was a very short and simple speech from Kellogg’s adcom and before we were able to adjust our self to this environment we were divided into teams. 10 minutes into the session and we all are experiencing how the business class looks like. One of the very strong points about getting an MBA from Kellogg is their hardcore team work and this session is not different. My team was having 5 members (I don’t recall their background but they all look sharp). All the teams were given this task to come up with an ad for the animal shelter and we were asked to support this ad with the slogan that will act as our marketing punch line. Soon everybody was busy working on their ad and we were given around 10 minutes to complete this task. I suggested the slogan for my team which got the approval from the other team members. All of us we were chatting and discussing as we all know each other for a long time. I can now see the team work in action in the business class and how the idea gets amalgamated. This activity was fun and after 10 minutes the spokesperson from each of the team presented their ad. After this we have this presentation about the school, (I would call this a marketing slide) which was full of lots of information. All that information can be gathered from the Kellogg’s web site as well.
There was a QA session followed by the presentation, where 4 current students from the PT program answered the questions. I was quick enough to ask my question as due to time constraints some of the attendees were told to meet the adcom in person for all their queries.
I asked this question during the QA session: “Is there anything the students would like to change about Kellogg?” I don’t recall on top of my head but I guess they gave me some diplomatic answer for that.
Out an out it was a fantastic experience. The members of the adcom looks friendly, the presentation was good and the event was worth spending the Friday evening.
I am happy about the slogan which just clicked with the team and it goes like this:
“We all understand the language of Love and the animals are not different “
We say good bye to each other and came out with the hope of returning to Kellogg (not as information gatherers but as information seekers).
Friday, November 19, 2010
Tim Berners-Lee (who ????)
First time on this blog I am writing something not related to MBA and B-schools. I am trying to stick to the promise I made with myself to write not only about MBA but all the things that excites me. Just came across this wonderful article about the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee (by who ????). Well, Tim Berners-Lee is the inventor of World Wide Web (www). These are the 3Ws without which the internet is dead and yet the name of his inventor got somewhere lost under the big and ever growing world of www. The article explains lots of interesting things right from the time www was conceived and how it was able to become the backbone of the internet. How business is driving the technology in the 21st century and how big companies are molding the www to their interests. The writer truthfully depicts the picture of www in the present scenario, and tries to explain why the flow of information should be open and accessible to every human being.
My favorite lines from this article:
As long as the web’s basic principles are upheld, its ongoing evolution is not in the hands of any one person or organization—neither mine nor anyone else’s. If we can preserve the principles, the Web promises some fantastic future capabilities.
In short, internet revolution is the biggest revolution of our generation. Every aspect of our life is directly or indirectly connected to it. Time will only answer this - Will we be able to destroy these walls which we have created around the information flow or will the www thrive like an independent entity like it was born, free.
My favorite lines from this article:
As long as the web’s basic principles are upheld, its ongoing evolution is not in the hands of any one person or organization—neither mine nor anyone else’s. If we can preserve the principles, the Web promises some fantastic future capabilities.
In short, internet revolution is the biggest revolution of our generation. Every aspect of our life is directly or indirectly connected to it. Time will only answer this - Will we be able to destroy these walls which we have created around the information flow or will the www thrive like an independent entity like it was born, free.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Shortlisting B-Schools
My choice for the business schools is very straightforward as I need to pick up the best business schools for the part time program. I need to look for the programs which are primarily in the mid-west region as that will make my commute easy over the weekend. The two of the best programs in the Midwest for both part time and full time and are on top of my list as well are:
University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
I am not sure about the PT ranking for this year, but for the fulltime ranking for the year 2010 (just released by BW), Booth is the top school (beating Harvard) and Kellogg is the number 4 school on that list. I knew that from the beginning that these 2 schools will be my top choices for the MBA, as both of them are offering excellent programs. Each of them is powered by a group of elite faculty members and the super achieving army of the world renowned alumni. These schools offer the evening as well as the weekend part time MBA program. Considering the distance from where I live/work from Chicago, I would prefer the weekend program.
On 6th of August 2010, I attended the Kellogg’s part time informational session in their lake shore drive campus and it was a pretty good experience. I will blog about that soon.
Other 2 schools which are on my list are:
College of Business at Illinois, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC)
Krannert School of Management, Purdue University
I read somewhere that while making the choices for the B-Schools always consider couple of schools as your realistic choices. These are the schools where you are sure that you will crack their admission procedure and will make it to their program without any setbacks. UIUC and Krannert are the schools that perfectly fit my contingency plan.
After figuring out the list of schools I want to attend, I am now all set to work on each and every school’s admission criteria. GMAT is the top priority on my list and I have already started working on that. As of now my GMAT score will decide where I am heading, till then back to my study table as there is still lot to be done on the GMAT front.
University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
I am not sure about the PT ranking for this year, but for the fulltime ranking for the year 2010 (just released by BW), Booth is the top school (beating Harvard) and Kellogg is the number 4 school on that list. I knew that from the beginning that these 2 schools will be my top choices for the MBA, as both of them are offering excellent programs. Each of them is powered by a group of elite faculty members and the super achieving army of the world renowned alumni. These schools offer the evening as well as the weekend part time MBA program. Considering the distance from where I live/work from Chicago, I would prefer the weekend program.
On 6th of August 2010, I attended the Kellogg’s part time informational session in their lake shore drive campus and it was a pretty good experience. I will blog about that soon.
Other 2 schools which are on my list are:
College of Business at Illinois, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC)
Krannert School of Management, Purdue University
I read somewhere that while making the choices for the B-Schools always consider couple of schools as your realistic choices. These are the schools where you are sure that you will crack their admission procedure and will make it to their program without any setbacks. UIUC and Krannert are the schools that perfectly fit my contingency plan.
After figuring out the list of schools I want to attend, I am now all set to work on each and every school’s admission criteria. GMAT is the top priority on my list and I have already started working on that. As of now my GMAT score will decide where I am heading, till then back to my study table as there is still lot to be done on the GMAT front.
Monday, November 15, 2010
GaGa over the PT
Don't get bamboozled by the title of this post as this is not about the very famous and talented Lady Gaga. Though I find no reasons why I cannot blog about her and her so called extraordinary marketing management style (someother post might be on that someday). This is my top pick for the attire which GaGa put on recently.
Anyways, another big reason to delay my MBA journey was a decision that I need to make about the type of MBA I would like to go for - full time or part time. After taking into consideration all the factors, I have decided to go for the part time MBA. One thing is for sure, I would not like to quit my job, take a 100K+ loan and go for the full time MBA. I mean there are lots of individuals who can do that pretty easily but not me. In this economic quagmire I am not ready to quit the job, feed the family, take the loan and study peacefully. I did all the possible calculations and reached this decision (against my wife's willingness) to opt for the part time program for various reasons.
One such reason (I guess one of the biggest) is that I would like to earn the MBA while earning my living. It will require lots of efforts from my end as I need to balance my current job, I need to be on top of MBA curriculum and need to give ample amount of time to my wife & kids as well. I am ready to take this challenge, as it will primarily test my time management skills in the real time environment. Taking into consideration my past records I can conclude that I am a good (not very good) time manager, but this will be an out an out very-very complicated and engrossing time management project and I am all set for it.
Is PT the new face for the MBA education? Well it is fairly difficult to predict at this moment but I don’t see why this cannot happen. I mean the way things are turning up with this economy and the jobs who know what might happen in the coming years. One thing is for sure, there are many more who are thinking like me to go for the PT and that is the reason why PT is getting so much attention these days. One recent pretty good article which I read in BW talks about PT MBA and their expectations. This is not to be missed if you have decided to go for the PT.
Anyways, another big reason to delay my MBA journey was a decision that I need to make about the type of MBA I would like to go for - full time or part time. After taking into consideration all the factors, I have decided to go for the part time MBA. One thing is for sure, I would not like to quit my job, take a 100K+ loan and go for the full time MBA. I mean there are lots of individuals who can do that pretty easily but not me. In this economic quagmire I am not ready to quit the job, feed the family, take the loan and study peacefully. I did all the possible calculations and reached this decision (against my wife's willingness) to opt for the part time program for various reasons.
One such reason (I guess one of the biggest) is that I would like to earn the MBA while earning my living. It will require lots of efforts from my end as I need to balance my current job, I need to be on top of MBA curriculum and need to give ample amount of time to my wife & kids as well. I am ready to take this challenge, as it will primarily test my time management skills in the real time environment. Taking into consideration my past records I can conclude that I am a good (not very good) time manager, but this will be an out an out very-very complicated and engrossing time management project and I am all set for it.
Is PT the new face for the MBA education? Well it is fairly difficult to predict at this moment but I don’t see why this cannot happen. I mean the way things are turning up with this economy and the jobs who know what might happen in the coming years. One thing is for sure, there are many more who are thinking like me to go for the PT and that is the reason why PT is getting so much attention these days. One recent pretty good article which I read in BW talks about PT MBA and their expectations. This is not to be missed if you have decided to go for the PT.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Date with GMAT
I am trying to catch up things happening in my life and the ones I am trying to publish on this blog. There is some delay but I will make up for sure. Important thing, my date with GMAT is fixed, and after much head banging and performing various superstitious permutations & combinations I've booked 29th Jan'2011 as my date to fight the GMAT. Got all the books and the plan has been laid. Each day is flying and the G-DAY is coming near. Already completed the Quant portion (Theory), and now working on the Verbal. I've decided to take up practice questions for the Quant and will now try to manage the time between Quant & Verbal. I will publish my complete GMAT plan after 29th Jan. Good luck to me and to everybody who are doing their GMAT prep.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Perfect Inception
10 years from now…
Somewhere in heart of downtown Manhattan, you are standing on the 25th floor of this office building, looking down as the traffic snarl. Though lots of things are happening around you but at times you feel that you are alone in this concrete jungle. Your expensive suit is making you uncomfortable, though you are wearing it every day to work but still you are not used to it. Confused and bewildered you come back to your desk. You try to relax in that plushy and comfortable chair. Your office looks like a exquisite suite of a 5 star hotel. You have everything you’ve ever wanted in your life but still you are searching for something. Suddenly your Bvlgari watch started making this alarming sound as if your office is on fire, you stood up and started to search frantically in all your coat pockets and find something. This thing is nothing but a top, which you carry with you all the time. Slowly you put down the top on the table and without thinking for another second you started to spin the top on the table. You are looking at the spinning top as your life depends on it. The top keeps on spinning making you more nervous with each rotation. As you gasp for air the top starts to wobble and then it stopped spinning. You take a sigh of relief as you’ve narrowly escaped death. Wiped your face and then looked around. Suddenly everything starts to lighten up. Your lonely feeling is gone, you are happy. You started to feel all the things around you. The concrete jungle has now become the most happening city in the world. But wait your suit is still giving you a hard time…what the heck, you need to be more careful next time you go out shopping for a new suit. Who cares about the suit when your office suite is real, your position, your job, your salary, your bonus & your Bvlgari is real. This is not a dream as you are real.
Flashback:
You are feeling helpless right now. You cannot hide or run from it. If you have decided then you have to do it. There has been an incident of perfect inception. You have successfully implanted the idea of getting an MBA in your brain. This idea is now everything for you. Your life, career and your goals all depend on it. Your task started by doing diligent search for finding the best schools that fit your business education schema. You shortlisted some of the schools, decided what program you want (FT or PT), burned the mid night oil to excel in GMAT, carefully laid your strategy for the essays, choose your recommendations, gather your transcripts, evaluate your GPA. By the time you realize the time has come to submit your apps. Now you are waiting and waiting and one fine day you get the interview call. You think this is it and you made your plans to attend the interview. This is the time you’ve waiting for and spend all your energy answering the very questions you’ve been asked. This was the last step between you and your dream school. Nothing is in your hands now. You did what you can. Your mind has now become the battleground of thoughts, you are not able to sleep and you won’t be able to sleep till you get a definite yes or no from the school you’ve just applied. You are laying in bed and just day dreaming about your B-school, but wait what sound is that. The cheap 10$ Armitron watch is beeping on your night stand. You get up slowly and picked the top lying next to the worn out watch. You started to spin the top on the night stand and to your dismay it keeps on spinning & spinning & spinning ….
There are many people for whom it is a dream to get everything they’ve ever planned in life, they working hard to achieve that, for them the top is spinning. There are others who have everything they have ever wanted in their life but at times they could not believe it. There are many more, who are spending their life in a state of limbo. They have no specific goals or plans, very contended and accept their life the way it is.
This is what life is all about, some are dreamers, some are achievers and some are just plain & simple human beings. But for all of us the earth is spinning, the life is spinning but for me the top is spinning.
I dedicate this post to one of my favorite, the extremely talented and brilliant director - Chris Nolan. He is having such an unparalleled approach to the craft of film making, that every movie he has made has left a lasting impression. If tomorrow Mr. Nolan changes his mind and came up with an idea to enter porn business, I am sure people will line up to watch that as well on the big screen, as he may have made that using his own style and his very gifted brain.
Somewhere in heart of downtown Manhattan, you are standing on the 25th floor of this office building, looking down as the traffic snarl. Though lots of things are happening around you but at times you feel that you are alone in this concrete jungle. Your expensive suit is making you uncomfortable, though you are wearing it every day to work but still you are not used to it. Confused and bewildered you come back to your desk. You try to relax in that plushy and comfortable chair. Your office looks like a exquisite suite of a 5 star hotel. You have everything you’ve ever wanted in your life but still you are searching for something. Suddenly your Bvlgari watch started making this alarming sound as if your office is on fire, you stood up and started to search frantically in all your coat pockets and find something. This thing is nothing but a top, which you carry with you all the time. Slowly you put down the top on the table and without thinking for another second you started to spin the top on the table. You are looking at the spinning top as your life depends on it. The top keeps on spinning making you more nervous with each rotation. As you gasp for air the top starts to wobble and then it stopped spinning. You take a sigh of relief as you’ve narrowly escaped death. Wiped your face and then looked around. Suddenly everything starts to lighten up. Your lonely feeling is gone, you are happy. You started to feel all the things around you. The concrete jungle has now become the most happening city in the world. But wait your suit is still giving you a hard time…what the heck, you need to be more careful next time you go out shopping for a new suit. Who cares about the suit when your office suite is real, your position, your job, your salary, your bonus & your Bvlgari is real. This is not a dream as you are real.
Flashback:
You are feeling helpless right now. You cannot hide or run from it. If you have decided then you have to do it. There has been an incident of perfect inception. You have successfully implanted the idea of getting an MBA in your brain. This idea is now everything for you. Your life, career and your goals all depend on it. Your task started by doing diligent search for finding the best schools that fit your business education schema. You shortlisted some of the schools, decided what program you want (FT or PT), burned the mid night oil to excel in GMAT, carefully laid your strategy for the essays, choose your recommendations, gather your transcripts, evaluate your GPA. By the time you realize the time has come to submit your apps. Now you are waiting and waiting and one fine day you get the interview call. You think this is it and you made your plans to attend the interview. This is the time you’ve waiting for and spend all your energy answering the very questions you’ve been asked. This was the last step between you and your dream school. Nothing is in your hands now. You did what you can. Your mind has now become the battleground of thoughts, you are not able to sleep and you won’t be able to sleep till you get a definite yes or no from the school you’ve just applied. You are laying in bed and just day dreaming about your B-school, but wait what sound is that. The cheap 10$ Armitron watch is beeping on your night stand. You get up slowly and picked the top lying next to the worn out watch. You started to spin the top on the night stand and to your dismay it keeps on spinning & spinning & spinning ….
There are many people for whom it is a dream to get everything they’ve ever planned in life, they working hard to achieve that, for them the top is spinning. There are others who have everything they have ever wanted in their life but at times they could not believe it. There are many more, who are spending their life in a state of limbo. They have no specific goals or plans, very contended and accept their life the way it is.
This is what life is all about, some are dreamers, some are achievers and some are just plain & simple human beings. But for all of us the earth is spinning, the life is spinning but for me the top is spinning.
I dedicate this post to one of my favorite, the extremely talented and brilliant director - Chris Nolan. He is having such an unparalleled approach to the craft of film making, that every movie he has made has left a lasting impression. If tomorrow Mr. Nolan changes his mind and came up with an idea to enter porn business, I am sure people will line up to watch that as well on the big screen, as he may have made that using his own style and his very gifted brain.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
MBA vs MS
The ideas & thoughts expressed below are my interpretation for the much discussed comparison. According to me both MS and MBA are great programs. The only difference is how one selects these programs to fulfill his/her career goals (both long & short term)
I knew from the very beginning that if I were given the option to go for the Masters program it would definitely be the one in Business. Reason being, I never got the chance to study Business or any of the related subjects such as Acc, Fin. or Eco. It is a human tendency that things that you have never tried in life attracted you to go for them - both good & bad :). Moreover, I felt that I have to diversify my educational portfolio, and the degree in MBA will help me achieve my long term goals. By the way what are my long term goals? They are way too many at this time and I need to work on making that list short and achievable.
MS on the other hand will help me in getting more in depth knowledge of the technical realm. To be frank in first place I guess I am done doing the same repetitive job I am doing with the technology I learn during my BS and I guess doing an MBA will help me tackle more challenging and interesting responsibilities. I love doing technical stuff, but the sheer interest in Business which I've developed in the last couple of years (blog coming soon...to explain how I develop this interest) is driving me to get an MBA, and now I am all set to go for one.
MBA vs MS - (MBA Won - undisputedly)
I knew from the very beginning that if I were given the option to go for the Masters program it would definitely be the one in Business. Reason being, I never got the chance to study Business or any of the related subjects such as Acc, Fin. or Eco. It is a human tendency that things that you have never tried in life attracted you to go for them - both good & bad :). Moreover, I felt that I have to diversify my educational portfolio, and the degree in MBA will help me achieve my long term goals. By the way what are my long term goals? They are way too many at this time and I need to work on making that list short and achievable.
MS on the other hand will help me in getting more in depth knowledge of the technical realm. To be frank in first place I guess I am done doing the same repetitive job I am doing with the technology I learn during my BS and I guess doing an MBA will help me tackle more challenging and interesting responsibilities. I love doing technical stuff, but the sheer interest in Business which I've developed in the last couple of years (blog coming soon...to explain how I develop this interest) is driving me to get an MBA, and now I am all set to go for one.
MBA vs MS - (MBA Won - undisputedly)
Friday, November 5, 2010
SK 101
Time for a brief introduction.
SK (that is me) resides in a very happening town in the Midwest. Home to one of the World's best universities, this town is ideally located in south of Chicago.
I am someone who has spend most of my life learning technology and after my Bachelors in Engineering (Electronics), I decided to enter this fascinating field of information technology. I am not a software programmer. I earned my bread & butter by working as a Unix Administrator. I am in this field of system administration for more than 9 years. By the way I am married to this wonderful woman FK and we have 2 great & hyperactive sons MK (4) & RK (1).
Life was going on fine as usual but somewhere in my mind I have these recurring thoughts (I assume most us in our mid-career have these thoughts):
Where is my career heading for ?
Is this what I want to do my entire life ?
Why I am still working as a Unix Admin where as my colleagues & friends (with same work exp.) have become Team Leads, Managers, Directors & Entrepreneurs ?
Is my present work challenging enough or should I go for a career change ?
All these and many more questions have made a permanent impression in my mind. Education and a keen inclination towards gathering knowledge are the two reasons for me being what I am today, and I have decided that these two factors will shape my future and help me answer those challenging queries in the back of my mind.
SK (that is me) resides in a very happening town in the Midwest. Home to one of the World's best universities, this town is ideally located in south of Chicago.
I am someone who has spend most of my life learning technology and after my Bachelors in Engineering (Electronics), I decided to enter this fascinating field of information technology. I am not a software programmer. I earned my bread & butter by working as a Unix Administrator. I am in this field of system administration for more than 9 years. By the way I am married to this wonderful woman FK and we have 2 great & hyperactive sons MK (4) & RK (1).
Life was going on fine as usual but somewhere in my mind I have these recurring thoughts (I assume most us in our mid-career have these thoughts):
Where is my career heading for ?
Is this what I want to do my entire life ?
Why I am still working as a Unix Admin where as my colleagues & friends (with same work exp.) have become Team Leads, Managers, Directors & Entrepreneurs ?
Is my present work challenging enough or should I go for a career change ?
All these and many more questions have made a permanent impression in my mind. Education and a keen inclination towards gathering knowledge are the two reasons for me being what I am today, and I have decided that these two factors will shape my future and help me answer those challenging queries in the back of my mind.
Monday, November 1, 2010
Me & My Blog
Finally I've set my profile and I am all geared to write this blog. It took me several weeks to write this first blog as I got involved in this dirty argument with myself to start this journey, this urge to share with others what I have learned and what I will be learning and sharing with all of them.
But wait, most importantly I want to put down all my thoughts in one place, and writing a blog is a wonderful idea.
I will try to make this blog as interesting as I can and I will try to publish all the things that excites me.
Now what are those things that excites me? Will get back to that shortly....
Happy First blog to me :)))
But wait, most importantly I want to put down all my thoughts in one place, and writing a blog is a wonderful idea.
I will try to make this blog as interesting as I can and I will try to publish all the things that excites me.
Now what are those things that excites me? Will get back to that shortly....
Happy First blog to me :)))
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