Year 1 at IIM Ahmedabad
I completed my first year of the MBA program at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, last week. Here are a few of the highlights from my time there.
As I write this, I am sitting on the thirteenth floor of an apartment building in Mumbai. I did not think I would get this far and remain stable while moving to a city I had never lived in. In the last thirty-two hours, I have realized that every major city is like every other, consisting of the same people trying to make it in a world that can be cruel and unfair but continuing in the hope that things will be better someday. That’s not a half-bad note to start writing on.
I am a Political Science graduate from the University of Delhi, and I took the CAT in 2021 on a whim. I completed the first year of my MBA at IIM Ahmedabad about three days ago, after which I flew out to Mumbai for a two-month-long summer internship that is a part of the academic requirement for the degree.[1] Much of this essay will be based on Debashish Reang’s Year 1 of MBA at IIM Ahmedabad essay.
IIM Ahmedabad is known for its academic rigor that makes “leaders” out of the selective students it accepts. It is true that life moves at a much faster pace within the campus because of the endless string of classes, submissions, deadlines, and examinations that I was always trying to catch up to. I learned a lot over the year, perhaps more than I did in all three years of my undergraduate degree. We are acquainted with a bunch of concepts from the different domains of business, and in the course of time, you are supposed to find whatever you would not mind doing professionally for a while. It can be something that clicked with you instantly, or it can be a process of elimination – “I am probably not going to be great with Finance if I cannot intuitively recall the difference between an option and a forward three days after sitting for a Corporate Finance final.”
However, while much of what is done at IIMA is simply the bare minimum required to pass the course, I don’t think it is a waste of time. Everybody I know here will do great things in the future (unless they become too greedy for their own good, which is a very real possibility).
There is a range of courses we are compulsorily required to take in the first year; the number exceeds 35. I don’t think I cried because of academics at any point, but that could be because I am not the ideal student. The imposter syndrome can hit you hard here. I always felt they made a mistake taking me in, that I didn’t match the standards and caliber the other students brought to the table. That has had a lasting impact on my mental well-being because while I understand that I am one in the small percentage of people who get the opportunity to be funneled into IIM Ahmedabad, the institute itself becomes a bubble that is shielded from the outsider perspective. I am not sure if what I wrote makes sense.
I stayed recluse from most of my batch for the first term, which made me quite lonely at the beginning of the second term. The friendships you make at IIMA become your safe space because you are inevitably going to have downs here, and a strong support system can do wonders. I am grateful to a bunch of my classmates for welcoming me into their circle rather fluidly around the summer placement season. I do not think my time at IIMA would have been worth remembering if not for them.
My decision to choose marketing as a focus area was not entirely by choice. It involved a lot of hearsay and misconceptions. Also, how much you end up liking a domain/course depends greatly on the instructor assigned to your class. A good instructor can enhance a boring subject and vice versa. The Marketing-I and II courses were some of the best lectures I have attended (meet me for a conversation in person if you want to hear honest opinions about the professors, we cannot leave a paper trail). I also liked Strategic Marketing, which was taught in the third term.
I have met a lot of kind people at IIMA. I have met a lot of unkind people here as well. My experience as a woman has been difficult because of the internalized misogyny that many of the students and professors have. I fully intend to write a complete essay on Sexism 101 at this college, but I am unsure if it would be worth getting kicked out because of it. Reputation, and whatnot. I come from a women’s college, and the kind of safe space that gives you in terms of having opinions AND voicing them is unmatched. Delhi University needs to be given a lot of credit for this. This was my first time in a co-educational space as an adult, and the contrast hit me like a slap. Men’s voices are louder, and they are echoed in cult politics; diversity is considered a “perk”, and professors can and will justify pink tax under the false pretext that “if they’re willing to pay more, why shouldn’t we charge them more?”, slut-shaming is the foundation for all gossip, social awareness is limited to class participation points.
It was jarring to be 21 in a batch where the average age is 25, and the lower and upper limits are 21 and 30, respectively. I am expected to keep up with extremely experienced people who have clarity on their career trajectory, have appeared for countless interviews, and are above the jitters of formal interaction. It is important to remember that I am still young, I have the time to make mistakes, and nobody expects me to get it right in a single try simply because I am here. It often feels like a race I can never win, but at the cost of sounding immodest, I have won more than I could have imagined a year ago.
IIM Ahmedabad is where 2 States was shot, and one of the most common questions I get asked is whether it is anything like the movie. The short answer is yes. The long answer is that if you find time to look beyond the terrifying amount of money you are spending to study here and appreciate the red brick structures that have lasted decades watching some of the country’s brightest minds run through it, it really does feel unreal. This campus lets you be a student while not limiting your independence, and it gives people like me a taste of adulthood before we get pushed into the real world.
Being here also wins you glory points wherever you will go. IIM Ahmedabad has a network that has the power to solve most, if not all, of your problems simply because of the accolades its alumni have achieved. You are treated with respect because of your association with this place, which is a rare status upgrade. Even now, whenever I mention IIMA in my tweets, they get the traction that my original thoughts could never.
One of the present great tragedies of the campus is that it does not have any options for decent coffee. My coffee runs to the Tea Post outlet that existed on campus were essential to my mental health when things were not going ideally. The outlet has “discontinued its operations” as of last week. I am simply not going to survive Year 2 without coffee, so we need to deal with that. There are a few nice coffee places around campus, but leaving campus needs time which we are terribly short of.
The surprise quizzes are a pain. We were the first in a couple of batches that had our entire first year offline, and I’ll tell you the painful part. You attend three classes, return to your room to eat, and rest some, but 13:45 has different plans. They need you to walk over to a classroom that is seven minutes away in thirty-five-degree weather for a quiz one hour from now that can last for any duration from eight minutes to seventy-five. It can potentially derail all the sweet afternoon sleep plans you might have had for the last four hours in classes. You probably aren’t going to score all that well, either.
Making it through PGP1 was one of the more difficult things I have done. It might come from the person I am as much as it does from the circumstances that all IIM Ahmedabad students undergo together. I was terribly afraid for my internship, to the point where I spent months crying about having to go to Mumbai, but now that I am here, I almost like it – but that conversation is for another essay. My first year here has made me a more anxious ball of stress, and I fear the future more than ever before because it makes adulthood extremely real. I can no longer sit in my room in denial of time passing me by. At the same time, it has made me more well-equipped and confident in my capabilities to handle whatever might be thrown at me. I will cry about it, but I will get to work right after. That’s the balance, perhaps.
[1] I am currently interning with Kimberly-Clark for the summer in the Sales and Marketing domain.
As I sit in my office reading this, I cannot help but think how in spite of all the differences (our PG colleges, age, work ex, UG degrees, internship companies and cities), the underlying emotion you might have felt while writing this is exactly the same.
Extremely well written piece Khushi, and I'm glad to have landed on this. Have a happy Summer.
Also, "meet me for a conversation in person if you want to hear honest opinions . . . . . . . . . ."
yes please!!
Expressive and honest write up which open windows to an insight about inner interaction with self one. Khushi keep posting to make the future sessions vibrant. All the best for your summer assignments.