TN Vision Summit @ Taj Coromondel April 12th

Working for social causes has never been so much rewarding .... Not only we are able to meet top corporate Honchos, HR Heads and VPs; we are able to involve with them in serious discussion at the same plane of thought... It really amazes me at most of the stages that these profit oriented people are even more dedicated and enthusiastic when the topic veers towards social upliftment... and i must add that this enthusiasm has definitely rubbed more often than not at our tyro arms.

What could be even more great, is when you are invited to a corporate summit which houses the who's who of the industry for a day long event along with great food at the TAJ.... of yeah Free !!!
It was really an eye-opener at the TN Vision summit organized by CII, at the TAJ on 12th April...

It started off indeed well with M.K.Stalin's trademark address (I really am beginning to get an affinity with him, since he has been presiding over most of the Top shows in town these days), but what happened afterwards was seriously food for thought... and it was not only industrialists who were talking about Rural development, Healthcare and the ubiquitous vision & mission statements but they were rallied on the stage with various Ministers of the state showcasing their achievements, roadmap and development for Tamil-Nadu.

Each panel discussion had members of the Industry sitting side with various ministers of the same field and each giving their view-point of how the next phase of developments should happen.

Of course, the first discussion revolved around the summit's moot point - TN Vision 2025 chaired by PWC(Price Water Coopers) with their Presentation on what should be done across the state of Tamil Nadu, which included from the inane promise of delivering one Noble prize winner to understated activities that have to prolonged on a sustainable basis for education in TN. But, personally i really could not relate much to a PPT ; more so as it was after all just a presentation and not a concrete effort in jumpstarting TN to the next decade....

The real show-stealers of the entire day were these two gentlemen ... Minister Arcot N. Veeraswamy (TN Electricity) and Mr. K.V.Kamath (CEO , ICICI)
I really admire the presentation skills of any politician, even though there is much to be said about their promises, but they can convince even the pope to become an atheist. And Mr. Arcot Veeraswamy was really brilliant in the way he started talking about the various initiatives that have been taken, talking about initiatives did you hear about the concept of "Staggered holidays"

Well, it goes like this the TN electricity board used to waste around 300 Kw of power every sunday cause all the companies were on holiday, so they decided to consort with the industry in a particular belt to give holidays on Tuesday and the other belt on thursday and so on... as a result they waste only 60 Kw... that is what i really would say "POWER OF SIMPLICITY"

Mr.K.V.Kamath's topic actually threw light about how civilizations evolved; sprinkling his ideas on couple of topics such as the dissemination theory & culture synthesis... of course, this was more so beyond the purview of the summit.. but i found it really interesting !!

Of course to keep the story short and sweet.... here is a pic of the Yin-Yan Dessert at the luncheon....

The Chennai JOB Fair (March 29th)

It was sure having a serpentine Queue of Job Seekers, which candidly the organizers had not anticipated at the Chennai Job Fair conducted by IFA consultants (albeit under the political aegis of DMK), but despite the political cloud surrounding the entire area there were a few things that you get to learn and appreciate being part of the on-the-day coordination.
1) Dream BIG and also anticipate Bigger
What ever be the flaws of the entire show, what should be appreciated is that it brought together 24 companies and a minimum of 3000 deserving candidates in a single platform.

Bringing across companies across the diaspora such as L&T, Hyundai, Orchid Pharma & Sutherland.. but this indeed was their Achilles heel as they did not categorize the companies and as a result the candidates were at total loss to decide where to go....

2) The business of Politics
As the minister M.K.Stalin started his speech i could really appreciate how similar are the workings of both a politician and a businessmen; while his speech peppered with lavish praise on his own accomplishments was met with rapturous applause of his party cadres but it was quite insightful as the politicians play the role of the pied piper luring all Companies into Chennai



3) The forbearance of a south-korean
This was the position of the Hyundai Chief right from the beginning till the ceremony ended.... frightfully rigid.





4) The power of networking
We utilized the entire oppurtunity to speak to all the head HR and VPs of the 24 companies and show-cased our model for a sustainable & scalable rural employment; and it really gave us lot of key insights from the corporate perspective on their requirements and their commitment to their employees as a responsibility.


Now we have deep insights from 24 top companies, formulation of a process for organizing the Job Fair and a full-day appointment with the Vice President of L&T...



For the Press review of the Job fair click here HINDU

Lock Stock & Trade'08 (Jan 19th 2008)

Pretty late Commentary but neverthless... LST has been a special event for me as the chief co-ordinator and with the legendary Capt. Gopinath as it's key note Speaker


"It was international currys with India flavor at SPJIMR's Lock Stock & Trade'08; the biggest mock IPO event this side of Dalal Street. With teams from across the globe from Thailand to Dubai competiting with teams across India, showcasing real-live business ventures ranging across Bikaji bhujias, Siyaram Silk Mills Ltd, Maharaja Appliances Ltd and Aeropharma Group along with their respective industry representatives to raise the maximum IPO bids.

The event kick-started with a key note speech from the legendary Capt. Gopinath who took the entire audience on a spell-binding ride across his entire entrepreneurial ventures from childhood to the latest Air-Deccan boom; later on as he graciously answered questions the stage was being set for a much bigger battle.

On this one day event the SPJIMR student teams representing the entrepreneur and investment banker present selected real life entrepreneurial businesses to the audience. These businesses are open for evaluation and trading by the audience who acting as investors mock 'invest' in shares of their choice. The stocks are allotted through bidding and the ultimate stock prices are determined by the market forces. At the end of the day the winning 'investors' are those with highest value portfolios and the winning 'company' is that which has the highest market capitalization. The game provides opportunity for many a player to bid, trade and build their portfolio, and experience…the Dalal Street excitement.

Later on to quench our thirsts we had an intellectual panel discussion on the topic, "From Idea to IPO" peppered by eminent set of V.Cs, Entrepreneurs & corporates such as Mr.Devand Neralla(MCX), Mr.Jinesh Shah(Nexus India), Mr.Ajay Kapur(SIDBI ventures), Mahesh Choudahry(Microqual) and Mr.Namit Malhotra(Prime Focus) and moderated by Ms.Priya Srinivasan. The event winners were the joint team of SPJIMR & Hindustan Tin Works Ltd; while the team from Thammarsat BSchool, Thailand won the jury's special award."

Mentee Mentor Meeting ... Full Swing

It was a very bustling day... amidst friend's marriage celebrations, shuttling across towns i really squeezed in an appointment with Mr.J.Sreenivasa, Manager for the BPO division at Accenture, Bangalore and a SPJIMR pass-out of 1998.
It began as a meeting to add a name to the face, but later went across into a warm meeting of college days (incidentally Mr.Sekar had set up our college's Intra-LAN facility as his summers) and loads of fun-filled reminiscences.
I got an opportunity to find out more about his career-choices, roles as a division manager; but a few sagacious wordings that really did strike my brain
1) Get into any company which is in the growth phase. (His own choice of getting into Accenture)
2) Summers is an opportunity to experiment, rather than a career-choice.
3) Networking among people who are in my dream profile (Marketing & Sales- IT) would be a great idea.

So, i am going to get back to my phone book and start dialing the list....

DOCC at Kanchipuram

As part of our Academic Curricula, summers in SPJIMR are not done in plush A.Ced Corporate offices, but rather across rural village land-scapes....
We call it DOCC (Development of Corporate Citizenship)
"The Centre for Development of Corporate Citizenship (DOCC) was established in the year 2001 with a view to mould management education in tune with the Indian context.DOCC works closely with NGOs and corporates by undertaking various consultancy and research assignments. It also works as a medium between the Corporate and NGOs and strives to bring them together in contributing to the society."
Frankly, this is one of the best part of my learning... and i am really looking forward for it...

My DOCC Project details :-

(a) Job Fair for rural youth- Drawing strategy -Synergy between different corporate, HR consultancy firms, local administrator (collector), and job fair

India lives in the village and without the development of village the country can not achieve the dream of becoming developed country. There is need of shift focuses on the village and rural youth and booming economy must involved village also as active partner. In Kanchipuram district there are more than 100 of industries working in different field but rural unemployment rate is quite high here. An approach is needed bring the industry together and initiating a step to increase the intake of rural youth in corporate.

Possible approach & objective

à Coordination and liaison with Local Administration (Collector)

à Coordination with leading HR consultancies and Corporate in Chennai

à Prepare and discuss the concept note to corporate explaining the need of bring rural youth forward.

In Brief :
I am going to working with the district collector, kanchipuram District to organize a JOB fair for the rural youths; facilitated by Orchid Pharma's NGO wing

lets see how things turn up :)