Meet the MBAEx Class of 2023: Manojit Kumar Dalai, Indian Institute of Management Calcutta

Manojit Kumar Dalai

Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta

“A Sales & Marketing professional who is curious about exploring new initiatives for change & transformation.”

Hometown: Cuttack, Odisha, India

Fun Fact About Yourself: An occasional blogger, writer, reader, and traveler.

Undergraduate School and Major: Biju Patnaik University of Technology, Bachelor of Technology in Mechanical Engineering; UnitedWorld School of Business, Post-Graduate Program in Management

Most Recent Employer and Job Title: LG Electronics India Pvt Ltd; Retail Marketing Manager

Aside from your classmates, what was the key part of IIM Calcutta’s MBA programming that led you to choose this business school and why was it so important to you? Historically the trend of average work experience of the batch for the program has always been more than 8+ years with batch size being 65+. These were key aspects for consideration as I was looking for a smaller cohort strength with higher work experience that would help my individual profile (11+ years of work experience) to smoothly blend in. This would also mean a very rigorous set of selected students that would contribute to richer peer learning.

What has been your favorite course or extracurricular activity at IIM Calcutta? What has been the most important lesson that you have learned from it?  While a plethora of subjects is being taught in the course with individual importance of each subject pertaining to business management, my personal favorite till now has been ‘Strategic Analysis and Choices’. This course was an eye-opener in terms of understanding the strategic decision-making process & the set of considerations upon which it is based.

What has been the best part of studying business in Calcutta? Calcutta is a heritage city and eastern hub of India. It housed the early business empires of India & played a pivotal role in setting up the business environment & economic/capital structure of the nation. It has a significant impact on the social, political, and cultural landscape of the nation as well. A lot of major public and private enterprises spanning different industries are headquartered out of Kolkata. These include ABP Group, Apeejay Surendra Group, AMRI Hospitals, Balmer Lawrie Co., Bandhan Bank, Britannia Industries, Emami Group, Exide Industries, Hindustan Motors, ITC Group, Lux Industries, RPSG Group, and Spencer’s Retail. This gives the city a mixed flavor of business culture along with socio-economic movement. Hence the city sets up as an ideal locale for understanding the dynamics of the Indian economy and business contexts.

Describe your biggest accomplishment in your career so far: While I’ve enjoyed innumerable accolades in my career spanning a decade, the achievement that gave me the highest was being adjudged as a Top 5 marketing manager amongst 51 marketing managers during my tenure at LG Electronics in the year-end assessment, 2018. This fetched me an early-turn promotion & a privileged ‘Get to know Korea’ trip in 2019.

Describe your biggest accomplishment as an MBA student so far: While we get to participate in a number of competitive learning initiatives during the program, being elected as a member of the Social Networking Committee was a special one, as it gave me opportunities to explore beyond academia. As part of an early initiative of the committee, I penned a press release using my prior professional skills that saw the light of leading national dailies. It gave me immense satisfaction as I had put my skills to use for the benefit of the entire cohort & the program.

What led you to pursue an MBA at this point and what do you hope to do after graduation? While pursuing an academic degree from a premier institute like IIM Calcutta was always on my bucket list, I had never figured out the purpose & process for it. It was during the COVID’19 pandemic that brought many changes to the economic landscape that made me reflect on my career plans. The job market dynamics were rapidly changing and the skillsets demanded were transitioning into more digital technology. It was then when I decided to pursue my education plan to upskill myself from a premier B-school and hence started my preparation.

I have long been in the field of sales & marketing roles with a clear understanding of strategies and their implementation. Now equipped with MBA from IIM Calcutta, I plan to transition into roles of designing those marketing strategies.

What advice would you give to help potential applicants gain admission into IIM Calcutta?  IIM Calcutta is one of the premier B-Schools of India with consistent Top 50 FT Global MBA rankings along with being Triple accredited by AACSB, AMBA, and EQUIS. I would advise all potential applicants to truly reflect on their SOP and essay submissions as it is most quizzed during the interviews. Also, IIM Calcutta is renowned for its mastery of statistics and analytics courses, one must be self-prepared with some relevant knowledge on quantitative applications of the same in their industry or domain.

DON’T MISS: MEET THE INDIAN INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT CALCUTTA MBA CLASS OF 2023

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