The Centre of Management and Humanities (CMH), Punjab Engineering College (Deemed to be University), Chandigarh, marked the culmination of a two-day ICSSR sponsored National Conference on “Innovative Management Strategies in Business: A Path Towards Sustainability (IMSB 2024)” from 15th - 16th March 2024.
The conference outlined the importance of sustainability and eco-friendly practices in all fields such as finance, marketing, HR/OB, operations, supply chain, and information technology, and how crucial it is to understand the dynamics between sustainability and innovation.Day 1 started with the inaugural followed by sessions across the six themes of the conference.
The Chief Guest of the conference, Sh. Anirudh Tewari (IAS), Director General, Mahatma Gandhi State Institute of Public Administration, Punjab, along with Prof. Baldev Setia, Director, PEC Chandigarh, keynote speaker Dr. Rajat Agrawal, Head and Professor, Department of Management Studies, IIT Roorkee and Dr. Sachin Gulati, Director Global Talent Acquisition, Head of India Campus Recruitment, American Express interacted with the participants.
Day two had two sessions where speakers shared new insights on sustainability and its significance in contemporary times through offline and online mode. Dr. Anju Singla, Head, CMH, welcomed the esteemed speaker for the second day, Dr. Vartika Dutta from IIM Amritsar.
She delved on the topic, “Beyond Green: Navigating the Future with Innovative Management Strategies for Sustainable Success” making it an interactive session by inviting questions from the audience centred around sustainability and innovation.
She simplified the relation between Invention, Innovation, and sustainability for the members attending the session by sharing examples from all walks of life like EVs, AI, Solar panels etc. She added that for us to be successful, “We don’t have to perform but think beyond our competitors.”
She added that Sustainability is a three-legged race between government and companies, companies and consumer activists, consumers activists and government. Therefore, there is a need to streamline the purpose of people so that revenue streams profit and minimise the negative impact on the planet especially with the coming of new technologies.
She left the audience with the question to ponder upon if we are in the process of, “Innovative Sustainability or sustainable innovation.”Across these two days, 85 participants from various institutes/universities of North West India presented their papers in the national conference.
The event saw some great technical discussions with the seasoned academicians from institutes like IIT, NIT, NITTTR, LM Thapar School of Management who chaired the sessions and the faculty members and research scholars from Centre of Management and Humanities.
The conference culminated with the prize distribution ceremony for all the participants. Prof. Vasundra Singh was the chief guest for the Valedictory session. She shared that people from the Management and Humanities have a shared responsibility of executing sustainability in our lives. She congratulated the Centre for organising the conference on such a relevant topic.