The first batch of IIM Trichy’s elective course in International Business Practices (IBP) ended successfully. The course is being taught in some older IIMs and a few new ones. With this course, IIM-T opened up another avenue for students, one through which they gained global exposure and learnt from their experiences of working in international firms.
Learning about International Business is essential in today’s age of globalisation. International trade or business balances the resource demand and supply between two countries. It helps the exporter nation increase its GDP, and gives the importer nation access to resources at competitive prices, given the multiplicity of suppliers in a competitive market.
International business is a big domain to explore, study and work in, and is not limited to mere negotiations with foreign clients. Rather, it makes use of related concepts, skill-sets and domain knowledge, ranging from marketing, research, pitches and sales to payments, business models and strategy.
The IBP course at IIM-T offers students a chance to work on actual projects offered by reputed global organisations.
The students learn much beyond cross-cultural interaction or behaviour. They get to know the practical aspects of International Business, how issues may arise amidst a real work environment, and have to come up with the right solutions to facilitate smooth business. Therefore, a thorough knowledge of the MBA concepts taught during the First Year is quite useful, along with application-oriented thinking styles, such as derived or lateral thinking.
The maiden batch of students opting for the IBP course got a chance to work with several global companies based in Singapore, on domains spanning analytics, market research, finance and more. Analogous to a live project undertaken for a company, the course work focussed on regular research work and submissions for a period of three months, both in India and Singapore.
The IBP course, however, should not be confused with an “industrial tour”, primarily because of the length of the project work, sacrosanct deadlines and submissions to the company, as well as extensive on-the-job learning opportunities, requiring the application of concepts taught during MBA course work and problem-solving skills.
(The writer is part of the PGP 2016-18 at IIM Trichy.)