IIM Tirchy - present challenges

IIM Tiruchirappalli (Trichy) is relatively better off in terms of facilities as it is located inside the National Institute of Technology (NIT), Tiruchirappalli, but has other challenges. "Last year we planned close to 100 lectures by visiting faculty and professionals, but we could execute only 17 due to poor air connectivity," says Prafulla Agnihotri, Director, IIM Trichy.

The Trichy airport has more international connections than domestic. This benefits Anand Tilak, Country Head, Facebook Indonesia, who teaches digital marketing. He reaches Trichy from Singapore in just four hours. Compare this with professionals in India who need to allocate two full days out of their busy schedules if they have to give a lecture at IIM Trichy. "It is important that students are provided with all round perspective and get to hear local academics apart from visiting practitioners. Setting up IIMs in smaller cities makes it a little challenging for industry professionals when there are no direct flight connections," says Tilak.

STRAIGHT TALK

But Agnihotri is blunt. "IIMs cannot bring in development. We are parasites who live on the infrastructure to disseminate management education. We are not IT parks. These challenges will have to go away if we have to create a world-class institution." Some problems will indeed go away when all the institutes get their own campus, but even that is still a few years away as some are still awaiting land allocation and a few are just about to commence construction.

So given the challenges, how are these institutions faring? If final placements of the students is taken as an indicator, they have managed full placement with a maximum salary of Rs 15 lakh to Rs 27 lakh and a median salary of Rs 9 lakh to Rs 12 lakh.

However, this is far lower than what students at IIM Ahmedabad get (maximum salary of Rs 41 lakh and a median salary of Rs 18 lakh). While IIM-A attracts the likes of A.T. Kearney, Bain & Company, McKinsey & Co., Boston Consulting Group, Hindustan Unilever, Reliance Industries and Goldman Sachs, these institutions get ICICI Bank, Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M), SAP India, Cognizant, Accenture, etc.

"Our students are as good as any, but the challenge is to get the recruiters to meet them," says BB Chakrabarti, Director, IIM Ranchi. "To make that possible, we invite industry professionals for guest lectures so that they get a feel of our quality," says Vishnu Puduval, a second-year student at IIM Trichy and a member of the external relations committee.

But a cross section of recruiters feel the new IIMs need a few more years to catch up with their older siblings. "The new IIMs hold promise and they have been gearing up fast, though they have some distance to go before they become a part of the premium league. Having said that, the early signs seem very encouraging," says Rajeev Dubey, President (Group HR, Corporate Services & After-Market), M&M. The company last year recruited 13 students from IIMs, including one student from IIM Trichy. But Ramsiva Linga, a first batch student from IIM Kashipur who now works in Tata Steel, disagrees with the view. "At Tata Steel I am considered on a par with my colleagues who have come from IIM-A," he says.

The new IIMs are beginning to see opportunity amidst challenges. "Being a new institution offers us an opportunity to build management institute that is based on research that is globally recognised by peers," says Janat Shah, Director, IIM Udaipur. Old IIMs do not do adequate research and having been caught up in the old culture they are finding it difficult to change. "Faculty in old IIMs do a lot of administrative work, which is a criminal waste of time," points out Shah, who has spent 20 years at IIM Bangalore.

OVERWORKED FACULTY

Also low fees earlier forced older IIMs to start different programmes like executive education to cross subsidise the MBA course. This led to overworking of the faculty who had to consult too to raise resources for the institute. "New institutions can give first priority to research by giving no administrative work to the faculty and limiting teaching to a fewer courses as the new fee structure obviates the need to cross subsidise any programme," says Shah. IIM Udaipur does not get its faculty to do administrative work. It does not have an executive programme and has allocated 20 per cent of its revenue to research.

IIM Trichy has managed a strong research-focused faculty (most professors have already published their papers in A-grade journals). "We are a collection of like-minded professionals with a familial binding. There are no silos of individual excellence here," explains Agnihotri. At Kashipur, Sinha is attracting top faculty by sending at least two professors every year to Harvard University for doing research.

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