Of IIM, fat salaries and the related comments

Of IIM, fat salaries and the related comments

Let me start with an old joke.

Manager : "Pick up first 100 CVs and call them for interview. Throw the other CVs away."

Junior: "Sir but what if there are good candidates in the other CVs?"

Manager: "You may be right but I don't want unlucky people in my company."

Although it is often read as a joke, the examples of such situation are widespread in corporate arena. Anyways let me come back to this joke later.

Ever since placements at IIM Calcutta concluded, I have witnessed numerous debates in private an public domains coming from every section of stakeholders. Professors of a certain IIM have come out in open to speak up on what they claim as the truth behind the salary figures, CEO of a well known firm has come out in open to ridicule the salaries offered at IIMs. All this while, these are the conclusions that I think people are trying to derive out of this whole debate.

• IIM grads are overpaid without any justification
• IIM grads are not overpaid and they just cook up the salary figures
• IIM grads are no children of gods to be paid so much
• most IIM grads are freshers and they don't deserve such salaries, its justified for people with work-ex
• The highest salaries are bagged by students with prior work-ex, something that they anyways could have got from anywhere else
• Once IIM grads pass out of bschool, they are no different from others
• they are arrogant

Whoa... conclusions are many, at times inconsistent and at times baseless although they are derived from correct data most of the time. After all, statistics is like an unloving husband, it tells what you want to hear.

Before getting to justifications, there's a simple concept of branding that I would like to remind people of. When I was shopping for chocolates in Zurich, I stood at the chocolate bay with split mind. Coop's private label swiss chocolates sold for 1-2 euros per 100 gm bar, while Lindt sold for 3-4 euros per 40 gm bar. Brand comes with an assurance, of quality although at a premium. If I had time I could have read about chocolates for a day on internet to find out the best composition suited to my taste and bought a private label with that composition at a lower price. "Maybe next time, as of now I don't have that much time."

Now let me add a twist. What if I am buying this chocolate for someone else as a gift. I would definitely want her to think that I bought the best chocolate for her. "Damn you private label, I go with Lindt."

Clients are like girlfriends. They want to feel special. Give them a team of 3 IITs and 4 IIMs and they would sing ga ga for you. Thats why in this free market of limited supply and unlimited demand, if someone pays higher salary to get a slot zero in IIM, be generous to him an don't call him nutcase.

With this I get back to the joke I started with. Believe me... meritocracy is an over hyped concept. So if you are someone who missed his/her chance to get into IIM because despite a final call you couldn't make it to the campus on joining date because of taxi strike, you are still not meritorious enough for every practical purpose. No matter how hard you work after doing MBA from another good college not as hyped, your blood is not seen as blue.

Unfortunately, answers to none of the questions raised is boolean. People often discuss how quoted IIM salaries include variable component and what not. Yes they do... (at average levels and not unrealistic levels though...) so what... when did we say that they don't. And its not something specific to IIMs. The term CTC is not contributed to placement dictionary by IIMs. Its been there for a while.

In the whole discussion what intrigues me the most is the level of outrage shown by the comments directed at the IIM students. Although its funny, it does get disturbing at times. The only response I can think of is a good old xkcd webcomic:

Finally, if people think that we at IIM enjoy this hype created by media, then chew this. When I got my first job in lateral placements, no one in my family was happy because of the salary. After I got another job in finals (salary higher than mean and median), and my father tells me one day... "it seems that everyone else has got a higher salary package than you."