Insights from MBAUniverse.com Roundtable Mumbai

Add Review

MBAUniverse.com News Desk |
October 27, 2014
The MBAUniverse.com Mumbai Roundtable was held in Mumbai on October 18 at the NMIMS University Mumbai
B Schools have to innovate too. There cannot be thousands of B Schools offering the same thing. Harsh Mariwala, Chairman, Marico Ltd

The MBAUniverse.com Mumbai Roundtable was held in Mumbai on October 18 at the NMIMS University Mumbai. The theme was 'Disrupt or be Disrupted - Accelerating Innovation in Management Education'. The Keynote Speaker for this meet was Innovation pioneer Mr Harsh Mariwala, Chairman, Marico Ltd. Special addresses were delivered by Dr Jagdish Sheth, Thought-leader & Co-author of The Business School in the Twenty-First Century, Mr. K. RamkumarExecutive Director, ICICI Bank Limited and Dr Rajan Saxena, Vice Chancellor, NMIMS University, Mumbai. The program was attended by Deans and faculties from leading B-schools like SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, Sydenham SIMSREE , K J Somaiya Institute of Management Studies & Research, ITM and many others.  

Speaking at the occasion, Marico Chairman Mr Harsh Mariwala said, "Entrepreneurs have to innovate to cut the clutter. There are many sources of innovations including Product, Pricing, Promotions and even Packaging. B-schools have to innovate too. There cannot be thousands of B-schools offering the same thing." Giving example of innovation through Packaging, Mr Mariwala said, "At Marico, we have innovated and excelled by rethinking our packaging. For instance, we created a "rat-resistant" plastic bottle of coconut oil by putting a sample bottle in a rat-cage for days, just to test it!"

Mr Mariwala emphasized on the need for 'creating a culture of continuous innovation' and 'Consumer In-sighting' to stay ahead of the game. Mr Mariwala started Marico in 1990 with an idea of providing hair, skin and health care quality products. Today Marico is the synonym to success with leading brands such as parachute Oil, Saffola, Mediker, Revive, Setwet, Zatak, Livon, Hair & Care, Nihar, Shanti, Kaya among others. 

Underlining the need for innovation in management education, Dr Jagdish Sheth, said, "We need to move forward from Regulation to Accreditation. We need to adopt practice oriented approach in management education - like medical schools have adopted. And, we need to create deep-domain specialists in our management education, and not generalists." Dr Sheth is the Charles H. Kellstadt Professor of Marketing at Emory University Goizueta Business School. Dr Sheth sits on the Board of Directors of several public companies including Norstan, Cryo Cell International, Wipro Limited.

Known for his candid views on Management Education, Mr. K. Ramkumar, Executive Director, ICICI Bank said, "Management education in India is suffering because academic fraternity is not amenable to change. The current testing (CAT), curriculum and pedagogy are too numerical and formulaic. This doesn't work in the real world as there are no formulas to succeed in the corporate world. B-schools need to disrupt the current paradigm, and innovate to win."Mr Ramkumar gave examples of how he led disruption at ICICI HR practices when he pioneered the institutions like NIIT IFBI and ICICI Manipal Academy for Banking and Insurance, which have been a runaway success.

In his special address, Dr Rajan Saxena, Vice Chancellor, NMIMS University Mumbai emphasized on the need for greater focus on students and industry requirements. "There are new threats and opportunities emerging for Indian management education. We need to understand the needs of our two key stakeholders - student and industry, and meet their expectation well."  

Speaking at the panel discussion on the program theme, Dr. Atish Chattopadhyay, Dy. Director, PGDM, S. P. Jain Institute of Management & Research and Prof Pratima Sheorey, Director, Symbiosis Centre for Management and Human Resource Development (SCMHRD), Pune emphasized on the need to create Indian solutions for Indian environment. Dr Chattopadhyay said, "We must not blindly ape the Western B-schools and adopt their approaches in India. Indian management education has to be much closer to practice and real-world impact, and not merely seek research for its own sake." Prof Pratima Sheorey added, "While change is tough, it's much needed. We have to effectively deal with sky-high expectations of both students and recruiters by leveraging technology and other assets."  

At the meet, Industry experts Michael J Cruz, Vice-President & Managing Director, Emerald Group Publishing (India); Mr. Santosh Joshi, Regional Manager-Higher Education, McGraw Hill Education (India); Mr. Gaurav Srivastava, Director -Market Development , South Asia, Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) shared how B-schools can effectively leverage new Research, Publishing & Marketing tools to innovate.

Stay tuned to MBAUniverse.com for more Insights and Trends on Indian Management Education.