A Memorable Classroom Experience At IIM Udaipur - Mahendrakar Vinil Rao

Our classes started on 2nd July 2018. The first subject was Managerial Oral Communication. Although I graduated from NIT Surat, one of the premiers institutes in the country and had almost two years of work experience, somewhere I had the most difficult problem, that an MBA student should not have stage fright. My heart rate increases exponentially, my legs start shaking and it becomes difficult for me to breathe. First, there was a storytelling session, where one has to tell a story with a message to everyone. I chose “Positive Thinking” and prepared a good story from my personal experiences. The problem was I prepared the story but, I never practised. The next day, when I went to tell the story, all the above mentioned beautiful things happened to me and I narrated it real bad, missing many things that I wanted to say.

I was given feedback from the instructor and all my classmates about the changes and suggestions that would improve my performance. So, in the next session, we were supposed to be presenting on a topic of our wish for five minutes. I was really scared when I came to know about this. On the other hand, I had the opportunity to tweak my performance considering the feedbacks and instructions. I decided to give a presentation on “Time Travel”, a topic that I had always found interest in. The previous day, I went to the classroom, and practised my presentation twice, recorded it, saw where I was fumbling and what improvements I had to make in the presentation. I was very confident when there was no one in the classroom and it was great looking at me in the video. I was making good use of the floor, giving great expressions, using the board.

The next day, I came to the classroom and when my turn was supposed to come next, my heartbeat started increasing. I just reminded myself of the video recording. I went to the center of the classroom and the pressure was gone. My nervousness was almost zero. I was doing exactly the same thing what I did the previous night. I was feeling Confident. Although I fumbled a few times because of the time constraint to explain everything in my slides, I was really happy that my stage fright was beaten. Practice is the key. IIM Udaipur, in just 3 sessions of MOC, gave me the confidence to give an effective presentation. This was the most memorable moment for me in IIM Udaipur till date. The feeling of the adrenaline rush I had after the presentation was of the same intensity that I had when I went deep into the ocean for scuba diving. That is the essence of college. It teaches you a lot of things and makes you a new and evolved person every day. I hope to learn so many lessons like this and utilize these 2 years to the fullest.

Which ABG Company would he/she wants to work for and why?

I would like to work with Grasim Industries Limited. Grasim is a global player in Viscose staple fiber, a manmade, Biodegradable fiber with similarities to cotton. I personally worked in our retail cloth outlet, and I would really love to explore and contribute to the textile industry through ABG. Grasim is one of the top leaders to offer an entire range of cellulose fiber under the brand of “Birla Cellulose”. The scope and competition for VSF are very huge. So an Indian Company becoming a market leader is the thing that I would be proud to be part of.