Mangalore visit during the passion weekend '21 ..

The Covid season has brought great discomfort and unease in going to churches. The fact that Gods could do nothing regarding the Covid virus, with religious leaders queueing up for the vaccine, was a depressing sight. We only have Science to depend on for emergencies and exigencies. 

The 1917-20 Spanish Flu virus saw the death of 70 million people globally when the global population was just 1500 million. In 2020, with the global population at 8000 million, the deaths due to Covid 19 virus has been barely 2.85 million.. 

Religions and religious leaders are out there to grab your time, attention and money for their personal needs and exploitation. I am sure educated people will have a relook at the practice. 

Booked the night train ticket to Mangalore. We reached Mangalore at 7 am on Saturday April 3. After a small breakfast at a neat veg hotel near to Milagres church, we went to Milagres church. Took excellent pictures of the church exterior and interior (built in 1630 AD. Went to Udupi and logged into the Treebo hotel room. 

After a quick bath, we were out to the Kaup beach by 1 PM. Stayed there till 4 PM. Was cool. Lot of rocks at the beach reminded me of the Anjuna beach at Goa. Could not enter the dangerous waters, the warnings were helpful.

After returning to our hotel room, by auto, we spent the evening time going around the famous Sri Krishna temple in Udupi.  I have heard of many of my friends visiting Udupi just to visit the Sri Krishna temple which is very famous. Saw the big rath (cart) used during the annual procession. Spent some time there before returning to the hotel after dinner. Had a good night sleep.

The next morning saw us proceeding to St, Marys island near the Malpe beach. The basaltic rock formed island of 70 million years age has its geological cousin rocks in the Madagascar islands near Africa. That shows the two continents were together and started drifting away 70 million years back.  

After a one hour stay we were back on Malpe beach till 4 PM and after Chinnu spent some time in the waters, we returned to our room at 5 PM. Had a brief coffee and rest, we were on board the Mangalore bus at 6 PM and the Bangalore train by 8.15 PM. after a good night sleep on the train, we were back at home in Bangalore by 7.30 AM and me back in college aby 9 am.

George.

My Covishield vaccine experience ..

 Even though my time for the first Covid vaccine (Covaxin) was fixed on March 30, 2021 afternoon, when I went to Accura Hospital, Koramangala, Bangalore for the vaccine jab, I had to wait till 4 pm and was told that due to lack of other vaccine recipients, my vaccination was being shifted to Wednesday. Paid Rs 250/- as Accura is a private hospital. A bottle of 10 mg can be used on max 20 patients @ 0.5 mg for each person, there were just five people wanting the vaccine at 4Pm on March 30.

I fixed the next visit on Good Friday, April 2, 2021. Accordingly at 9 AM, I was at the hospital on 2nd April, they asked me to return by 10.30 AM, as the number of patients were less. 

One thing I have observed in my interactions with the public, is a good awareness of the lack of complete tests on effectiveness by the vaccine companies. The public therefore does not want to take a chance on this vaccine and desires to go slow regarding the imminisation vaccination procedure. 

Even at 10.30 AM, I waited till 11.30 AM, when some more patients came up. I was the third in the list. Took the Covishield (from Oxford Uty-Astra Zeneca) jab at 11.40 AM and waited in the hospital till 12.15 pm. Since there were no reactions observed, I informed the sister on duty and left the place.  

After reaching home, I started reading the book by Peter Diamndis, The future is faster than you think. Interesting. The Covishield vaccine looks to be really matching to my body systems. That led me to take family, Anila and Chinnu to Mangalore and Udupi for a small weekend break. 

Today it is the fifth day after taking the injecton. So far, so good. I am feeling perfectly fine and energetic. Maybe I also do frequent blood donation, the last was given by end Feb '21. Maybe, the blood is very pure and has no component to cause any adverse reaction. Waiting for another week more before taking Anila also for the injection at Accura.

I am planning to wait for another 8 weeks before taking the second followup jab, even though Accura doctors asked me to return by 4 weeks, ie. end of April. I have been reading that longer the gap, upto 8weeks, more immunity one gets against the virus. Let us wait and see..

George..

An interesting strategy building session at AU ..

It was interesting to have an interesting 4 hour interaction of Area Chairs with Prof. Dr. B V Krishnamurthy, the Advisor to the Pro Chancellor of Alliance University in Bangalore on the first of April 2021. 

 

We are taking up the step after a Bench marking session, an Operations Strategy exercise where our University was bench marked to some of the world's best and we fixed the targets to reach these standards in the next five to ten years. It was great to see an Operations strategy exercise to compare our Institution with the best in the country being deployed in our University. (Click here for the HBR paper How to measure yourself against the best, Tucker et al, Jan '87 that mentions Xerox's experience initially with Bench marking and how it grew to be global in quality eventually)

We brainstormed over 4 hours on Thursday from 10.30 AM to 4.30 PM to find how to proceed to beat the competition and remain among the top in the NIRF survey where we were ranked among the only three schools in the top Bschools from Karnataka along with IIM Bangalore and TAPMI, Manipal. Other business schools were far behind and we hope in the near future they will offer us credible challenge and competition to the top position. 

Some of the interesting points that came up for discussion with the Area Chairs is mentioned here with illustrations. 

Mentorship : 

Mentorship is the influence, guidance, or direction given by a mentor. In an organizational setting, a mentor influences the personal and professional growth of a mentee. Wikipedia 

The purpose of mentoring is to tap into the existing knowledge, skills, and experience of senior or high performing employees and transfer these skills to newer or less experienced employees in order to advance their careers. - www.togetherplatform.com 

One of the most important points was to start mentorship with a different meaning and scope, this time instead of the faculty deciding the mentees, the mentees will decide which faculty member will be their mentees for the next one or two years, till the student passes out of the University. This is a real challenge to the faculty as they will be put to test in the eyes of the students. Students would naturally like to align with those faculty whom they feel will help them with good quality industry knowledge enabling them to perform and shine in the truly competitive business world. (click here for an interesting HBR article on mentorship in August '20 by Landry and Lewiss)

Detention of the bottom 5% : As is being done usually in some of the top ranked Bschools of the world, to bring competition and excellence inside the classroom, the bottom 5% is detained or asked to repeat the course. For Institutions with high academic performance and global rankings, industry work experience requirements and high GMAT entry scores are a must. One of the AU  faculty member's son happens to be studying in IESE Barcelona where the last 5% of the class is asked to repeat the course. In the said Institute for a course on Economics while the boy scored 90%, the class average was 92% and the 5 percentile score was 76%. The students at the bottom 5% percentile were asked to reappear in the subjects in the following semester. ie. 95 percentage of students in the class scored above 76%. The class average of 92% was indicative of the high academic standards in IESE Business school, Barcelona, the Economist global #1 ranked Bschool of 2021 .. Can we employ similar standards in ASB ?

Some of the other interesting points that were discussed included 

1. Taking concrete steps to improve peer learning 

2. Incorporating SWAYAM MOOCS from Govt of India to help improve the quality of instruction delivery.

3. Proposal for faculty to prepare a detailed subject outline for any subject which was currently being taught and to follow it up for all subjects in future

4. Taking steps to improving the strike rate of student placement from the 5-7 lakh band presently to 7-11 lakh band 

As per Prof. Krishnamurthy, when the 

• faculty demonstrates real passion for teaching and 
• students know that the faculty member really cares in their individual growth and continuous excellence, 

it results in the success of the student and faculty relationship.

We hope to discuss some more exciting practical points in the coming days.

George