The desire to become entrepreneurs is taking roots with a vengeance this year at B-schools. Many students have shown eagerness to stay out of the placements process and start their own ventures instead.
For instance, Chaitanya Jha — a second-year post-graduate programme in management (PGPM) student at the Management Development Institute (MDI) Gurgaon — has come up with an interesting concept like Choco-Mishtham and is already planning for another educational venture this year.
“While Delhi-based Choco-Mishtham is a young company, with expertise in making and supplying hand-made chocolates in retail outlets, and corporate in Delhi NCR, I have signed out of placements and am planning another venture now in the field of education. The venture basically will focus on changing the mindset associated with education and imparting training based on life skills. The pressures of education have pushed a lot of students towards committing suicide recently and with this venture, I want to provide a platform to them and become an associate of strength for them. We want to modify the counselling methodology, which is very formal today. We will discuss our module with schools and let them modify it according to their needs,” says Jha, who is also looking forward to approach the government schools with his module.
Jha will take the help of alumni from Indian Institutes of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A), Faculty of Management Studies (FMS) and Xavier Labour Relations Institute (XLRI) to design the module.
Around 20 per cent of the current PGIM students from MDI have signed out of placements and have planned setting up their ventures in Strategic sourcing in auto ancillaries, Digital marketing in Hospitality sectors to name a few.
Jha is only a case in point. There are numerous students like him that are opting out of placements to pursue their dreams. Another example is that of Arun Shenoy — a student of the Indian School of Business (ISB) — is planning the implementation level of his entrepreneurial venture — Green India Building Systems and Services, which aims to help reduce energy cost, carbon emissions and raise productivity. “I am working with the Wadhwani Centre for Entrepreneurship Development at ISB to get support for the implementation of my plans,” says Shenoy.
At least 30 students at ISB may opt out of the ongoing placement drive this year. They want to be entrepreneurs, and are eyeing opportunities in areas like travel, education and use of clean technologies, according to Krishna Tanuku, Director of Wadhwani Centre for Entrepreneurship Development at the ISB. All the business proposals are service-oriented and therefore the funding requirement for each will not exceed Rs 4 crore.
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Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies has students planning ventures from boutique financial services to social enterprises this year. “We have about 5 per cent of students opting out of placement to start their own ventures. Some of them have their business plan ready and others are in the midst of preparing them. The ventures range from boutique financial services to social enterprises,” says Anupam Rastogi, senior faculty at NMIMS.
Mumbai-based Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies (JBIMS) has seen a trend, where students who have taken up offers during placements start their ventures over a period of time. “This year, the entire batch of 120 students will be sitting for the placements as we have a provision where even the students who are planning to start their ventures can sit for placements and consider various offers coming their way. We cannot give out more details at this point of time as the placements are about to begin but are hopeful we will see many of them starting their own ventures a few years down the line,” said a member of the placement committee at JBIMS.