Management education is perhaps the biggest growth segment in the education sector in India today. There are estimated to be around 1200 registered institutions imparting management education at the Master’s level, and even after adding on the backyard and garage schools, the numbers graduating, of whatever quality, do not begin to meet the need for entry-level managerial manpower in this country. The gap is sought to be met by post-hire training of managerial entrants sourced from other education streams, ranging from Hindi literature to chemistry or physics graduates, all of whom happily abandon their first choice of subject for the better job prospects in management. This tragic mismatch between supply of subject specializations, and the demand for them in the Indian education system needs to be urgently corrected, and that is where books such as this play a role. The author is a former Director of the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore, and Founder President of the Association of Indian Management Schools.
AIMS was launched in August 1988 with the very laudable objective of federating the new institutions mushrooming in every corner of the country, so as to provide a quality control framework. At the time, the AICTE had not come into effective operation. Even though AICTE subsequently took over the formal accreditation function, there are severe lacunae in its functioning, and it is in any case no substitute for a forum where institutions with similar objectives meet on a common platform to discuss issues of common concern.