Report by India Education bureau; Jamshedpur: XLRI, the premier private management school in India, today conferred the Distinguished Alumnus Award on Dr. Akshay Rao, alumnus of Business Management Programme of the 1980 batch, at a special ceremony held at the campus. Dr. Rao, who is based in USA and currently holds the General Mills Chair in Marketing at Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota, U.S.A, especially visited the campus in Jamshedpur to receive this prestigious Award conferred on him. The glittering ceremony was also specifically organized to facilitate him.

At Carlson, he also served as the founding director of the institute for Research in marketing, an academic-Industry think tank established with the corporate partnership of 17 multi-national firms, from 2005-2010. From 1997-2000, he served as the Director of the Doctoral Program and from 2003- 2006 he served as the Chairman of the Marketing & Logistics Management Department. Besides, he has served as consultant to numerous organizations including Abbott Laboratories (Germany), Ambrosetti (Italy), Boston Scientific, the Carlson Companies, among others.

For the 1993-94 academic year Dr. Rao was a Visiting Professor at MIT and for the 2000-01 and 2007-2008 academic years he was a visiting Professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

Among the awards he has received are - 1987 Robert Ferber Award for interdisciplinary research on Consumer Behaviour, as well as the 2000 Maynard Award for his contribution to Marketing Theory. At the Carlson School he has received several awards for teaching excellence including the Curtis Cup Award for Outstanding Teaching in the Executive MBA programme in 2012, and was recognised as an Outstanding Faculty member in the fourth and fifth editions of Business Week’s Guide to the Best Business Schools.

Speaking on the occasion Fr. E Abraham, Director of XLRI mentioned ‘XLRI is proud to confer the Distinguished Alumnus Award on Dr. Akshay Rao for his achievements in the specialized area of Marketing and for his continuing endeavour towards greater heights of success in the field”.

XLRI has been conferring the Distinguished Alumnus Award on alumni who have excelled in their profession, both in the corporate world as well as in the field of academics. The awards are conferred on alumni on the occasion of Homecoming each year in November. Dr. Rao, who was to have received the Award on the occasion of Homecoming 2011, is visiting his Alma Mater all the way from U.S.A. to receive the Award in person.

While interacting with students he revealed his delight and said ‘I am very happy to receive this award. XLRI is the universe of learning; it is where I learnt the lesson of my life and importance of being responsible towards the society at large”. He also shared with students how XLRI played a key role in shaping his career and the need to continually learn and “unlearn” on an ongoing basis.

During the ceremony Fr. E Abraham presented the alumnus award to Dr. Rao. Mr.Rana Sinha MD of Telcon, Mr.Pradeep Srivastava MD of ISWP, Mr.Senthil Kumar - Chief Human Resources Officer, Tata Steel, Prof. P Ray, Dean (Academics), XLRI and other faculty members were present at the ceremony.