ALARD Group of Institutes Conducted their National Seminar on Saturday 14Th Febuauary 2009.
On
INNOVATION-KEY TO BUSINESS SUCCESS
At
HOTEL ORCHID, BALEWADI.

Alard National Seminar ‘Innovation: Key to Business Success’ was attended by about 400 plus students and about 100 guests that includes Industrialists, Invited guests and other registered delegates.

The Keynote Speaker of the inaugural session, MR. HITESH OBEROI (Director & Chief Operating Officer of Info Edge (India) Ltd. (Naukri.com Group), Delhi) shared the success story of Naukri.com. Sharing examples he emphasized on how his organization treats Customers, Sales force, Competitors (direct, indirect), Conferences, Vendors , Suppliers, Partners and Employees as sources of innovative ideas.

He also shared that how the innovation used for sales helped company to grow from 30 lakhs to 270 crore business. He shared how the company stepped-up from Direct Selling to Online Sales/ Payment, Field Sales force Setup, Telesales team, Walk in sales Channel, Retail outlet and finally to Inbound & outbound Customer service.
 

2nd Session. (Midday Session.)

Topic of the Session- Marketing Innovations- Cross-cultural Brand Communications

PROF. ATUL TANDON (Director, Mudra Institute of Communication, Ahmedabad (MICA))
While sharing some wonderful examples of innovation in communication by brands like Coca Cola, Rexona, Nokia etc, he emphasized :

· Innovation can be divided as Continuous, incremental improvement in the way of doing things.
· Life is an alternate series of Choices & Crisis which helps in making Innovation.
· Never underestimate the importance of local knowledge as in culture rituals beliefs. He gave example of HSBC ad campaign to emphasis on this point.
· Marketing is all about bringing Behavioral Changes.

PROCESS FOLLOWED BY MART.

· Research- Qualitative & Quantitative
· Strategy- Awareness, Availability, Affordability, Accessibility, Acceptance.
· Pilots- 1 districts each in 3 representative States.
· Scale up- Strategy & Implementation.

MR. JAISURYADAS. (Managing Director, Xanadu Consulting Group, Pune) said that Innovation is an Activity of Neurons in the mind, when these neurons get activated, captured or when some activity or an idea creates an impact on them then the idea or concept becomes successful, As it creates an impact in the mind or customers.

3rd Session (Post Lunch session).

Topic of the Session - Media Innovations- Key Drivers and Innovations in PR.

MANISH PORWAL (The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Percept Talent Management (Division of Percept Ltd. Co.), Mumbai) said that

· Today the Scarcest Resource is no longer Men, money, Machinery, Information but is the ATTENTION of people.
· Attention is Media Neutral, but is Media lead.
· Innovation: is thinking and acting out of box. For thinking Out of box one should be aware of what is there in the box i.e. usual things- we can think of many options within the box too.

LEARNINGS from his experience:
· Narrower the space higher/ more unboxing of ideas can be done, what limits us is just our ability to Unbox.
· We are in the Solutions & not the Service Industry.
· Ideas belong to the people who execute them.
· New 4 A’s of Marketing – Association, Affinity, Availability, Ascertainity.
· Customer is in complete control of media & media is having remote control in both hands.

He shared how they fine tuned the media-mix for the client Western Union to reach out to the villages/towns/cities indulging more in money transfers. The activity raised the business of Western Union in North India immediately by 25%.

ARIJIT SENGUPTA (President, Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, Mumbai.)
· He emphasized the roles of different marketing companies and building an image for the clients.
· He talked about how an ad can change the future of the company, example western union money transfer.
· He shared cases of deal of Jaguar.
· He emphasized as how PR can change and create a new brand for the company.
· Media is all about Inventory Management.
· Inventory to him means Celebrities.
· He also shared how Celebrities Create an Image in minds of the customer.
· According to him Management is Building Connections.

4Th Session (Evening Session)

Topic for the session - Innovation in Technology & its Impact on Brands.

MR. MURUGAVEL JANKIRAMAN (Founder & Chief Executive Officer of Consim Info (BharatMatrimony.com Group), Chennai). Give great credit to Innovation he shared the success story of BharatMatrimony.com. The company was first to introduce features like Verification of profiles, testimonials, reference checks etc

He gave emphasis on:
· Incremental Innovation
· Value Innovation
· Quality Innovation.

Innovation requires Passion within oneself to bring about it. This will lead Him to Success.

Today Companies like Google, Apple are Success Stories because of consistent Innovation.

Mr. M. Jankiraman Said that it is his Idea of people getting married with his Innovation we Have Today Bharatmatrimony, due to which an individual can find his love as per his choice and not only that we now have a Channel for Bharatmatrimony.tv today due to Innovation.

Valedictory Address : MR JAMSHED KHURSIGARA (Head HR & IR, Tata Motors)

In his short and impactful address Mr. Khursigara shared that Innovation is Not Only Restricted to the top management but should come from all the members of the company.

Sharing innovative practices by HR Department in Tata Motors, he stated that Not Only the Person Working in the organization feels safe but also His family. Tata Motors which stands for Reliability, has not only made the company reliable for its product but also made the employees reliable in the hard phase of job cuts today.

Summary:

A Brief MESSAGE THE SPEAKERS LEFT BEHIND:

· MR. HITESH OBEROI. - INNOVATION refers to figure out a way to do things in a better way than they have been done before. Necessity is the mother of all Inventions.
· PROF. ATUL TANDON – Life is an alternate series of Choices & Crisis which helps in making Innovation.
· MR. JAISURYADAS. - Innovation is an Activity of Neurons in the mind.
· MANISH PORWAL – Innovation is thinking and acting out of box.
· ARJIT SENGUPTA – Innovations in Public relations which have lead to a present Changed scenario and created a brand for the companies.
· MR. MURUGAVEL JANKIRAMAN- Innovation requires Passion within oneself to bring about it.
· MR JAMSHED KHURSIGARA- Innovation is Not Only Restricted to the Directors but all the members of the company. (HR DEPARTMENT)