4th Intl Conference on theme ‘Changing Business Landscape’ at St Aloysius-AIMIT
4th International Conference on theme ‘Changing Business Landscape: Implications for Management Education and Research at AIMIT-Beeri
Mangaluru: The 4th International Conference organized by the Post Graduate Department of Business Administration at AIMIT, St Aloysius College (Autonomous), took off on an enthusiastic note on April 4, 2018. The day-long conference that deliberated on the theme ‘Changing Business Landscape: Implication for Management Education and Research’ was inaugurated at the Arthur Shenoi Auditorium at AIMIT. Speaking at the Inaugural, Rev Fr Denzil Lobo SJ, Director, AIMIT laid emphasis on the need of the hour to reinvent, innovate and reform the way we educate and learn in our business schools. Quoting corporate greats, he reaffirmed the call to prepare our students to solve problems that still do not exist.
Rev Fr Dionysius Vaz SJ, Rector, St Aloysius Institutions, delivering the presidential address, added the fourth dimension – collaboration – to profit, growth and humanity as the goals of business education and research. He reiterated the goal of the Institution to create men and women for and ‘with’ others. While laying stress on the significance of the spirit of enquiry, he submitted that our institutions have to move from ‘teaching-learning’ mode to ‘discovery’ mode, thereby fostering critical thinking and analysis. Rayan D’Souza, Faculty Conference Convener, provided a brief outlook into the significance of the Conference. The conference proceedings and the Aloysius Journal of Management and Research (AJMR) were released during the inaugural. Dr. Rowena Wright, Dean – MBA proposed the vote of thanks. Dhananjaya K, Co-convener was present.
Post Inaugural, Rev Dr Oswald Mascarenhas SJ, JRD Tata Chair Professor of Ethics, XLRI and Chairman, MBA Programs, AIMIT, interacted with the conference participants via web conference, live from XLRI. In his keynote address he critiqued the existing research paradigms and opined that research needs to get out of the shackles of ‘variables’ and ‘quantitative’ heavyweights. While regretting the demise of inquiry and research in our present education and curriculum, he insisted that we redefine research with new critical inputs, process and desired outcomes. He presented the ELMS (ethical-moral-legal-spiritual) framework to relook into the ‘How’ of research and education. Responding to a query of the participant on whether we will become irrelevant with the dawn of Artificial intelligence, Dr Mascarenhas, clarified that they might take away the ‘job’ but not the ‘work’.
In the track sessions that followed, 52 research papers from UAE, Australia, Singapore and India were presented and discussed at length. The research papers dealt with diverse themes in business in the silos of economy, finance, human resource, banking, entrepreneurship, technology, business education and corporate social responsibility.
Report submitted by Rayan D’Souza- Conference Convener