What 2015 brought for Udyam…

Like every year, Udyam has taken a lot of initiatives this year as well. Starting with Walk-a-thon 2015 and Jayapriya Scholarship at the beginning of the academic session (20015-2016), the team has included new initiatives for raising funds for various NGOs.

Sunshine Scholarship:

NMIMS, Bangalore is sponsoring the education of Jayapriya, a bright student of class 8th, for the past three years. For the past 3 years, team Udyam raises funds for the scholarship through various fund raising activities such as Silent Auction. This year also, the institution continued the tradition of supporting the girl child’s education. Moreover, the “NMIMS Sunshine Scholarship 2015” was also provided to two more bright students- Praveen Kumar from 5th Std and Arokya, who studies in 3rd Std.

Chalk the Walk:

Knowesis as a partner of the Walkathon gives an opportunity to the students to showcase the talents. In order to be part of the driving force that is campaigning for Zero Waste, the students created posters with as many images and slogans. The posters were displayed during the walk in Lal Bagh during a flower show.

Walkathon:

Udyam in association with Rang-the cultural committee of NMIMS, conducted its annual event called ‘Walk-a-Thon’ for creating awareness about Zero Waste, this year. Udyam team joined forces with a Bangalore-based NGO called ‘Saahas’, which was committed to finding solutions to solid waste.  The walk was to raise awareness about the issue which has been plaguing our society for far too long and needs to be addressed. It took place in Lal Bagh during a flower show.  Amid the huge crowd, the walk was commenced with a street play titled ‘Dekh Bhai Dekh’ that was performed for increasing the knowledge about Waste Segregation and different ways to reduce it as Waste Reduction is the need of the hour.

Smarthanam:

Committed to making a difference: Udyam’s constant endeavor is to work towards the betterment of the society. Udyam organized CSR event on Independence day. As a humble contribution to Independence Day, the Students of NMIMS Bengaluru visited ‘Samarthanam’ an NGO based in HSR layout and organized activities like ‘Drawing Competition’, ‘Dance workshop’ and engaged with over 200 differently-abled kids of Samarthanam.

Joy of Giving Week:

Joy of Giving Week (JOGW) is going to be conducted from October 2-8, 2015. NMIMS Bangalore celebrates the joy of spreading love through various activities. These activities such as Collection drive, Blood donation, Cleanliness drive, food stalls and Visit to an NGO are conducted by Udyam team. This year new event called “wish tree” is being introduced in the Joy of Giving Week. All the collections from the food stall and collection drive events of Joy of Giving Week were donated to Mitrajyoti and Riva NGOs.  The wishes of the kids suffering from cancer of Riva NGO were fulfilled through “wish tree” event. Around 90 students volunteered for JOGW.

CSR Round table:

NMIMS, Bangalore partnered with Brandonomy-Sponsor Source to host CSR Round Table. The event held on 31st October, 2015 in association with Udyam, the Social Responsibility Cell of NMIMS, Bangalore was the first of its kind for raising cognizance and sensitizing leaders, corporates and students about the advantages of CSR for the business to create brand differentiation and build brand strategy.

The esteemed panelists of the panel discussion were CSR and Marketing heads of various organizations- Mr. Aniisu K. Verghese from TESCO, Mr. Deepak Prabhu representing Cognizant, Ms. Shiwani Varma Vyas from Xchanging Technologies and Mr. Bala Warrier, CEO of Manipal Foundation. The enthralling discussion was moderated by Mr. Abhishek Ranjan, Head-CSR from Brillio. Moreover, the event was attended by the Marketing and CSR delegates, working professionals, startup founders and academicians.

The productive discussion ended with a sense that such events need to be conducted more often to facilitate sharing of best practices and free exchange of ideas in the field of brand management through CSR.

2015 – an exciting year for Rang!

In the midst of the most festive month of the year, and the most looked forward Christmas break for NMIMS Bangalore, let us see how the year was for the Rang team.

Start October and one could see them everywhere but classes. Making phone calls, preparing events, negotiating with vendors, visiting colleges and sponsor hunting became routine. Each of them had one thing in mind, to make Nityaksh IV bigger and better. And they sure did!

Nityaksh began with a bang on 15^th October with its management events which saw participation of colleges from all over the country. We owe it to the creative minds of the club members which helped us pull off the management events so uniquely. On 17^th, a sunny Saturday morning we started with our cultural events. We opened with solo singing, followed by solo dance, a short play, group dance and the resplendent fashion show. We had a roaring audience which added to the success of that day and cheered us up further for the D-day. On the 18^th we got to witness the performances of the best bands in town. The viewers could not help leave their seats and sway to the tunes of the talented guitarists, drummers and singers.

As the star event of the night was nearing, we were all on our toes to make sure that all arrangements are made flawlessly. Nothing can describe the excitement we felt to see the house full for that night. The Viral Fever team put up a spectacular show and gave a perfect close to Nityaksh. Happy and tired, the RANG team retired having pulled off Nityaksh IV – bigger, better and bolder like promised! But it didn’t end there. For more exciting inside stories about RANG stay tuned to this tab!

KNOWESIS – HALLOWEN’S DAY

Halloween’s origins date back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain (pronounced sow-in). The Celts who lived 2,000 years ago in the area that is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France, celebrated their new year on November 1. This day marked the end of summer and the harvest and the beginning of the dark, cold winter, a time of year that was often associated with human death. Celts believed that on the night before the New Year, the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became blurred. On the night of October 31 they celebrated Samhain, when it was believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth. In addition to causing trouble and damaging crops, Celts thought that the presence of the otherworldly spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to make predictions about the future. For a people entirely dependent on the volatile natural world, these prophecies were an important source of comfort and direction during the long, dark winter

Somehow all the religions narrow down to one belief that the dead have an extended life after death in other world. Even Indians believe in life after death. So this triggers a primary question in my mind “Do ghosts exist?” and “Are they friend or foe?”  But the returning of the dead on a particular dead sounds too creepy and also scary. May be that’s why on this day people dress themselves as ghosts so that the dead who wander around us consider them as fellow ghosts and do not harm us.

Halloween has always been a holiday filled with mystery, magic and superstition. It began as a Celtic end-of-summer festival during which people felt especially close to deceased relatives and friends. For these friendly spirits, they set places at the dinner table, left treats on doorsteps and along the side of the road and lit candles to help loved ones find their way back to the spirit world. Today’s Halloween ghosts are often depicted as more fearsome and malevolent, and our customs and superstitions are scarier too. We avoid crossing paths with black cats, afraid that they might bring us bad luck. This idea has its roots in the middle ages, when many people believed that witches avoided detection by turning themselves into cats. We try not to walk under ladders for the same reason. This superstition may have come from the ancient Egyptians, who believed that triangles were sacred; it also may have something to do with the fact that walking under a leaning ladder tends to be fairly unsafe. And around Halloween, especially, we try to avoid breaking mirrors, stepping on cracks in the road or spilling salt.

But what about the Halloween traditions and beliefs that today’s trick-or-treaters have forgotten all about? Many of these obsolete rituals focused on the future instead of the past and the living instead of the dead. In particular, many had to do with helping young women identify their future husbands and reassuring them that they would someday—with luck, by next Halloween—be married. In 18th-century Ireland, a matchmaking cook might bury a ring in her mashed potatoes on Halloween night, hoping to bring true love to the diner who found it. In Scotland, fortune-tellers recommended that an eligible young woman name a hazelnut for each of her suitors and then toss the nuts into the fireplace. The nut that burned to ashes rather than popping or exploding, the story went represented the girl’s future husband. (In some versions of this legend, confusingly, the opposite was true: The nut that burned away symbolized a love that would not last.) Another tale had it that if a young woman ate a sugary concoction made out of walnuts, hazelnuts and nutmeg before bed on Halloween night she would dream about her future husband. Young women tossed apple-peels over their shoulders, hoping that the peels would fall on the floor in the shape of their future husbands’ initials; tried to learn about their futures by peering at egg yolks floating in a bowl of water; and stood in front of mirrors in darkened rooms, holding candles and looking over their shoulders for their husbands’ faces. Other rituals were more competitive. At some Halloween parties, the first guest to find a burr on a chestnut-hunt would be the first to marry; at others, the first successful apple-bobber would be the first down the aisle.

Of course, whether we’re asking for romantic advice or trying to avoid seven years of bad luck, each one of these Halloween superstitions relies on the good will of the very same “spirits” whose presence the early Celts felt so keenly.

ModEx – Excel O Mania

Hey all you technology freaks out there!!!

Greetings from Team ModEx- The Business and Technology Club of NMIMS, Bangalore!

ModEx realises the importance of excel in the corporate world, and thus takes all endeavours to promote the use of excel amongst its students. We began at a micro level by conducting a series workshop for our members to help them learn the various tricks of excel both at basic and advanced level. (Perks of being in ModEx :p) The success of these workshops have shown in the enhanced excel skills of our members and we now plan to extend these workshops to the other students of our college too and also use our excel acumen to contribute to the administrative department of our college.

We are also geared up to test the excel skills of all b-school students via our next big event- ‘Excel O Mania’- a Pan India Excel Competition. This event would be based on excel expertise with a blend of turns and twists to add masala to the event. So watch out for more updates from us on this exciting event and till then, keep EXCELling…

For more information on ModEx, follow us on our facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/modex.nmims/

Ace the Case- By Paramarsh

 

However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.

Winston Churchill

 

Coming on the back of hectic preparations and a successful outcome of ‘Chanakyaneeti’ the strategic event as part of Nityaksh the Cultural and Managerial fest of NMIMS Bangalore, the team at Paramarsh brainstormed as to what the next big event would be. After much deliberation it was decided to plan a pan India event around a case study.

With the theme decided, the guys decided to approach Pikkol the flagship offering of Rednile Innovations Private Limited, the technology centric logistics firm founded and supported by IIM Alumni. Pikkol aims to be the leader in the highly fragmented packing and moving industry focusing on easing the woe a customer faces when he/she has to shift house.

The team at Pikkol were incredibly receptive to our idea of a case study challenge and had a live case study for us, a problem they were facing currently. Armed with the case study and a suitable name to boot, the team at Paramarsh went by inviting colleges across India, ably assisted by the Public Relations Cell at NMIMS Bangalore.

The response to the invitation was staggering. More than 300 teams from 60+ colleges registered for the event. The first round consisted of profiling the company Pikkol as well as its competitors and to suggest a few new service offerings the company could introduce. After a barrage of entries, the best were shortlisted for round 2 which actually gave the shortlisted participants a crack at the case study.

The Pikkol team judged the entries and were more than satisfied with the quality on show. After a tough shortlisting process, the final top six teams went through to get a chance to present their presentations at the college on December 12th, 2015. The final showcase was judged by the team at Pikkol, led by the very affable Mr. Deepu Chandra, the CEO of Pikkol. Also joining on the judging panel were Prof. Harashvardhan, mentor to everyone here at Paramarsh and our esteemed director, Prof. Suresh Mony a stalwart in the field of management.

After a gruelling battle between the teams, the winners of the Ace the Case challenge were team ZenMasters from JBIMS. The runners up were team Blitzkrieg from our very own NMIMS MPE Batch.

As the curtain drew on another successful outing punctuated by a rousing speech from Deepu on the problems faced in the industry, and one from our director showcasing the talent on hand, the members at Paramarsh are already deciding on the next sojourn.

 

 

 

INTUITO – ANALYTICS DAY!!!

Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), Bangalore hosted the 6th edition of its flagship event, “Analytics Day” on 30th October, 2015. Continuing its legacy of having a new theme event every year, this year the theme of Analytics day was “Supply Chain Analytics”. The event was organized and coordinated by “Intuito”, the student led Analytics club of NMIMS, Bangalore. In order to increase the awareness about the domain of analytics amongst the academic circles and the corporate world, NMIMS has been conducting Analytics day every year, since 2010.

The chief guest of the event was Mr. Sudipta Sen, Vice Chairman & Board Member- India, Regional Director South East Asia at SAS Institute (India) Pvt. Ltd and the key note speaker was Mr. Ravi Vijayaraghavan, Vice President and Head – Analytics at Flipkart.com. As a preamble to the event, Mr. Sudipta Sen in his speech talked about Internet of Things (IoT), uses of Analytics at various stages in the value chain, challenges faced in supply chain and logistics, et al. The event was also graced by the presence of Loveen Vuppala, Mr. Karthik Subbiah Mr.Rajamani Kalpathy Subramanian, Mr.Venugopal G and Mr. Anand Das from Flipkart.com, Dell, Tata Motors, Infosys and Target, respectively. These eminent dignitaries participated in an enthralling discussion and also did a detailed analysis for the topic during the Panel discussion. The proceedings were moderated by Prof. Krishna Kumar from the Rainman Consulting Company and also visiting faculty at NMIMS, Bangalore.

Later, Mr. Anand Das from Target and Mr. Karan Shah, CEO of Epoch, presented corporate case presentations titled “Demand forecasting in modern retail” and “ How Analytical solution helps in curbing Supply Chain gap?”, respectively.

A massive success that raised the bar set by its predecessor, Analytics Day caught the attention in terms of the participation by the corporates and students as well as for providing insightful discussions on how analytics in supply chain can be used to gain competitive advantage.

 

 

‘INSIGNIA’ – THE ALUMNI COMMITTEE

Get in touch… Stay in touch

For any reputed Institute, one of the major strengths is a strong alumni base. NMIMS Bangalore’s Alumni Committee – ‘Insignia’ devotedly functions to enhance the bond between the institute and its alumni for a mutually beneficial relationship. We maintain a close relationship with our alumni and ensure their active participation in the functioning of their Alma matter.

With the inception of our college in 2008, we currently have alumni strength of around 662. The alumni committee was formed in the academic year 2010-11 and currently has 21 members which is a mix of senior and junior members. The junior members are selected through interview process by the senior members of the committee and the senior members are selected through interview by the faculty coordinator who is responsible for the committee. The president and the joint secretaries of the committee are elected by the members of the committee. All of us in the alumni committee are continuously charged with generating spirit of bonding by helping alumni grow personally and professionally under the college flag. Although the eventual goal of our committee is to create goodwill which results in gifts of time and money, we are trying to promote programmes and initiatives for our alumni over the short term that will cause a connective spark.

The alumni committee organizes diverse events round the year. The major ones include,

Coffee Meet with Alumni: NMIMS strongly believes that every former student is special in their own way. To continue the tradition of building a strong alumni connection, this year we had ‘Coffee Meet’ with our alumni on 8^th August 2015 at NMIMS Bangalore Rooftop.

The reunion was attended by 65 alumni. The meet kicked off with a welcome address and the air was filled with fond memories of our alumni recalling and sharing their NMIMS days. We even had good wishes and messages sent by alumni who could not attend the meet. To bring back memories of fun filled events at NMIMS, we organised games and competitions which were followed by the prize distribution ceremony. We also had the inauguration ceremony of the ‘Alma Connect’ website portal followed by detailed instructions regarding the same.

Towards the end of the event, we had a cake cutting ceremony with one alumnus of each batch who did the honour of cutting the cake. This was followed by delicious snacks. There was lot of excitement and bonding over snacks, with nostalgic music playing in the background.

It was finally time to say goodbye. The alumni left with a feeling of nostalgia, waiting to bond over the next alumni meet.

Grand Annual Alumni Meet: The Grand Alumni Meet is a time for the alumni to come back and meet up with old friends.  It is also a time to reminisce about their college years. Last year ‘The Grand Alumni Meet’ was held on 1st February 2015 in Club Cabana Resort from 9:30 AM to 5:30 PM. Registration was followed by distribution of wrist bands. Transportation was arranged from the campus itself.

The meet started with a welcome address by Puja Das. This was followed by having our alumni grouped into teams and playing a game of Treasure Hunt. Breakfast was arranged at the venue. To add some fun to the event and keep the guests engaged, we had a Tombola game conducted by the students of PGDM 04 and PGDM 05. The person giving the right answers received chocolates. There was lunch organized. There were various games in the resort such as Bowling, Archery, Snooker, Cricket, Carom, Chess and Badminton. There were also few water sports and rides which the Alumni enjoyed thoroughly.

Towards the end of the event, we had high-tea at Club Cabana and the alumni were dropped back to the campus.

This year the event is scheduled to happen on 30^th January 2016.

Interactive Sessions with Alumni: The committee also organises alumni interaction sessions for the current batch of students regularly, so that the students can gain a first-hand insight into the corporate world. We also seek our alumni guidance to hone the skills of our current students through mock interviews and also conduct interactive sessions with them so as to learn a lot from their valuable experiences.

Other activities of our committee include updating and maintaining alumni database, engaging alumni on LinkedIn and Facebook Alumni groups, Alumni Connect, newsletter of the Alumni Committee which will be sent to all the alumni periodically.

All of these events provide an opportunity for the alumni to catch up with old buddies, narrate stories and also learn about what exciting endeavours their alma mater is spearheading.

ACADEMIC COMMITTEE

The Academic Committee at NMIMS Bangalore thrives to provide a prior corporate exposure to the students through live project opportunities at various renowned companies as well as start-ups. This helps the students experience the nuances of the corporate world and be prepared for their upcoming targets in the business world. These projects are for an approximate span of two months and will take together all fields of management like marketing, finance, HR, operations, analytics. Apart from these, the Committee also organises competitions and case analysis to inculcate healthy competition and think beyond the ordinary.

About the team

The team is a decent amalgamation of seniors and juniors mentored by       Dr. A.Aparna and Prof. Eklavya Baruah. The present team is led by Ojaswita Gupta, a senior student from PGDM-05 batch.

We have companies like Wipro, HCG, CGI, Ginger, Accenture and start-ups like Nightpanda visiting us offering live projects and summer internships.

Cherry on the top

The B Plan competition held on 7th August 2015, Friday, sponsored by SOC Analytics and organised by the Academic Committee at NMIMS Bangalore. It was a live case analysis regarding online promotion programmes of one of the clients of SOC Analytics. The four final teams – Archit Kumar and Arjun Manek, Pratap Deshmukh and Anil Sahu, Manogna and Bala Vege, Akash Sharma and S R Subham- were judged by Reecha Sinha and Samir Prakash, from SOC Analytics. The winners, Akash Sharma and S R Subham received a cash price of Rs.3000 and all the finalists received participation certifications.

Worldly Wise is the quiz out-of-box to put the grey matter to test. The quiz includes all the management streams. Each stage comes up with a unique twist in the regular plot making it all the more exciting and challenging.

This is what we are in this short span. We promise that they willl be many more to come. Stay tuned with us at https://www.facebook.com/academiccommittee/timeline

Lakshya NSL 2015-16 Mid Season Round Up

The NSL started with carom in the month of July. Rakesh Joshi from the yellow team beat Swapnajit Roy from the green team. In the doubles section Jayesh Kinare and Lakshmikanth M P from the Blue team won. Over all the points table after the carom had the yellow in positive point tally while the rest of the teams had a negative score.

The table tennis tournament saw the repeat of the finals of last year where Dhruv Agarwal met Varun Bhandari. This time though Dhruv got the better of Varun in a thrilling final match. The 3^rd place was won by Saurabh Mitra , who beat his roommate Sahil Mahajan. In girls singles Nidhi Desai beat Sherya Garg while in the girl’s doubles Shreya and Yasha were victorious. One of the matches of the tournament was in the mixed doubles section where the underdogs Arpit and Nidhi beat the favorites Varun and Jolly. Over all green mustered up the most number of points from the TT round.

The third sport event to take place was Cricket. Here we witnessed one of the most exciting matches where the Green team put up a huge target by literally annihilating the blue bowlers. The huge target put up by them made the task look impossible to chase with a fortnight s gap between the 2 innings. The Blue team somehow managed to chase the score winning by 1 wicket in hand. It was one of those victories that really crushed the green team emotionally. The final was won by the yellow team on the same day against the blue team who just did not have enough after the previous match. In the girl’s category yellow beat red. The Cricket tournament saw red open its account in terms of points while yellow surged ahead from the rest of the pack.

The team points currently stand as

*each color represents their corresponding teams

We are looking forward to the Chess, Badminton and Basketball tournaments which are going to start from January on wards after our winter holidays.

25 Students went to IBS Hyderabad to represent the college in various sports. Surendra Mohan and Aditya Kohli reached the badminton semi finals. In TT Saurabh Mitra won his matches but the team as whole could not qualify further due to aggregate total. A special mention to the girls team who had recently learnt to play throw ball and were very competitive and gave a real fight in their last match. Overall the students are reflecting on their performances and are ready to practice hard for the upcoming tournaments.

Thy Love!

Pretense is boring. If it isn’t now, it will sometime soon be. Being you is always in vogue!

Well, there is this one friend that you always talk to. And forth, of course!! That one alter ego who apparently knows more than you do, more often than not.

This friend should have been the most awesome person you could have ever come across during the sunny days of life – days when you were making hay while the sun shone.

This friend comprehends what your heart speaks for and what your head asks for. It isn’t easy to bail you out of such complicated dilemmas. Your friend finds it a cakewalk though!

A feeling so intriguingly magical would be when you start believing that a few intrepid moments spent with this friend are those that design your beautiful calling, your dream.

This friend, my friend, is your first love – the inner you. None but you alone can afford it. None other than you would invest in it.

So I say – “Pamper thyself, for you are beautiful.  And then watch the world fall in love with you!”

Sounds cool 🙂 ??

~ Lakshmikanth M P