Ashok Leyland ties up with IIT Bombay

Chennai: The city-based commercial vehicles major, Ashok Leyland Limited, has signed an agreement with the Shailesh J Mehta School of Management (SJSOM) of the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, for a customised management course in manufacturing excellence for its engineers. The tie up is first of its kind for IIT, Bombay.

Significantly, SJSOM had provided its expertise to carry out a company-wide competency mapping exercise for Ashok Leyland. This identified knowledge and skill gaps, which provided the basis for development of a custom-designed curriculum for the 15 month course comprising six modules and a live project.

54 on-site contact days are built in whereby 40 executives from the company will interact with IIT professors at the company's 'management development centre'. Peer interaction is facilitated by e-groups, through Ashok Leyland's e-learning centre.

At the end of the course, IIT Bombay will certify the successful participants with certificates of participation in manufacturing excellence (CPME).

According to JN Amrolia, executive director, HR: "Manufacturing has been one of our core competencies and we would like to sharpen it especially in view of impending competition."

Ashok Leyland already has a successful tie-up with BITS Pilani since 1997 for MS (Engineering Management) and BS (Industrial Engineering and Technology) programmes for its engineers. Five sponsored batches averaging over 40 nominations per batch have earned their degrees from BITS. The Company also sponsors its executives to IIM Ahmedabad, IIT Madras and TAPMI Manipal, for courses in varied disciplines.