Events & Issues

New Delhi, 30 May 2011

Jairam’s IIT Remarks

 (IN) SUFFICIENT RESEARCH WORK?

By Col. (Dr.) P. K. Vasudeva (Retd)

Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh has kicked up a controversy by claiming that the faculty of Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) are “not world-class”. Is that a fact? He also maintained that these premier institutions were “excellent” because of the quality of students. Further, he said there was hardly any worthwhile research from the country's IITs and IIMs, which are ranked among the prestigious universities in the world.

The statement of Ramesh does not seem to be true as the Indian School of Business (ISB), is ranked 12th among business schools globally by the Financial Times. It also has high brand value in the world of corporate placements.  Similarly, IIM Ahmedabad has also been ranked 20^th among the best global management institutes. However, other IIMs and IITs do not figure anywhere near the global rankings.

In an assessment of research capabilities in business schools in India, a study has found that these schools have poor representation in the 40 peer-reviewed journals that the Financial Times uses to rank research in MBA schools worldwide.

Covering two decades to 2009, the study shows just a handful of faculty of a few IIMs and IITs having contributed papers to such journals. In addition, the study suggests that while case papers are valuable as pedagogic tools these do not provide the “cutting edge knowledge”

This knowledge comes from academic research that is “double-blind peer reviewed (i.e. the authors and reviewers do not know each other's identities)” with “high standards of proof”. The emphasis is on “rigour” as against practitioner-oriented research with immediate ‘relevance' and lower standards of proof.

Importantly, academic management research is more important than theoretical teachings in the classrooms of management schools because it gives applicability to “real life” solutions in the industry. There are three main reasons why such research constitutes the “backbone” that “supports the pedagogical mission”. One, is the introduction into the real world of concepts such as ‘core competence' that strategists and financiers cannot do without today. Two, the value it contributes to teaching, consulting and “writing for practitioners”. And three, the value it adds to the institution's efforts at attracting the best faculty.

All this sounds perfectly reasonable on first consideration. The advantages of research target three groups: the corporate world itself, the faculty that broadens its knowledge frontiers (and, of course, fattens its purse through consultations) and the student as the beneficiaries of enhanced pedagogy.

If Ramesh’s statement is to be believed then how Ramalinga Raju's Satyam's board of directors had leading management professors from Ivy League business schools: Mangala Srinivasan from University of California, Berkeley, Krishna Palepu from Harvard Business School, not to forget R. Ramamohan Rao, dean of Indian School of Business; who could not prevent the promoter from hijacking the blue-chip IT company. 

Given the interface between management school research and corporate practice “in real life”, the best that business schools can do is to get jobs for students who pay through their nose for these courses.

Viewed against the primary aim of imparting a value-loaded degree, research and publications by faculty members has merit. Double peer-reviewed publications on issues relating to management theory and practice would improve the quality of the pedagogy and its recipients.

The big question is: What is the explanation for this poor representation of Indian B-schools and technical institutes in the corpus of global management theoretical practice? The more obvious answer is that these institutes are driven by one agenda only — placements.

Indian firms do not tire of complaining about the shortage of managerial talent. As if in answer to this oft-stated gap between demand and supply, a rash of management schools have spread, some in the most unlikely places, including regions with few industries such as the North-Eastern States that want their own IIMs. To date, there are some 1,600 management schools and while there is no way of finding out if all their graduates get jobs, the lure of a business school binds both the promoter and the student. Landowners and business luminaries turned politicians turn again into founders of business schools, and technical institutes all with one aim: Increasing student enrolment to amass wealth.

As of now, employability of engineering graduates for technology services is only 26 per cent. But things seem to be changing on the ground now. For the first time, large companies such as Cognizant and Infosys are acknowledging an improvement in the quality of engineering graduates. Much of this is because of interventions in educational institutions by the industry.

Over the past few years, the industry has collaborated with technical institutes not just for the curriculum, but has also been involved in train-the-trainer initiatives for universities, engaged in workshops and training modules and lent subject experts as guest lecturers to colleges. Also, where volumes are concerned, the industry can derive comfort from the spurt in the engineering enrolment at colleges — over a million at the last count. That will mean more hands on the production floors a few years from now.

There could be no doubt that more needs to be done. Even today, IT sector invests $1.4 billion to convert ‘trainable talent' into ‘industry ready' professionals. And, because the education system does not make them “first day-first hour job ready'', freshers joining companies have to undergo months of training. Even then some do not make the cut in the end. Second, the growing chasm between the quality of output from leading IITs and those from smaller technical institutes needs to be bridged. The latter still suffer from old curriculum and unavailability of good faculty.

B-schools in India are meant to be degree shops; in most rankings and in the popular imagination, “placements” determine quality. As degree shops, they are no different from the general university that has, over the decades, shed its research faculties to become an assembly-line producer of degrees.

The poor quality of academic research in B-schools and technical institutes is the outcome of a general and systemic decline of research within the university system. – INFA

(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)