National Innovation Summit 2015

Last week I had the opportunity to speak at the National Innovation Summit organized by Aditya Institute of Management Studies & Research, Mumbai. Here are some thoughts from the same:

1. For the first time I saw a management institute led by a woman – Dr Swati Lodha. You could see her imprint everywhere – in the well co-ordinated efforts of her staff and students. Her choice of speakers had a fair representation of women speakers. Do we need more reasons to put women at top?
2. Students and faculty from multiple management schools participated in the event, making it a networked learning. It is important for us to create learning platforms where we let even our potential competition to learn and contribute to taking knowledge a bit forward
3. The mix of speakers included management professors both from India and abroad, young entrepreneurs, industry professionals and I was there in the capacity of an author. There was a bit of skew towards Mumbai based speakers but then its not easy to avoid that. 
4. I have spoken at many conferences – absolutely local ones to international ones and this is by far the best organized summit I attended. For the first time I was asked to share my topic of talk beforehand. A faculty and a student co-ordinator took care of all arrangements – I did not have to do any followups. This seems small but is good enough to create bad taste in the mouth of the guests. I was kept informed of everything.
5. I requested for a round of the institute and ended up spending time in their small but interesting library. I wish I could recommend lot more books for that library.
6. At the reception, there was a lovely idol of my favorite goddess – Saraswati and I was told that everyday there is a Pooja that is done. As a proud practicing Hindu, I was touched that a goddess of learning presides over an institute of learning.
7. I learnt about Faaya – a fashion e-commerce venture that lets you get customized clothing and a venture by a very young Mridang Lodha.
8. I missed the morning sessions as I was travelling from Pune, but I hope they the institute puts up the videos online soon enough for me to listen to them.
9. Only place where I think they could have done better was putting up the event on social media with some live updates. Having said that, not doing so does not take away anything from the event, it would have just help them reach out to a larger audience.

   

10. Finally, I want to thank them for giving me an ‘Innovator of the year’ award in digital space and for allowing me to speak on something very close to my heart – making ancient Indian wisdom relevant for contemporary Indian professionals.