The Ravi C gems series - Part 2

I have taken a course called Logistics management taken by Prof. Ravichandran in the sixth term. Boy! It is the most awesome fun! I have taken some pains to document some of his classic one-liners in class. This blog is a small sample:

a long discussion in class over a point ... same point gets repeated 20 mins later as if the guy is making a fresh point ... Ravi C says "I thought we had already covered this point some 20 mins earlier... Does sound travel so slowly here? "

I don't know why, but RaviC used to mercilessly tease some foreign students who came to IIMA on Exchange and were (un)fortunate enough to choose his courses. Here goes a small sample:

We were discussing a case on the supply chain for Hoechst Pesticides and he gets irritated at the speed the case discussion is progressing"You know you guys should have been able to complete the case discussion in 40 mins if you had thought clearly... now we have spent the better part of 4 classes on it - 9 times as much time.

With a sideward glance at the exchange students, he follows up "With increasing globalisation, the Indian students are also becoming world class..."
[silence for two seconds and a riotous thumping of the benches as the message sunk in..]


Bright student: Sir, this inventory is stocked in the head office whereas the recommendation is to stock it at the regional offices.

Ravi C: " If there are four members in your family and one of them goes abroad, then how many members are there in your family? It doesn't matter where the inventory is stored bhai as long as it is stuck in the system"

On the idea of debating options for transporting goods from factory to markets: to illustrate the idea of buying low value-add items locally the prof said :
"If you are going to transport cowdung, will you transport it by airplane?"

more to follow... :-)

Ranga

Reflections for the new year

I have always been fascinated by the concept of new year resolutions. It is almost like a capsule of all the good intentions that one can have. It is like one of those rare flowers, (I think it is called kurinji in Tamil) which blooms only once in 12 years, only to fade again as quickly as it came.

I have tried to give up the habit of making new year resolutions for quite a while now, but even if I don't declare something formally as my new year resolution, I find myself unconsciously becoming determined that I would achieve something worthwhile or do something better this year and Hey Presto! I have a New Year Resolution even before I know it. Needless to say, not one of those good resolutions has materialised fully till now.

What causes the human brain to make resolutions? Fundamentally, I think we are a dissatisfied lot. The ability of the human mind to reflect analytically and/emotionally on past happenings and dissecting them into some specific cause-effect relationships is no doubt well established. But it is during some landmarks in time such as birthdays or New Years that there is this trigger which prompts reflection much more than during normal times. Again maybe the human mind is fundamentally optimistic? There is always the inclination to believe that the future will be better than the past if one takes the necessary actions... maybe that is what has made our race so successful?

But then, what prevents most resolutions from seeing the light of the day when it comes to action? In my opinion, it is that reflection is generally almost completely internal but action is completely external. And being external, there are a lot of forces in the environment that influence action a lot more than they would influence reflection. The really exceptional people can focus upon their reflections and use them to take the necessary actions to influence the environment in such a way that the reflections bear fruit in terms of actions and results. Will I be one of them? Till date, I haven't been able to achieve even a tenth of what I set out to do, but that will not keep me from trying :-).