Indian Institutes of Vocational Management (IIVMS): Institutes for Next Generation Management

My first brush with management studies was in 1970 when I took an optional course of production management as part of my final year mechanical engineering course selection. Thereafter, I had the opportunity to complete post-graduate and doctoral programs in industrial engineering and industrial management. Over the last 44 years, it has been my practice to keep in touch with the management disciplines as taught and as practiced. As an engineer who pursued management studies, I was variously intrigued, fascinated and circumspect, time to time, about the glamorous attraction of the management studies that tempted several thousands of engineers to branch off into management. The emergence of premium schools of business such as the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) only fueled the trend. The more established premium schools of engineering, technology and science such as the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) had to follow suit by establishing their own in-house departments or schools of business.   

Unlike engineering, management studies have remained largely static over the last four decades. While more nuances may have come about, and while other disciplines such as mathematics, statistics, economics, sociology, psychology, and information technology may have enriched management, there have been no new disciplines that have emerged out of management. Even Porter’s theories of competitive strategy and competitive advantage (of the 1980s) made for compelling reading but elusive application. Overall, over the last four decades management studies helped graduates improve their conceptual, analytical and communication skills and leapfrog in their careers, leveraging their institutional moorings. With mushrooming of management studies and the increasing need for companies to secure operational advantage rather than strategic advantage, management studies need to move from the (now threatened) vantage position of prescriptive studies to a (future secure) position that would be more value generating and value sustaining. This blog post discusses a few options, some merely extensional and some truly transformational.

Art, science, skill

For too long, the debate on management focused on whether it is an art or science; the former view because of the strong people element in management and the latter view because of the strong quantitative element inherent in performance. Neither is wholly right or wrong but what is more relevant is that management needs to be like anything else - a profession of skill. There is an oft repeated criticism that the Indian educational system focuses too much on information and theory and too little on knowledge and application. As a result, there is a strident view that the workforce is qualified but not knowledgeable and where it is knowledgeable it is not skilled. One of the concerns on ‘Make in India’ reaching its full potential relates to the skill deficit arising out of the Indian educational system. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s very first exhortation has, therefore, been that India must focus on 3 S’s of skill, scale and speed. On these, a common view could be that individual efforts are required for skill development and management efforts are needed to achieve scale and speed. In a distorted view of this, managers tend to believe that only the employees at the bottom of the organizational pyramid need to be skilled while the higher levels need to be only well versed in managerial processes and focused on others’ outcomes than on their own contributions.

Historically, organizations have looked at skill only from a workman perspective and even categorized workmen as unskilled, semi-skilled, skilled and highly skilled. The fact of the matter is that everyone needs to be skilled; whether one is a material handler, forklift operator or machinist. It is only that different types of skills are required for different roles. As understood from serious incidents of quality, compliance or safety, lack of skill even at the lowest levels can cause serious dislocations or disruptions. Given this perspective, it would be an even greater organizational distortion to conceptualize that skills are required at frontline levels and higher levels need only capabilities of management and leadership,  classified as art or science. Management and leadership must move out of the exotic domains of visioning, strategizing and performance management and concentrate equally on individual contributions that are commensurately and consummately skilled. The synergistic arithmetic of organizations has two components; individual and team based. Managers and leaders are also governed by similar value arithmetic. There are two approaches to achieve this in a phased manner. The first is by redefining management curricula. The second is by making management studies completely vocational, and skill based.

Specialization and customization

A logical way to go is to increase the extent of specialization and customization. Specializations such as production, operations, marketing, finance, human resources etc., have always been there. The next frontiers of specialization must be three dimensional. The first dimension must be on specific industry orientation. There is no point in letting management studies remain generic and prescriptive. The least that can be done is to customize studies to industries, which will retain the basic scientific and technological foundations of one’s professional undergraduate studies. One may envisage at least 50 such industry specializations to start with. The second dimension must be on converting themes into subjects. Fashionable topics such as visioning, integration, diversification, costing, execution, self-realization and self-actualization which are nothing more than sections or chapters currently must be developed into holistic subjects. The third dimension must be on focusing on management for differentiated national cultures. Setting up and running industries or businesses could be significantly different across nations, and customization would help in making management graduates better.

The above is based on the requirement that management studies must not remain as generic studies as they now are. Two years is a long time in one’s educational career, especially as one gets closer to the career doorstep. By remaining generic, management studies not only make students unlearn their hard-learnt technical competencies but also make them managers of others’ competencies rather than contributors of their own intellectual might. Today’s generation has the opportunity to learn from diverse sources from the childhood days and it does not require a management capstone course to acquire soft skills. In fact, soft skills, including conceptual, analytical and communication skills, must be integrated from the basic school curricula stage. Management courses by becoming more specialized and customized will become more relevant to the industry. Possibly, educational institutions could be averse to such specialization as there could be uncertainty in securing high student intake. Specialized and customized management courses, not unnaturally, would require early career planning by the students (and their families who have a say over the career choices of students in the Indian context!).

Indian Institutes of Vocational Management (IIVMs)

Vocational courses are those that are directly deployable onto a work situation by teaching and developing work related skills. Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) with their technician courses are typical providers of vocational studies. Even at a higher level, with reference to scientific and engineering studies, it is commonly understood in all engineering institutions that while class room teaching is essential and inevitable science is best learnt in laboratories and technology is best appreciated in workshops. Not only that, class room education is embedded with problem solving to illustrate and imbibe the theoretical principles. In contrast, management studies, despite the gallant efforts to bring in the case study approach and occasional industry guest lectures, remain theoretical and class room laden. In addition, the inevitability of reducing complex real world issues to manageable assignments leaves the students quite distanced from the complex realities. Added to this, the convenient management principle of holding someone else accountable and responsible for elemental projects makes management studies even more superficial. The earlier recommended approach of specialization and customization in subjects, industries and cultures is the first foundational step to make management vocational.  

To institutionalize vocational management studies, it would be necessary to establish a string of Indian Institutes of Vocational Management (IIVMs). The existing management institutes may be given options to convert themselves into IIVMs or establish adjunct IIVMs. Vocational management studies must have five essential components. The first is that an equal distribution of pedagogy between classroom and workplace must prevail. If it is a one year program, six months must be in class room and six months in a workplace, and in the case of a two year program, one year each in classroom and workplace. The second is that project work is not a surrogate for real time work experience. If there exist 12 courses in the theoretical curriculum, there must be 12 projects, each reflecting the main theme of each of the subjects. The third is that the faculty must comprise an equal number of fulltime academic faculty and visiting workplace managers and leaders. The fourth is that the curriculum should be managed and students’ performance evaluated by an academic board of both in-house faculty and industry experts. The fifth is that the vocational management institutes should run off-campus management programs aggressively on the lines of Birla Institute of Technology & Science (BITS), Pilani.  These five principles can transform the way management courses are conceptualized and run as truly application oriented vocational programs. This, of course, requires close collaboration between industries and IIVMs. The exciting opportunity of next generation management - vocational management - is well worth the effort to overcome challenges of collaboration.  

Posted by Dr CB Rao on October 22, 2014

New Generation Technological Education at the IITs: Optimal Track, Rather Than Fast-Track?

The Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), India’s central government owned premier institutions of national importance for technological education have been the Indian icons of globally competitive technical education. The initiatives they take, and the reforms they usher in, have a ripple effect in the entire field of technical education in India. IITs’ latest proposal for fast track engineering (B Tech) degree based on accelerated credits (in three and half years instead of four years) has the potential to churn the technical education scenario in India if it is not appreciated and improved in a holistic perspective. This proposal has to be viewed in the perspective that not several years ago, engineering degree in India required five years of full time study. If this proposal of three and half years becomes real, India would probably the first major country, after the USA, to provide a bachelor’s degree in engineering in such a compressed time frame.   

IITs are known to be cradles of high pressure, high performance education. The entry into IITs is itself a resultant of highly competitive Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) system, for which school boys start preparing years ahead through high intensity coaching. Given this context, an emphasis on credits for a compressed time frame could be seen to be adding to the high pressure robotized study system in the IITs, making students vulnerable to the dangers of intense competitiveness. If other competitive institutions like National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and other key universities follow suit, it could be a larger phenomenon of ‘race to degree’. Another worry would be that other regional universities and colleges may try to follow suit, and given the reduced level of study and examination solidity in such universities and colleges there could be a dilution of study standards in such institutions. At the same time, there also seem to be certain higher order goals in the proposed change which are yet to catch the attention. This blog post discusses the latest proposal from the IITs in the totality, and options.

Flexibility

The IITs proposal, announced by Partha Pratim Chakrabarti, the Director of IIT Kharagpur at the 60^th convocation of the Institute on July 26, 2014, has an important concept of flexibility. The fast-track option is essentially for those students who can accrue the requisite credits. The proposal also allows a more languid pace, extending up to 8 years for the ‘slow learners’. The fast track option envisages that the ‘saved’ six months can be utilized for job or entrepreneurship. It also allows inter-IIT portability of credits to utilize the centers of excellence that exist in various IITs. With these features in tow, the fast track proposal would appear more holistic. This, does not, however take the focus away from the weighty nature of a true technological curriculum and whether adequate justice is being done to it under even a four year program. The pitfall in any credit based system is the equation of credit to learning and subjects to knowledge, all of which require certain minimum periods of time for attention, absorption and assimilation.

The undergraduate level engineering programs are both foundational and specialist in nature. Despite the proliferation of various engineering streams, each engineer irrespective of the specialization must be well versed in certain core engineering studies. These relate to mathematics, sciences, humanities, design and drawing principles, and a foundation of each of the core or basic engineering specializations like civil, mechanical, electrical, electronics and computers. And, each of these has to have a corresponding laboratory practice, which should expose the students to a wide range of machining, forming, casting, welding and bonding practices related to various kinds of materials. Given the heavy knowledge and practice load on one hand, and the extremes of extracurricular pulls and social media distractions on the other hand, the case seems to be more for extension, rather than compression, of degree granting period.

Flights away

One question to ask is to whose benefit the acceleration would be if the fast-track graduate were to choose a job or another degree instead of the well intended entrepreneurship. As we are aware, many of the IIT graduates end up taking up management diplomas in the equally reputed Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) or go abroad for higher education or research. In the IIT Kharagpur convocation, Bharat Ratna Professor C N R Rao exhorted the IITians to stay in the country and contribute to India’s scientific and technological capital, citing his own example of success. If the fast-track graduates see the credit based graduation as an opportunity to explore other options elsewhere, the basis of advancing gets called into question. A total credit score of 182 in 7 semesters, covering theory, laboratory, workshop and fieldwork seems to be an intensely packed study and learning schedule (a typical course take 190 credits over 10 semesters).  A dual degree program is also offered under this route, though details are not yet available.   

By the same token, allowing a highly relaxed period of 8 years for course completion may also be misplaced. Given that all entrants to the IITs are competent and competitive, allowing that level of extended flexibility would be a loss in the formation of intellectual capital in India. Considering that certain students do find the pressure a trifle too much, flexibility for completing the course up to 6 years could be more in order.  Also, extending inter-IIT portability to cover at least one year of residence could expose the students to not only other centers of excellence but even to other residential cultures as well. Given that the new program will be rolled out from the academic year 2016-17, and in a phased manner, there is an opportunity to reinforce the good points of the fast-track program (in fact, it should be called optimal track program!), overcome the weaknesses and develop a techno-entrepreneurial ecosystem that maximizes the benefits of the proposal. 

Specializations

The key to success of a flexible credit based system is the availability of a number of specializations and micro-specializations on one hand and well coordinated academic planning. Providing total flexibility to the student in course choice could lead to diffused learning while too much control could lead to the defeat of the system itself. It is important that the academic deans of the IITs develop a course planner which explains why a cluster of related specializations would make a holistic sense compared to a random choice of courses. The course credits must be hierarchically defined based on complexity and relational synergy of the courses. It may be a good idea for the IITs to develop an App exclusively for course and credit planning under the fast-track system. The App must also link specializations offered by the various IITs to define a total universe of specializations. There could be certain thorny issues related to different IITs providing differential values to similar specializations based on the excellence they think they possess in the domain. This will be one challenge of flexibility.

The other challenge will be providing the specializations themselves. For a mechanical engineering stream, the range of main and specialization courses can range from thermodynamics to robotics. Whether a robotics specialization could be common for  mechanical and electronics mainstreams, or whether it would need to be customized to each mainstream would be one call. Given the fast paced developments, what would be the life of a course (say, 3 or 5 years) would be another call. Whether courses that belong to a graduate level (for example, prosthetics) would be a good fit for an undergraduate level mechanical engineering course could be another call. Whether specializations should be only subject matter or whether even laboratory or workshop practice could qualify as specializations is another call. Ideally, specializations should have a range that plays on one’s aptitude for further academic specialization or industrial practice. The challenges are likely to be more in domains where product life cycles are getting shorter. One way would be to link up academic expertise, research directions, consulting practice and industrial inputs in development of state-of-the-art specializations.

Entrepreneurship in IITs   

Given that an important aspect of the fast-track proposal is to release one semester for entrepreneurial activity, availability of an entrepreneurial ecosystem within the IIT system, or otherwise, would be a prerequisite.  A few IITs, notably IIT Madras, IIT Bombay, IIT Kharagpur, and IIT (BHU) Varnasi have experimented with creating entrepreneurial ecosystems as adjuncts to their educational systems. IIT Madras has set up IIT Madras Incubation Cell. IIT Bombay has set up Society for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. IIT (BHU) has established Malaviya Centre for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship. Each of them has incorporated specific initiatives funded by the IITs, Central Ministries or IIT alumni themselves. Even a newer IIT like IIT Hyderabad has set up E-Cell for entrepreneurs. Although some of these have been in operation since 1999, there is no evidence of any major entrepreneurial startups that emerged from these incubation initiatives. Even though IITM has provided physical infrastructure through IIT Madras Research Park adjacent to IITM campus, startups have been few to leverage the facilities.     

Undoubtedly, the strong technological foundations at IITs, and the personality strengths of the IITians make them look at entrepreneurship as a career option more confidently, the only inhibiting factor being the hugely attractive job opportunities they automatically command. That said, convergence of futuristic research with foundational technology, and combination of financial support with commercial insights would be necessary to create an ecosystem that would make entrepreneurship widespread across IITs. Special emphasis should be laid on socially relevant low cost, high technology products. Entrepreneurship, however, requires more than a feasible product idea. A recent research suggests that an entrepreneur with a product idea needs a core organization of likeminded passionate friends to make a success of entrepreneurship. Even some of the biggest globalized startups of today such as Apple, Amazon, eBay, Facebook, Salesforce.com as well as regional startups like Project A Ventures, Eyeota, Flipkart, RedBus validate this thesis.

Indigenous ecosystem

The other aspect is that successful entrepreneurship needs certain other skills in addition to wholly technical skills. This has prompted the Hyderabad based management school, the Indian School of Business (ISB) to launch, as a two-year programme at ISB, Technology Entreprenurship Programme to equip select engineering students with skills to become entrepreneurs. It is stated that Microsoft Ventures and Google are supporting the programme. The larger question still would be whether even a broader educational curriculum for entrepreneurship or cross-collaboration between IITs (and/or NITs) and IIMs (and/or ISB) would be completely sufficient. The philosophical question is also whether entrepreneurship can only from arise from premier institutes, or could emerge as a broader national phenomenon. Prima facie, creative technological ideas ought to emerge from any institute which has higher technological and research competencies. Idea incubation (example, IIT Madras Incubation Cell) and licensing of patentable ideas (yet to happen in a big way) from institutes of higher technology is one facet of creation of a broader national entrepreneurship ecosystem.

The real answer could lie in restoring and rejuvenating the traditional economic employment system of India which was rooted in skill and craft based self-employment system but has faced dilution due to the attraction of readymade and assured career options that could arise from formal educational qualifications. It is, therefore, gratifying that some of the IIT entrepreneurship schools are focusing on socially relevant product or service ideas (example, Center for Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation at IIT Madras). Real developments that can be commercialized would need to focus on market applications rather than technology roots. For example, could a variable speed micro-motor be developed that could make a potter’s work more productive, more consistent and of higher quality? Can a portable ultrasound linked with tablet computer be designed to take ultrasound diagnostics into the rural areas? Can there be a sanitizing solution for dry leaf plates (used extensively in certain southern states) to obviate the need for paper plates? Can solar panels, inverters and electricity power be integrated to reduce generated power consumptions? Can there be water purifying technology which does not waste any water? The optimal track for IITs could be in not fast-tracking credits per se, but in integrating latent market needs with creative technologies.

Posted by Dr CB Rao on July 29, 2014          

 

 

Management & Leadership (M&L) at the Cost of Science & Technology (S&T): Time for the Former to Cease Piggybacking and Commence Standing Alone

From being a staid domain a few decades ago to becoming a fancied domain, management & leadership (M&L) have emerged as gateways to career progress and organizational ascendancy, even to scientists and technologists. Despite any number of achievements in science & technology (S&T), such as the successful launch of indigenous cryogenic space rocket by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and the national pride and international recognition such scientific and technological achievements bring to India, there is no let up in the preference for management and leadership courses, both in pre-career and in in-career stages. While the educational and course preferences tend to be a matter of supply and demand as well as job potential, an emerging economy such as India cannot afford to leave the knowledge dynamics entirely to market fancies. A nation will have a true meritocracy when domains are geared to continuously develop new knowledge, and to continuously expand the body of the overall knowledge base, in the process integrating the new knowledge and making the existing knowledge contemporaneously relevant.

 The craze of sorts for M&L, which essentially meant students and professionals moving away from further specialization in S&T courses (at post-graduate or research levels) to M&L courses (at post-graduate or fellow levels), has made advanced countries lose their some of the competitive edge.  It has prompted some of such countries to welcome overseas students and professionals from S&T streams into their nations. Emerging countries such as India and China benefitted from the importance given to S&T in their curricula. Amongst all the Asian countries, including China, Japan and Korea, only India has favored the growth of M&L streams to a great extent, essentially as an offshoot of adopting the Western education model. While this need not be disparaged, movement of top-flight talent from S&T to M&L needs to be discouraged. S&T, rightly so, have higher entry barriers for learning and mastery, compared to M&L. Lower entry barriers to learning coupled with higher job opportunities could lead to distortions in India’s talent pool and industrial endeavors, particularly at a time India requires the ultimate push to become an economic superpower.  To restore S&T to pride of place, the proud facets of being an S&T professional need to be understood by students and educational institutions, and recognized and rewarded by industrial organizations.

Touchstone of solidity

Any knowledge domain that raises expectations has to eventually live up to the expectations of contributions to society in terms of the domain knowledge and its technological applicability.  S&T undoubtedly qualifies as a critical knowledge domain under this criterion. The body of knowledge under S&T continually grows, oftentimes in exponential spurts, transforming society and quality of life. The S&T knowledge is an eclectic combination of principles, laws, logic and mathematics, leading to quantification of physical, chemical and biological models.  There is a true and sustainable correlation between publications, patents, theory and practice in S&T, making them truly holistic knowledge domains. Science creates theory out of experiments and uses experiments to validate theory. Technology applies science to design, manufacture and deliver products or services.  In contrast, the body of knowledge under M&L seems to increase at best once in a decade, and the total body of knowledge of the last several decades of organized M&L can be summarized under a handful of concepts. The M&L knowledge is predominantly based on behaviors and couched in linguistic expressions. The real expansion of knowledge in M&L, which is very low relative to S&T, is magnified by rather creative expressions and sporadic case analyses; very little is based on statistically representative research. Management creates repetitive theories on age old principles like planning, organizing, staffing, directing, coordination, controlling and budgeting. Leadership looks at personalities to weave modeling theories around stylistic syndromes.

S&T requires M&L for optimized commercialization but not necessarily always. Without S&T, however, M&L is completely superfluous; in fact, M&L is purposeless without S&T. Whether companies that wade through financial management or countries that are resurrected after economic collapse, they are dependent on science and technology. If New Delhi’s T3 airport of yesterday or Mumbai’s T2 airport of today received rave reviews, despite managerial delays, the technological concept and execution grandeur are responsible in no small measure. It is somewhat of a misrepresentation that S&T and M&L are distinct, and it is an even more of misrepresentation that S&T requires M&L to optimize itself. S&T approach which is based on review of current knowledge, logic of new hypothesis and validation through experiments has the basic managerial principles integral to the approach. S&T, once established, accepts no ambiguity. The basic principles of S&T whether it is the Periodic Table of Elements, the Boyle’s Law or the Iron-Carbon Diagram, do not change over time. S&T is absolute in a universal sense. A deep sense of review and a tremendous level of experimentation make the principles rock-solid. In contrast, all M&L principles are contextually flexible and iteratively reversible and merely firm-specific or person-influenced (for example, integration is good for some, integration is bad for some; conglomeration is good in the 1950s, bad in the 1980s, again great in 2010s, and so on).

Linear versus circular

Science and technology have a linear (and exponential) development track. Each S&T development builds on the past for a new future, rather than revert to the past. Management and leadership, in contrast, are steeped in rediscovery.  From time to time, old M&L concepts are simply refurbished and repositioned, from time to time. The flight of talent to such refurbishment and repositioning of management and leadership instead of staying with science and technology is a matter of concern. Having attracted such S&T talent, the inability of the M&L domains to become linear and exponential in genuine knowledge accretion is a matter of greater concern. The question that dispassionate analysts face is whether M&L streams contribute materially relevant value or just add some transient flamboyance to basic S&T. The first two decades of independent India had no institutes of management or even business management courses, yet the country saw significant industrialization. The best of India’s talent went into the graduate engineer schemes of technological giants. The strength of these industrial undertakings today is based on these talented scientific and engineering corps which grew the companies and grew with the companies. Officers of the Indian Administrative Services were some of the best managers and leaders then. One would like to see better value addition from the proliferation of M&L streams.

This phenomenon of early stage fundamental development on the base of science and technology is common to technology leaders of America, Inc as also to several Asian countries, such as Japan, Korea and China. From the early Toyota Production System that originated on the automobile shop floor to the Minimalist Design Philosophy that emerged from classy electronic devices, it is science and technology of design, manufacture and delivery that has been presumptively positioned as management and leadership models. From time to time, newer phraseology such as lean, six-sigma is used to reposition the philosophy of ‘minimal input-maximal value’ that is inherent at each level of S&T through the ages. Even the interpersonal facets of M&L are just simple principles of balanced living that are ingrained in the spiritual and philosophical treatises of various religions from times immemorial. The relative paucity of new M&L thoughts is due to the limited nature of enquiry, which is confined to the four types of human-machine interfaces; human-machine, machine-machine, human-machine and human-human. S&T, on the other hand, is in an endless pursuit of seemingly inexplicable and indeterminate natural phenomena, in terms of physical, chemical and biological models of the universe. The greater the talent concentration on S&T, as opposed to M&L, the greater could be the value generation and wealth creation in a nation through the unraveling of the natural mysteries and discovery, and subsequent perfection of solutions for them.

Rediscovering M&L  

To be fundamentally value-accretive and practically effective, M&L have to be considered as subservient adjuncts to S&T domains rather than as substitute or revisionist superior domains. The key M&L learning factors need to be integrated into S&T curricula. As part of several decades of practical experience, the author of the blog post has had the occasion to interact with hundreds of management graduates, managers and leaders employed in industry or services sectors; not one has admitted to have implemented the courses taught in the two year management programs, be it, for example, advanced statistics, operations research, portfolio theory, signaling theory, reliability models, and the like. Given that the engineering degree program in India is of four years durations, it makes little sense to unlearn the core S&T and spend another two years in learning fancied M&L, most of which it is never applied in any case. Given that good management and leadership is an integral part of science and technology, it would make better sense to integrate certain core management and leadership subjects, not exceeding eight in number (one in each of the eight semesters), as part of S&T domain learning. These could be statistics, economics, accounting and finance as the four core subjects, and operations, marketing, strategy   and responsibility as the four application subjects.    

Those who are committed to M&L as their life’s passion must be prepared to go through the full five year professional certification programs in management and leadership, as economists, mathematicians and accountants go through. Only then, the exponents of management and leadership, whether in academics or industry, will be challenged to develop and grow as a self-sustaining discipline rather than as a discipline that piggybacks on other disciplines, and unwittingly makes the core disciplines ignored. M&L as a stand-alone discipline will have its own research and self-development paradigms, to be relevant to the nation as a separate knowledge continuum. This, coupled with the earlier proposed strategy of graduate and post-graduate S&T programs being self-sufficient with their basic M&L knowledge, would ensure that the investments made in S&T are preserved and flight of talent from S&T is avoided. Many institutes and universities making hay on capstan management programs will be disappointed with this approach but India, as an emerging nation, will immensely benefit from S&T investments, in both education and industry, fulfilling their potential. Probably, the famed IIMs can take the lead by stopping piggybacking on the IITs for the core talent with their two year MBA programs, and start standing alone in the fields of management and leadership through new five year integrated MBA programs.

Posted by Dr CB Rao on January 12, 2014

      

 

            

Foreign Educational Institutions in India: Right Priorities and Relevant Pathways

For a country which has its share of debates, a new item has been added for diligent debate in India. The move by the Government of India to allow foreign educational institutions to set up bases in India is considered an unnecessary cost-push move by some educational experts given that the Indian educational system has reached a state of maturity. On the other hand, the proponents feel that the move is a logical extension of globalization with Indian universities being allowed to set up shops in foreign shores and vice versa. It is also hoped that foreign universities bring in the required investments for world-class educational experience in India. Some experiments of liberalization in India have had unwelcome fallouts of mass entry; some caution, therefore, is probably well merited.

Foreign educational institutions in India

Over the last ten years there has been a significant proliferation of the so called foreign educational institutions in India without commensurate qualitative change in the educational scene. According to the Association of Indian Universities, the foreign education institutions in India have increased from 144 (in 2000) to 631 (in 2010). The maximum number were from the UK (158), followed by Canada (80) and the US (44). Of the 60 foreign education providers, who have programmes of collaboration with local institutions, only 25 local institutions were affiliated to Indian universities or approved by regulatory bodies. Only 32 of the 49 foreign institutions operating under twinning arrangements have had approval or affiliation. A review of the institutions or the institutional collaborative arrangements indicates that the arrangements are usually aimed at awarding a degree with a “foreign tag” rather than achieving any institutional transformation.

The Foreign Educational Institutions (Regulation of Entry and Operations Bill) 2010 has been pending before the Indian Parliament for the past two years. There has been growing concern in recent years that fake foreign varsities were duping students from India. Now, over 600 foreign education institutions operate in the country. The UGC put its plan to allow foreign universities to set up campuses on hold after a large number of members felt that there was need for greater deliberations from different areas of study, including technical, medical, law and architecture. There are also questions raised on the need to allow foreign varsities to function as "deemed universities''. Overall, it is clear that the existing framework has not enabled the real Ivy League institutions enter India; nor has it stopped the pursuit of higher education abroad by India’s talented students.

Enter UGC

The Universities Grants Commission has oversight and approval authority on the Indian university system. In an attempt to rein in fly-by-night operators who could money making educational shops in India, the UGC has made its approval mandatory for all collaborations between foreign and Indian educational institutions. The new regulations approved by the UGC on June 2, 2012 give existing institutions six months to get approval. The UGC has also laid down dual criteria to ensure that quality academic institutions are allowed to run joint degree or twinning courses. Only those foreign institutions will be allowed to collaborate who figure in the top 500 of the Times Higher Education World University Ranking or the Shanghai Jiaotong Ranking. The Indian varsities should have received the highest accreditation grade from the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) and the National Board of Accreditation (NBA) to be eligible for a tie-up with a foreign institution.

The degrees will be awarded by the Indian universities for their acceptability in India. Institutes failing to abide by the guidelines would be penalized. The UGC is empowered to stop grants in case of public institutions while it can recommend to the Centre withdrawal of recognition in case of deemed universities. As stated by the UGC, the regulations aim to set a quality bar to the entry of foreign educational institutions into India, as well as for collaboration between the foreign and Indian educational institutions. The regulations, however, do not, and probably were not intended to, provide a canvas for structural changes in the Indian educational system, even in the higher education band where such foreign educational institutions operate. A more fundamental appraisal is needed.

Indian education, more with less

The Indian educational system has certainly its world-class achievements. The numbers of Indian students who gain admission in the top rung US educational institutions annually and the numbers of the Indian scientists and engineers employed in the US constitute a clear testimony to the Indian talent and Indian universities. In addition, the strong base of science and mathematics from the school level in India contrasts with the diffidence to engage in those studies in the US. However, these achievements are more in keeping with India’s ability to “do more with less”, rather than with a natural potential to “do even more with more”. The gaps in the educational system can be seen at different levels from primary school education to higher university education.

The need for a massive transformation in the primary and secondary school educational systems together with strict enforcement of the right of every child for education is keenly felt in India. This is, however, a domain which is, and has to remain as, the core competence of India. Foreign institutions would have little incentive or capability to play a role in this area. The fact that the pre-school and school years are also the years of solid foundational grounding in the Indian culture and Indian ethos, there is a case for the Indian institutions to display their moorings. Given this situation, this blog post focuses only on the higher education component of foreign institutional entry. The higher educational system has serious shortfalls in terms of infrastructure, faculty and research direction.

Higher education, lower resources

The largest of the entities in the Indian educational system, the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) have an annual budget in the range of Rs 2500 million (USD 50 million). They have typical faculty strength of 500 and student strength of 6000. In contrast, the top rung US universities have budgets of USD 1 billion to 4 billion (20 to 80 times over). The faculty strength tends to be the order of 2000 to 4000 and student strength of the order of 20000 to 40000. It is not uncommon for the top US universities to receive USD 500 to 1000 million each in research grants or alumni gifts. It is also not uncommon for the US universities have research budgets of the order of USD 750 million. While clearly there are differences of scale and scope, these are particularly pronounced in funding channels and their scale as well as research budgets and their scope.

The Indian higher educational system has done particularly well to equip each of its students to higher education or higher research abroad. What the Indian system failed to do is to create a base of fundamental research and development in its institutions in India that could serve as the further developmental grounds for the Indian talent. Even today, the breakthrough research continues to get done in the university laboratories of US, Japan and Europe. The Nobel prizes continue to get won by professors of US and European laboratories (despite several Indian researchers working in those laboratories). The entry of foreign educational institutions should address this fundamental infrastructure, research and resource gap rather than aim at providing run of the mill degree award and executive development programs.

Building a new research ecosystem

Foreign educational institutions can make a significant contribution in building a new research ecosystem in the Indian educational institutions. The work in the foreign laboratories is continuously focused on the fundamentals of matter and biology, oftentimes exploring the linkages. For example, at a time India is looking at genetics, epigenetics has been taken up in a big way in US laboratories. Interdisciplinary research is an institutional approach to provide new solutions. Microrobotics for less invasive surgery, nano-structured meta-materials, development of new materials such as graphine, ultra-sensitive diagnostics, human protein sequencing, personality genetics, amino acid studies, solar energy development, and so on. While not all research makes it to commercialization and while some is hyperbole in advance, the fact remains that many new problem solving directions are emerging from the US academic research.

The dilemma or disconnect for the Indian educational system lies in having a valuable stock of academically trained scientists and technologists in India who necessarily have to find a research base in the advanced laboratories of the US, Japan or Europe. Clearly, the value proposition for the foreign educational institutions must lie in accessing Indian talent without barriers and for the purpose creating the requisite laboratory infrastructure, research processes and information exchanges in India. This would certainly be a more complex process than sourcing products or processes from India because of the sensitive nature of intellectual property generation and patenting issues. By acting innovatively and responsibly with enhanced capabilities of scientific and technical communication the Indian talent can actually accelerate the publication and intellectual property record of the foreign universities. On the whole, a new ecosystem needs to be the sine qua non for getting the foreign educational institutions in to India.

What the governments can do

The governments, state and central, should treat setting up of state-of-the-art laboratories under the Indian-foreign educational system on par with attracting global commercial manufacturing and research proposals. Liberal provisioning of land and supportive infrastructure such as roads, power and telecommunications would go a long way in creating world class educational and research infrastructure in India. The Government of India and the Indian universities can also address the intellectual property constraint or barrier through a vibrant intellectual property office (IPO) system in India. Proposals of collaboration between the Indian and foreign universities must specify clear domains of research and goals of development. Commercial viability could be attempted for the initiatives through sponsored research projects.

Posted by Dr CB Rao on June 3, 2012

Globalization of the IITs : A Pan-IIT 2008 Thought Stream

The Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) are by far the most visible symbols of India’s prowess in scientific and technical education. Alumni of the IITs have distinguished themselves in academic and industrial settings in India and in all the advanced countries of the world. No wonder then that the recently concluded Pan-IIT 2008 deliberated on what else the IITs could or should do on a global canvas. Here are a few thoughts:

1. Commercializing cutting-edge research

The IIT system has completed 56 years of truly high technology educational saga in India. What started as an undergraduate program had soon become a beacon for higher order post-graduate and research education. It is a matter of no small significance that Ph.D. students currently constitute about 17% of the total student population in the IITs. Post-graduate and research education has been an engine of growth in IITs in its own right. There is a need, however, to establish centres in areas of cutting edge science and technology such as biotechnology, nanotechnology, robotics and artificial intelligence from which innovative ideas and inventions could be generated and incubated as entrepreneurial start-ups. This model has been perfected in the United States by a number of universities and is now pioneered in Europe by institutes such as Karolinska Institute and can be easily supported by the IITs in India. Following the example set by IIT Madras, Research Parks may also be set up by various IITs. However, these ventures need to be supported by government grants and industrial donations so that faculty and inventive students are provided laboratory space free of charge during the incubation period.

2. Converging engineering and medicine.

For far too long a period, India has treated Engineering and Medicine as two physically and intellectually distinct streams of education and research. This contrasts sharply with the US scenario where the best of engineering and medical institutions function within common campuses, and under shared umbrellas. With advances in genetic engineering, medical engineering, physical, chemical and material sciences and several hybrid domains it has become possible to study the human body (or objects of life) as much as engineering traditionally studied inanimate objects (such as buildings or machinery). The ultimate goal of science and engineering will be to understand life in its entirety to be able to arrive at cost-effective diagnostic and therapeutic solutions. In order to promote such convergence, IITs need to expand curriculum to include biological sciences as well as hybrid biology-engineering domains to create requisite academic and research platforms. Just as management schools have become integral parts of the IITs, medical schools would also need to be parts of IITs. Medical undergraduates need to be facilitated to acquire post-graduate engineering degrees in fields such as robotic surgery, tele-medicine, bio-medical engineering, and so on. Similarly, engineering undergraduates should be facilitated to acquire post-graduate medical degrees in fields such as genetic engineering, artificial organ engineering, pharmaceutical drug delivery, human biotechnology and medical nanotechnology, and so on.

3. Globalization of IITs

IIT alumni have been the most powerful and iconic representatives of India’s highly successful IIT system abroad. Despite the clear knowledge and competence edge, IITs have not been overtly successful in drawing students from advanced countries. Even students from emerging economies and contiguous nations are not many at the IITs. Lack of awareness, concerns on geo-political safety, family and cultural issues, logistics, higher costs of overseas education and loss of linkages with employment sources could be the causes that limit the number of students accessing IITs in India. The only way to irrefutably strengthen IITs’ global blueprint is only through physical presence in advanced countries. This could at the minimum level take the shape of faculty collaboration cum student exchange programs with reputed overseas institutions and at the aspirational level could involve setting up of overseas campuses. The latter of course requires deep financial resources and support of non-resident Indians in a big way. A start could be made with the setting up of mini-campuses within major universities such as Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Oxford, Cambridge and Karolinska. The value proposition for those universities would be in terms of an intense exposure to Indian economic, technical and business perspectives and preparation of their students for cross-cultural professional employment.

4. Strengthening the faculty.

Even as the intake of IITs has been expanding, the share of research growing and the number of IITs itself increasing, the availability of requisite faculty has become a major issue. There is a need to create new tiers of post-doctoral programs to generate and retain new pools of academically oriented researchers who could undertake a variety of educational and research activities in the IITs. At another level, apart from enhancing the compensation levels for the faculty members, and increasing their share of consultancy income, out-of-box measures such as participation in research driven start-ups could attract greater number of bright doctoral and post-doctoral professionals to the IITs. It may also be beneficial to create pools of superannuated faculty as well as industry professionals to act as adjunct faculty for application oriented courses.

5. Transactional efficiency in consulting.

IITs can help industries and businesses, big and small, because of the superior laboratory resources, computer facilities and knowledge systems that reside in the IITs. The vast pool of students and researchers can, of course, undertake project works of short time bursts. However, the IITs have not been able to leverage these intellectual assets due to slow pace of consulting transactions. By setting up offices for business development in consulting and project management for facilitating and monitoring the execution of consulting projects, the IITs can achieve transactional efficiency. Consulting at IITs should, however, be truly in knowledge-intensive sectors befitting the scientific pedigree. Deployment of modern electronic and telecommunication technologies in logistics and transportation projects could, for example, be a challenging area of consultancy. Design of flexible manufacturing systems for small and medium enterprises could be another. There would be potential areas in each industrial or business sector that demand the skill-sets of the IITs.


By focusing on and commercializing cutting edge research, integrating engineering and medicine, globalizing the campus presence and faculty-student intake, reinforcing the faculty and enhancing transactional efficiency in consulting, the IITs could become the top-tier educational system on a global basis over the next two decades.

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Dr C Bhaktavatsala Rao is an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, and is presently the Deputy Managing Director of Orchid Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals Limited, Chennai. Posted on December 19, 2008.

Globalization of the IITs : A Pan-IIT 2008 Thought Stream

The Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) are by far the most visible symbols of India’s prowess in scientific and technical education. Alumni of the IITs have distinguished themselves in academic and industrial settings in India and in all the advanced countries of the world. No wonder then that the recently concluded Pan-IIT 2008 deliberated on what else the IITs could or should do on a global canvas. Here are a few thoughts:

1. Commercializing cutting-edge research

The IIT system has completed 56 years of truly high technology educational saga in India. What started as an undergraduate program had soon become a beacon for higher order post-graduate and research education. It is a matter of no mean significance that Ph.D. students currently constitute about 17% of the total student population in the IITs. Post-graduate and research education has been an engine of growth in IITs in its own right. There is a need, however, to establish centres in areas of cutting edge science and technology such as biotechnology, nanotechnology, robotics and artificial intelligence from which innovative ideas and inventions could be generated and incubated as entrepreneurial start-ups. This model has been perfected in the United States by a number of universities and is now pioneered in Europe by institutes such as Karolinska Institute and can be easily supported by the IITs in India. Following the example set by IIT Madras, Research Parks may also be set up by various IITs. However, these ventures need to be supported by government grants and industrial donations so that faculty and inventive students are provided laboratory space free of charge during the incubation period.

2. Converging engineering and medicine.

For far too long a period, India has treated Engineering and Medicine as two physically and intellectually distinct streams of education and research. This contrasts sharply with the US scenario where the best of engineering and medical institutions function within common campuses, and under shared umbrellas. With advances in genetic engineering, medical engineering, physical, chemical and material sciences and several hybrid domains it has become possible to study the human body (or objects of life) as much as engineering traditionally studied inanimate objects (such as buildings or machinery). The ultimate goal of science and engineering will be to understand life in its entirety to be able to arrive at cost-effective diagnostic and therapeutic solutions. In order to promote such convergence, IITs need to expand curriculum to include biological sciences as well as hybrid biology-engineering domains to create requisite academic and research platforms. Just as management schools have become integral parts of the IITs, medical schools would also need to be parts of IITs. Medical undergraduates need to be facilitated to acquire post-graduate engineering degrees in fields such as robotic surgery, tele-medicine, bio-medical engineering, and so on. Similarly, engineering undergraduates should be facilitated to acquire post-graduate medical degrees in fields such as genetic engineering, artificial organ engineering, pharmaceutical drug delivery, human biotechnology and medical nanotechnology, and so on.

3. Globalization of IITs

IIT alumni have been the most powerful and iconic representatives of India’s highly successful IIT system abroad. Despite the clear knowledge and competence edge, IITs have not been overtly successful in drawing students from advanced countries. Even students from emerging economies and contiguous nations are not many at the IITs. Lack of awareness, concerns on geo-political safety, family and cultural issues, logistics, higher costs of overseas education and loss of linkages with employment sources could be the causes that limit the number of students accessing IITs in India. The only way to irrefutably strengthen IITs’ global blueprint is only through physical presence in advanced countries. This could at the minimum level take the shape of faculty collaboration cum student exchange programs with reputed overseas institutions and at the aspirational level could involve setting up of overseas campuses. The latter of course requires deep financial resources and support of non-resident Indians in a big way. A start could be made with the setting up of
mini-campuses within major universities such as Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Oxford, Cambridge and Karolinska. The value proposition for those universities would be in terms of an intense exposure to Indian economic, technical and business perspectives and preparation of their students for cross-cultural professional employment.

4. Strengthening the faculty.

Even as the intake of IITs has been expanding, the share of research growing and the number of IITs itself increasing, the availability of requisite faculty has become a major issue. There is a need to create new tiers of post-doctoral programs to generate and retain new pools of academically oriented researchers who could undertake a variety of educational and research activities in the IITs. At another level, apart from enhancing the compensation levels for the faculty members, and increasing their share of consultancy income, out-of-box measures such as participation in research driven start-ups could attract greater number of bright doctoral and post-doctoral professionals to the IITs. It may also be beneficial to create pools of superannuated faculty as well as industry professionals to act as adjunct faculty for application oriented courses.

5. Transactional efficiency in consulting.

IITs can help industries and businesses, big and small, because of the superior laboratory resources, computer facilities and knowledge systems that reside in the IITs. The vast pool of students and researchers can, of course, undertake project works of short time bursts. However, the IITs have not been able to leverage these intellectual assets due to slow pace of consulting transactions. By setting up offices for business development in consulting and project management for facilitating and monitoring the execution of consulting projects, the IITs can achieve transactional efficiency. Consulting at IITs should, however, be truly in knowledge-intensive sectors befitting the scientific pedigree. Deployment of modern electronic and telecommunication technologies in logistics and transportation projects could, for example, be a challenging area of consultancy. Design of flexible manufacturing systems for small and medium enterprises could be another. There would be potential areas in each industrial or business sector that demand the skill-sets of the IITs.


By focusing on and commercializing cutting edge research, integrating engineering and medicine, globalizing the campus presence and faculty-student intake, reinforcing the faculty and enhancing transactional efficiency in consulting, the IITs could become the top-tier educational system on a global basis over the next two decades.

--------------------------------------------------------
Dr C Bhaktavatsala Rao is an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, and is presently the Deputy Managing Director of Orchid Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals Limited, Chennai. Posted on December 19, 2008