For a business not to market their product is like winking at a girl in the dark. You know what you are doing but no one else does.

Stuart H. Britt, US advertising consultant

The students of IIM Calcutta were in for a jam-packed weekend with the 7^th edition of the ‘Strategic Marketing’ Workshop being organized in association with the Chennai Chapter of the IIMC Alumni Association and the Marketing Faculty on 19-20 Sep, 2009. 12 hours of hard-core, real-life marketing experiences among alums with more than 350 years of expertise among them, were up for grabs, as the students made best of this opportunity by interacting with them and participating in the case-study competition, as a part of this event

This workshop was conducted with the assistance of the Marketing Cell-“Marcell” of IIM Calcutta. Through the medium of cases, it aimed to introduce a few to the concept of Strategic Marketing and help implement their ‘text-book’ knowledge to solving these real life cases for the others.

The opening keynote address was given by Prof. Prashant Mishra, PGP Chairman, IIM Calcutta.  He spoke about this workshop “being a unique opportunity for the students to take advantage of the collective experience of the wide resources from the Alumni network”.  In the words of Prof. Sudhas Roy, a workshop like this was needed to “bring the real world into the classroom.” He also lauded the hard work put in by the Chennai Chapter and praised them for being able to sustain and continue the same effort for 7 editions.

The overview of the workshop were given by Mr. J.Krishnan (12^th batch), MD, Netlink Technologies Ltd. (ex-CEO of the Deccan Chargers) and Mr. Ashok Jayaraman (8^th batch), MD, CFI Ltd. Both of the speakers recognized the importance of conducting such workshops as a medium for students to understand how the real world works and to stimulate an environment so as to get a reality check on where they stood.

A case study in the Education Sector

The first case of the day “Marketing in Education” was anchored by Mr. Anand Sudarshan (19^th batch), CEO and MD, Manipal Education. He discussed how the Third Quotient, GQ or the ‘Glamour Quotient’ was missing in the field of education and how the poor ‘Gross Enrolment Ratio’ of India vis-a-vis  other developing countries would hurt its future prospects. He also divulged how quality Vocational education institutes would be needed as an immediate measure. Teams of 5 students each, presented their views and suggestions on the case. Innovative solutions encompassing PPP models and popular organizational structures like the hub-and-spoke models were examined for their efficacy and economic benefits. Mr. Sudarshan eventually explained what was really happening in real life and outlined the need for a Joint-Venture with an established brand in the area of education.

Appreciating Funds-Its Mutual

The next case was conducted by Mr. V Sankar (18^th batch), MD, CAMS. He engaged the audience with the concept of ‘Marketing of Mutual Funds’ and how it would be beneficial to set up a Sales and Distribution framework in India. He also cleared up many misconceptions about Mutual funds in general and how understanding them better would lead to appreciating their true advantage in today’s world.

Roadmap to remove roadblocks

The next session dealt with the tricky issue of a ‘Removing roadblocks from PPPs (Public-Private Partnerships)’. It involved analysing the need for having a PPP in a particular situation, the roles adopted by the partners, funding of the projects and ensuring viability. Mr. D Prakash (11^th batch) Director, UTI Technology Services, played the role of the anchor in this discussion and gave his vital inputs in investigating the parameters involved in evaluating the success of such a partnership.

The day ended with the much awaited interactive session between the alumni and the students of IIM Calcutta. Students fired their doubts and queries at the alums who gladly answered them.

A Stitch in Time

Day 2 was kick-started with the discussion on a case study in the apparel retail sector. This case dealt with the intricate concepts of deciding the distribution strategy of a fictitious company, its cost structure and deciding on the change of management that would accompany an acquisition. Mr. Vineesh Chadha (30^th batch), Director, MXV Consulting, anchored the discussion and evaluated the groups on the basis of innovative solutions with practical feasibility and outlining the significance of understanding the customer needs. He also stressed on the common mistakes made by companies in the Post Merger Integration stage of the acquisition.

Results for the Case Study Competition

The final session of the event saw the results for the highly-contested Case Study Competition. This competition was judged by eminent alums like Mohan Eddy (8^th batch), Director, India Satcom, R. Ramaraj (8^th batch), Senior Advisor, Sequoia Capital, Ajay Jain (18^th batch), Director, Tecpro Infrastructure, K. ‘Mali’ Mahalingam (22^nd batch), Partner, TS Mahalingam & Sons, Ravi Santhanam (15^th batch), MD, Hindustan Motors and PVR Murthy (13^th batch), CEO, Executive Search Recruitment Consultants.

The honours of the 1^st place in the competition were taken away by the PGP-2 team comprising of G. Sriram (Yay Jokatimes!), Anand Goyal,  Kushal Kumar Manupati, Swayam Khialani and Sarang Shahane.

With this, a fruitful and an enlightening experience came to an end leaving the students with a taste of real-life strategic marketing and hungry for more such interactive sessions.

For JokaTimes,

Purnoor Singh Sodhi