Principal Speak: Training techno managers to be industry ready

Prof Abhijeet Chirputkar, director, Symbiosis Institute of Digital and Telecom Management, a constituent of Symbiosis International (deemed university), is an MCom rank holder from the University of Pune and a Chartered Accountant. Before joining Symbiosis, he was a practicing Certified Information Systems Auditor. He is also a member of The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India and ISACA (USA). Here he traces the growth and development of what he says is “pioneering” educational endeavour.

 What makes Symbiosis Institute of Digital and Telecom Management a go-to institute?

Symbiosis Institute of Digital and Telecom Management believes in holistic student development and is a student-driven institute. We provide an experiential learning environment for the students via case studies. Our students are responsible for managing multiple events like TedX and international telecom seminars over the academic year. Students are also provided opportunities to participate in winter and summer schools with an institute in France. They are provided opportunities to get trained and certified in industry- leading international certifications like ISO and cyber security. Students are also provided opportunities for research like the annual telecom forecast, which are highly appreciated by the industry. 

What would you terms as the college’s USP?

The institute was a pioneer to start an innovative programme in telecom management. We started in 1996 and it was really a visionary step by chancellor SB Mujumdar. The curriculum is always updated considering the changes in technology as well as management. Over the last 23 years, we moved from core telecom to ICT management and also added specialisations like ‘analytics and finance’ to meet industry needs. We have now three specialisations - ‘systems and finance’, ‘marketing and finance’ and ‘analytics and finance’. 

Looking to the future, what major changes to you foresee?

We have recently changed our name and programme to Symbiosis Institute of Digital and Telecom Management (formerly Symbiosis Institute of Telecom Management). This means our courses and curriculum are getting more aligned with the digital communications policy of the Indian government. Digital Technologies have been at the forefront of the recent industrial revolutions in the global economy and our students are better prepared to manage these technology changes and will be able techno managers. 

 What plans for upgrading the curriculum? 

Symbiosis Institute of Digital and Telecom Management understands the rapidly changing industry and technology environment, hence, we constantly provide industry-relevant value-added programmes (VAP) to our students. Our students are provided courses on cyber security, information security management, devops, cloud computing, internal audits and many more. All students also appear for psychometric tests and specialisation allocation tests to better understand their areas of improvement via a holistic and scientific method..