‘You can’t top pigs with pigs’ was Walt Disneys not-so-subtle dig at a proposed sequel to his celebrated Three Little Pigs cartoon film. And why is this relevant here? Because that is exactly what most b-schools are trying to do today – aping each others’ curriculum and trying to outdo each other by positioning themselves as ‘being different.’

So, what exactly does ‘being different’ mean?

It means disregarding benchmarks and outperforming by coming up with something radical, being brave enough to implement something that is different in its core and essence and is not ‘the old wine in a new bottle.’ It is not about repeating the previous successes or strategies mindlessly, but coming up with something unique that creates a pull instead of having to push it through!

And it matters because there are people who don’t want to settle in their lives and are willing to walk that extra mile to get what they want, who want to be holistically developed and be much more than just a ‘manager,’ who want to understand what being a leader actually means in practice rather than in theory.

But isn’t the concept of practicing leadership a bit far fetched? Well, it seems to be, unless you come across one such b-school, which believes in empowering its students and transforming them into business-ready leaders of tomorrow, who can face challenges head-on and can devise novel and innovative solutions to business problems.

Great Lakes has been one such experience for me. Not only did it deliver on its promise of ‘preparing me for the rest of my life by providing an excellent and diverse peer group with varied background and work experiences and interaction with brilliant academicians, management gurus and industry experts from around the world’ but it also went the extra mile by empowering me with an unique experience of ‘Karma-Yoga: The Leadership Experiential Project’.

The project is a medium for the students to connect with ground realities and experientially learn transformational leadership & creates a mutual win-win situation for both the students and the villages. While the villages get budding leaders to enable villagers to lift themselves into their better selves, the students acquire a first-hand understanding of creating followers and transforming them.

There are 20 villages surrounding the institutes campus that have been adopted by Great Lakes for the LEP. We visit these Karma-Yoga villages every week and spend time with the villagers trying to understand their problems and help them lead a better life. Our main aim is to enhance the self-esteem and self-efficacy of the villagers by focusing on some key issues in the fields of education, health, agriculture and small business.

Over the past years, Great Lakers have been involved in organizing health camps, financial inclusion programs, agricultural training programs, activity-based learning programs, etc., in association with leading hospitals and several NGOs. This project runs throughout the year and has been responsible for quietly transforming the lives of the people around the campus.

This program has taught me to ‘not settle for the ordinary’ and it has enhanced my interpersonal skills by teaching me how to build and maintain relationships. Apart from that, it has also instilled the ‘never say die’ attitude in me. Don’t know the language, try coming up with an innovative way to communicate! Village dynamics too hot to handle? Use your political and leadership skills to tame it down and make the initiatives work! If there are students not very confident of their English skills, work with them, equip them with confidence and see them working wonders!

Is it the school for me? Leaders are far and few and transformational leaders, even more so. I believe this program has equipped me with the skillset that are necessary for becoming a transformational leader. Now, where I go from here, depends entirely on me. So, if you are someone who believes in taking the ‘path less trodden’ and in making a difference, this is the school for you.

Video on Karma Yoga

Sushree Panda

Student, PGPM 2012-13

Note: This is a sponsored article and has NOT been written by the PaGaLGuY Editorial Team. It is intended from an informational perspective only and it is upto the readers to research and verify the claims and judgements in the article before reaching a conclusion.