Great Lakes Institute of Management hosts Dr. Simon Galpin as part of its Distinguished ‘Thought Leadership Series’

~ Dr. Galpin sheds light on key topics like retaining talent, role of technology, role of millennial in making India as an attractive investment destination ~ 

15^th March 2021, Mumbai: Dr. Simon Galpin, Managing Director, Bahrain Economic Development Board graced Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai in a virtual thought leadership session organized by the institute. Dr. Simon addressed a strong audience of 450+ participants and shared his insights based on his experience and observations over the years.

During the event, Dr. Simon touched upon some key aspects and spoke about the recent trends in the FDI promotion in a post-COVID world and its implication for millennials. He started by saying that India has a large group of millennials and it is the nation’s strength. The first step is to attract and retain globally mobile talent. The creative class is critical in taking the digital economy forward. Countries need to re-evaluate education and immigration policies to attract global millennial talent. He emphasized that there is a need to support companies to retain creative pool. The second point he made was technology will come to the aid of supporting talent. He said that the thought process should be to attract companies that bring useful technology to boost economies. Health tech is one of them and here is to stay. There is a lot of focus on high-growth enabled start-ups and the right kind of hard and soft infrastructure to aid the growth of these companies. Hard infrastructure which includes access to 5G, cable networks and datacentres and soft infrastructure which includes transparent regulatory environment, remote working tools are going to be the necessary trends in encouraging FDI promotions in a post-COVID world. He further added, tools like Zoom have enabled individuals to get the job done at a much quicker pace. It helps everyone to get together like sector experts, decision-makers, local partners, and regulators and makes a difference to the whole process. 

He added, remote flexi-working hours will go a long way in retaining younger talent especially youngsters, young mothers, among others. It can help in targeting companies in different time zones and allow individuals to develop skills to reinvent themselves. It will vividly bring everything to life. The next point he made was 'Small is Beautiful' and investment promotion agencies tend to target bigger companies and it becomes a bit too cluttered. There should be focus on high growth startups and scale-ups and even SMEs which are nimble, have the potential to grow fast and allows swift decision-making because of less cumbersome company structure. He next spoke about how millennials are a critical value proposition and are tech savvy, early adopters. He focused on the soft skills like familiarity with presentations, usage of social media, good inter-personal skills, keen entrepreneurial mind-set and able to use local knowledge to their strength. He said that menial jobs and internships will always add to knowledge and becomes a good learning opportunity. He stressed that it is important for the millennials to engage with the startup ecosystem. The last valuable point he made was the importance of developing and maintaining networks for the millennials. It can start from building on your family and school connections. The development should be consistent across social media channels and should meet your objectives. He highlighted that the role of mentors is important and should be a win-win relationship.

Speaking during the event, Dr. Suresh Ramanathan, Dean, Great Lakes Institute of Management, said “We are honoured to have the magnanimous presence of Dr. Simon Galpin. He brought alive the ideas that millennials are an important cog in the wheel of the FDI ecosystem and they can be vital to highlight a nation’s attractiveness as an investment decision. His vision of nurturing a young and skilled pool of people and how to develop your skills, build stronger networks can give the right signal to potential investors. His messaging was important for us and all the faculty and students of the institute and enlightened us to be prepared for the future.”

About Great Lakes: Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai founded in 2004 by Padma Shri Awardee Dr. Bala V Balachandran is one of the premier B-schools in India. Great Lakes has, within a short span of 15 years emerged as a top-ranked business school. Great Lakes has 50+ full time faculty and 150+ visiting faculty including over 25+ international faculty from top global schools like Yale, Kellogg, Stanford, and Harvard. Further collaborations with world’s leading institutions like University of Houston, University of Bordeaux, Hong Kong University of Science & Technology (HKUST), University of Missouri, Kansas, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago and Babson College etc., have helped Great Lakes in globally benchmarking its programs.

Great Lakes, Chennai, was accredited by Association of MBAs (AMBA), UK in 2014 and became the youngest B-school in India to receive this prestigious international accreditation. In 2015, Great Lakes, Chennai also received international SAQS accreditation and in 2017, its two-year PGDM program was accredited by National Board of Accreditation (NBA). For the years 2018 -2019, Great Lakes was ranked No.1 in India by Analytics India for its Analytics program. Great Lakes, Chennai was ranked 5th by Outlook India among top private MBA institutions, 9th by Business India, 15^th by Business Today and 18^th by NIRF among top 10 Indian B-Schools. It was also placed in Super League 2 category by Business Standard in the year 2019.

Led by exceptional academic faculty, steered by an outstanding advisory council, and buoyed by the international collaborations, Great Lakes has been constantly innovating to stay ahead of the needs of our businesses and community. It is the first B-school in India to offer full time specialization in Analytics and first to introduce AI and Machine Learning specialization.

Great Lakes has a 30-acre LEED Platinum rated green campus in Chennai and a second campus in Delhi-NCR. In the year 2019, Great Lakes Gurgaon campus received the prestigious AMBA accreditation and was also ranked among the top 5 emerging business schools by the National HRD Network (NHRDN) for the year 2018-2019. Great Lakes Gurgaon was also ranked 13^th by Business World for its one-year program in the year 2019.

Great Lakes offers One Year full time MBA (PGPM) for experienced professionals, Two-year MBA (PGDM), Part Time Executive MBA for senior managers, and Weekend Executive MBA Program. Great Lakes alumni currently numbering 8800+, work at world renowned organizations both in India and overseas across 30 countries.