The full-time Executive Post Graduate Programme (EPGP) is an intensive one-year residential programme created specifically for professionals with remarkable track records and 5 to 12 years of work experience in a wide range of industries. The EPGP provides students with the same solid foundation in key management concepts and disciplines as a two-year MBA, with similar rigor, range of electives, and grading criteria. A key advantage of the EPGP is that the course work builds on the diverse and extensive work experience of the students.
In today’s volatile and competitive economic environment, companies face an increasing need for skilled mid-level and senior executives who have the vision and potential to attain top leadership positions. While deep functional and operational expertise is a prerequisite for such executives, their success is also contingent on their ability to perceive and analyse a situation from multiple perspectives and take timely and effective action.
IIMB designed the EPGP specifically to prepare such forward-thinking and creative managers – the business leaders of tomorrow who will create value for their organizations as well as for society.
Statement Of Purpose
Post MBA, I want to take up a middle management role in operations in Retail or Real estate industry. I strongly believe that EPGP will be a catalyst in helping me transform to a middle-management professional.
In the Army, I have extensive leadership and operations management experience. I have led large teams of 60-150 men in very challenging and tough environments. For e:g In XX, under Operation XX I led a XX men unit at a vulnerable place near Line-of-Control between India-Pakistan. Before I took that responsibility in that area, there was a recent terrorist-attack which took lives of xx soldiers. For that tenure, my sole objective was to ensure no casualties and that was possible only when troops were engaged, trained and motivated. I trained them by organizing regular patrolling, ambush and Quick-reaction-team drills. I engaged them by organizing games competition, mandir parades and movies. I motivated them by regularly organizing motivation session where I spoke to them. After tremendous hard work I achieved my objective and I was awarded a medal by the President for my service in that area.
In Army, I have also been instrumental in planning and supervising various movements of men and material including movement of 250 vehicles, 800 men, 3000 KGs of ammunition and 36 artillery guns (weighing 400 KGs each) over a distance of 1500 KMs. I have forecasted, sourced ration, clothing and personal equipment for 500 people, and spares, tools, fuel and lubricants for 120 vehicles. I have constantly revisited and revised my units Standard Operation Procedures for various processes. These stints enabled me to gain deep insights into operations management and honed my skills in it.
Leveraging my leadership and operations experience in the army, I wanted to take up greater challenges in the area of operations and man management. The HR operations role at Randstad was something new and different and I loved the diversity of the Job.
The last 21 months at XX have been very exciting and transformational. I had a unique opportunity to leverage the rigor, process orientation and disciplined approach of the Indian Army and apply it in a corporate setting. Under my leadership we conducted over 10,000+ CV reviews, and 2500+ interviews. I have also revamped hiring and on-boarding processes that improved the process quality, productivity of HR team and business results of my organization. I also improved many other HR processes helping reduce TAT. In one year, the new hiring process saved over 800 man hours helping HR team in providing substantial recruitment support to Business. These experiences have enabled me to gain a strong grounding in the corporate environment and also enabled me to inculcate the best of the Army as well as the corporate environment in me. I do believe I bring unique insights of strategy, leadership and innovation to IIM-B.
I believe that my strength lies in Operations and I want to leverage my deep domain expertise garnered through my Army as well as corporate stint and evolve as a middle management professional in an operations role in Retail or Real-Estate industry. In the long run, I envision myself as a CXO responsible for operations in an Indian MNC.
Through courses such as Supply chain Management, Operations Management and Technology and Operations Strategy, I will build skills that are very important for success in an operations role. Building skill sets in the areas of corporate finance, Strategy, Macro economics is imperative to gain a 360° perspective of business and to transition into a senior management role. Along with comprehensive project that will give me opportunity to work on a live issue, IIM-B will also help me gain cross-industry and cross-functional perspective from the diverse backgrounds of my peers.
Rishav Ankit
I worked with Ameer for my ISB application and interview preparation. His clarity of thought and logical approach was something missing from my application. He helped me re-work and re-think my essays with an entirely new outlook, which enabled me to come up with the right strategy and pitch. This not only helped me with my ISB application but also helped me with my international application as well.
One of the best thing working with him was the amount of time he spent with me on my application, answering all my queries at any time. His mock interviews gave me a full flavour of what a B school interview is like and highlighted my shortcomings, which with his feedback I was able to turn around within a couple of days and finally get the coveted ISB to admit.
Santosh Reddy
Coming from a PSU background and having a moderate GMAT score seemed a bit challenging in the pre-application period. So I needed a trained eye and a mentor in the application process to guide me through the so called “chakravyuha”. One of my friends suggested to approach Ameer and I instantly followed. it was one of the best decisions I took in my life. He not only guided me through the process but also helped me realise my potentials, brought out the positives in my experience and aided me to throw away those PSU insecurities. I applied for two top 40 US B-Schools and two top 5 Canadian B-Schools and got into 3 of them. His straight forward approach and instant feedback would make you realise that you are heading in the right direction. His mock interview sessions were great and I strongly recommend taking them. Thanks Ameer for the great support and I am indebted to you my whole life.
Rayelene D’souza
I walked into the application process with an average GMAT score, a strong resume, and years of professional writing experience, but I quickly found that it takes a trained eye and unique skill set to turn those credentials into the perfect business school application. Though Ameer and I initially disagreed on a few points, he remained patient and understanding until I was fully comfortable with the content in my application while also remaining sensitive to the best way to tell my story to win the heart of the admissions board. As I was keen on pursuing a part time in-class MBA program, I had my heart set out on Boston University and that was the first college I applied to. Within a month of my application I was admitted with a partial scholarship and I couldn’t be happier. This school is the perfect fit for my career goals and I could not be more grateful to Ameer for helping me get into the school of my choice. Thank you once again.
Vaibhav Vishal
Coming from India with a 620 in GMAT, I was not sure of applying to any of my dream colleges, but I was also not very keen to sit for another year to improve my GMAT score. I got in touch with Ameer, and he asked me to focus on my strength which was 7 years of Leadership experience in a Public Sector Organisation. I trusted his guidance throughout my application process and interview. His serious effort in the reiteration of my essays and the mock interviews was beneficial in securing an admit to Schulich School of Business, Canada.
Hu Shunfeng
“Ameer helped me prepare the interview of HEC Paris, including a 10-min presentation and the question-answer session. I got much valuable advice and made great progress through 2 mock interviews, especially for the presentation, where he suggested me to adjust the structure of the content in order to better match the school’s requirements. Moreover, Ameer inspired me a lot when practicing some cross questions, which made me think further about my strengths and weaknesses. He did me a big favor not only for the interview but also for my future learning experience at HEC”.
Akhil Khanijao
“I got in touch with Ameer through Facebook group. I was just starting to think about applying but I was not clear in which school I would fit in and what I want to do after MBA with my 10 years of Entrepreneurial experience. Working with Ameer was a wonderful and fruitful experience. Ameer really guided with school selection and career goals I might be able to pursue. He put in serious efforts in my application, and made sure that I get the admit.”
Dharam Nain Singh
“Applications are mostly about selling yourself in the best way possible. Ameer helped me in making a list of all the important events in my life, and used them to highlight what skills I have.I think I might not have been able to make the application so precise and to the point without Ameer’s help. I don’t think I would have been able to make so convincing applications without his help.”
Statement Of Purpose
Into its seventh year, my career has evolved from the production floor to store sales to planning an international fast fashion business. Each move up to my current role has been to get a deeper understanding of business principles and to be able to handle a business myself. Now the closer I progress to the next level, the more the demand for understanding business increases. I have reached here by learning and working hard, but the next position in line- that of a Business Manager requires me to gain business education.
Also, from here, I want my career to take a greater international focus. I wish to follow a road that gives me a chance to work across varied markets and cultures. To learn how a brand/product needs to adapt itself while entering a new market, while still keeping its core values intact.
To do this, I aim to work in a strategic planning profile for a consumer product or retail organization. The position should look at tuning business tactics for existing or upcoming territories. Such a position will expose me to multiple business environments and the impacts of global events on markets. My previous experience with retail, planning and product across borders pooled with formal management training should come handy while dealing with challenges such a job may present. Over a period of next five years, I plan to gain knowledge of products while working on suppliers’ strategy, as well as interact with diverse markets and consumers.
This combined experience, across the three major aspects of any business, over a longer period should help propel my career into a senior management role that will involve rolling out global/regional operations into new or emerging markets. I finally see that culminating into my taking independent charge of a complete territory or business.
Once I developed the need for studying business and deduced all the experiences I desire to gain from such a program, I didn’t have to choose IIM-Bangalore. It chose itself.
EPGP will help build on my existing experience in South-East Asia and India. I seek to use this familiarity to become better suited for most businesses that club India and the South-East Asian regions as a single business unit.
Academically, electives such as International Business, Corporate Strategy and Business Forecasting will help me gain knowledge that I feel missing in my arsenal.
The program will give me an opportunity to utilize the international immersion and interpret my studies and past practices from a global perspective. It will aid me refine the attitude of observing across borders- something very essential for my targeted career.
By working with high-caliber individuals with know-how of varied cultures, geographies and walks of life, I will labor to gain more flexibility and cross-functional understanding. This will assist me to calculate the numerous factors while planning a wide-reaching business.
I will take complete advantage of the location of Bangalore as it houses the corporate headquarters of major retailers in India. There is nothing like being able to attend classes in the day and approach industry in the evening. Furthermore, the timing couldn’t have been better, with FDI open to international retailers, India will soon need leaders in the field in coming years and I plan to make the most of it.
My career choice requires a comprehensive understanding of management and EPGP’s emphasis on general management is a perfect tie-up.
Integrating the global stance, first-rate peer culture, aptness of the location for my targeted turf and unrivaled education value of IIM-Bangalore, I am sure I can make a meaningful transition into a corporate strategic profession.
