Saturday, February 27, 2010

Mugging

Mugging might have a different meaning in North America but in “Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow” (in fact across IIMs) it means:

Mugging = (Reading + Memorizing – Understanding)

B-schools have such a rigorous curriculum with some boring subjects (my perception) that mugging becomes inevitable to complete the course with in the stipulated time. Many a times I heard comments from senior executives from industry that B-school students are getting deeper and deeper into “Analysis Paralysis”. We do so much of analysis, somewhere down the line we miss the point why are we doing what are we doing? This may be the result of over-mugging.

So, shall we say a BIG NO to Mugging? In one of the lectures of Human Resource Management Prof. Himanshu Rai said, “Mugging is not bad”. He gave a very nice example of a doctor. Suppose that he is a big time muggu. So in the above equation Understanding = 0. However the doctor can give the medicine instantaneously as he remembers most of the things. On the contrary let us take an example of a doctor who hates being muggu. So in the above equation Memorizing =0. This doctor needs to refer books every now and then to prescribe a medicine. Obviously, a patient will trust the first doctor.

So there is nothing black and white. If people call you a muggu, say proudly, “Yes I am a muggu”.I think that one needs to strike the OMP (Optimal Mugging Point).What is that? IT DEPENDS .

4 comments:

Afshan Shaik said...

like it happend.............to me many timeS!!!

Mai kaun hu kahan hu ?!y am i reading this :P

Such a QUICK and short AND CLEAR analysis U HAVE DONE on mugging!!!

i truly agree :)

Pooja S said...

Baba ki jai ho :P
Jokes apart, good one Shadab..

Ravi Shankar said...

nice point dude...mugging is never bad..it becomes bad only when understanding goes "-ve". I do feel that mugging is a form of "practice" .. in a lay man terms u r readin the same thing over n over again and tryin to remember it...howz is this different from a runner running over n over again (aimin to improvise)....no one explicitly define what understanding is....n so definitely mugging will contribute to understanding frm a different point of view...which is definitely helpful in executin practices...

Ravi Shankar said...

one more example tht strikes me is tht .. suppose u r a physicist and u want to understand the nature of a molecule in terms of associated atoms... u dont bother about what constitutes an atom...and u proceed happily with ur work with out understanding what actually constitutes an atom...so essentially u abstract the unknown by giving a term and try to use it with a belief that u know the unknown..still people dont critisize this as unscientific :)) so I would say mugging is no different frm this and in our education..its a form of abstracting the unknown(understanding) by givin it some terms(mugged up concept)and proceed with activity ...