Expecting the Unexpected!!

The Valley is reputed to be one of those places where “creative destruction” takes place @ a faster rate than anywhere else on earth. Words that come to your mind are:

Innovation

Disruption

Computers

Ideas

Progress

New

The tech industry based in Silicon Valley employs some of the smartest people I’ve met.  My internship experience leads me to believe that most engineers and managers in the Valley in general come from top schools world-wide. They represent over 100 different nationalities from across the globe. This reminds me of the ancient Indian (Sanskrit) saying:   

वसुधैव कुटुम्बक  - Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam – The whole world is one family!

There are however no pre-set qualifications, smart people from across the globe with no formal qualifications other than an undergrad are successful here . The incredible magnet that Silicon Valley is you would think that it’s “an all work, no play lifestyle”. Right? Wrong!!!!!

Here’s what you probably never expected: most companies in the Tech industry offer great life styles -  plenty of freebies (perks) such as free meals, free snacks etc, half day work on Fridays  and  a work –life balance that is un-paralleled in most professions world-wide.

So how does my internship experience compare (from someone with first-hand experience)?

No standard work hours – just get your work done, show initiative, drive performance and results!

Thank God it’s Friday – carnivals, shows, concerts, bands etc

Cafes – plenty to choose from and an array of choices! 

Snack Bars!

WFH -Work from Home is not frowned upong (as long as you get the work done, attend meetings!)

A few notes below that will give prospective international students a greater feel for the tech industry:

Job Hopping:

A key driver for rapid innovation in the Silicon Valley as AnnaLee Saxenian, author of Regional Advantage: Culture and Competition in Silicon Valley and Route 128, puts it is

"Job-hopping, rather than climbing the career ladder within a corporation, facilitates flows of information and know-how between individuals, firms, and industries. When combined with venture capital, it supports unanticipated recombinations of technologies and skill.

Old vs New , Consulting vs Tech:

While consulting firms and consultants focuses on old age economies and traditional business models and processes, the valley focuses on start-ups, developing new processes and innovative business models.

Many Careers:

You don’t program all your life, neither are you into sales all your life in the Tech Industry.

In this video (click here), Tim Draper, managing director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, talks about the California's Silicon Valleyand about many careers in the tech industry! 

In my next post, I shall talk about enjoying the internship experience - it is such a fleeting moment!

Looking Forward...

The first year of my MBA journey at Ross has been an historic journey.  The internship search experience for me proved to be a short but very rewarding experience. As an Australian who has lived in four countries Nigeria, Kenya, India and Australia I was able to highlight my breadth of international experience and skillsets to secure a finance position in the Technology Industry in the Bay Area.

Coming from an accounting background, I look forward to enhancing finance skills and exploring if finance is indeed my true calling over the summer.  While I am still not aware of the project I will be working on or the managers I shall be working with, I have met several individuals who will be on the team in the company sell day and they are indeed an exciting bunch of individuals from some of the top business schools within the US.

The summer internship also allows me to develop networks in the Bay area. This will be helpful as I look at working on the west coast post MBA. While I will not be travelling as my peers in consulting do, I look forward to exploring California over the weekends – Napa Valley, Lake Tahoe, Alcatraz come to my mind….and Vegas looms in the distance.

I am very excited about my summer and look forward to keeping everyone posted about my internship, my life experiences and my adventures in California.

Final trip

As I write this I'm on my final work trip of the summer to Bangalore, an altogether more pleasant place to be than Delhi. The weather here is amazing, and by that I mean it's almost chilly. Think Michigan in the spring. But in comparison to Delhi it is a huge relief. It's interesting to note though, how much of an impact this has on people and their attitudes. Bangalore is a hectic, busy city and the traffic is a nightmare, but people here are much calmer than they seem to be in Delhi. Even Indians I've spoken to share this view, Delhi is a tough place to visit for this reason. And I think it has a lot to do with the weather. Constant heat combined with the stresses of living in the capital city creates this constant tension which manifests itself outwardly as a constant level of aggression. As a friend said last night, Bangalore is a good introduction to India and it's a lot to do with the climate. No I understand what has driven western companies to look to this city as a base of operations for technology, pharma and outsourcing.
But back to my point, Bangalore has provided the backdrop to my last couple of interviews for the summer and a chance to collaborate with some colleagues on the preparation of final deliverables, which are due this week and next. It's been nice to escape the cauldron that is Delhi for a few days before things heat up!

the home stretch

Wow, can there really be only 4 weeks to go?  My time in Delhi is starting to get short and already we are about to say goodbye to some good friends who are heading back to the states.  Things have really kicked up a gear in the last couple of weeks here.  I've been running here and there having meetings with a wide variety of organizations operating in the healthcare and BoP spaces in India trying to understand what they do, what challenges they face and how the organization I'm working for can help them overcome these challenges.  This has involved experiencing a wide range of Indian 'office' spaces, which are mostly apartments with the trappings of corporate life transplanted into them...a video conferencing system is a common fixture in most offices of international NGOs for example.  But this is something you come to expect from India and from Indians...there is a way of making do here, of getting things done despite a lack of resources, infrastructure or political support.  A way of reusing what is around you, of repurposing it to fit your needs.  Indians refer to it as 'Jugar', the practitioners of which are the ‘Jugari’.  If we have a word in English to describe the unique combination of resourcefulness, creativity and willingness to operate outside the rules that constitutes the Indian way, it would probably be MacGyver (used as a verb).  Of course, it isn’t just a lack of resources that encourages this approach.  Indian bureaucracy and regulations are legendary, with a dizzying array of rules, laws, policies, institutions, ministries and layers of administration.  So much so that daily life in India seems to revolve around figuring out how to get things done…not so much working the system, as working around the system.

Now, time to MacGyver myself up some coffee in this chai-obsessed country.

Monsoon is here

Today the monsoon arrived in Delhi, 3 days ahead of schedule apparently.  This is a double edged sword...on the one hand the rain can be chaotic, messy and miserable.  However, it does provide some respite from the crazy heat we've been having since I got here.  Its worth braving the rain for that post-monsoon coolness in the air which makes it so much more bearable to be outside.  Distances here are significant, so walking anywhere in 100+ degrees is really not possible.  Thankfully Delhi has a state of the art metro system that really rivals any in the world (and has recently won awards for its sustainability...they save 30% on their energy costs through regenerative braking for which they also receive carbon credits for Certified Emissions Reductions CERs).  They also have a massive fleet of autos (three wheeled auto rickshaws) that are powered by natural gas making them impressively environmentally friendly.

Finally I found a cable for my camera and am able to include some photos.  I've mostly been spending the weekends visiting some sites around south Delhi.  I'm living pretty close to Lodi gardens, which is an amazing 90 acre garden beside Khan market, one of the most expensive retail districts in the city.  It’s interesting to see how Indians use parks and how it differs to back home.  People come here for picnics, to hang out in large groups, or to just sit or sleep in the shade.  It feels really relaxed.  Of course, that’s probably because its too hot for the more familiar band of joggers, cyclists etc. to disrupt the calm.  

And of course another way that parks in India are different to those in Ireland or the US is they usually have things like this in them...

The next couple of weeks will involve some travel, specifically to Lucknow..the home of great biryanis and amazing mangos apparently.  And I finally get to go on a field visit to see some of the projects I'm working with in action.

The Final Countdown at Harley-Davidson

Three more days to go, and then I’m done with my internship at Harley-Davidson! I cannot believe that 10 weeks passed by so fast, and I’ll be headed back to Ann-Arbor in less than a week. It has been an incredible experience and I’ve learned so much. To all of you interested in general management, I’d highly recommend applying to Harley-Davidson’s Leadership Development Program (LDP) during your internship recruitment. It is probably one of the best rotational programs I have come across, and to add to that, the company is a great place to work in.

Well, I’m sure that a small part of why I am gushing so much about my internship experience is due to my visit to Sturgis, the largest annual motorcycle rally in the US. I am immensely grateful to my project sponsor for giving me the opportunity to go to the rally. It was probably the most memorable experience of my internship – the sight of all the die-hard motorcycling fans, and especially Harley-Davidson fans was quite something!

Harley-Davidson had a custom bike ride-in show at Sturgis, where bikers who had customized their bikes could ride in on their bikes and display them at our booth. Employees of Harley-Davidson then award the best bikes in various categories such as model families etc. It was fascinating to watch how much everyone there had personalized their bikes – and this gave me some good insights for my project, whose focus is to develop a long-term personalization strategy for Harley-Davidson. The picture here shows one of the customized bikes at the ride-in show.



The area around Sturgis is very scenic and most of the bikers who go to Sturgis go for a ride along Spearfish Canyon or to Mt. Rushmore. My project sponsor was kind enough to take me on his Road Glide Ultra for the most memorable ride of my life (so far!) along Spearfish Canyon. The winding roads and sights of streams and lakes on the way amidst lush green trees make for a very delightful experience. The picture here will illustrate what I am talking about.



All in all, this has been a challenging and rewarding internship experience. I really hope that I get to come back, but if not, it was still worthwhile as I learned so much. Again, I highly recommended the program for everyone interested in general management and for all you Harley-Davidson enthusiasts out there. Ride safely!

Almost done

I am at the final stretch now, with two weeks left to my final presentations. All interns in my VP’s team do a five-minute presentation demonstrating their summer project during a 2-hour meeting at the end of the internships. All the other interns are software developers. Since I am the first and only MBA intern this team has had, my presentation will be unique. The first thing I learned in a communication class I took at Berkeley Haas last year was “Know Thy Audience” (no that is not how the professor phrased it). I have to tailor my presentation for software engineers and tech gurus, which I hope will not be too hard since I was a software engineer not too long ago. The second presentation is the famous Amazon white paper – a six page executive summary of my research, findings, results etc. I will present this white paper to 6 to 10 people during a 45 minute meeting. As with everything else, everyone is incredibly helpful. I hope to have it reviewed by a couple of people over the next two weeks.

This project reinforced a few beliefs I already had and taught me many new things. First, I do love numbers. Time flew by when I was working in excel on projections and models. I love a data driven job where I am analyzing trends to make recommendations. Second, there is a lot of room for me to improve when analyzing data. One of the principles at Amazon is to dig deep. I learned early in my internship through feedback that I needed to do more of that -- get to the core of the data, figure out what the underlying assumptions are, figure out what the methodology for collecting the data is. I initially hesitated to follow up with people because I did not want to disturb them or take too much of their time, but I learned that it is okay and even encourage to ask many questions. The biggest take-away from the summer is that I should foster my curiosity and that applies to all aspects of my life.

My project strategy takes shape at Harley-Davidson

(The picture shows the oldest known Harley-Davidson motorcycle which can be viewed at the H-D museum in Milwaukee)

With 2 weeks to go, I am getting into fifth gear to shape my recommendations for my project on developing a long-term personalization strategy for Harley-Davidson. As I had indicated in an earlier post, this strategy is a holistic look at what the company can do over 3 horizons to personalize the entire customer experience. And believe me, the project is as interesting as it sounds!

The Leadership Development Program (LDP) has an annual conference where all the LDP interns, incumbents and alumni gather over sessions and dinner. This year we had a workshop on globalization and sustainability. We split up into groups and brainstormed over the two topics and then got back together to exchange our ideas. The sheer knowledge and creativity of the group impressed me a lot – I always find it amazing that companies do not use more of their brain power to generate innovative ideas everyday!

The workshop was followed by a panel discussion on our international efforts, which was again very candid and interesting. We ended the sessions with a town hall with our CEO, Keith Wandell, and COO, Matt Levatich on the topic of innovation. This was followed by a dinner where I got to meet with other LDP alumni and some of the most interesting people in the company.

Harley-Davidson has a plant in York, Pennsylvania, which is undergoing tremendous transformation right now. We visited the plant yesterday via Baltimore, MD. We hired 2 cabs from the Baltimore airport and drove down to the plant. The visit was extremely well-organized, and we had the opportunity to meet some very impressive people at the plant. The strength of Harley-Davidson is the passion of its employees for the product, and more so at the assembly plants. This was very evident when we heard the pride with which all employees spoke about their work. Being a consultant, I have worked with many companies over the last 8 years, and I cannot think of a single other company that even comes close with respect to both, customer and employee loyalty.

As you must have guessed by now, I have become a big fan of the company, and for a person who has never had anything to do with the manufacturing industry or motorcycles, that’s saying a lot! My final post will wrap up my time at Harley-Davidson, and also have incredible pictures of my trip to Sturgis. Till then, have fun riding!

Mid-point at Harley-Davidson

It’s been over 5 weeks at Harley-Davidson, and I can’t believe how fast the time’s gone by. I had a mid-term review this week, which went well (I think!), and I am now revving up for the last leg of my internship.

There are 2 companies in Milwaukee that everyone recognizes and wishes to be a part of – Harley-Davidson and The Miller Brewing Co. The Miller headquarters is just opposite the H-D headquarters, and that’s where we went for the ‘insider’ or ‘hard-hat’ tour of the Miller Brewery. We were taken to the plant, where we saw the bottling and packaging process. The best part of the tour was the free beer, of course, but what made this even better was that we got to go to the employee bar inside the corporate office! Imagine having a bar inside the office, where all employees get absolutely free beer everyday! Apparently even the conference rooms out there have taps! How people ever get any work done, I wonder!

Milwaukee is enclosed by Lake Michigan on one side, and that part of Milwaukee is very popular for its scenic beauty, beaches and jogging treks. The COO of H-D hosted an event for the LDPs (Leadership Development Program) last week at Bradford beach. The COO, Matt Levatich, is an LDP alumnus himself. The LDP program provides many such opportunities where the LDP interns and current incumbents (full-time employees currently undergoing the rotation) get to network with the leadership team. I met a lot of interesting people at the Bradford beach social, and tasted the famous Milwaukee custard.

The Harley-Davidson Foundation works with many non-profit organizations to support the communities in which the company has facilities. We met with Gail Lione, the President of the Foundation, who has been closely associated with the LDP program for many years. The work that the HD Foundation does is phenomenal, and what is especially impressive is how just 4 people manage to accomplish so much. In all companies that I work with, I always look for a strong community involvement, and opportunities for employees to volunteer. I followed up with Gail after the meeting, and volunteered at a local public school to read to young children. I was paired with a 6 year old girl by the name of Shakira, and we spent about 30 minutes reading a story book. She was absolutely adorable, and after the session, she drew a picture of me with lots of hearts around it, and wrote ‘I love you’ and gave me the picture. I now hang the picture proudly at my desk!

Well, as you can see, an internship at Harley-Davidson is a fantastic opportunity to be part of a prominent program, along with the challenges and perks that come with it. I don’t remember the last time I’ve enjoyed working so much, and it promises to get better with a trip to Sturgis planned soon! More details about that, and my attempt at learning to ride in my next blog. Have fun riding!

Life at Harley-Davidson gains momentum

Having completed 3 weeks out of my 10 weeks of internship, I now feel that my project is taking shape. The LDP program here is quite an intense experience, and you are evaluated not only on your project deliverables, but also on how much you have networked within the organization, and on how many H-D events you have attended. This is true even for the internship, and so my days are packed with work and lunch & dinner events!

I had a fantastic trip to our Kansas City plant recently where I saw first-hand how the fuel tanks were fabricated, then were customized with H-D’s famous paint options, and then how the motorcycles were assembled. The Harley culture seems to be prevalent even in the plants where all employees there were very warm and helpful. And of course, I did not miss out on the famous barbeques of Kansas City at Smokehouse!

Summerfest saw millions of visitors flocking to Milwaukee as usual. As I had mentioned earlier, Harley-Davidson has its own stage, and I got VIP treatment as an employee – I got to watch the shows from the H-D deck. In the picture, you can see Counting Crows performing at the H-D stage.

Part of getting to know the American culture is getting to know the two most popular games in the country – American football and baseball. I got to know the first game at Ann Arbor itself, in the largest university stadium in the US. I watched my first baseball game ever in Milwaukee last week, with their local team ‘Brewers’ playing against the San Francisco ‘Giants’. The game’s quite slow, but people go mostly to hang out with friends and drink beer and eat hot dogs! I did all of that during the last game, and although the Brewers lost, it was a very memorable experience!

My next blog will have details about my ‘insider’ tour of the Miller Brewery, a company-hosted Bradford beach social, my dealer visits, and a volunteer opportunity I am participating in with the Harley-Davidson Foundation. Till then, keep riding as always!

Reflection

The summer internship is finally coming to an end and it is now time to do the one thing we all love to do; reflect on these last months and identify what we have learnt and how much growth there has been, around the waist and intellectually!! To merely say that I have “grown” over these last months would be an understatement without qualifying that claim with all the things I managed to accomplish!

Starting off as an eager student of business, ready to soak up the knowledge and get my hands dirty with paint, I have now managed a decent size business and ran a team of 9 employees, handled angry customers, satisfied customers, met deadlines, payed off my debt and began to understand what I really want to achieve from my business degree. Did I value and like this experience? Definitely. Is entrepreneurship for me? Maybe. Maybe not. I realized that although I love to get out there and meet new people, talk to them, lead a dynamic work force, entrepreneurship is a tough job and one that maybe I should keep for later on in life, once I have had more experience on the financial and administrative side of business, am comfortable with that and willing to leave it to others to handle that task!

What I take back most is the amazing network of fellow colleagues I made who are from every walk of life and I truly learnt from them as I understood that although I may be international, I did grow up with a lot more than they did and that while I look at the internship as a resume builder, for them it was real work that would help them earn a decent amount of cash to get through another year of university. This put things into perspective for me and helps me realize that I need to better utilize the opportunities that come my way the following school year!

Week 1 at Harley-Davidson in Milwaukee

My first day at Harley-Davidson began with a bike night. How very fitting! H-D has a bike night every Thursday outside the H-D museum during summer. Bikers from all over Milwaukee, and not just H-D owners, congregate outside the museum to show off their bikes and enjoy some good food and drinks. It is quite an amazing site!

Besides bike night, there’s another reason that summertime in Milwaukee is the best time of the year. It’s also summerfest time! Check out the website at www.summerfest.com. Harley-Davidson sponsors a stage, and on the first day, I got to watch the show from the HD deck, with free food and drinks flowing through the evening. This privilege continues during the 2 weeks of summerfest late in the evening, and it’s a great opportunity to meet other HD enthusiasts.

My project is turning out to be very interesting as well. For a complete motorcycle novice like me, getting to know every part & accessory that H-D sells on its various models is quite a daunting task, but I am learning so much! The sheer passion of the H-D customers and employees is very infectious, which is probably what makes the work culture here so very easy-going and open.

I am especially looking forward to the plant visit to Kansas City next week, where I get to see how HD manufacturers its legendary bikes. In addition, I will be visiting the dealers to understand the sales process. But the most awaited portion of my on-the-ground research is a currently tentative trip to Sturgis for the largest annual motorcycle rally in the US. There’s no better way to get to know HD customers.

Milwaukee is a very beautiful city, and is very European in its building architecture. The German influence is still very visible in the city’s construction, people and culture. And of course, it is known as the ‘drunkest’ city in the US. Policemen cruise around in their special ‘Police’ edition Harley-Davidson bikes, and also on really large horses! Apparently, the easiest way to get a drunk crowd under control is to show up on either of these 2 beasts.

I am learning so many new things not just from a project perspective, but also about the local people, and the American culture. My next update will have more details about my Kansas City visit, and my discussions with H-D dealers. Till then, keep riding!

Musings on a train journey

Hello Everyone!

My name is Anshuk Gandhi. I am writing this post on board a train from Manchester to London. We just finished a very intense and rewarding MAP last week and I am treating myself to a short holiday in England. I came to Ross from India with 5 years of operations and technology consulting for large manufacturing companies. My first year at Ross has transformed the perspective with which I went in to solve business problems. Reflecting on my MAP experience, I was thrilled with my ability to quickly recognize strategic issues in a retail bank's business model and to lay out specific changes to their products, pricing, marketing techniques and customer relationships - all in six weeks. As I prepare to intern in IBM's strategy and transformation practice this summer, this experience gives me great confidence in my ability to do well and land a full-time offer.

Besides my love for consulting, one of the reasons for my choosing IBM over other offers was that it's based out of New York, which I like because of its pace and its vibrant arts and culture scene. Thankfully, IBM has arranged for subsidized housing in Manhattan for the summer. I do not know yet whether my client will be close to New York or I will be on the road Monday to Thursday, but I am looking forward to having some great weekends in the city.

Prior to the start of my IBM internship, I am going to spend a month in Bombay and intern for a month with GMR Infrastructure. This is a corporate finance internship and I hope to gain a deep understanding of project evaluation and financing models, which will be really useful in my consulting career. I will write on this blog about that experience and others during the summer. Until then, adios!

Introduction: Summer Internship at Harley-Davidson

I am a first year MBA at the Ross School of Business, originally from Goa, India. I will be interning at Harley-Davidson Motor Company this summer in their Leadership Development Program (LDP). The internship acts as a feeder into their full-time LDP program, which is a rotational program that hones management graduates into general managers. During the LDP, you can choose the functions and assignments you would like to work in, and also the duration of the total LDP. At the end of the LDP, you emerge as Director of the function of your choosing.

My internship assignment is to create a go-forward strategy for HD's Next Generation Personalization (NGP) initiative. NGP is a means for HD to build stronger one-to-one relationships with their customers by enabling them to create a one-to-one motorcycle, thereby deepening their emotional connection to their bikes. My role is to help HD develop a formal strategic approach that optimizes the balance of customer service, minimized waste, individualized product offerings, and complexity concerns for the organization.

I am excited not only about the project, which is a huge jump for HD in their customer marketing strategy, but also about working at HD. The company has a great working culture, where everyone I've met has been friendly, intelligent and humble. I am most excited about the free HD riding lessons and gear that all interns are provided during the internship.

I fully expect this summer internship to be a roller-coaster ride, mainly because of how different it is from my previous experiences. I have worked for 8 years before joining Ross, primarily as a Consultant. I have never worked in ‘industry’ before, as the consultants call any work outside of consulting! I am completely new to the manufacturing industry, and what’s more have never ridden a bike in my life! So I am trying to re-invent myself with this internship.

Watch out for more details about my sojourn at HD in Milwaukee, Wisconsin this summer.

Prologue: A clean slate

Hi there – my name is Kripal Kavi and I a second year dual–degree student (MBA/MS) here. I will be spending my summer as a consultant with Booz & Co. in their Chicago office. I am an international student from India, and yes, I was an engineer before I came to school. I am very excited to be going to a top–notch consulting firm this summer. And quite frankly, I feel a little lucky as well, given the caliber of the students here at Ross and the high level of competition for consulting internships.

I, like most other business school students, want to generate a full–time offer out of this internship. That would make the final year a lot less stressful! But at the same time, I am using this internship to determine my fit with consulting, and decide whether this is a career I would like to pursue for a prolonged period of time after business school. I have multiple reasons to be worried: never worked in the US before, don’t have a background in consulting, not sure what to expect, etc. etc. But at the same time, this is a tremendously exciting opportunity for me – to work with some really smart people, do some fantastic work and basically have a great time over the summer. Right now, it's a clean slate, and it's up to me to see how the story gets written!

Take care, and happy readings!