‘STRATONOMICS’, the annual Business Conclave organized by CONSTRAT, the Consulting and Strategy Consortium of XIMB, took place at Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar on August 26, 2018, at 9 am. The theme for this year’s conclave was "Dynamics of strategy in a Technology and Data-Driven world".

Mr. Sanjay Agarwal (CFO, Tata Communications Payment Solutions Ltd.), Mr. Sayan Sen (Head-Data Labs, HDFC Life Data Labs), Mr. Shobhan Mahapatra (CIO, Birlasoft), Ms. Namrita Mahindro (Senior General Manager, Mahindra Group) were the speakers for the occasion. Prof. Amar KJR Nayak (NABARD chair, Professor in General and Strategic Management, XIMB) served as the moderator for the event.

Prof. Nayak started the discussion by noting that in current times, technology is at the heart of the competitive market and data is the support of it. Ms. Namrita Mahindro was the first speaker of the day. She started her address by quoting Charles Darwin that not the strongest or the sharpest, but those that adapt best will survive. She went on to stress how customer expectation is changing and how good experience is the benchmark for comparison between products, highlighted that digital masters outperform their peers in every single business metric. She focused on leveraging digital technology as the basis for business growth, future value creation, evolving ecosystems in an organization using platform technology.

The next speaker, Mr. Shobhan Mahapatra spoke on the topic of Dynamics of Strategy in today’s ‘Data-driven’ world. He explored the use of data sciences to answer the questions pertaining to the organization of how to increase productivity, which geography to target, which business model to adopt for the organizations to grow ‘profitably and sustainably’. He observed that every 3 years, data collected will double and this humongous amount of data will unveil the opportunity galore for businesses, saying ‘World is the market’. He also spoke about machine learning. He concluded by stressing how the third world war can be in cyberspace and how this impacts our present strategy.

Mr. Sayan Sen was the third speaker of the day. He noted that with the digital and data-driven transformation, the role of strategist has been rediscovered. He went to elaborate on the use of data led to innovation in the life insurance business. He elaborated on how to augment the data collected, how to ensure frictionless customer experience and risk management using digitalization and cloud-based service network. He highlighted the concept of facial underwriting and also spoke on predictive analysis using data technology across the customer lifecycle.

Read about XIMB Bhubaneswar

Mr. Sanjay Agarwal was the final speaker of the day. He began by noting how connectivity is the backbone of machine learning, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence and how the Indian market is reacting to it. He discussed using data analytics in capturing the behavioral shift in customers. He explored the definition of strategy and illustrated the flow of an organization’s vision to mission to goals and finally strategy and the use of all data in formulating the strategy. He observed that ‘Data and its analysis is the new oil’ for organizations.

The speeches were followed by an interactive Q&A session. Prof Nayak shared his insights and learnings with the audience. The event concluded with a vote of thanks proposed by Nagaraj RG, the coordinator of CONSTRAT. This conclave marked the launch of this year’s release of the annual magazine of CONSTRAT, “Strategist 2018”.

About XIMB

XIMB, a 30 years old business school of global repute is the Flagship School of Xavier University. Offering MBA in Business Management, Global Management, and Executive programs, XIMB strives to be a premier institute globally recognized for management education, training, research, and consulting that help builds a just and humane society. The Institute today has become widely recognized for its excellence in imparting management education. It is counted among the leading management institutions in the country.

About XUB

Xavier University, Bhubaneswar (XUB) was established in accordance with the Xavier University Act 2013 and was inaugurated on the 7th of July 2014. XUB is India’s first digital University and an institution of higher learning for imparting professional and technical education. It is a self-financing institution imparting professional and technical education. XUB has 9 Schools that offer world-class education in different fields. XIMB offers an MBA in Business Management, Global Management, and Executive programs. Xavier School of Human Resource Management offers the MBA-HRM program. MBA-RM is offered by the Xavier School of Rural Management, MBF- Master of Business Finance by Xavier School of Commerce, MBA-SM by Xavier School of Sustainability and MBA-UMG by Xavier Center of Urban Management and Governance. The Xavier School of Sustainability, Xavier School of Commerce, Xavier Center of Urban Management and Governance, Xavier School of Economics, Xavier School of Computer Science and Engineering, and the Xavier School of Communications offer different postgraduate and undergraduate programs.