Why Peer-to-Peer Learning is Important During an MBA

I wanted to share some of my personal experiences since starting my degree at the Indian School of Business (ISB), one of the top-ranked business schools in India.

An MBA is popularly believed to be a degree to fast-track participants and graduates to higher salaries and executive positions at multinational corporations, but one often forgets to ask an important question, “What is a management education anyway?”

As Prof Dipak Jain, previous dean at Kellogg, says, ‘management education teaches you to put structure to the unstructured problems; it helps to bring clarity and vision.’ The world and its problems are actually very complex and management education can really help to simplify a lot of these problems.

At the same time, a management education is not true to itself if it cannot give you a global perspective. With business problems transcending continental boundaries, business leaders need to have a global perspective.

In India, each state is as diverse as each country in Europe and being a part of a cohort of 930+ students who come from across the country it would be fair to say that at ISB we have our share of diversity.

But diversity has a larger meaning than just regional variety, as diversity broadens our horizons when we come together as colleagues. People bring differences of opinion, ideas, skills, problems, and networks.

I feel I am very fortunate to be part of such a talented pool of students. I say that in spite of having not met any of them in person yet and probably won’t be able to meet them until the end of August.

All our interactions have been virtual so far, and although our classes haven’t started yet either, what we have participated in is a serious number of texts, discussions on innumerable topics, and a plethora of virtual events and speaker sessions.

In the past month, I have learnt more than I had imagined I would from the entire course thanks to my peers who are chartered accountants, product managers, data scientists, entrepreneurs, programmers (and the list goes on), and each of them offer their own knowledge and expertise in their respective fields. Peer-to-peer learning is a very important part of your executive education, and I am really glad that we have made the most of it at ISB. To name a few interesting student-led initiatives:

The Changemakers Season 1

A student initiative to invite pioneering industry leaders in their field for a casual conversation with the cohort. So far we have had Rahul Garg, Founder of Moglix; Ankur Jain, Founder Bira 91; Achal Mittal, Co-founder of Liquiloans; Vikas Bagaria, Founder of Peesafe; Deep Mishra, leading Venture Capitalist in the country.

Product teardowns

For special interest and P2P learning, some students organised an event for interested participants to analyse and breakdown app architecture and its design for the cohort. App teardown for Airbnb, Audible, Cult fit, Snapchat and Bookmyshow to name a few.

Brand scan

A marketing event for the brand enthusiast, where 10 teams analysed several brand strategies and a panel of two experienced judges declared winners and gave their feedback.

Shark Tank

Imitating the popular TV Show, 10 teams presented their business ideas to the cohort and votes were gathered to declare winners.

Alumni interactive meetups

ISB has a strong network of 12,000+, using this network offers regular interactions with alumni. The meetups are organised for participants to discuss about their job roles and how students can prepare for it.

These were some of the highlights from the past month, but to be honest there is so much more going on within the cohort that it is difficult to keep track of.

In everything I have participated in, I have learned that the meaning of peer-to-peer learning is all about sharing your network, ideas, and knowledge with your colleagues. Though our classes begin on June 5, one might think that things might slow down, on the contrary it is only beginning. The ride of our lifetimes.