MDI Gurgaon hosts its annual red carpet event ‘Delphique 2020’

Gurgaon: India’s leading business school, MDI Gurgaon virtually hosted its annual national management convention ‘Delphique 2020’, 24th edition of a three-day event from 11 – 13 of December, 2020.

‘Delphique’, confluence of following events: Knowledge Partnership (Research Panel discussions based on Live Projects), Vincenza (International B-Plan Competition), Cerebro (National Case Study Competition), and Model United Nations (MUN – Debating and Diplomacy Conclave) brought together organizations, academicians, industry peers, and students to interact and share thoughts on critical issues faced by the corporate world.

The event started on an auspicious note with lighting of the lamp. Prof. Jyotsna Bhatnagar, Dean- Graduate Programmes and Student Affairs welcomed the first keynote speaker of the event, Mr. Harsh Mariwala, Founder and Chairman, Marico to enlighten MDI students with his entrepreneurial journey at Marico.

Prof. Bhatnagar appreciated the initiative taken by MDI students. She encouraged promising industry academia dialogues which can help train budding managers for the future growth. Elated about Delphique, she said, “I would like to thank the industry leaders for sparing their valuable time to be a cherished part of Delphique 2020. This year is challenging as pandemic has opened new horizons of case studies, and MDI looks forward to work on these challenges to open new avenues of innovation”.

Delivering the keynote address, Mr. Mariwala talked about Industry 4.0. Citing the relevance of technology, he said “Technology evolution is meant for humanity and one should not be servant of technology. He motivated the students by highlighting the importance of ‘Grit’ and said “Everyone needs grit to succeed, learn from your failures and work on them in order to succeed.” Quoting his journey of starting Marico, he further added, “The ‘never giving up attitude’, ‘Resilience’, ‘Perseverance’ and Determination will help you learn and succeed”.

‘Delphique 2020’ focused on six management domains, i.e. Operations, Marketing, Operations Strategy, Human Resource, Strategy, and Market Research. By promoting strong research, students were assigned domain specific problems to come up with solutions on themes like B2B e-retail industry, B2B Marketing, Strategies for faster adoption of rooftop solar panels in the marketing and strategy areas. Interesting topic of customized video CV from the movie Heist 21 and impact of Covid 19 on the food industry were assigned in the market research domain.

The panels were headed by renowned knowledge partners. To name a few, for the Operations Strategy panel, the knowledge partner was Udaan. Sterlite Technologies, Sungrow Company, and Happ Coach were the knowledge partners for the Marketing panel. For the Operations, it was V Tran and for the HR panel, it was DS Group. While for Market Research panel, knowledge partners were Pine Labs and Caters Point.

In the HR domain, HR Conclave 6.0, the flagship event of HR Direction club of MDI Gurgaon, with the theme Resilient HR: Rewind. Rejuvenate. Reposition was organized in a virtual setup on 12th and 13th of December, 2020 and attracted participation from all over the students’ community and industry experts.

The conclave saw an insightful panel discussions by industry stalwarts like Dr. GP Rao (Founder and Managing Partner, Goof People Relations), Bhavna Batra (Managing Director, Managing Consulting – PwC), Budaraju Sudhakar (Joint President – HR, Adani Group), Prem Singh (President, HR Group, JK Organization), Dr. Sanjeev Dixit (Global President – Human Capital Management, Cadila Pharmaceutical Limited), V K Singh (Director HR, Power Grid Corporate of India Ltd) moderated by Prof. Jyotsna Bhatnagar (Dean – Graduate Programmes and Chair PGP-HRM, MDI Gurgaon), who played a vital role throughout the event.

Prof. Shailendra K. Rai, Chairperson – Students Affairs appreciating the efforts put in by the students said, ” I feel it was a great learning experience for the students. The event provided a platform to interact with the industry stalwarts. From planning to attending, the experience helped students to gain insights on leadership, creativity, innovation and strategy. ‘Delphique’ provided an opportunity for the exchange of ideas among the brightest minds in the country”.

This year, the theme for ‘Delphique 2020’ valedictory panel discussion was “Indian Economy Post COVID: Steps Taken by the Government and the way ahead”. To discuss the same, MDI Gurgaon invited Mr. Rabi Mirsa, Former Executive Director of Reserve Bank of India; Mr. Gurbachan Singh, Professor from Indian Statistical Institute; Professor Gourav Vallabh from XLRI, Jamshedpur and National Spokesperson of INC; and Professor, Arun Kumar from Institute of Social Sciences to share their insights on the ‘ways forward’ to mitigate the repercussions of the global pandemic.

The valedictory panel emphasized the impact of Covid 19 along with discussion on the policies introduced and what next can be done. The panel was insightful for the budding managers as they witnessed viewpoints of industry experts on the measures taken and how to be prepared for similar challenges in future.