Management Education in India: Industry Relevance and Employability

 

In the beginning of a new academic year, one can see a flood of admission advertisements from the B schools, with a promise of 100% placement along with the long list of dream recruiters.

One can see the main focus of these advertisements is only high-paying jobs, than enhancement of   knowledge, skill, managerial capabilities inculcating business ethics and social responsibilities. Instead of projecting as learning centers of excellence, B-Schools promote themselves as placement centers.

Post Graduate Management Programmes in India leading to Master of Management Studies (MMS), Master of Business Administration (MBA) and Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) are the most sought after post graduate programmes for two reasons. The reason number one is, these programmes can be pursued by fresh graduate students from all streams irrespective of their area of specialization in bachelor’s degree, without any work experience. The second reason is the overhyped employment prospects and the pay package. There are over 5000 B-schools in India with a total intake of about 400,000 seats.

The B- Schools in India may be classified under three quality levels for the sake of comparison:

The top 40 ranked premier institutes – Tier-I

Institutes ranked between 41 to 100 – Tier-II

Institutes ranked beyond 100 – Tier- III

 While a few of the Tier-I premier B-Schools are often ranked among the top global schools, the Tier-II B-Schools come a distant second in imparting quality education. The Tier- III B-Schools mostly deliver low quality, sub-standard and unemployable outputs.

According to the ASSOCHAM study, only 7% of the graduates from the Tier-III B-Schools were actually found employable. It was reported that the average course fee at these B-Schools was between Rs. 3 to Rs. 6 lakhs and the average monthly salary offered to the management students was between Rs. 12000 to Rs. 18000. It was also reported that many of these so called B-Schools doled out certificates for the payment of the fee.

Recruiters generally look for communication skills, leadership skills, problem-solving ability, analytical thinking, strategic thinking and general knowledge in a B-School graduate. Students from the Tier-III B-Schools are often found pathetic in most these critical areas.

Majority of the Tier-III B-Schools don’t take any proactive measures to improve their quality of education. They lack the required institutional infrastructure, some have only the deceptive infrastructure, the teaching methodologies are mostly class room lecture oriented, the examinations are designed to test what is taught and students are evaluated based on the rote-learning and not on application of concepts. As one component of internal assessment, students are often bombarded with large number of assignments, which only make them experts in cut, copy and pasting. The syllabi followed are often outdated and no efforts are made to test the validity of what is taught from the available books, internet etc. are relevant to the changing industry dynamics. There is no difference between the pedagogy used in the undergraduate and the post graduate management programmes.

The Tier-III B-Schools hardly have interaction and collaboration with industry with the result that there is no participatory role by the industry in the curricula development, designing relevant programmes and providing feedback. Students from these B-Schools don’t get much opportunity for gaining hands-on experience. Though, some universities have included few months of summer internship as a part of the management programme, the institutes, the students and the organizations are not serious about the internship. Most of the firms generally use these free-interns for data collection and for other sundry work.

The biggest shortcoming is the non-engagement of good quality, full-time faculty with the right combination of academic exposure and industry experience. Due to poor pay package offered compared to the industry, bright people are reluctant to enter these B-Schools. Most of the faculty employed are pure academicians, unemployable elsewhere with insignificant industry experience, which further widens the disconnect with the kind of problem solving skills that the industry needs. Many of the Tier-III B-Schools heavily depend on visiting resources who may be just interested in completing their brief. In a nutshell, the Tier-III B-Schools consider their ventures as pure profit-centers / commercial establishments, hoping to maximize their profits by all means, with less input costs and on the lookout for cutting corners wherever possible.

The poor regulatory mechanism followed by the governing bodies like UGC and AICTE further adds to the woes of the Tier-III B-Schools. These agencies lack professional expertise to guide the institutes in imparting quality education. There is a general consensus among the experts that the present university system is too rigid and does not provide the required flexibility in curricula development and adapt to the changing industry needs. Standardization leads to more often than not to mediocrity.

The tier-I B –Schools attract the very best students followed by the Tier-II B-Schools. Unfortunately, the Tier-I B-Schools, which do well in designing the teaching-delivery-learning process, don’t play any proactive role in extending professional guidance to other B-Schools. They have become islands of excellence and only take pride in maintaining their status as a select few elite institutions.

The recent initiative by the HRD Ministry to make the NAAC Accreditation mandatory for all the management institutes is expected to improve the overall quality of education. It is too early to come to the conclusion. Incidentally, IIMs and IITs are not NAAC Accredited.

 Experts advise the students not to merely go by the ranking of the B-Schools. Ranking of many of the B-Schools are manipulated.

While the Tier-I B-schools charge anywhere between Rs. 18 to Rs. 25 lakhs, the Tier –II B-Schools charge between Rs. 10 lakhs to Rs. 16 lakhs. For a student seeking admission in to the Tier-I and Tier-II B-Schools, affordability could be a main constraint. This may force a bright student to seek admission in a Tier-III B-School. In such a pressing situation, are there ways to improve one’s learning and employment opportunities?

Yes. There are various ways one can strategize:

1.      Improve communication and presentation skills through volunteering in events conducted by the institution and outside the institution;

2.      Improve your grooming, etiquette, personality and soft skills through self-initiatives;

3.      Select and complete value adding courses from National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL). Students find value in taking NPTEL courses since the certification is done by the reputed IITs.

4.      Regularly read at least two newspapers- one general newspaper (Times of India, Indian Express, Hindustan Times etc.,) and one business newspaper (Economic Times, Mint etc.,);

5.      Network with industry professionals, through social networking sites like LinkedIn and seek guidance wherever required; Follow the industry trend and identify emerging opportunities;

6.      Identify the area of interest and shortlist companies / firms operating in that area. Study their business model, career prospects, recruitment and selection procedures and gather other relevant information and prepare in these areas

        Always remember it is the individual who is responsible for steering his / her life towards the desired destiny. Any institution, good or bad, is only a means but not an end in itself!!

 

#mms #mba #pgdm #managementeducation #employability #industryrelevance #placement

#quality #jobopportunity #bschool # paypackage

 

Dr. C K Sreedharan

 www.sreedharanck.com

 amazon.com/author/sreedharanck