Our Three Months at IGTC
I am taking a break from reading cases and studying accounting to write a few thoughts about my first term at IGTC. Sitting in my chilling classroom at IGTC, which is so cold probably because they are preparing us for the icy cold weather of Germany, I can’t help but realize that I am sitting in the same classroom as Mr. Arun Roy, CFO, Chevron, had sat when he was reading cases and studying accounting.
As I took my first step into IGTC, I stared at the tall rustic building etched with the name Indo-German Training Centre, and the thought of coming here itself gave me a lot of confidence. As I looked through the vast classroom, I saw the name tags of people who were diverse in every sense. The students came from different parts of the country, some engineers, some arts graduates and some even from the hotel industry.
As much as I was in awe of the environment, part of me was concerned if I would be able to feel comfortable spending so much time with the people whom I have just met. But all my suspicions have now gone down the drain as after spending more than 12 hours every day with my classmates, we have already become very close, just in a three month term.
Change. Or Leadership. These are the topics we often talk about. It’s not a surprise if we hear these discussions in an operations management class or an accounting class. In the end, every subject is linked to each other and to the basic crux of management in some or the other way. Now after 3 months, we can easily relate the Managerial Economics principles with what we had learnt in the Fundamentals of Management class.
We started our journey at IGTC with Descriptive Statistics. Engineers are supposed to be the best at math but thanks to Chitra Ma’am, now everyone in the class can solve complex probability problems with ease. After all, why should engineers have all the fun?
“If you don’t change, you will die” were the golden words of Prof. Leslie Rebello in the first lecture of Organizational Management where we were studying Change Management. Thus we now make it a point to come out of our comfort zones more often than not, and strive towards changing ourselves with the ever-changing world.
Our very first encounter with financial accounting and cost accounting were at IGTC. After studying assets, income, expenses and liabilities in detail, I can definitely say that we all IGTCians are being moulded into “Assets” for our hiring companies. Fundamentals of Management and Managerial Economics are taught to us by the veterans, Prof. Sydney Prabhu and Prof. Harkant Mankad. These subjects are highly relatable as we are basically studying to bridge the gap between management practices and economic theories. Morardian Sir’s operations management has taught us much more than just operations. Thanks to his “principles of management”, we begin to lead a new way of life.
Undoubtedly, each professor at IGTC believes in only one thing and slowly the students are also imbibing it, that there is no elevator to success…you have to take the stairs. Hence, studies are taken very seriously here.
The first term climaxed into a very intense week consisting of major presentations in each subject. Every day was a challenge and that is exactly the culture of IGTC, preparing the students for playing in crunch overs. We had Organizational Behaviour, HRM, Business Communications, IT presentations where we had been given a topic and had to research, prepare presentations and deliver in front of the whole batch and faculty. Marketing assignment was one of the most interesting ones as we had to deliver a presentation on how would we start our own new venture and how would we market it. The topics given were also quite interesting ranging from opening an Asian cuisine restaurant in India to re-launching Tata Nano in the market.
Once the presentations were over, it was time for the exam week. All the students slogged through it but in the end everyone seemed quite content with their hard-work. Some of the exam patterns were really creative and new for us. One example of this is the economics exam where we were not only tested on our concepts but we had been given the Economics Times from which we had to discuss an article of our choice.
‘Nothing can substitute experiences’ is the one line that IGTC has taken very seriously as we had the chance of experiencing an unsupervised examination. There was not only an exam of academic knowledge but also of trust. The subject for this exam was also strategically selected to be Cost Accounting because this is an area where students have a strong impulse to cross-check the final answer. This stimulated an experience for us where we could demonstrate superior emotional intelligence by not cheating and breaking the trust of our faculty when we have a hundred percent chance, need and impulse to do it.
By the end of the first term at IGTC, we realized that through every briefing and interaction with our Director, Radhieka R Mehta, we were gradually being steered and being prepared for our corporate internships. We had started understanding what we are expected to do and what all should we expect from the companies. From being extremely professional, to making an impact with our work, to carrying forward the values of IGTC, we were guided thoroughly. Moreover, working for huge German multinationals that too as a first time for many of us, can be scary. But IGTC has acquainted us so well with the German culture and beliefs, we are confident that we will be in sync with the company’s norms. We are all set to learn as much as we can from our internships and keeping in mind the motivation that the expert in anything was also a beginner once.
Most of the time in the first term we have listened attentively to our professors relating the most complex management concepts to simple life experiences. Our language is changing. We have started are journey towards being a full-fledged MBA student. We now use jargons and phrases of the corporates (which is working in our favor and making us look brainy to the outside world).
“Why IGTC?” is what I am often asked. I reply to this question with another question:
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” – Mary Oliver, The Summer Day.
Article contributed by students of IGTC, Mumbai’s PGPBA Batch 2018 – 2020: Aruja Singh and Gargie Paliwal
