What’s the differences between cc: and bcc: in your e-mail client ?

If you've been using email clients for some time, you may already aware that you have the option of sending email to multiple recipient using to:, cc: and bcc:.

 

cc: means 'carbon copy' - is a copy given to another recipient beside the person you're sending the email to. For example, if you are writing an email inquiring about the price of a particular product, naturally you'll send it to sales@example.com, and then you might want to send a carbon copy to your supervisor - supervisor@yourdomain.com, telling him that you're doing your job.

 

so when the sales department in the other company responded, your supervisor will be able to read the reply as well. So everybody in the cc list is able to know each other email address when they receive it.

 

 

bcc: stands for blind carbon copy - basically is the same with cc: but with a little twist, the bcc: receiver just receive a copy of the email, and he can't read other email addresses in the list. So in a nutshell, bcc offers more privacy than cc because the email address of the recipient is protected from each other.

GANESHA IN THE BOARDROOM

Lord Ganesha's big head inspires us to think big and think profitably; the big ears show openness to new ideas and suggestions; the narrow eyes point to the deep concentration needed to finish a task well; the long nose encourages curiosity and learning Ganesha is known throughout South Asia as the fountainhead of wisdom and courage. When laying the foundation stone of a building, he is invoked. No new business or industry is started without a prayer to him. Prayers to Ganesha precede every Hindu religious ceremony. Travelers on lonely roads pay homage to the elephant god at roadside shrines; trusting Ganapati to remove every danger from their path. As a student of management, I was fascinated enough by Ganesha to research the subject. Clearly, there is much we could learn to become more effective managers. Management is always the major chunk of the problem on the job; in business and at home. Symbols have been one of the most effective ways to communicate ideas since the dawn of civilization. Let's look into the symbols of Ganesha to get our managerial inspirations.

PRESENTING A GOOD FRONT   Ganesha's excellent image took thousands of years to evolve. In Hindu mythology, Brahma stands for creation, Vishnu for preservation and Shiva for destruction. Ganesha, son of Shiva and Parvati, took his unique place among these principal deities because of his wisdom and courage. Emerging as early as 1200 B,C., about the time of the Mahabharata, Ganesha has been worshipped by devotees across the country. He is believed to embody Om, the sound from which the world was created, and Yak, the first word. Early representations of Ganesha show an elephant-headed warrior with the beard of a rishi, a sword and snake in one hand and a quill in the other, with a trident to one side—the embodiment of both courage and wisdom. Later, in the Deccan region, Ganesha was pictured with a sheaf of corn and sugarcane, with a mouse as his vehicle. Invoking him made it possible for farmers to eradicate their worst problem, namely rodents, insuring a bountiful harvest. Ganesha is thus the guardian and protector of success, in this case, a good harvest. Mythology is replete with stories of the origin and qualities of Ganesha. Many of these tales, which figure in the Puranas, poke good-humored fun at the gods in their all-too-human predicaments. They teach the truths, beliefs and values of religion in the simplest ways possible and leave a lasting image in the minds of adult and child alike. INSPIRATION FOR MANAGERS I have found inspiration in Ganesha's wisdom and judgment, his ability to solve problems and remove obstacles, his capability as a communicator, his goal-orientation and his adaptability. These qualities were much needed by our forefathers as they advanced from hunters to agriculturists. More than strength, they needed wisdom and judgment to survive. These qualities are no less at a premium today, especially for managers. A Ganesha manager likes people, all kinds of people with their diverse skills and aptitudes, and he likes to work. He enjoys bettering his records. He is forward-looking, with clear and friendly eyes. He likes to set goals and solve problems, and because he is stimulated by this challenge, he becomes better and better at it. He likes to help others realize their goals. He nurtures his own understanding and discrimination by reflecting on his own and others' experience. He always operates at 150 per cent of capacity; he knows that's what keeps him happy and growing. The opposite of the Ganesha manager is Gobarganesha—literally, a cow-dung Ganesha. Full of himself, he has no time for others. He's always oppressed, always overburdened. He carries his problems around instead of solving them. He's wary of change. He can't lead others, and he has no self-defined goals. The fact is, he doesn't know what he wants to be or do. It never occurs to him that this is something he needs to sort out himself. He makes others feel tired and unhappy. A Gobarganesha avoids action and shuns the spotlight. He shrinks from challenges and wallows in self pre-occupations. He may do what he's told, but grumbles through the effort. He wastes the latent potential within himself.

 

REMOVER OF OBSTACLES Ganesha, son of Shiva and Parvati, is Vigneshwara, the Remover of Obstacles. And thereby hangs a tale. It is said that Shiva and Parvati didn't always see eye to eye. A nagging bone of contention was Shiva's insensitive lack of concern for Parvati's privacy. Shiva, who traveled a lot, would think nothing of strolling into Parvati's private chambers when he returned. Irked, Parvati posted Nandi, Shiva's attendant bull, to guard the door of her palace. The instructions were clear and precise: no one was to enter her chambers while she was in the bath. Nandi proved inept and inefficient. He was fired and Parvati fashioned her own attendant. A goddess in her own right, she 'created' a son out of the saffron paste she removed from her own body. When Shiva returned from his travel, Ganesha placed himself squarely at the entrance of Parvati's chambers. There was no getting past him. Mythology has an enraged Shiva using his army, his associates and their armies, but to no avail. Finally Ganesha was beheaded by unfair means. To keep Parvati's maternal fury at bay, Shiva was compelled to use his powers to revive Ganesha, who was given the head of an elephant. Shiva blessed him and decreed him to be worthy of worship forever. He also gave him the name Vigneshwara, one who can remove obstacles. With an elephant head, a potbelly, and a mouse for a vehicle, Ganesha had many obstacles to overcome from the outset. Did he run away and hide? No. Did he try to bluff? Never. He met obstacles head-on. He converted perceived disadvantages into advantages. SYMBOL OF WISDOM The elephant head is the over-seeing, all-seeing, eternal witness, the unmanifest supreme. Below the head is the belly, the symbol of the manifest, the mortal. Ganesha is the lord of all, manifest and unmanifest. The memory of an elephant is, of course, proverbial. Ganesha's twisted trunk represents the zigzag path to wisdom. It reminds us that there is no direct path, that we must turn right and left in the search for truth. The elephant ears are like winnows that separate the wheat from the chaff. All experience must be subjected to scrutiny to determine what is essential and what is nonessential. This is a critical aspect of judgment. The discerning and the wise do what they must and let the rest be. Ganesha's endearing potbelly is equated with space; it is vast enough to hold all wisdom and all life. Gentle and harmless, he uses his great strength only when provoked. Good managers can draw a lesson from this.

GOAL-ORIENTED The elephant seems to swerve as it walks, but keeps to the path. He makes it to his goal with unhurried grace. Ganesha rose from the ranks to hold high office. He was in the right place at the right time. Ganesha's vehicle, the lowly mouse, stands for the dark, fertile forces of the earth into which it burrows, avoiding light. As a recurrent threat to the harvest, it had to be tamed. But the rat also represents swiftness of movement. He burrows with his sharp teeth, chews through anything, and squeezes out of the smallest hole. In this way, he proves an excellent transport for Ganesha, who has to be everywhere and anywhere at short notice to remove obstacles. THE WRITER AND COMMUNICATOR It is believed that Ganesha penned the Mahabharata. The sage Vyasa, under instructions from Brahma, dictated the Mahabharata to Ganesha. Vyasa was to dictate without pause and Ganesha was to understand every word and thought and its implications before writing it down. In the process, Ganesha honed his intellect and became wiser. There is a lesson here for managers: as speakers or listeners, we must understand and cogitate deeply on the implications of spoken and written words. The Mahabharata, or for that matter any important document, should not be read in a hurry. To benefit optimally from the Mahabharata, one should proceed in slow and deliberate steps, ensuring complete comprehension and sustained reflection at every stage. The ability to write is one of the basic traits of a good manager. Good writing and good communication is possible only when thinking is clear and understanding deep. QUICK-THINKING PROBLEM SOLVER Once Shiva and Parvati acquired a pot containing the nectar of supreme knowledge. Both their sons, Kartikeya and Ganesha contended for it. The hapless parents set up a competition. The rules read that the first one to go around the world seven times would be declared winner. Kartikeya, a man of action, instantly started circumambulating the world on his peacock. With a mouse for a mount, Ganesha needed to do some quick thinking. Using the mental library in his big head, he analyzed the situation, did the SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) and realized that he was constrained by his bulk and slow mount. For inspiration, he went through the Veda floppies in his mind to arrive at an essential truth: one's parents are bigger than anything else in the world. So, Ganesha went around his parents seven times and claimed the pot of nectar. Due to his unique form, Ganesha could absorb symbols over the centuries. Choosing adaptability as a way of life, he acted, observed, reflected and updated his image. When he found a better way, he adopted it. A god who changes with the times is a good one to emulate.

 

HOW SOFTWARE COMPANIES HIRE PEOPLE?

Cognizant Method :

 

Hire a lion... ask him to stay for late nights but give him no work to do.

 

give him gobi 65 to eat again and again.
hire 100 more lions but do not increase the space to sit
give them same gobi 65 to eat
hire 200 more....... and more .......

 

TCS method:

 

Hire a lion
give him hell a lot of work and pay him government salary lion dies of hunger and frustration

 

IBM's metbod:

 

hire a lion, give him a pink slip in an hour... he dies of unemployment...

 

Syntel Method:

 

Hire a Cat ...
assure him that he will eventually become a Lion once he reaches onsite and make sure that he never reaches onsite.
Cat dies in hope of becoming a Lion....

 

MBT method:

 

hire the lion, make him take 14 tests and tell him that if he doesn't score 60% he will lose the job.
Lion dies of the strain?

 

i-Flex method:

 

Hire a lion???.oops cow, tell him he is a lion, send him in African safari for implementing flexcube in god forbidden territories, tell him if he comes alive he will get band movement (promotion) holy cow dies in fear of the real lion.

 

Polaris Method:

 

hire ..sorry....purchase a lion(COSL) ..
change his timings...(instead of 9 AM ...change it to 8:30 AM)
cut down his allowance (coupons etc)
lion dies from fear of becoming CAT.....

 

Patni method:

 

hire a lion, give him a salary of a cat...
the lion dies before joining....

 

Wipro Method:
Hire a Lion,
give him a mail Id.
he will die recieving stupid mails all day........!!!!

 

Accenture Method:

 

*Hire a lion.... **
Send him to chennai
Ask him to stay on bench for a long time
Ask him to eat idli,Dosa and Vada
No hindi, kannada or no other languages speaking ppl other than TAMIL...
No good food, No water..and specially No Beautiful girls
And say him "Go Ahead be a Tiger".
Lion dies in confusion he is Tiger or lion......

 

WORKOUT AT WORK!

Some exercise is always better than none. Here are ten tips to help you get your workout at work:

 1.  Park farther away from the office, or get off public transportation at an earlier stop, and walk the rest of the way.

 2.  Take the stairs instead of the elevator, especially if you've got only a few floors to climb.

 3.  Go for a walk during lunch. One way to do this is to skip your usual salad spot on the corner and find one a little farther away. If you bring your lunch to work, use the time you save buying lunch to take a walk around the block.

 4.  Deliver messages by hand instead of by phone or e-mail, and walk over to co-workers when you need to chat with them.

 5.  Instead of meeting in the office or over lunch, take it to the streets (or park) for a walk — or even to the gym.

 

 6.  Take frequent breaks to get up and walk around.

 7.  Find a gym near your workplace and exercise for 20 minutes during your lunch break or just before or after work.

 8.  Use your headset or cell phone and walk around while talking on the phone.

 9.  Stretch occasionally while sitting at your desk.

10.  Participate in workplace-sponsored sports activities or athletic fund-raising events.

FILLING UP THE CAT FORM : AVOID ERRORS

FILLING UP THE CAT FORM : Common Mistakes that need to be avoided

The Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) have published their admission notification in all major newspapers on Sunday, 14th July, 2008. The Common Admission Test (CAT) will be held on November 16th this year.   The prospectus and forms are available from branches of Axis Bank. One can also obtain the form in exceptional circumstances from the IIMs.   The form is easy to fill. It is just 2 pages long, but students often make mistakes in filling up the form, resulting in the form getting destroyed, and a waste of Rs 1200. Or you may miss out the chance to appear in the exam altogether in case your form is rejected for a small mistake.   The points listed here may seem trivial, but you will be surprised how many students make these mistakes! In our teaching of students for CAT of over 15 years we have found some of the most common mistakes that students do:    1. MAKE SURE you fill in the bank's pay-in slip properly. One copy of the pay-in slip is to be sent along with the form, so preserve it. Many students tend to misplace it. If your name is "Rajesh Kumar Gupta" this name should appear on the pay-in slip. Do not shorten the name or make any changes.    2. DO NOT buy the form in bulk or ask your friends/relatives to buy it for you. There are two dangers in this. First, the pay-in slip may have a discrepancy. Second, the the forms might get interchanged. If the serial number of the form does not match your name, the form is liable to be rejected. Every year a number of students make this mistake.    3. MAKE A photocopy of the blank form and fill up the form as instructed, before you fill up the actual form. Calculate your school and college percentage before you start filling the form.   4. SOME PARTS of the form are to be filled in pencil and some parts are to be filled in pen. Ensure that the parts must be filled in pen and pencil as instructed.    5. CHECK OUT your eligibility. If you have not completed your bachelor's degree or if you have completed your final year and waiting for results, you must obtain a letter from the Principal/Head of the Department/ Registrar/Director of the university/institution certifying that you are currently in the final year/ is awaiting final results and has obtained at least 50% marks or equivalent (45% in case of candidates belonging to SC/ST/PWD category) based on latest available grades/marks. Principals usually hesitate in giving such letters so be prepared for several trips to the college office!    6. IF YOU have passed your final exams and have the marks sheet or degree, send a photocopy of that with the form.  7. GET COPIES of the latest photograph of yours and put it where instructed.    8. DO NOT fill in wrong information, either about your degrees or marks, or about your work experience. Any experience less than 9 months is not to be filled in.    9. DO NOT round off your marks. If you have 59.99% marks in your college, do not write 60%. Students tend to make such mistakes.    10. FILL UP the address where you will get mail. For instance, if you are in a hostel or paying guest, your mail will get lost if you leave the hostel by the time your result comes.    11. DO NOT staple any papers on your form. The bank pay-in slip and a copy of your certificate should be enclosed in the envelope without any pins or staples.    12. REFER TO the CAT bulletin for codes of your university and course. Only codes are to be filled in.    13. DO NOT fill the form in presence of your friends or relatives.    14. GET YOUR form checked by an experienced teacher/counsellor before sending.    Issue of CAT Bulletins by Axis Bank STARTS  JULY 14, 2008 (Monday)  Issue of CAT Bulletins by Axis Bank ENDS  AUGUST 8, 2008 (Friday)  Issue of CAT Bulletins by IIMs ENDS AUGUST 13, 2008 (Wednesday)    Last date for receipt of completed CAT 2008 Application Forms September 5, 2008   Common Admission Test 2008 Date  NOVEMBER 16, 2008 (Sunday)

 

(CAT) DATA INTERPRETATION (DI) AND LOGICAL REASONING

THE DATA INTERPRETATION (DI) AND LOGICAL REASONING SECTIONS REPRESENT A BACKDOOR ENTRY TO THE IIMS. WHY THIS SECTION REQUIRES THE LEAST EFFORT WHEN COMPARED TO THE OTHER THREE :-

 

 

IN our previous article in this series we had started discussing an outline for Data Interpretation (DI) preparations --- wherein we defined four lines of preparation for DI and Logical Reasoning (LR):
    1) Traditional Data Interpretation
   2) Advanced Reasoning Based Data Interpretation
   3) CAT Type Reasoning
   4) Non CAT Reasoning
   In today's article we continue our focus on DI and LR preparations. Let us tackle this point by point:
   The DI and LR section represents a shortcut into the IIMs - This is perhaps a backdoor entry into the IIMs and we have our reasons for saying so. Basically, if you were to look at the preparation processes for the three parallel sections that the CAT tests you for; namely Quantitative Aptitude, Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension and Data Interpretation and Logical Reasoning; and compare these processes, you would realise that this section requires the minimum effort as it also affords the possibility of minimum turnaround time.
   So, if you were aiming at moving from a range of say 50 percentile to 90+ percentile in any of the three sections of CAT, the DI section would be the fastest as well as the one involving the least effort. Hence, ignore this section at your own peril. A moot point one realises while saying this is that unfortunately, for the vast majority of CAT takers, DI remains the least prepared of the three areas for CAT exam preparation.
   In our last article, we had raised this issue and also reasoned that this occurs mainly due to the lack of a clear preparation outline for DI prep. So, obviously the question that arises in your mind as you read this is: "What should I do that would help me improve my DI percentiles and solving abilities?" And more importantly: "What can one do in a 90 day time-frame to improve DI?"
   We realise that a lot of you out there preparing for the CAT 2008 exam might be having serious doubts about your ability to improve your DI score at all- especially in the context of the fact that every year there are a lot of students whose score gets stuck in DI. So, we would like to make the following points for your benefit:
Adopt a two-pronged approach:
    Skills Development
   Exposure creation
   Perhaps, the first thing you need to realise as you try to create a strategy is that since you cannot adopt a portion coverage approach, you should create a skillsdevelopment approach plus an exposure to problems approach while trying to improve your DI scores.
   You need to distinguish clearly between these two:
    a) By skills development we mean that there are certain specific skills that are essentially tested in DI. As a CAT and management aspirant you first need to identify these skills, and then create a regimen for the development of the same. To further expand this point, suppose one has a simple set of DI containing four questions that are based on percentage changes and ratio calculations — If such a set of questions is given to three lakh CAT aspirants to solve under test conditions, the results would show that even in these four questions there will be a great variance in the scores across the nation. Not only that, even amongst the people who get everything correct.
   Our question to every CAT aspirant reading this - Why should you allow your competition to have an advantage over you? Either score wise or time wise, in simple percentage change and ratio calculation questions. And, if this gap does exist, ie even if you can solve all these four questions correctly but would take three minutes more than the 99 percentilers, should you not do whatever it takes to overcome the gap.
   b) By exposure to problems we mean that your preparation objective should be to get to a point where you have solved so many question sets of DI that belief wise you should be able to tell yourself: "What else can they throw at me?" or the even stronger belief: "Give me anything to solve and if it is DI, I can take any bet that I will solve it."
   The idea of DI preparation has to be to take yourself to the comfort zone (confidence wise). In other words, when you pick the next set your mind should expect to crack it rather than be cracked by it.
   The obvious question which arises in your mind as you read this is: "How many question sets in DI do I need to solve to get to this point?"
   The answer, from our experience, is that you should reach this point if you solve around 750-1000 question sets (not questions) and are able to learn from the solving experience you gain through every set. One word of caution though — while doing this you will need to ensure that you solve the correct sets of questions which will expose you to all kinds of logics. Thus, for instance, you should expose yourself to questions based on tournaments, questions based on progressions, questions based on maximising and minimising constraints and questions based on Venn diagrams, to name a few.
   So, obviously the task set for the exposure to problems approach is pretty easy to determine. You can do the math yourself — If you need to do 1,000 question sets in 90 days time it would leave you with around 11 sets per day.
   For those of you who have already begun to think that there is no preparation time left, take heart. Turnaround times in DI can be as short as 30 days. Just work in a task oriented fashion, set tasks for yourself and complete them.
   In our next article in this series, we will deal with the skills development approach in more detail.

No man is an island

MOST STUDENTS GOING ABROAD CHOOSE A UNIVERSITY BY ITS RANKINGS,OFTEN NEGLECTING ITS LOCATION,WHICH MAY OR MAY NOT PROVIDE THE RIGHT EXPOSURE. THE SHORTCOMINGS OF SUCH AN APPROACH

 

 

   Adecade back higher education abroad for Indians quintessentially meant studying in Harvard, Oxford and Cambridge. But the dynamics of education have undergone a paradigm shift today. Firstly countries across the world are investing in education, particularly higher education, with the objective of attracting international students. This is being done with the dual objective of promoting international ties and attracting foreign investment. Universities are also offering innovative schemes in terms of financial aid.
   Secondly, earlier most students who went abroad to pursue their higher education degrees did so for the love of learning and receiving a degree. Hence, earlier it was mostly the exceptionally bright and academically oriented students who went abroad. Today,
education is becoming more application-oriented and viewed as an investment in terms of securing a job. Hence, there is a proliferation of students of varying academic calibre who are going abroad to pursue their education. For these students it is not just about getting a good academic degree but getting it in the right environment that makes all the difference, in terms of opening up vistas for personal and professional development.
   Most Indian students feel that studying in a university abroad will give them a multicultural exposure, and this is one of the key reasons they attribute towards their decision to pursue higher education abroad. Ironically though, this objective gets sidelined when they start the application process. "I, like many of my friends, thought that by pursuing my postgraduation in the UK I would have better prospects in terms of industry interface and networking with professionals. Factors which would eventually help me secure a good job in a multinational company," says Rohit Gupta, who pursued his MBA from Nottingham University Business School.
   He adds: "I chose Nottingham University because it is ranked among the 10 best universities in the UK. However, once there, I realised that Nottingham was more of a university town and there was hardly any multinational firms based there. The business landscape in Nottingham is characterised largely by traditional enterprises like dairy and textile weaving. As a result, although I got a good education, I suffered in terms of networking. On the other hand, a friend of mine who attended King's College London got the best of both, e d u c at i o n and exposure. This u l t i m at e ly helped him secure a good job profile at Barclays Bank." Sahil Rajvansh, who is studying at the Notre Dame University in US, echoes similar views.

UNIVERSITY TOWNS


“Notre Dame is a university town and everything is university-centric. There are hardly any big firms and enterprises. In choosing Notre Dame I was focussing only on its rankings and now I regret my decision. Winters are particularly boring and depressing, as everything shuts down early because of the snow,” shares Rajvansh.
   According to Rajvansh, universities that are not located in upmarket towns and cities should necessarily focus on building a strong placement cell. He elaborates: “There was a time when I was contemplating transfer to another university. However, the fact that Notre Dame University has a good reputation in terms of facilitating placements made me reconcile to my situation and I stayed on.”

LOCATION WISE


Reiterating the importance of location, Neha Jain, who pursued her Bachelor's in Finance from San Francisco State University, says her education abroad went beyond the course content owing to the advantage the university enjoys in terms of location. She opines: “A university should be located in a place that has a professional environment.”
   According to Jain, a university’s location can be beneficial in two ways: “Being in the vicinity of corporate firms facilitates easy reckoning for an institute. It then becomes easier for firms to approach the institute in terms of placements and internships. Secondly, if a university is located in a professional hub there is a strong likelihood for students to meet professionals in informal settings.” Jain, for example, managed to secure an internship in CNET Networks, a Fortune 500 company, when she met a senior executive from the company while travelling in a bus in San Francisco.

EMERGING TRENDS


“Earlier most students who went to Canada for higher education preferred to study in the universities of British Columbia and York. But there has been a noticeable shift in the recent years with more and more students opting to study in the universities of Nova Scotia and New Finland,” says Hazel Siromani, vice president, CECN Global Schools.
   “Moreover, students are not limiting their options to the MTV (Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver) cities as they are realising that the cost of living is far more economical in smaller towns,” she adds. According to her, it is in fact easier for Indian students to acclimatise themselves in smaller towns, as these towns are more welcoming towards Indian and South East Asian students. Speaking on the criterion of rankings she says that rankings can be a cursory consideration at best. Students can refer to universities, which are highly ranked, but they should necessarily do a thorough background research on the university’s faculty and course content before applying to it. “Canadian universities on their part are not very conscientious about rankings and there are only a few ranking agencies,” she adds.

SUBJECTIVE DECISIONS

According to Luna Das, educational advisor for north and northwest India, USEFI, the ranking and brand value of a particular university is a fairly subjective concept. This holds true especially because rankings are done by private agencies. She says that before taking a university’s rankings into account, there are other things students need to consider. “While the location of a university is definitely important, it is equally important to consider the accreditation of the institute and the kind of opportunities it can offer in terms of financial aid,” informs Das.
She further adds that while most students stress on rankings, they tend to overlook the weightage accorded by the university to the course they are going to pursue. Rashi Mahajan, for example, who pursued her Bachelor's in Political Science at Pisa University-Italy, is a case in point. Rashi admits that while she chose the university on account of its international recognition, she did not bother to learn more about the political science department in particular.
“Pisa University is known for its computer science courses both, at the Bachelor's and Master's level. And I soon realised that a large part of the university's funds are directed towards research, faculty development and infrastructure building of the computer science department. Although the political science department is one of the relatively older departments at the university, the course is somewhat restrictive and outdated,” says Rashi.
According to Shikha Mohanty, education and trade manager, Embassy of Ireland, universities in Ireland do not endorse the concept of rankings. Despite this, Ireland is recognised for its technical institutes, which are located across 14 counties. “It is accreditation, location and quality of the course offered in comparison to other universities which should guide students in terms of their selection of a university,” she says.

KEEP IN MIND


So, Das stresses that students should talk to current and former students of a particular university/course before enrolling. “In addition, students should also consider the quality of the faculty, level of research fundings and the overall acceptance rate of the university in terms of international students. It is also advisable to check the total enrolment capacity of a university. Some undergraduate universities have huge numbers in one class and thus, students often suffer in terms of individual attention,” advises Das.
   The climatic condition and social environment of the place where the university is situated are also important. Das adds: “Students from southern and western India should be particularly cautious about choosing universities in very cold places in the US like Pittsburgh, Boston and Chicago.”

 

10 Steps for Maintaining a Positive Attitude in the Workplace

Every workplace is different, and accordingly, each has unique challenges. Simple solutions do not apply to every business, especially if managers and employees are constrained by rigid labor agreements or ill-conceived business models. Nevertheless, the following time-tested principles should serve as a checklist designed to assist leader/managers in the never-ending challenge of maintaining a positive overall attitude in the workplace.
 
1. The leader/manager should, first and foremost, demonstrate a commitment to the organization through hard work and responsible behavior.

"Nothing is so infectious as example."La Rochefoucauld
"Example is the school of humankind, and they will learn at no other."Edmund Burke
"Any team can be a miracle team, but you have to go out and work for your miracles."Pat Riley

2. The leader must be competent and worthy of leadership.

"Leadership comes from competence. Leadership is by example, not talk."Bill Walsh

"Authority without wisdom is like a heavy axe without an edge, better to bruise than to polish."Anne Bradstreet

"He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command."Machiavell i
 
3. The leader should have a clear vision of the goals of the organization; the leader should clearly communicate those goals to the appropriate parties.

"Nobody wants to follow somebody who doesn't know where he's going."Joe Namath

"If you don't know where you're going, be careful. You might get there."yogi Berra

"The true leader inspires in others self-trust, guiding their eyes to the spirit of the goal."Bronson Alcott

4. The leader should translate the organization' s goals into clearly definable work.

"One of the most important factors, not only in military matters but in life as a whole, is the ability to direct one's whole energies towards the fulfillment of a particular task."Erwin Rommel

"The best plan is only a plan, that is, good intentions, unless it degenerates into work."Peter F. Drucker

"Inspiration comes from working every day."Charles Baudelaire

5. The leader should establish clear expectations and provide frequent feedback so that employees will know when they have been successful in their work and when they have failed.
 
"Drive thy business or thy business will drive thee."Ben Franklin

"Issuing order is worth about 10 percent. The remaining 90 percent consists in assuring proper and vigorous execution of the order."General George S. Patton

"As I grow older, I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do."
Andrew Carnegie

6. The leader should create an atmosphere of success, one in which employees confidently believe that they can be successful if they apply themselves.

"The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches but to reveal to him his own."Benjamin Disraeli

"Confidence imparts a wonderful inspiration to its possessor."John Milton

"Act as if it were impossible to fail."Dorthea Brand
 
7. The leader should reward success and praise behavior that meets or exceeds expectations while dealing forthrightly with behavior that fails to meet expectations.

"The deepest principle of human nature is the craving to be appreciated. "William James

"Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it's amazing what they can accomplish." Sam Walton

"Praise loudly. Criticize softly.."Lou Holtz
 
8. The leader should demonstrate appropriate respect for his or her employees.

"We awaken in others the same attitude of mind we hold toward them."Elbert Hubbard

"We have committed the Golden Rule to memory; let us now commit it to life."
Edwin Markham
"When you respect the other person, you respect yourself."Clint Eastwood

9. The manager should understand that attitudes are contagious and that a manager's outlook, either positive or negative, will play a major role in the overall attitude of the workplace.

"The real secret of success is enthusiasm. Yes, more than enthusiasm, I would say excitement. When people get excited, they make a success of their lives."Walter Chrysler

"People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed and redeemed and redeemed and redeemed.."Audrey Hepburn

"Passion persuades."Anita Roddick
 
10.. The leader must understand that chronically negative individuals will, inevitably, have a profound negative impact on the morale of the workplace.

 

HOW TO PREPARE FOR CAT (COMMON ADMISSION TEST)~~

The Common Admission Test (CAT) for admission to IIMs and other management institutes has been announced. In this section we cover some frequently answered questions as to how students should prepare for the exam. This section will be helpful to students who wish to appear in CAT and other management entrance exams.

 

a) Pattern of the tests

 

Management entrance tests traditionally have three sections:

 

Maths, English, and Reasoning.

 

There are 75 questions with 25 questions in each section. The test is of two and a half hours duration. As nobody can do all the questions in this time, the candidate must have the ability to pick and choose the questions that must be done. You get 4 marks for every correct answer and –1 for every wrong answer, so avoid guesses.

 

b) When to start?

 

Start preparation as early as possible. Use your summer vacations to cover up your basics. A high level of logic and reasoning skills must be developed as the questions are not straightforward, at least in CAT. Each question requires some thought, and what may appear to be answer initially, may usually be wrong.

 

An important thing to keep in mind is the fact that the student must exhibit proficiency in all sections of the paper. This means that all sections must be attempted. Usually students make the mistake of attempting only those areas in which they are good. For example, engineering students would like to attempt all the questions in maths section and will not touch verbal, while an arts student may like to attempt only English and avoid maths. This is not the road to success.

 

c) Changes in test pattern

 

IIMs are at liberty to change or modify the test. This is done perhaps to separate the student who rely on mugging up from those who approach the test with an open mind. Hence, no fixed pattern works. In the ultimate analysis, the student who is able to adjust himself to changed time, or number of questions, or any other difference in pattern, will survive. If you have been depending on "magic formulae" as many coaching institutes provide, or are good at mugging up things, chances are that you will be baffled if you see any change in the pattern of the test.

 

Approach the paper with an open mind and do not get confused with any new element. After all, a manager has to deal with different situations and this test simply puts forth real life situations in a microcosm.

 

 

HOW TO PREPARE FIRST STEP:

 

Do your basics in Maths, English Grammar and Vocabulary, and understand how reasoning sums are to be done. This can be done from class 10 books or from study material or correspondence course of a coaching institute. Do not worry about speed at this stage.

 

Maths—Must do topics

 

—Number Systems, Factors,

 

HCF, LCM, Change of base

 

—Percentages, Profit and Loss,

Time and Speed, Ratios

 

—Geometry, Areas and Volumes,

Trigonometry

 

—Algebra, Quadratic Equations,

Logs, Functions, Graphs,

Series, Inequalities, Venn diagrams

 

—Less frequently asked or

fewer questions

 

—Probability, Permutations

and Combinations, Binomial expansion

 

 

—Calendars, Clocks, Races,

Stocks, Simple and Compound

Interest

 

Learn tables by heart. Things like fractions and percentages must also be learnt by heart. For instance, if you are to find 37.5% of 88,000 do not do 88000 × 375/1000, which will undoubtedly take a long time. Instead remember that 37.5% is equivalent to 3/8 so the sum boils down to multiplying 88,000 by 3/8, which is mental, and the answer should be 33,000.

 

Also look for shorter cuts in doing sums. If the sum is a lengthy like: where a person comes and takes 1/3rd sweets from a bowl and another takes 1/4th of the remainder and still another takes ½ of the rest, then how many sweets did we start out with? The shorter way to arrive at answer in such question would be to see the choices and find which of the choices is divided by 3 and 4; the answer will be a multiple of 12. By doing sums like this, a student can arrive at the answers faster than by doing them in the conventional way. In above case it will become a complicated equation if we take x and subtract the sweets taken at each stage.

 

 

MANAGEMENT

DI Section

 

Data Interpretation requires an understanding of graphs and charts. Puzzles are also frequently asked in this section as also a good amount of reasoning. To prepare for this section, one must be competent in the following areas:

 

1. Graphs and charts

2. Analytical Reasoning

3. Different reasoning questions,

coding-decoding, series, sets,

and so on.

4. Data Sufficiency

5. Puzzles

 

English Section

 

Verbal Ability has always been an integral part of MBA exams. For many people Verbal Ability is a bugbear because long lists of words have to be learnt and then long aragraphs have to be unjumbled. Moreover, the choices are often quite close and one is never sure of the answer. Coaching centres typically do not teach English properly, so one must work on one's own. Attempts must be made to understand each kind of question that is asked. The broad categories of different questions asked are: (a) Vocabulary, (b) Jumbled Paragraphs,

 

(c) Fill in the blanks, (d) Sentence Improvement, (e) Syllogisms, (f) Paragraph Completion (g) Critical Reasoning and (h) English Usage. Of course, this is not an exhaustive list, because the examiner is free to include different questions every year. In the first step, get familiar with the different types of questions.

 

 

SECOND STEP:

 

The second step involves developing speed and familiarity. You must do a large number of section tests now.

 

A section test consists of 25-30 questions on Maths, English or Reasoning. Each test must be done in 50 minutes exactly, so time yourself. Do at least three section tests every day, one of each. After the test, look up the answers and explanations and learn where you made the mistake. The test and the analysis should take you two hours each. Note down the points in a diary. New words you come across should also be written down. A minimum of 10 section tests in each area must be attempted. The more you do, the more speed and understanding you will develop.

 

THIRD STEP:

 

In the third step, you must do a number of Mock-Tests. Such tests should have all the three sections with varying number of questions. Do the tests in the requisite time of 2 ½ hours, making sure that all the sections are attempted. Look for tests that change the pattern, so that you are not taken by surprise in the final exam. After each test, analyze it by going over the answers and explanations. Make notes of where you get stuck. Also keep a record of your scores as you appear in various tests.

 

Start by doing one Mock-Test every week, increasing it to two tests every week. In November, do one test everyday till November 16th and supplement it with section tests in areas where you are lagging.

 

Which coaching institute?

 

Students are often confused as to which institute they should join. High powered advertising and all kinds of claims of coaching institutes tend to confuse the youngster.  Do not believe all that you see in newspapers or on television. Coaching institutes make tall claims and many students are disappointed after paying the fees. For example, choose an institute if you are comfortable with the teachers, not on the basis of claims. Also, take sure that the institute is near your home, otherwise you will waste a lot of time commuting. It is not necessary to join one, if you can study on your own. You can buy the study material and practice on your own.

 

Safe Instant Messaging - Ten tips to protect yourself while chatting online

Safe Instant Messaging

Ten tips to protect yourself while chatting online

 

Just like e-mail, instant messaging (IM) also poses security threats. In some ways, the threats are more severe in this case, because to use instant messaging, you have to bypass any firewall that you've installed on your machine. This means that potential threats, such as viruses, worms or Trojans already have a door that opens to your computer through the firewall. What's more, they also have a readymade list of your friends which they can use for further infection and propagation.

 

For instance, you could receive a message with a URL from a trusted source, while the URL may lead you to a Web page that contains malicious code, such as a Trojan. Within minutes, the URL will be sent from your instant message ID to your buddy list, with all your friends assuming that you've sent the link. If you or any of them click the URL, an infection is guaranteed. The same thing can also happen through file transfers, where the attachment may contain a Trojan, virus, or worm, or a combination of these.

 

Such malicious code can make a lot of mischief on your machine, such as stealing passwords and other personal information, using your machine in denial of service attacks, configuring your hard disk to share all your files, and so on.

 

It's essential, therefore, to be very careful while using instant messaging. Here are some things you can do for your protection.

 

• Speak only to known people
  Instant messaging should ideally be used only to speak to people who are on your Contacts list. Making contact with a stranger over chat is fraught with risks, as you don't know the other person's intentions or why he or she wants to chat with you. Chatting in public rooms also pose a similar risk. When you receive chat invitations, you should be careful of who you add to your contacts or friends or buddy list. Add only those people whom you know well and trust; and accept invitations to be added to the contacts' or friends' lists of only such people.
   
• Be wary of links and downloads
  If you receive an image, link or other files over IM, first confirm that they are from someone you trust. You should never download anything or click a link sent by strangers. The second step is to confirm with the senders if they have sent anything—if it's a malicious file or link that used the sender's ID to propagate itself, your friend won't know anything about it.
   
• Be secretive of personal information
  You should not give your name or email ID in areas such as public chat rooms. It's also advisable not to disclose personal information such as telephone numbers, passwords, bank account or credit card numbers in IM conversations, even if you're talking to someone you know. Most IM service providers don't ask you for personal information. So, if you get a message professing to be from the service provider and asking you to 'verify' your ID or password, you can be sure that it's fake and a security threat. Ignore such messages.
   
• Create good screen names
  Ideally, your screen name for IM should not give out personal information like your name or email ID. Using a nickname is much safer.
   
• Be careful on public computers
  If you use IM at a cyber café, don't use the option of logging on automatically. Otherwise, your information will be visible to people who use the computer after you.
   
• Never respond to unsolicited messages
  If someone is sending you unsolicited chat invitations or messages, you should not respond to them. Most IM applications give you the option to block senders—use that.
   
• Advise your children about IM security
  Ensure that your children are safe while using IM. Advise them against responding to unsolicited messages, giving out personal information, and downloading files over IM. Speak to them about the threats of using IM and how they can use it safely.
   
• Download and install updates
  Be sure to download and install any security updates provided by your IM service provider. These will help to plug any security loopholes in the application.
   
• Avoid using IM at work
  Using IM applications at work puts not only you, but the entire corporate network at risk for infection. That's because most IM applications open a way through firewalls, which is risky. Therefore, try not to use IM at work, unless your employer has a corporate IM solution, policy and security measures in place.
   
• Use encryption on corporate networks
  If a corporate wants to use IM, an instant-messaging application that enables encryption should be used. Several providers have such applications for corporate use. In addition, users should be aware of the security risks, and the corporate security policy should involve keeping IM logs to detect suspicious activity.