Last year, I had gone back to my alma mater. I met up with one of my favourite professors from campus. As usual we ended having up a lengthy discussion. One of the things we debated on was “What can B- Schools do to better prepare students for the industry?”. I had shared a few ideas with him. He had asked me to flesh out my ideas more and send him an e-mail.
Below is an excerpt of the e-mail I had sent him.
-
Dear Sir,
It was nice meeting you the other day .
I have been reflecting on the discussion you and I had about "What can we do more at the institute level, to ensure that when students graduate they are better prepared to meet the challenges of the industry?" (This is the way i have verbalized the intent of the discussion even though these were not the words used.).
You had asked me to flesh out the thoughts i shared and write to you.
The answer to the question asked would lie around 3 areas, viz:
· Admissions process- Profile of students who are taken into the system?
· Course Curriculum - What is taught to the students?
· Pedagogy - How is it taught to the students?
These 3 areas are inseparable and inter - related. But which one should we focus on?
When i look back at the times that i have learnt the most i realize that there have been some common characteristics:
· The situation was novel, and
· The answers were not forthcoming and hence I had to struggle through to find a solution to the situation,, or ..There was a lot of material available on possible solutions but i had to form my opinion because i knew i had to defend my opinion to the hilt, and
· There was an element of working with others to arrive at a commonly accepted solution.
During this process my own assumptions used to get questioned causing the learning to be much deeper.
What i have also consistently observed is that success on the job is a function of:
· Problem Solving - the individual's ability to arrive at a solution given a situation (novel situations are the ones which usually cause most difficulty to individuals).
· Openness to relook at one's own assumptions - when faced with contradictory evidence to one's own assumptions, how does the individual react?
· Being able to effectively relate with important others on the job.
I rely on my experiences ( including what i have heard relevant others say - Professors, Line Managers, Function Heads, Fellow Recruiters, etc) in different roles as a Student, Employee, Recruiter , Process owner for Induction of new joiners to arrive at the observations i have made above. These experiences include:
· Admissions interview for B-School - i remember being asked to back the opinions i had shared during the interview.
· Some courses in B-School- there was a lot of information which comes your way and initially there is a feeling of being overwhelmed. The subjects which left their mark on me are the ones where there was a strong focus on "struggling through to find your own solutions" and where my "assumptions got questioned".
· Hiring across campuses - many a times i don't find students making their own choices. They seem to select careers on the basis of what they have heard others say (peer groups, seniors, etc) but there is limited individual processing (What is my opinion? What do i want?).
Now let me get back to the 3 areas i had mentioned above - Admissions Process, Course Curriculum, Pedagogy.
Though i agree that focussing on the Course Curriculum is important, at the same time no course curriculum can be exhaustive enough. There is only so much you can learn at a point of time.
On the other hand if the "struggling through" way of finding answers to situations becomes a part of life for a student, then i feel we would have managed to bridge the gap between what the industry wants and what the institute delivers. This would be a function of the Admissions Process (Students who are keyed on to Problem Solving, Openness to relook at one's assumptions when faced with contradictory evidence, and being able to effectively relate with others) and Pedagogy (Consistent reinforcement of this "struggling through to form your own solutions" method of teaching would make a student comfortable with this way of working).
This is what i had on my mind.
-
Sourav
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.