Ocumen is the flagship event of Oculus, a student committee, conducted with active support from the Student Affairs Office at IIM Lucknow. It aimed at helping young impressionable minds form an opinion towards the world of management that comes not from word of mouth but from a first hand feel of management. According to Dr D.S. Sengar, Chairman, Student’s Affairs, IIM Lucknow “as an institute our objective is to contribute towards management development and nurture global, socially conscious leaders contributing towards upliftment of society. Ocumen is quintessence of our efforts to improve our environs.”
OCUMEN 2007 had some remarkable improvements planned over the previous years. The games covered all the gamut of functional areas that a management student is exposed to during his two year stay on campus like finance, marketing, strategy, operations and many more. The games were especially designed to be introductory, fun, easy to understand and at the same time, sowing the seeds of management in the children’s minds.
Highlights of this year are:
‘Money Matters’, The Finance Game:
This finance game aimed to make young financial wizards of the participants conversant with the risks and returns, interest rates and investments. It aimed to evaluate an understanding of the basic concepts based on which the investment decisions are made.
‘Market Place’, The Marketing Game :
Marketing is one of the primary managerial functions and PRiSM hopes to use this event as a useful platform for information sharing across educational institutes. This was achieved through a quiz based on contemporary marketing issues, advertising and recent news.
‘Opsessed’, The Operations Game:
Operations Interest Group (OIG), conducted a simulation game for school children aiming to introduce them to the basic concepts of operations management.
‘Teams Win’, The HR Game:
Management is all about working with people in teams. There is a process that leads to formation and success of teams. This game highlighted this very process.
Miss and Mr. OCUMEN:
A test of quick and creative thinking in the midst of a discriminating audience helped in picking the best participants for the day judged as Mr. and Miss OCUMEN.
‘Strategists’:
Your today will take you to your tomorrow. But what charts this connection between the present and the future is strategy, the management vertical to be addressed by this event.
In addition, the day saw quizzes, skill-based contests and extempore sessions being conducted, all evaluating the overall personality of the participating students.
Ocumen aimed to introduce school students of class XI and XII, at an important inflection point of making their career choices, to the all-encompassing field of management. It tried to provide an introductory snapshot of management to young students through a variety of games and competitions, at the same time providing them with a unique opportunity to experience life at a B-school.
OCUMEN as an endeavor is unique to IIM Lucknow. It was first started as an effort to bridge the gap between the realities and the perception regarding management education. It aims to deliver this by demystifying management education through a day long event conducted on campus, at IIM Lucknow.
Our biggest success story was the fact that we could instill among the students an appreciation of the complexities of management and a realization of its importance in the competitive world today. The ultimate objective of which would be to chart a plan of progress for the country’s education system by identifying loopholes in the system and an attempt to plug them by ideas brought forth by the stakeholders of the system.