Void's Journal, Jan 23rd 2014.

Slot V is an interesting journey. It’s all around you. You can see it. Hear it. The way people speak in this slot. Maybe it's the course content, maybe it's the accumulated learning, maybe it's the accumulated learning about how to speak about the course content; but suddenly everyone's an expert. We all seem to have read the latest McKinsey quarterly, BCG perspectives and the high browed among us even know the closing stock prices on each day. Until you decide to Google these for yourself. We all know what Kejriwal or (preferably and - what are you? An urchin?)Modi has to say and more importantly have an opinion about it, however half-baked it may be. The suits from the Summers season are gone, but sometimes you can feel the spirit of it in the air. Knowledgeable sounding verdicts, convictions of other people's judgement delivered with the power of hindsight-the “oh-so obvious”-ness of it all seeps into the atmosphere. A tweak of the interest rate here, an optimistic assumption there and soon the success of every successful proposal in the past looks inevitable, as does the doom of all those which were condemned to failure.

Rationality is assumed and then that assumption is broken. There are chants of "goal incongruence" all around you. Reports are made, borrowed and remade as are the facts in them. And then there are the PPTs. Aah.. The road to hell is indeed paved with good intentions. I am sure when the historians look, they would find the kind misguided soul who saw it fit to deliver Powerpoint presentations to his boss to earn a few brownie points. Maybe they would condemn him in the future. But this is little respite for today's MBA graduate for whom this particular monstrosity seems to be the work of the devil himself.  The NPV is negative, you see. But then, I never understood PPTs. I'm more of a listener myself, as Peter Drucker would put it. Oops, sorry. There I go quoting my MBA fundamentals again. It seems to be a bad habit I have picked up.

Back to the ramble. There are surveys and questionnaires filled up by the principle of reciprocal back scratching. Frameworks are learnt and applied with the grace and efficacy of a sieve for separating milk and water. But no matter, the bell curve of the normal grading scheme watches all. It is a kind and benevolent ruler. It understands that there isn't time. That there are trade-offs. There are always trade-offs (But never a compromise, you understand? That's a bad word-except in HR/OB courses where that is the lifeline you hang on to, in order to stay afloat in the class participation component). We all nod knowledgeably and in agreement. The best minds in the country seldom disagree.

Slot V is interesting. 

{Edit Credit : Patient Little Minnu}