Dr. Kamal Ghosh Ray, Director, Vignana Jyothi Institute of Management, Hyderabad reflects on the importance of PGDM in the new world

According to Dr. Kamal Ghosh Ray, the number of non-serious applicants for management programs has decreased in the recent years. He believes students applying for their PGDM programs are those who really value their management education. And still there has been an increase in CAT applicants for the year 2015. So what does the Director of Vignana Jyothi Institute of Management (VJIM), one of the top rated B Schools in Southern India believe his institute has to offer to students who are serious and focused about their futures? The tête-à-tête reveals it all.

Right at the onset, Dr. Ray a renowned name in the world of academia describes the USP of studying at the institute as POGIL, the internationally acclaimed teaching – learning pedagogy that VJIM has adopted. “It stands for Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning and bears brilliant results for students. In fact, VJIM won the Silver Medal at the International Management Conclave-2015, conducted jointly by MBA Universe, Mumbai and ISB, Hyderabad for the Innovative Pedagogy in Teaching Learning Process,” adds Dr. Ray.

But of course the institute, which has earned its stripes through a series of consistent efforts and initiatives, has several hallmarks for management learning. Dr. Ray stresses on a few of them as he says, “We focus on Intensive Induction and Orientation, pre-term module, career vision schooling and personalized student monitoring system to offer them the best learning experience. Our curriculum is catered towards the trends and demands of the industry, and taught by experienced faculty members who are approachable, which gives our students the edge for the new jobs in this dynamic economy.”

VJIM also makes the most out of business simulation, Socratic dialogue approach in teaching, reverse orientation of fundamental concepts and Economic Times newspaper analysis to ensure that its students are engaged and learn in the robust environment. “We try to develop event management skills amongst our students as well. Weekly institution seminars offer them an insight into how the corporate world functions. Our students can also rely on the strong alumni network, which we have built over the years,” states Dr. Ray.

In fact, the alumni from the institute have been its glorious ambassadors and many of them have gone to carve a niche for themselves in their chosen careers. They admit it has a lot to do with the corporate exposure given to them by VJIM and the tireless efforts of its placement cell. Dr. Ray throws light on the efforts as he emphasizes, “We have summer internship programs at reputed companies with the application of business model. Our students also get good placements with reputed MNCs, which help them start their career on the right notes.”

That is indeed true for the last placement season, which witnessed 100% placements among the eligible and opted students. While the opted batch size was 173, there were 215 Pan India offers for the students. Amongst the recruiters who came to the campus for placements were 40 international MNCs and the average annual package was Rs. 5lpa. Those are impressive figures, which give the Director every reason to be proud of. “We have had similar figures in previous years too. At VJIM we also believe in maintaining the consistency,” he says matter-of-factly.

Dr. Ray believes management students in the country have exciting opportunities ahead of them because the number of startup companies hiring has increased. In fact with the economy taking strong strides towards investing more on start-ups and new ventures, the market is full of opportunities and is going to be so for a while now.

What does it take to be a student at the institute? “Proportionate weightage is given to the candidate’s academic background, CAT score, work experience, performance in group discussion and personal interview conducted by VJIM. The cut-off for CAT score is 70 percentile,” he adds.

The Annual fee for the program is Rs. 6,50,000 (excluding hostel fees); fee structure that has remained constant for the last two years. The total intake for the flagship program, Pan India is 180 and the institute manages attain diversity in its classrooms that adds to the learning experience. “We have students from diverse academic backgrounds. In the last two years we have been able to maintain a gender diversity of almost 50:50. It creates an enriching learning environment for students who can go on to become global managers,” he ends on a positive note.