Gunjan Gulati Member, Public Relations Team Shailesh J. Mehta School of Management IIT - Bombay

HR Continuum 2009

SUNDAY SEPT 27th, 2009, SJMSOM, IIT BOMBAY
Attended by luminaries from the Human Resources domain the students of Shailesh J.Mehta School of Management successfully conducted their Annual HR Conclave – The HR Continuum 2009. The Continuum is a rolling seminar series that is organized every year, by the students of SJMSOM, IIT Bombay. Each of these seminars focuses on issues and challenges faced by a specific management function and aims at drawing insights from the knowledge and experience of the speakers. The seminars are well attended by delegates from different organizations, our distinguished alumni, and students from various B-Schools. The HR Continuum is the 6th and last in this very illustrious series of Continuums 2009 which was conducted by SJMSOM, IIT Bombay.

The Theme

Today companies are trying to explore new markets, while consolidating the existing ones. The development and preservation of high caliber people is a source of competitive advantage for any business and the HR personnel can be viewed as the axle in the moving machinery of any organization. Thus, the field of human resources is of great importance in today’s environment. An array of eminent speakers expounded on the theme “Managing talent for Strategic advantage” in the context of their individual domains of expertise.

 The Event

The continuum began with the inaugural address by Professor Anand Patwardhan from SJMSOM. He set the tone of the event by posing some thought provoking questions about the role of theory in practice and the dilemma faced by the HR department in the industry.
The keynote speaker for the day was Mr. Yogi Sriram, currently working as executive VP, Corporate HR and Personnel at Larsen & Toubro Limited. He provided an insight into what is different and what remains the same in the changing economy while competing for talent. It was followed by a highly interactive session by Ms. Somna Singh who currently heads HR in the Wholesale Banking division of Standard Chartered Bank. She discussed the challenges faced by the HR departments in the industry today in terms of rethinking employee engagement and managing motivation to enhance productivity.
Then was the time for the panel discussion with esteemed luminaries, each representing a different sector and hence providing a varied perspective to the topic for the discussion "Human resource: The key to success in dynamic times”. The discussion was moderated by Mr. Sangram Tambe, Director, Group Human Resources, Piramal Enterprises Ltd.  The panel included Ms Somna Singh of Standard Chartered bank, Mr. Sanjay Mathur, director, Human Resources, Petroleum division of Reliance Industries, Ms Ritu Anand - Deputy Head Global HR & Talent Management TCS and  Mr. Rajesh Ramanathan, Vice president- ‘People & Talent’ at Cadbury India. The panel saw opportunities in the current turmoil for both the organizations and employees to learn share and grow. The panel agreed on the availability of better performance management processes and better learning opportunities for an employee.

The panel discussion was followed by a very riveting session by Mr. Rajeev Dubey, President - HR, After-Market & Corporate Services, Mahindra & Mahindra. He provided an interesting perspective how to unleash the human potential. He talked about how trust, belief, inspiration and vision can help leaders and managers tap their employees’ potential to the maximum. It was followed by a session on how to manage talent during recession by Dr. Asit Mohapatra, Director HR-Textiles at Raymond Ltd. He provided an insight into challenges faced by HR professionals including evolving communication strategies and issues in motivating and engaging employees. The last session of the day was conducted by Ms. Hastha Sivaramankrishnan, CEO, MaFoi Global Search Services Limited & Director of MaFoi Management Consulting Service Limited on the very crucial topic of ‘Importance of succession planning: key to grooming leaders’.
All the dignitaries present gave very interesting talks embellished with real-life examples, which kept the audience engaged and involved through the presentations. All the talks were followed by interactive Q&A sessions wherein the students got an opportunity to pose pertinent questions to the distinguished speakers.

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Operations Continuum 2009

SATURDAY SEPT 26th, 2009, SJMSOM, IIT BOMBAY
Attended by luminaries from the Operations domain the students of Shailesh J.Mehta School of Management successfully conducted their Annual Operations Conclave – The Operations Continuum 2009. The Continuum is a rolling seminar series that is organized every year, by the students of SJMSOM, IIT Bombay. Each of these seminars focuses on issues and challenges faced by a specific management function and aims at drawing insights from the knowledge and experience of the speakers. The seminars are well attended by delegates from different organizations, the distinguished alumni of SJMSOM and students from various B-Schools across India.

The Theme

With a firm belief that novelty in the supply chain is the best possible competitive advantage a company can get, along with the added benefit of enhanced customer service, OPERA, the operations Club of SJMSOM  presented the Operations Continuum  2009  on 26th Sept on the theme, “Innovation in supply chain management: An answer to uncertainty”. 

The Event

The Operations Continuum 2009 began with the inaugural address by Professor G.K Adil from SJMSOM. He set the tone of the event by posing some thought provoking questions about the challenges in achieving operational efficiency and the hurdles faced by the Operations department in various Industry verticals.
The sessions started on a grand note with the keynote address by one of the distinguished alumnus of SJMSOM, Mr. Sanjeev Chachondia, Ex-CEO of Loop Mobile, who gave a panoramic view of the telecom sector in India including challenges in the current scenario and strategies for future growth. The people aspect of supply chain management was elaborated upon by Dr. Anant Mahale, Country Manager, i2 technologies wherein he talked about the importance of human capital in attaining excellence in supply chain operations. Mr. VGS Mani, Country logistics Manager, Nokia  took things forward by touching upon the 3Ps i.e. Products, Process and People and he delivered an exciting talk on the impact of these three factors on the overall supply chain, putting the Mobile Handset Industry in focus. Next in proceedings was the talk by Mr. P.S. Easwaran, Director, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India Private Limited, on managing Supply chains in volatile times by going back to basics. He emphasized on revisiting supply chain strategies and operations in difficult times through the case study approach.
The post lunch sessions started with insights on collaborations and the role of IT in achieving the same. Mr. Sukanta Padhy, Head-Supply chain, Cummins (I) Ltd, lucidly explained how collaborations can be used for achieving competitive advantage and he briefly touched upon the future of industry collaborations in supply chain operations. The next speaker, Mr. Pankaj Gupta, General Manager, Supply Chain Operations, HUL elaborated on the role of Supply chain in attaining competitive advantage and the talk was substantiated by a gamut of real life case studies featuring products across the various categories of HUL. The last session of the day was conducted by Mr. Deepak Chibba, Executive VP of Mahindra and Mahindra who spoke very eloquently about the challenges that exist on a real time basis when working in a global framework. He provided a holistic perspective on the global supply chain, covering topics ranging from global sourcing to softer issues like leadership.
All the dignitaries present gave very interesting talks embellished with real-life examples, which kept the audience engaged and involved through the presentations. All the talks were followed by interactive Q&A sessions wherein the students got an opportunity to pose pertinent questions to the distinguished speakers.

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Finance Continuum 2009

SATURDAY JULY 18, 2009, SJMSOM, IIT BOMBAY
Attended by stalwarts from the finance domain and abuzz with media attention, the students of Shailesh J.Mehta School of Management successfully conducted their Annual Finance Conclave – The Finance Continuum 2009. The Continuum is a rolling seminar series that is organized every year, by the students of SJMSOM, IIT Bombay. Each Continuum brings together eminent speakers from the industry as well as academia. These seminars focus on issues and challenges faced by the Indian Industry. The students benefit from the valuable insights gathered during the interactions with the speakers. The seminars are well attended by delegates from prominent organizations, distinguished alumni, students from other B-schools and the various departments of IIT Bombay.

The Event

The Finance Continuum is hosted by Finesse, the finance club of SJMSOM. The theme for Finance Continuum 2009 was “Changing Global Financial Landscape: Opportunities and challenges for India” The event was inaugurated by Dr Karuna Jain, Head of the Dept, Shailesh J.Mehta School of Management, IIT Bombay. In her opening speech she spoke about how the School has been instrumental in nurturing technologically equipped future mangers. The event was graced by eminent speakers from all segments of the financial industry, culminating in a day of wholesome knowledge for the finance enthusiast. In all nine trend setters from the finance domain shared their views and insights with the students of SJMSOM, IITB through talks and a panel discussion. The honourable guests at the Continuum were -

• Mr. Anup Bagchi, Executive Director, ICICI Securities
• Mr. Somak Ghosh, Group President-Corporate Finance and Development Banking, Yes Bank
• Mr. Ajay Garg, Managing Director and CEO, Equirus Capital
• Mr. Nirakar Pradhan, Chief Investment Officer, Future Generali
• Mr. Prachetas Raikar, Head, Global Banking Risk, HSBC
• Mr. Abhijit Phadnis, Former Director, Head Finance Administration and Operations, Credit Suisse First Boston (I) and Phd Scholar at SJMSOM, IITB
• Mr. Naveen Gupta, Head, Private Bank Treasury, Standard Chartered Bank
• Mr. Anant Rao, Dy Head, Derivatives, SBI Cap Securities
• Mr. Ananda Bhoumik, Senior Director, Fitch Ratings
• Mr. Anil Nair was the moderator for the panel discussion. He is a Business Journalist and Executive Editor with United Business Media.

The talks

The Keynote address was delivered by Anup Bagchi, Executive Director, ICICI Securities. His talk was centred on the key takeaways from the Global Financial Crisis. He stressed upon the need to identify and track the lead indicators to any crisis rather than focussing on the lag indicators. He discussed about the impact that consumption and saving behaviour have on the entire economy. “Never lose the opportunity in a crisis”, was his key message. He said that developments in the real economy and the financial markets point to a period of moderation.
Somak Ghosh, Group President-Corporate Finance and Development Banking, Yes Bank spoke about Inclusive Finance and converting challenges into opportunities. He stressed on the need for market based solutions catering to ‘bottom of the pyramid’ businesses. He spoke about the need to provide a conducive investment environment in the businesses of Healthcare, Education, Financial Services and Retail & Logistics. He discussed the opportunities provided by microfinance and said that there was still a long way to go before Microsavings and Microinsurance options can reach the masses. On a parting note he said that “BOP markets offer commercially viable opportunities with significant growth potential and positive externalities”.
Naveen Gupta, Head, Private Bank Treasury, Standard Chartered Bank spoke about the opportunities to innovate, introspect and invent which are the outcomes of the Global Financial Crisis. He stressed on the importance of Risk Frameworks and the need for a paradigm shift towards realism. A few of the challenges facing India are uncertain consumption patterns, and the problems in keeping up infrastructure spending.
Anant Rao, Dy Head, Derivatives, SBI Cap Securities conducted a workshop on Equity Derivates. He gave a very enlightening talk on the derivatives market in India and the students were thrilled to receive a first hand account from a practitioner’s perspective.
Mr. Ananda Bhoumik, Senior Director, Fitch Ratings gave a talk on the risk perspective of the challenges and opportunities for India in the changing Global Financial landscape. He discussed in detail the impact of the volatility in asset prices on the financial domain as a whole.

The panel discussion

The thematic talks were accompanied by a panel discussion moderated by Anil Nair, a Business Journalist and Executive Editor with United Business Media. The panellists were Ajay Garg, Managing Director and CEO, Equirus Capital; Nirakar Pradhan, Chief Investment Officer, Future Generali; Prachetas Raikar, Head, Global Banking Risk, HSBC and Abhijit Phadnis, Former Director, Head Finance Administration and Operations, Credit Suisse First Boston (I).
The discussion was focussed on the Next step forward for the Financial Sector in India.  The panellists spoke on an array of topics ranging from microfinance to the realty sector in India. The discussion was engaging and insightful and the students benefited immensely from the interactive Q&A session, in which each speaker provided insights from his area own area of expertise.
On the whole, the continuum proved to be a power-pack of knowledge with the industry leaders dishing out ample information to whet the appetite of the upcoming finance wizards.

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Marketing Continuum 2009

SUNDAY JULY 19, 2009, SJMSOM, IIT BOMBAY
Attended by stalwarts from the Marketing and communications domain and abuzz with media attention, the students of Shailesh J.Mehta School of Management successfully conducted their Annual Marketing Conclave – The Marketing Continuum 2009. The Continuum is a rolling seminar series that is organized every year, by the students of SJMSOM, IIT Bombay. Each Continuum brings together eminent speakers from the industry as well as academia. These seminars focus on issues and challenges faced by the Indian Industry. The students benefit from the valuable insights gathered during the interactions with the speakers. The seminars are well attended by delegates from prominent organizations, distinguished alumni, students from other B-schools and the various departments of IIT Bombay.

The Event

The Marketing Continuum is hosted by Marktrix, the marketing club of SJMSOM. The theme for the Marketing Continuum 2009 was “New Age Marketing - Challenges and Strategies” The event was inaugurated by Dr. Karuna Jain, Head of the Dept, Shailesh J. Mehta School of Management, IIT Bombay. The event included discussions, lectures and business games covering a wide range of topics like relationship marketing, rural marketing, interactive marketing, experiential marketing & technology marketing.
The honourable guests at the Marketing Continuum were -

• Mr. Paritosh Joshi, CEO, Star CJ Network India Pvt. Ltd.
• Dr. (Mrs.) Pragnya Ram - Group Executive President, Corporate Communication, Aditya Birla Group
• Mr. Sudhanshu Vats - Vice President, Hindustan Unilever Ltd
• Ms. Darshana Bhatt, Marketing Head, Loop Telecom
• Mr. K V Sridhar - National Creative Director, Leo Burnett India
• Mr. Niteen Bhagwat, Executive Director and CEO, Cogito Consulting

The talks

The Keynote address was delivered by Mr. Paritosh Joshi, President, Star India Pvt. Ltd. His talk was centred on New Age Marketing theories and practices. He spoke about the shift of companies towards customer empowerment and co-creation. He stressed that around 40 percent of new product innovations now come from the customer and he also spoke about the benefits of crowd-sourcing. He gave a fitting start to what soon turned out to be a day of novel discussions and interactive sessions between the students and practitioners of marketing.
The next talk was delivered by Dr. (Mrs) Pragnya Ram - Group Executive President, Corporate Communication, Aditya Birla Group.  She took up the example of the Aditya Birla Group as a case for Image Identity and Reputation Management. She shared some enlightening insights on the criticality of communications and the universe of brand delivery.
Mr. Sudhanshu Vats - Vice President, Hindustan Unilever Ltd spoke about Holistic Brand building. He focused his talk on the fact that brands have to stand for value, benefit society and provide meaning to the consumer. He stressed on the importance of doing well by doing good.
Darshana Bhatt, Marketing Head, Loop Telecom spoke about new age marketing mantras and the significance of Customer Relationship Management. She took up interesting examples from different sectors to highlight changing consumer preferences and the role of social media marketing in the making and managing of brands.
Mr. K V Sridhar - National Creative Director, Leo Burnett India held a very interactive session for the students on New age media and Advertising wherein he highlighted the changing rules of advertising and the new media available to reach out to the entire spectrum of consumers. His talk was made more interesting by videos and movie clips on the conjunction of the internet with advertising.
An interesting talk on Social Media Analytics was conducted by Mr. Niteen Bhagwat, Executive Director and CEO, Cogito Consulting. He spoke about how blogs and Consumer Generated Media are becoming a genuine source of information. He spoke about the relevance of new age advertising channels and the methods employed by brands to exploit these new avenues.
On the whole, the continuum brought out a melange of ideas, with luminaries from the corporate arena getting bowled over by the upcoming marketing wizards.

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EVENT - Finance and Marketing Continuums 2009

Continuum is a rolling seminar series that is organized every year by the students of SJMSOM, IIT Bombay. Each Continuum brings together eminent speakers from the industry as well as academia. These seminars focus on issues and challenges faced by management functions. The seminars are well attended by delegates from different organizations, our distinguished alumni, and students from various business schools and from other departments of IIT Bombay. Continuum series also feature various competitions among students, like online quizzes and business games.

Finance Continuum 2009 (18th July, 2009, Saturday)

While most of the western economies were severely impacted by the recent subprime crisis, it brought to fore the strengths of the Indian financial system that helped us takes the crisis in our stride. The question that now needs to be answered is how India should leverage this situation to its advantage and accelerate its growth and development. The Finance Continuum 2009 will explore the opportunities and challenges India faces in these changing times with its central theme being “Changing Global Financial Landscape: Opportunities and Challenges in India”.

We are organizing the seminar with participation from industry bigwigs. The speakers for the event include – Mr. Kaustubh Kulkarni, Executive Director, JP Morgan Chase, Mr. Somak Ghosh, Head, Corporate Finance, Yes Bank, Mr. Ananda Bhoumik, Senior Director, Fitch Rating, Mr. Anup Bagchi, Executive Director ICICI Securities, Mr. Naveen Gupta, Head Private Bank Treasury, Standard Chartered Bank & Mr. Ajay Garg, Managing Director, Equirus. There will also be a Workshop by Angel broking on Derivatives.

Marketing Continuum 2009 (19th March 2009, Sunday)

The marketing continuum this year with a theme of “New Age Marketing - Challenges and Strategies” will present a broader picture of the marketing function and will throw light on some of the most popular and latest trends of marketing that are relevant to the present scenario. This will include discussions, lectures and business games covering a wide range of topics like relationship marketing, rural marketing, interactive marketing, experiential marketing & technology marketing.

Speakers for the continuum include Dr. (Mrs.) Pragnya Ram, Group Executive President, Corporate Comunication, Aditya Birla Group, Mr. K V Sridhar, National Creative Director, Leo Burnett, Mr. Sudhanshu Vats, VP, HUL, Mr. Paritosh Joshi, President, Star India & Mr. Prasad Narasimhan, CMO, Virgin Mobile(I).

Placement Report 2009

SJMSOM beats global recession blues, all sectors hire!              
“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he stands at times of challenge”. - Martin Luther King Jr.
The Final Placement Process ended with the entire batch of students getting placed with many students having multiple offers. A total of 60 companies were vying for some of the best minds across the business schools. The domestic average salary for the Batch of 2009 stood at INR 10.28 lakhs. After including the foreign offers the average salary was INR 10.61 lakhs. The highest domestic salary offered was a staggering INR 21.08 lakhs.

The Final Placements saw almost all the sectors recruiting at SJMSOM, IIT Bombay. SJMSOM reaffirmed its relationship with its traditional recruiters like P&G, Marico, Coca Cola, Cadbury, ICICI Bank, GE, Wipro, E&Y, CTS, Feedback Ventures, RPG group and Inductis amongst others.

Despite the financial meltdown, there was no dearth of roles on offer in the financial sector. Roles offered included Investment Banking, Corporate Finance, Quantitative Finance, Corporate Banking, Project Finance, Treasury, Risk Management, Business Intelligence, Sales & Marketing and Banking Operations. 19 % of the batch accepted offers in the finance domain. Morgan Stanley (MSCI Barra) made one of the most sought after offers in the school. Other recruiters included ICICI Bank, SBI Caps, Tata Teleservices to name a few.

The school continued to demonstrate its strength in the field of Operations with 25 % offers going in that direction. It saw the likes of companies such as P&G, J&J, Marico,              Dr. Reddy's etc. offering SCM, Operations and Manufacturing profiles. The Final Placement also saw UK based Retail giant TESCO, picking up students for international roles.

Consulting careers continued their huge popularity with 24 % of the batch taking up the role of consultants in organisations such as E&Y, Deloitte, Emergent Ventures, Inductis etc. The profiles offered included niche ones like Energy Consulting and Carbon Credit Advisory as well.
Marketing profiles were accepted by 14% of the batch. This domain saw participation from companies such as Marico, Genpact, Big 92.7 FM, Schindler, as well as conglomerates such as RPG and Vedanta Group. International Marketing & Management profiles were offered by Peerless Fabrikkerne.

Systems profiles were offered by companies such as Deloitte, Mphasis (EDS), CTS,     Infosys BPO etc. 13% of the batch accepted offers in this domain. Also, Business Development profiles were offered by Battelle, an international science & technology enterprise.

New sectors explored this year and which were actively recruiting included niche ones like Carbon Trading among Analytics Consulting, Technology Consulting, Healthcare, PSUs, Publishing, Entertainment, Engineering/Construction. This year also saw an active participation from Public Sector Organizations offering exciting profiles backed by competent packages.  Public Sector Organizations found favour with the students with nearly 12% of the batch choosing to start their management careers in the government services such as BHEL, COAL India, Power Finance Corporation and SIDBI.

“It is heartening to know that in spite of the hard hitting recession in the global economy, the students are moving to sectors of their choice. Excellent placements can be attributed to diligent planning, the premium brand value of SJMSOM among the industry and the unwavering support provided by the alumni“

Consulting Continuum 2009

Continuums are a series of lectures held annually in each discipline of management at Shailesh J. Mehta School of Management, IIT Bombay .The Consulting Continuum 2009 was held on 14th March. The theme was ‘Hard times come hand in hand with opportunities: A consultant’s perspective’. This continuum was graced by top-notch consultants from esteemed organizations like KPMG, Mc Kinsey & Co., Stern Stewart & Co., AT Kearney, Protiviti, Avalon Consulting etc. The event saw participation from almost 300 students, including the management students and Alumni from the Shailesh J.Mehta School of Management.

The event was kicked off with and address by the Head of SJMSOM, Prof.Karuna Jain. She spoke about technology and analytics being the two key tools of a consultant. The keynote address was delivered by Mr. Neelesh Hundekari, Principal AT Kearney who said that the current scenario is not all doom and gloom because what some may perceive as frightening, others may perceive as challenging. The next talk on the agenda was by Mr. Santosh Kamat, Director, KPMG, who spoke about issues and challenges in Public Private Partnership in the infrastructure sector. The next in line was Mr. K.G.Purushottam, Associate Director, Protiviti Consulting who stressed on the need to work within a risk management framework. He also emphasized the fact that there are more expectations from consulting to deliver more ‘solution’ from more service and at the same time demonstrate value and savings.

Present there to honor the occasion was Mr. Ashish Dwivedi, an alumnus of SJMSOM who is a part of Corporate Strategy and Business development at the Aditya Birla Group. He highlighted the typical reactions of corporates at the downturn period and the key concerns of the corporate sector at this point in time. He put forth his views on why downturns are the time to bring enduring benefits to business by making some structural changes and seeking synergies actively. After this was a crisp lecture from Mr. Sanjay Kulkarni, MD, Stern Stewart & Co., who gave an optimistic view of the downturn situation saying that we were lucky to sense it very early.

The post lunch session was made very interesting by Mr. Raj Nair, the chairman of Avalon Consulting who gave many examples to stress the importance of innovation in business. Finding comfort outside the comfort zone is very essential and the companies who have done that have managed to capture markets. The next to share his views was Mr. Deepak Bhavsar,MD, Strategic Consulting and Land Agency Services, JLLM who spoke about the growth opportunities and challenges facing the Real Estate Sector at this point in time.

The late-afternoon talk was given by Mr. Govind Balan, Principal, Diamond Management and Technology Consultants who spoke about the impact of regulatory changes on Mobile Telephony. The talk was peppered with data and examples of the Indian Telecom sector and the students were able to relate to it very well. The last talk of the day was delivered by Mr. Prashant Gupta, Partner, McKinsey and Co. who spoke about the implications of the global crisis on India. His main words of advice were to be prepared for each situation and to have all strategies in place to face any challenges that may turn up.

The vote of thanks was delivered by Prof. Dinesh Sharma, the Faculty Coordinator for the Consulting Continuum who expressed the delight of the students and faculty at having such a series of distinguished practitioners from the industry share their views with the students.  All the talks were followed by interactive Q&A sessions and the students made the most of this opportunity to question the stalwarts from the consulting domain. 

The event was very successful with avid participation from the Consulting fraternity and it is industry interaction sessions like these which can actually acquaint students about the concerns, challenges and growth opportunities in the Industry which they will become a part of shortly.

Systems Continuum 2009

‘Continuum’s are a series of lectures held annually in the six major disciplines of management at Shailesh J. Mehta School of Management. The Systems Continuum, 2009 was held on 15th March. The theme of the event was ‘’IT-Driving the next generation Business processes’ and was graced by head honchos of companies like Infosys, Yahoo, eBay, CA, Capgemini Consulting, IBM, MphasiS, Reliance Communications and Directi.

The event started with an inaugural speech by Prof. D.B Phatak, Chair professor KReSIT, IIT Bombay. This was followed by a key note address by Mr. S.Gopalakrishnan, CEO &MD, Infosys Technologies Ltd who spoke about ‘The Future of IT’. He spoke about the impact of IT saying that only 25 % of the actual potential of IT has been explored till date. He also spoke about the impact of the internet and how the internet has extended into the real world. He shared his views on mobile computing, cloud computing, the Digital Home, & green computing. He stressed that India is at the center of IT and IT is as exciting as ever and we have many significant opportunities in this space which are as yet unexplored.

Dr. Jawahar Malhotra, CTO of Yahoo! India shared his insights on’ Leveraging the open Web’. He spoke about the Yahoo! Open strategy and beginning of the YOS momentum.

There was also a panel discussion moderated by Mr. Rajdeep Sahrawat, the VP of Nasscom. The topic of the panel discussion was ‘Managing IT in the downturn’. The eminent panelists were Ms. Sunanda Ambardar Chak, Director, Marketing, CA, Mr. Meetul Patel, VP, Capgemini Consulting, Mr. Bhalchandra Joshi, VP, Reliance Communications and Dr. Jawahar Malhotra, CTO of Yahoo! India.

The post lunch session started with a talk by Mr. Suvojit Mazumdar, Global Delivery Leader, Global AIS,IBM India on ‘Smart solutions’ wherein he stresses that in order to build a smarter planet we need to provide solutions in fields of digital data, distributed computing, and IT infrastructure. The next talk was by Mr. P A Krishnan, President, ITO & Head, GDS - New Business Support, MphasiS. His talk was based on the concept of ‘Productivity and agility comes in Green’.

A very interesting session was conducted by Mr. B Muralikrishnan, Director, Category & Product Management, eBay India. He gave an insightful view on e-commerce opportunities and his talk was peppered with many relevant examples of e-commerce businesses and strategies in the past decade.

The last talk of the day was by Mr. Naresh Jain, Quality and Community Evangelist, Directi. He conducted an interactive session on Agile Software Development which the audience enjoyed immensely. He touched upon the new trends in software development and project management.

Systems Continuum 2008, with its eminent speakers and variety of inputs was a resounding success, appreciated by not just the students, but the speakers themselves. Each talk was followed by a short interactive Q&A session and the students had the wonderful opportunity of mingling with the visionaries in the IT domain.

Diksha Session at Shailesh J Mehta School of Management, IIT Bombay, 2009

Ms.Gulati , Public Relations Team , Shailesh J. Mehta School of Management from IIT - Bombay informed following to UrPercentile.com :

Diksha is the Industry Interaction series conducted by eminent speakers from the corporate world at the Shailesh J.Mehta School of Management, IIT Bombay. SJMSOM has a strong belief in continuous ‘knowledge creation’ and transmission to the budding managers and leaders. Dikshas are a good medium for corporate interaction wherein students get to discuss a myriad of issues with the speakers leading to an informative and introspective session. This is a part of the continuous endeavor by the school to bring forth various issues and to attempt to find answers to them.
Two very enlightening sessions were conducted for the students of SJMSOM by Mr.A.V.Rajwade and Mr. Krishna Majithia.

The first session was conducted by Mr A.V.Rajwade.  Mr. Rajwade has worked with State Bank of India from July 1957 to October 1976 specializing in industrial finance and international banking. He has been working as an independent consultant in forex, interest rate and derivatives risk management for more than two decades. He is consulted by Corporates and Hedge Funds on Treasury Management. He is a part of The Expert Group on Development of the Foreign Exchange Markets in  India (1995) and Committees on Capital Account Convertibility (1997 and 2006) appointed by the Reserve Bank of India, Advisory Council of Currency Derivative Segment for MCS Stock Exchange Ltd and the Executive Committee (Futures and Options Segment), National Stock Exchange. He has authored multiple books on International Finance, Derivatives & Risk Management and published over 2000 articles in ET & Business Standard on monetary affairs.

Mr Rajwade being a very engaging and thought-provoking speaker, his talk threw light on various aspects of risk management and the current financial environment. He also spoke about the history of banking and the economic philosophies that has led to the financial crisis in recent times. A never before linkage among diverse perspectives of history, philosophy, economics, mythology and finance was explained in a lucid manner.

The second Diksha session was conducted by Mr. Krishna Majithia, the Director, Head of Market Risk Management for India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh at Citibank.  He is responsible for ensuring and implementing Citigroup's policies on market & liquidity risk management for all the businesses and legal entities in these three countries. This includes establishing appropriate limits & controls for market risk across Forex rates & equities and asset liability management. He is a Chartered Accountant by background and has been with Citibank for about 17 years.
The students were enthralled as Mr.Majithia shared a first hand perspective on the risk management and risk mitigation strategies applied by banks. His talk traced a series of events leading up to the current financial situation with the discussion leading up to the steps that would have to be adopted by the practitioners of financial management to deal with the after effects of this financial downturn. The objective of the talk was to make students aware of the latest developments and issues in the industry. The students found the session to be very engaging, Lucid and a very comprehensive coverage of the financial crisis was given

This was just the beginning of the many Dikshas to be held throughout the year and the students are already anticipating the next of many such sessions.