For Lokit Khatri, a final-year MBA student at MICA, participating in ITC’s Interrobang was an ecstatic feeling. He thinks the over 100-day grounding for him and his teammates during this campus engagement initiative gave them the opportunity to bridge the gap between theoretical understanding and practical implementation in the corporate world.

“ITC promotes entrepreneurship, wherein they want us to work like a start-up. We were not just working as a team, we were working like a start-up, wherein we were creating and curating ideas,” Khatri says, sharing his experience of the Kolkata-headquartered conglomerate’s flagship initiative, tailor-made for India’s premier business school students, that completed 14 seasons this year.

Case studies

More than 4,600 students across B-schools submitted over 550 business ideas in Interrobang this year.

Khatri and his teammates were offered the ‘Sunfeast Dark Fantasy’ brand as a marketing case study. “We were supposed to create a 360-degree marketing campaign for the brand,” he says.

After engaging campus sessions and case study presentations, Khatri and his three teammates from MICA became the national winners in the marketing category. Similarly, national winners were declared in two other categories — human resources and supply chain.

In the HR category, a four-member team from XLRI, Jamshedpur, was selected as national winner. Paridhi Dandwate of the XLRI team describes the programme as a great opportunity.

“We were supposed to develop a performance management system. And, it was a complex case study, but a very well stated one. The case was basically that we had to brainstorm and come up with research and some industrial benchmarking as to how to develop a competent performance management system,” Dandwate says, adding her team got support and encouragement from the senior management of ITC during the programme.

“The interaction with the ITC mentor was something that made us believe more than our end. It was very distinctly supportive,” she recounts.

Since its inception 13 years ago, ITC Interrobang, a unique and popular programme designed to foster collaboration between industry and academia, has generated over 50,000 innovative ideas, with many successfully implemented. Launched in 2011, Interrobang receives overwhelming response across campuses.

Amitav Mukherji, Head of Corporate Human Resources, ITC, told businessline, Interrobang is all about providing the brightest minds at India’s premier campuses the opportunity to engage with real-world business challenges. “Students have the added benefit of engaging with and hearing from ITC’s managers closely associated with these live cases, helping them appreciate the context and urging them to think outside the box,” Mukherji points out.

According to him, working in a team, applying their knowledge, discovering industry dynamics, deep diving into their functional areas while crafting business relevant solutions, and competing with the best are all aspects that make Interrobang such an appealing platform.

ITC is focused on building and enhancing its campus presence and directly engaging with the students across premier institutions. The goal of competition has always been to create a platform for students to apply their rich academic knowledge to real-world problems across domains such as marketing, supply chain and human resource management, explained through case studies from the numerous businesses of the diversified conglomerate.

Recruitment channel

Interrobang continues to be an important channel of recruitment for ITC.

The solutions offered by the students from the premier B-schools offer a huge opportunity for the company to identify some of the sharpest minds across the country. It encourages students to execute on-ground research and utilise their theoretical knowledge in creative ways, thus bringing forth students’ innovation, intelligence and hard work, which are key tenets of future corporate leaders.

Apart from participants, the competition has also allowed the company to engage with other batches of students, providing rich information to students, some of whom later join the company in various positions. Moreover, Interrobang leaves behind a lasting buzz on campus and online, garnering further interest and appreciation for ITC across the country, says a company spokesperson.

Way forward

Every year, Interrobang grows in terms of student engagement, solutions from students and reach through digital platforms. Going forward, it is keen on creating experiences that not only aptly capture industry challenges but also reflect pressing issues of the time. “We are keen on gaining a variety of fresh perspectives from students, especially through online interactions and producing content that resounds across campuses,” the spokesperson informs.

This year, national round finalists of Interrobang Season 14 got the chance to experience a session by B. Sumant, Executive Director, ITC. Sumant recounted his early years in the company through exciting and impactful stories from his on-ground research work in remote parts of the country.

“We are thrilled to see the overwhelming response to the 14th edition and ever since we have taken it national, we have seen a remarkable surge in participation intensity, solution quality and student enthusiasm, all of which have grown exponentially,” adds Mukherji.