The Indian School of Business Weblog

It seems like only yesterday when I was desperately rushing to finish my ISB application, appearing nervously in front of the admissions committee for that 25 minutes interview, and holding the letter which starts with the words, “Congratulations”. So I thought to myself, why not reflect upon some of the reasons that motivated me to make the Indian School of Business mine.

While researching about the school, I remember one phrase that alumni and current students kept iterating over and over again was the awesomeness of the faculty. Was it for real, so I thought? Four months into the program, and voila. I too join the bandwagon. Over the last three terms, I had the privilege of being taught by arguably some of the best professors across all business schools. In this post, I would like to take the liberty of highlighting a few of them.

Professor Bhagwan Chaudhary took the first half of our Corporate Finance course. Going to his class was like going to a rock concert: energetic and high on tempo. He has this unique style of explaining a concept that just sticks in your mind. The other day, he was teaching us how to unlever beta for a firm (for the uninitiated, it’s part of CAPM concept — something that an MBA student hears a lot of during b-school), the song that kept playing in my mind was “Shoot to Thrill” and boy, did I enjoy that class. Wake me up in the middle of sleep and I will blurt out the concept verbatim.

Decision Models and Optimization (DMOP) has arguably been the most feared course on the campus over the last three terms. Bring in the elements of regression, optimization, decision trees and probability; forget about the poets, even the most self-respecting engineers who could mentally do Fourier transformations were running for cover. Lucky us though, for we had Professor Sumit Kunnumkal. An IIT, MIT and Cornell alumnus, his biggest virtue is his patience. All throughout the ten lecture sessions, the class kept firing a barrage of questions and the wise one kept unclogging the cobwebs of doubt. He always had an answer. And he always had this smile on his face that instantly made you feel calm and at comfort.

In our Marketing Management course (Term I), we had “Smart Pricing” as a recommended reading. While reading the chapter on “The Art of Price Wars”, I thought how wonderful it would be to interact with the authors. Term II and I had my wish fulfilled. Professor Jagmohan Raju, one of the co-authors, taught us Marketing Decision Making. The highlight of his lectures was the real world examples that he elaborated upon at the end of the sessions. Interesting marketing challenges that he had consulted on, the real learning from them was not only the way to approach the problems; but also his constant emphasis on the fact that we barely-2month-old-MBA students can and the confidence he imparted in us that we will provide solutions to these challenges.

Before I wind up, how can I forget to mention the nicest professor that I have come across. Professor Mary Lea McAnally introduced us to the Texas culture. Her classes used to begin with a lively “Howdy” and then progress on to demystify the world of Financial Accounting. Debitore, creditore, accrual accounting, statement of cash flow, COGS — her animated style of teaching motivated our class to learn and master them.

Some of the professors I am looking forward to attending their classes in next couple of terms are Professor Sankar De and Professor Bruce Tuckman. More about them later.

To all you prospectives, do you research. ISB offers several flavors that you can strongly associate with. I found mine and am confident that you will find yours too.

Teaser Preview: Watch out for my upcoming blog on Professor Atul Nerkar. After one of his classes, my Facebook status reflected: “These are the kind of experiences I came to business school for.”