Sitting pretty: IIM, Ahmedabad students at the 2004 convocation ceremony

INDIAN INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT, AHMEDABAD

FOUNDED: 1961 FIRST FULL-TIME DIRECTOR: Ravi J. Mathai FOUNDER: Dr Vikram Sarabhai CURRENT DIRECTOR: Bakul Dholakia CURRENT CHAIRMAN: N. R. Narayana Murthy NO. OF GRADUATED BATCHES: 43

Philip Kotler once said: "don't sell the steak; sell the sizzle." the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) treats this dictum with all the seriousness it deserves. Ask five people the question: What makes IIM-A special? Chances are you'll get only one answer: the case method of study. But everyone will qualify that with his own take on the matter.

Narendra K. Ambwani, President & Managing Director, Johnson & Johnson India, who passed out of the institute in 1972, is very clear about it. "This method stresses on translating theory into practice. And there's a lot to learn from fellow students with prior work experience." Adds Pankaj Baliga, Vice President, Tata Consultancy Services, who graduated from IIM-A in 1971: "The course is structured in a manner that forces you to think. Mere reading and study are not enough. You have to come up with solutions for given problems. And when you discuss everybody else's solutions at the end of the session, you absorb many different thought processes and emerge richer from the exercise."

Everyone BT spoke to agreed on this. "The course comes packaged with two years of high voltage management fundas," says Vinayak Chatterjee, Chairman of Feedback Ventures and an alumnus from the Class of 1981. "Huge companies are bought and sold (or often liquidated) in charged case study discussions only to be restrategised and resurrected in the next session. Freshly discovered jargon is joyously yelled across from dorm to dorm. And eager beavers sweat it out together under nerve-wracking pressure to get the right grades," he adds.

The cases discussed are all "live" ones; that means they deal with real problems faced by real companies. "Our faculty members interact regularly with the corporate world to develop these case studies," informs Bakul Dholakia, Director of the institute. Typically, two-and sometimes, three-faculty members get together to develop these cases. The time taken can vary between one and two months. "We ensure that our cases keep pace with the times and deal with contemporary issues. We've recently developed cases dealing with mergers and acquisitions. We developed cases on derivatives and futures and options when these instruments were first introduced in India. Before that, we focussed on supply chain management. Whenever there is a new development in the real world, we develop a new course to cover it," he says, adding: "Our faculty is the single-largest source of teaching material in India."

It's little wonder then that ex-students are still in awe of the teachers who once taught them here. "Anything said about the quality of faculty at iim-a would be an understatement. They are 'Gods' in their chosen field, be it finance, hr, organisational behaviour, etc. They would often point out things the entire class had missed," says P. Balaji, Vice President, Marketing & Technical Solutions, Ericsson, who graduated from here in 1990.

Gunit Chadha, Managing Director & CEO of Deutsche Bank India, who belongs to the Class of 1984, adds another dimension to the discussion. "To build a reputation and maintain it consistently over decades is not easy," he says, adding, "the autonomy IIM-A enjoys is probably one reason for it. Besides, the place offers exposure to a diverse environment, not just in terms of learning but also in terms of the people one meets."

FAMOUS ALUMNI
K.V. KAMATH MD & CEO/ICICI BANK CLASS OF 1971 Pioneered ICICI's retail thrust and transformed a project finance company into a retail lending giant	M.S. BANGA CHAIRMAN/HLL CLASS OF 1977 First MBA to head HLL. Spearheaded the company's power brands strategy in India
CASE IN POINT
IIM-A's Dholakia: Leading the pack IIM-A is not just the Harvard of India; it's the Harvard of Asia," says Bakul Dholakia, the Director of the institute. "Our students analyse over 300 live cases drawn from Indian, Asian, European and American industry in the first year and over 200 smaller cases in the second year. Nowhere (he repeats this word thrice to emphasise his point) else in the world do you get this kind of depth and breadth. This is what allows us to develop managers who can fit into any culture anywhere in the world."

So much so that some former students even get passing thoughts of returning there. S. Ramasundar, Executive Vice President (Finance), Ranbaxy, and an alumnus from the Class of 1976 is one such. "I would love to go back and teach there if only to keep myself fresh and mentally agile," he says.

That, many ex-students admit, could be the only way they could get back into their alma mater. Deutsche Bank's Chadha, for one, is certain he wouldn't get admission were he to try again today. "IIM-A is probably the toughest place in the world to get into (apart from the IITs)," he says. Only the very best gain admission here. And the cream invariably rises to the top.

That brings us back to the example of the steak, if you'll pardon the mixed culinary metaphor. Sums up Feedback's Chatterjee: "IIM-A does a great steak. So do many other B-schools. But IIM-A undoubtedly does the best sizzle."

-additional reporting by E. Kumar Sharma, Supriya Shrinate and Priyanka Sangani