Prof Prakash Apte of the IIMB made the following points:
1. Among various competencies managers need, the two most important are a. Managing Decision Making Process and b. Managing Human Capital
2.Should we create 'Managers' or people with skill sets for jobs like 'analyst' or 'market researcher'? Companies are looking for technically competent 'analyst' or 'market researcher' which might mean a moving down of HR and decision making skills.
3. Diversity is very important as a lot of the learning happens between peers. IIM's seem to lack this as many of the students are engineers with no work experience, good with numbers.
4. B Schools need to revisit the value of and weightage for various selection criteria like experience (is length the only thing?), quantitative abilities, personal interview etc.
How I considered his keynote was that there needs to be a relationship between what kind of student is taken in and the course offered in terms of content/delivery/placement opportunity and every other aspect. There can not be a one size fits all kind of approach. In short, we need to create "Managers" ( strategy, HR, Leadership etc) or Business Process Professionals ( finance/ CRM....analytical and dependent decision making) based on kind of intake and placements.
Various speakers from industry spoke about what they expect in terms of knowledge, skills, attitude etc. of students who graduate from B schools and join the industry. This is a randomly put together which hopefully still makes lot of sense.
- Institutes need to educate students about realities of careers and get them grounded before they leave school.Students need to know that they need to do their time in the trench. Students need to know it is not a 100meter race, it is a marathon.
- Bring fresh perspectives/new ideas eg: need to know about social media marketing which may be new to the senior manager
- Persistence of purpose
- Should have a opinion. To have a opinion one needs to have understanding and passion.
- Balance is a essential. Emotional intelligence is a prerequisite for success. Balance also between theory and practice.
- Need to understand the context of the organization. Learn to be in listening mode initially!
- Customer centric. Communication skills and Change management abilities...the three C's
- Intellect, inter-personal skills and integrity ....the three I's
All speakers felt that MBA grads have great expectation and are unaware of realities. One speaker went to the extent of calling them "not real people. Well packaged surreal people"
Surely I have not been great at recording all the points..but I do hope you my dear reader gets the drift. Improved communication skills especially listening skills, being grounded, good people skills, and realistic expectation are what industry is looking for apart from analytical skills, can do attitude and knowledge of concepts and new stuff. Do write in.
