It’s festival time at the Xavier Labour Relations Institute (XLRI), Jamshedpur, as it prepares for its annual dose of hard rock, jazz and corporate quizzes. But, for the first time in the festival’s history, it is also a time to slug it out on matters of outsourcing, working capitals and lay-offs. The three-day annual management festival called ‘Ensemble 2002′, beginning on Friday, will have among others a game called ‘Cost-cutting’ which will feature a live simulation of a major cost-cutting exercise as undertaken in firms today. XLRI aims to make the game a number-crunching exercise that will give participants an insight to the various nuances involved in reorganising the pay structure and cash outflow. ‘Smartsizing’ will be another game with a live simulation (-cum role-play) of an organisation’s lifecycle. Participants from different B-schools in groups of four will determine the fate of a hypothetical firm struggling for an existence in a highly competitive market. “Ensemble 2002 is being organised on a bigger platform this year” says a spokesperson of XLRI’s External Linkages Cell. This year the institute has roped in quizmaster Siddharth Basu for a quiz contest and there will be a host of other cultural and informal events including a rock show. The festival will also have ‘Asterix’, a case analysis contest providing an insight into business. The competition will present the students with a business problem. The event will test the students’ ability towards a structured approach to solving a case and coming up with suggestions that are innovative yet can be implemented within the given constraints.