IIM Bangalore’s Initiative Towards Women Entrepreneurship
Economic Empowerment is a vital part of encouraging Women Empowerment. The economic empowerment comes when the women participate in the economic nation building. With a grim ratio of women participation in the entrepreneurship, the vision of women empowerment is distant. IIM Bangalore has come up with an initiative to enhance the women participation in businesses and to promote the women entrepreneurship with financial support and mentorship.
An excellent management institute is the one which doesn’t just make a good manager, but also develops great entrepreneurial skills. IIM Bangalore is one of the top-notch management institutes which ranks at the 2nd position by the NIRF 2017 (National Institutional Ranking Framework) of the Ministry of Human Resource and Development, Government of India.
IIM Bangalore focuses on the research-based learning and lay particular emphasis on the entrepreneurial skill development. For that purpose, the institute also has the N S Raghavan Centre for Entrepreneurial Learning (NSRCEL) which is dedicated entirely for the purpose of entrepreneurial skill development and researches.
According to the sixth economic census survey, only 13.76% women entrepreneurs are there among all which constitutes 8.05 million women out of 58.5 million entrepreneurs. It is a lamenting figure concerning the efforts being put in the direction of the women empowerment. To bridge this gap, the N S Raghavan Centre for the Entrepreneurial Learning has launched the nationwide “Women Startup Programme”. The programme is the Goldman Sachs who is a well known Global Investment Bank and has been an active investor in India in various sectors. The programme is also supported by the Department of Science and Technology of the Government of India.
The Women Startup Programme of the IIM Bangalore is considered as the first customized and classroom initiative in India that will immensely help the women entrepreneurs to enhance the requisite managerial and entrepreneurial skills that can cater the market needs. Under WSP programme, women will be provided with the incubation, mentoring and financial support. With the support of the renowned business management institution, the well known corporate giant and the Government of India, it is expected that the grim situation of the women entrepreneurs will be holistically revamped.
The WSP programme will include online training of the women entrepreneurs with a target of 12,000 aspiring women. Out of numerous businesses, 100 business ventures will be selected for the financial, incubation and mentor support. After that, the second step will involve the training of women entrepreneurs on developing the business plans, understanding pricing and costs and finally understand the sales and marketing techniques. Amid the whole process, women entrepreneurs will also get to interact with the IIM Bangalore faculties, professionals and experts of Goldman Sachs and the successful women entrepreneurs.
The idea of online mentorship is because it would be so easy for many women to participate otherwise the participation may get affected due to the problem of relocation. Some other partners also took an interest in supporting the WSP which includes IIM Udaipur, IIM Indore, IIM Visakhapatnam, CIIE’s Innocity and Presidency University Kolkata. This initiative will help to increase the number of women entrepreneurs as well as create jobs which will be healthy for the overall employability in the country.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shreyansh is a Writer for Collegesearch. A writer by day and reader by night he holds a keen interest when it comes to writing on education-related issues. He also writes on subjects ranging from National and International Issues to National Security and Economy.
