Indian School of Business Review By Madan Gopal Rathi

I passed out in 2012 and the cohort then was that you need to have a minimum of 1-year experience to join ISB. From 2014 that has changed to a minimum of 2 years and the ones who want to consider this prestigious college must have some good work experience as well. The college is next to IIMs and the facilities and all are perhaps better than them. There are some 30+ members dedicated to the CAS (Career Advancement Services) department that works out of their skin to get the best companies of various domains on board. Visiting faculty from Kellogg, Wharton, and Duke taught us on various topics. For an Indian MBA aspirant it was a dream institute and the way the course is designed and the kind of placements they provide, Indian School of Business Hyderabad is from a different league. The program that is run has an advantage as the same program is going in parallel in both ISB campuses, i.e. Hyderabad, and Mohali. If you feel like switching the campus in-between, you can do so. Another thing that stands out is that one year Executive Fellow Program in Management has 6 months of classes and 6 months of full-time internship.

Your GATE Score, your work experience and your own theory, and many soft skills are checked before you are finally given the admission letter. EFPM is just a one-year course where the first six months we had rigorous classes as they were long and hard and the case studies never completed on time. There were no excuses for delay and if one has to pursue PG from ISB, he/she has to be ready for grinding 15-16 hours a day. It may sound boring but that is how it as the fruits that you will get after the completion will be sweeter than a pudding.

Best in the business as the domestic professors were still into some research and they were also kept on toes as they had to publish their research in international journals every year. The guest faculty on the other hand gave us the global perspective and taught us the working style of MNCs in India and how they operate in abroad. Most of my classmates including me are in different countries and it was all because of the international faculty that trained us to adapt to any working conditions.

In our time, it even broke the IIM-A record as the highest placement was of INR 26 Lakhs. It may sound ordinary today but ask anyone have they heard of such a figure 10 years back. All the MNCs like ATK-Deloitte-PWC-EY were the regulars. Apart from them Accenture, Nestle, P&G, and Johnson & Johnson were the premiere companies that took care of 800 students as all of us got placed. Even after such a huge batch size and the world economy going through turmoil, we had placements, or should I say dream placements. When we sit back and talk to my colleague we all are at different locations and will have to kind enough to thank ISB as it wasn’t just our talent that has got us here, it’s the college label behind us that we are seen as a potential candidate for the tough job.

There’s a student village at the campus that has 4 hostels. Two boys hostel, one girl’s hostel and one is for married people. Since ISB programs are residential programs everyone has to compulsorily stay at the apartments on the campus. The buildings are nice and rooms were large and laced with all the facilities required. The food was served at the same mess had variety as it had dishes from north to south on daily basis. The fees are quite high at ISB and to make sure that they are charging right they have provided the best residential facility along with food.

I have seen various Universities in India and abroad and I have not seen such infrastructure at any of the Asian universities. Absolutely world-class facilities and security-wise too the campus is one of the best. It’s not one of those campuses where girls are not allowed to wear what they want to. In the student's village, there’s a large swimming pool and pool parties were a regular thing in the student villa. LRC (Library) which has been modified now was beautiful back then as well. Indoor sports and world-class gymnasium was there on the campus. The classrooms are of international style as ISB Hyderabad Campus was the first institute in India to introduce digital classrooms. The sporting facility was again were world class as international-styled snooker tables, badminton court and TT tables were at the recreation room. Among outdoor sports, we had volleyball, a basketball court, and a football field. Living at ISB is no less than living in a resort.

Socialism started making noise a decade back and that was the reason most of the events that we had in college were of social subjects rather than of entertainment. The lounge room at the campus was the relaxing point as it was a mini theater and was one of the unwinding spots on the campus. The social life at the campus was again the next level as students intertwined with each other gracefully and there was no restriction on roaming inside the campus at any point in time as all the facilities are accessible for students even at night.