Marketing - From The Lens Of A Novice

A classic question which a vast majority of MBA graduates in India are tired of hearing on a regular basis. After all, in most of the B-schools, more than half of the cohort has an engineering background.

Don’t worry, this is not an MBA interview, so I won’t tax your mind with some extravagant use of jargons, per se. Still confused as to why I asked this question? Park it aside for the time being.

Fast forward a few months of your life. You took an entrance test, like CAT, XAT, MAT or something similar. Got a few offers from a few b-schools. If you scored well, you might be juggling around with offers from IIMs, XLRI, FMS and the likes of those b-schools. You might be spending sleepless nights over the choice between IIM X vs IIM Y (X may be good in Marketing, Y in Consulting, and the list goes on).

In the entire farrago of exasperated emotions, what did you finally do? Can you describe this entire episode in simpler terms?

Quite inevitably my friend, all this while you have been taking baby steps of something which we call “Marketing”.

Confused? Let me explain.

In Scenario 1, you decided to pursue an MBA from a Premier B-School, post Engineering (mostly) because of the fact that such a step will give you an “edge” over others. In marketing terms, it will give you the “differentiation”, which you need, in order to stand apart from the crowd (or avoid commoditization). We are however not debating about the goodness of futility of this step, that is a separate topic altogether.

In Scenario 2, you wanted to be associated with a Premier Institute (mostly again) because of the “Brand Value” of that Institute. Brand. This is something which might have been hardwired in your brain since your childhood, sometimes strongly enough to replace the product name with the particular brand name (For Example, many people might refer to any “antiseptic liquid” as “Dettol”, although Dettol is a brand in that antiseptic liquid market).

What did this branding exercise convey? Exclusivity? Quality? Reliability? The parameters can be multifarious.

It is great that you inadvertently conducted a reasonable deal of marketing exercise while you took the decision to join MBA, as well as the point when you decided to go for IIM X, Y or Z among so many other offers.

Then why did you quit practicing this great exercise just when you stepped into the hallowed grounds of your chosen Institute? Why did you choose to follow the commoditized approach as taught by your seniors and the seniors before them?

Confused?

In a Premier B-School anywhere in this country, you will always find people who are better than you, or at least, equal to you in one way or the other, be it in academics, or sports, or arts, or whatever other fields for that matter. Sometimes, the abundance of excellence within the B-School can lead to a great deal of commoditization of skills as everyone in that cohort is assumed to possess the same academic skills as you are possessing.

Coupled with the commoditization of skills comes up another cliche activity which most of our students find pleasure in carrying out. It refers to mindless rote learning of the concepts without pausing to think of the real world application or interests. Although the case based pedagogy of B-Schools solve the problem of cramming up to a great extent, yet, we would still find people delving into their books for hours at a stretch, highlighting almost the entire book, learning even the punctuation marks in the definitions provided, and conveniently surviving on Maggi 24 x 7, to “save” time. Brilliant. Most of the seniors also (out of their good intentions) create a “State of Fear” (quite apt a description of the scenario, with the novel of the same name) among the juniors, showing them “cycles of Hell” which would break loose if their grades are off the “Stellar Zone” by even one or two decimal points. Everybody then seems to work like a perfectly synchronized programmed drone. Is this good in any way?

So what is the way out? 

The answer again lies in the same Marketing tenet called differentiation, preferably through personal branding.

However, you will have about 90 Exams (Quizzes included), 18 Projects, Placement Interviews etc banging our head for an entire academic year, yet how can you think of building your own brand?

The scenario brings back the lessons from “3 Idiots” movie. Keep calm, take a deep breath and say “Aal izz Well” (All is Well).

Now coming to the answer.

Whether in MBA or elsewhere - strive for excellence. That is the ultimate differentiator.

How to achieve excellence?

• Choose the domain of your liking and work hard to sharpen your skills pertaining to that domain. Go for some great certifications, live projects, paper publication, case competitions etc. Ask your faculty members for guidance, the more you ask, the better it is for your profile.
• Devise an action plan and allocate sufficient time and resources towards such goals, as well as do keep something aside for recreation.
• Planning means taking some steps as well as avoiding the others to ensure that you keep your focus intact towards achieving your desired results. Keeping bare minimum decent grades in completely unrelated subjects is also fine.
• Join only those clubs and committees where your skills can be sharpened based upon your interests. It will not only benefit you but also the club and the Institute from your actions (I am waiting myself for the results of a couple of Clubs of my choice)
• Get out of your comfort zone. You came to MBA to study. Academic rigour is sacrosanct in a B-School.

So, that is all what a novice, who has barely joined MBA, has to say to the fellow first-year students, who are struggling hard to find focus in MBA or have started suffering from the existential crisis. Just take a deep breath, calm down. You are in a good Institute. Let it not overwhelm you, but at the same time, let it neither make your profile a commoditized one, nor make you a careless overconfident fellow. Work smart, be focused, maintain differentiation, and thus, market yourself to the recruiters for a Premium, which they would be more than willing to pay for your differentiated set of skills.

Remember, strive for excellence, success would follow you automatically (“3 Idiots” movie).