MBAs should be Job-Creators and not merely Job-Seekers, says Former President of India Ram Nath Kovind at Indian Management Conclave 2022; presents IMC Awards; CEOs, 250 Directors & Decision Makers participate

B-schools should play a major role in the rise of India as the economic superpower with a $5 trillion economy by creating successful entrepreneurs who find solutions to the myriad Indian problems by leveraging new technology. “B-schools should create MBAs who are Job-Creators and not merely Job-Seekers,” said Former President of India Shri Ram Nath Kovind at the 12th Indian Management Conclave (IMC) 2022. He was delivering the Valedictory Address as the Chief Guest for IMC 2022, being held at IIM Kozhikode on Dec 9-10.

“India has produced many global management thinkers, like Prof CK Prahalad. Many global CEOs are of Indian origin. We are proud of the impact Indians are making on global business stage,” said Former President. He also called upon B-schools to create ethical and socially responsible managers and leaders. Before delivering his address, Former President Shri Kovind also gave away the IMC Awards for Excellence in Management Education 2022 and IMC Distinguished Alumni Awards 2022.

On December 9, IMC Founder & Convenor Mr Amit Agnihotri set the context for this year’s Conclave during his opening address when he said, “India is home to the largest number of MBA Programs in the World! But do our Outcomes match our Scale?” He further added, “At a global level, no Indian B-school is ranked amongst Top 100 B-Schools on Research Contributions and only 4 B-schools from India are ranked in FT Top 100 MBA Rankings. Indian MBAs also have low employability. IIMs are much behind IITs when it comes to producing Unicorn Founders.” He urged 250+ B-school leaders at IMC 2022 to dwell on these challenges and create a blueprint for improving MBA Outcomes, the theme of this year’s Conclave.

Dr Debashis Chatterjee, Director, IIM Kozhikode, welcomed the delegates to IIM Kozhikode. He spoke about the importance of learning from the significance of miss-measuring the MBA outcomes in order to create a new all-encompassing world view which is rooted in a strong framework and clear fundamentals.

IMC 2022 hosts Top Business Leaders, Management Education Doyens, Global Experts
India’s top Policy Makers, Business Leaders, Management Education Doyens and Opinion-shapers came together for the IMC 2022. Mr Suresh Narayanan, CMD, Nestle India and Mr Shyam Srinivasan, MD & CEO, Federal Bank delivered the keynote addresses at the Conclave. International Keynote Address was delivered by Dr Nilanjan Sen, Dean, School of Business, University at Albany, State University of New York, USA.

Mr Suresh Narayanan said, “We are all living in a 'brittle', 'anxious', 'nonlinear' and 'incomprehensible' BANI world. Leadership for surviving and thriving in this era requires focus on Character, Conscience and Communication. Unfortunately, MBAs are too focussed on data-analysis techniques, but are poor as ‘sense-making.’ We need a more holistic approach for business and management education.”

Mr Shyam Srinivasan said, “B-schools must produce MBAs who should be Optimising Opportunities, Managing Risk Potholes, Explorer for Excellence, Governance Hawk, Authentically Authentic – in short be the OMEGAs.”

TAPMI, JAGSoM win IMC Gold Awards 2022
Shri Kovind presented the IMC Awards for Excellence in Management Education, popularly known as IMC Awards. Award winners were selected by an eminent jury after a rigorous multi round selection process. IMC Awards Winners 2022 are:

Theme 1: Measuring Academic Learning: Framework & Implementation

Award	Winning Institution	Presented by
Gold	TAPMI	Dr Purnima Venkat
Silver	SoM, Hindustan Institute of Technology and Science, Chennai	Dr M K Badrinarayanan

Theme 2: Measuring Corporate Readiness: Approaches & Results

Award	Winning Institution	Presented by
Gold	Jagdish Sheth School of Management (JAGSoM)	Prof Edwin Moses
Silver	XIME Bangalore	Dr NMK Bhatta

Presenting the IMC Award, Shri Kovind said, “I am happy to present IMC Awards today. I urge B-schools receiving the awards to continue their good work, and others should be inspired too.” Earlier, Jury members Dr Pawan Kumar Singh, Director, IIM Tiruchirappalli and Dr SR Singhvi, Former Senior Faculty, IIM Indore & MDI Gurgaon announced the award winners.

IMC Distinguished Alumni Awards 2022
Mr Kabir Ahmed Shakir, Chief Financial Officer, Tata Communications and an BIM Tiruchirappalli Alumnus was awarded the IMC Distinguished Alumni Awards 2022. Award was presented by Shri Kovind. Tata Communications has a presence in 190 Countries and is serving 7000 global clients comprising 300 of the Fortune 500 companies. Mr Shakir was the Chief Financial Officer at Microsoft India and spent 23 years with Unilever in leadership roles across the world – as Global CFO for the Skin Care category in the UK, Global Supply Chain Finance Director in the UK, CFO of the Home and Personal Care business in India.

30+ Top Directors & Deans hold intense discussion on MBA Outcomes:
IMC 2022 saw Who’s Who from management education in India and Subject Experts from all parts of the globe share their views on how B-schools can measure and deliver outcomes better. Plenary Session on ‘Measuring Learning Outcome’ was addressed by Dr Varun Nagaraj, Dean, SPJIMR Mumbai (Chair); Dr Geoff Perry, EVP & Chief Officer, Asia Pacific, AACSB International; Dr Ramabhadran S. Thirumalai, Deputy Dean, Academic Programmes, Indian School of Business (ISB); Dr Shubhasis Dey, Dean (FA&D), IIM Kozhikode and Dr Sangeeta Bharadwaj, Dean, Graduate Programmes, MDI Gurgaon. 

Plenary Session on Measuring Research Outcomes was addressed by Dr Nava Subramaniam, Dean, Amrita School of Business Coimbatore (Chair); Dr Rudra Sensarma, Former Dean (RI & I); Professor, IIM Kozhikode; Dr Francois Bonvalet, Director, BSIS, EFMD; Dr Lakshmi Kumar, Dean, IFMR GSB, Krea University Sri City and Dr Neena Sondhi, Dean Research & Accreditation, IMI New Delhi.

Plenary Session on Measuring Corporate Readiness was address by Dr Vishal Talwar, Director, IMT Ghaziabad (Chair); Dr Srinivasan R Iyengar, Director, JBIMS Mumbai; Dr Ajit Parulekar, Director, Goa Institute of Management Goa; Dr Monica Khanna, Director, K J Somaiya Institute of Management Mumbai and Dr Kumar Mohanty, Director-Corporate Relations, KIIT University Bhubaneswar.

Leaders Roundtable, a highlight of this year’s conference, was held on the evening of Dec 9. It was addressed by Dr Debashis Chatterjee, Director, IIM Kozhikode; Fr Sebastian George, S.J, Director, XLRI Jamshedpur; Dr Varun Nagaraj, Dean, SPJIMR Mumbai; Dr H. Chaturvedi, Alt President, EPSI; Director, BIMTECH Greater Noida; Mr Raghav Gupta, Managing Director, India and APAC, Coursera; Dr Asit K Barma, Director, BIM Tiruchirapalli and Mr Gaurav Srivastava, Regional Director - South Asia, GMAC.

Special Sessions on Rethinking Admissions for achieving desired Outcomes, UG Management Education were also held. Dr Atish Chattopadhay, Director, JAGSOM (Chair); Prof Alberto Acereda, AVP for Global Higher Education, ETS; Dr Vishwa Ballabh, Chairperson Admissions, XLRI Jamshedpur; Convenor, XAT; Dr P K Shajahan, Dean, Academic Affairs, TISS Mumbai and Dr Amit Das, Chairperson - MBA Admissions, IFMR GSB, KREA University Sri City. UG Management Education Mr Vinay Hebbar, Senior Vice-President, Head - International Markets, Harvard Business Publishing (Chair); Dr Suraj Commuri, Senior Associate Dean, School of Business, University at Albany, State University of New York, USA; Dr Shruti Tewari, Dean-IPM, IIM Indore; Dr Viraj Varma, Chairperson-IPM, IIM Ranchi; Dr Aditya Mohan Jadhav, Dean, TAPMI Bengaluru Campus and Dr Niraj Mankad, Assistant Dean - Programs, School of Business FLAME University Pune were also held.

A theme paper titled Measuring Outcomes of MBA Education was released at IMC 2022. More than 200 Directors, Deans, Senior Faculty Members and Decision Makers from 100+ Universities and B-schools attended the conference. 

IMC 2022 Partners were: AACSB International, IMT Ghaziabad, TAPMI Manipal, K J Somaiya Institute of Management Mumbai, BIMTECH, Greater Noida, GMAC, ETS GRE, Coursera, Harvard Business Publishing, BIM Trichy, JAGSoM, Bangalore , IFMR GSB KREA UNIVERSITY, SDMIMD Mysore and SCMS Cochin.

Organized by MBAUniverse.com in partnership with India’s top B-schools and knowledge organizations, IMC is India's definitive annual Management Education Conference & Awards Platform.

MBAUniverse.com will publish more highlights from IMC 2022 in coming days. Stay tuned!