• Home
• /
• Education

The man behind Dubai's youngest Business School

Dubai - Nitish Jain replies to 200 emails a day on his phone. And he's out of India 20 days a month travelling to 3 countries where his B-Schools have campuses.

Nitish Jain replies to 200 emails a day on his phone. And he's out of India 20 days a month travelling to three countries where his B-Schools have campuses.
"It is an intense job, yes," says Jain, President of S P Jain School of Global Management. (The emails have to be replied to even when he is on vacation. This takes "at least 4 hours a day").
Jain was in Dubai earlier in the week to preside over a celebratory event at the Oberoi Hotel. His B-School was recently ranked in the Top 100 by The Economist in its 2015 MBA rankings. The Financial Times and Forbes, too, have ranked SP Jain on their lists.
It was party time also, since the B-School - known as SP Jain - is the youngest and only business school from Dubai on the list. He says, "We get all these rankings because of our innovation."
Travel hacks
How does he deal with all the airline food, given how much he travels? "I am very disciplined," Jain says, "I eat my meals before getting on to the flight." And then sleeps undisturbed till landing time, earplugs and eye masks on. (He's a fan of Modern Japanese, and the best Indian food he's had is in Sydney at 'Urban Tarka').
What about the jet lag? "In a way, I'm always jet lagged," he smiles. "But it's been so long, I've learnt to manage it". He generously allows a glimpse into his mind, when he says, "Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and I'm not sure where I am." It's a demanding routine. Jain now for several years has spent 20 days a month travelling from Mumbai (home) to the globas campuses of his Singapore, Dubai and Sydney.
MBAs then and now
Jain completed his own MBA back in 1985 (83-85) from Cornell University in the US. "I did my MBA when there was no Internet. It was a very different time. And MBA programmes have evolved hugely since then."
How is an MBA at SP Jain any different from an MBA at several other highly-ranked institutions? "Most colleges, " he says, "offer very structured, very rhythmic courses." But that is unlike that real world. "The real world of business," Jain says, "has very long hours and then a lull period, so the students need to be prepared for that." He spoke also about how most well ranked B-schools offer "reasonably good classroom learning" but perhaps not enough exposure. "How you do business in China is very different from how you do business in the US."
With it's global campuses, Jain says their B-school plugs that gap, as students get to learn about the business practices, consumer behaviour, and cultural-political trends at in three prime business environments: Dubai, Singapore, Sydney, and home turf - Mumbai.
The 10 % tip
"Be prepared for meetings, and make a good contribution," is advice Jain would give to youngsters, and not just to management students, but to those who might never be able to afford an expensive B-School programme, or even want to. "Go the extra mile, a little beyond your job description, even an extra 10 per cent," he says.
Apart from that, he said something his author-wife, Bapsy Jain -- (she's written, among other novels, a lovely book called 'The Blind Pilgrim) -- would be happy to endorse: "Read anything, read everything. 18-year-olds today don't read."
Read the newspapers, read books, you have to remain well-informed, Jain said.
"I read a lot of papers," he says. Books are read in paper form, but with newspapers, like much of the world, he's 'gone digital'. How else does one read the news from Singapore, from Dubai, New York, Sydney. In fact the book he's currently reading, fittingly enough, is one by Joan Magretta and Nan Stone: What Management Is: How It Works and Why It's Everyone's Business.
nivriti@khaleejtimes.com