Interview Prep experience: Weird Problem statements

Here is an instance of a case where problem definition is weird and we are essentially looking at solving these types of cases in pressure situations.

This case was discussed once in prep practice by group 5.

First the characters in the story:
Interviewer: Narayanan (aka Mama)
Interviewee: Venkat
Case fished out by: Guru (also the observer)

Case statement: A hamburger manufacturer in the US has acquired a meat processing facility. The cows can be made to walk into the processing machine or run into it. What should they do?

Interviewee’s approach:
1) Tried to define the problem. What exactly are we trying to do?
2) What exactly is the difference between walking and running? Understanding the process.
3) How does it effect the output? Are there quality issues?
4) What is the processing capacity?
5) How does walking over running impact the capacity? (Lame question. Of course make the cows run will increase the quantity of meat produced)
6) How does it impact the cost of processing?
7) Questions on various cost aspects (lot of hints were given by interviewer)
8) Conclusion: On a per unit level, Its cheaper to produce by making the cows run. So that’s should be the approach

Interviewer’s comments:
1) Structure could have been better
2) Too much time spent on walk vs run. Interviewee should straight jump to the real issue which is “How can we improve our profits by doing one over another”?
3) How is the facility being used? Captive consumption Vs Selling to outsiders as well. If only captive, overproduction of perishable item like meat would result in wastage losses. Also can we sell to outsiders?
4) How will a process improvement at the facility impact revenues of the burger chain? Can we translate the cost savings into lower prices and ultimately better margins?
5) Charts could ve been used to understand the process (Thinking aloud)

Key takeaways:
1) Structure-Structure-Structure---Ask the right questions
2) Don’t get overawed by the weirdness of the problem. Walk Vs Run doesn’t mean anything unless it impacts the bottom line. Ask intelligent questions to get out the real problem and define it to obtain the agreement of the interviewer.
3) Think about both cost and revenue aspects. Similarly from an operational output stand point match supply to demand.
4) Think aloud and try to present pictorially your understanding of the process. Interviewer may throw hints if there is something wrong.
5) Listen carefully. In case of weird problems like this, there are enough hints in the initial answers which would help a candidate to come up with a good problem definition and structure

(This case is adapted from the case given in Pg 40 of the Harvard MCC case interview prep guide. Those interested may go over the case for a better understanding and numerical details. This case was repeated in the mock interview session with Yashraj from BCG and his comments have been incorporated at appropriate places)

Interview Prep session by ATK

After the success of the Mckinsey workshop, the Consulting Club continued its series of interview centric information sessions with a session from the A.T. Kearney (ATK) team, conducted on Saturday 2nd December 2006. The session was conducted by Saurine Doshi, Supratim Banerjee, Anshu Gupta and Kunal Malani.

The ATK team gave a brief overview of the firm and highlighted the features which differentiate ATK from the other Consulting majors. The speakers illustrated the differences by recounting their own experiences and emphasizing on the service delivery methodology followed by the firm. The focus of the session was interview preparation from the point of view of cracking ATK interviews. The following are the most important qualities that ATK tries to assess in the candidates through the interviews:

• Strong intellectual capabilities
• Ability to work in ambiguous environments
• Intellectual capital development
• Long term partner potential

The candidates are evaluated on certain broad aspects viz, – problem solving skills, personal qualifications, and client impact potential. Supratim also emphasized on the fact that everyone in ISB has come in with experience and hence the firm gives a lot of credence to a candidate’s prior work ex. The interview procedure is designed in a way so as to assess the candidate’s flare for consulting and whether he/she will be an appropriate fit for the firm or not. One question that is frequently asked on the interview is “Why ATK?” The candidates need to carefully think through this and assess whether their skill sets and qualifications are a good fit with the firm’s culture and how best they can leverage upon their own experience and proficiency in order to differentiate themselves.

The session ended with the ATK team conducting mock interviews with volunteers. After the interview, the team provided their feedback and perspective on how good or bad the interview was and what are the key areas of concern that need to be worked upon. As in the Mckinsey case session, the mock interviews were immensely useful not only to the observers but also the volunteers themselves as they got a thorough understanding of what they need to do and how they should go about doing it, in order to crack ATK interview.

Case Interview workshop by McKinsey and Company

The mercury has really started rising when it comes to the placement fever. With the D-day fast closing in, preparations have begun in full swing. Amidst this high pressure environment, the Consulting Club organized the Mck case workshop, which caught the pulse of the atmosphere on campus. The event was eagerly awaited which was quite evident from the number of people that swarmed AC 7 Max theatre on 1st December 2006. The workshop was conducted by Nigel Andrade, Venkatesh Srinivasan, Raj Kamal, Gaurav Bhalara and Rohit Kapoor and focused on the dos and don’ts for case interviews.

Nigel kick started the session by giving a general overview of what was going to be covered in the workshop and what would be the key learnings at the end of it. He defined the framework within which he was going to conduct the session and asked the student body for their expectations from the workshop. The key concern that Nigel sought to address was the evaluation criterion used to ascertain the success of a candidate in a case interview.

After the expectations had been laid down, Nigel switched gears and jumped straight into the methodology of preparing for and tackling case interviews. He stated the 4 key things that Mck looks for when evaluating the performance of a candidate on a case interview

• Intellectual horsepower / Problem solving ability
• Business judgment
• Drive and aspiration
• Leadership qualities

He then elaborated on the various stages that a candidate must pass through in order to crack the case. The emphasis is on the thought process rather than getting the correct answer.

First and foremost is the understanding of the problem and correctly defining it. The candidate must delve into each and every aspect of the problem posed to him and ask questions in order to completely understand the problem at hand and define it appropriately.

Once the problem has been identified and delineated, the candidate must work towards structuring the problem. This stage is very important as it can help the interviewer judge the thought process of the candidate and assess whether he is on the right track or not.

The third and the most important stage is the “test of creativity” which highlights the candidate’s ability to think out of the box and bring out new ideas and solutions to the problems. At this stage, the candidate must aim towards being as creative and innovative as possible as it will help the interviewer get an insight of the personality of the candidate and assess whether he would be a good fit with the organization or not.

The last stage is the problem solution or conclusion. In this stage the candidate needs to tie all the lose ends together and synthesize the ideas and link it back to the problem definition. A successful case interview is one which ends with all the loopholes plugged and all the ideas and solutions tied back to the original problem, and not necessarily getting the “correct” answer.

The above mentioned process of tackling case interviews was illustrated through a mock case simulation where volunteers were called upon and given a case to solve. Volunteers were made to handle a single stage of the case interview and after each round; the team gave feedback on what the volunteers should or should not have done. This approach made the whole learning experience extremely enjoyable as students could understand and grasp all the techniques required to crack a case by observing the volunteers solve cases on the spot. The session was immensely useful especially at a crucial time like this, as it gave a clear understanding of the line of attack to be adopted to successfully crack case interviews.

Hierarchy in Trade up

A very interesting article by Michael Silverstein, Vice President and Director, The Boston Consulting group. The article was published in the brand equity section of the economic times on Dec 6th 2006.

Cracking Case interviews: Some Tips

Diamond visited ISB around 15 days back to have an interactive session with the Consulting Club. Yashraj Erande from the Class of 2006 also visited ISB for an informal interaction with the club.

Both the sessions touched upon the process to be followed by students to crack case studies during interviews. The main take aways from both the sessions are documented below:

Steps to problem solving:

Problem definition: After the problem statement has been given to you, ask relevant probing questions to understand the situation better. Remember that the interviewer is trying to hire a future partner and not an associate. Ask questions about the constraints, if any. Thereafter define the problem concisely
Issue tree: Develop an issue tree and identify all the possible issues. This is a very important step because you will structure the problem at this stage. If the interviewer is not showing interest in what you are saying then it means that your issue tree is going in the wrong direction. Step back and start over again.
Collect data: Ask questions and gather as much data as you can. Manage data well – make sure write it all down.
Analyze data: Work out the calculations with the interviewer – speak out each step, check for signals
Recommendations: After all your analysis is complete, wait for the interviewer to give you a signal to start the conclusion. Thereafter concisely conclude the case.
While concluding, make sure that you conduct a sanity check: If the solution seems ridiculous and you think you’ve covered everything then tell the interviewer that the solution seems a little weird – ask if you missed out on something.
Synthesize – story about your full case (60 seconds)

Some do’s and don’ts:

Do’s and don’ts about case interviews
- do take time to understand the case and the key question
- do ask questions if something is not clear or if you need more data
- do take some time to think through the entire process and then start
- do keep your interviewer aware of your thinking
- do use a pen and paper if you have data to manage
- do stop and check if you are missing something obvious

Don’ts
- don’t be unstructured – this is all about structure (not necessarily the right answer)
- Don’t hesitate to admit that you have got it wrong and to start again
- Don’t force fit frameworks or use too much jargon
- Don’t just hypothesize – prove your hypothesis
- Don’t focus only on the answer – the approach is just as important

Posted by: Contributions from several members of the consulting club.

First steps towards placement preparation

With the end of core terms and the electives on offer, the Consulting Club kick started preparations for the placement season. Preparations are mainly targeted on two fronts:

CV / Resume preparation; and
Interview / case studies preparation

The first effort in this direction started off with a video conference with Rohit Kapoor and Shankar Prasad (both McKinsey and ISB Class of 2006) on CV Tips. The main takeaways from the session were:

-Identify your spike – it will either be education, work experience or extra curricular. Once identified, allocate the maximum page space to that spike.
-Work experience:
Emphasis on skills vs. content – you will be taking your skills to the new job, not the content of your work experience
-State results, not activities. For every activity there would be some result – emphasize that
-Prioritize achievements to state: Any bullet point, even if it appears to be remotely meaningless-delete it
-Use the situation – complication – resolution format. Identify the complexity in the job and then state the achievement
-No need to mention all projects done – just state the important ones
-Mention client names only if your previous employer did not have a policy of not disclosing client names
-Try and quantify achievements in numerical terms (increased revenues by XX%, improved efficiency by XX% etc.)
For other activities – if they are your lifetime passion and you have been perusing them since childhood then mention them in the extra-curricular section. Things done in educational institutes that do not fall in the above category – mention in the education section
Stress on value created by you at ISB – even if it is in a very small capacity
Keep font size consistent and leave enough white space on the CV
And most important – do not lie on your CV

Apart from this, some alumni have volunteered to review student CVs as a part of the interview preparations. The interview preparation efforts will start from this weekend and more posts on the progress will follow.

Nnumerous individual specific queries raised by students were also cleared. All in all it was a wonderful session and the student body went away with some important takeaways. This session was very useful to the entire student body and not just the Consulting aspirants.

Continuing with the series of Consulting firms visiting ISB, Diamond is visiting ISB on Friday. A post on that session will follow shortly.

Consulting in cross cultural environments by ATK

A.T Kearney visited the ISB on 22nd September to share some perspectives about Consulting in cross cultural environments. The session was conducted by Raman Mangalokar (Principal), Supratim Banerjee (Manager, ISB Class of 2002) and Ankur Warikoo (Senior Business Analyst, ISB Class of 2006).

The team shared their experiences about consulting with various business over the course of their career and how working with culturally diverse teams added to their experience. Raman recalled and shared his experiences of working out of ATK’s Chicago office and the different experiences he had working with cross cultural teams.

The team also spoke about ATK, the kind of work done by the firm and how an ATK consultant is passionate about not just making recommendations for the problem they are trying to solve but also, to see through the implementation of the solution.

Supratim also shared his perspectives and spoke about his experience with ATK for last 4 years.

On 23rd Sept, Ankur conducted a resume analysis session for the benefit of the students interested in consulting and ran us through a case study of his own resume and how he worked on it to shape it up for applying to Consulting firms. Use of effective verbs, and efficient presentation tactics to bring out all the positive aspects of one’s profile was stressed upon.

Both the sessions were attended by a large number of students and the consulting club would like to thank the ATK team for visiting the campus and interacting with the students.

Venkat

Introduction to McKinsey and Company

McKinsey and Company visited ISB on 9 September 2006 to conduct an “Introduction to McKinsey” session with the student body. The session was conducted by:
Rajiv C Lochan – Associate Principal
Venkatesh Srinivasan – Engagement Manager
Rohit Kapoor – Junior Associate (ISB Class of 2006)
Gautam P Chhugani – Junior Associate (ISB Class of 2006)
Ruchi Bansal – Junior Associate (ISB Class of 2006) and
Chris Fernandes –Recruiting coordinator

The session began with a presentation giving the general background and information about the firm. This was followed by each of the speakers recounting their own experiences with the firm and the ups and downs in their careers. The student body appreciated the honesty and frankness of each speaker as they recounted their initial days in the firm.

Thereafter, the focus shifted to the recruitment process of the company. Venkatesh invited questions from the students regarding the recruitment process and the same were addressed during for the remaining part of the event. The main focus of the remaining part of the session was on the short listing and interviewing process followed by McKinsey.

The speakers gave a detailed insight on the interview and evaluation process and elaborated on the parameters on which they judge the candidates. They emphasized on the fact that grades are important to the extent that they provide a quantifiable measure on the basis of which the candidates can be differentiated. However, it was also very clear from the discussion that grades were not the only consideration and other factors are equally important. These include – prior work experience, leadership skills and extra curricular activities. They also gave a brief overview of the rigorous resume short listing process where they spend almost 7 -8 minutes per resume and that every resume that is accepted needs the concurrence of at least two people.

After the resume short listing stage there are two rounds of interviews where they judge the following skills of the candidates:
· Quantative skills
· Problem solving
· Personality
· Ability to work in teams

The session was immensely useful as it gave a sense of what McKinsey is looking for in the applicants and provided an opportunity to students to reflect on their profiles and assess whether there is a “fit” between their profiles and the expectations of the firm and what needs to be done in order to bridge the gap.

Posted by Sunanda

BCG' s session on Consulting Careers

Representatives from The Boston Consulting Group visited ISB on 17 August 2006 to conduct a session on “Careers in Consulting”. The main agenda of the session was to address the specific questions of students on careers in consulting and to dispel some of the common myths that enshroud the profession. The session was conducted by Arvind Subramaniam, Ravi Srivastava, Rohit Chhapolia, Vishal Sharma and Ramesh Jha.

The event started with the Arvind inviting specific questions and queries from the students. The key questions that were asked during the session were as follows:
What are the different types of Consulting?
How to make the most of the management programme at ISB from the perspective of making a career in Consulting?
What are the key characteristics that Consulting Firms look for in prospective candidate?
What does the life of a Consultant entail – Work Life balance?
What is the Career progression in a typical Consulting firm?
Myths about Consulting

The speakers started with clearly defining and differentiating between the different types of Consulting – Management, Functional and Operational. Further, they addressed the above mentioned questions by citing examples and instances from their own experiences and their career progression in the firm. They also gave an insight on the diversity of projects and engagements that they had handled and impressed on the fact that each engagement is unique to a large extent and entails its own set of challenges. The theme that emerged from the discussion was that Consulting is all about “Out of the Box” thinking and the tools and methodology used in one project cannot be blindly applied to all projects. They also gave an insight on the problems and challenges faced by them as consultants in their day to day work life and gave a perspective on how they went about overcoming these challenges. They elaborated on and dispelled some of the common myths that surround consulting and helped the students get a clear understanding of the profession as a whole.

Towards the end of the discussion, the speakers addressed specific questions regarding the recruitment process and how to prepare for the same. However, the specific details of the interview preparation process were not addressed and would be taken up in the interview specific sessions in the coming terms. It was a highly interactive session which ended with the speakers informally interacting with the students on a one on one basis. This exercise gave the students an opportunity to express their individual concerns and get answers to questions which were probably not answered during the session.

Posted by Sunanda

Alum Interaction : Vijay Mulbagal

Vijay Mulbagal from class of 2006 was at the ISB today. He spoke at length about the various aspects of consulting and about his short span so far in the consulting world working with Diamond. Here are some key takeaways from the session:

1) Not everyone is cut out for consulting. Management Consulting is a glamorous job but at the same time it’s tiring, tedious and involves a lot of travel.
2) Grades and only grades are not important to make it to consulting. Each one of us has some unique achievements and it depends on how we bring that out in our resume’.
3) Resume building exercise should start early (may be now). A good resume plays a vital role in helping a candidate make a shortlist. People should get their resumes critically evaluated by peers and others and try to achieve perfection. The cover letters should be personalized and well written as well.
4) Vijay suggested some books that would be good to read towards preparation for consulting careers. The McKinsey way, McKinsey mind, The Pyramid principle ( by Barbara Minto) and Say it with charts were some of the books he suggested.
5) It is very important that one understands the key qualities required for consulting jobs. Flexible(read long) hours, frequent travel and working with ambiguity are a part and parcel of consulting. Qualities like good interpersonal skills and ability to communicate effectively are extremely important.
6) You should not choose to get into consulting just because it is glamorous. You have to make sure that you are cut out for it ( i.e to say you will be happy doing it). If you lack the qualities and still feel passionate about consulting, you should work on developing them.
7) There is a huge world outside consulting. There are many people who have not gone into consulting and yet are very well placed ( i.e earning well and happy with their job content!). Finally its only the industry guys who make the headlines.
8) It is very important to understand individual firm culture. Every firm is unique and has it’s own strengths and limitations. An aspirant should choose his/her target firm after evaluating the best fit according to his/her preferences.
9) Vijay also spoke at length about his experience with Diamond so far, the kind of work Diamond is looking to doing in India and overall culture at Diamond.

The Consulting club would like to thank Vijay for taking time out and being with us.

Posted by Venkat

What is Consulting?

The consulting club conducted its first major event today. It was a panel discussion on a Consultant’s work profile and culture across different consulting firms. The discussion was moderated by our Deputy Dean Ajit Rangnekar.

Three Alums: Bejoy Suri from Accenture, Anshuman Biyani from BCG and Rohit Kapoor from Mckinsey took part in the discussion.

Most of the discussion was centered around the kind of work consultants do in general with focus on strategy firms. What is consulting? What kind of work the consulting firms do? How is a typical day in a consultant’s life? How do you grow and learn in a consulting firm?—All these and many more such questions in the minds of many students looking at consulting careers post ISB were effectively answered.

The alums discussed in detail the kind of projects they have been doing since they joined their respective firms. The spoke at length about their experiences and touched upon the various assignments they have been involved in, to give the students present a deep insight into the life of a consultant. Ajit provided us with his valuable comments and narrated his own experiences as a consultant to add to the discussion and drive home the issues being discussed.

A consultant’s typical day was also discussed and it was emphasized, that though consulting careers give you a great opportunity to constantly learn, innovate and challenge yourself, it’s a tough job at the end of the day and you need to be one up always to succeed. Further, it was clearly mentioned that consultants had to travel a lot and keep away from their base offices for long periods adding to the challenges of the job.

Later an interactive session with alums was conducted to build upon the discussions and answer certain unanswered questions in detail.

The consulting club would like to thank Bejoy, Anshuman and Rohit for taking time out to be with us. We also thank Ajit for agreeing to moderate the discussion and provide us valuable insights on consulting careers.

-v

Falling Rupee--Good News !!

The Indian rupee continues its upward march against the dollar and there was no intervention from the RBI till yesterday. According to a TOI article published yesterday, although the rupee/dollar real exchange rate continues to be strong, a worldwide strengthening of the dollar has lead to a weaker rupee.

The strengthening of the dollar against the rupee is being considered as good news for the Indian business having huge receivables in dollars ( in particular the software firms--) a weaker rupee means more rupee for each dollar receivable and this could lead to boosting up of bottom line for many of the firms.

The RBI believes that as long as the rupee/ dollar real exchange rate is in good shape i.e to say that macroeconomic fundamentals are strong enough a weaker rupee only means good news for Indian firms in the short run. Though, what percentage fall is not a risk to the currency is something to think about

Venkat

Class of 2007 takes over

The activities of the consulting club were kick started with the formation of the club and election of office bearers. The class of 2007 has diverse set of individuals with their unique strengths and a stellar set of achievements. The profile and expertise of students is reflected in the consulting club as well.

For details about class of 2007 please click here.

The consulting club at the ISB is driven by the following objectives:

• To equip the students with the tools and resources necessary for careers in the consulting domain.
• To create a forum for information exchange among the industry and students.

Following is a snapshot data about the student members of the club:

Number of members: More than 250
Average work experience: 4.5 years
Areas of prior consulting experience:
Management consulting, risk advisory, process / operations consulting, IT consulting, benchmarking advisory.
Club members with consulting experience have previously worked at: (Illustrative only)
KPMG, Ernst & Young, PriceWaterhouse Coopers, Deloitte
Consulting, Ma Foi Management Consultants, Best Practices LLC, IBM, A.F. Ferguson
Club members with domain expertise have previously worked at: (Illustrative Only)
Infosys, TCS, Tata Motors, ICICI Bank, Maruti Udyog, CNBC, Siemens, NCDEX,
Wipro, Microsoft, Progeon, Marico, Evalueserve.com, Thomson Financial

The range of activities planned by the club in the current year includes:

• Facilitating forums such as internal speaker series, knowledge sharing sessions, and industry focus groups ensure the dissemination of knowledge amongst the students.
• The club plans to organise various speaker series’, interactions and workshops with executives from various companies and industries. This would facilitate an environment for knowledge sharing and growth. Interactions with the industry shall widen the students’ knowledge base and enhance their ability to respond to “real world” situations.
• The club plans to organize a plethora of events that prepare students for a career in consulting. These include facilitation of focus groups for case study discussions, groups for discussing the latest trends in industries, conducting mock interviews and regular interactions with consulting firms.

We at the consulting club would like to thank all alumni for all the support rendered to us so far and hope to having many more interactive sessions in the future.

A special thanks to Yashraj ( Class of 2006) for helping us reactivate this blog. This blog would contain updates about the activities of the club and all other material relevant to the Consulting world, Industry insights and preparation for Management Consulting careers.

Any further queries about the club may be addressed to the Club President Akshit Shah at Akshit_Shah@pgp2007.isb.edu

[Consulting@ISB] Big Ticket Dreams - Time to Pause

Dear All,

Now that the placement report has been formally announced, I can formally take a "pause" on this blog. This year has been a watershed year in terms of the consulting placements. New records have been established and our efforts have borne fruits. ISB has bagged huge (if not the largest) number of consulting offers from the bluest of the bluechip firms.

I hope that this blog has served its purpose of being a platform for sharing knowledge with all consulting aspirants from Co2006. We worked as a team to ensure that everyone gets the best shot at their dream consults. There was unprecedented collaboration within the batch and I strongly feel that it helped all of us push our bar a notch higher. Great show! This has only vindicated our belief that consulting placements are not a zero sum game.

The placement figures are available for all to see [ http://www.isb.edu/campussbuzz1/placements_2006_Fact_Sheet.pdf ] so I would not repeat them here.

The incoming batch can use this blog to get a feel of the way their alums went about preparing for consults. From here on it’s up to the Class of 2007 to carry the tradition forward and keep the ISB and Consulting@ISB flag flying high!

Wish you all the best in your careers.

Cheers :)
Yash

ps: if anyone wants to get in touch with me then mail me at yashraj_erande@pgp2006.isb.edu or yashraj.erande@gmail.com or check the alumi website for my latest contact details.

So what ?

Folks:
The following post is courtesy Rohit Kapoor... thanks dude.
Rohit has suggested two very useful frameworks which can be used during PI to generate the 'wow' ;D factor. Read on...

[Rohit's comments --]
I was reflecting on the PI rounds that I conducted and somehow found that the 'wow' factor was missing. The common link was that I could not understand the "so what?" of the answers. In other words the question which came to my mind was "so what is great about this particular thing". I think the challenge-action-impact framework will help in answeing PI questions especially around leadership, team work etc.

Challenge - Describe succintly what were the circumstances which made the job/experience difficult. This gets the interviewers attention.
Action - This part is essentially "what did you do?". This allows the interviewer to appreciate your problem solving and leadership capabilities.
Impact - Anything one does is meaningless unless it impacts something - client, internal processes, colleagues, team etc. Describing the impact tells the interviewer that you are an achiever. Also use a FROM-TO approach within this section. E.g. "The market share in this product category went up from 42 to 45% as a result of these initiatives".

Some other observations:
Please avoid using bombastic terminology like "passion for excellence", "amazing leadership capabilities !!" in describing yourself. You are really setting yourself up for trouble because after you have used such extreme superlatives, your examples better be damn good. Words like "committed", "person who can take end-to-end responsibility" are more likely to be believed and examples can back these up.

Lastly, please please do not give cop-out answers on "What are your weaknesses" question. Answers which are complete disasters are "I work so hard ... I multi-task so much that I fail to prioritize ..... I dont know how to strike work-life balance ..... I am too analytical". The interviewer is out to recruit a human being and not god !! One good answer which I got was "I am a slow starter ..this can be a handicap in consulting .. however I was given this feedback in my last job .... this is what I have done to get better at this"

Economic Indicators on Economist.com

Some of you might be interested in tracking the Economic indicators on a regular basis.
You can visit this link on Economist.com using ISB login (via E_Resources):

http://www.economist.com/markets/indicators/index_wide.cfm?page=Emerging%20Market&story_id=5446071

-- Yash

Interesting trends in IT industry

As a follow-up after my session on 'Global Delivery Model' here is an excellent article that talks about the emerging dynamics in the Indian IT industry.

It makes a passing reference to a new delivery model christened 'Networked Delivery Model'. In my understanding the key difference between Global and Networked Delivery Model is that the latter may include multiple delivery centers in the same geography operating as a mesh. For example, Chile may provide Insurance (verticle) domain serivces while Mexico may provide Application Development and Maintenance (horizontal) services and India may provide Engineering and QA (horizontal) services.

The main advantages are:
1. Increased localization - European office has better grip over European insurance sector
2. Increased specialization - Chile office focuses mainly on Insurance, India on solution derlivery
3. Increased robustness (risk mitigation) because of increased geographical spread - In built fail over system

In my opinion, in the long run this model will allow TCS to develop processes and competencies at one center (say Solution Delivery capabilities at India) and then roll them out across many other centers (say Latin America). Thus, the main hub will function as a center of excellence in a particular horizontal / verticle.

Although, the article's focus is on TCS' strategies, I think it gives a very good perspective on the changing paradigm in the Indian IT industry. I got this article from an alum - Vijayant Gupta Co 2002. Thanks Vijayant!

file://isbhome/generalhome/Clubs_Co2006/Consulting-Club/Resources/CS.pdf


-- Yash

Bharat Nirman Project

Following post is courtsey Gaurav Balhara... thanks Balu!

BHARTA NIRMAN
Swaminathan Aiyar
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1336063.cms

---

Main Analysis and Targets
India sets Rs. 80 bn plan for rural infrastructure development.

Roads, railways, electricities, water supplies and telecommunications; what else 70 per cent of one billion plus population is waiting. Will the virtual figure of improving these in rural areas show its face in reality. Time will break the pause.

One of the main relation between project made and project done is the correlation between ‘cause’ and ‘effect’. If the ‘cause’ runs in a positive direction, the ‘effect’ is always positive. In the development sector, which generally is a very long period plan, ‘cause’ will never affect the mass. It is always the ‘effect’ which matters. Promises are made and promises broken. Its nothing new among Indian politicians. Still, lets hope for the better tomorrow in the infrastructure development sector which was served deliciously in the Lok Sabha in the long two hour speech by the Harvard-educated lawyer-turned-politician Mr. P. Chidambaram.

For the development of Rural India, Chidambaram invited private investment in the rural infrastructure plan to implement the project ‘Bharat Nirman’, outlined by President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam last week. The annual funding of this four years plan is Rs. 80 billion. Bharat Nirman is a business plan for building infrastructure in areas of irrigation, roads, housing, water supply, electrification and telecommunication connectivity by 2009. Our FM is confident about ‘Bharat Nirman’ and mentioned it to be “an achievable project”.

The Targets:
• Extension of irrigation facilities to additional 10 million hectares.
• Providing rural roads to inhabitations with a population of 1,000 people in plains.
• Providing the same to inhabitations of 5,000 people on hills.
• Building 6,00,000 additional low-income houses.
• Providing drinking water facilities to 74,000 habitations who are currently lacking this facility.
• Providing power connections to 1,25,000 more villages involving connectivity to 23 million houses.
• Providing telecommunication facilities to 66,822 more villages.
It will be a giant step in development of the rural India if the ‘effect’ comes out with flying colours after four years. As in the telecommunication sector, only 1.1 per cent of the total national density is in rural areas. According to the promises made, it will be increased to more than eight per cent. According to Kalam, Rural India should be seen as a growth engine and public investment is required in the area of rural infrastructure to unleash its growth potential. If all goes well, Bharat Nirman will eradicate poverty, provide excellent and affordable opportunities for education and skill development for all citizens. Health will surely improve and higher income level groups will be generated in India.

An allocation of Rs 9,308 crore has been made for the North Eastern region for the fiscal 2005-06. Out of this Rs 459 crore has been alloted as a special package for highway development in this region. Kumarghat-Agartala and Lumding-Silchar-Hiribam-Imphal projects would be supported with additional funds outside the Railway Budget as projects of national importance. According to FM all ministries and departments are required to allocate at least 10 per cent of their Budget for schemes and programmes in this region.

The burgeoning foreign exchange reserves for will be used for infrastructure development henceforth. All disinvestment receipts will go to the National Investment Fund and used for social sector projects and it will not be taken as capital receipts nor as revenue receipts. Courtesy