Podcasts

Past Imperfect Episode 12: Taylor Sherman on the myths of Nehru’s India

How much of history is mythmaking? In this episode, Taylor Sherman, author of Nehru’s India: A History in Seven Myths, tackles some shibboleths of India’s first seventeen years of independence. How nonaligned was nonalignment? Could socialist policies actually widen socioeconomic disparities? Was Nehru really the architect of modern India? The answers, Sherman discovers, are far more messy and complex than we imagine.

Sapience Episode 7: Transforming business and leadership

This edition features Prof. Surya Tahora in conversation with Prof. Chris Laszlo, Department of Organizational Behavior, Weatherhead School of Management. In this engaging discussion, Prof. Laszlo reflects on the evolving role of business in society, emphasising the integration of ethical behaviour, market forces, and individual transformation. Explore the importance of personal practices and experiences in driving transformative change, drawing parallels with wisdom traditions that recognise the interconnectedness of self, others, and the world.

Tune in to the latest episode of the podcast series Sapience presented by SPJIMR Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

The inner side of leadership and coaching with Payal Nanjiani

Join Prof. Sushmita Srivastava in this engaging conversation with Executive Coach and Leadership Expert Payal Nanjiani. They discuss the impact of coaching in unlocking the full potential of an individual. With a rich experience of over a decade, Payal shares insights and anecdotes from her enriching journey and key takeaways for emerging business leaders. Tune in to this latest episode to know more!

Sapience Episode 8: Is Arthashastra Relevant in Modern Times?

Prof. Surya Tahora is in conversation with renowned Leadership Advisor Rajesh Kamath. Mr. Kamath is a Keynote Speaker, Storyteller, Consultant, Facilitator, Columnist, Teacher, Coach and Lifelong learner. In this episode, he discusses elevating leadership and transforming organisations by adapting timeless principles from Indian wisdom, with a focus on the ancient Indian text Arthashastra.

The discussion touches on its historical context, authorship, and relevance to modern leadership. The conversation also explores specific tools and frameworks from the Arthashastra that can be applied in organisational contexts. Join us in the latest episode of Sapience to gain insights about implications and wisdom related to leadership. The series is presented by SPJIMR Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Past Imperfect Episode 11: Toward a free economy with Aditya Balasubramanian

SPJIMR Prof. Dinyar Patel is in conversation with Aditya Balasubramanian, Senior Lecturer in History at Australian National University

The Swatantra Party, established in 1959, briefly became India’s chief opposition party before disintegrating in the early 1970s. What explains its rise and fall? Aditya Balasubramanian’s Toward a Free Economy charts one of democratic India’s earliest experiments in viable opposition politics: how a diverse cast of political leaders articulated the need for an alternative to a dominant political party. Swatantra’s clarion call was for a “free economy,” one unshackled from the license-and-permit raj. But the party was equally concerned with unchecked political power, rising corruption, and the long-term health of India’s democracy.

Past Imperfect Episode 10: Ashok Gopal on the Life and Thought of B. R. Ambedkar

SPJIMR Prof. Dinyar Patel is in conversation with Ashok Gopal

In B. R. Ambedkar, India possessed a phenomenal intellectual powerhouse. Drawing on ideas and thinkers from the subcontinent and around the world, he stirred India’s conscience, pointing to the devastating legacies of caste and untouchability while raising urgent questions about the viability of democracy in India. Ambedkar’s ideas could be unsettling and uncomfortable—and that is precisely why he remains so relevant today. In A Part Apart, Ashok Gopal has written the definitive English-language biography of Ambedkar, the product of fifteen years of close research and study. Gopal’s book charts the evolution of Ambedkar’s career and thought, from his engagement with Hindu social reform to his embrace of Buddhism as a religion truly compatible with social. democracy.

Sustainable Futures Episode 2: Conservation of India’s Privately-owned Mangroves, by Godrej & Boyce

In our new episode of the  Podcast Series ‘Sustainable Futures’ Prabhat Pani, Executive Director, CISD, is in conversation with Anil G. Verma, Executive Director & CEO of Godrej & Boyce. In this thought-provoking podcast episode, we delve into the topic of India’s privately owned mangroves and the efforts to preserve them. Tune in now and be part of the conversation.  

Past Imperfect Episode 9: Radio Across Borders with Isabel Huacuja Alonso

SPJIMR Prof. Dinyar Patel is in conversation with Isabel Huacuja Alonso, Columbia University.

Before the internet and television, South Asia tuned in to the radio, and the radio helped South Asians forge a shared sense of belonging. Isabel Huacuja Alonso’s Radio for the Millions chronicles the history of broadcasting from the beginnings of All India Radio (AIR) in the 1930s to the heights of Radio Ceylon’s filmi music-powered popularity from the 1950s through the 1970s. Governments tried to use radio to project state power, but listeners regularly used their sets and transistors as tools of defiance or resistance. This was particularly the case after 1947 when film songs and Hindustani broadcasting helped bring together people divided by Partition.

Past Imperfect Episode 8: The World of Sugar with Ulbe Bosma

SPJIMR Prof. Dinyar Patel is in conversation with Ulbe Bosma, International Institute of Social History and Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

What can sugar teach us about global history? Plenty, as Ulbe Bosma demonstrates in his new book. “The World of Sugar” is a sweeping narrative of how sugar emerged from India and China to conquer the world: generating both enormous riches and endemic poverty, powered by sophisticated networks of capital and technology as well as brutal labour regimes. Bosma examines how the human penchant for sweetness has shaped politics and economics for centuries, laying the foundations for modern capitalism and globalisation.

The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Past Imperfect Episode 7: Vinayak Chaturvedi on Savarkar’s Reading of History

In the latest episode of Past Imperfect, SPJIMR Prof. Dinyar Patel discusses with Prof. Vinayak Chaturvedi, University of California, Irvine, the role of history in shaping Hindutva, including the ideas of V.D. Savarkar. Chaturvedi’s work engages with Savarkar’s ideas and perspectives, which may be viewed as innovative, controversial, or challenging. The podcast highlights the significant role of history in shaping the concept of Hindutva, and Savarkar’s insights into the account provide context for understanding this ideology.

The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Beyond the Bottomline Episode 1: Is India ready for CBDC?

Join us for our new podcast series, Beyond the Bottomline, where SPJIMR’s Prof. Varun Yadav discusses India’s readiness for Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) and their impact on the digital economy, securities and contingencies, and technology and design choices.

Technological advancements have enabled the creation of a new form of money, the CBDC. CBDC is the digital version of a country’s fiat currency, issued and backed by the RBI. India has a well-developed digital payments ecosystem, but CBDC requires significant infrastructure upgrades to ensure secure and efficient digital transactions. This podcast discusses potential opportunities and challenges before India fully adopts CBDC and adds to the ongoing debate among policymakers, experts, and stakeholders.

The series is produced by SPJIMR’s Centre for Financial Innovation.

Sapience Episode 6: The Wisdom Researchers and the Elephant; An Integrative Model of Wise Behavior

Prof. Surya Tahora is in conversation with Prof. Judith Gluck, University of Klagenfurt, Austria. Prof. Gluck offers an insightful perspective on the different approaches to wisdom in the field of research, drawing parallels to the well-known fable of the blind men and the elephant. Listen in as she shares her journey towards developing a unified model of wisdom and its various interpretations. Join us for a thought-provoking and informative conversation on the latest episode of Sapience. The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Sustainable Futures, Episode 1: Tata Coffee’s Sustainable Journey

Very few corporates worldwide can claim to sequester ten times the carbon they generate in their operations. From zero depletion of groundwater in their operations, mitigating human-elephant conflict to digitally tagging its coffee bushes and scientifically assessing climate change for itself and the coffee-growing community, Tata Coffee has walked the talk on corporate sustainability. In the first episode, Mr Chacko Thomas, MD and CEO of Tata Coffee, in conversation with Prabhat Pani, Executive Director, SPJIMR Centre for Innovation in Sustainable Development (CISD), discusses how Tata Coffee has raised the bar on sustainability initiatives by corporates. The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Innovation in Sustainable Development (CISD).

Sapience Episode 5: Linking Wise Organizations to Wise Leadership, Job Satisfaction and Well-Being

In our latest episode of Sapience, SPJIMR Prof Surya Tahora is in conversation with Prof Monica Ardelt, University of Florida. Monica Ardelt takes us on a journey into the heart of wise organisations. Drawing from her Three-Dimensional Wisdom model, she breaks down the components of a wise organisation, from leadership and decision-making to the sharing of profits. She also explains why wise organisations are the way of the future and how they can create a better, more sustainable world for future generations.

The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Sapience Episode 4: The Science of Wisdom in a Polarized World: Knowns and Unknowns

Faculty member Surya Tahora is in conversation with Howard Nusbaum, University of Chicago. They discuss how, despite its long history, there is still much to learn about wisdom and how it can be applied in the real world. They also scrutinise how wisdom researchers from various disciplines and backgrounds can collaborate to identify commonalities in their theories and develop a more comprehensive understanding of wisdom. This understanding can then be used to assist people in making wiser decisions that consider the impact of their actions on others.

Past Imperfect Episode 6: Priya Atwal on Women Power in the Sikh Empire

Priya Atwal, Author and Professor at the University of Oxford, is in conversation with SPJIMR faculty Dinyar Patel. Women’s voices are absent from so much of South Asian history. In “Royals and Rebels,” Priya Atwal recovers the remarkable roles that royal women played in the affairs of the Sikh Empire (1799-1849). Ranjit Singh might have been the Sher-e-Punjab, but Atwal demonstrates that his empire owed much of its success to female power.

Sapience Episode 3: Application of wisdom research to organisations, leadership, and qualitative research methods

Faculty member Dr Surya Tahora is in conversation with Dr David Rooney, Macquarie University. They discuss if there is a way to overcome the existential threat that young executives feel and what wisdom practices they can adopt. The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Past Imperfect Episode 5: Bombay Imagined with Robert Stephens

The architect Charles Correa once described Bombay/Mumbai as a great city but a terrible place. In ‘Bombay Imagined,’ Robert Stephens, an American-born architect at RMA Architects, chronicles several centuries of unfulfilled plans to make the city both greater and less terrible. ‘Bombay Imagined’ demonstrates that smelly sewage, awful infrastructure, paltry open space, and inadequate housing are not simply modern problems: Bombay citizens have established a long tradition of devising plans to mediate these perennial headaches, unfortunately with limited success.

Sapience Episode 2: Advancing the science of wise reasoning in management

They discuss why despite extensive work on wisdom research it is yet to percolate to the Organisations. They also talk about how ‘wise reasoning’ can benefit organisations where intelligence, emotional intelligence and cognitive ability fail. The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Past Imperfect Episode 4: The Global Business World of the Sassoons with Joseph Sassoon

Author and Professor, Georgetown University, Dr Joseph Sassoon, is in conversation with SPJIMR Prof. Dinyar Patel. Joseph Sassoon’s ‘The Global Merchants’ charts the meteoric rise and calamitous collapse of the Sassoon family, Jewish refugees from Baghdad who built a world-spanning business empire out of Bombay, London, and Shanghai. Sassoon’s book is full of fascinating characters: opium traders, horse racing aficionados who rubbed shoulders with British royalty, and perhaps the first woman to lead a global commercial enterprise.

Sapience Episode 1: Developing Leaders to Perform in Uncertainty; The Mindfulness Solution

In our new podcast series, ‘Sapience’, Faculty member Dr Surya Tahora is in conversation with leadership Development Advisor Dr Elizabeth King

They dive into the many aspects of mindfulness; does the evidence match the hype, and can we distinguish between mindfulness’s peripheral and deeper side? They discuss the implications for organisations, what goes on in senior leadership rooms, and do those decisions serve the greater good.

The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL).

Past Imperfect Episode 2: Thinking about Constitutions with Linda Colley

Linda Colley’s ‘The Gun, the Ship, and the Pen’ is a wide-ranging exploration of the development of constitutions, a book which demonstrates how increasingly violent warfare led to the worldwide spread of these documents between the 18th and early 20th centuries. In this episode, Colley discusses global influences on Indian constitutional thought, the relevance of constitutions today, and why historians need to write accessible books.

“Past Imperfect,” explores leadership from a historical perspective while bridging the past and present. The series is brought to you by SPJIMR’s Centre for Wisdom in Leadership (CWIL) and features conversations with authors of recent works of global and Indian history and explores political and economic leadership in unusual or unconventional situations.

Past Imperfect Episode 3: A Man and a (Five-Year) Plan with Nikhil Menon

“In ‘Planning Democracy’ Nikhil Menon takes us to the summit of Nehruvian planning in the 1950s and 1960s—and what we find there might surprise us. The story of India’s first Five-Year Plans involved a genius professor, Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis; deft Cold War diplomacy; and the introduction of India’s first computers. But it was also about so much more: an attempt to make planning ‘democratic,’ a project which involved rural volunteers, Bollywood talent, and even sadhus.”

Continued Employee Engagement is a Vaccination Against Future Crisis.

Mr Suresh Narayanan, Nestle India Limited’s Chairman and Managing Director, talks about how it was his employees who helped the company survive the Maggi crisis in India, the importance of highly engaged employees in companies at all times and his conviction that well-run companies need to invest more in building a company culture than in CAPX.

Company culture fosters innovation.

In this episode of the podcast, Mr. Bharat Puri, Managing Director and CEO of Pidilite Industries Limited and SPJIMR Former Dean Dr. Ranjan Banerjee, talk about the links between an organization’s culture and its innovation capabilities, the importance of a leader listening to every last voice in a company and the role of an organization’s leadership in a crisis such as a pandemic.

The 3 Leadership Principles to Triumph over Crises.

Mr. Sanjiv Mehta, Chairman and Managing Director at Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL) in conversation with SPJIMR Executive-In-Residence, noted author and corporate advisor, Mr R Gopalakrishnan talks about how the Bhopal Gas Tragedy crisis turned him from a “boy to a man”, and how the experience helped him as a leader to navigate various other crises such as the Arab Spring in the MENA countries, the introduction of GST and Demonetization in India and the ongoing Covid19 Pandemic.

Don’t wait for the storm to blow away, instead learn to dance in the rain

Mr Deepak Iyer, President of Mondelez India talks to SPJIMR Professor Dr Ashita Aggarwal about why it is important for leaders to plan well in advance of a crisis, enable an innovative and growth mindset in organizations, remain invested in brands and employees during crises and how to take advantage of a Black Swan event such as a pandemic to retool the organization.

Young managers should learn about the difference between a papaya and a banyan tree

Mr. Amit Jain, Managing Director of L’Oreal in conversation with Dr. Tulsi Jayakumar, Professor of Economics and Chairperson of Family Managed Business at SPJIMR, reflects on a leadership journey that has seen him helm companies across industries – paint and chemicals, soft drinks, media, cosmetics – and made him a truly fungible leader.

Play your game as if there is room for only one

How did a talented cricketer, coached by none other than Ramakant Achrekar, start his entrepreneurial journey at the age of 23 and go on to become one of India’s most successful bankers?

Newspapers will always remain the most credible source of news

This episode of the podcast is a conversation between Mr. Partha Sinha, President at Bennett, Coleman & Company Limited (Times of India Group) and Prof. Vineeta Dwivedi, Head Digital Communications at SPJIMR.

Leader with an entrepreneurial spirit!

This episode of the podcast is a conversation between Padma Bhushan and Padma Vibhushan awardee Mr. A. M. Naik, Group Chairman of Larsen & Toubro (L&T) and Dr. Pallavi Mody, SPJIMR’s Professor of Economics.

The best marketing strategy in the world needs great execution!

Ms. Sangeeta Talwar, Managing Partner, Flyvision Consulting; a leader behind iconic brands like Maggi and Tata Tea is in conversation with SPJIMR’s Professor of Marketing and Head, Delhi Centre, Dr Ruppal Walia Sharma.

Vaccines and ‘power’ brands – Leadership in the pharma industry

Mr. Rajaram Narayanan, Managing Director & Country Chair of Sanofi in India is in conversation with Prof. Vineeta Dwivedi, Head Digital Communications at SPJIMR.

How do leaders make tough decisions?

Ms. Mansi Tripathy, Regional Vice President – Asia Pacific Middle East, Shell Lubricants is in conversation with Prof. Ratika Gore, Assistant Professor- Communications and Head – Alumni Relations, SPJIMR.

How Shaadi.com and Bigg Boss became success stories on Digital platforms!

Mr. Gourav Rakshit – Chief Operating Officer of Viacom18 Digital Ventures, is in conversation with Prof. Vineeta Dwivedi, Head – Digital Communications, SPJIMR.

Driving Value-Based Growth, the SPJIMR way

SPJIMR Dean Dr. Varun Nagaraj is in conversation with Mr. Sunil Lulla, media industry veteran and SPJIMR alum, class of 1984.

A successful career is based on successful relationships at home.

Ms. Megha Tata, Managing Director, South Asia – Discovery, Inc is in conversation with Prof. Ratika Gore, Assistant Professor – Communications and Head – Alumni Relations, SPJIMR.

“Life is like a Dashboard in a creative agency.”- Making brands that people love”

Mr. Dheeraj Sinha, CEO & Chief Strategy Officer, South Asia at Leo Burnett, Publicis Business & Publicis Health is in conversation with Prof. Vineeta Dwivedi, Head – Digital Communications, SPJIMR.

Past Imperfect: Episode 1

In a new SPJIMR podcast series, ‘Past Imperfect’ our Faculty member Dr Dinyar Patel is in conversation with Historian Dr Ramachandra Guha.