How collaboration and adaptiveness made us the Runners up HUL FinAce Season 4 -By Team Finners from IIM Bangalore and IIM Calcutta

Being announced as the winner of any competition is always a good feeling but when the competition is of such a big scale as HUL FinAce Season 4, happiness is obviously next-level. Seeing our efforts bear fruit was indeed amazing. Here is a glimpse of our journey to becoming the Runners up of this grand competition.

We had two primary reasons to participate in this competition: Firstly, it gave us the opportunity to work on a business case that most likely could happen in real life, and got a chance to brainstorm and potentially solve it. Also, in doing so, we collaborated and competed with the top minds from the country’s B-Schools, which was an exciting factor.

A robust multi-staged competition

HUL FinAce Season 4 had a healthy mix of evaluations, ranging from business simulation to business cases. These cases also involved presentation in front of an experienced panel at each level and the insights we obtained after our presentation indicated their level of expertise and business sense in evaluating our performance. 

It was a well-organized competition and we dug into different levels of preparation for the varied stages. The first was a business simulation that did not require any preparation as such. Post that, we had a case submission for which we worked extensively (including continuous zoom calls for 3-4 days straight). This approach proved fruitful as we reaped the benefits obtained here in the semi-finals as well. Talking about the virtual set-up, we were all new with the virtual mode and had not participated in any case competition before either. So, this was a unique experience for us and it did take some time to adapt to it. But eventually, we got a hang of it and collaborating virtually became normal for us.

Finally, 3 teams made it to the finale of HUL FinAce Season 4. Having not met or seen the presentations of any of the other teams, we were not really sure which team could be our toughest competitor and hence, we did not pay much heed to this fact and rather focused on giving our best to the work we were supposed to do. And here we are as the Runners up of the competition!

Here, we would take a bit to mention a moment that shall remain close to our hearts. In the semi-finals stage, two of our team members had their end terms exams coinciding with the case solution submission deadlines. The due date was supposed to be the morning after the last exam. Hence, as you’d imagine, we had to sit for virtually 14-16 hours straight post the end of the exam to ensure we turn in a decent submission, let alone a quality one. As morning approached, we realized that it was getting difficult to finish on time, and eventually after the panic, we finally submitted our solution 20 seconds before the deadline. Such a narrow escape!

Taming conflicts, leveraging diversity, and marching ahead

There were some conflicts now and then as to how we can approach the problem but the team had a collaborative mindset and we resolved the issues in a timely and cordial manner. Moreover, since our team’s unique aspect was the level of diversity, we leveraged this fact and capitalized on each other’s strengths which ensured that we were able to produce a well-rounded and comprehensive solution to the cases. All said, an engineer, an arts graduate, and a CA are three professions that virtually could not be more different from each other; so was us!

Our journey at HUL FinAce Season 4 was based on the ground rules of an MBA - collaboration and adaptiveness. These are the key capabilities imbibed early. Further, we learnt how to apply theoretical concepts to a practical case and analyzed the behavior of multiple variables in such a setting. Drawing from each other’s strengths along with consistent guidance from the mentor assigned to us by HUL ensured that our learning was maximized!