XLRI will focus on finance and international partnerships in Mumbai, Amravati campuses: Director

NEW DELHI: Founded in 1949, XLRI Jamshedpur is India’s oldest business school and it just celebrated its platinum jubilee. Now, the 75 year-old private institution has hit another growth spurt with new campuses in the works.

Its Amravati campus will focus on international collaborations; Mumbai, on finance courses; and in Delhi, an automobile design school is planned. Father S George, S.J., director, XLRI Jamshedpur, spoke to Careers360 about upcoming campuses, new courses, placements, partnerships with Indian and international universities and more. Edited excerpts:

Q. What are the new courses and departments introduced recently? How are they doing?

A. XLRI Jamshedpur launched a unique one-year postgraduate certificate programme in corporate social responsibility leadership in collaboration with the Tata Steel Foundation in 2023. The same year, the XLRI Leadership Education and Development (XLEAD) Trust was registered.

The institute marked 75 years of its service to the nation. To commemorate this, a Skill Development Cell (XLRI - SDC) was created in June 2023. The cell aims to train youth in acquiring working skills that would help them get employment.

It is XLRI's livelihood mission to mark 75 years. Through this, we aim to go back to the roots and relive the original dream of the founding fathers of the institute.

In 2022, a two-year post-graduate diploma in innovation, entrepreneurship and venture capital was started. We introduced a XLRI and Rutgers University, New Jersey, US, partnership under which a two-year double master’s programme in supply chain management and supply chain analytics was launched. Further, Xavier Online Learning programmes were also launched in the same year and we inaugurated the Center for Public Policy and Public Affairs.

Recently, we partnered with IAE Bordeaux, Bordeaux, France for dual-degree programmes with specialisations in healthcare and analytics, a master's in business analytics and a double master's in social entrepreneurship and innovation, international business and human resource management.

Q. How have XLRI Jamshedpur placements been for this year, considering the economic slowdown and recession?

A. Last year was a big challenge. It took nearly 10-15 days to place all students; usually it takes only one or two. But the summer internship is much better than last year and we are witnessing that the market has improved.

However, we haven’t reached the normalcy of placing all students within a day or two. It will take time but it is certainly better than last year. In 2023-24, we had 100% placements but the average salary dropped by Rs. 1 lakh overall.

Both Jamshedpur and Delhi NCR campuses have 100% placements for the 2021-23 batch for its flagship programmes, including the two-year PGDM in business management and PGDM in human resource management, with all 463 candidates securing offers.

The final placement process was conducted in two stages. The first stage - the lateral recruitment process (LRP) – was conducted over a week in January 2023, where students with prior work experience were interviewed and were offered higher than entry-level positions.

The second stage – the campus recruitment process (CRP) – was conducted in a single day in February 2023, where there was no segregation on the basis of work experience. About117 recruiters participated, including 30 new ones, making 484 domestic offers and three international offers. These include pre-placement offers (PPOs) which were offered to 43.8% of the batch based on their performance during summer internships.

The institute received an overwhelming response from companies like Amazon, Jio, Mahindra & Mahindra, TVS, Trident, Deloitte, Accenture, ServiceNow, and Axis Bank, among others.

Q. XLRI Jamshedpur opened its first branch in Delhi-NCR 2020. Are you planning any others? How do you ensure the new campuses complement each other?

A. Our aim has been to have campuses in different parts of the country. As Jamshedpur is in the east and Jhajjar is in the north, we want to now open campuses in the west and south and have a presence in all parts of the country. Previously, we were often told that Jamshedpur is in the interior.

We are in the process of starting a new campus in Amravati in Andhra Pradesh. I recently met Chandrashekhar Naidu, chief minister, regarding the proposal. The campus will be opened soon and the focus will be on international collaborations and dual degrees like five-year integrated MBA, BBA with LLB and similar courses. This campus will have a new model.

Further, we have also taken 50 acres of land in Mumbai for another campus to be launched later. This campus will focus on skills development and finance-based courses due to its location. It won't have a regular MBA programme.

Our vision is that all the campuses must have the same values, curriculum and quality. Many professors went to the Delhi-NCR campus from Jamshedpur to ensure that quality and rigour were maintained. We shall follow the same process.

We have seen that, other than ISB, all the institutes have diluted the quality when it came to their second campus. So, learning from our peers, we have maintained the same standards including salaries, faculties, admission process and quality. We also have one examination and placement process. This year we placed 600 students from both campuses.

Q. What are some of the significant partnerships that the institute has forged to help in innovation, research and entrepreneurship?

A. We have several agreements with foreign universities. We already have collaboration with Rutgers University, New Jersey, and now we are collaborating with Georgetown University, Washington DC, US and a few European universities.

In India, XLRI Jamshedpur and ArcelorMittal Nippon Steel India signed an agreement in July, 2024, to promote leadership excellence and innovation. In September, 2024, XLRI Delhi-NCR entered into a partnership with Automotive Test Systems (ATS) India to establish the Indian School for Design of Automobiles (INDEA), the country's first school dedicated to automobile design and management.

Under the MoU, ATS will take on full responsibility for the project management of the design studio and prototyping facility at INDEA, overseeing everything from defining the infrastructure requirements to commissioning the facility.

The reason for establishing an automobile school in India was that we still don't have many automobile designing institutes and we are dependent on Germany, France, the USA and others.

Our automotive design school is mainly for students who have done architecture and automobile engineering. The whole idea is to select only 20 students but give them the best education in that area and top names have already designed the curriculum. It's not operational yet.

Q. While the number of women in MBA has risen, there are still few in leadership roles. How do you see this trend?

A. This is a real concern for all of us because we still are not using our overall human resources. As you pointed out, it is growing but not at the scale we expect and the only concession we have at XLRI Jamshedpur is providing access to more women by giving concessions in marks.

While we have been doing this, we are not doing so radically because it will be a disservice to other sections and eventually, evaluation is done equally for both boys and girls. But we want more women to join us. If you look at our human resource management course, more than 50% of the class is female. But if you look at business administration, it is still 30%.

We are making a conscious effort and it will take time.

Q. MBA classes are becoming more diverse as well. What is the reason for that?

A. During my time, 99% of MBA classes had engineers only. But we have come a long way.

Today, even non-engineers are making it through their merit, without any special concession. The reason for this shift is that earlier, admission tests – whether the Common Admission Test (CAT) or Xavier Admission Test (XAT) – favoured quantitative questions which have now been normalised.

Now, everyone has an equal chance to score high and meet the interviews. And for our human resource programme, it is already levelled in terms of women, non-engineers and everyone is at the equal stage.

Q. With the penetration of AI/ML and deep tech across industries, what curriculum changes have been made to ensure your courses are industry-relevant?

A. Every year we have a curriculum review committee consisting of professors who constantly interact with the industry to revise. Now, the trend is that every industry or company wants people who are tech-savvy and aware of artificial intelligence, even in HRM. Courses like big data, and business analytics are being introduced. It is applicable to all roles, even sales, and everyone across the line. This has become the new normal that every management candidate should be familiar with all these new-age courses.

Also, strategy as a discipline is emerging in a big way because previously nobody specialised in strategy. Because of consultancy roles, this area is emerging.