Sunday, November 18, 2012

GMITE VI at IIM Bangalore - Take Away from the Course

Finished off with GMITE VI @ IIM Bangalore - yesterday (17th Nov 2012). Looking back at this time and trying to think how the course was ? What did I gain ? ROI ? etc

To Begin with, I joined the course because the next level of hierarchy in my company required it. The course began in Jan 2012 and ended yesterday, some points

1. This course required a good amount of time and effort from my end, the professors don't teach everything, you have to read a lot yourself.

2. The course was totally justified in the subjects and electives that were taught, we tried to introduce new courses, so next batch may benefit from it.

3. After doing the course, in general, my knowledge has increased and I feel more confident, I think the best you can do with this course is to grow in your organization, most of the professors also feel the same. The course is worth ed, the professors are really good and knowledge gained is excellent.

4. The first week of campus, there were lot of group assignments, so groups were formed the first day. Sadly, those never changed for the entire 11 months, I don't know almost more than half of my class out of 90 students. The groups should change during the course, we tried it, but most of the people didn't like working that way. There is no much time in breaks (10 minutes), so you would hardly get to communicate with people apart from your group.

5. Found some good friends and connections.

Overall, a great experience !!!

-B

Saturday, June 23, 2012

GMITE VI at IIM - Bangalore, Courses Offered

Below is the list of courses done / offered for GMITE VI at IIM - Bangalore (2012)

This list is NOT complete, as the course ends in November 2012

Course Phase Status
Phase I - 16th Jan - 20 Jan, 2012
Strategy for Emerging Markets  Completed
Financial Accounting  Completed
Managing Cross Cultural Differences  Completed
Phase II - 3rd Feb – 1st June, 2012
Micro Economics  Completed
Financial Accounting   Completed
Team Building and Conflict Management  Completed
Corporate Finance  Completed
Management Accounting  Completed
Management of Commercial Contracts Completed
Organizational Structure and Design Completed
Phase III -  4th June - 9th June, 2012
Management of Technology Products Completed
EXAMS  Completed
Phase IV - 15th June - 21st Sept, 2012
Intellectual Property Rights  Completed
International Taxation  Completed
Service Management Strategy  Completed
Strategic Management Completed
Leadership: Organizational Politics  Completed
Proactive Leadership  Completed
Thinking Unconventionally  Completed
Strategic Market Planning  Completed

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Indian Custom Duties - Upto 60%

Here are the details of what the customs charges me, this is for 50 USD Skechers shoes

BASIC CUSTOMS DUTY - Rs 302.10
COUNTER VAILING DUTY - Rs 398.77
ADDITIONAL CUSTOM DUTY - Rs 149.72
EDUCATION CESS - Rs 21.03
HANDLING FEE - Rs 300.00
SERVICE TAX 1O% - Rs 30.00
EDUCATION CE55 2.00% - Rs 0.60
HIGHER EDUCATION CESS 1.00% Rs 0.30

TOTAL Rs 1202.52


Think twice / thrice .... as many times as you can before ordering something from USA.

MyUS.com - Shopping Experience

I got an AMEX Gold Card some time back and they are tied up with MyUS.com, using which you can buy things from USA and Ship them to India. Here is my experience.

I bought Skechers Shoes from www.shoes.com, the shoes cost 50 USD. The membership fee is waved off for 1st year for AMEX customers. MyUS.com has a good personal shopper where you can just put the details of the product you want to buy and pay for it, they will do the rest, but they charge a fee ($10 + Any USA shipping fee), for me it came to 20 USD. So total of 70 USD.

The package arrived at their FLORIDA Address. As soon as it arrived, I received an email from MyUS.com for my permission to ship it. The shipping cost after 20% discount was 40 USD. So the total came to 110 USD.

I checked the Indian Customs website and it said that anything below Rs 5000 (=100 USD) is free and will not be charged, but when the package arrived, I was shocked, that it asked me to pay, 1200 as custom charges (approx 25 USD), that's almost 60% of the shoe price, I have no idea why so much of custom charges.

So the total cost of 50 USD shoe came to

50 + 20 + 40 + 25 = 135 USD, more than twice the cost of the product !!!!

PROS (MyUS.com) -

1. Excellent communication through Emails.
2. Clarity on charges.
3. Good Package.
4. Through AMEX, discounts are available.

CONS (MyUS.com)

1. They don't mark the product as GIFT.
2. There is no calculation of custom or an estimate on how much it will cost.

FINAL words

There are other websites which include everything, including the customs etc, like www.shopyourworld.com, ebay.in (Global Shipping Program) and they are good, I have bought earlier from them. I thought, MyUS.com would be cheaper, but it turned out to me at least 20 - 30 USD more expensive. One should one use it, if you are getting some Deal, like the product is on 80% discount or something, otherwise use www.shopyourworld.com or Ebay.in or similar websites.

Saturday, January 21, 2012

GMITE VI - 1st Session - 16 Jan 2012 - 20 Jan 2012

GMITE @ IIM Bangalore.

GMITE stands for General Management Program for IT Executives, it's an OPEN Program (you don't have to give exam to get into it), long duration course (11 months). Upon completion you would be given a Certification along with grades.

Subjects for 1st session -

Strategy for Emerging Markets - Prof. Jean-Paul Larcon
Financial Accounting - Prof. Hema Krishanmurthy.
Managing Cross Cultural Differences -
Prof. Rabi Bhagat


The classes start at 9:00 am, and end by 6:30 pm, with break for tea / coffee and lunch. I found the classes’ very tiring, as by the time I reached home didn't have time to study at all.

Course Contents and Professors - The course contents were very elaborate and the professors are extremely experienced, overall experience of study was good, but the course demands that you read the subjects before coming to the class, otherwise lots of time is wasted in discussions which are not directly related to the subject. The professors are given a timeline to complete the course, so irrespective of time, they will just complete the course somehow or other. We had 4 sessions of Financial Management and only learned about Balance Sheets and Profit Loss Statements, that's some 16,000 rupees considering course fee is 5.3 lacks!!!.

Students - The students were from various backgrounds, mostly engineers. The companies were also widely distributed. There was hardly any time to interact with people, only time was 15 minutes break and lunch break, after that no communication. From network perspective, it all depends on you.

Should one join - Very early to say, but if you are just joining this program for IIM BRAND name, then it might not help you, unless you have a plan on how to CASH on it. If you are looking to gain knowledge, then definitely yes, but you would really have to devote time for the course.