Our Courses are so designed as to meet the requirements of our industry partners and others, says Director Dr Dhingra

In a conversation with Shiksha.com, Director of PML SD Business School Dr KL Dhingra talks at length about key differentiating factors that help the institute differentiate itself from other institutes offering similar programmes. He goes into detail discussing various initiatives taken by the institute t help students become industry-ready.

Dr Dingra has over 39 years of experience in Academic Administration, Banking, Finance, and Management, out of which he has worked for more than 25 years in leadership roles of Executive Director/Director/Chief Executive Officer and Chairman and Managing Director.

Read the complete interview in detail

Q: What are the three things that your college is doing that will enable it to differentiate itself from competition?

A: Three most important differentiating factors are:

• Excellent faculty with a global outlook and those having high academic and industry experience.
• Optimal faculty to student ratio
• Practical course curriculum to suit requirements of industry and other segments

Q: What are the top three initiatives undertaken by you that are helping your students become more industry ready?

A: Industry readiness is one of the most crucial skills in today's time. To help our students become industry ready, we offer:

• Value-added teaching methodology with expected learning outcomes through Case Study analysis, aided by IT wherever possible to enhance the learning experience, Involving students at all levels to ensure better assimilation of knowledge, etc.
• Facilitate students to gain an insight into various analytical tools and where they can be applied
• Invite industry experts such as CEO’s, VPs, MDs, and ex-officio Government Officials to enlighten our students.

Q: What are the key attributes that a student should have in order to qualify for your institution and perform well?

A: To be a part of the institution, one must have a valid and good score in either of the nationally accepted management qualifying exams such as CAT, CMAT, XAT, MAT, ATMA, GMAT, etc. Basis their test scores, we shortlist students and invite them for an extempore talk for at least two minutes to check their communication and presentation abilities. Students qualifying these two rounds are further invited for a personal interview round.

To perform well one must have critical thinking skills, be regular & persistent.

Q: Which programme/s would you say is/are your best? What is it that helps your institution differentiate itself for this programme?

A: Our two-year full-time PGDM program is one of the best and is well accepted in the industry. We claim such a prior sentence because of our curriculum design. Our Courses are so designed as to meet the requirements of our industry partners and others.

First: We have experienced faculty members to cater to the needs of the students wrt their area of specialization.

Second: Proper solicitation is done by premier institutions in the country and by the industry practitioners, who suggest changes and incorporate the latest trends in the market.

Third: This is finally evaluated by the academic core committee members after which it is incorporated in the curriculum.

The institution conducts workshops on new and emerging areas of study which are useful for students in the current era (e.g., design thinking, business analytics, machine learning, IoT, Blockchain, consultancy services, etc.)

• At PMLSD Business School we offer entrepreneurship as a part of our curriculum which helps the students to nurture their entrepreneurial spirit.
• Diverse learning through the audit courses.
• Advance learning through online certifications from MOOCs / NPTEL platforms

Besides the above they are made to go through real-life case studies from various spheres of Industrial / Organisational functioning to get a hands-on experience. They are also made to review research papers and articles to enhance their domain knowledge

Q: What are you doing to improve/drive better campus placements for your current students and alumni?

A: PML SD Business School, being a new Business School has to match the legacy of GGDSD College which is a great institution set up by the same society. Keeping this in mind and the looming threat of pandemics across the world, we are focusing on providing the best placement opportunities to our students. For our first batch, we have been able to bring more than 15 companies to our campus and have already achieved more than 100% placement of our maiden batch with the highest package being 12 lacs per annum. We are also working to make our students more industry ready and face the work challenges faced due to the pandemic. We are also providing industry-specific training, developing skills, and making them more aligned in today’s virtual world, which is the immediate goal of our Training & Placement Cell. We intend to set the benchmarks for the peer B-School and carve out a niche for PML SD Business School in near future.

Looking at the recent trends in the job market, we can see more start-ups joining the industry. Most of these start-ups are technology-driven and are well equipped to meet the challenge posed by the pandemic. For our maiden batch, we had the presence of established organizations such as HDFC, Vardhman on one hand and other startups and tech companies like Byju's, UPGrad, on the other hand.