Alma Mater turns 25....

IIMs have been in the news for decades now. They are spoken of as the best management schools in the country, CEO factories (50% of the CEOs of the top 200 companies in India are IIM alumni), recruiters' suppliers for future business leaders, tools for producing cash-generating machines and much more!

The questions is, "What sets them apart?". Many believe it is possible to replicate the curriculum, case studies, study material and even the rigour being offered at the IIMs. They think it's even possible to build institutes with much better infrastructure then the IIMs have (after all, that takes nothing more than big money!). A few feel its even possible to bring in Faculty from these institutes. There have been instances where professors from IIMs have taken up roles of Directors at other private institutes. So, all-in-all, a lot of private institutions these days have been trying to ape the success of the IIMs. What is it then, that still helps these institutes stand apart? To answer this one needs to look at the admission process of these institutes.

As most people would know, admission to the IIMs takes place through a 2 step process:
1) CAT - An entrance exam taken by more than 250,000 candidates annually
2) Out of these 3,500 to 4,000 candidates are invited for round 2 - the GD-PI round after which the fortunate 1,500 make it to these coveted institutes.

This calls for a comparison:
1,500 students out of the 250,000 applicants get admission offers from the IIMs ( Top 0.6 %)

We compare this to Harvard, supposedly the best B-school in the world, which requires a candidate to be among the top 10-12% of the applicants to receive an admission offer.
Top 0.6% vs Top 10-12%....Sometimes numbers do speak louder than words!!!

This, I believe, is where the IIMs have outscored their peers. For years, after their inception the IIMs have continued to throw up talented individuals who went on to become influential and successful managers, bringing glory and fame to their alma mater, which in turn attracted better talent year after year. The good work of the alumni added value and credibility to the IIMs and over the years built the now worshipped 'Brand IIM'. In return year after year, the talent entering the IIMs continued to gain knowledge, exposure and more importantly 'value' from these esteemed institutions, thereby making it a mutually beneficial relationship between this talent pool and their alma mater. This is where the IIMs have taken a big lead compared to their counterparts. The best students in the country being a part of these institutes has been the single most important source of competitive advantage for the IIMs. And it is this which the wannabes are finding it extremely difficult to ape. Where, and how, do they get students of the calibre like those of the IIMs? They can't.

We are now just 3 days away from a historic day in the history of one of the IIMs. IIM Lucknow, the 4th to come into existence after Calcutta, Ahmedabad and Bangalore (in that order), will celebrate its completion of 25 years on July 26th, 2009. For us, the alumni of IIM Lucknow, it is a proud moment to be associated with such a great institute which we fondly call hel(L) - thanks to the rigorous curriculum we went through during our two year stay there. On this day, I would like to congratulate every single member of the IIM Lucknow family - the students, the faculty, the alumni, the administrative staff, the workers, the wage earners and every single person who has been associated with my alma mater anytime over the last 25 years. It is indeed a proud moment for all of us.

This blog, titled: "Stars in hel(L)", as one might think is NOT an attempt to highlight highly successful, super rich, star achievers of IIM Lucknow. We already have enough coverage on them (For more info about the star alumni, refer to "ACHIEVERS", a monthly interview series highlighting the most successful alumni of the institute. For further details contact alumni@iiml.ac.in ).

Then, what is this blog about? Well, this blog is about people. The people, I came across during my two years in hel(L). It does not matter what they go on to become in life, their attidude, their personality, their traits, the passion with which they lived their 2 years in hel(L), makes them my stars. These are the kind of personalities, I had come across for the first time in my life, in hel(L), and its extremely unlikely that I may come across similar people in future. They have been the most loved, and the most hated people in hel(L).