Network Solutions brings home the crown

After weeks of preparation and studying late in the nights, the
participants of the Cisco Mastermind 2006 could well be excused for thinking
they were back in their school days, during exam times. And when C Sujit Singh and
Rajesh Kumar G from Bangalore-based Network Solutions won the finals, they felt
that all the mugging up was very much worth it, not just for the prizes, but
also for the sheer glory of getting acclamation in front of their peers.

Butterflies in the stomach, stammering answers and momentary
loss of memory: this and more were something that the participants of the Cisco
Mastermind Quiz for 2006 experienced galore. Since the intimation about their
participation for the contest, most contestants diligently spent several hours
scouring over books and websites, improving their knowledge about technology and
corporate matters.

But in the end, winning the trophy was well worth all the
effort put in, feel C Sujit Singh and Rajesh Kumar of Bangalore-based Network
Solutions.

The first runners-up were Rajesh Shetty and Shailendra Pujari of Nirmal Datacomm
from Mumbai while Girish Pateria and Sandeep Pandey of New Delhi's DARTS were
the second runners-up.

The Network Solutions team won a holiday package with their
spouse either to Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia or Sri Lanka. The runners-up
bagged music systems. All regional winners won a Sony DVD player, while the
regional first runner-up got a Worldspace Radio with a six-month subscription.
The second runner-up bagged some Cisco goodies.

Interestingly, three different teams from Network Solutions
had participated in all the three regional rounds of the contest. And this is
the second time the company has won the quiz, the first time being in 2004. Last
year, it had made it as the runner-up in the finals.

Winners take it all

After the win, comes the euphoria. Sujit of Network Solutions is excited
about taking his wife on a holiday to Malaysia. This trip will be all the more
cherished as he has just moved to Bangalore while his family continues to live
in Chennai and will give him a

lot of leisure time with his spouse.

He recalled how his was a wild card entry and he was
nominated to the team, after the original participant, Srinivas Rao, contracted
typhoid. "I had barely three weekends to prepare. Though technology
questions about wireless and switching were a breeze, I found the audio-visual
rounds, especially about Indian music, a bit tough," he confessed.

Utkarsh Joshi of Tata Infotech was part of the team that was
the runner up in the regional rounds this year. And though he could not make it
to the finals, he is not at all disappointed. He is happy with the knowledge
that he was the finalist in last year's contest. And is also keen to
participate in next year's contest as well!

Why the quiz matters

Winning the Cisco Mastermind quiz means a lot to the participants, who view
it as a status symbol in their fraternity. Says Sujit, "Our position within
the channel community and even our company is elevated following a win. Besides,
we also learn a lot about Cisco's offerings, especially the newer ones, which
helps us in our own line of work."

Shailendra Pujari of Nirmal Datacomm is also thrilled about
winning the runner up award and feels that having such quizzes regularly
motivates employees of the partner companies and also makes them loyal to the
vendor. "It is a great honor to walk away with such an award in front of
your peers on a national platform," he added.

Another plus of a quiz show of this nature is that the
participants can network with people from their genre of business. This helps
them team up with other channel organizations, if they are working on a project
where they can employ their peer's competencies.

Utkarsh mentions that events like these help boost the
participant's standing in this own company. And he should know, because he was
part of the winning team for Tata Infotech last year and this year as well.
People in his company now come up to him for any information related to Cisco.

Quiz format

The Mastermind Quiz is open to all of Cisco's channel partner organizations
that can nominate a team of two people to participate in it. They are then
directed to www.cisco.com/in/mastermind2006 for an online registration.

The elimination rounds starts with a written test where each
team of two people is given a set of 20 questions to be answered in 10 minutes.
Cisco Team then checks the answer sheets and pick out the top three scorers.
These teams then go on stage to battle out for the regional finals.

There are four rounds played in each region:

• Corporate Round (15 questions, 5 for each team, 10 points
  for each correct answer)

• l Technology Round (15 questions, 5 for each team, 10
  points for each correct answer)

• l AV Round (1 question each, 10 points for each correct
  answer)

• l Rapid fire round (10 questions, -10 for wrong answer)

The team with the maximum score is the regional winner.

Utkarsh mentioned that the contest was keenly fought and it
was the rapid fire round, which tilted the scales in favor of the winners.
"We were leading, but during the last round the trailers shot
forward," he added. A little more preparation would have held his team in
good stead and he definitely hopes to do so for the next year's quiz show.

VINITA BHATIA