195000 FY students took the Common Admissions Test in 2013. This summer, 3665 of them will head to IIMs and XLRI to pursue their PGDMs. The remaining 191335 FY students will need to decide what to do next. This article is for them.

Getting an MBA is a big deal, anywhere in the world, and especially in India for young men and women who are ambitious, dream big and someday want to be CEO of a company. Economic Times found that:

· 78 percent of the BSE(Bombay Stock Exchange),100 CEOs with Bachelors in engineering went on to get their Master’s degree. Pretty much like Satya Nadella, who recently became the CEO of Microsoft, the global IT major.

· The story gets even better. 64 percent of engineers with Masters Degrees went on to get their PGDM/MBA. Again like Satya!

Let’s assume you are reasonably well prepared for the FY examinations. Let’s say you’ll get a first class Bachelor’s degree in engineering or commerce by summer.You are already ahead in the game. Do a Nadella. Get a Master’s degree, if you can. Then, get yourself a PGPX/ PGDM /MBA. What if you:

· Cannot afford to study abroad or cannot go abroad because your family won’t let you?

· Don’t want to do M.Tech if you are an engineering graduate or M.Com if you are a commerce graduate

· Hate the very thought of spending another year of your life attending CAT/XAT coaching so you can write these examinations again in 2014

and

· Are totally determined to join the 2014-16 PGDM program

I bet you are thinking “Where do I get my PGDM now that I did not get into IIMs and XLRI?” Allow me to help you answer your question as best and as honestly as I can.

Imagine a B school where students say:

· I study in an AICTE (All India Council of Technical Education) accredited B School. It has partnerships with the Arizona State University and the Catolica-Lisbon School of Business. Our Dean and Associate Dean are from Arizona State University in Phoenix, USA. I got a work-study scholarship.

· Our Career Services is unbelievable. It is our first year as a school. All 47of our class have been placed in summer jobs. In companies like Fiat, Axis, Future Brands and IDBI! The PGPX placement brochure is being created. We hear that this 32 page brochure will be sent to 500 senior executives. All this for 9 students who make up the first batch of PGPX!

· Our faculty is simply amazing! They got their Ph.Ds. from places like Stanford University, INSEAD and IIMA. They teach in B Schools in universities like Arizona State,Pittsburgh, and Michigan State in the US, Cambridge and LSE in the UK and Canterbury in New Zealand.They come to India to teach us. The amazing thing is that they are down to earth and friendly people, always willing to answer questions and clear doubts students have.

· The best part of studying in this B School is that I am not a parrot. I am not forced to mug up and repeat the instructor’s slides, handouts or the text book. The focus of teaching is to get students to think for themselves. I am required to understand concepts, theories and frameworks and apply them to address real life problems. Courses in this B School challenge the mind. They do not test memory.

· Our class sizes are small. The level of personal attention faculty showers on us – OMG, you’ve got to experience it to believe it. The downside is that there’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. You just have to study like there’s no tomorrow. There is no compromise on intellectual rigor and quality of academic work.

· Our 10 acre campus is small and beautiful. It won an architectural award. Our classrooms are air conditioned and wired. We get pretty decent food. Our gardens and lawns are well maintained. Like our campus, our hostels are pretty awesome, one is for the ladies and the other is for gentlemen. We have air-conditioning, cleaning services, dining and 24×7 security.

Would you consider joining this B School?

If your answer is “Yes”, please visit our website www.myra.ac.in. If you like what you see and read, write to me at [email protected] if you have any questions.

– Nagananda Kumar (Fellow, IIMA), Executive Director, MYRA School of Business