Executive courses, IIM-B’s cash cows

The successful executive education programmes run by the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIM-B) have turned out to be a major money spinner for the country’s top B-school.

According to sources at IIM-B, the institute earned a total of Rs32.5 crore from the executive education programmes during 2009-10.

“The executive education programmes are specially designed courses by the institute to further hone the skills of practising managers across the globe. IIM-B’s executive education programmes are very popular among senior managers, and have helped the institute to earn huge revenue,” a senior official of IIM-B said. “In fact, the programmes have taken care of the institute’s monetary needs in a big way,” he added.

“Running the programmes on a regular basis will ensure that the institute can earn its own revenue and become self-sustaining,” he said.

Designed by the institute’s faculty members, the executive education programmes are offered exclusively to senior managers.

The department of executive education programmes at IIMB has taken several steps to ensure that these courses maintain international standards.

The executive education programmes comprise open, customised and international programmes. The open programmes are anchored on faculty research and expertise across various disciplines of management and draw participants from different organisations. These consist of both short and long duration programmes.

The customised programmes offered are designed/customised to meet the specific needs of client organisations.

“The institute partners with client organisations, not only to disseminate state-of-art knowledge to all their managerial personnel through various customised programmes, but also to help in problem solving. One of the distinctive elements of the programmes we design and conduct for corporate partners is the action learning component,” said a faculty member of IIM-B.

“As part of the programme, company personnel study live challenges confronted by their companies and generate solutions under the guidance of the institute’s faculty. The purpose is to achieve both individual and organisational learning simultaneously and more importantly, to make things happen,” the faculty member added.

The international programmes are offered for the benefit of global practising managers, in collaboration with top international B-schools and universities.
The two main international programmes run by the institute are International Masters Programme in Practising Management (IMPM) and Advanced Masters Programme in Management of Globally Distributed Work (AMPM).

“A cooperative venture of business schools in the five countries — the UK, Canada, India, China and Brazil — the International Masters Programme in Practising Management (IMPM) is a novel one that functions in an authentically international context. Every possible aspect of the programme has been customised to concentrate on the needs of participants and their companies.

Deviating from the mould of the functional ‘silos’ so common in management education, the programme is, instead, structured around managerial ‘mindsets’,” said the faculty member.

“The Advanced Masters Programme in Management of Globally Distributed Work (AMPM) is an advanced management education programme for executives who as part of their job, need to develop markets and sources and manage business units around the globe,” the faculty member explained.

IIM-B also designs and conducts in-house management programmes for international business organisations.