Business of Businss Education

The factories of innovation ..some of the greatest B schools of India seems to be on path to new kind of innovation , developing the most expensive post graduation programs on the earth. ISB, SP Jain Institute of Management and research are leading the pack with introduction of new program which can cost you more than 2.5 Million INR to get an MBA degree ( well to be specific some of these may be only diplomas or certificates if not approved by AICTE) . At one side ISB is starting PGPMAX which will be more of a part time MBA course for executives and will be taught at Hyderabaad campus with some sessions in Kellogs and Wharton on the other side SP Jain has already launched a course in collaboration with Schulich university Canada which will be divided between Mumbai and Toranto campus.

There is no doubt that some of the included expenses are stay in foreign campuses , food etc but the point to ponder is whether these courses will be wble to provide you the relevant return on investment. If we include other living expenses for around 2 years , it will come across 3 Million INR, It is enough amount to secure a middle class common man's pension for lifetime so what is the kind of ROI one is looking from this kind of investment , well I do understand intellectual development and ability to apply structured methods for solving strategic , operational issues etc would be some of the great take away from this course but at the end it all boils down to what can you do with such skills i.e How much you can earn or what is the kind of job you are offered.

If we even consider some of the normal not so expensive courses , they have failed to provide a good ROI to more than 50% of the participants . All the media hype about million dollar salary in pink news paper is focused on some top 5- 10% of the class participants , rest go back with a decent increment in their salaries and mostly almost in the similar area of work ( as even in campus placements organizations give due weight to the background of candidate). even though top 20 institutes take fees in the range of 4 to 10 lacs , and the salary of students coming out of program varies between 4 to 11 lac with average being somewhere 6.5 to 7.


two of the Three generic strategies which even watchman of these B school knows is cost leadership and differentiation

Cost Leadership : Salary , roles depend on various factors from business condition to industry need so why can't B school implement a more innovative model which they have been teaching for long time , They can take a fixed component of fees which covers cost of course material , infrastructure etc and a variable component of the fees which depends on what kind of benefit is materialized to the student after course , to be specific let it be a percentage of annual pay package received by student , isn't something similar today's IT organizations doing by charging a variable component depending on how much money IT saved / earned for their clients .

I think We all have something to learn from TATA's here , a 2000$ car and a 20$ water purifier , that is what Indian market demands value for every penny spent , specially in education which is very crucial for indian middle class .

Differentiation : There are very few institutes in India which have created a differentiation , I would consider NITIE (SCM), ICFAI(FIN), FMS(Service), IRMA(Rural), IIFT (IB), XLRI, SCMHRD (HR) , MICA (MarCom) as some of the leaders , rest all are more of "Me too" kind . They should start differentiating in a way which adds value to students and also makes sure that it is filling a wide gap in the industry