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Leadership Lecture by Mr. Manish Sabharwal

April 2, 2010: The third TAPMI Silver Jubilee Leadership Lecture, ‘Entrepreneurship as a career’ was delivered by Mr. Manish Sabharwal, a successful serial entrepreneur and co-founder of TeamLease Services, to the TAPMI fraternity in Manipal. Mr. Sabharwal is an MBA from Wharton and has co-founded companies that include IndiaLife, ICAP India and India Insure Risk Management.

Mr. Sabharwal touched upon his initial experiences as an entrepreneur. He mentioned that there were no golden rules in entrepreneurship, and that entrepreneurship is not merely about a brilliant idea, but about a commitment and determination to see the existing mechanisms with new eyes, and pursuing one’s dream.

He viewed the allocation of resources such as capital and human resources as an important decision for an entrepreneur. He said, “Money should be spent as little and as late as you can, whereas a good team has to be chosen as early as you can”. He pointed out that as an entrepreneur, one should value diversity in a team, since different skills are required at different phases of business.

He then explained the scenario of entrepreneurship in India, where India can be seen as a market base or a production base. He concluded his talk by suggesting to the students to take a long term view of money and life and to consider entrepreneurship as a viable alternative after graduation. He later answered the queries raised by the students on social entrepreneurship, challenges for entrepreneurs in India and learning entrepreneurial lessons from both success and failure.

Prior to the commencement of the talk, an awards function was held to recognize TAPMI student achievements.

Mr. Sabharwal handed over the following awards:

  • Dr. S. Dhandapani award for topper of the PGDM programme, to Vivek Didwania, batch of 2008-10.
  • Prashant Kulkarni award for best summer internship project (MIP), to Muthu Subramanian, batch of 2008-10.
  • Dr. A.S. Iyer award to the best student in Finance, to Vivek Didwania, batch of 2008-10.
  • The Smt Gangamma Ammannaya for the best lady student in Marketing, to Archana Rajendran, batch of 2008-10.
  • The Smt Gangamma Ammannaya for the best lady student in Finance, to Sonam Banka, batch of 2008-10.
  • Jaspreet Sebastian award for achievements in the first year to Kanika Gupta, batch of 2009-11.

The Top 3 Brandscan 2009 projects were also awarded:

  • 1st – Tuhin Guha and his team for a project done for Shaadi.com.
  • 2nd – Tanmoy Sarkar and his team for a project done for Wildstone.
  • 3rd – R.Srikanth and his team for a project done for GCMMF (Amul).

The second issue of TAPMI’s Research newsletter was also released by Mr. Sabharwal. Dr. Ramdas M. Pai (Chancellor, Manipal University), Dr. Ballal (Pro-Chancellor, Manipal University), Dr. Saji Gopinath (Director, TAPMI) and Dr. Simon George (Dean-Academics, TAPMI) were present on the occasion along with the students and faculty of TAPMI.