History repeats itself !

If my last lesson from the MBA was about confidence, this one was, "Don't speak too soon."

In the middle of August were our final exams for 4 of the 5 core courses that we took this second term. As is the norm, the exams were consecutive weeks, one each on Friday and Saturday. The first week was nerve-wracking with 2 heavy courses lining up their finals back to back. When that first weekend was done, all of us had some relief, for the worst was over. The next weeks exams both had only 5 or 6 classes worth of content while the first 2 had tested us on the full 12 classes worth. I was justifiably in a good mood on the afternoon of Saturday, 15 Aug 09, as I rode directly to Penn's Landing in Philadelphia for the Indian Independence Day celebrations. Good food, great performances by children et al, I totally loved the afternoon.

The evening was more relaxed, stretched out on the couch after a nice dinner made by my wife. This was Sunday morning in India and it was time for the customary call with my parents. My mom was first on the line and her first question obviously was, "How did your exams go?". Without spending much time on whether it is funny for a 60 year old woman to ask this question of her 36 year old son, I will go on to the importance of this question in this episode and hence my lesson.

"I did very well, ma!", I said, "And this VERY WELL is not like the VERY WELL I told you after my History exam in the Quarterlies of my 8th grade at school. I really did well", I said.

"What is this thing about the History exam in class 8?", asked my attentive wife, who was stretched out in the other direction on the same couch.

"Well", and I took a deep breath. "After my History exam in the Quarterlies of class 8, I came home and told Amma that I would get 71 marks", I said. (I have no clue how I came up with that estimate).

"And how much did you actually get", my wife prodded on. I could see the expectation in her eyes of some embarassment to come for me.

"I got 17", I said with total embarassment. (I obviously had no clue how I came up with that estimate of 71!!!)

"But this time is not like that. I am now 36 and I am far more responsible than that. I have really done well in both courses ma", I re-emphasized to my mother.

"Good job son, I am happy to hear that", she said. The discussion then moved on to other less embarassing topics and the day ended well.

However, all was not well. In less than a week, the results were out for the Corporate Finance course. When the email that announces that the grade is ready came through, we had just a few minutes for the start of the next exam on that next Friday morning. But that did not deter me from quickly logging on to the student portal and checking my grade.

When I saw the grade I was shocked. I had just secured pass grade. The proctor's annoucement about the official start of the Marketing exam kept my mind away from this shock for exactly 2 and a half hours, but at the stroke of 1130 AM, it came right back into my mind.

I thought I had done well, for real. I tried to think of everything that could have gone wrong with the grading, questions not graded, pages of the print outs missing, so on and so forth and even reached out to the professor to see what had gone wrong. Even after the professor had kindly provided me explanations on where I had gone wrong and why my grade was what it was, my mind was not at peace.

It wasn't until after 8 PM that evening that I came to my senses and started working on my next day's exam. The sense prevailed just long enough for me to complete the last exam and this time when my wife asked me how I had done, I restricted myself to, "It is over".

I spent some time thinking about what went wrong. There had been a pattern in the courses I had done well on in my first term and with those I had not. I had judged this exam by the same reference framework in my mind and thought I will score A grade, but I ended with just pass.

The last 4 days have passed well. Exams done and a 3 week break before term 3, I have been stretched out on the couch for most of the time, enjoying my new 32 inch SAMSUNG acquisition. The process of browsing through the channels brought me to the History channel. And brought back a quick memory of History, class 8 and Corporate Finance...

Funny, how history can repeat itself. (I just couldn't resist myself from saying it...)