XLers Unlimited

You know you're at XL when...

1. There's a 6pm class going on, and at 6-53pm, 97% of junta are busy pinging each other on Facebook to find out whether ANYONE has gone to attend the class.
Often called: MASS BUNK

2. A smiles at B, C reports this to D, who claims to E, F and G that A took B out. E, F and G tell I through P that A and B have been going steady for 6 months. They in turn tell all their friends, who tell their friends, who tell...
Next morning, A finds his Facebook flooded with "Congratulations! When's the Wedding?" questions from 1,479,456 users, most of whom have no idea who A is, but who just want the gossip.
In other words, GRAX.

3. There's no time to eat and even less time to sleep, because work fills all available time (apparently), but there's always time to catch three back to back episodes of F.R.I.E.N.D.S, attend a Drac quiz and bungle it up, and loudly cheer a grainy version of Harry Potter and the HBP in LH-1 until 2-30am. And then go back to the room and crib about there bring no time to do anything.
Otherwise known as FRAX.

4. It's 3-45 am in the morning, the world is dead to all noise and movement, and inside a whitewashed room, sixteen people are asking at the same time for bread burji, aloo cheese sandwich, gobi aloo cheese paranthas, omelettes, fried maggi, cigarettes and nimbu pani. And they ALL get exactly what they asked for in record time.
The eighth wonder of the world: Bishu-da.

5. The class is in full swing, the prof is asking B for a two-line definition of Motivation; and Q jumps up and explains it in 3765 words, with two diagrams and a chart thrown in, as well multiple pointed references to the textbook authored by the same prof (and still doesn't manage to explain what it is to the class, which has by now fallen asleep with mouths wide open.)
In brief: DCP.

6. Prof asks for the meaning of Transfer Climate- and R begins: "Well, sir, to look at it from a general perspective, I am convinced about the veracity of the definitions given by Roiller and Goldstein, however, to put my own views in a nutshell regarding the subject matter under discussion and throw a clearer light on things as they stand"-
Pure, unadulterated-by-facts, GAS.

7. On July 1st, a deadline of July 15th is declared for a project submission. Till 14th, there is no reponse, only lethargy, inertia- and on 14th night:
At 11:00pm, with a sudden burst of spontaneous energy, people are darting into each other's rooms, asking if anyone else has done it.
By 1:00 am in the morning, mass prayers are being organised and Google worship is under way.
By 3:00 am, 50% of people are in Bishuda's looking like escaped convicts and groaning in acknowlegement of each other.
By 5:00am, 66% give up, put in arbit shit and 4-5 random graphs and hit the sack.
By 7:00am, the last few survivors vow never to postpone work ever again and collapse over laptop.

Next week, another deadline- same story.

XL meri jaan! :-)

Awaaz's (hindi channel of CNBC TV18) news on XL's summer placements

from Prof Shukla :

Hello Folks!

The 3rd Weekend of November is approaching - and so, time to start planning your trip back to XL for the 5th Annual XLRI Alumni Homecoming

This year we also plan to kick-off the XLRI's Diamond Jubilee Celebrations with the Homecoming

Am pasting the preliminary invite below so that you can start planning your trip for the Nov 15-16, 2008...

.... More details will be forthcoming

[Original Post here]

An espresso coffee machine which functions without electricity, a special bamboo which lasts longer and is more durable or medicine for asthma made out of traditional herbs may soon be a reality.

Innovations like these and many more would soon be patented in the innovators’ name if XLRI has its way.

Taking a step ahead in its endeavour to bring grassroots innovation to the mainstream, XLRI has recently selected about 25-odd grassroots-level innovations across eastern India to get a patent and be marketed as business ideas.

The move, to be implemented in association with the National Innovation Foundation (NIF), comes in the wake of NIF setting up a research advisory council at the B-school recently.

Set up in association with the department of science and technology, NIF was established to provide institutional support to innovations across the rural pockets of India and grassroots-level workers in transforming their ideas into a profit venture.

“According to the agreement with NIF and XLRI, the regional research advisory council would assess the innovations made at the grassroots in Bihar, Bengal, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh. The body would later provide marketing strategies for the launch of these innovative ideas in the market,” said T. Raghuram, the assistant professor in strategic management, XLRI.

The council would comprise B-school professors, NIF members and also senior authorities from institutes like IIT (Kharagpur) and IIT (Guwahati).

“We have so far received about 25 such interesting innovations from absolutely grassroots-level workers — farmers, mechanics and electricians. Right now we are in the process of studying their technical possibilities and validation,” said Raghuram.

Once finalised, the selected innovations would be funded by National Innovation Foundation (NIF) and also be protected under intellectual property rights.

“We are not revealing the innovations for we are in the process of patenting these innovations in the founders’ name so they can be saved from being copied,” added Raghuram.

From the XLRI blog:

Faculty Exchange: AIM and XLRI will exchange at least 2 faculty members per academic year.
Joint Executive Development Programs: AIM and XLRI agree to jointly design, market, and conduct short-duration executive development programs in 3^rd countries—especially in the Asian region.
Joint Research: AIM and XLRI agree to identify research themes of international, particularly Asian, relevance
Case Development: AIM and XLRI agree to launch a concerted drive to develop Asia-based cases and, thereafter, publish jointly a compilation on an annual basis.
XAT: In order to attract Indian applicants for admission, AIM agrees to join the group of business schools that accept XAT
Joint Management Journal: AIM and XLRI agree to jointly launch a new, international-class management journal by January 2010.
Student Exchange: AIM and XLRI agree to continue student exchange as per the agreement signed between them earlier on December 13, 2004.

Happy New Year dear friends. Here are some great pics of the XL Alumni Homecoming in November 2007 to start off the year on a great note! Thanks to Mr. N Venkatesh !

From the Telegraph

XLRI School of Business and Human Resources is set to get deemed university status.

XLRI director Father N. Casimir Raj told The Telegraph: “UGC has agreed in principle to grant us deemed university status.”

He, however, clarified that that though a verbal assurance has come from the University Grants Commission, the business school is yet to receive a formal notification.

“UGC has verbally told us that in principle they agree to our proposal for deemed university status which was sent about a year ago. Now we will pursue the matter so that the written confirmation reaches as soon as possible. We will then apply for a no-objection certificate (NOC),” Fr Raj said.

An NOC from the state government is a must for any institute to begin autonomous operations.

At present, Birla Institute of Technology (BIT), Mesra, and Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad, are the other deemed universities in the state.

From the XLRI blog:

With domestic stipends reaching astronomical heights of Rs. 5 Lakhs (Lehman Brothers), the process resulted in the batch of 2009 being placed in exclusive roles with the best companies in the industry, both from India and abroad. Lehman Brothers, J P Morgan Chase, Hay and Microsoft offered stipends of more than a lakh (for domestic offers), while Novartis, HUL, ABG, P&G, Transworld, Asian Paints and ICICI made foreign offers. HSBC, Ernst & Young, ABG, Edelweiss, Deloitte Consulting, IBM and Nokia were the largest recruiters this year with the highest number of accepted offers. Other premier recruiters include Carlyle, Accenture Business Consulting, KPMG, TAS, Yahoo etc.

• Highest Domestic Stipend of Rs 5 Lakhs by Lehman Investment Banking
• Highest International Stipend of Rs 1.75 Lakhs by Novartis
• Around 10 overseas offers were made from Novartis, HUL, ABG, P&G, Transworld, Asian Paints and ICICI
• 2/3^rd of the batch placed in Slot 1 in less than 36 hours
• First time recruiters in the Financial sector include Lehman Investment Banking, 8 Capital Hedge Fund, Indea Capital, Lotus Asset Management etc
• 20 companies took part in the process for the First time
• 60+ companies made internship offers to the batch

From the XLRI blog:

Head honchos from the FMCG giant Proctor & Gamble (P&G) visited XLRI today to select a winning idea which could give them big returns in the global market.

The move comes in wake of P&G taking over the popular men’s brand Gillette globally.

Significantly, XLRI was the only B-school that the FMCG giant approached.

The contest, named “The Big Leap”, saw an enthusiastic participation from 33 groups at XLRI, out of which seven ideas were finally selected for today’s presentation by the FMCG major. The event was aimed at the analysis of various management-related issues involved in the acquisition of Gillette by P&G.

But what marked the highlight of the entire event was that the four-member jury from the multinational — comprising Varun Bhatia, VP (HR), Asia Pacific region, Mohit Nayyar, country HR manager India, Sonali Roychowdhury, senior HR manager India and Surya Rai, HR manager products and supply — were all former XLRI students. For the jury, it was a homecoming.

Who says budding managers are not creative and poetic people. Check the sample of writings that the following folks from the 08 and 09 batch cooked up as part of Oktoberfest in XLRI. Seems like good fun was had by all. Writings are hosted on the Dracula blog...which is not so much an ode to the Prince of Transylvania but the Dramatics and Cultural Association of XLRI ;-)


Seniors

Kailash
Seema Narera/Bharath Rao
Shivani Nigam
Sonali Ahuja (2nd Place!)
Swati Jena

Juniors

Tushar Kataria
Ramakrishna
Kartheek Kanumuru
Srinivas
Krishna Bhaskar
Ankur Sawhney (1st Place!)
Ankur Sawhney
Mukund Madhav

If you want to know where XL is being mentioned in the media you just need to look at the right hand sidebar on this blog !

From the XLRI News blog. It's also got featured in the University Network for Social Entrepreneurship:

Xavier Labour Relations Institute (XLRI), Jamshedpur is introducing a new elective on Social Entrepreneurship for its second-year Personnel Management and Industrial Relations (PMIR) and Business Management (BM) students in September.

You can download the course outline here (140 KB MS-Word File)

From Abhilasha:

"Stop the car right now!!" I shrieked, horrified at the news I'd just heard.

On my way from the Tatanagar station to XL for the Independence wetnight, I had just comfortably settled into the passenger side and casually asked Guppu, my junior, for campus news. He turned to me and, almost reluctantly, said "Dadu's has been broken down".

For a few minutes, there was complete silence as I tried to figure out if he was pulling one of his usual fast ones on me. He looked serious enough, concerned even... I asked him to repeat himself, a little slowly this time, from the beginning... even before he got beyond the first sentence I was screaming for the car to stop.

My eyes brimmed over and through the mist I could see two years of friendship, heartbreak, fun and nostalgia flash before my eyes. Our first days at XL, and finding my first set of friends at Dadus... the autumn evenings seated at the log... 'nimbu paani' by the litre during Ratanjee and XL-IIMC... taking a break during classes, leaning against the white washed walls proudly proclaiming 'Happy Diwali'... express sutta service for batchmates during SIP... winter mornings with seniors, banging on the blue counter window, waking Buddhu up to make a steaming cup of tea when the sun had barely risen... rediscovering friends and observing the new crop after summers, while the smoke trailed from our fingers... jumping the compound for impromptu dinner at Madrasi... from visiting dadus, to making it home--Niranjan da's smile and welcome small talk... discovering, in a cycle that I suppose repeated itself in every batch, friends among the junior batch while seated on the compound wall...

My heart was heavy as we headed to XL, the initial excitement having died down completely... it was near midnight when I got there, and in the rush of meeting people, it slipped my mind... the next morning, we took a walk down and I saw the shell that remained... I could not fathom why anyone would have wanted to break Dadus down--to me, it was as horrific as ripping one's own limbs apart...

Dadu's has now been moved behind GH1, where the broken furniture used to be kept... when I met Niranjan da, he told me all this had happened but a day before I got there... one look at their faces could have shown any fool that they felt cheated, betrayed by their own... to them, XL had been family all their life, and the little room known to the XL world as Dadu's their lifeline... to snatch that away must have taken an awfully cold heart and lack of all human consideration...

Is that where XL is headed? The official reason is that this is a part of an overall plan to beautify the campus.

Many XLers hold prominent positions in the corporate world... I ask of you, when you come to recruit us, does it really matter how green the garden is or how even the pavements? Or do you look for signs like these, that tell you what we value and what kind of human beings we are? And what does such blase destruction of a revered symbol of the XL tradition say about XL now? I, for one, am sorely disappointed......

Huh?

Wasn't it earlier too "inside" the campus?

Secondly to all seniors who by accident or by choice happen to read my blog the not so latest news is Dadu's has been shifted to inside the campus behind the TFEMR hostel, where there were furniture repair earlier.

Abhishek posts just this bit of news !

Any other detailed info, folks?

Live consulting projects floated by Accenture in collabration with SAPPHIRE recieved overwhelming response with around 20 teams i.e over 80 students submitting project proposals for 4 live projects. Accenture will bear the project expenses of consulting teams as well pay for the consulting, how cool is that?

(Grax is that quite a few XL seniors got help from their summer guides ;-) or at least tried to !)

Watch this space for the results.....

Sapphire's 'Human Resource In Practice' kicked off with a bang on pre independence eve with Mr. Sunit Sinha, Principal Consultant , M&A, of Mercer HR delivered a talk on 'Careers in Consulting'. The session was attend by around 100 students comprising of GMP, BM and PMIR students.

Sunit talked about the typical lifestyle of consultant, myths about consultancy and what students need to look before choosing consultancy as a career. He stressed consultancy is more of a career and not a job which demands self belief, abiltiy to think on feet, presentation of thoughts and resilience.

He also enlightened the prospective managers who are wannabe consultants about what consultants look for in a prospective employee. He also brought forward the fact that more and more women are now joining consultancy and are climbing to success.