Diversity, the new Homogeny!

Picture this: An Entrepreneur who owns a mining unit, A Healthcare Administrator, a Chartered Accountant, a Marketing Country representative, a HR Manager, a Radiologist, an Operations Manager at a nuclear plant, a Product Lifecycle Management specialist, an Investment Banker and an IT Salesman having an avid discussion on Organization Behavior and Business Ethics!

For those pursuing their General Management Program at XLRI, this is not an uncommon sight.

The classical saying ‘birds of a feather flocked together’ holds no water when it comes to the 2012 Batch of the General Management Program (GMP, a one-year fulltime flagship MBA program) at XLRI Jamshedpur!

Originally conceptualized for the promising middle-level managers TATA Steel for a faster climb up the corporate ladder, XLRI broadened the scope of the General Management Program by extending it to professionals from other industries as well. XLRI in its admission process places a strong emphasis on choosing prospective students not only based on the relevance of their job experience, but also ensures diversity within the class. The GMP has evolved over the years and boasts of a class profile now that spans across industries.

Students from sectors such as Media, Medical & Healthcare, Energy (Nuclear, Oil and Gas, Petrochemical) , Manufacturing, Information Technology, Fast Moving Consumer Goods, Human Resources, Business Consulting, Telecommunication, Steel, Mining, Apparels, Banking, Textiles & Fashion open up to subjects such as Management Accounting, Economics, Marketing, Ethics and Corporate Sustainability to obtain a holistic perspective of a business.

The diversity and variety is not restricted to Sector representation alone.

Students have held various corporate positions and wide ranging roles and responsibilities such as Regional Managers, Design Specialists, Operations Managers, Portfolio Manager, ERP consultants and Project Managers.

The GMP boasts of a wide range of student age groups with the youngest class participant being 26 years old and the oldest, 38 years, as well as participants who have worked across geographies and multiple locations.

Where does all of this lead to?

Both Raja Marthandan (27), the youngest entrepreneur in the batch who runs a Manganese Ore mining unit, and Siddhartha Agarwal (38), unquestionably the wisest member of the class, an importer and exporter of textile goods are able to correlate the curriculum and their knowledge gained in running businesses.

For the class participants, interacting with members from other organizations and sectors and listening to their perspectives of subjects is an eye opener.  The result being that the program provides the managers with not only a substantial exposure to the theoretical foundations in management but also a comprehensive view of business. This in turn helps them shoulder responsibilities that come up as they move up the hierarchy. In sum, the GMP re-emphasizes that the value of an MBA education lies also in things learned outside the classroom, in the relationships established with others in the community and fellow students and most importantly in the importance of the age old mantra ‘Unity in Diversity’.