Dear alumni community
Indian festivals, Italian thinkers, global business leaders and Hindustani singers
Happy Deepavali to you, your families, friends and loved ones, everywhere. May the festival of light dispel the darkness of recent events and bring a better, greener, more equal, less polarised future to us all.
It is one month since the new office bearers took charge.
The occasion of Deepavali (as we call it here in Singapore), prompted some reflection on the road ahead.
The office bearers have taken over at a time of a jump discontinuity.
Societies and economics across the world are undergoing structural changes:
- Nationalism is rising – both economic and identity
- Disillusionment is growing – with the inequity of economic models, capitalism and financialisation
- Discourse is rapidly polarising – abetted by social media
- Pandemic has upended all priorities and accelerated shifts – from physical to digital, from wealth to health
The Pan IIM Alumni community faces some other challenges in the community as well.
- Our engagement model of a big infrequent physical format events, funded by sponsorship is done for. We need to develop a new way of thinking about community engagement, networking and funding
- We are roughly evenly split (in Singapore) between those who graduated before 2000 and after. The newer entrants will soon outnumber the older. And we have not sufficiently engaged them, or catered to their needs and challenges.
Big challenges. Easy to become despondent, or to attempt anything at all.
The Italian thinker Antonio Gramsci, summed up things well.
“The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.”
But he also brilliantly said:
“I’m a pessimist because of intelligence, but an optimist because of will.”
The new team has been busy since we were elected. They have already conducted an extremely successful cross-chapter quiz, where a combined Pan IIM Alumni team won by a whisker in the tie break. 2-3 more events are planned before the end of 2020.
But we need to think longer term as well. Here is what we plan to do, with a nod to Gretzky ((skate to where the puck is going to be) and Cervantes (attempt the absurd to attain the impossible).
Our primary and lofty goal:
The IIM alumni community must continue to be the need to prepare the ground (here in Singapore) to be as receptive for the next generation of global business leaders from India, as it was for us.
Such a course is not just visionary and altruistic, it is also in the short-term self-interest of those already here.
To do this, we need to be, and be seen to be, a “force for good” (as eloquently expressed by Piyush Gupta at our AGM).
Over the next decade/s, We must aim to create a generation of Singaporean business leaders, who are acknowledged to be Singaporean business leaders on a global stage.
Much as leaders like Indra, Satya and Sundar are acknowledged as global American leaders who happen to be of Indian origin.
This means that we need to be “builders”
- Of the IIM brand, not just individual institutes
- Of meaningful engagement, not just social interactions
- Of societal connections, not just business networks
- Of doing well for others, not just for ourselves
We see this as playing out in 2 different audiences
- The community within (alumni, careers, families…)
- The community without (Singapore, Singaporean business, Singaporean society, Singaporean life)
This will be exciting as to the ends.
Challenging as to the means.
Demanding as to the time and effort.
I end with a quote Pandit Jasraj:
“Umar aur badlav se kabhi darna nahin” (never fear age and change).
Thank you for joining us in our desire to be a ‘force for good’.
Suresh V Shankar,
President, Pan IIM Alumni Association Singapore
