Boston

A Report on the IIT Bombay Heritage Fund Event in Boston

by Dwarika Agarwal _______________________________________________________________

A group of IIT Bombay alumni and their friends held a very successful meeting at the Marriott in Burlington, MA on September 26, 1999. Kishore Deshpande was in charge of organizing this event and about 35 people attended it. Other members of the team included Anil Kharkar, Suhas Joglekar, Jawa Tembulkar, Amit Jain and D.P. Agarwal.

This was one of the four meetings in the last three months, which have been organized by the alumni/alumnae from different IITs to honor the Directors and the Professors from their respective Institutes. All four delegations had very similar messages. They gave the current status of their IITs and provided their vision for the future. They also emphasized the need to improve communications with the alumni around the world and felt that the IITSINE approach of an all IIT Alumni Association is appropriate for most of the alumni gatherings. IITSINE (http://www.iitsine.org) was organized in 1991-1992 time period and it stands for Indian Institutes of Technology - Society In New England. Canada has a similar organization and recently a similar group has been started in Houston. It is called IIT Forum. The IIT Bombay alumni present at the meeting also felt that it would be much easier to achieve a critical mass with a combined group and a much more orchestrated effort could be launched from different IITs.

The IIT Bombay delegation included Director Sukhatme and Prof. S.L. Narayanamurthy, Dean of Resource Development. Prof. Narayanamurthy joined us in Boston on September 26 and the same day Director Sukhatme was talking to the Alumni in the Chicago area. In addition to a presentation by Dean Narayanamurthy, we had a Keynote Address by Prof. Amar Bhide. Amar is an Associate Professor at Harvard Business School. The title of his talk was "The Origin and Evolution of New Businesses". He has just finished writing a book with the same title. Both of the presentations were very well received. The core group was also very interested in getting alumni feedback and therefore, the first segment of the meeting was devoted to a discussion on their expectations and frustrations about alumni 'Networking' meetings. A summary of these discussions is given below. It was prepared by Jawa Tembulkar. We also had a small segment on 'Down Memory Lane' and T-shirts with IIT Bombay logo were available for $10.00 each.

What will excite/enthuse folks?

• Networking was the most popular. It included the following sorts of interaction:
  1. Professional networking to enable career development, including recruitment and jobs.
  2. Discuss experiences with new businesses, finding venture capital, etc. TIE was brought up by those who are also members of that group.
• Identify mutually beneficially ways (other than monetary donation) for alumni and the alma mater. Collaborative R&D and projects to IIT faculty.
• Be informed about What's New at IIT-B. New programs, future plans, goals for expansion, spending patterns, opportunities, etc.
• Foster social networking among alumni and their families.
• Host guest speakers who are eminent in their fields.
• Provide feedback to alumni on how the Heritage fund donations are being utilized. Basically demonstrate accountability.
• Have a Newsletter that keeps member alumni abreast of what happened in the last meeting, changes in membership, etc.

What will turn off folks?

• If the meetings are only focused on fund raising. Basically avoid aggressive fund raising.
• If there is no follow through on decisions that we collectively take.
• Ensure that donor information (e.g. email) is kept private. Donors
  don't wish to get bombarded by hostel, department, etc., for
  donations, once they make a donation to the Heritage Fund.
• Ensure that no "clique/group" emerges to run the alumni
  association. I read in this, that we should try and get as wide a
  representation as possible among the organizers - year of
  graduation, where one is from in India, department, profession,
  etc.
• Should not become merely a social club.