Once upon a time, there were three IIMs (Imperial Institute of Management) – X, Y & Zee. Every year in March, these institutes would hold their Final Placements and their success (or the lack of it) in placing their students in big-name companies, with big-buck salaries would make headlines in national newspapers.
While there was always some degree of healthy competition among IIM X, Y & Zee, somewhere along the way this competition degenerated into a street brawl, with each IIM doing their damnedest to ensure that even if they couldn’t get ahead, they would pull their opponent down in the mud.
But this year, the placement competition among the IIMs X, Y & Zee definitely reached rock-bottom. First X had started the new “legion” format for their placements (allegedly to ensure that they didn’t go last in the usual round-robin format the IIMs had agreed on). While the media waxed lyrical about the merits of the new system, the students weren’t too happy – now the companies had more time to grill each student & with shortlists coming on the evening before interviews , many felt that the point of having legions was lost.
Next was Y’s turn. Y’s Pre-Placement offer performance after the summer internships had been especially good & they kept to the usual format. However, something went wrong during the Finals process – at the end “n” number of students were forced to sign out, so that Y could report to the media that they have achieved 100% placements. (Don’t be outraged, all the IIMs do it some year or the other – it was the large value of n this time that caused the outrage.) In the outroar that followed, the entire committee in charge of placements in Y had to resign.
Last came Zee – Zee’s performance was much better than X & Y. But the moment some of their salary figures came out, the real farce started. X also revised the salary figures they had released earlier (coincidentally the new figures matched the ones from Zee exactly). The figures themselves were a joke – the crore-plus salaries were just the dollar/pound figures multiplied by the exchange rate; the cost of living in foreign cities were never factored in. And then the mudslinging started – students from each of the IIMs made it a point to vilify each others’ colleges on public forums. Even in IIM Zee, the students took particular pleasure in savoring the poor placements in their sister institutes – conveniently forgetting that many of the students of X & Y were their friends & ex-colleagues.
So who loses out in this new great game of placements & salary figures? It is the new students who will be joining XYZee in about 3 months. Their heads are filled with dreams of inflated salaries – many assume that once they get into an IIM, their futures are assured. Reality turns out very differently. It also institutionalises a situation where its OK to abuse others just because they are from a different college. Sadly even within the IIMs the entire placement process has been reduced to who gets into the big firms with big money – a childish game of “mine is bigger than yours”. Unless you have a Slot Zero offer (or at best a Slot 0.5) you are not respected on campus. I doubt whether any of the students who apply to the IIMs know this is what they are signing up for.
Update: Here’s something to put this in perspective - http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/arvind-singhalglutmbas/393890/
