Their Collaborative Efforts Helped Them Become The 1st Runners-Up In Amazon ACE Challenge 2021

Although I had three years of experience across domains like Technology and Management Consulting, I wanted to learn more about an industry that was relatively unknown to me. Additionally, many of us know that Amazon is pretty much popular for its interesting problem statements for its ACE competition, so I wanted to experience the competition and gain more insights into problem-solving, thus I participated in the ACE challenge.

The Stage of Preparing

Firstly, the preparation for the challenge was a collaborative effort. Our team, DIRK(Indian School of Business) had three more members namely Charu Bhardwaj, Apoorv Gupta and Aryan Mittal. Our team was pretty much experienced, having worked in the corporate world for 2-8 years. 

The Amazon ACE challenge had two case submission rounds, both of which gave us 5 days for research work and submission. Firstly, to solve the given problem, our team performed extensive research about the problem statement and talked to the stakeholders to understand the real problems that both the parties viz. sellers and consumers face. Secondly, we made sure that our final document adheres to the ACE competition’s protocol and unique writing style.

"Preparation for the case required us to go through extensive research, books, talking to professionals who are experts in the field and eventually putting our thoughts to paper. Starting from the quiz, to the national final round, cumulatively we spent around a month on different stages of the case competition. Most challenging was the national final round where we had to map out excruciating details of our solution while making it fit between all the restrictions in place in the industry. Things were obviously not always so smooth. We also have had conflicts while arriving at the solution we were to pitch to Amazon's leaders. We analysed every aspect of different proposed strategies and evaluated it on metrics of focus, feasibility and impact and went ahead with ones which did better on all three." - Aryan Mittal

Together we made it!

During the times of the pandemic, the connection and bond of being a part of the team were missing. But, luckily, for us, we had the locational advantage that all our team members were in the same location, so we could spend time together brainstorming and discussing our viewpoints. 

As I have mentioned that our team is well-experienced, this aspect played to our advantage. We could leverage the professional and diverse experience of our team members and bring in a holistic viewpoint for the evaluation of the case. Also, every team member used his skillset which was of great use to the team.

You would be probably thinking that since we are a bunch of diverse people, we might have had some conflicts while solving the case. Surely, we had conflicts while solving the case. But, we logically approached the case, with each member explaining his viewpoint which was backed by relevant data points. So, in this way, by listening to each other’s diverse viewpoints and explanations, we could resolve the deadlock and proceed to the solution part.

The Grand Finale

After all the efforts, research and formulation came the grand finale. A total of 13 teams(including us) reached the pinnacle of the competition. We had to grapple with 12 other competitors in this virtual presentation round to be the winners. We were confident in our ability but we knew that the team Goal Diggers from IIM Lucknow was our toughest competition as the institute had already won the previous year’s challenge. So, they had an edge over us due to the guidance provided by the former champions. Eventually, when the results were announced, Goal Diggers went on to win the competition, with us bagging the 1st runner up spot.

Key Takeaways

As I wanted to explore an unknown domain, I wasn’t disappointed after the event. I could learn a lot about the agri-input and agri-tech industry. I was able to hone my problem-solving and solution-structuring skills. Additionally, we had mentorship sessions with Amazon leaders, so I was able to connect with them at a personal level. Being able to witness how an Amazonian approaches a particular case was a great learning opportunity that I couldn’t have afforded to miss.

For more exciting competition success stories, read:

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