“MBA is an ever evolving field of education.”
Prof Arindam Chaudhuri, Dean Centre for Economic Research & Advanced Studies – IIPM conducted a seminar titled‘See the world through a keyhole, or open the doors with an MBA’. The noted economist and management guru is an eminent author, an authoritative speaker and a transformational leader too. He has been conferred upon with ‘Management Guru 2000’ award, ‘Personality of the Decade’ award, ‘Example to Youth’ awards and many more. Prof. Chaudhari also happens to be a film maker. Punekar caught up with this new age Renaissance man and garnered some great insights from him.
How does an MBA open doors to the world?
(Laughs) An MBA is the only field of education which puts the individual first. In a B school classroom it’s not the education, it’s not the subject, it’s not the book but about the individual who is learning the subject. MBA makes education a happy and exciting experience. It is a life transforming experience where the student can benefit and relate to it at every point in time.
You have been in this business for many years, how have the MBA programmes changed?
MBA is an ever evolving field of education.They have to be changed as per the changing trends to make it more meaningful to the students. Because what I am teaching today may not be relevant tomorrow, what I am teaching tomorrow may not be relevant day after tomorrow.
Since last year the world economy was in a slump. What should MBA’s do to cope with the global slump and what is the skill set required?
MBA’s can actually do very less or do anything with the global slump simply because MBA’s can only work hard. It is the politicians and the governments job to work up and take the countries out of a global slump. Having said the biggest lesson from recession is, either you can give up or you can work doubly hard and reach there.
MBA’s need to study the changing market trends and analyze what works and what doesn’t. So the work manifolds and the MBA’s need to be ready to put forth that much of effort. For example in IIPM itself , last to last year when there was no recession we placed 2650 students and it took us only 600 companies to place them. This year we placed 2700 students but we placed them in 1200 companies. So to do the same thing we had to work double as hard as compared to last year..
Management education is only turning out managers who work in different corporates, very few of them can become entrepreneurs can you comment on that?
Ya of course, I mean IIPM’s programmes are entrepreneurship programmes, we don’t teach management. Our programmes revolve around planning and entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship creates employment and gives a scope for many managers to work while a manager can only get one job. Therefore to keep the ball of entrepreneurs rolling, banks should put more faith on MBA’s once they have about 5-7years experience.
What is the vision of IIPM and where do you see IIPM five years down the line?
The vision of IIPM is there in our tag line “Dare to think beyond IIMs”. Our industry interface is far superior in terms of our curriculum as we concentrate more on entrepreneurship and economics than a management program per say. In terms of global exposure we are number one. All our students are taken abroad for various courses, as a compulsory part of our education. They go to the best B-Schools around the world to do this course which is called Advanced Global Management certificate. And this they get from the B-School that they attend. For example if they attend Judge School of business they get an Advanced Global Management certificate from the same school.
The only place where we are still behind IIM’s is placements. You know their average packages are 8-9 lakhs, our packages are still 5 1/2 – 6 lakhs. But that’s our biggest challenge. In another 5 years time what we hope to achieve is to take the packages at par with the IIM’s so that our other advantages like better education, better global exposure and better industry interface are highlighted. So after five years down the line we feel that we will stand a great chance in becoming the most sought after B-School in the country.
According to surveys the ranking of IIPM is 8, what efforts are being made to make it number one?
Actually this year the ranking has come up and it is number 5 now. Coming to number 5 to me was much easier because all you are defeating is other B-Schools. But beating the IIM is tough. To say IIPM is better than IIM somebody has to understand management. But the problem is that the people who rank these schools don’t understand management themselves so they rank on the basis of perceptions which is a very tough war. That’s why we are very aggressive on marketing and as I said we are working very hard on placements and hopefully in 2-4 years our figures are as good as theirs.
IIPM is No 8 according to surveys, why is it that IIM’s get better placed than IIPM’s?
IIM students get better placed because IIM’s are government backed, its like an ISI mark. It is an institution for the last 40 years and they have deliberately kept their intake less to keep their packages high. So in a hundred acre campus they teach only 150 students.They deliberately teach less number of students so that in the market there is more demand for them and they can get more packages, so it’s a straight demand supply equation.
As a private institute I can teach any number of students as I want and no one can question me. But as a government backed institute they have to necessarily teach as many students as possible without bothering about the packages that they get. Because the important thing is spreading education not getting your people higher packages.
What do you think an MBA institute should do? Should they develop global managers or should they develop managers?
Global managers are the need of the hour as the world is getting smaller day by day and at that point of time talking about local managers is impossible.
There are no two ways about it. Managers are going to be working in India for American company or working in America for an Indian company and travelling all over the world at the same time. So just creating managers is out of question.
Who is your role model?
(Laughs) There are two role models that I’ve had in my life one is my dad. My education, learning and understang about life are inculcated from him. My second role model is Che Guevara, who crossed boundaries to fight against exploiters. And though he was violent his ideals are extremely inspirational for me.
Which are the institutes in the world that you emulate?
There are lot of good B-Schools actually like Dardin, Hass, Harvard, and a couple of smaller B-Schools like Insead, IMD are worth emulating. I think these are all B-Schools which are either very old yet have constantly delivered innovation or they are new B-Schools who within very short time have become centers of innovative education.
I think in India, ISB is doing a very good job. Also it’s not that I don’t emulate the IIM’s it’s just that I feel that they impart good education but there is far more that they can do.
List few critical skills for the business world post 2009?
One of them as I said is that you have to work doubly hard. The second is that post 2009, cost has become a huge factor so every company is going to engage itself in terrific cost cutting. You have to accept an environment of lesser salaries at the same time deliver much more. One key thing which I have always believed in to achieve success and which will hold through in any kind of situation is ‘sustained sincereity’.
What benefits does a student of IIPM avail?
I think every student of IIPM gets placement and will keep on getting interviews till they get placed. We go to any miles to achieve our targets. In a year of recession like thi,s we have placed 2700 students which is the highest in the country along with international placements. Last year we had 165 international placements and this year we had only 55 in spite of the shrinking market. But we had 55 at a time when others had none which is a great achievement.
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Hi! this is Tina from Mumbai, ya nice write up, I did my MBA from Sikkim Manipal University of Distance Education, they have awesome courses and the great thing is that they have no entrance exams and the fees are reasonable too and they have their centers all over.
I enjoyed studying at SMUDE, and their website http://www.smude.edu.in will clear all your doubts surely.
Regards,
Tina
Arindam Chaudhuri has given very convincing answers.All those considering doing their MBAs can certainly look at IIPM as an option.