New age leaders

Updated on: Monday, January 11, 2010

The School of Inspired Leadership (SOIL) is all set to build strong partnerships with the industry and offer a transformational learning experience enabled by quality faculty from across the world.

SOIL is a business school, which is a co-creation of a consortium of 30 companies - including Aditya Birla Group, Dabur, Hindustan Unilever, Infosys, Mahindra & Mahindra and TATA Steel - that share a common vision of creating future business leaders.

Forging meaningful partnerships with the industry, SOIL has actively engaged these companies in all aspects of the Institute's overall functioning - imparting direction to the curriculum design, participating in the admission process, mentoring students, facilitating the learning process and leading the placement process.

The first challenge for the visionaries behind SOIL was to create a curriculum that was fit for cultivating the art of leadership amongst students . It took the combined resources and inputs of over 50 senior practitioners, consultants and faculty members to arrive at the curriculum structure that follows a three-pronged approach - rigorous focus on fundamentals, ample and diverse practical experience and the freedom to explore.

With a focus on attracting the right student base, SOIL adopted a selection tool (Caliper Profile) widely used for selection and promotions by global corporations. Caliper Profile is one of the most accurate assessment instruments that measures an individual's characteristics, motivations and potential (particularly focussed on leadership competencies). Additionally, every shortlisted applicant to SOIL is interviewed by an eminent industry panel that determines the appropriateness of the candidature keeping in mind the industry requirement. Around 70 panellists including the likes of R Sreeram, VP manufacturing , Dabur; Ravi Nindwani, director, marketing, Kohler; Somnath Baishya, corporate HR head, Infosys Technologies and Radhakrishnan Nair, chief HR officer, TATA Steel participated in the SOIL selection process.

At SOIL, every student builds an Individual Learning Plan to identify specific ways to grow, and this forms the bedrock of their developmental opportunities. Practical developmental suggestions are provided by the faculty and mentors to help students build on their strengths and make desired behavioural changes. Every student is also individually mentored by leaders from across the industry. The list includes Sanjay Gupta, India leader, American Express; Puneet Bahl, head consumer banking, ABN Amro; Rajit Mehta, COO, Max New York Life Insurance and Arvind Gupta, managing partner, Accenture, amongst others.

Faculty from reputed universities (INSEAD, Stanford, IIM Bangalore, Carlson School of Business and others), leading global consultants and practitioners help students build a real time global perspective and explore new paradigms in learning and innovation. Gary Jusela, PhD, Yale University, says, "I enjoyed the interaction with students at SOIL. They asked insightful questions. I liked the classroom that I used for the course and the seating arrangement with the round tables was conducive to creating natural small groups and facilitating an interactive and engaging learning process."

The institute offers full-time postgraduate management programmes across three disciplines - business leadership, HR leadership and marketing leadership - and has recently announced admissions for the batch commencing July 2010.
SOIL is organising an information session. Make the most of the opportunity by interacting with industry partners, faculty, current students and the management team of SOIL. The session is scheduled for January 16, Saturday, 11-4 pm at the campus (Plot no. 76, Sector 44, Gurgaon). To register or for more information, email your queries to info@soilindia .net or call up at +91 98713 39158.

times of india

New age leaders

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