Scariest Friday the 13th of my life
Midnight 31 March, 2018 brought with itself joy. My application to MICA Ahmedabad had been accepted. Life seemed to have come a full circle with the months of labor finally bearing fruit. As someone who deeply loves the marketing world, getting accepted to MICA is nothing short of a fairytale.
What do you normally do when you have no lingering sense of doom/worry, and have reached your target? Binge-watch. Binge-eat. Binge-workout. Make people who are special to you happy. Did all that. See, the reason I wrote CAT was to either get into MICA or SP Jain since to my knowledge these were the only 2 colleges that allowed students to pick their streams before joining. I had been clear about my interest and love for marketing, so most other conventional business schools had not even been a part of consideration set. I also ended up writing XAT as a fail-safe since both these colleges also accept XAT scores.
My scores were great too – 97 in CAT, 99.4 in XAT. Why are these details important? You’ll find out. Cut to the evening of 13 April, I get a call from one of my friends asking me to check the XLRI result. I really don’t care so much since I’m not expecting the convert.
My XLRI interview had been a shambolic mess. Not that I hadn’t given my best or anything, but it seemed as if I had not been able to convince them of anything. The interview that had lasted over an hour had me probed on quite literally everything, academics, my work, my personality, solutions to their problems, my right-brain, my left-brain, freaking guesstimates, my past, my future. None of which seemed to make way through the interviewers. I still remember telling my parents after that interview that this one’s definitely gone. It was by definition a stress test. Anyway, I log into the portal, enter my ID.
“Congratulations, your application to the PGDM-BM program has been accepted…”
So, I had actually gotten through that interview with flying colors? Felt great. It was a sense of validation that I hadn’t been seeking, but nonetheless was soothing. The thing is, XLRI was exactly next in my list of B-Schools I wanted to go to, but was placed lower on the priority simply because it offered a general management course – something I felt made slightly less sense for me because my undergrad had been a general management course too with a final year specialization in marketing. Also, it’s FAR MORE difficult to get into XLRI than it is into MICA. XLRI is a top 5 business school of India while MICA’s reputation as a B-School is not really among the top.
Also, stats speak their own language. The average placement at XL is 22 l.p.a, at MICA it’s 12 l.p.a. I immediately know this is going to be a very hard conversation with my parents. But before that, I am having to convince myself of what I want. It’s easy to say that I’d choose MICA over XLRI when you don’t have the admission letters of XLRI in your hand, but variables of those equations change the moment you have to actually take the decision that’s going to stick with you for the rest of your professional (or entrepreneurial) life. I’m in limbo.”
I have had conversations with alums of both places previously so I have both quantitative as well as qualitative data points to evaluate this decision. A bit of brooding around listening to the angel and the devil deliberate about what I ought to do. I decide to reach out to my support system. I am fairly privileged when it comes to this as I probably have the greatest friends and mentors I could get. I tell them what I want, and what the problem is. Conversations end up being a mixed bag. There’s more talk about numbers, the culture, some about the ‘culture fit’.
I am told about how XLRI’s rigorous pedagogy is the reason they churn out business leaders, also it’s a name in itself that can propel you through your career. But seriously, I don’t buy into the whole ‘rigor’ ideology – that it prepares you well for the corporate life. I’d rather have my breathing space and let my brain, my skills, and creativity develop. And MICA seems like a better place for me to do it. As for brand value post MBA, I somehow feel more comfortable in being known as ‘Apoorv the guy who did xyz’ vs ‘Apoorv the guy who’s from xyz’. I know I’m making it sound like both can’t happen together, but I’d rather take the risk. I don’t want to be the CV zombie that I think a lot of people end up becoming in a B-school, more so a ‘ranked’ B-school.
Who am I? A Deranged Lunatic?
I don’t want to come out as a different person after an MBA. I want to come out as a better version of me. I don’t have any hard-logical points to support this choice. It’s just that I think I can still hustle my way through whatever I do. I’d rather be Apoorv the amazing dude at work than be Apoorv the dude from XLRI. I just feel I would be making unnecessary sacrifice at the cost of my persona if I choose XL. The company I joined- VMock had only 30 odd folks when I joined and seemingly wonky job descriptions in terms of delineation of responsibility.
About 2 weeks into joining we had a company-wide outing and there among various team-making activities, the CEO saw something in me and offered me a different position in his team. A position where I would work with the senior leadership directly. I had been averse to sales back then and thoroughly invested in content and digital, but I took the leap anyway. And I would do it again. Next were 1.5 years of crazy working. Bad work hours, terrible authority-responsibility balance and too little work-life balance. But they came with 3 promotions in 1.5 years. So it was sort of worth it. I know I grew in so many ways during that period, but skills I added did not come of my choosing. I want to make sure that the skills and everything that I add, come of my choosing.
I think that’s who I am.”
