Meet The HEC Paris MBA Class Of 2018

Priya-Darshinee Ramkissoon

HEC Paris MBA

Describe yourself in 15 words or less: Love innovating with minimal resources, real Excel/Visual Basic nerd, always running across all landscapes

Hometown: Brisée Verdière, Mauritius

Fun Fact about yourself: I speak 5 different languages – Creole (my mother tongue), English, French, Hindi and Bhojpuri. On a typical day, I wake up to my grandmother’s Bhojpuri, engage with my surroundings in English/French/Creole and end up dreaming in a jumbled mixture of all of these languages!

Undergraduate School and Major:

Université Lumière Lyon II, France

• Masters in Financial Markets Operations
• Bsc Economics, Management and Econometrics

Employers and Job Titles since Graduation:

• Distribution Manager in a family import and distribution business
• Assistant Customer Network Manager as part of the Barclays Pan-African Graduate Development Programme, Barclays Mauritius
• Bancassurance Manager, Barclays Mauritius

Describe your biggest accomplishment in your career so far

I was part of the winning team for the “Barclays Africa Innovation Award 2015” with the implementation of a Customer Lifecycle Management (CLM) system. We clearly stood out with our self-designed automated system & process, and for our customer-centric approach. Engaging differently with our wider team and, most importantly, with our customers resulted in phenomenal CLM results – our level of engaged customers has consistently been the highest in the 11-country group.

I am personally proud of and consider my contribution to the CLM project as my biggest professional accomplishment so far. As a Bancassurance Manager with no initial experience in insurance, I led the business from being largely irrelevant to customers to meeting customers’ needs while turning it into a significant income-contributor for the bank. As the nerdy solution-finder, I surpassed my creative and programming skills to design an automated CLM system that enabled all users (callers, supervisors, front-liners) to manage their tasks through simple mouse-clicks and minimal data entry, thus ensuring that we actually spend most of our time doing what CLM was designed for – engaging with customers.

Looking back on your experience, what advice would you give to future business school applicants? In retrospect, I owe my MBA application success (from taking the GMAT to being admitted to HEC Paris) largely to my grit and determination to succeed. I spent a minimum of two hours every day for three months straight preparing for the GMAT exam, and I took the time to map my strengths, weaknesses, abilities and skills before writing my essays and going through the admissions interview.

The application process may seem tedious, but the trick to overcome this feeling is to put time aside every day for GMAT revision, essay writing and interview preparation. Setting and sticking to daily/weekly goals, while keeping in mind the objective of being admitted to the business school of one’s choice, makes the application journey much easier.

What led you to choose this program for your full-time MBA? My heart was set on the HEC Paris MBA for a number of reasons. The programme is moulded to take me closer to my short- and long-term aspirations – successfully switching from a banking career to one in operational consulting while building the core competencies and skills required for such a change in 16 months.

I was also very much drawn to the vibrant “feel” of the HEC Paris MBA – the leadership seminar at the Saint-Cyr military academy, in particular, intrigued me. As an enthusiastic sports fan, hosting the amazing MBAT sports tournament held a strong appeal to me.

Tell us about your dream job or dream employer at this point in your life? Passionate about driving efficiency in a business, I see myself as a dedicated consultant specialising in operational efficiency in the short run, and subsequently setting up my own consulting practice in Africa from my home country or as a chief operating officer for a multinational in the long run.

I believe that execution plays the most important role in any strategy or plan. I enjoy and thrive at executing perfectly – pursuing this dream job will help me align my passion to my professional calling.

What would you like your business school peers to say about you after you graduate from this program? I would have made a difference to their lives by sharing my experience, skills and knowledge while learning as much from them.