PGDBM Class of 2008 creates The League of Millionaires
February 20-21, 2008

The PGDBM class of 2008 created a record of sorts, with almost every participant getting that dream job within hours of Day 0, as the placements kicked off in February this year. Notwithstanding the record salaries received, the PGDBM participants attracted some of the most coveted job profiles in the industry, many of which were offered for the first time. The placement season also attracted some of the most renowned international firms, which recruit only from the best business schools in the world.

Signing off with new, exciting profiles and ever-burgeoning salary packages, the class of 2008 accentuated the trend that has been seen at SPJIMR for many years. New, diverse profiles kept pouring in and more than 95% of the class signed-off as millionaires. The placement season culminated in an increase of 25% in the average salary offered to a participant, which stood at Rs. 13.96 lakhs. The highest domestic offer stood at Rs. 24 lakhs while the highest international offer increased to USD 70,000. For the batch of 89 participants, 96 different companies took part in the placement process, offering as many as 258 jobs. Besides these, 45 participants were given preplacement offers.

The process concluded with the participants being offered their dream profiles in large Indian and foreign firms in sectors such as Consultancy, Banking, Information Technology, Investment Banking, FMCG, Private Equity, Manufacturing, Healthcare and Pharmaceuticals, Telecom and Media.

Companies participating in the process for the first time included McKinsey & Company (Corporate Finance), Bharti Group, Cummins, Ranbaxy, M&M Corporate Strategy Group, Principal AMC, Barclays, Aricent, J&J Pharma, ING IM, Swiss Re, GE Healthcare, Suzlon, GSK Pharma, Tata Capital, Reliance Group, Virgin Mobile, Heinz and many others.

The consulting bandwagon was led by McKinsey & Company which recruited two students from SPJIMR. This was out of a total of five students recruited on their Batch Day from across India's premier b-schools. Other consulting companies on campus included Accenture Business Consulting, TSMG, PWC (Performance Improvement Team), E&Y (Business Advisory Services), Deloitte etc.

This placement season also saw some of the premier investment banks like JM Financial, Enam Securities, Deutsche Equities; banks like Barclays, ABN-AMRO, HSBC, Standard Chartered, and financial institutions like GE Commercial Finance, IDFC, SEBI recruit candidates from SPJIMR. Marketing profiles were offered across various sectors in companies like P&G, HUL, Marico, Cadburys, Nestle, Intel, Microsoft, J&J, Motorola, HT Media and several others.

General Management profiles were offered by Tata Administrative Services, Aditya Birla Group and Reliance Group. The operations domain saw companies like GSK, Cummins, Miebach Consulting, ITW, ECS, and Bristlecone among many others. IT companies like Capgemini, CTS, Wipro, HCL Technologies, IBM and Oracle among others offered exciting profiles in IT consulting, business development etc.

Over half the batch had preplacement offers and pre placement interviews from their Autumns internships, an indication of the confidence of the corporate sector in the high quality of work demonstrated by SPJIMR participants. These internships were undertaken in much sought after companies like P&G, HUL, Citibank, Sabre Capital, Edelweiss, Pentland Brands (London), Development Bank of Singapore, etc.

The placement season saw an average of two offers of more than Rs. 10 lakhs for each student. Along with the compensation packages offered, companies also carved out specific roles to meet the interests of the participants. One candidate opted out of the placement process to start his own venture, taking advantage of the new institute rules, which allow candidates to opt out of the placement process to pursue entrepreneurial interests, while retaining the option to participate in the process for the next 2 years. The placement process was a fitting finale to the PGDBM programme, which aims at promoting an inquiring and analytical mind , proactively seeking knowledge, acquiring appropriate skills and promoting the right attitude to develop capabilities needed to manage enterprises in the 21st century.