Friday, September 22, 2006

Opposite

Having an opposite view is the fundamental basis of our lives. sounds like an emphatic but standalone statement?

This statement is true of almost every aspect of life and business. lets see how.

every trade that happens in the world has a buyer and a seller. a buyer has some expectation of the value of a product. and the seller has his own. now their opposite views or opposite take on the value of the product takes them to opposite sides of a transaction. and there is a deal. imagine if everybody thinks the stocks will head upwards, there will be no sellers and when everone thinks the stocks r sure to tank, there will be no buyers. so unless there r opposite views on the underlying entity, there cannot be a trade.

interest rate and exchange rate views affirm this very fact that if there were no opposite views there r no forwards, options or swaps.

this is the beauty of opposing views. after all opposite views r the fundamental reason for existence.

take life. marriage in particular. if everyone thinks a particular guy/girl is bad in a certain way , there is just one opinion and the 'deal' of marriage never takes place. what happens is this, a guy finds a girl good when it may not be the same for most other ppl. again the girl might have a excellent opinion abt a guy while he is actually not acc to most other ppl. so one ends up being teh bakra which is not actually bad.(if both r bakras , their relative pluses n minuses will be factored in). this is becoz again for balance to achieve in one's life, there has to be give n take. without this opposing view, the world will come to a standstill.

this bakra scenario can be compared to the balance of payments ( BoP) concept which infact induced me to write this post.

in a BoP, there is surplus or deficit in a sub account. one surplus in a sub account will be balanced by a deficit in the other account.

a bakra scenario is not so bad really. coz, the minus of a guy will be balanced by the plus of a girl and vice versa. as long as the surplus of one matches the deficit of the other, life is good. this is analogous to the capital account surplus balancing the current account deficit. whnever there is a disequilibrium, policy interventions have to take place ( like internal adjustements of personalites to avoid ego clashes)

if there were no opposite views then all engineers wd go for compsci . and if there were market forces only to exist, would there have been someone working for the larger good?

and if GOD did not think opposite, will there have been Men and Women as well?

Saturday, September 16, 2006

The Logic for our future??

How silly can things get in one's life..?

When the underlying logic of important events in one's life is decided by frivolous parameters what more can u say?

we r supposed to be choosing courses which wd decide our future and u dare to know the "thought process" that go into the decision of designing the future! and yeah the thought process of people who had excelled in their respective fields of study earlier ( with exceptions like the author) and ppl who had decent industry exposure and consider themselves too practical ( big joke!)


first of all, we r a bunch of ppl who have gotten extremely bored with life and decided that nothings gonna improve by a judicious choice of courses.

after completing 25 courses in 1.25 years, no one is in a humour to quench their thirst for additional knowledge if there ever was..and no one is excluded from this, the topper not withstanding. so here is the guide to choosing courses @ som. juniors can learn valuable lessons i m sure.

The Ten 'Som'mandments

1. For ppl who hv no problem getting up early..all pre lunch classes only. afternoon sleep is a must. that too full stretch and under the blanket.

2. For ppl who hate waking up at the crack of dawn at 8 am(like me)..take classes from 10.30 onwards..and ofcourse they will not sacrifice afti sleep also. so take courses which start at 4 in the evening

3. Maximise courses per day. strive for maximum holidays per week and choose courses accordingly. who cares if u have classes 6 hrs a day. anyway sleep in class is assured. especially the ERP room Aesthetics and AC effect is a decent bet!

4. If u r a localite, make sure ur holidays r spaced next to each other. transaction costs to home n insti r reduced.

5. Make choices by prof and not by merit and usefulness of course. after all u want a peaceful life!!

6. Check if the prof gives good grades. that is minimum of AB ( like for sales n distribution mgmt) . prioritise courses by probability of grades expected. yes, u can plot normal curves, fix confidence levels. calculate Value at risk due to unhedged exposure..:P

7. Finance is a big pain. more effort and tough to get grades. take vague courses where prep reqd is minimum. and u can gass off the whole paper.

8. Choose courses so that ur diwali holidays n reqd leave can be optimised. after all u got to spend fair bit of time at home.

9. No courses on sundays as far as possible. after all Huma theatre and the many babes crowding around r not to be missed on sundays!!

10. finally ofcourse make sure the class timings do not conflict with your regular yahoo chats or skype voice chats with ur near and dear ones. afterall networking is the name of the game in MBA!!!!