The MBA syndrome

The MBA syndrome

Last week I attended a HR conference in Gurgaon at a 5-star hotel , Hotel Leela-Kempinski ( also, my previous employer ;) ). Well to my much surprise, this is the first 5-Star hotel which I came across where I had to pay Rs.100 for valet parking. This hotel is attached to Ambience Mall. But I didn’t understand why they charge for parking, does the hotel management thinks that , if they keep parking free of cost, people will park in the hotel and go for shopping ?? Do we Indians think so economically ??
I entered the hotel. The conference was organized by Dun & Bradstreet along with other big sponsors. The topic was inspired from very common words used these days ‘Downturn’ and ‘Recession’. The Topic- HR Challenges in the Downturn. The event was attended by good no. of people from HR fraternity. The conference started with speeches by well known people from HR. After the speech the question and answers round started, which made a huge difference to the perception of thinking it as a intellectual conference.

The first question came from the audience on How to retain MBAs ? followed by -Are MBAs fit for Managerial jobs ? and so on…… Are we doing right by paying more to IIM passed students?? ………. I think by now you should have noticed that their was no question on Downturn / Recession and HR challenges in these turbulent times. Shall we assume that intellectual level of understanding good speeches and talks not present Gurgaon / India or HR fraternity etc etc. ?? or Are MBAs such a hot topic these days that they can it can dilute the whole agenda of the conferences ?? I think Yes, this makes a little sense for me.
In my discussions with various HR guys present their, many of shared their problem with retaining MBAs and making them happy , satisfying their expectations which are set high by MBA colleges. The training head of a newly launched Telecom network provider company with good presence in South India recently launched North India made a very effective statement and I quote - “ I think expectations are set very high by the MBA colleges and when fresh grads reach companies their plans are completely shattered.” Unquote. I think there is need to train these fresh grads by recently passed out students who can actually tell what is life after MBA for next 3-4 years. But what is currently happening is that these students are being teached by CEO/ COO/ Departmental heads.

Well there are so many conclusions that one can take out of this whole episode. But what I realized is that these conferences are not the pure intellectual discussion conference rather it’s a Networking Conference.
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