SIBM Bengaluru hosts Convergence 2013 - Mumbai Dabbawalas descend to Bangalore
Bangalore,
Karnataka, September 7, 2013 – Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (SIBM),
Bengaluru hosted Convergence 2013, the Annual Operations and IT Summit. The
event was organized by the Operations Batch & the Placement Committee of
the B-School which was attended by over 350 MBA students. It was sponsored by
Steel Authority of India Limited(SAIL), Lord's Plaza, TEOCO, Zoom, Freecharge.in
and ManagementParadise.com! The theme of the event was "India seeks
Revival" and the focus was on "Challenging the Convention".
Day 1:
The first day of the event was the Operations Summit.
It began with two interactive sessions followed by an exciting panel
discussion. Mr. Samir Inamdar, Co founder, MD and CEO, Forum Synergies
shared his experiences and beliefs with
the students. He stressed on challenging convention and conventional wisdom. This
was followed by a session on Warehouse Management System (WMS) given by Mr.
Veda Ramachandran, Senior Director, Manhattan Associates. He highlighted the
transformation of the warehouse from a conventional one to a technological one.
The panel discussion was held on the topic,
"Is FDI imperative for India's Supply Chain integration". Mr.
Tarjinder Singh, Vice President, Robinson Cargo & Logistics Pvt. Ltd., Mr.
Rajesh Kumar, Director, Planning Operations, Entercoms, Mr. Ishwar Rao, COO
SIPL and Mr. Rajesh Agarwal, WW Leader, Global Supply Advanced Analytics CoE,
IBM were the panelists. Mr. Arvindan Ramachandram, Faculty & Independent
Consultant acted as the moderator.
The afternoon session was the highlight of the
event. Mr. Abhishek Ekal, VP, Dabbawala Foundation Mumbai and Mr. Sakharam
Gawde, Secreatry, Dabbawala Foundation Mumbai graced the occasion. They
explained the working of their system and revealed facts about how they were
able to maintain 99.99% efficiency with 100% customer satisfaction. They shed
light on how they achieve six sigma efficiency in their operations. They also
shared the CSR initiatives taken up by the Mumbai Dabbawalas. They were a great
encouragement to the MBA students. The students were highly motivated by the
end of the session. A lot of corporate attended the session as well.
Day 2:
The second day was the IT Summit and it began with
an exciting panel discussion. Mr. Parag Patankar, Senior Director, Industry
Strategy & Insight, Oracle, Mr. Chandramouli CM, Director, Globalization
Advisory& Talent Practice, Zinnov Management Consulting, Ms. Sonali
Khopkar, Associate Director, Capgemini (India), Mr. Amlan Nayak, Director
Development, Teoco Software Pvt. Ltd. and Mr. Ravindra Athayle, Director,
Banking & Financial Services CGI were the panelists. Mr. Sabari Thampi,
Director, Arowana Consulting acted as the moderator. The discussion was on the
topic "Indian IT's midlife crisis." All the panelists agreed that the
Indian IT industry was simply facing a low phase but it should not be labeled
as a crisis.
This was followed by a speech by Mr. Thampi on the
same topic. He also shared his industrial experiences with the students.
Meanwhile, the finale of Kurukshetra was held. The
participants were asked to propose a solution of a real business problem faced
by MTR to the MTR management. The team from Welingkar, Mumbai won the
competition and received a cash prize of Rs. 15,000. The team from IIM, Trichy
was the runner up and they received a cash prize of Rs. 10,000.
Professor
Aarti Mehta Sharma, the mentor for the event says,
"I highly appreciate the efforts of the students in making this event a
success. I am glad that we were able to address the need of the hour through
this event."
Mohit
Bhasin, one of the organizers of Convergence says, “Convergence
made us implement all the operational practices that we have studied so far. I
am sure this will help each and every member of tem Convergence to succeed in
the future."
Jitesh Agarwal, another
organizer says, "I feel humbled. I now realize the amount of hard work
required to organize an event of such scale and the credit goes to the entire
team, because in the end, it was their efforts that made it all possible."