XLRI
IIM Calcutta
India Inc flocks to campuses with live projects; Snapdeal introduces 'Stratethon' in 13 top B-schools
Students were taken through simulation games, online quizzes and a 12-hour live case study where mentors from Snapdeal were assigned to them. Sreeradha D Basu&Devina Sengupta | ET Bureau | December 26, 2015, 09:17 IST
MUMBAI: Top recruiters in India Inc have been flocking to B-schools much ahead of the campus recruitment stage and using live projects, promises of funding startup ideas and strategy competitions as inducement to identify talent.
In October, ecommerce major Snapdeal introduced a competition, 'Stratethon', in 13 top Bschools, including the IIMs at Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Kolkata, XLRI, MDI Gurgaon and SP Jain, to engage with and identify new talent on campuses. The competition saw participation of more than 550 teams of three-four members each, which was about 50% of the cumulative batch strength of the institutes.
Students were taken through simulation games, online quizzes and a 12-hour live case study where mentors from Snapdeal were assigned to them.
"Stratethon helped us engage with students in a more informal way and expose them to Snapdeal's vision and work culture. Going forward, we will use this engagement programme as a key driver to hire the right talent from campuses," said Saurabh Nigam, vice-president, HR, at Snapdeal.
The RPG group, this year, extended its contest 'Blizzard' to first year students and asked for new business ideas that the company could invest in.
'Blizzard' saw participation of 3,800 students from 15 campuses, including those of IIM Kozhikode, IIM Calcutta, FMS Delhi, IIM Ranchi, IIM Indore, TISS, MDI and XLRI.
The company plans to recruit 5-10 students through this route, said Pratima Salunkhe, vice-president-Group Talent Management, RPG Enterprises.
Hindustan Unilever Ltd, which had earlier run the popular competition 'LIME' (Lessons in Marketing Excellence), launched 'Carpe Diem' last year to reach out to first-year students as well.
Through this, students can work with HUL on a live project and get a chance to be selected as asummer intern under the prestigious Unilever Leaders Internship Programme (ULIP). The internships are held at Unilever offices across the globe.
"Students have to find solutions to an actual marketing problem while working with a brand manager in HUL on a live marketing project. This offers students a rich learning opportunity and insights into the FMCG industry," said a spokesperson for HUL. This year, the competition saw more than 1,200 registrations.
Where competitions were earlier mostly restricted to final (2nd) year B-school students, the inclusion of first year students marks the growing importance being accorded to tapping this talent pool early on.
At IIM Kozhikode, for instance, the Hyderabad-based SH Group is testing waters for recruitment by launching a competition through which it will recruit summer interns.
The Mahindra Group's 'War Room', Reckitt Benckiser's 'Mavericks', JP Morgan's 'The Deal', Cognizant's 'The CXO Challenge', L'Oreal 'Brand-Storm', Asian Paints 'Canvas', L&T's 'OutThink' are among the other contests being run across campuses.
Winners of these competitions and projects get prize money, and in many cases, pre-placement offers (PPOs), pre-placement interviews (PPIs) or summer internship. Besides industry exposure, they also get a chance to hobnob with CEOs, CXOs and the top management. For companies, it offers an opportunity to gauge students' strategic thinking, problemsolving skills, out-of-the-box ideas and decide who is be the best fit for them.
Top B- schools say this avenue is gaining popularity. "Recruitment is just one aspect of such programmes; the other is getting fresh ideas for the company," said Kanwal Kapil, placements chairperson at MDI Gurgaon. At the prestigious Mahindra War Room, for instance, the best teams get to present their strategies directly to Anand Mahindra and the group's executive board.
"We have around 40 such programmes this time," said Kapil, and that's not including the smaller ones.
AT IIM Kozhikode, Ziffy, Snapdeal, SH Group and SABMiller were among the companies that launched competitions this year. "Students are very enthusiastic about such competitions, which explains their popularity," said an IIMK student.
Tags : E-commerce, E-tailing, XLRI, SnapDeal, SABMiller, India Inc, IIM Calcutta, Hindustan UniLever