Business Schools – Active Voice

l to r: Samuel Paul, Vasant Mote, Warren Haynes, SC Kuchal, HN Pathak, some of the earliest faculty members at the prestigious Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA).

Came across the photo above recently on Facebook courtesy Vasant Mote (second from left) on his left is my Dad, Samuel Paul, who would later become director of the Institute. He has no memory of when this photo was taken. IIMA as the Institute was called was set up in collaboration with the Harvard Business School and its campus was designed by the renowned American architect Louis Kahn. I’ve written about this in an earlier post but was minded to do so again today after reading the following article: What makes IIM Ahmedabad among top 39 elite B Schools in the world. Apparently according to the article:

The Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad has found a place in top 39 elite Business Schools in the world named by MBA employers, according to QS Global Business School Report 2013, which also ranked Indian MBA graduates as the world’s most academically distinguished.

It’s one of three Asian business schools to earn this global ranking, the other two being from Singapore.

I remember a group of these early professors deciding to start a South Indian restaurant in Ahmedabad in the 60s, though I can no longer remember what it was called now. Surely if they were teaching management they should be able to run a successful business themselves? Well, not so at all, the restaurant didn’t last a year and proved to be a poor case study. Academics should stick to academia was the chastened conclusion.