Over the past few decades business education has become a necessity for individuals to occupy positions of significance within organisations. While thousands of students enroll each year into top bracket b- schools, year after year corporations claim the unavailability of the right talent to hire for the right positions. To make the matters worse the world has been witnessing the consequences of unethical practices in businesses and impact of non-sustainable actions by executives.

Business education of 21st century is replete with similar challenges that corporations and business education institutions face (See Table 1). There have been several well intentioned yet disparate attempts to address them.

Table 1: Challenges of Business Education Institutions & Corporations

Understanding the challenges necessitates reconceptualising the way business education is imparted. School of Inspired Leadership (SOIL) was founded by Anil Sachdev in 2008. At SOIL innovation occurs at each point of the value chain to addresses these challenges holistically (See Figure 1) while operating in a blue ocean space.

Figure 1: Innovation at SOIL

Innovation at SOIL

Innovation in the Business Model

SOIL is different from the traditional set up followed by b-schools. SOIL partners with 3 major stakeholders – Industry consortium, Mentors for students and Non-government organisations (NGO, for giving students a unique learning experience.

• Industry consortium: SOIL is co-created by a group of 32 leading companies from across Industry verticals that believe in SOIL and its value proposition, who contribute to curriculum design, student selection, research, student mentoring and placements
• Mentors: SOIL has a network of senior industry leaders (120 and counting) who have agreed to mentor a student each from SOIL throughout the year as a way of giving back to the society. This process has been rated as one of the most important avenues for learning by students
• NGO: SOIL has partnered with a host of civil society organisations across NCR for our students to spend a day every week making a difference at the grass root level. A group of students work for an NGO one day a week throughout the year, trying to apply all that they learn in classroom at the field. This helps build empathy into our students

Innovation in processes – Learning Design & Delivery

• Focus on Multiple intelligence: Traditionally B- Schools have had a heavy bias towards logical reasoning during selection processes. However, research shows that individuals use their multiple intelligences (Spatial, Linguistic, Kinaesthetic, Musical, Interpersonal etc.) actively to learn and work.

The Talent Appreciation Processes (TAP) at SOIL using Caliper Profile Assessment helps SOIL identify and pick students with proficiency in multiple intelligences.

• Curriculum Design: The curriculum at SOIL is futuristic and blends a fine balance of mainstream business courses, skill development and leadership courses. It focuses on the relevance of developing individuals through scientifically designed self-reflecting course.
• Individual Learning Plans: At SOIL every student draws an Individual Learning Plan (ILP) that he/she meticulously follows. This is a case of customising learning to suit the specific needs of every student.
• Using space to advantage: Round tables in classrooms are a design unique to SOIL among B-schools (See picture). Research suggests that round tables help facilitate better peer learning and active participation as opposed to the traditional galleries.
• Value driven culture: We learn, lead and live by practicing Compassion, Diversity, Ethics, Mindfulness and Sustainability. These values of SOIL are ingrained in the philosophy of teaching and every action that is shaped at SOIL and they manifest in multiple ways.

SOIL Recent Accolades

A case study by SOIL on ‘Innovation in Education’ was selected in the top 3 cases studies at the AIMA – Second Global Innovation Conference Case Study Contest held on 13th November, 2010 in collaboration with Accenture. Tata Chemicals and Indian Oil were ranked 1 and 2 and Tata Motors and BARC were ranked as 4 and 5. Read more

SOIL was recognized by the academic committee of CEDEP as an innovation in higher education with clear focus on learning, at a recently held conference in France. Read more

Dr. Srikant Datar of Harvard Business School invited us to present our case study at a conference for heads of B schools in India including all IIMs. Read more

An IIM-A research study named SOIL as a ‘game changer’. Read more

Dr. Rajendra S Sisodia, a pioneer in the conscious capitalism movement and also the founder of Conscious Capitalism Institute, recently visited SOIL and applauded our education model. Read more

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