THREE BOOKS AND ISB

Read “Made in America” by Sam Walton…the saga of the creation of the Worlds biggest organization….from the voice of Sam Walton himself.

This book is amazing….depicts the heart of Wal-Mart…..its technology, sophisticated distribution system, associates culture…..

Also Sam Walton has depicted himself through this book…as he broke all frontiers of success…His famous Hula dance in the Wall Street…his Saturday mornings with his associates…his fleet of little airplanes which he piloted himself….and all such stories which were instrumental in building the Wal-Mart culture.

The ideas of Sam are as entertaining as it can be…and I will like to include two lines from the book…

This one is about the basic marketing trick, which Sam asks his associates to practice

“From this day forward, I solemnly promise and declare that every time a customer comes within 10 ft of me , I will smile look him in the eye, and greet him”

This one is about having the right person at the right time

“All along the history of Wal-Mart has been marked by having the right people in the right job when we needed them the most. We had Whitaker, straight out of the get-after-it-and stay-after-it old school, to help get us started, Ferold , a methodical hardworking German, to get us organized, Ron Mayer a whiz at computers to get our systems going, Jack Shewmaker, a brilliant shoot-from-the-hip executive with a store managers mentality and David Glass who could step up in a crisis, keep his cool, and eventually get control of a company that became so big that it was hard to comprehend".

Also read “Wise and Otherwise” by Sudha Murthy….a book depicting individual instances….extremely simple book….with powerful messages in the Indian context

The third book was “Teaching the Elephant to Dance” by James Belasco….a book about Change Management….This book is informative…well researched …but somehow I felt it was too textual in nature (may be because I was reading “Made in America” also during the same time...

So that’s about the books….

Ah yes…..now something about ISB….Its official now…..ISB is ranked 20, in the world, by the influential Financial Times (FT)…..once again, my Alma mater has broken all records…..and this time the records are not just in the Indian context….its global….the youngest B-School to make it to these rankings (In fact, TOP 20)…ISB has indeed redefined the concept of Indian B School education….