Day 9 - The Lectures Continue

The morning started with a lecture on learning to analyse the Marketing Environment. How to scan the environment, the primary and secondary means, the monitoring of these information and making your forecasts accordingly. To further enhance our understanding of the concepts, we went through the case study of Tata Motors Ltd and did an Environment Threats and Opportunity Profile. The class was indeed informative - it seemed like an advancement from the normal SWOT analysis that we have learnt over the years - I thought - yes..the world is advancing - we have progressed from SWOT....lols!!!

The Lectures continued with Professor Kanupriya discussing the various Marketing Decisions that firms are normally faced with. I particularly liked the examples used - chocolates...yes - the different target markets and segments are easy to figure out with these examples. Of great interest is the information given on the initial purpose of Pesi and Coca Cola - as in they were initially brought into the market for medicinal purposes - now we use them interchangeably with water/drinks..how the markets have evolved and changed over time.

Professor Mohan then discussed how IT has enabled businesses to progress in this day and age. A key reminder is that IT is not a substitute for your operations - it is there only to assist in leveraging your business. Another key point put across is the need to have ERPs in place - to assist in terms of ensuring consistency of reports and operations, amongst other aspects.

The afternoon saw a different twist to our learning as Professor Raj employed a variety of pedagogies to attract our attention. Just allow me to dwell on this word 'Pedagogy' for a while..I have not heard it before - but I like it - something to take back home...I also need to get the full meaning of this word - if someone has it - please post it...In any case - Professor Raj touched on Quality and even abit on 6 Sigma - now when he went onto the technalities...as he rightly said...'ohh I'm going to lose some of you now....' ..and then when he discussed normal distribution function...he said..'ooh...I've just lost some of you..'..lols...to be quite honest - he did..lols...but only for a moment Sir - you had us back when we discussed the case study that you handed out as well as the Bombay Badawalas (if this is not spelt correctly - please let me know...)

All in all - the sessions were good - but we definitely needed that game of croquet right after!!lols

Blessed Day All

MKN