In an interview with PaGaLGuY.com, the Dean of the Faculty of Management Studies (FMS), Delhi University Prof Kuriakose Mamkoottam describes the curriculum revamp that FMS underwent in 2010, plans for the new FMS campus and why he believes the day-system of placements does not serve the goals of either students or companies.

How has FMS Delhi evolved in the recent years? What new things are you planning to put in place before the incoming batch of 2013 joins?

In the last couple of years, my singular focus has been on academics. I have also tried to improve the infrastructure. I have managed to update the syllabus and make it as latest as possible. We have made structural changes in the MBA course in the sense we have increased the internal assessment component to 50% of the total grade which is a very major thing in a university system. It’s been very meticulously structured in the sense that students will be evaluated on predetermined and informed criteria. There is a pronounced and declared emphasis on academic activities and class participation. After all it is a regular fulltime course and even though students will be encouraged to participate in extra-curricular activities or competitions, it will not be at the cost of the classroom. Our focus is to improve the amount and quality of interaction in the classroom.

We have also merged the two fulltime courses (MBA Fulltime and MBA – Management of Services) together. We had created MBA-MS some years ago keeping the possibility of developing a niche program for a niche market. But our experience was not as we expected. We had no disappointment, but the targeted students and corporates were not able to distinguish its special features and respond to them. But as a result of the course, we were duplicating our administrative processes right from recruitment to classroom teaching to placements and examinations. But neither the students nor the recruiters were keen discernes of the program. So we took a decision to merge the two programs together into a single fulltime MBA. So we’ll be recruiting 226 students in one batch this year which we hope to divide to three sections for imparting classroom learning.

MBA-MS was run from the South campus of Delhi University whereas the MBA Fulltime was run from the main North campus. Will the integrated batch study from one campus or two campuses?

At the moment we dont want to make a committed statement. We’ll have to look at the logistics and take a decision, which we’ll take in due course because there is still time before the new batch joins us from July 1. We would like to integrate them to the extent that logistics permit us, but I wouldnt like to make a statement yet.

Does the North campus have the capacity to accommodate 226 students?

Well, we are really stretching out (laughs). We’re using every inch of the space. I have also made all efforts to increase the existing space, expand it to the limit possible, make it usable in terms of comfort, air conditioning and so on. Even to the extent of, with great difficulty, installing an external elevator so that the physically handicapped can move from floor to floor in the three-floor building. With that, if the need be, we should be able to accommodate all in the north campus.

Are there plans to expand the infrastructure beyond what you already have?

Yes, we have a new building sanctioned. The money and location have been sanctioned and the plan is approved. It’s a question of the construction taking off. In the meantime, the (Delhi) universitys top level administration has changed and the new team is going to be in place soon so we hope things will start moving. The new campus will be in the South campus of Delhi university, at more or less the same location as the existing FMS facility in the South campus. We have a 12,000 sq-m space there so once the four-floor building is constructed, we will move the entire FMS out of the North campus to there.

Will there also be hostels dedicated to FMS?

The university policy is such that they dont give dedicated hostels to any particular department. But as part of the larger university plan there will be augmentation of the hostel facilities in the entire South campus.

How many faculty members does FMS have now and how are you looking to ramp it up?

Right now, three new faculty have joined us and that has taken our total number to 33.

Which functional area is your strongest area in terms of faculty?

We are more or less balanced. I won’t call any one particular area strong or weak but we have huge deficiencies in the total number of faculty considering the number of programs we run and the number of students we are recruiting now. We are not able to find people. There is, as in all b-schools, a huge scarcity (of faculty). But we are able to stretch out and with the help of some select visiting faculty, we are able to manage.

How many faculty members would you need to sustain your growth?

With the given trend, at 45-50 faculty members I think we should be alright. Of course, we won’t have the luxury of teachers being given a semester off wherein they can do their research and so on. But we should be able to manage.

Are there any curriculum changes in the pipeline for the MBA fulltime?

At the moment our fulltime program is fairly updated. The process of updating is a fairly tedious process. We update the curriculum and take it to the university academic and executive councils where it has to get passed. But other than that, on a regular basis, all our faculty imparts whatever is the latest possible in their individual field. Every teacher at his or her level makes reasonable changes within the broad parameters of the syllabus approved by the university. But the major structural changes happen only once in 3-5 years as a major exercise.

When did it happen last and what were the salient features?

It happened just now, for the batch that joined in 2010. In the changes, we have included new papers (courses) in all the functional areas based on what is happening in the world. More importantly, we have added a couple of compulsory papers, one on Corporate social responsibility and another on Corporate governance. Other than that we have made the number of electives larger in the fourth semester. As a result now they would be doing eight papers in every semester. We have also added something called ‘contemporary issues’ wherein any faculty member can announce a paper he or she wants to offer at the beginning of the year, after it is whetted out in the teachers’ meeting and sought approval of from the university. So even if it is not in the syllabus, it can be added. Additionally, the service sector courses have been made as electives in the fulltime course. We have brought a whole stream of electives in entrepreneurship in too.

How relevant are three-year part-time MBA programs such as those offered by FMS Delhi given the rise of 1-year executive MBA programs?

Yes, we are looking at the part-time program’s duration given that the duration of three years is too long and given the current mobility of executives. We are also looking at the option of a 1-year executive MBA. But it’s under discussion so I don’t want to say that anything is final right now. But I’m hoping that this will be reviewed in the next 6 months.

Will the FMS entrance test go online anytime soon?

You see, this year we took the FMS registration completely online. Ultimately I’m sure that we’ll move the test too online but it has to be a collective decision, given the experiences of the CAT and the difficulties it faced in the initial year, even though it’s gone well this year. But I agree that the FMs test has to be online someday, but I cant say when.

Do you think that sooner or later there will be a consolidation of all the myriad MBA entrance exams in India into one single test such as the GMAT?

I should imagine so. As a country we need to evolve something like that. You know, even we are also under pressure from various quarters to join the CAT. But our argument is that the CAT is associated primarily and solely as an IIM property. I don’t hesitate to say that we (FMS) are there at the top in the same league as the IIMs. But we don’t want to be known as among ‘IIMs and others’ (by joining the CAT). But the moment the IIMs, FMS, XLRI Jamshedpur and similar institutes come together or an independent body in the model of the GMAC (the body that owns GMAT and was created by a consortium of top US b-schools) comes in, I think that a single test is the best thing to happen. You know, administering the FMS is a tremendous and gigantic energy and time-consuming process which nobody really wants to do. But the fact is that there is a certain historical legacy we are all inheriting and for an institution like FMS, it is not easy to suddenly give it up and join somebody else. But certainly if there is a unified and neutrally managed and nationally acknowledge single test, I think that is the best thing to happen.

Some of the country’s top b-schools are experimenting with the placement process or are changing the process from a day-based process to a rolling process. What is your opinion of this transformation and going forward, do you see FMS reviewing its process too?

I will not hesitate to say that I am not happy with the current placement process. I myself have handled placements in the 1990s for many years and we’ve done well. We still do exceedingly well but I somehow feel that the whole placement process has turned the entire attention of students towards only getting a job. Anywhere you see in the world, the entire student attention is driven towards placements which in my mind is not a great thing. I don’t know what will replace this. but what is currently happening is neither good for the company nor for the student. It’s a process wherein the decisions are hurriedly taken under pressure and they are not the right decisions in my opinion. Placement is like marriage in my opinion. You’re joining a company you want to spend a reasonable amount of time with so both the student and the company should spend a good amount of time with each other. But if you look at the turnover in the first year of the jobs after placements, you can see that the company has not been able to make a correct decision. I do wish our mechanism changes so that this day pressure, the day 1, day 0 and day -1 (laughs) which creates hierarchy among students and companies goes.

I believe that there are many students and companies which are very similar to each other, and so there is very little to choose from. So the placement process ends up creating company hierarchies based on salaries, which does not help in matching what the student is good at to what the company has to offer. And adding the pressure from the peer group, parents and relatives to get the best paid jobs, the system is not working out the way should be. Placements are taking too much time away from the students and the institute. It makes things too simple for the companies — they just walk into the campus, do their processes in a couple of hours and get who they are looking for. However placement decisions should be a little more deliberate and elaborate with more time given to both the student and the company. Then the media has also exaggerated the whole thing in terms of assessing a campus through its placements.

What do you think of diversity of educational backgrounds in MBA classrooms and of b-schools that are experimenting with their admission criteria to admit fewer engineers?

I firmly believe that a work organization should reflect the society outside. But you find that the engineer-MBA combination is dominating corporates. This was the case in the US too a few years ago, but it has now been corrected. In every top US b-school you will find that the engineer component is less than 50%. But here unfortunately we get more than 80% engineers. We wish to correct it and we consciously make attempts to ensure that non-engineers do come in. This year, the engineering component at FMS has been slightly lesser than in the previous intakes. The other component we want to seriously increase is the number of women in the class. If a balance in multidisciplinary composition and gender takes place at b-schools, it will do a great deal of good for the corporates and society at large. What are we at FMS doing about it? Well, there is no simple answer to that. Our attempt is to give equal weightage to all backgrounds and we cant be subjective and biased. As you know, the FMS is a test which is open to everyone.

But unlike other b-schools, you own your entrance exam exclusively. Does that not give you the best possible freedom to change it and make it more non-engineer friendly?

We do attempt to dilute what is known as the engineering-oriented component in the FMS test but to be very honest with you, in whatever experiment we have tried, engineers have again managed to come up. I think the reason for this is the fact that engineers tend to make it a point that this (getting into a b-school) is what they want. And from first year (of engineering) onwards, a major part is spent on preparing to get into a b-school. So maybe they’ve become very competitive in terms of cracking tests. But so far in our own experience we haven’t gotten the diverse mix we would want to have.

How do you think IIM Rohtak will affect the fortunes of the older and established b-schools in Delhi?

I don’t think it is going to make any difference at all to us, because the new IIMs are going to take their own time to grow. They have an advantage of the brand, but I will not hesitate to say that we also have a brand name, and FMS is not a brand to be dismissed. We’ve always had students who’ve gotten IIM admissions and have still decided to join us. So it’s not that anybody who gets any IIM is going to go there. The new IIMs will take their own time to establish their reputation and corporate connections. So far, we have that advantage and we hope we will only strengthen it.

Do you think IIM Rohtak will make hiring and retaining faculty more challenging for you?

It will, but I’ll tell you something. University departments such as those of Delhi university have the least turnover. Once somebody joins the university of Delhi as faculty, you’ll hardly find them leaving it. Additionally, we have the advantage of being located in Delhi. It’s a huge advantage from the point of view of faculty. They have all the facilities, avenues for their children’s education and a whole lot of other things.