The Journey of Mr. Smeer Walia, co-founder of ‘The Smart Cube’, as captured by Monika Sharma(IWSB pg12).

Mr. Sameer Walia, co-founder of ‘The Smart Cube’

This was a great opportunity for all of us to have a face-to-face interaction with a person of such a stature in my journey series. Mr. Sameer Walia co-founded “The Smart Cube” (TSC) in 2003 and has built the organization from a scratch over the last 4 years. He currently takes care of the India operations and is focused on developing a strong capability for the firm.

He started his words with the ultimate secret of success, which we all know ,but we never implement it in our life that is “FAITH”.  Consultancy is a desk based business in which we need computers and proper phone line but while starting this venture there was nothing with him, except his Faith on himself. Before actually starting up with his venture, Mr. Walia and his business partner outsource their business from Evalueserve and became their client.  And one fine day they decided to set up their own venture. He quit his job on sept 23,2003. And after a lot of planning he started up with his own office. He believed “whatever you do, do well”. He gave an example of that, In his office 40% of his investment was gone in a single generator, because he wanted to create an environment which would lead to increase in productivity. And the result was that, the people from city bank, world banks and London business school joined them, there was of course more analytical rigor. Their planning shifted from staring of the first year to its end, at first they planned that it is not necessary that they will succeed in first year, so failure is not a problem, but eventually they made a go for it, make or break situation and they succeeded. One more different key to their success was they didn’t have investors they own all their investment and they never run out of cash

But it was not about success only. They suffered several setbacks too.

First setback for them was, when 18 analysts out of 50-60 in numbers left them to Hyderabad to set up their own ventures. It was a huge loss for them, both emotionally and financially. Second setback was when they kicked out Sky which was an important client for them, having a turnover of $ 2.8 million, whatsoever were the issues behind it he didn’t share with us but again their business suffered. Next set back was Ceiling of their office in which, they invested Rs 2.5 crore and it was a salvage value. They went to Supreme Court for this. Their cash reserves went down to zero but they get the relief for 9 months.

Then he proceed his speech by showing his confidence that now they are strong enough to fight with any kind of problems as they have learnt a lot in this period. Of course they walked two steps forward and one step backward during those unfortunate periods but, this is a part of business, therefore you should take setbacks very calmly, and things will go on. You need challenges in life of success., It’s all about how you take it. This must not be wrong to say “There is a will, there is a Way”.

His opinion on entrepreneurship was:

It’s not about being an entrepreneur, one should be entrepreneurial. Which means being resourceful. sNo, “NO” should be there. He shared his experience with us, that while he was traveling to the Koraput his train was caught in cyclone and they stuck there for many hours. Then they saw a train which was moving in opposite direction. They caught that train and of course they didn’t reach their destination, but at least they moved from there and then took some other way of reaching there. So he always remains resourceful, so he was extremely entrepreneurial. He said even as a student we can be extremely entrepreneurial. We could be resourceful always. If we are lazy, we can’t help our self so we should be hardworking and last thing Entrepreneurship comes with huge personal sacrifices.

He also gave us ingredients of success.

There is no Magic Mantra. It’s all about luck. He also believed, there is nothing like permanent bad luck. Both good and bad luck lasts at sometime. Hard work and perseverance changes your bad luck. He gave examples of Shahrukh Khan, Akshay Kumar and Rajnikant that they didn’t succeeded in one day. Akshay had 17 successive flops, but it was his bad luck, by his 18th film he was back again. It’s not about bad luck but It’s about how you face it.

About taking risk, He said:

In binary situation, it’s easy to say but difficult to live that moment, when u go to minus actually. Taking risk is core thing.

About making Decision and living consequences, he gave his views as:

Decision making is a natural procedure. While he take decisions he know it that  out of 10 ,2 of them are going to be wrong .Once you made a decision good or bad you should live with that. This kind of attitude makes life happier. It is worse to taking back your decision. People shy from a conflicting situation, but they have to take tough decisions.

Then he told about humbleness, as If we treat all as equal. If we are humble we can do many things in life. The more humanity we have, more grounded we are, more grasp we will be having in our business. These are small things which will go a long, long way. We should have ability to connect dots together. Environment should be perceived, economic and social. Analytically it’s called Trend analysis.

He gave his views on ability to with stand adversity.

He said he didn’t think success requires high IQ, It’s about high EQ, and Emotional Quotient should be high. If it is not increasing, 5-10 yrs from now, we will less likely to succeed.

He spoke about personal sacrifices also.

Personal sacrifices, includes health but biggest scarifies is time. Even we have to sacrifices time for our family too. We have to sleep less and less sleep will lead to certain consequences.  Our body is unchangeable, so we should take care of it properly, it’s very important. He said, we should be very detail focused. God lies in details, a lot people do yoyo, Up and down. Consistency matters a lot and it brings in people’s trust.

Dark side of Entrepreneur.

Speaking in his language, first of all it’s not about Money. Money is a driver, the joy and satisfaction that lead to drive. Money part is not as glamorous as it looks from outside.  There are lots of heartburns, tears. It sounds glamorous from outside. It takes away your comfort, it’s very lonely ride as an entrepreneur. It’s stressful, no back outs. It can make you a tough person. You have to take hard decisions, even if you don’t want to, as business demands it. Your antenna should always up, you can’t trust anyone. Your life will be completely changed.

This interesting session was concluded with a query session in which Mr. Walia cleared all the doubts and curiosity of the students, by enriching them with various insights of professional as well as personal life.

(The article is part of  ‘My Journey Series’  at IWSB)

‘Summer Internship – A waste of time?’ by Prof. Arindam Lahiri, Executive Director, Indus World School of Business



Does summer internship really contribute substantially to the learning process of a business management graduate?

There are arguments on both sides and both views can be logical. Before we delve into this, let us take a look at the process of management education. During the first year of the usual 2-year MBA programme, a student is exposed to the various functions of an organization. This prepares the student for the foundations of management theory. However, management education in hardly academic in nature – it has a strong focus on applying the same in real life situation and this transition is difficult.

My own view is that the summer internship provides you with the best opportunity to attempt at making this transition. And most students fail while making this transition, as this is the first time that most of them are attempting such a transition. Yes, even for the students having pre-programme work experience – since it is the first time that they will attempt to put management theory (which most of them are not aware of, except for undergraduate management students) into practice.

It is this failure that raises a question mark over the entire practice of summer internship. And most students do not fail only once at this summer internship. They fail a number of times subsequently in their first job. This also raises another issue about a large percentage of management graduates leaving their first job within the first 12 months – we will not get into this here.

Learning through failure is an important pedagogical tool. A summer internship allows student to get frustrated and underscores the challenge of application of management theories in practice. Such an exposure, if absorbed internally in a constructive manner, can be one of the most important learning for the student. The student, with the help from his faculty members, must analyze the challenges of application and failure points. Understanding the constraints and parameters within which various theoretical constructs are applied is important. And without repeated practice, this is difficult to achieve.

However, once word of caution at this point, one must be careful about internships where the student is completely left on his own and not challenged to deliver. In such a case, opportunities to fail, is minimal. Though the internship experience may be comfortable, the learning may be incomplete.

Using the opportunity of summer internship to understand how organizations work, especially how people in the organizations behave, is a must learn for all management students. It also helps the students to establish some useful networking relations. At the same time, it allows the student to gain self-confidence by comparing his own efforts with other existing employees in the organization. It helps a student identify his strength and weakness for effective working in the organization.

A summer internship may add more value to people who have worked for less than 2 years with an organization. The challenge in most cases, result from expectation mismatch of the student and the organization. The core objective is that the need for summer internship is of the student and not necessarily a need of the organization. The onus is on the student to make the most out of this opportunity.

A summer internship has been a life-changing experience for a large number of students (and these students are not necessarily the students with pre-placement offers from organizations). It impacts the choice of organization, functions and the pace of career growth of an individual.

‘National Training Workshop on Personality Development’ at IWSB.

Indus World School of Business (IWSB), Greater Noida conducted a Two-Day National Training Workshop on Personality Development from 20-21^st October 2010. Peoples from all works of life like students, Library professionals, and academician attended the workshop. Around 75 people attended the workshop. In the Inaugural Session Chief guest Dr. Janardhan Jha kicked off the workshop by lightning the lamp along with Satya Narayanan R who is the founder and chairman of IWSB, Executive Director Arindam Lahiri IWSB and Dr. Rajesh Kumar. Janardan Jha, who is presently Director, Amity center for innovation and New Concept, Amity University Noida Uttar Pradesh also shared some words of wisdom. Dr. Rajesh Kumar, Organizing Secretary gave the introductory remarks. The first Speaker on the first day was Dr. Rakesh Kumar Bhatt. Dr. R.K Bhatt who is presently serving as Associate Professor and Head, Department of Library and Information Science, University of Delhi touched on the key points of the Personality such as Interpersonal Skills, Communication Skills, Basic Etiquettes, Body Language, Time Management, Stress Management etc. After that Sreenivasan Ramakrishnan, Co-Founder IWSB and Career Launcher took the session. This was mostly an interactive session, where he used many tools to help the participants understand more about their personality. Like how ambitious one is? How much growth oriented one is? and many more such traits about one’s personality. Overall the main motive was to get a clear picture of one’s personality and where all is the scope of improvement lies. Prof. Arindam Lahiri took the next session. His topic was the Locus of control. This session also used loco inventory tools to give a clear picture of one’s locus of control. The second day started with Dr. C.V Ramanan’s session. Dr. Ramanan is the Director at National Academy for Training and Development, ISTD. He shared with the participants the unique concept of Total Quality Person (TQP) and how one can be a Total Quality Person. The session was full of very interesting and fabulous stories. It was really a very enlightening session and the end of which Dr. Ramanan also shared how one can achieve what one want to in his life. Dr. Jaideep Sharma who is Associate Professor Social Sciences, IGNOU, conducted the last session. He concentrated on the topic of competency mapping of professionals. He mentioned about three key attributes knowledge, skills and attitude. These three play a key role in an individual’s efficiency and his competency mapping. The two-day workshop ended by Prof. Arindam Lahiri’s Valedictory remarks. Dr. Rajesh Kumar delivered a vote of thanks. Overall the workshop was a grand success.

Research paper from Prof. Arindam Lahiri(Executive Director – IWSB) got selected at IIM Ahmedabad.

Title of paper:  Role of Vocational Education and Training in mitigating the challenges of inclusive growth in emerging economies

About the article:

The paper examines the challenges of capacity building and its linkage to the overall challenges of inclusive growth in emerging economies. The Indian formal education sector has not included vocational education and training (VET) as an inherent part of capacity building. Over a period of six decades post-independence, the initial focus has been lost and today we end up with a capacity mismatch of VET capacity in formal sector vis-à-vis the workforce that enters the Indian labour market for the first time. The case studies include the social impact of the capacity development initiatives and compare it with such initiatives being undertaken with other emerging economies around the globe. The research firmly emphasizes that inclusive growth and empowerment in emerging economies can happen through vocational education and training.

Research paper from Prof. Raju Majumdar got selected at IIM Calcutta.

IWSB congratulates Prof. Raju Majumdar (Faculty Finance, IWSB) on this wonderful achievement.  The abstract of the research paper is given below. The paper will be presented in International Finance Conference to be held at IIM Calcutta from 9th to 12th January.

Abstract:-

Agency, Asymmetric Information and Market Timing Theories of Capital Structure: A Reinterpretation of the Relation Between Growth and Corporate Borrowing

Financing growth opportunities is one among the biggest challenges that a firm face. Corporate finance theory, based on agency conflicts and asymmetric information issues predicts an inverse relation between the two; empirical analysis of firm’s borrowing behavior also corroborates the assertion of theory.This paper develops an alternative interpretation of the observed inverse relation based on the market timing theory of capital structure and provides empirical evidence to substantiate the claim that incorporating growth in terms of market-to-book ratio does in fact measure alternative theories that have varied interpretations based on firm specific micro factors as well as macro economic factors. Consequently, in order to devise a conclusive and non-overlapping test of theory there is an urgent need to revisit the issue of firm growth and its estimation, as well as reinterpret existing findings in the light of our findings.

Yet another Milestone! IWSB’ians Bags 1st Prize at IIM-B in RMAI(Rural Marketing Association of India) Competition.

From the horse’s Mouth:-

The winning of a gold award in a competition organized by a prestigious organization Rural Marketing Association of India (RMAI) at IIM, Bangalore was a great moment for us. The competition was organized for management students from across the country that did their summer trainings/ projects in rural domain, catering to the markets in rural domain. Our project aimed at setting up an enterprise in the rural setup, an enterprise that was setup to produce sanitary napkins by rural women, who were both the producers as well as consumers of the product. The concept of inclusive marketing was actually practiced in the project by including the consumers at every point in the value chain.

The competition was held on 23^rd September, 2010 at IIM Bangalore’s Management Development Center’s auditorium. The competition started at 10:45 a.m. with the Co-coordinator’s address. The initial presentation was given by the team from IIM Calcutta, followed by the team from SCMLD, Pune & GNIMS, Mumbai. In the tea break, which was immediately after these two presentations, gave us a chance to interact with the teammates of the rest colleges. It made us feel proud that we were competing with the top notch colleges of the country & were at a platform, where the name of our college was unheard of. Immense confidence was generated out of having come at a place where our unheard institute made the mark. Our presentation was scheduled at 6^th place, post lunch. Till lunch, 3 more presentations were given by SPJIMR, IIMI & IIMC. The post lunch session started with our presentation, when the chief guest (Prof. Pankaj Chandra, Director, IIM-B) & eminent judges arrived. The final presentation was given by IIML. Post presentations came the most awaited moment, the award felicitation. Prof. Chandra delivered words of wisdom to all the participants, post which the awards were finally announced. The list came as: bronze- IIMI, silver-IIML & the gold winner is IWSB, Greater Noida. We were overjoyed with the results & it was like a dream come true for us, having won a competition, defeating the stalwarts of management education at their backyard.

The feedback & compliments given by the judges post ceremony were highly encouraging for us. Prof. Chandra said “I am really proud of you & would wish you both to take this project at national level. I would be very happy to help you people at every step of your journey in the project. Feel free to call me up anytime”. He gave us his card. Mr. Khurram Askari, the coordinator of the competition and CEO, Insight Outreach said, “Your project was the only project which was selected unanimously for first position by all the judges, though there were debates for the 2^nd & 3^rd positions”. A lot of positive feedback by rest participants & other eminent guests further boosted our confidence & gave us the strength that we must look forward on strengthening this project further. The whole competition was a moment of joy & confidence for us.

The details of the 7 participating teams:

1.) Nitesh Yadav  – IIMC

Title -Unlocking the rural opportunities in East India with focus on crackers & cookies category

2.) Angad Singh Uberoi & Kuldeep Singh –  SCMLD – Pune & GNIMS – Mumbai

Title – Study of haats as a marketing hub for FMCG companies

3.) Mohit  Sareen – S.P. Jain Institute of Management & Research, Mumbai

Title – Strategic Business Plan for RUDI in Ahmedabad

4.) Sandeep Nair – IIMB

Title – Brand Revival of Asataf –  A National Rural Marketing Campaign

5.) Abhishek Mittal on behalf of Amit Chhabra & Tanvi Dhamija – IIM -Indore

Title – IT Enabled solutions for financial Inclusion

6.) Ankita Gupta & Shobhit Jain  – Indus World School of Busines(IWSB)

Title – Developing & executing a complete business model for an emerging enterprise Sahyog

7.) Ashish Sharma – IIML

Title – Understand and analyze the attitude and usage behaviour of rural consumers in Andhra Pradesh & Maharashtra and develop a marketing mix for the rural markets.

The panel of judges consisted of:

1. Mr. R.V.Rajan – Chairman of Anugrah Madison, Chennai
2. Professor Mithileshwar Jha – IIM Bangalore
3. Harish Bijoor – CEO Harish Bijoor Consults Inc, Bangalore

Mr. Khurram Askari, CEO, Insight Outreach Pvt. Ltd. was the coordinator for the competition.

Ankita Gupta

Shobhit Jain

IWSB – Seeking Leadership in a changing World – Satya Narayanan R (Chairman, Board of Governors – IWSB)

IWSB – Seeking Leadership in a changing world

The world is changing. Leadership in a changing world comes to those who are anchored in the tomorrow. Not the yesterday. On the business side, I am sure you are anchored in the future. Similarly, on the education side, IWSB is deeply and singularly anchored in the future –  the world of entrepreneurship which is where the world is moving, according to me.

To us at IWSB, entrepreneurship or entrepreneurial leadership is a fundamental behavioural model, not an activity!

A Testimony :

As I sit down to write this note, I receive a heartwarming news from Arindam Lahiri, Dean – IWSB that our PG-11 students, Ankita and Shobhit, who were at IIM Bangalore in the finals of the RMAI competition on the summer projects that were rural India centric, have actually been crowned the winners. So, the winners podium read as  – IWSB (First Prize), IIM-Lucknow (Second) and IIM-Indore (Third). Needless to say, the project was on rural transformation in India through entrepreneurship and innovation.

This is just an early testimony to the value IWSB would bring to the world of management education this decade. My conviction comes from an undeniable truth of the world – The Change!

How has the world changed ?Over the past two decades, the world has shifted from being an administered society to an entrepreneurial world!  The change is far more remarkable in the developing world than we care to take note of!

66% (13 out of 20) of the top-20 Fortune500 companies have changed over the past decade and a half. The MarketCap leaders or stars in India today  were unknown small and medium enterprises even a decade ago.

80% of the enterprise wealth represented by the BSE  is contributed by just about 200 stocks and half of these did not even exist on the stock market or were miniscule just a decade ago. Nine of the 25 wealthiest people / families of the world are Indians this year compared to none in 1996.

There is only one common theme to all these shifts in the world – Entrepreneurial Leadership.

What about the future ?

There is an observation that the richest man of 2030 is not born yet and the idea with which s/he will make that fortune is not known yet.  Even today, over 90 per cent of the business entities in India would be classified as ‘Small and Medium Entreprises’.  A visible percentage of these SME of today will emerge as the star companies or organizations of tomorrow.

Focus on the Emerging and gast growing Companies :

I believe that the top notch B-school of 2020 will get there by focusing and contributing to the world of entrepreneurship. These contributions would come in various forms – knowledge creation through active research,  entrepreneurial education, real world incubation, growth support to the CEOs, in-take of students linked to this goal,  reaching out to the ‘Bharat’ and so on.

IWSB already has a head-start in this space. Right from inception, IWSB has focused on this sweet spot singularly and the dividends are beginning to come our way!  The red carpet at IWSB rolls out to the CEOs of young and dynamic companies such as Nettpositive, Pinstorm, Netambit, Infoedge, SKS microfinance, Educomp, Career Launcher, Gaja Capital, Core Tree, and so on.

Half of these entities are still unknown to the readers of ‘The Economic Times’ or a CNBC TV-18 viewer.  However, IWSB students are already working in these stars of tomorrow.

At the same time, large entities who continue to focus on growth love recruiting entrepreneurial youngsters at any stage of their growth. Perhaps, Google’s success can be half-explained by their DNA that is closest to entrepreneurship even at this stage and size!

Any CEO or head of HR who is intent upon bringing in the talent that comes with the self-starting entrepreneurial attitude, values that works for the morrow and the work-ethic that is contagiously positive cannot afford to miss out on the youngsters from IWSB.

Of course, our students are our best ambassadors!  Now, We have a few CEOs too!

Sincerely

Satya Narayanan R