Transformation journey from core Researcher to a Senior research Leader – IIMA way

I captured my journey in this article right from decision to do Senior Management Program (SMP) and key learnings in SMP and way forward…

Background:

Being a researcher in IT field, I enjoyed invention, innovation with patents, papers and building platforms and solutions. That was my world in the last 15 years. I was also enjoying teaching AI concepts to the students and working professionals as visiting / adjunct faculty in various institutes. Even though the journey was going smooth, my interests slowly moved to strategy and leadership to grow up in the career ladder. I started looking for the programs in this regard. Doing full time MBA was out of scope as I did not want to leave my job.

Decision to apply for SMP in IIM Ahmedabad:

I was clear to do executive education in top institutes such as IIM Ahmedabad/Bangalore/Calcutta. After exhaustive search of available programs, my list narrowed down to Executive Program in Leadership and Management (EPLM) at IIMC and Senior Management Program (SMP) in IIMC/IIMA. LinkedIn helped me to find few seniors who have already completed these programs. After couple of interactions with them, I decided to apply for SMP from IIM Ahmedabad for the following reasons:

(a)   Learning general management concepts might be better for me as I have not done any MBA earlier. This ruled out EPLM option.

(b)  The case-based method of IIMA has lot of positive feedback from the participants

(c)   The pedagogy of SMP, brand value and alumni status of IIMA prompted me to choose SMP from IIMA.

We need to submit profile and statement of purpose (SoP) as part of the selection process. I have taken couple of days to prepare my profile and SoP that helped me to recap entire 35 years journey. Please note that profile is not same as CV/Resume. After couple of months from applying to the program, received a mail that I was shortlisted for SMP batch-2 in IIMA. Immediately after graduating with Ph.D. from IIIT Bangalore in July 2018, my learning further continued with SMP. With lots of hope, I entered the first campus module in July 2018.

IIMA way of learning:

The campus is a temple of learning. IIMA emphasized KASH – Knowledge, Attitude, Skills and Habits

The average experience of our batch was 17.5 years. The minimum criteria for SMP was 10+ year and we had senior people with experience ranging up to 25 years  as well.

Case based method (inspired from Harvard) was completely new for me and most of my batchmates. First time I read hundreds of pages before the class. Without the case and supplementary reading, you cannot make sense in the class. That was the key takeaway for all of us in first campus module.

In second campus module, at the end of classwork on every day, our sub group used to meet for 4-5 hours to read the cases, discuss and learn from each other. There was lot of peer learning on difficult subjects such as financial management, economics etc..

Most of us did not step out of campus gate in all the 3 campus modules except the last day where the capstone presentation and valedictory function happened in Hyatt Ahmedabad. I regret sometimes as couple of my batchmates were able to squeeze some time to visit Ahmedabad and neighboring places even in their busy schedule. However, we enjoyed mid night tea and Maagi in the canteen.

Blended Learning:

 I had my apprehensions before attending the remote sessions through video conferencing but VCNow has done wonderful setup with mini classrooms (video conferencing rooms) instead of typical setup of internet center with individual computers and head phones.

We can attend the remote sessions from any VCNow center in India with prior intimation. I attended sessions in more than 7 cities during the program. That helped to get familiar with my batchmates and learnt best practices from peers. For instance, Chennai and Mumbai batchmates were very active in having group discussions to expand their learning. With that inspiration, I continued to have Bangalore group meetings and regular calls with sub group members (formed by IIMA). I made a rule for myself that I should read the case and share my analysis in Moodle before the next class. This resulted into lot of reading and analysis till late night.  However, I feel happy when my batchmates said that they read some of my analysis before coming to the class when they did not have time to read the complete case.

The credit of most of my learning goes to these group discussions along with professors’ analysis. Professors always added different dimension to the analysis of these cases, which were practical in nature.

My network, typically had technocrats from IT companies. Now, I can proudly say that my network reached much more and  beyond IT sector with my 150 friends representing various industries across India. We have doctors, chartered accountants, engineers, lawyers etc… working in all sectors. That’s the beauty of this program from IIMA.

The pedagogy of IIMA covered nearly 100 cases with 40+ frameworks across all the modules of general management - Strategy, Economics, Information Systems, Operations and supply management, Marketing, Organization Behavior, Risk management and finance markets, Negotiation and Law, Finance Management, Human Resource Management, Ethics, Corporate Governance and Communication.

Capstone project experience:

The experience of 24 hours capstone was really top notch. Interesting case was given to us. Knowing each others talent, the division of work among ourselves, preparing theme for our presentation, executing the individual group tasks, combining them into final presentation – wow! What an experience for me to lead the capstone of our group with 24 wonderful human beings. I learnt a lot  and finally the presentation went very well with our Rockstar presenters.

Evaluation was continuous and not an easy task for us. We know our overall GPA only after receiving the certificate as the evaluation was continued till that time. IIMA was very strict in attendance and evaluation of each module. Every professor had his own style of evaluation – ranging from home assignment, open book pen and paper exam, closed book exams, online exam with negative marking and all possible combinations one can imagine. Get ready for surprises ?? as these evaluation patterns were subject to change. Given a chance, we used to ask for closed book exams as open book exams were tough to crack ?. Finally, I was able to come out with overall GPA of A (3.58).

Key Learnings:

·       Cross functional knowledge of all the departments in an organization.

·       The answer to specific problem needs to be analyzed from multiple dimensions and finally “It depends”. Frameworks can come to our rescue during the analysis.

·       Lot of learning from both professors and peers

Last but not the least:

It was a happy and indeed proud moment when Prof. Chetan, Program co-chair mentioned in person, "If there is a gold medal for this program, then it is for you" while receiving the SMP certificate during the valedictory function.

I’m happy for my decision to pursue SMP from IIMA. Finding some time to spend with my family on weekends after a year of packed Saturdays for the quality learnings from IIMA. All set to apply the learnt concepts in real world..

Big THANK YOU for IIMA, Professors, VCNow, batch-mates, family for their unconditional support in this learning process.

We are branded for Life at IIMA. #IIMA alumnus #WIMWIAN. Learning continues...