The Inhibitions of a Senior

This is my first post as a senior at IIM K. Feels strange, doesn’t it? It seems just yesterday that we were the younglings going with our smallest queries to our seniors. But now, the time is not far when it will be our turn to rise from being mentees to mentors. Life at a B-school is all about transitions: from home to hostel, from a triple-sharing room to a single room, from classes that used to begin at 9:15 a.m. to classes that end at 9:15 p.m. , from the dreaded Fin subjects to the amicable Marketing electives and of course, from juniors to seniors.

As the 1^st week here draws to a close and the countdown to the arrival of the juniors begins, I couldn’t help but notice some very peculiar instances on campus. It all started with the 1^st class when we were welcomed with the words:

“Welcome back. It’s going to be a great year.” projected on the screen.

Here’s how the events unfolded:

·  When should I leave for class? 

This is about deciding the optimum interval between the time taken to leave your room, have breakfast and the rush to class. 5 minutes before the class begins, I believed would suffice. But I was wrong. Strange isn’t it? This used to be the optimum interval last year. This year, it would have to increase. Why? Because when I entered class, I was faced with another dilemma.

·  Where should I sit? 

With the fixed seating arrangement system removed in the 2^nd year, the only seats that were left vacant were those in the 1^st row. As I unwillingly sat there, I started calculating the best possible time when I should leave my room to avoid this disaster in the next class. But no matter what your Quants score was, all calculations fail when there comes up another problem. And it is a grave one indeed.

· Whom should I sit with? 

This could as well be the topic of my Game Theory term paper.

       a) If my best friend has taken the same subject, am I left with the choice of seat?

       b) If a) does not hold true then: should I sit with my classmate or rather section-mate?

       c) Should I sit with my hostel neighbour?

       d) Should I sit with my friend who used to be my room-mate last year?

       e) Should I sit with my regional gang?

       f) Should I save space for my friend?

       g) Should I refrain from anybody else occupying that seat?

In each of these cases, how happy would I and the person who I’m sitting next to be?

· How should I form my project groups? 

The answer to this question is a 3-step procedure:

Let   N=number of members per group

       S=number of students in that elective who were in your section last year

Step 1: If N=S, immediately form your group

Step 2: If N>S, join a group such that S>N/2

Step 3: If N>>>S, join any group which is ready to take you

· How to effectively utilize the 10 min break-time? 

In the 10 min that I get between 2 classes, should I have a cup of coffee to wade off my sleep? Should I use the restroom? Or should I rush for the next class, which is in a different room so as to avoid the first 2 problems that I encountered? Or should I waste my time calculating the least time in which all the 3 tasks can be completed?

· Did somebody just knock my door? 

With no room-mate to wake you up from your slumber, even the slightest sounds in the dorm sound louder than the alarm which has been ringing for the past half an hour. Did I over-sleep and miss class? Is it my neighbor who just left for class after banging the door so hard that the entire dorm is awake except me?

· Am I checking the correct time-table? 

Checking time-table never seemed so difficult. This too has several steps:

      a) Check the google spread sheet sent by the PGP office

      b) Check the personalized time-table

      c) Re-confirm the subject and the classroom with another student who has the same

      d) Ask your friend to confirm your time-table

      e) Repeat all the above steps as many times as you can till you leave your room for class

· How will I address my juniors? 

Being a fresher in a B-school is analogous to being a kid amongst adults. So, addressing seniors was never a problem. All seniors, irrespective of the age difference are addressed as ‘Aap’. With batch-mates, it hardly matters whether they are addressed as ‘Tu’, ‘Tum’ or ‘Aap’. We’re all in the same batch after all. But how should I address my juniors who would probably be 3-4 years elder to me? Should I respect them for their age or should they respect me as their senior? And what if some of them were my seniors in school or college? The Queen’s language is a 1-word solution to this problem. All juniors, irrespective of the age difference will be addressed as ‘You’. Mischief managed.

Some other stark differences that I observed as compared to last year:

· The time taken between the announcement of the requirement of a Course Coordinator to the time taken for a student to be appointed as one is greater than 5 min, where these 5 min are spent exchanging glances and unwilling nods

· With you and your best friend opting for different electives, group study has now become a thing of the yore

· An 8:00 p.m.-10:00 p.m. class always seems longer than a 9:15 a.m.-3:45 p.m. class

· Despite the erratic electricity, the projector and the professor’s computer continue to operate and so does the class. Gone are the undergrad days when a power-cut meant the end of a class