- Intimidating : You scored a perfect 100 percentile in CAT, Got 2 years of Pre-MBA work experience at a Bulge bracket Investment bank, But still find yourself trailing behind half the batch at a large number of assignments, presentations, competitions, projects, placement prep activities, corporate cases and literally every other thing. The crowd at FMS is scaringly intimidating.
- Soul-Sucking : From your Day 1 at FMS, you’re overloaded with an unimaginable amount of academic work and presentations on complex subjects in Finance, strategy, capital markets, marketing, supply chain, HR & IT, while you also simultaneously have to prepare for the most awaited two days of summer placements, that can happen anytime in September or October.
- Heartbreaking : You had entered with a high CAT score and much higher expectations, that you’re going to ace everything during your MBA, and not waste time like engineering, but only to realize that despite sleeping for only 4 hours in a day, you’re struggling to complete even the minimum required work for passing the course, leave alone your pipe-hole dreams of acing anything or doing some extra placement preparation for your dream company.
- Depressing : If you ain’t hard broken enough by your own mediocre performance and have a positive attitude, then worry not, there would always be enough people making jazzy presentations on subjects you’re planning to flunk, Winning National level Case competitions while you are not winning even a class level competition and getting internships (before the placements through competitions) and scholarships, while you are struggling to adjust yourself to an inundating academic calendar that leaves you no space for taking a single breath of solace.
- Humbling : A few days into FMS will kick the entitlement mindset out of you, and fill you with the single most important quality that is needed to succeed in life - Humility. Once you accept, that there are so many things that you need to learn, and so many people who have already done so much better than you in every aspect of life, that’s when your real journey at FMS begins. The realization dawns on the onset of the two most wonderful years of your life that are bound to prepare you for every challenge and opportunity that you’d encounter in your life.
- Surprising : Just when you had planned to flunk in finance, there would always be a faculty, senior, classmate or alum, who’d explain everything to you, with such detail, that you’d never fear even the most complex problems in Finance. When it comes to providing help, FMS is way ahead of Hogwarts, as it almost always provides help to even those who don’t ask for it. The level of time & Commitment that the faculty, Alumni, seniors and your own batch mates invest in helping you, will always leave you pleasantly surprised. Your broken heart will melt to mend again, with their unbridled affection.
- Enlightening : Everybody is confused in the first year, No matter how confident they might pretend to look, and therefore FMS has a 65-Year-old tradition of providing an active pool of mentors, who act as a guiding light in the life of every student at FMS. Generally, First-year students are provided 3–5 mentors from the senior batch and 2–3 Alumni mentors from their chosen industries to ensure they can learn and gain from the experience of their mentors while clearing out the clouds of confusion from their heads in any aspect of their life, Be it academics, placements, projects, presentations, competitions or career choices. Needless to say that every faculty is always accessible to every student, on campus, as well as on calls.
- Empowering : One of the biggest strengths of FMS for the last 65 years has been the peer learning that one gets the benefit of, not just during group assignments and presentations but also during placements. The diverse range of knowledge, interest, and experiences that students at FMS are always sharing with each other is the most empowering pedagogical tool at FMS. You always get to learn something from your friends and batch-mates in almost all fields of business and life.
- Exhilarating : Being among the top 4 Business Schools in the country, Placements at FMS have always been something that every student looks upto and works really hard for. But, unlike other B-Schools, students at FMS are not single-mindedly driven by CTCs, rather they have the freedom to carefully assess and choose roles and domains that match their true calling because they don’t have the burden of loans. Cherishing and enjoying the learning at FMS for the sole purpose of self-improvement and exploration of one’s interests and capabilities is something that has always been unique to the culture at FMS and eventually turns out to be far more exhilarating than placements
- Nostalgic :
- You’ll win some case competitions, you’ll lose far many.
- You’ll fail in some projects, you’ll ace most of them.
- You’ll rock most presentations, you’ll embarrass your group in many.
- You’ll fall in love with most subjects and profs, You’ll not like few.
- You’ll be shortlisted by many companies and you’ll be rejected by a few.
- You’ll make the best of friends, you’ll have bad fights
- You’ll have sleepless nights working on one case after another, You’ll sleep like a log after the semester exams
- You’ll be far more sad at your friend not getting a PPO than the happiness at yourself getting a PPO
- You’ll help even those who never helped you, You’ll be helped by those who don’t even know your name
- You’ll learn more things in two years than most people learn through decades of corporate experience, You’ll teach more things to your friends that you didn’t even believe you knew well
- You’ll hate many things while doing them, you’ll be glad that you worked hard for it after you’re done
You’ll be there at FMS for only 2 years but the friendships, bonds, learning, experiences, lessons, and life at FMS will remain in your heart forever!
The author represents ReGraduate: A company that provides bespoke advisory services in Executive Search, Learning & Development and Human capital expansion.