Topic: Evolution of Supply Chain Management
26 February 2007

L G Subramanian, who has been with the Indian Air Force for 27 years and has had stints with HAL and is presently associated with the Indian Institute of Material Management (IIMM) presented to the FW0709 students his perspective on the process of Supply Chain Management (SCM) and its criticality in the business world today. Mr. Subramanian’s hour long talk focused on how SCM has become a source of competitive advantage today and companies can chose to ignore it at their own peril.

'Customer Needs and motivation'
Supriya Sinha - Brand Manager, UB Spirits division
Date: 19 January 2008

Outside of the consumer behavior course that the students of the Fall Winter batch 2007-09 are attending, Supriya Sinha an industry veteran in the marketing and advertising vertical presented an industry perspective on a part of consumer behavior that served as a supplemental piece of learning laced with industry insights Supriya has gathered in her career. Live examples and couple of caselets that were solved in class had the students asking for more in an insightful take on what exactly motivates customers to buy the stuff that they buy!

"OVERVIEW OF FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT"
Date: 12th January 2008

The most widely belief among students is that "Finance and Accounts are one and the same". The session on "Financial Management" taken by Prof. Pooja Gupta (Trainer and Adjunct faculty at various B-Schools); who addressed the students of Fall Winter 2007/09 batch on 12th January 2008; was aimed at undoing such ideas and marking clear cut differences between finance and accounting. The session took place on  Students got a chance to understand the scope of Finance beyond the horizon of Accounts. Even though Finance and Accounts are not independent as argued by Prof. Gupta; but they do have differences when it comes to objectivities and functionality. Moreover, Ms. Gupta discussed the importance of the Time Value of Money and the ideas relating to inflation. There were numerous examples given on the power of compounding so that students understand the importance of saving and investments.

Motivation
Date : 15th December 2007

Motivation is the drive from within, an urge to perform, the force that drives you towards superior performance. There are three types of motivation, Push, Pull and Self Motivation. Mrs. Sally Thomas interacted with the students of the SS0709 batch on December 15th. the main objective of the session was to boost the motivational level of the students and to make them self motivated. She started with glimpses from one of the articles in TOI stating " Everyday we are living a dying life". she gave some live examples and how self motivation can change someone completely. she also spoke about passion and how passion can even change your destiny. The students were fascinated with her speech as she spoke about the importance of self motivation and how to get self motivated.

"PATENT RIGHTS & CYBER LAWS"
Date: 21st November 2007

As far as the efforts of government are concerned, the protection of intellectual property rights in India continues to be strengthened. There is a well-established statutory, administrative and judicial framework to safeguard rights, whether they relate to patents, trademarks, copyright or industrial designs. However there is a need for awareness of laws and procedures relating to the same. Mr. Ramakrishna Srinivasan (Practicing Advocate) took a session on 21st November 2007 to emphasize on the same with the students of Spring Summer 07/09 batch. He started with an introduction and detailing of requirement of such laws and how the laws have evolved over time. With students warming up to the discussion, there were some insights given on Cyber Laws and its need in India. Students could relate well to the examples given by Mr. Srinivasan as he brought out the uses of Patent Rights and Cyber Laws to end the session.

"LEADERSHIP"
Date: 29th October 2007

As a part of our continuous effort towards 360 degrees growth of our students, Mr. Prashanth Bangalore (Poject Manager – SAP Labs) took a session on "Leadership Skills" with the Fall Winter 2007/09 Batch on 29th October 2007. The session was aimed at discussing the students' perception on various leadership skills that are required in present corporate world. Mr Bangalore started with a simple question: "Who is a leader?". It was found that even though every student had an idea but didn't know the exact definition and importance of a leader. The interaction continued for 90 minutes wherein Mr. Bangalore showcased live examples of successful leaders and explained the essentials and abilities that each powerful leader possessed.

Topic: Corporate Social Responsibility
Guest Speaker: Mr. Krishna Madhav, Director CSR Initiatives, Bhoruka Group of Companies.
Date: 23rd june 2007

Concept of CSR: CSR or Corporate Social Responsibility is a concept that signifies the societal commitment of the present day corporate houses. It’s a realization of the corporate world, about giving back something to the society, in which they are operating rather than focusing solely on profit, at the expense of societal welfare. CSR is slowly but surely emerging in today’s corporate world, in a big way and more and more companies are taking it up as their number one objective of existence. Many companies are using CSR as a key business strategy that will provide them with a competitive advantage over others. CSR is becoming more important than profit maximization in the present corporate world.

The Event
On 23rd of June, 2007, a lecture was organized for the SS 2006/08 specialization batch. The lecture was all about making the students aware about the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility, its importance to the industries and how an MBA graduate can make a career out of it. Generally a Master of Social Work Graduate was preferred to work in this kind of a profile, but now, with the increase in demand as well as the orientation of CSR towards Marketing, more and more MBAs are in demand.

The Lecture started exactly at 10.30 AM, as per the schedule and went on till 12.30 PM. Our Guest Speaker, Mr. Krishna Madhav, threw light on the general concept, the evolution of this concept, its benefits and how this concept has taken a global shape in today’s era of Globalization. Around 80 students participated in this lecture from the SS 2006/08 specialization batch, who came up with some intelligent questions at the end of the lecture. This lecture have opened up a new opportunityr path for many students who were not aware of it till now.

GOP
The latest lecture in the Global Outreach Programme at IIPM hosted Prof. Frank Schulz from the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley on the 7th of June 2007 at the campus. Prof. Schulz enlightened the students with his research on ‘Deliberate Practice: Creating Superior Performance Organizations’ The students got a lot of practical insights into how to be good at acquiring expertise in their career and personal lives and Prof. Schulz enthusiastically involved them during the interactive question answer session. The professor was visibly enthused and even remarked that he was so excited to interact with young management graduates across multiple Indian cities that he felt no less than a rock star! The students sure will corroborate that they had a ‘rocking’ time learning how to acquire expertise.