The Athenaeum Effect

17th March 2007 morning. I wake up in the guest apartment in Bharathidasan Institute of Management, Tirchy. A humble attempt of learning made by myself and Nishi had brought us here. Athenaeum 07, a national symposium organized by BIM aimed at gathering academicians to discuss and deliberate topics on contemporary management research – Human Resources Management & IT Management. I reminded myself of the time when I stood before the notice board at ASB reading the Athenaeum notice four months ago and how I and Nishi had planned to work together. Our efforts had paid off. We were here today to present our paper, “Employer Branding – Branding for the future”.

BIM student organizers where always around. There was Balaji, Bibek and Archana who always made sure we were comfortable. As we reached the Symposium hall, driving around the gigantic BHEL complex, we had started to appreciate the relevance and appropriateness of the event. We were informed that ours would be the fourth paper to be presented. The symposium began…. As academicians and scholars presented papers, we felt like dwarfs or more like children looking at the ocean watching the elders swim. There was Amber Raza, Lecturer at Karachi Institute of Economics and Technology who had come all the way from Pakistan to share her views on Occupational stress, there was Colin Funk who had come from Canada to talk about creative capacity and tere were eminent academicians present their papers. Archana said our presentation went well. We didn’t think of that at all. It was a different experience. It was not a B-fest!!!

In the evening after the presentation sessions for the day was over, there was this Plenary session about fostering innovation and creativity in the work place. We were blessed to listen to Mr. G. D. Sharma, Vice President and Head-HR, Larsen & Toubro, Dr. R Karthikeyan, Director, Gemba Management Consulting Pvt.Ltd, Mr. Raja Shanmugham, VP – Testing Services, MindTree, and S. Anand, Deputy GM, HR, Tablets India Ltd. talk about how organizations go about managing and fostering talent. This part was what I liked the most. It was just awesome.

As the first day comes to a close, I am already waiting for tomorrow. We are sure that when we return home to ASB, we’ll bring with us a great experience. This opportunity was the best I’ve ever gotten so far… Thanks to Shobhana mam, Deepak sir, Krishnan sir and Somnath sir for their encouragement and support. Let’s keep it going. Learning is unending. We just have to look forward.