How top Indian B-schools are grooming future CEOs with technology, empathy

AHMEDABAD, DELHI

If you try to guess the case studies discussed at IIMA, you can’t be blamed for thinking about MNCs or famous Indian companies. The Tirupati temple does not fall into that realm. But, the more you think about it, the more it makes sense. After all, it is one of the richest temples in the world and there are many things to be managed. The case discussion around the temple gives students a different perspective. The trust is a non-profit, so how should it manage its funds? What motivates it to serve devotees well, and what does good service mean in that context?

The questions fit a curriculum at IIMA, which is fine-tuned every term and every year. One major shift, said Prof Ankur Sinha, chairperson, MBA-PGP, is that classrooms now discuss topics like sustainability and artificial intelligence. Conversations about society and the environment had been missing in b-schools, he feels, and are now being integrated differently.

“The idea is to integrate all these things into almost all the courses,” he said. “For instance, if there is an operations-related course, there can be a couple of sessions on sustainability from the operations perspective. If you have marketing-related sessions, then one can talk about AI in marketing. The problems which students will face tomorrow will not come by subject perse but one will have to apply all the subject knowledge in an interdisciplinary manner to deal with the problems.”

There are no restrictions on using AI in classroom submissions or assignments. In fact, every student has a ChatGPT licence (paid plan), for which the institute has tied up with OpenAI.

Moreover, though the case study method remains integral, the cases are changing. They are getting shorter, and video (five to 10 minutes) and podcast cases are being used more. “The fundamentals are not going to change and are going to stay relevant,” said Sinha. “The conversations have become a bit different and more contextualised based on the requirements of the world.”

Students are not told they are being trained as operations, marketing or supply chain managers. They will be managers for some time, Sinha said, but the ultimate aim is to become CEO. “A CEO is the one who needs to take a holistic view whenever important strategic decisions are taken,” he said. “A finance person might only look at it in terms of numbers, a HR person may only look at it in terms of employees and so on. But the moment a plant has to be shut down and a new plant has to be built, the CEO will look at it from all the perspectives—the cost aspects, lay-offs, etc.”

While the focus of the institute is clear, how does it work during placements? What do recruiters expect of IIMA graduates? “Organisations have problems,” said Prof Viswanath Pingali, chairperson, Placements Committee. “Solving one problem raises some other problem elsewhere. We train people in general management much more than we train in any particular discipline. Almost every subject is taught with general management at play. That is where recruiters give you a lot of credit.” He added that companies are also looking for candidates who have familiarity with technology. “How you leverage technology to get work done more efficiently is something a recruiter is looking for,” he said.

B-schools across the country are adapting to the demand for technical knowledge. At MDI Gurugram, its flagship two-year MBA recently underwent a review and, for the first time, technology was added to the core course. Everyone must attend sessions on AI, blockchain and IoT, learning how they work and how they are deployed. A course on sustainability and technology has also been introduced. “One has to keep up with the times and what is required by recruiters,” said Prof Arvind Sahay, director and professor of marketing and international business. “But recruiters still want one to know management accounting and what it takes to be a good marketer or the ability to do multi-dimensional scaling analysis. Besides that, current recruiters still want to know whether you know elements of supply chain.”

Recruiters also often have well-defined job descriptions. “If a recruiter is coming from the financial services domain they will have a well-defined role description and will try to do a profile matching,” said Sahay. “So, in the recruitment process now, the first cut screening of CVs is increasingly being done by AI. So one can create CVs with the right set of descriptions to match the requirement. The institute can give those skills to the people.”

Sahay observed that current management graduates, and a large proportion of younger people, lack resilience and are anxious. “I don’t blame them entirely,” he said. “Our generation of graduates or even 15 years ago had limited access to information. With loads of information that’s available today, uncertainty increases—we are wired to pay more attention to the negative stuff. To counter those aspects, we are also working to create wellness programmes for the students.” The institute conducts a behavioural assessment test as part of selection. “We try to assess emotional resilience,” said Sahay. “In these uncertain times it is not about teaching alone but about how the learning is taking place. Ultimately, the purpose of teaching is to lead to some learning.”

Prof A. Venkat Raman, dean, the Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi University, highlighted the role of emotional intelligence. “[Apart from] continuous practical exposure (through regular corporate affiliation) and embedding technology in the curriculum, there needs to be more focus on human relations competence, including cognitive level focus on emotional intelligence and mindfulness,” he said. He also stressed that managerial decisions are within the realm of human logic. “Subjects such as accounting, IT and logistics/supply chain are likely to be influenced by AI tools to a significant level. Our management curriculum should focus on cognitive abilities, given that AI shall give us the decision options.”

Venkat Raman pointed to another key factor. Many Indian schools still rely largely on American management frameworks, though in recent years many have consciously incorporated Indian cases, context-based analysis and social realities. “Though the tools of analysis still remain western, this is unlikely to change quickly as most global b-schools use western frameworks,” he said. “But there is an increasing realisation that western models are outliving their utility in a country like India.”

Raman Ramachandran, dean and director, K.J. Somaiya Institute of Management, Mumbai, said meaningful adaptation goes beyond relabelling existing courses. “B-schools can integrate emerging areas through new modules, electives, contemporary case studies and industry-led learning,” he said. “The focus should be on evolving the learning experience while preserving fundamentals that underpin management.”

From what is happening at India’s top b-schools, it is clear there is a straightforward solution to the problems posed by the modern world. And it is not, in essence, a new solution. In fact, it is one of the fundamentals of management education—go beyond static knowledge to developing the ability to learn, unlearn and relearn, with greater emphasis on life skills, adaptability, critical thinking and problem-solving. That continues to be the truest test of an MBA degree.