What does it take to be a Great Laker?

May 16, 2019 | Posted by BPR Team << back to blog

An MBA is said to be a transforming experience, but to what extent depends a lot on your alma mater. To be honest, the MBA program at Great Lakes is probably not everyone’s cup of tea. The rigorous residential program for budding managers of tomorrow is designed to give us a taste of exactly what’s waiting out there. Endless deadlines for projects, assignments, pre reads, case studies, exams, committee work, classes, guest lectures, empirical research… the list is endless. The course is designed to make sure that you put in your 100% and come out with the best results, not just once but always.

Time Management

At Great Lakes, you can have 3 submissions, 8 hours of lectures, 2 pre reads, an on-going live project, research work for your empirical study all due on the same day, while still having an exam (sometimes more than one) the next day. Surprised? Ask any Great Laker and they won’t even blink an eye at that list. We have been there, done that and are pros at it now. TIME is said to be the most valuable thing we have in life and at Great Lakes we learn how to make use of every second of every day. We see time as a crucial resource and know how to use it in our favour. No amount of work is too much work; no number of deadlines are too many deadlines.

Tenacity

Lakers are a tenacious bunch. We don’t know to give up. The right way or the jugaad way, we get it done, and we get it done on time. Be it the One – Year MBA or Two Year regular MBA, it is packed with a crazy, roller-coaster schedule. There’s no looking back once you step foot on campus. Throughout the program, we will complete all our work and still have all the fun possible. No one here has given up no matter how herculean the job at hand is. Maybe, the reason why its enjoyable is because it’s hard, because Lakers are always up for a challenge.

Pedagogy

Nobody will spoon feed you at Great Lakes. Subjects are taught more from the extensive experience of our faculty than from the books. You don’t get extensive cycle tests, prep time or study break (we give 8 exams in 4 days, go figure!), last years’ question papers, “important topics for the exam”, etc., etc. if you think you can memorise the book and clear exams here, you cannot be more mistaken. So you can either learn the concepts from the Profs in class or from your nerdy friends while prepping for the exam. Either way you’ll need them to crack the totally loaded case studies and application based questions set in the paper. There’s just no easy way out.

Spirit of Great Lakes

There’s famous saying on our campus – ‘Great Lakers never sleep’, and there couldn’t be a bigger truth. Many of the visiting faculty are pleasantly surprised to find the entire campus up and going even at 3 am. Playing sports, munching midnight snacks, catching up on all the campus gossip, participating in student organised activities, taking leisurely walks in this pleasant green campus, brainstorming about the next big thing over a hot cup of coffee, discussing everything from Bollywood to politics and sports to climate change, everybody is busy in something and there is no hurry to hit the bed. Of course, in the mornings you see most of us running to reach the 8:30 class, because our disciplinarian, no-nonsense professors don’t care if you were passionately discussing the future of bitcoins with your buddies till 4 am, the class will always start dot on time.

In photo – Sanjna Gopal (fifth from L -R) along with her batch mates

B-schools are in some ways are a metamorphosis, to turn an average Joe into someone capable of not just managing but leading. And Great Lakes had been churning out leaders since 2004. Lessons learned here are not just to crack interviews or impress the future boss, but to gain a step up in life. Great Lakes has given wings to the ambitions of thousands of students before and will continue to do so, but the bigger question is- Do you have what it takes to be a Laker?

Authored by Sanjna Gopal from PGPM Class of 2019 at Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai

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