XLRI students’ date with social issues

Jamshedpur, Aug. 24 (The Telegraph): In a unique initiative, XLRI for the first time has decided to undertake a series of social projects on the outskirts of the city under the guidance of senior professor M.G. Jomon.

Elaborating on the project, which kicks off tomorrow and will continue for a week, XLRI officials said 12 teams had been formed to be assigned programmes such as organising medical camps at different localities to spread awareness on healthy lifestyle.

“We have chalked out a list of programmes to be carried out in different areas. Our objective is to help students learn about human behaviour. The students will mingle with the people and try to understand their problems and help them overcome it,” said Madhukar Shukla, a senior professor of XLRI.

Professor Jomon said they would soon organise a fun fair at Kalyan Niketan, run by All India Women’s Conference in Kadma. The first phase of the project will involve identifying an orphanage in Jamshedpur and encouraging the inmates to participate in various fun-filled programmes. “The idea is to make them feel that they are not alone and they too can lead a normal life,” said a student of XLRI, who would participate in the social live projects.

The B-school also intends to organise a daylong eye-checking camp for underprivileged children on the premises of Gyan Deep Vidyalaya in Birsanagar. Opticians and doctors would be present at the camp to check the students and to offer them the necessary diagnosis.

A career counselling session would be conducted on XLRI campus to make students aware of the different career opportunities available to them.

“It will be conducted among students of Class X to XII and their concerns regarding different career paths will be addressed,” said another student of the B-school.

There will be a project christened ”Samarpan — a ray of hope whereby tribal families around Sundernagar on the outskirts of the city would be invited to participate in a host of recreational activities.

Joy of Giving Week (Sept 26-Oct 2, '10): XLRI to anchor Jamshedpur JoyFest on grand scale

Jamshedpur (August 20, The Pioneer): City-based leading B-school XLRI is gearing up to celebrate Jamshedpur JoyFest 2010 as a part of the nationwide event, Joy of Giving Week (JGW), in grand scale this time. The JGW event is scheduled from September 26 to October 2.

In a meeting between XLRI students’ committee members of SIGMA (Social Initiative Group for Managerial Action) and CII-Yi (CII-Young Indians), plans were chalked out for the JGW.

Prof Madhukar Shukla, chairperson, external linkages, XLRI, said that this was the second meeting for the purpose, and they were also joined by student club — Sankalp — of NIT Jamshedpur. In an earlier meeting in July with local stakeholders and NGOs, some ideas had been brainstormed to celebrate the week.

“We have decided that many events held last year will be repeated this year too including “Vastra-Samman” however, it was also discussed that the initiatives launched during this week should have wider, longer-lasting and sustainable impact.

This year it has been decided to design and launch a training programme on “basic accounting” for the Self-Help Groups through collaborating with local NGOs, such as Kalamandir and to participate — and give time and skills —in the education programme run by the Rotary Club.

Officials informed that plan this time is to involve the schools children more actively through Design for Change programme, which is a nationwide event, give in terms of one’s time and professional skills to counsel the school students for vocational guidance.

NIT students club —Sankalp — offered to use their engineering skills to develop inexpensive technologies such as smokeless chulhas, water filters, which can be provided to slum-dwellers and in rural areas.

The school music bands will be organised to create a musical evening to raise funds for charities and NGOs. The reach of the XLRI alumni network will be used to create larger awareness of the JGW, and involve them in the planned events, through use of social media.

It was also noted that last year, the key initiative of Jamshedpur JoyFest was Vastra Samman, through which over 4 trucks of wearable clothes were collected and distributed to the needy in the rural areas through the NGOs.

Last year the celebrations started with a bike rally on September 27, with students, staff and faculty rallying around the city to spread awareness about the “Joy of Giving Week’’ through gifting clothes to the less-privileged.

This day was also dedicated to the senior citizens. The students visited Nirmal Hrudaya, an old-age home. Special performances were arranged to entertain the residents. The students performed dance, played music and distributed sweets.

"Marketing Management: A Decision Making Approach" - 5th book from Prof P Venugopal, XLRI

A contemporary discourse on the rapidly changing environment of the world of marketing, this book provides the mantra to transform short-run sales into long-term marketing growth. Starting with the basics of marketing, it takes the reader on a smooth journey to understand various strategies of correct 'decision-making' in the market. In doing that, it provides an in-depth analysis of how to build a sustainable customer base in the ever-growing competitiveness and dynamism of the Indian marketing arena.

The author defines marketing to include all activities associated with identifying the needs of the target customers and making them 'want' the product. Thus, the book redefines the need hierarchy, allowing marketers to look at their technical product as more than one marketing product, and develop a marketing product concept.

Prof P Venugopal is a Post Graduate and Fellow in Management from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, is currently the Dean (Academics) and Professor (Marketing) at XLRI, Jamshedpur. He has been a Marketing faculty at XLRI, Jamshedpur, since 1994. He was the Dean (Academics), XLRI during 2004-2010. Prior to his stint at XLRI, Prof. Venugopal held managerial positions for 10 years in the marketing divisions of two agribusiness companies.

Professor Venugopal has authored the books on four books, including “Marketing Channel Management: A Customer Centric Approach” and “Input Management, The State of the Indian Farmer: A Millennium study”, and has also been involved as a consultant with several projects for both the profit and non-profit sectors.

Dr Vanita Viswanath @ XLRI: Building Rural Women Enterprises

Jamshedpur (August 12, The Pioneer): Vanita Viswanath, the CEO of Udyogini, in an interaction with the students of XLRI on Wednesday said that to make the ventures of the women entrepreneurs sustainable, it is more appropriate to focus on helping the women enterprise groups to systematise and innovate business processes for efficiency and cost-cutting, than on merely increasing the “turnover”.

She also discussed the challenges in developing rural women entrepreneurs. She shared that scale and making the products available in large volumes is a major challenge. The key to overcome this is to create and target intermediate level markets (e.g, markets at block or district levels), rather than markets with large volume buyers.

Low education, illiteracy among the women, and dependence of professionals (who come at a high cost) are some of the other challenges. Viswanath described Udyogini’s initiative in Jharkhand, and specifically talked about the Udyogini School of Entrepreneurship which is being started in Bundu on Jamshedpur-Ranchi highway. The School will be supported by Intel.

After the interaction with the students in the class, Vanita Viswanath, who was accompanied by two of her colleagues from Jharkhand field office, also discussed possible collaboration with the students and faculty of XLRI in terms of research, internship and involvement in the Udyogini School of Entrepreneurship.

Vanita Viswanath also shared Udyogini’s experience with various initiatives such as formation of women’s trade-based enterprise groups in various parts of country, e.g., workingVanita Viswanath is a PhD from University of Texas at Austin (USA), and has worked for more than 20 years in the field of women’s issues and micro-enterprises. Before joining Udyogini has served as consultant and advisor to many international agencies. She was also micro-enterprise consultant with the World Bank in early 1990s. She has also written many books and articles on gender issues in development, micro-enterprises, and poverty alleviation.

Udyogini was founded in 1992, and works to empower poor women in secluded rural areas through helping them to create their own micro-enterprises, provides them with training and capacity building, credit and market-linkages.

At present, Udyogini works in seven States of the country (Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa and Assam). Though started recently, its Jharkhand field-office has become the second largest, after Madhya Pradesh.

Udyogini works with a target of 6-8 years support to the rural women who want to become entrepreneurs during which time they must become sustainable ventures, and become entrepreneurs in their own right. It does so by promoting women enterprise groups to achieve scale of produce (e.g., textiles, crafts, agriculture produce, NTFPs, etc.)

Life at XLRI: Observations, impressions and more….

Here in XL, no two days are same. Each day bring something new to add to yourself, each class shakes up a belief somewhere. Aha-moments et al . What makes the experience amazing is the excellent camaraderie among 600 people strong student body(PMIR+BM+GMP) on campus.

Here are two new experiences for you, which capture these emotional upheavals(Please note that I used “experience” very deliberately as XL experiences can’t really be read or narrated;  you gotta just “live” them to understand them!):

http://whatitees.com/2010/07/15/the-mba-pictionary/

http://nikunjverma.com/2010/08/09/synergy-and-collaboration-this-is-what-a-bschool-should-look-like/

Heil XL!

XLRI-Packard Foundation Workshop for Public Health Professionals

Jamshedpur (The Pioneer, Aug 7): With an aim to promote the leadership development in the health sector, the premier B-school XLRI is conducting a two-day workshop for public health professionals dealing in reproductive health.

The Appreciative Assessment and Reinforcement Workshop, started on Friday, is being held with the support of the David and Lucile- Packard Foundation for the past participants of this inittiative. The two jointly began work on the issue of Leadership Development for Reproductive Health Professionals in 2009.

Programme coordinator, Visha Ballabh, who is the professor, Central for Rural management, XLRI, said that the specific objectives of the workshop are to overview and reflections since the leadership development training, consolidation and reinforcement of leadership capability of the participants through mutual learning and networking and provide feedback and strategies to strengthen the leadership development programme for health sector in general and RH in particular.

Pooja, a research assistant in XLRI said that the curriculum was designed through a series of consultative process. The feedback received from the participants during the training has encouraged them and they are overwhelmed that some of the participants have seriously made attempts to bring about change within themselves and also in their organisation. This workshop has been organised to further reinforce mutual learning.

She went on to inform that it would comprise of participants who have previously attended leadership development training at XLRI and it aims to strengthen and improve the leadership capability among participants by enabling them to track their own capabilities, attitudes and beliefs as leaders and also provide an opportunity to learn and build networks.

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In the same series, the 3rd Training Programme on Leadership Development for Public and NGO’s Reproductive Health Professionals will be organised during August 10-17, 2010, and will be attended by District and State level health professionals like Civil surgeons, ACMO, RCH and District Programme Managers, NGO’s leaders working in the area of Reproductive Health, maternal and child care.

Apollo Partners with XLRI to Train Healthcare Professionals

Hyderabad, Aug 4 : Apollo Hospitals Group has announced its partnership with XLRI Jamshedpur to conduct management programmes for Apollo’s practicing managers.

Apollo Hospitals Group Executive Director (Operations) Sangita Reddy and XLRI Jamshedpur Director Fr E Abraham S J have signed the MoU yesterday to mark the partnership at Apollo Health City here.

The tie-up is a part of Apollo’s Talent Management Programme that aims to nurture in-house talent.

’’This unique tie-up is a path-breaking initiative to address the need for professionally trained hospital managers, which is being increasingly felt in Indian healthcare,’’ Ms Reddy said.

She said professional training for practicing managers will be an important step to improve standards in managerial and functional areas of healthcare, which in turn will go a long way in boosting operational excellence and care delivery.

According to a CII report, employment in healthcare is expected to increase by at least 2.5 million by 2012, which is indicative of the demand for professionals in this space.

Currently, India has about 400 healthcare managers graduating every year, while the need is for 8,000.

Prof Jagdish Sheth's talk about "Chindia" @ XLRI

Prof Jagdish Sheth, the 72-yr old Marketing/Strategy Guru was in XLRI Jamshedpur on Aug 4th, '10, and gave a talk to the XLRI students and faculty on "Chindia Rising"

It is in the self interest of India to partner with China, as collectively they are going to rule the world economic order over the next few decades. By 2020, China will be the largest economy in the world with India close on its heels; and the world economies must wake up to this fact urgently.” This was the theme of Dr Sheth’s talk at XLRI.

Chindia’ to rule the global economy: Jagdish Sheth

Professor Jagdish Sheth, from the Marketing department of Goizueta Business School of Emory University, spoke about the theme of his recent book Chindia Rising. According to Dr Sheth, the last two decades saw a fundamental shift in industrial growth from regulated markets in advanced nations to competitive markets in emerging nations such as India and China. The markets in Chindia are still under penetrated, with only 65 per cent of consumption coming from organised sectors. However, with the growth of what he described as the ‘Call Centre Couples’ the need for branded products is rising and the only limitation is affordability.

He described that there is a fundamental shift in global growth from regulated markets in advanced nations to competitive markets in emerging nations, in which India and China are playing increasingly important role. The global footprints of the Indian and China are growing, though in different manners. He described how China is growing through exports companies like Haier and Lenovo which were hitherto dominant only in Chinese subcontinent have expanded into the US and European markets with great success. Indian global growth, on the other hand, is happening through acquisition of manufacturing bases abroad, for instance, acquisition of Tetley and Corus by Tata, or take-over of Novelis by Birla’s Hindalco.

At the same time, he pointed out, the companies in Chindia, such as Airtel and Haier, have commercialised technological innovations from the West very well and are now increasingly going global in their ambitions.

Such changes, Dr Sheth pointed out will are leading to three major shifts which qualitatively change the way global business happens. The student fraternity and faculty were treated to a deeper understanding of the impact of these shifts - the race for resources, markets and geopolitical leadership - by Dr Sheth.

The race for resources includes the race for human capital, land etc and is driven by global expansion and cross-border mergers, rising investments in Africa, shortage-driven breakthrough innovations and so on.

The race for markets is shifting the economies from a domestic to a global level. This has resulted in the emergence of large consumer markets, shift of R&D to China and India to bring out affordable inventions, new products and services from fusion of cultures, etc.

Lastly, the race for geopolitical leadership is resulting in new strategic alliances such as the G-8 becoming G-20, the rise of multilateral politics, etc.

Dr Sheth dwelt upon the fact that India lost a golden opportunity when it rejected the offer from western nations to outsource manufacturing to India (due to its non-alignment policy) which allowed countries like Taiwan, Singapore, Japan to gain hold in low cost manufacturing. He, however, also pointed out that as the center of gravity shifts to Asia, it will also lead to a redefining of the nature of capitalism from a self-interest driven phenomenon to a “caring capitalism’.

Finally, Dr. Sheth said that contrary to popular belief, it would be in the self interest of India to become partners in trade with China so as to shift the balance of power from the Old Triad of US, EU and Japan to the New Triad of US, China and India.

“It’s vital for the students to get exposed to global trends and shifts happening across the globe, if they are to establish themselves as industry leaders of tomorrow”, said Professor Narsimhan Rajkumar head of Marketing department at XLRI, Jamshedpur.