Billionaire Philanthropist George Soros Speaks with Professor Reuben Abraham

In a conversation that touched upon myriad topics from reforms in Burma to deficiencies in democracy, billionaire philanthropist George Soros spoke candidly with Professor Reuben Abraham, Executive Director of Centre for Emerging Markets (CEMS) at the ISB. Speaking extensively on Eurozone, Soros remarked about the inadequacies of the Euro. “It was a currency union not a political union.” There are several flaws in the European Union that are not fully recognised. There is a misconception on how financial markets operate. "They assumed imbalances arise from public sector, they did not realise that markets itself would be flawed."

Despite being a proponent of democracy, Soros conceded that there were flaws in open societies because political discourse is not designed in democracies. However, he emphasised that in the developing countries there is still “an innate belief in right vs. wrong.” Despite corruption and abuse of democratic process, there is still a desire to "do the right thing."

The session ended with Soros fielding questions from the audience on issues ranging from corporate governance to the role of religion in democracies.

For more information on the event please click here

World Economic Forum invites ISB to Join Knowledge Advisory Group

ISB has joined the Knowledge Advisory Group of the World Economic Forum (WEF). The objective of the group is to create a more structured communication channel between universities and the forum. The group members, nominated by the head of the university, comprise university vice-presidents, senior administrators or faculty with a broad overview of their institution’s activities and engagements. The ISB joins many leading business schools and universities such as MIT, Kellogg, University of Chicago, INSEAD, Harvard, etc. In addition to this, the WEF has also invited ISB faculty to join their Global Agenda Councils. The councils consists of multi-stakeholder groups of experts who work towards advancing knowledge and collaboratively exploring important issues that shape the global, regional and industry agendas.

Professor Galit Shmueli writes book on Time Series Forecasting

Forecasts from time series are used widely across different areas such as economic forecasting, workload projections, sales forecasts, and transportation. Practical Time Series Forecasting: A Hands-On Guide provides an introduction on statistical models and data mining algorithms used in business forecasting, with a focus on the complete forecasting process, from goal definition to implementation. Real data are used throughout the book for illustrations, exercises and cases. This text is part of the "Practical Statistics" series written by the Professor Shmueli, which is aimed at making business analytics accessible, practical and affordable.

For more information on research by Professor Shmueli please go to http://galitshmueli.com

ISB Ranked 20 in FT Global Top MBA rankings 2012

The Post Graduate Programme at the Indian School of Business (ISB) has been ranked 20th in the Global Top MBA rankings 2012 released by the Financial Times, London. This is the fifth consecutive year that the School has made it to these global rankings. Last year the School was placed at the 13th position. For more information on the rankings please go to Global Top MBA rankings 2012

Dr Thomas Schmidheiny Extends his Commitment towards Family Business Chair

Dr Thomas Schmidheiny of Spectrum Value Management has extended his commitment to the Chair in Family Business and Wealth Management by one more year. The Chair will now be active until the end of 2013. The Thomas Schmidheiny Chair was established through a generous contribution made by Dr Schmidheiny towards ISB during the year 2007-08. Since then the TS Chair and ISB have come to be known in both academic and industry circles as the only significant organizations with devoted resources to study family business. The Chair, held by Professor Kavil Ramachandran, has researched family business extensively.

For more information on Thomas Schmidheiny Chair of Family Business and Wealth Management please click here.

Venerable Tenzin Priyadarshi Stresses on Ethics for MBAs

Venerable Tenzin Priyadarshi, Founding Director of the Dalai Lama Centre for Ethics and Transformative Values at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), was at the ISB, where he addressed a packed audience on “Transformative Leadership.” He stressed that individuals must be trained in ethics, in addition to their training in management and leadership at MBA schools. “We want to train people to be managers, administrators, bureaucrats and we think somehow, magically, automatically, they would become ethical individuals.”

It is also important that managers receive adequate training in emotion management so that they do not bring conflicting emotions such as anger and jealousy to their homes and infuse it into their family lives. Likewise, a problem on the personal front should not be brought to the professional sphere. “This is something that requires training – how to live a life of balance and vigilance,” he added.