Ques 1. Honouring LBSIM with your presence as the Head Administration and Officiating Director, what is your vision for LBSIM?
Ans 1. LBSIM was setup to perpetuate the memory of Prime Minister late Lal Bahadur Shastri to provide value based and affordable management education in the Country. I am proud to be associated as a part of this prestigious institute for a long time. I have seen this institute very closely and its faculty, students and administration has great potential. In view of pending bill with Parliament for granting IIMs degree institutes, I wish that LBSIM should get the same status in next 5-6 yrs. I wish to see it is as a university for management education.
Ques 2. LBSIM’s PGDM-Finance has been on the priority list for many aspirants who want Finance as a specialization. With the Bloomberg Lab set up, how is it going to make students industry relevant and enhance their skillsets?
Ans 2. The finance discipline is expending very fast and one of the objectives is financial inclusion. There is a lot of work to be done in finance area. Financial technique known as FINTECH is growing very fast now-a-days which will help in wide range of financial services to the people at large. Management is a clinical subject rather than speculative one and a substantial proportion of our academic research should be devoted on real business problems both by top managers and academicians. Bloomberg Lab provides students an experiential learning where it involves integration of class room learnings with different clients’ problems, competition and work as a real client.
Ques 3. SPARSH, The Social Initiative by Shastrians points out to the Ethics and Social Responsibility traits which LBSIM cultivates amongst its students. Please shed some light on the same.
Ans 3. Since its inception, the emphasis in LBSIM has been ethics and values, and inculcates the societal responsibilities to its graduates. The adoption of village, research on MNREGA in six states are few examples where we have emphasized the Shastrian values to its graduates. Live projects on educating the marginal and left-over children of the society and our regular Interaction with NGOs to take up their cases and bring out to the society is our strength. Our endeavour is to work for the neglected lot and bring them at par with their fellow beings.
Ques 4. With your exceptional academic experience coupled with your association with LBSIM since its inception, what are your observations regarding the current scenario of the management education in India?
Ans 4. Management education is at a crossroads in India. Management education cannot be carried out in isolation. It has to take into consideration economic, political and business environment simultaneously. The classroom teaching is gradually shifting towards experiential learning, problem solving of the society at a grass root level, particularly in rural areas. This has reflected into our endeavour when we introduced courses on entrepreneurship and venture creation. The management education will focus on ‘doing’ and ‘being’ rather than ‘knowing’. More emphasis is placed on ethics, society, corporate governance and environmental performance.
Ques 5. As an equal opportunity employer with faculty representing a broad spectrum of demographics how does LBSIM ensure that this is seen in the student batches as well?
Ans 5. LBSIM, from very beginning, focused on equality. And since its inception the gender equality has been maintained. There has been almost 60%-40% ratio of boys and girls in management courses. Students are from different states and around 23-25 states of the country. They speak different languages; follow different cultures and religions, even in some cases students with very low economic background have been admitted, providing them the scholarship and other amenities. We inculcate societal values in them at par with other students of their class.
Ques 6. The 12 terminal Bloomberg Lab and the state-of-art IBM-Analytics Lab are the latest additions to the LBSIM infrastructure. Please share the motivation behind these developments.
Ans 6. As indicated, finance will play an important role in the country. There is a need to provide financial services to the most neglected people. Financial assets have to be created as fast as possible, specifically in backward areas. Finance Lab will act as a tool of experiential learning to the students of LBSIM. We wish to provide deep and wide financial awareness to our students so that they can use the same when they join the corporate sector. IBM analytical lab is an important introduction to provide analytical skills to the students. Data is the future money and it is the ‘data’ and whosoever controls the data would be in better position academically, financially and entrepreneurially.