Education is all about learning new things. Enabling the development of both sides of our brain for complete personality development, Education is in dire need of shifting from remembering to understanding, accepting to questioning, and reading to reflecting. An effort should be made to focus on bringing about a positive learning outcome, critical thinking, communication skills, deeper learning, problem-solving abilities, teamwork, social awareness, moral awareness, innovation, and creativity.
Teachers should be motivated to promote learner-independence and to facilitate learners to achieve autonomy. Encouraging learners to reflect on their work, to evaluate their study habits, to write commentaries on their approach, etc. Throughout, learners must learn to work as members of a team, involving other members from a related team and engage in dialogues related to the subject-specific content.
Moving from a “time-based model” to an“outcome-based” learning approach, focusing on credit acquired rather than the number of lectures, would end the current situation where Indian employers are missing out on highly educated and motivated graduates while talented young people are missing out on opportunities.
Bringing about that change in the education sector, Dr. Anuradha, Principal of Al-Ameen Institute of Management Studies, strives to elevate the institute’s academic reputation, through enhancing the qualities students already have by providing individual attention to students. She believes that scaling the performance of students in their areas of interest would certainly facilitate enhancing the brand equity of the Al-Ameen Institute of Management Studies in 2020.
Jumping Through the Hurdles
An MBA graduate, Dr. Anuradha is very passionate about teaching. Despite being mocked by her fellow graduates for declining the plum offers she received from corporate houses through campus placements, she paid no heed to them and chose to pursue her passion for teaching without any regrets. She comments, “I am in this field by choice, not a chance.”
Starting as a Lecturer at the Administrative Management College, Bangalore, in 1996, Dr. Anuradha became a part of the Al-Ameen Institute of Management Studies in 1996 and has been a part of the family since then. Lecturer at first, Dr. Anuradha drew her Career Graph and is currently serving as the Principal of the institute.
Seeing situations as a challenge and not a difficulty, Dr. Anuradha has programmed herself to tackle these obstacles with ease. During her time in MBA, the professors had oriented them to digest challenges. They would say that hurdles that come in the way are food for professional managers, and one would end up hungry if they didn’t tackle them daily. “My system is so tuned to tackling problems of varying magnitude on a daily basis that my homeostasis gets disrupted if I do not have to face any challenge on a particular day. Being a woman, it is a tight rope walk for me to balance my work and family, and that itself is an obstacle which I have successfully overcome over two decades now”, opines Dr. Anuradha.
Envisioning a Brighter Future
Aspiring to help her institute to be at the forefront when it comes to Management Studies with a global and dynamic outlook, Dr. Anuradha aims to continually expand and define new frontiers of Management Education and its implications in the corporate world. She also envisions to help Al-Ameen Institute of Management to be the best vendor of ethical and value-added human capital for the development of the corporate and Industry Economy through Quality Training and Continuous Learning. As an educational leader, Dr. Anuradha ensures that all their resources are channelized productively in accomplishing this mission in the pursuit of realizing the vision.
Advocating students to aim for the stars, while keeping their feet on the ground, the students are prepped to always have a “Plan B” in all their decision making processes that are done with taking realistic resources and constraints into consideration. Dr. Anuradha advises her students to never be let down by failure but flaunts them as a learning experience. Most of the MBA graduates suffer from “Perception Performance Paradox”; wherein the MBAs have a Perception about their capabilities, which might not match with their Performance.
This gap between Deserve and Desire needs to be understood and bridged. One needs to distinguish between the buildings of the institute and institute building. Benchmarking with the best B- Schools, institutes now need a curriculum that incorporates practical knowledge, critical thinking, thorough reading, writing, research discussions and debates, emotional intelligence, stimulating experiential learning, self-awareness, and outof- the-box thinking. Also, B-Schools need to hone a student’s ability to pull available data and make decisions and to work with teams as a good team player. They need to have an eclectic mix of Academicians who are Though Leaders, and Industry Experts who are Action Leaders to teach a course.
Dr. Anuradha adds, “The pedagogy needs to be more of blended learning having the right mix of online courses and classroom contact hours. Students must get exposure to a range of real-world scenarios from the grassroots in villages to the corner offices in glass buildings.” Advising the future generation of India, Dr. Anuradha concludes, “Youngsters need to embrace Ethics, Integrity and Corporate Spirituality to be successful in the long run. Youngsters need to instill in their minds the fact that ethics isn’t something one can just put on like a raincoat when the weather gets stormy.”
Awards and Recognition
• Conferred “Nalapad Woman of Worth Award” for administration by N A Haris Foundation in association with Confident Group & Baby Sutra on the occasion of International Women’s Day in 2020.
• Conferred “International Golden Achievers Award” by The Global Achievers Foundation in association with International Business Council, in 2019 at Moscow during the International Summit.
• Conferred “Women Achiever Award” by Lions Club International in 2019.
• Felicitated on the occasion of International Women’s Day by BWSSB in 2019.
• Peace Governor Award of Excellence in 2016 by World Peace & Diplomacy Organization and CIAC Global (Confederation of International Accreditation Commission).
• Conferred the “Chanakya Award 2012”, from Public Relations Council of India for “Academic Excellence”, presented by Mrs. Rajashree Birla at Mumbai.
• Conferred the Dr. Mumtaz Ahmed Khan Award for Distinguished Community Service in 2011, by Al-Ameen Educational Society.
• Conferred Dr. Mumtaz Ahmed Khan’s “Best Teacher Award” in 2010 by Almas Education Trust.
• Conferred the “Award of Excellence” in 2009, by the Rotary Club on International Women’s Day.