Blogger No. 2!!!

Curtis's post made me realize I hadn't introduced myself. Doing that now, although a little late might still be ok considering that we are still not too many posts into the blog. And it gives me something to blog about. And the speciality about me, even if I don't put in picture, my post can run into pages together, especially when I'm bored to death with nothing to do.

Who am I?

This is Randhir Hebbar, born in the temple town of Udupi, near Mangalore in Karnataka, brought up almost entirely in Bangalore. I did most of my education in Bangalore (Bethany, NCJ and UVCE) and worked in the IT and ITES space for about 6 years with a 2.5 year stint in Columbus, OH, USA - Mostly IT Consulting and Project Management. I've traveled all over the US, looking to exchange to London to do some Europe traveling. My biggest complaint about myself is the fact that I haven't traveled enough in India. Curtis has seen a 1000 times more of India than I. Hope to rectify that some day.

My MBA Story?

I made it thru CAT and ditched IIMs for the US Onsite trip on the advice of a few gurus (friends) who thought an MBA before you become a manager is not really worth your time. In hindsight, I really believe that is true. You can of course disagree with me and we can have a big debate over this. But that's my opinion. So if you are less than 2-3 years work-ex and you ask my advice about doing your MBA, you know what my answer is going to be. Of course, there are always exceptions.

Finally after managing a team for about a year, I realized that I just couldn't do what I or even my immediate boss was doing for the rest of my life, needed a change for the better and applied to ISB. Just doing the ISB App helped me learn my mistakes and the HKUST App was surely a 100 times better than the ISB App. And the ISB interview was fun in hind-sight. This nerdy guy trying to prove that he was better than me and that being an ISB Alumnus made him some kind of super-human. The HKUST Interview was so much more professional and to some extent so much more easier that in hind-sight, I wished it was tougher. That would have made me feel like I'd earned it. :-) You can never satisfy me, can you?

The HKUST Experience?

It's been an awesome journey so far. I've had some super experiences, learning everyday, from peers, from profs, from alumnus and lots of crazy fun times and parties here. Just meeting people from all these countries, some really special characters, working with these special characters is something wonderful.

The Highlights: All the Free lunch/dinner/cocktail parties, Mini-Olympics, ELP/RP, Case Competition, Exam-Fever (that one dreaded week in December), the past month of crazy B-Plan work and of course that hard-work paying off.

The next big event is obviously the CMU Business Plan Competition for me. Looking forward to doing well there and coming back richer (at least in terms of experience and learnings :-)). And of course, a well-deserved potential one week break in US and meeting the Columbus gang.