Great Lakes
Celebrates L' Attitude 13°5' with Top B-schools & Corporate
Post-event Press-release
L' Attitude 13°5' - the
third Annual B-school Fest of Great Lakes Institute Of Management, Chennai,
concluded on December 14-15, 2007. It was attended by top names from various
sections of society such as Mr. Narayana Murthy (Chairman of Infosys),
Mr. Thomas Anderson (Associate Dean, IIT, Chicago),
Mr. Y. V. Reddy (RBI Governor), Mr. Shailesh Rao (Head,
Google India) among many others. Add to that the deluge of students who
arrived from different B-schools from different parts of the country.
14th
December 2007
Dr. Bala along with the
Chief Guest and the other guests formally inaugurated the festival by lighting
the holy lamps. The inauguration function was followed by keynote speeches by
Dr. Thomas Anderson, Mr. Shailesh Rao and Mr. Y. V. Reddy.
Mr. Y. V. Reddy flew to Chennai
to be part of L' Attitude 13°5' and gave students some insights on the Indian
and global economy. He also spoke about future trends in economy and mentioned
that after taking into consideration of various factors, the GDP in the current
year was expected to be around 8.5%, while inflation will be maintained below
5%. The external sector continued to be stable and strong. The fiscal situation
is likely to be on track. The financial market, by and large, particularly money
market will remain reasonably stable. He also added that as a result of
fundamentals, which have been laid over the years, the country is more stable.
Despite a number of challenges, political ups and downs and other negative
factors, India continues to manage economy well, he pointed out.
After Mr. Reddy's speech, Mr.
Shailesh Rao (Google India Head) addressed the students of Great Lakes. Mr. Rao
said that the current youth demographic provided a 'unique opportunity' for
India today. "There is no other country with the scale of opportunities for
growth and such a unique youth demographic," he said. "How today's youth will
get trained and educated could determine the next 50 years of progress for the
country." Mr. Rao pointed to several areas of concern that had to be overcome if
this opportunity could be realised. "We have to inspire more of a culture of
risk-taking and innovation and to fill the gap in people management. I would
encourage entrepreneurs to take more risks, be adaptive, cross-train and think
in an integrated way."
Dr. Thomas Anderson, Associate
Dean, Stuart School of Business, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, also
addressed the students. He said that the education model had to encourage
students to take more initiative. "A concern is that the current instructional
model of education puts the student in a passive position as a receiver of
knowledge," he said.
Mr. Anderson stressed that there
was a need to start early in the education process, in primary schools, to
encourage students to take more responsibility. He added that introducing a
global perspective in education through associations between universities from
different countries was also needed.
Earlier Dr. Bala said that the
idea behind such a festival is to provide a common platform for eminent scholars
from various walks of life to interact and exchange ideas and for the students
to keep themselves abreast with the experts' views on current trends. He also
acknowledged the contributions of Mr. Darsh Wasan, VP, IIT Chicago,
Illinois, who inaugurated Great Lakes' EMBA Program, Dr. Paul Prabhaker
from Stuart Business School, IIT Chicago, who has been constant source of strong
support, the college administration team and several others towards the creation
and building of Great Lakes Institute of Management.
15th
December 2007
This was the day when L' Attitude
13°5' was graced by none other then Mr. Narayana Murthy, Chief Mentor,
Infosys Technologies. Mr. Murthy, also inaugurated a new Centre for Excellence
for Infrastructure created by MARG Construction Limited at Great Lakes.
The centre is the product of a partnership between MARG Constructions Limited,
which has committed Rs. 3 Crores to the centre, and Great Lakes Institute of
Management, where it will be located. It will conduct in-depth studies into
infrastructure in India and abroad and use them to develop business models for
growth and development. While addressing students, Mr. Murthy said that though
there were signs of tremendous positivity, "For us to make it an inclusive
growth story, to bring the benefits of globalisation to the worst off sections,
we have to get into low-tech manufacturing and services to create job
opportunities for the illiterate and semi-literate. In order to make sure that
they can enjoy the fruits of liberalisation and globalisation, we have to focus
on infrastructure."
The need of the day and the first
stage to a better infrastructure, he said, was to bring about a change in the
mindset. "Unless we are open-minded and learn from other countries and cultures
which have performed better than us, unless we are willing to engage in
discussions with those who have created infrastructure better than we have done,
unless we are willing to admit our mistakes and open our minds to learn, I am
not very sure that we will make the kind of progress that we want."
Along with customer care and an
invigorating workplace, it was openness to ideas, benchmarking with the global
best and adapting best practices from across the world that made the IT industry
what it was today, he said. His speech ended with a thunderous applause and a
standing ovation by all Great Lakers and everyone present.
L' Attitude 13°5' also brought
a gamut of events from all spheres of management which includes one game
exclusively for corporate, to challenge acumen and test ones nerves. These
included That's the Way: The Corporate Battle; Pentathlon: The
B-Plan Contest; Tourada: The Finance Game;
Nabataean: A Unique Strategy Game; Pankration: The Marketing
Mania; Funambulism: Soft Skills Galore; Athlos: The Moth of All
Contests. The winners of these games were awarded handsome prizes to the tune of
Rs. 30,000 each! The events were followed up by a quiz which saw a huge turnout
with some teams coming from Bangalore.
Following are the winners of
various competitions which were held
Pankration (Marketing):
1st - LootStreet.com, IIM-Ahmedabad; 2nd - Emeralds, Alliance Business School.
Tourada (Finance): 1st -
LootStreet.com, IIM-Ahmedabad; 2nd - 3 Students Team, SIBM-Pune.
Funambulism (HR): 1st -
Innova, ISB-Hyderabad; 2nd - Bogus Brothers, IIM-Ahmedabad.
Nabataean (Strategy): 1st
- Realty, ISB-Hyderabad; 2nd - Conquisators, IIM-Calcutta.
Thats The Way (Product
Relaunch): 1st - Reshoot, Frost'n'Sullivan, 2nd - Innovators, NMIMS-Mumbai.
Pentathlon (B-Plan): 1st -
Rural Managers, IRMA-Gujarat, 2nd - Parivartan, IMT-Ghaziabad.
The winners of the Quiz conducted
by Giri Pick Brain Balasubramanium were TCS and they won Rs.
30,000. Second place was won by Sun Micro Systems and they won Rs. 15,000
and third place was won by CitiBank and they won Rs. 10,000.
Great Lakes's B-festival L'
Attitude 13°5' is a reflection of the spirit of Great Lakes and previous
editions of L' Attitude have witnessed active participation from top management
schools and corporate all over the country. This year the fest surely scaled new
peaks in terms of its size and grandeur.
