AMBA & BGA ASIA PACIFIC CONFERENCE
“work is worship” has long gone. He cited statistics that showed the average attention span of a student was two minutes and 45 seconds in 2015; it has since declined to just 21 seconds. So, how can teachers inspire in such a climate, pondered the Rohtak director. He latched onto the word “rigour”: students are not just looking for entertainment in the classroom, but also, in his opinion, for extraordinary teachers who will strive for the highest standards. Breaking down barriers to collaboration Chaired by AMBA & BGA’s regional relationship manager for India, Shikha Taunk, the conference’s eighth session took the form of a panel debate focusing on how to maximise international collaboration. It examined the unique opportunities and critical factors that foreign institutions must consider when partnering with Indian business schools. Ram Kumar Kakani, director of the Indian Institute of Management Raipur, began by referencing the opportunity for Indian schools to develop master’s programmes jointly with European institutions. This is an initiative that has been facilitated by a new policy elaborated by the Ministry of Education. The disruption caused by digitalisation and the introduction of AI in the classroom are key factors when it comes to international collaboration, according to Mahadeo Jaiswal, director of the Indian Institute of Management Sambalpur. He noted that India has the third-largest ecosystem in the world for start-ups, with 130,000 such firms already registered. The challenge now, claimed Jaiswal, is to educate industry so that it partners with business schools, ensuring that they can educate properly in this regard, ie in the context of software, digital payments and platform transformation. Chahat Mishra, head of international relations at Great Lakes Institute of Management, talked of the need to “bring India to the world rather than vice versa”. The spirit of internationalisation is “cross-cultural collaboration” in Mishra’s opinion but, as he remarked, India is so diverse, it’s already in that mode. He advocated for schools bringing in industry gurus and heads of state to interact with MBA students, so that they can in turn cater to the needs of companies operating in a challenging geopolitical scenario. Bhaskar Chakrabarti, academic dean of the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, reported that his institution organises student exchange programmes with no fewer than 100 partners during its two-year MBA. He also noted how the course must have at least 40 per cent international content. “We have alumni, partnerships and scholars around the world”, he commented. Ranjeet Nambudiri, dean of faculty at the
relax and take time for self-reflection. Meanwhile, London Business School brings its MBA cohort to a local prison in order to introduce them to inmates convicted of white-collar crimes such as fraud, thereby giving them the opportunity to gain a different perspective. Integrating AI technology into teaching The presentation given by Cesim China managing director Wen Wu focused on how to effectively integrate AI technology into pedagogy. She described the company’s teaching assistant platform as containing “the latest-generation AI frontier models trained with simulation-specific data”. Wu explained that the tool “acts as a sounding board for ideas regarding coursework and reinforcing key concepts, as well as a continuously developing toolset designed to ensure teaching staff are at the top of their game as far as experiential learning is concerned”. She allayed fears that the AI-powered assistant would replace faculty, noting that it acts as “an autopilot for teaching, but the human instructor would always be in the driving seat”. Cesim’s technology can help lecturers with various aspects of their work. One scenario outlined by the Cesim China MD was that of a teacher meeting students for a mid-term review and asking for an analysis of their performance to date, along with a handful of insightful questions that could be posed to them. The Cesim AI tool can also provide real world examples from a regional context that teaching staff can use. In terms of a case study, Wu referenced how the ESG version of the company’s banking simulation includes the decision to issue a green bond. If a team decides to issue this kind of bond, they need to write a prospectus and that prospectus is then given to the AI platform, which will evaluate it according to six different parameters. Helping lecturers to achieve academic excellence In an impromptu conference session, Dheeraj Sharma, director of the Indian Institute of Management Rohtak, spoke about achieving academic excellence in higher educational institutions. He advocated for a reduced workload for faculty, remarking that he believes business school lecturers should not do any administrative work, but should “focus on excellence in teaching” instead. Such an approach, he maintained, would enable teaching staff to achieve having their research published in peer-reviewed journals more easily. However, noted Sharma, it is difficult to attain a first-rate educational experience in these post-Covid times; attitudes to work have changed dramatically and the previous mindset of
Indian Institute of Management Indore, remarked on the huge diversity of the Indian subcontinent where “the dialect changes every 10 miles”. He said he believed it was important for MBA students to interact with the local population “at the bottom of the pyramid” and related how a first-year cohort had spent a week engaging with one of the area’s rural communities.
Ambition • ISSUE 1 • 2025 19
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