Toina N. Yeptho Sumi, Visiting Faculty – Department of Management
What exactly is Management about? Is it necessary only for large corporate companies? Is it required only for private enterprises or for businesses only? These are some thoughts that may cross the minds of many. However, we opine that these are only a part of the wide area of management. In this series of short papers, C-Edge College with the initiative of Management Department will draw out and illustrate the necessity and applications of management skills.
Business management is the process of developing the strategies, plans, procedures and policies that guide a business on both a day-to-day and long-term basis. It involves coordinating human, financial, marketing and material resources to achieve organizational objectives/goals. Business Management course is designed to enhance the students in the fast-paced global world of private and public organizations, coordinating teams and using resources efficiently, or perhaps establishing and running their own business. Business Management course aims to produce enterprising, employable graduates with the skills and problem-solving abilities to take an international perspective and to make a difference in business. Business Management course encourage and enable the students to think and act as a manager, develop their critical-thinking skills and build a broad knowledge of core business subject areas.
Business Management education has become so necessary for all types of business ranging from small businesses to large businesses. Management education involves teaching basic theories and processes to do a business. It is disheartening to find that in our state Nagaland, there are only few schools and colleges which provide business courses and with few numbers of enrollments of students. Now the question lies why business course is not so important or popular in our state: is it the parents who do not encourage their children to take up business courses or is it that the parents are not aware of this course or people feel that there is no scope for business graduate students in our state or our government doesn’t give importance to it etc.
It is important to know that to boost the economy of any state or country; it depends heavily on the businesses. Accordingly, to enhance the flow of economy in our state, we need enough industries and private companies and thus, to set up industries or factories, either we should be literate in business management basics or we need to hire business experts to guide the businesses. So far to my knowledge, there are more than 73 colleges under Nagaland University, out of which only 3 colleges provide management courses (School of Management Studies NU Dimapur, St. Joseph College Kohima and C Edge College Dimapur) and some few other institutions like ICFAI University, Sikkim Manipal University etc., And interestingly, around 44 colleges provide arts course, with very few that provides science and commerce courses. The questions underlying here is why business courses are not popular in Nagaland? Why do the parents don’t want their children to take up business management courses but rather they encourage their children to go for conventional subjects and for government jobs only? This is one of the main reasons why our state is facing serious unemployment problem. There has been increasing number of students who graduate from different streams. Consequently, we also see unemployment rate increasing each and every year. In the year 2015, approximately 14000 candidates have appeared NPSC exam just for 71 posts. If this trend keeps on continuing, the number of unemployed Naga youth will increase which will definitely affect our economy so also a rapid increase in the number of anti social elements and corruption. It is known that all these happen when we totally depend on government. Thus, instead of depending only on white collar job, we should establish our own businesses unit, where we can earn our living and at the same time provide job opportunity to others. Our society needs rampant growth of good entrepreneurs and business houses which will eventually lead to the overall development of the economy.
In Nagaland, we don’t have enough industries and MNCs, which clearly shows the kind of economy we have, viz. underdeveloped. Nagaland, especially Dimapur is one of the major business centers for northeast after Guwahati, and we have plenty of opportunities. But all these opportunities are untapped due to fewer numbers of graduates in the field of Business Management Studies. After obtaining work experiences, an advanced degree such as an MBA or BBA may help business professionals to advance in their job positions with more responsibility and higher pay. Some graduates may pursue further study in finance, human resources, marketing, international business or computing to develop their expertise in a business specialization. For instance, labor relations specialists can be promoted to human resources directors; department managers can become operations managers; management consultants can be promoted to chief financial officers. As a business management major, you could find yourself positioned for opportunities throughout your career up to the top level in an organisation.
Additionally, businesses play important role in wealth creations for shareholders, employees, customers and society at large. No other human activity matches private enterprise in its ability to marshal people, capital and innovation under controlled risk-taking. In order to create meaningful jobs and produce goods and services profitably – profit being essential to long-term business survival and job creation. The government, financial institutions (banking & non banking), NGOs, Societies group should recognize the genuine entrepreneurs and encourage them with financial support and subsidies. With increase of business centers, lots of development activities can happen in Nagaland and can create lots of avenues for our people. Development of industries and businesses will help to decrease unemployment rate, increase family income, improve in living standard, increase in government income, increase in CSR activities, good connectivity transport, good communication system, good hospitals, good educational institutions etc... The government should encourage educational institutions to offer the importance of business management courses as businesses make a huge contribution to economic and social development for any country.
