CAREER SPECIAL....... Executive MBAs Can Help Your Career

Executive MBAs Can Help Your Career





They pave the way for a change in salary, designation & industry

In just one year, Dhananjay Rastogi, senior planner at one of India's top conglomerates, jumped three levels and bagged a 100% increase in salary . The 31-year-old, who completed MDI Gurgaon's oneyear fulltime executive education programme this year, will be joining the Trident Group as vice-president, at double the salary he was drawing at his previous workplace.

“It would have taken me another two promotions to get to an AVP role in my last organisation,“ said the chemical engineer from IIT Kharagpur. Now he's VP and what's more important, he said, is that it wasn't just a change in terms of designation. “I have a much bigger playground, given that now I will be handling process optimisation for the entire group,“ he said.

For Shipra Singh, a psychology graduate who holds a master's degree from the London School of Economics, her last job was in the HR function at Nokia India. Fresh out of the Indian School of Business, the 28-year-old will be joining an FMCG giant as head of recruitment and university relations for their global capability unit. With a 70% increase in pay and a huge jump in scope of the role, Singh will have a bunch of direct reportees.

For individuals like Rastogi and Singh, who have an average 4-10 years of experience, mid-career management programmes offered by some of India's top business schools are paving the way not just for much greater domain knowledge, but also a significant change in salary , designation and often, industry. In several cases, placements offered are catapulting them up several levels, along with commensurate rise in pay .

The numbers speak for themselves. The class of 2016 at institutes such as Indian School of Business (ISB), IIM Bangalore, IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Lucknow and MDI Gurgaon have seen an up to 100% jump in the number of senior positions offered compared to last year, along with a huge jump in salary and designation from what they were getting earlier.

At ISB, 34 senior positions were offered, double of last year. This included roles as diverse as those of vice-presidents, general managers, cluster heads, vertical heads, directors, CXOs and at the top end, even a CEO position based abroad for one of the largest Africa-based business groups.

At IIM Bangalore, there were eight offers for AVP level or above, compared with five last year. MDI Gurgaon saw the number of senior positions quadruple to four from last year. At IIM Ahmedabad's PGPX programme, till date there ha PGPX programme, till date there have been two international placements, one of which is of director international bu siness at an IT company invol ving direct re sponsibility of P&L for UK and Europe regions.

The total number of very senior ro les is seven compared with three last year, while the number of students who will be entering leadership programmes is 10 vis-à-vis five last year.

Institute sources said offers for these senior roles are coming in from across sectors, with salaries at the upper end crossing the ` . 1crore-mark. Arvind Infrastructure, Mount Meru Group, Godrej Industries, Narayana Hrudalaya, Propstack, Practo, Trident Group and Premier Logic are among those that have picked up students from across these campuses.

“Recruiters find such candidates well rounded with the right mix of experience and academic input once they have completed the programme. These candidates can be hired or senior positions and they can hit the ground running on joining the organisations,“ said Sapna Agarwal, head, career development services, IIM Bangalore.

That's not to say, however, that everyone in the batch bags equally lucrative or very senior roles, said placement sources. In fact, for people with a much larger number of years of experience under the belt, it can be sometimes challenging to switch industries, said Kanwal Kapil, chairperson, placements, MDI.

But many others make the leap.

Singh's ISB batchmate, Abhishek Agnihotri, an electronics engineer, whose last job was in TCS as a business relationship manager, has bagged a 200% increase in salary , joining an Indian group with diversified business interests. “It's helped me break into senior management where I'll be handling a large P&L, a large team and reporting directly to the CEO,“ he said.

“It's been a huge jump in terms of responsibilities,“ he said.

Saket Kumar, secretary , student placement committee at IIM Ahmedabad, said that they have seen more and better quality offers for PGPX students in terms of seniority as well as an upsurge in leadership programmes.

Even leadership programmes offered to PGPX students are different in nature from what are offered to two-year PGP students, in that they are generally of shorter length, and directly under the supervision of CXOs senior organisational leaders. “Also, the outcome of such programmes for PGPX students result in very senior roles in the organisation,“ said Kumar.

R Subramaniam was a lieutenantcolonel in the army before he decided to pursue the IPMX programme at IIM Lucknow. He will now be joining as a senior operating officer at Jardine Lloyd Thompson Independent at a senior leadership role.

Sreeradha DBasu

Mumbai:

ET18MAR16