The Greater Noida-based B-school, Birla Institute of Management Technology, BIMTECH, is the 20th B-school in India to receive the coveted AACSB accreditation. In this interview, Prof Harivansh Chaturvedi, Director, talks about what this means for the B-school and what difference it will make for its students and the school’s systems and processes.
What does the AACSB accreditation mean for BIMTECH? What difference will it make for you?
Industry demands quality business graduates from top business schools to attain a competitive advantage. The US-based accrediting body — the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) accreditation — is considered to be the gold standard in management education. It is known worldwide as the longest-standing, most recognised form of specialised accreditation that an institution and its business programmes can earn.
AACSB-accredited B-schools are considered to be the best business schools in the world. They are characterised by schools with better programmes, better faculty, better industry-ready students, more international students, and more employers that recruit from them. In India, the association has accredited only 20 B-schools so far.
For BIMTECH, AACSB accreditation opens the possibilities for more collaborative research (at national and international levels), and more faculty and student exchanges. NEP 2020 allows the top 100 business institutions in the country to have partnerships with foreign universities and business schools. AACSB accreditation will facilitate conversion of these possibilities for BIMTECH.
Do you see this influencing student selection of the B-school as a place to study as in perception BIMTECH will be regarded as among the top B-schools?
Accreditation is an important distinction for academic programmes. AACSB accreditation is the largest and most recognised specialised accreditation worldwide for management programmes at the undergraduate, master’s, and doctorate levels.
The requirements for AACSB accreditation are very stringent. There are many benefits of graduating from an AACSB-accredited business school. Job opportunities are likely to be more with higher starting salaries. International mobility and job opportunities abroad are likely to be enhanced because of AACSB accreditation. Drawn to a level of academic rigour that ensures a first-rate business education, the best faculty, and brightest students seek out institutions with AACSB accreditation.
What did you have to do internally to gain the AACSB accreditation? How did you have to change your processes and in what aspects did you have to change and transform?
Our guiding principle of functioning has always been one that facilitates the grooming of ethical global business leaders who are committed to inclusive growth and sustainability. The Vision, Mission and Values (VMV) of BIMTECH guide all the activities that culminate in the positive contribution to society, business education, the diversity of people and ideas, and the success of graduates.
Further, the ideals of BIMTECH spring from the renowned legacy of the founders — the Birla Group —dedicated towards nation-building and also preserving the rich cultural traditions of India.
The systems and processes at BIMTECH are quite robust and gel with international quality standards. However, during our AACSB accreditation journey, we could identify a few areas where we needed to revisit our systems and processes in order to fully align with AACSB Standards.
We formed an AACSB task force which monitored this alignment on a regular basis. We sailed through this journey because of our strong collaborative team of management, faculty, staff, students, alumni and all other stakeholders.
And, how long did the process take? When did you kick off the process to get the AACSB accreditation?
We at BIMTECH started our AACSB journey in 2015. International accreditation is a rigorous and complex process. It takes five to six years for an institute to be accredited. Due to the pandemic, the accreditation exercise was further delayed.
Since the physical visits were not possible, hence the Peer Review Team (PRT) from AACSB had to conduct the visit virtually to check the alignment of our systems and processes with their 15 Standards.
In brief, what are the 15 standards that AACSB judges you on for the accreditation?
The 15 Standards of AACSB can be clubbed into four broad sections:
Strategic management and innovation: These standards address three critical and related components: mission and strategy; scholarship and intellectual contributions; and financial model and strategies.
Participants (students, faculty, and professional staff): These standards focus on the admission, support, and progression of students, as well as on the deployment of sufficient faculty and professional staff to support mission achievement.
Learning and teaching: These standards focus on processes for determining learning goals, designing and delivering curricula to maximise the potential for achieving the expected outcomes
Academic and professional engagement: These standards identify three critical activities that help business schools to connect theory and practice: (a) the teaching and learning activities fostered by a degree programme curricula that highlight the importance of student engagement and experiential learning; (b) executive education activities; and (c) the initial preparation, development, and ongoing engagement activities of faculty.
Will you now look for other accreditation such as AMBA?
Globally, along with AACSB, there are two other reputed accreditation bodies which are EFMD and AMBA. In the next few years, we shall surely explore the possibility of getting these two accreditations also. It will take a lot of effort and will require resources but our efforts for continuous improvement in our quality will never end.
And, you are now the 20th B-school in India to receive the accreditation? Which are the other recent B-schools which received it?
AACSB had started their activities in India around year 2000 and TAPMI Manipal was the first Indian B-school that was accredited by them after a decade-long effort. Thereafter four IIMs: IIM Calcutta, IIM Indore, IIM Lucknow, and IIM Udaipur got accreditation from the AACSB.
During the last five years, some of the top private B-schools which have been given accreditation by the AACSB are IIFT, Rajagiri Business School, KJ Somaiya Institute of Management, Symbiosis Centre For Management And Human Resource Development (SCMHRD), VIT Business School, and Amrita School of Business