A Silly Battle

I had joined a group with two other guys for a class called Society, Business and Management. This class is meant to impart the importance of social responsibility, ethics, and other things that are considered 'utter crap' in the corporate world. We have a small assignment, where the group has to make a small quarter hour presentation on one of the chapters in the prescribed text book. The book is ironically named "Business Ethics".

The issue is the guy wanted me to submit 'my part' of the presentation last night itself. Being a busy guy, with two other assignments, a huge backlog and a very important assignment on the same day as this assignment, I had to prioritise my work. This was the first thing we were taught here - priorities are important. I guess this is why ethics had to be 'taught' in a management institute. Profits are given more priority and hence job security, that social responsibility and other 'crap' come last.

This guy wanted me to finish my part of the presentation so that he could add his part over it and proclaim 'he did it'. This had happened last term also. Last term, in another assignment, he was constantly pressurising me to finish my part of a report while claiming he has finished his. When I checked, he had started nothing! He was waiting for me to finish so that he could just add a word here or there. Finally, this was what had happened. This time, too, I have completed 'my part' so that he could do 'his part'. Just the last night, he had come to my room and wanted to hear me say that I will give it tonight. I did not say such things and used the universal word, ASAP. Now, this ASAP is a very beautiful word. It gives a sense of urgency while being non-commital. You can say, I will do it ASAP and still not do anything.

One very interesting thing that MBA teaches is reading between the lines and making mountains out of mole hills which he seems to have mastered. I must mention this guy has a history of fighting (not physically, verbally) with every one in my class. He takes offense where none is meant, and always walks around with a chip on his shoulder. However, he never realises that he irritates the shit out of everybody but maintains that everyone is out there to get him.

Anyways, the transcript is too long by a blog's standards, so I have put that in a special page: http://www.geocities.com/kmanoj32/fight.html
An I being unethical by posting this conversation?