The stage is set for the semi-finals of the BLoC Boardroom Challenge for the BusinessLine CXO of the year. Presented by apparel brand Indian Terrain, the semi-finals will be held across six cities: Chennai, Coimbatore, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi between August 28 and September 2. The grand finale, to be held on September 11 in Chennai, will see the top teams from each city battle it out for the coveted CXO title.
The online preliminary round saw around 1,600 three-to-five-member teams across the six cities, from all the top B-schools, including the IIMs. Entries were also received from B-schools located in cities such as Visakhapatnam, Guwahati, Indore and many more. Twelve teams from each designated city will tackle a case to be outlined by BLoC and present to a jury comprising industry leaders and academics. Senior corporate leaders will be participating as jury members in each city to assess the best teams from each city.
In the finals in Chennai, the contestants will again be tackling a company-specific case study. The cases have been written by Vishwadeep Kuila, an IIM-A alumnus and who runs Chennai-based branding consultancy Brand Vectors. In the preliminary round, the online psychometric test was prepared by S Sivakumar, an executive coach.
The semi-finals will be staged in the campuses of various top B-schools. The Chennai semi-finals will be held at LIBA; in Bengaluru at XIME; in Mumbai at SPJIMR; Delhi at BIMTECH; in Coimbatore at PSG School of Management while the Hyderabad leg will be held at The Hindu office.
Why the contest? Why the why
The corner office, presentations, discussions, data analysis, ideation, problem-solving, trouble-shooting, team-building — this is the daily life of most CXOs. The contest aims to put B-schoolers in the shoes of a CXO for a day and tackle a challenging business problem. Their objective is to solve it with fellow board members, compete with other equally capable teams and come out on top as a winner.