Brand IIT - Whats wrong?
Its time that I give a take about Brand IIT! Ive seen, heard and read enough about brand IIT and its various avatars! Its really cool to corporatize an educational institution. But unfortunately, too much onus has been laid on the brand part without any significant thought about the product! From an insider perspective this is what I feel about the reckless debates doing rounds in the society about Brand IIT!
Since we have started using corporate jargon to describe IIT, let’s take a well known corporate - Mercedes for a comparison purpose. Every one of us admires merc as a brand and we look at it as premium stuff. The Brand got built as a result of world class products produced consistently over a period of time, with due respect to their marketing heads who complimented the products through their positioning strategy!
IITs in a similar fashion, produced amazing guys like Muthuraman (MD, Tata Steel), Rajat Gupta (ex CEO, Mckinsey), Raguram rajan (Chief Economist, IMF) and tons of such people with raw talent and hardworking capabilities in the 70s and 80s who quickly learnt the ropes of the corporate world and made it big. At the same time, these guys did a wonderful brand promotion campaign for their alma mater and the Brand IIT is flying Sky high!
Everything till now is very nice and rosy.But here starts all the trouble, and this is where the comparison of a corporate with an educational institution starts dying!
Merc, even after establishing its brand, still produces cars with cutting edge technology and the basic premium offerings it had from ages! It basically does not stop producing Steering wheels stating that it has been doing it for ages! What iam trying to convey is that, a past product does not have any effect on the working of the current or future product. Basically the Merc car does not react to the qualities of the predecessor. Every new car again begins with the construction of a hull, tightening of bolts, fixing of wheels and so on!
But the Products from our prestigious IITs are not inanimate four wheelers. They react to the brand being built around them. In a way, they realize what their real worth is in the global market, and the companies are willing to pay a premium for acquiring you.
But on the other hand, you forget, even now you have to start off from the nuts and screws to the tuning of the engine. Yes, it is all done in the previous products. but since there is so much of talk about the finish, the product development processes takes a beating and the finish nor the brand hardly matters.
At the end of the day, the product does realize its mistakes and gets its bearings right, but not before taking the driver for a rough drive.
4 comments:
Thought provoking comparison sir. Suggest you please mail it to Siddharth's father. :)))
Someone has to do the bull work as well.
-------------------------------
Btw, What time are you going to Hamsadhwani ??
Brilliant analogy and the difference pointed out perfectly.
I wish there are more people like you to point out this fact well in advance so that students joining IITs understand the reality.
As an IITian, I would like to say
'Thank you'
I guess the point you are trying to make is that people are not making the most of What IIT the tech institute has to offer, but are trying leap frog using the the brand.
i think everyone is already aware of this, but when it comes to action to change, all of us students only raise our hands in protest.. which is ironical.
@ Dharik
Well, thats not exactly the point i wanted to make.
When you talk of action to change, in this case, it has to be from every person for the betterment of himself and not for any society or such gyan.So being lazy bums and expecting to make it big or mint some quick buck doesn't really happen.Thats my point.The Media and the brand makes it out to be and we shouldn't fall for that trap.
I'm not trying to raise any flag on how IITians should function.Its upto them to decide what they want to be in life and how to get there.
This post is just like one of those messages which cautions you to have safe sex and is NOT to be taken as a cure for AIDS :-)
So, i hope your irony issue is solved :-)
Post a Comment