Upholding the Standards is the Way to Go for IMI-B – Dr. Garimella

As the newly launched IMI-Bhubaneswar institute starts its academic journey, Dr. Somayajulu Garimella, the director plans to lead the institute on a path of consistent growth. Dr. Garimella shared his thoughts on meeting the key challenges faced by a management institute in its nascent years.

Dr. Garimella has been the area chairman of Marketing and Chairman-MDP and Consulting Committee at IMI Delhi earlier. With his immense experience in the field of management as an award-winning academician and an industry expert both, he identified several challenges that lay ahead of him. In his view, there are several challenges associated with keeping only the best faculty, students, and administrative staff in the campus.

A noteworthy academician, Dr. Garimella earned several qualifications that reinforces his repute as one of the few management gurus in India. He completed his Ph. D in Management from the Osmania University after completing his M.B.A from the University of Texas and M.S. in Chemical Engineering from the West Virginia University.

“In a highly crowded management education space, my major challenge is to attract outstanding faculty, administrative staff and students to join a new campus,” mentioned Dr. Garimella. Having said that, he also shared his plans to rely on excellent teaching fraternity IMI already is known for. “Fortunately for us at IMI-Bhubaneswar, we were able to overcome the challenge of attracting good faculty thanks largely due to the excellent reputation that IMI enjoys in the teaching fraternity and also due to availability of a large pool of well qualified management faculty in this part of the country,” He added.

Discussing about his plans to meet these challenges, Dr. Garimella intends to make sure that the IMI-B campus upholds the reputation of IMI Delhi in a long run. “To start with, we intend to follow the same pedagogy and curriculum which made the PGDM program at IMI-Delhi one of the most sought after in the country. In addition, many of my faculty colleagues from Delhi will complement the faculty members at IMI-Bhubaneswar to ensure that the standard set by Delhi campus will be replicated in Bhubaneswar campus as well,” Said Dr. Garimella.

In addition, he put emphasis on developing unique teaching methodologies by continuous practice of research and innovation. “While we strive to uphold the standards set by the Delhi campus, we will try to create unique image for the new campus by constantly innovating and introducing new courses and teaching methodologies to stay ahead of the curve,” added Dr. Garimella.

He also informed that the students of IMI-Bhubaneswar will be availing the placement opportunities along with the IMI-Delhi students. He declared that the companies visiting the IMI-Delhi campus would also be offering employment opportunities to the IMI-B students. This decision has been made in order to maximize the student satisfaction since the very first batch of the PGDM course at IIM-B.

Quality of Student Intake A Priority since the First Batch – Dr. Garimella

Renowned academician having served his excellent academic innings at IMI Delhi, Dr. Garimella joins the new IMI-B as the director. He brings with him a rich experience of over 25 years having worked in the industry as well as academics. The director of IMI-B, Dr. Somayajulu Garimella, shared some facts about the admission criteria, programme fee, and admission process for the PGDM program at IMI-B. He also shed some light on some other aspects related to the PGDM programme being conducted at the IMI’s Bhubaneswar campus.
Dr. Garimella informed that the sanctioned limit for the current year admission process for the PGDM course is going to be 60 seats. “However, we don't intend to fill up the seats unless we find students with strong academic performance in their X, XII and degree courses. Candidates with work experience of 1-3 years will be given preference,” he added indicating that only the best candidates will be offered admission. The selection of the suitable candidates will also consider their relevant work experience in addition to their CAT scores. In order to ensure the highest quality student intake, he emphasised on the importance of a rigorous admission procedure.
He also shared his delight about the fact that college has been receiving good responses from candidates with good CAT scores. “We have received good response to our call for admissions and we intend to look at the pool of candidates before deciding on the cut-off scores. But my expectation is that it will be high,” said Dr. Garimella.
He also informed about the extension in the application deadline by 10 more days due to requests from candidates for extension. As opposed to the earlier deadline of July 15, 2011, it has now been revised to July 25, 2011. Dr. Garimella also indicated that the admission process will be quick and hence, the first academic session will commence positively by the first week of August 2011.

Dr. Garimella also stated some quick facts about the programme offered by the institute, i.e. the two-year fulltime PGDM programme. The fee inclusive of the books and computer facilities for the PGDM program is Rs. 7.89 Lakh for the entire length of course (two years.) This fee also includes a refundable caution deposit of Rs. 15,000/- The food and lodging expenses for tenure of two years will be additionally charged and is estimated at approximately Rs. Two lakh.
In order to make this expenditure bearable by the deserving students, the institute has already made arrangements with financial institutions, including HDFC Bank, Credila, and Allahabad Bank. Students willing to join the PGDM programme can avail the education loan from these banks.
IMI-B, counting on its intellectual wealth inherited from IMI Delhi, now seeks the talented candidates for its first batch of PGDM. With the leadership of Dr. Garimella and expert faculty, it aims to shine in the world of academic excellence since the year of its commencement.