Message on 20th ISB Day

MESSAGE FROM THE DEAN ON THE 20TH ISB DAY

 Dear Members of the ISB Community: (relevant to the larger community as well)

December 2nd is the 20th ISB Day and the marks two decades of a very eventful journey. While we are no longer “teenagers” we are a young, forward-looking and agile organization focused on positive change. Despite the upheaval that we are now facing in our lives, we should celebrate the success of what the founders started and each one of has contributed to the evolution of ISB. This age of the pandemic is especially a moment to reflect on our growth, challenges, hard work, commitment and future.

With this in mind, I requested the former Deans of ISB who have played a pivotal role in shaping what ISB is today to share some thoughts. In the last twenty years, we have had five Deans including myself: Pramath Sinha (June 2001-June 2002); Vijay Mahajan (June 2002-June 2004); M Rammohan Rao (June 2004-June 2009); Ajit Rangnekar (January 2009-December 2015); and myself (January 2016-till now). 

When I glean through the reflections of the past Deans, there are some key messages that come alive. These include:

·        Although the Founders had a unique and ahead-of-time vision, ISB is today what it is because of the teamwork of a large number of people.

·        The partner schools, Executive Board members, the visiting faculty and the growing community of alumni have played a critical role.

·        The role of the early batches of students are particularly noteworthy because they took a risk and put their trust in an “idea whose time had come.”

·        The journey has not been easy despite the successes. There have been gut-wrenching challenges along the way.

·        The impact of ISB has been felt in many areas particularly in the growth and evolution of management education in the country.

·        The future beckons us when education and higher education in particular are going through an era of disruption.

I am sharing below edited excerpts from the reflections of the three past Deans. They are nuggets of invaluable information and insights that could serve as our guideposts for ISB’s next twenty years. I am grateful to them for sharing these at a short notice.

From Pramath Sinha: “20 years have gone by in a flash and sometimes it feels like a dream. But this is a case of living a dream—global top 20 ranking in the 6th year, close to 12, 000 alums (today) with several in key leadership positions in top corporations around the world and a worldwide recognition for quality of management research. ISB has not only impacted management education in India, including at the IIMs, but it has also inspired many high-quality institutions of collective philanthropy in India including Ashoka University, Krea University and Plaksha University. As we look ahead to the next 20 years, ISB can raise its sights even higher and aim to become a top 10 B-school in the world and the very best in India as management education and education itself is going through a major disruption. I believe we can and it should be our only goal to build a future-ready B-school of global pre-eminence out of India.”

From M Rammohan Rao: “The one-year full time programme, a substantial number of visiting faculty from highly reputed international business schools teaching at ISB, the emphasis and support for cutting-edge research are some of the important distinguishing features of ISB. The success of ISB has created a market for one-year management programmes in India and has motivated other premier institutions in India to not only give importance to research but also gain international recognition. This is an enriching contribution of ISB to management education in India.”

From Ajit Rangnekar:” ISB is a perfect example of how big change can happen when people come together for a good cause. In the late nineties, the dream of setting up a world class Institution in India would have sounded crazy to many. But when the global industry got together with Academics across the world, it caught the imagination of all. In its eventful twenty-year journey, ISB too faced many difficulties. In spite of the challenges posed by the downturn after 9/11, the performance of ISB alumni, and the support of the recruitment community, ensured that ISB students would remain in great demand. Similarly, ISB was able to weather the financial meltdown and other setbacks that followed. The success of Alumni and Faculty is the best measure of the success of an Institution. To me, there is no greater joy than seeing ISB alumni in key management positions across the world. As the first Indian institution to be globally ranked, and that too at rank 20, the first to get AACSB accreditation, the first to welcome a US President, and the first to be ranked among the top Research institutions in the world, ISB has always created history. The unsung soldiers in this great journey have been the amazing staff of ISB. Twenty years is a short period for an education institution, and ISB will scale greater heights in the decades ahead.”

We are now entering the third decade of ISB. The experiences of the first decade have been captured beautifully in the book, An Idea Whose Time Has Come, authored by Mr Pramath Raj Sinha. The second decade has been no less eventful with ISB growing from strength to strength as evidenced by the higher global rankings from multiple institutions and publications of global repute. I am sure that the third decade will only strengthen our growth and take us to our avowed aim of being one of the top ten global business schools – a goal that I shared with our Board when I joined as Dean on January 1st 2016.

On this occasion, I thank each one of you for your contribution and sacrifices to the success of ISB.