Great Lakes Institute of Management honours Successful Women in Management at SWIM 2009

Theme of the event “Women at the top: Breaking the Glass Ceiling”

India, Chennai, August 26, 2009: Great Lakes Institute of Management, one of the leading management institutes in the country, founded by Prof. Bala V Balachandran, honoured successful women in management at the SWIM 2009 event. Successful Women in Management (SWIM) is an initiative by the students of Great Lakes to empower women with the required traits to assume leadership roles in the corporate and social spheres.

The day-long event organised by Great Lakes Institute of Management was presided by the chief guest, Dr. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Chairman & Managing Director, Biocon Limited and Special Guest of the day was R. Radhikaa, Creative Director, Radaan Mediaworks (I) Limited, enlightened the audience on the theme of the event “Women at the top: Breaking the Glass Ceiling”. The distinguished guests discussed at length about the success, women had achieved in the field of management and aspired to achieve greater heights.

SWIM (Successful Women In Management), an initiative by the students of Great Lakes Institute of Management, is organized to identify and bring together the women achievers of the corporate world to inspire and facilitate learning among the students. It aims to showcase the leadership qualities of women and provide encouragement to other women. An exclusive SWIM event gives the audience an opportunity to interact with and gain insight from eminent women in their respective fields. It not only facilitates personal and professional development of students but also ensures that the future leaders from Great Lakes recognize the influence and importance of women in the corporate world and hence relinquish any prejudices that they might have had earlier.

Other guest of honours who participated were Chandra Iyengar, IAS, Additional Chief Secretary, Govt. of Maharashtra; Renuka Krishna, VP-HR, KPIT Cummins; Sujata Tyagi, Director- HR, L’Oreal India; Niharika Davar, Sr. Director – HR, DHL; Dev Deepika, Director-HR, Avendis Capital; Baagyalakshmi N, Director Sales South, OOH Media and Kami Narayan, Co-CEO, Premedia Global.

Speaking on the occasion, Prof. Bala V. Balachandran said, “The world is increasingly witnessing women climbing the organizational ladder and assuming leadership positions. As an institute that pioneered the concept of celebrating successful women in managerial leadership positions, this development is very heartening. We at Great Lakes believe that more women in leadership positions will make organizations humane and ethical.”

The event also witnessed two panel discussions on the topics “Diversity in Profile – A key contributor to success?” and “The 3 Es to the top – Education, Exposure and Experience”.

The first panel discussion was on the topic “Diversity in Profile – A key contributor to success?” was moderated by Lalitha Maheshwaran and the panel included Amberin Memon, VP, Global Head Insurance Vertical, Hexaware Technologies Limited; Priya Srinivasan, Founder Priya Srinivasan CPA & Asst General Manager, Sundaram Business Services and Sowmya Haran, Director, Alchemy Urban Systems Pvt Ltd.

The second panel discussion on the topic “The 3 Es to the top – Education, Exposure and Experience” was moderated by T.N.Seshan, former Chief Election Commissioner of India. The panel included Soundarya Rajesh, Founder-President, AVTAR career creators; Nishta Shukla, Founder, Pen Pundit (Consulting Editorial Firm) and Kalpana Anantaraman, CEO of Avion.

Since its inception in the year 2005, SWIM has seen the esteemed presence of eminent women such as Kiran Bedi, Kanimozhi Karunanidhi, Anu Aga, Padmashri Sudha Raghunathan, Mridula Mahesh, Rajshree Pathy and Hemu Ramaiah among others.

During the event, the SWIM magazine which tried to capture the thoughts of these remarkable women in a few pages that can provide inspiration to the students and also to the corporate world was also launched.

Photo Caption:

Great Lakes – SWIM 2009 – PIC 1 – (From the left) R. Radika, Creative Director, Radaan Mediaworks; Prof. Bala V Balachandran, Founder and Honorary Dean of Great Lakes Institute of Management and Dr. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw launching the SWIM2009 magazine at Great Lakes

Great Lakes – SWIM 2009 – PIC 2 – (From the left) Dr. Krishna Ram, Director – Placement, GLIM; R. Radika, Creative Director, Radaan Mediaworks; Prof. Bala V Balachandran, Founder and Honorary Dean of Great Lakes Institute of Management; Dr. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw and Prof. S. Sriram, Executive Director, GLIM launching the SWIM2009 magazine at Great Lakes

Great Lakes – SWIM 2009 – PIC 3 – R. Radika, Creative Director, Radaan Mediaworks addressing the audience at Great Lakes Institute of Management’s SWIM 2009 event

About Great Lakes Institute of Management:

Great Lakes Institute of Management is one of Chennai’s finest management Institutes, founded by Prof. Bala V. Balachandran of Kellogg School of Management. He established the institute with a dream of setting up an international class Business School in Chennai. Great Lakes Institute of Management has been bringing the best brains in the world of management to India with an objective to provide world-class management education. Great Lakes have tie-ups with eminent universities of international repute. One such initiative is Yale-Great Lakes Center for Management Research, started in partnership with Yale University of USA. This center aims to promote, facilitate and advance India-centric management related research, which contributes, to the development of basic and applied knowledge in the field of management. The centre will be a bridge that links scholars around the globe with India as a common interest.