Pickbrain is his middle name! And that is his passion and profession too!!

Not many are fortunate enough to make their passion into a lucrative profession. But 30-year-old quizmaster Giri Pickbrain Balasubramaniam, the CEO of Quizbrain.com, is one such fortunate soul. An active quizzer and debater during his school and college days, Balasubramaniam strayed into selling newspapers and space for The Times of India (TOI), where he began a quiz column under the by-line pickbrain. It started him off a more lucrative way to earn a livelihood - pursuing his passion at the same time - by picking other people's brains. Today, he is one of the three most highly paid quizmasters in the country, the other two being Siddharth Basu (general knowledge and Derek O'Brien (corporate / brand quiz). Balasubramaniam's specialty is IT quiz shows, and he has no reservations in telling you that he bills around Rs.1 lakh a quiz show.

"I decided to focus on IT as no one else was doing it. It is my USP," says Balasubramaniam. His recent book Know IT Better was sold out within a week of its release in Bangalore.

In the past 1-½ years, Balasubramaniam has conducted 27 IT quiz shows at 12 locations, and that includes one in a rural area of Karnataka. "Rural students do not lag behind in knowledge, they only lag behind in confidence. A quiz goes a long way in helping them express themselves," he points out. Balasubramaniam today conducts annually 60-65 quiz shows on a wide variety of subjects and in various formats. Quizbrain.com, which he heads, has turnover of around Rs.16 lakh per year and that provides a handsome profit.

A graduate of University of Bangalore, and student of The Times School of Marketing, New Delhi, where he studied management, Balasubramaniam, after two stints with the TOI, including helping to start its Bangalore edition, and then taking care of Walt Disney India's southern operations, decided in February 2000 to make his passion his profession. He accepted the offer to head a quiz portal, Quizbrain.com, an affiliate of indiainfo.com. Meanwhile the once staid question and answer competition was becoming a glitzy event, thanks mainly to Doordarshan's 'What is the good word' and Siddharth Basu's quiz shows. Nevertheless, all these quizzes had limited appeal. When KBC hit the Star screen, everything changed; the programme caught the imagination of the masses. "KBC has done a lot of good for quiz shows. Any kind of question is better than seeing the hero chasing the heroine around the trees," Balasubramaniam quips.

With awareness about quiz programmes increasing, the number of events went up. Corporates too started to look at quizzing as something to support. KBC also ushered in a quiz presenter. Quiz shows become a team event, with technology sharing center stage with the quizmaster. "Research became just one component of the whole show," Balasubramaniam says. "Today, success of quiz shows is a combination of packaging, presenting and entertaining".

According to Balasubramaniam, there is an ocean of difference between quizmaster and a quiz presenter. "The former is generally an active quizzer and has a good grounding in research. A presenter is basically a celebrity. All he is expected to do is to conduct the show without a glitch". Quiz presenters are good for TV shows that are pre-recorded, he says. On the other hand, quizmasters are the ones who can conduct live shows and add value. "Their subject knowledge comes in handy in guiding the contestants towards the right answer and also in deciding the marks in case of half answers." A spontaneous reaction to a tricky situation, a good sense of humor and deft handling of audience are other prerequisites for a quizmaster.

The easygoing Balasubramaniam dons the professional quizmaster's role with ease when occasion demands it. At the Chennai leg of Tata Consultancy Services' (TCS) QuizIT.com 2001, Balasubramaniam got down from the stage and mingled with the 1450 plus students while conducting the show. He also handled well the boisterous student crowd, using wit to do so; the teachers present would surely have learnt a trick or two.

Of all the shows Balasubramaniam conducts, the most prestigious one is the TCS contract. "The company wants to spread IT awareness amongst the masses and also catch young talent early in life. Quizzing was chosen as the vehicle to do that," he explains. TCS conducts this annual quiz show in several cities, like Bangalore, Trivandrum, Chennai, Hyderabad and Kolkota, and Balasubramaniam has been retained as the quizmaster for all the centers.

While Balasubramaniam is public face on the stage, an eleven-member technical / research team assists him.

Is it because of his talent or is it economics that made TCS have a common quizmaster for all centers? Says K Jayaramakrishnan, Vice-president, TCS, "The quizmaster is really good. Never has he repeated a question till date, though he has conducted several shows.

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