In the wake of the COVID 19 lockdown, Harvard Business School was forced to shut down its physical classrooms and go completely online on March 23. This successful transition was planned over a two-week period. Prof Srikant Datar, Senior Associate Dean for University Affairs and Faculty Chair of the Harvard Innovation Labs, led the transition at HBS.

MBAUniverse.com conducted an in-depth interview with Prof Datar to understand the preparation, principles, and learnings from the Harvard Experience.

Responding proactively in student interest, regulatory body All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has released the revised academic calendar for B-schools with guidelines for the PGDM/PGCM admission time lines, commencement of classes for new as well as existing students, mode of teaching, revised dates to apply for fee refund among others key instructions. These guidelines are mandatory for more than 500 B-schools including top B-schools like XLRI, SPJIMR and MDI.

Progressive institutions are adapting their delivery models in the wake of COVID 19 lockdown. AACSB, the leading global MBA accreditation body, recently held its annual ICAM conference virtually on April 26–28, 2020. Traditionally, ICAM is one of the largest congregations of MBA educators in the world. This year, nearly 600 participants joined the online event, with more than 50 from the Asia Pacific region and a handful from India. MBAUniverse.com was also invited to participate from India.

Masters’ Union School of Business will open its doors to students in August 2020. Modelling itself on a School of Medicine, Masters’ Union is taking many initiatives to make sure that students get a great industry-immersive experience. “It’s the novelty of it,” says Professor Karthik Rammana, Director, University of Oxford, who will be teaching Business and Public Policy at Masters’ Union, “that makes it so special-this is the first time this means of education has been employed outside the field of medicine.”

Kohinoor Business School (KBS) Mumbai, one of the leading MBA colleges in Maharashtra, is taking the calamity of Corona Virus Outbreak as a new challenge and has continued to impart the regular teaching and learning, and also moving towards developing a model of sustainability, while many B-schools are yet to come up with their strategy to complete admissions, proposed use of pedagogy, summer internships, session commencement and placements.

Soon after its rival ETS announced at-home GRE test on March 23, Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) announced on April 15 that GMAT exams can be taken at home. GMAT Online will have a slightly different Exam Pattern and will be available across the world except in some countries like China. This move comes in the wake of many leading US B-schools including Kellogg School announcing waiver of GMAT/GRE for upcoming MBA admissions. This MBAUniverse.com article reviews this important global MBA trend, and explores implications for Indian MBA education.

PGDM Admission 2020 at the National Institute of Financial Management (NIFM) Faridabad, an autonomous institution of Ministry of Finance, Government of India is open now!

Dr Rishikesha T. Krishnan is the new director of IIM Bangalore. The Board of Governors of the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIMB) have appointed Dr Krishnan as the new Director of this prestigious IIM. Dr Krishnan will take charge on July 31, following the superannuation of the present Director, Professor G. Raghuram. Known as a thought leader in Innovation Management, Dr. Krishnan has served as Director of IIM Indore.

With COVID 19 disrupting the World, Universities and B-schools are adopting online learning tools for some continuity in Learning. While Zoom, Google Hangout and Webex are popular platforms, a few B-schools that have invested in propriety Education Technology platforms stand to gain competitive advantage.

In the present phase of lockdown due to Corona Virus outbreak, while many B-schools are yet to come up with their strategy to complete Admissions, ensure Summer Internships, and Final Placements, Mysore based SDMIMD has met these challenges by taking proactive steps. SDMIMD Mysore is accredited by NBA, EFMD (EPAS) and ACBSP, and its PGDM is recognized as MBA equivalent by Association of Indian Universities (AIU).