Goddess of English

I just came across this interesting bit. And only now.

A Dalit writer called Chandra Bhan Prasad, along with the dalit community of a village called Banka in UP, has built a temple to worship the Goddess of English!

An excerpt from a write-up on the BBC site:

About two feet tall, the bronze statue of the goddess is modelled after the Statue of Liberty.

"She is the symbol of Dalit renaissance," says Chandra Bhan Prasad, a Dalit writer who came up with the idea of the Goddess of English

"She holds a pen in her right hand which shows she is literate. She is dressed well and sports a huge hat - it's a symbol of defiance that she is rejecting the old traditional dress code.

"In her left hand, she holds a book which is the constitution of India which gave Dalits equal rights. She stands on top of a computer which means we will use English to rise up the ladder and become free for ever."

Incredible!

It's a sort of socio-cultural development but I gather quite a few marketing tips from this event.

If people are stuck up about religion, seed the change in the religion itself, instead of trying to generate an anti-religious sentiment. Am sure it must have been some work convincing at least some of the dogmatic people in the community.

And if God is the greatest and if God's word is the highest command, then make God command the change.

They've also announced that they'll celebrate Oct 25 every year as English Day. Of course, if you have Ram Navmi, Shivratri, Holi and so on, why not English Day for Goddess of English.

Still early days but this should yield interesting and positive results. Great initiative.

You can go through the BBC article here.

Pic courtesy: http://www.bbc.co.uk/

So what's the scope?

Parents and their kids, who are just about to choose a stream/pursue a professional qualification, ask this. Some young pros considering starting some form of business or entrepreneurial venture ask this. As if this question is going to make their careers or help earn a great deal of money.

And while I've answered that question, I have not been internally satisfied with my answers. I wonder those who asked for my opinion were satisfied either :).

MBAs would know better that 'scope' can be answered through Porter's 5-forces model. However, with supply trumping demand in most categories which pertain to life in general, Porter's 5-forces model might not be sufficient.

'Scope' is a category question. And it can't be answered categorically. Besides, it requires that once you put a name to the category, you do a lot of slicing and dicing. More on this in other posts.

For now, let me try and close this by saying that in today's economy, scope will be largely determined by how you intend to connect with people, how long are you willing to check and evaluate whether you are connecting with people in the greatest possible manner.

If you want to earn a salary, 'scope' might often be a redundant question.

An exam of your own choosing

Last night, Dad said, "You must be feeling like you've passed an exam."

Just a thoughtful fraction of a second and I said, "Exactly!"

His commented in response to my update on my attempts at photographing earrings.

The thing is I didn't quite relish exams, even if I would score pretty well. Even now, some rare dream dips me in those days and fills that night with the dread of school-time exams. Guess the problem was they were imposed. Goals of organizations also felt like that on occasions. Anyway...

I work better choosing my own exams.

Bee the Baker

A MICAmate is doing interesting things.

The first interesting thing is the name of her venture/initiative Bee the Baker.

Second interesting thing is her designation: Chef, CFO, CEO & Office Boy at Bee the Baker. 

Third interesting thing is her FB page: https://www.facebook.com/beethebakerindia

Fourth interesting thing is all that she is doing to make that FB page come really alive.

Fifth interesting thing is the visual rendition.

Wanna do something interesting of your own? Here's a little to learn.

Wield the sword, carefully!

Even if you are careful, there are others who will run riot :)

The eternal human urge to conserve energy which translates into seeking convenience percolates into B-school marketing too. How?

B-schools directly or indirectly market 'guaranteed' placements and hefty packages to lure students. For a parent or student reading an ad or an article, the equation is simple. A B-school might charge a good amount of fee but in return it will offer placements (on a platter).

The result is that students wait for companies to visit campuses and offer them jobs, packages and whatever else. The very thing - initiative among budding managers/businessmen - that a b-school ought to inculcate takes a real beating when students simply wait for the most important milestone to happen in their careers. Just as it happened in movies where a car would stay in its place and the reel would run in the background to make the audience feel that the car is moving. But even if the audience did enjoy the story, they always knew the truth, no?

Campus Placements / Laziness

I've been listening to the stories of some about-to-graduate b-school students.

I sense when students pay the hefty fee for studying at these b-schools they buy not the 'education', they buy campus placements.

At another level, it seems money induces laziness. Just coz students have paid the fee doesn't mean that they don't have to put in the effort to bag the job they like and they deserve.

Also, who says that fresh management grads are meant only for the companies that visit the campus for recruitment. Why can't students voluntarily and individually approach the companies which they feel like working for.