BANGALORE IIM - IIM students break moulds

From TOI

BANGALORE: It could well be an IIM student working for a real estate project, for a festival celebration event or an IPL team. It's no longer the corporates who lap up IIM students, but newer areas that hunt for the prestigious B-school students' managerial skills.

As the season for summer placement begins in the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), companies are thronging campuses for recruitment for the internship during summer next year. The Times of India looks at the emerging sectors that are looking at IIMs apart from the loyal recruiters on campus from finance, marketing and consultancy.

At IIM-Kozhikode where the summer placements are completed, students have broken the mould to enter other sectors like sports management and infrastructure. Students have been hired by GMR group for airport operations in Hyderabad and Delhi and Reliance for projects related to the IPL team. There are others recruited by companies in sports sectors like Football First.

Life sciences and healthcare too has started wooing IIMs across the country. IIM-Bangalore has reported to have Narayana Hrudayalaya enter the summer placement sector for the first time. Narayana Hrudayalaya had recruited students in the past two years during the final placements. Apollo hospital has expressed interest in IIM-Shillong. IIM-Lucknow that has 12 doctors in the batch also has life sciences as an important sector for recruitment.

At IIM-Bangalore, a new group that has shown interest in recruiting interns is the real estate companies, both the major local and national players. Private equity and venture capital is also an area that is more prominent this year. The summer placements will kick off on November 9. This is the first year that IIM-B has made summer internships optional for students who have a working experience of over 36 months.

Non-government organizations also have entered the campus much to the delight of students who are planning to work in the social sector. Bangalore-based Janaagraha has recruited from IIM-Kozhikode and so has GEC.

Education is also one of the key areas of recruitment. IIM-Indore students have been recruited for online education, while other companies like Edunirvana have also picked up IIM students. Companies working on civic issues like e-waste management and clean water supply in rural areas are the new entries in IIM-Indore.

The state government projects are equally in vogue. "We had 20 students working for the Chattisgarh state government last year during the summer in projects like improving the public distribution system, developing a new communication strategy for state government over the internet, developing strategy implementing micro financing scheme in the state. This year, we did the marketing for a festival along with the mayor of the city. The projects with the state government will be on similar ground with more focus on rural sector and education sector," said Anurag Tripathi, career development and placement office, IIM-Raipur.

With entrepreneurship turning into one of the major focuses in the B-schools, there are also takers for start-up companies. "We have an entrepreneurship consultancy recruiting from the campus. With the kind of importance our institute is giving to entrepreneurship, we are interested in having such companies on campus," said Rajesh Aithal, IIM-L.

Students are also open to joining start-ups and no longer look only at the mighty corporate giants. "There are quite a few start-ups that have lined up. We are not just going by names but also looking for some good projects for our students to get exposed to," said Kavitha C, placement officer in charge, IIM-Udaipur.

Though the clouds of recession have been haunting markets, the sun seems to be shining over the IIMs. The pre-placement offers at IIM-B are turning out to be much higher than what the campus had last year. So far, there have been 71 pre-placement offers and another 30 pre-placement interviews on card. This is against the 84 offers that happened last year. The average stipend at IIM-K rose from Rs 27,000 last year to Rs 28,000-Rs 30,000 this year.