S P Jain wins international TeamMBA award

After more than 21,000 votes were cast online in May, two business schools ― SP Jain Institute of Management and Research (India) and the College of William and Mary Mason School of Business (United States)―won TeamMBA awards for their community service and social responsibility programs. The winners were announced today by the Graduate Management Admission Council at its Annual Conference, the largest gathering of graduate business school professionals in the world.

A total of 78 service programs from schools around the world were considered for the TeamMBA award. These programs involved nearly 1,500 students who volunteered almost 50,000 hours and raised US$2.6 million.

“In honoring these two great institutions, we  also recognize the tremendous spirit and passion that business school students around the world have for giving back to their community and to their commitment to improving the lives of others,” said Dave Wilson, president and CEO of GMAC. “These are challenging times for many people all over the world and to see the effort that these students are putting in to making a difference is truly remarkable. Today's MBAs and other graduate business students fiercely embrace their obligation to give back and make the world a better place.”

SP Jain won the All School Award, which recognizes a school for its commitment to promoting and supporting social engagement by its students through school-led programs, services, institutional culture and community outreach. Through more than a dozen individual, team and school-wide projects, students at SP Jain worked to improve the lives of women, milk and agricultural growers, disaster victims and rural villagers.

The College of William and Mary Mason School of Business won the All Service Award, which recognizes outstanding projects in categories such as community service, sustainability/greening and consulting, for engaging in a variety of projects, including a mustache auction to raise money to start a microlending account, two blood drives that collected 100 pints of blood, and raising tens of thousands of dollars for local and global charities.

A stamp of approval

Sharon Bamford, Chief Executive of the Association of MBAs (AMBA), was in Delhi recently to speak at a global accreditation conference. The UK-based organisation accredits programmes at 190 business schools in over 70 different countries. Sharon spoke with me about the AMBA accreditation process and global quality standards for Indian business schools.

Debeshi: All of a sudden, leading business schools in India are scrambling for international accreditation. Why, in your opinion, has this happened?

Sharon: India has taken its place at the top table in terms of global politics, global companies and global leaders - it is now important that India's top business schools are recognised for their global standards in research and teaching.

Sharon Bamford: accreditation is key

Accreditation differs from rankings in that it is audited to ensure compliance. Our accreditation in particular, is not about imposing irrelevant foreign standards on a school, but ensuring key quality indicators are benchmarked globally and the programmes we accredit are relevant for the context and the Market, thus, ensuring impact. We regard it as a developmental and consultative process and schools feed back to us that the process was as important as receiving the accreditation itself.

Globalisation requires not only a global mindset, but global knowledge and the skills to operate in a global marketplace. India's top schools already have outstanding international partnerships with schools who hold international accreditations, but to be an equal partner it is important that India's schools also benchmark themselves against these global quality standards.

India has the opportunity to attract international students to its top business schools, but this discerning market will require assurances of standards, not just in the teaching and learning, but in aspects of pastoral care, alumni relations, industry links, to name but a few.

Indian graduates are taking global leadership roles and need to be cognizant of the recognition of their qualifications on the world stage - an international accreditation of their programme is.

Debeshi: When awarding AMBA accreditation, what are the things that are taken into account?

Sharon: A critical element for us is the three years of relevant work experience, which we see as the cornerstone of a quality MBA. In India we accredit the MBA that new graduates sign up for as the equivalent of a Masters in Management, and the Executive and Part Time MBAs as an MBA. We look for international experience, which can be given in a variety of ways that suit the school and its students and we require minimum cohort size of at least 20 and at least 50% of the faculty to have PhD's, thus ensuring the quality and relevance of the learning for the student. The programme should also have been running for a certain number of years.

We originated as an organisation 'by MBAs, for MBAs' so a prospective student signing up for an AMBA accredited MBA can be assured of a qualification that is recognised internationally and is rigorous and relevant.

Debeshi: How does accreditation from an international agency such as yours improve prospects of domestic business schools?

Sharon: Business school graduates are increasingly mobile and even a very good school might not be recognised by employers around the world. An international accreditation articulates that the school meets global quality standards and that the school belongs to an elite 'club'. An employer in Australia may not have heard of an Indian school, but they would understand that if that school had met the same quality standards as Queensland University of Technology, for example, they would be able to set the candidates qualifications in the context of a quality school from their own environment.

We are also an MBA membership organisation and the alumni from all of 190 accredited schools across the world provides an outstanding network.

Debeshi: Which are the Indian b-schools that have been awarded AMBA accreditation?

Sharon: IIM Lucknow, IIM Kozikhode, SP Jain and MDI Gurgaon are the Indian schools with AMBA accreditation.

Debeshi: Any new updates/developments that you would like to share with my readers?

Sharon: I was invited to speak at the first global accreditation conference here in Delhi, but have extended my visit to meet with our schools and also with candidate schools that are going through the accreditation process.

The Indian alumni from our accredited schools that have returned to India are also important to us and we running an MBA Refresher, delivered by international and Indian faculty in August this year. Part of our mission is to maintain the professionalism of the MBA through continuous professional development.