Brief Report of ICROSMOS 2016

Eminent dignitaries for the inaugural programme were Mr. Prahlad Kakar, world famous ad-film director and ad- guru, Ms. Sonya Sahni, Chief Strategy Officer, Publicis iStrat and Mr. Sunit Tandon, Ex-DG, IIMC and well reputed journalist for Doordarshan and Loksabha TV who were welcomed by Shri Sharad Jaipuria, Chairman, Jaipuria Institute of Management and Group’s Vice Chairman, Shri Sreevats Jaipuria along with Director of the institute Dr. Rajiv R. Thakur and senior faculty and staff colleagues.

After floral welcome and lamp lighting ceremony, Chairperson Shri Sharad Jaipuria Ji welcomed the eminent guests and participants from all parts of the country and abroad in the jam packed auditorium. He introduced the guests Shri Prahlad Kakar, Mr. Sunit Tandon and Ms. Sonya Sahni to the participants and deliberated upon the social media and its increasing role not only in individuals’ life but among the organizations and how social media is there to stay and grow with time. He also touched upon how Jaipuria Group is pioneer in providing world class education at its institutes and chain of schools. He recalled how this journey was started way back in 1945 with establishment of first college in Kolkata which was inaugurated by Late Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru.

Director of Jaipuria, Noida Dr. Rajiv R Thakur briefed about the conference theme and recalled the journey from the beginning when conference was conceptualized about a year back. He was delighted to see that from all corners of the country including its east, west, south and north ends participants have participated in the country. Presence of international participants and international partner institutes’ representatives made the event more meaningful.

The Guest of Honour Mr. Sunit Tandon in his address discussed the gradual evolution of social media, in government sectors from the traditional media. He mentioned that all media including traditional and social media will co-exist. He recalled how even a fax machine was not known to most of the people in eighties’ decade to indicate the participants a perspective about change in technology and medium of communication. His address raised lot of questions and unlike the usual inaugural monotonous programs made the inaugural program a highly interactive one.

Next speaker, Ms. Sonya Sahni, the Chief Strategy Officer of Publicis iStrat talked about importance of social media in organizations’ life and how it can compel the organizations to take steps towards world’s sustainability. She cited examples of pharma companies who are the biggest polluters of the environment through release of their anti-biotic residuals in water resulting all of us consuming the same without even knowing it. She concluded mentioning that only we the people can bring change instead of blaming on to government or public authorities.

Finally, Shri Prahlad Kakar, the famous ad film maker who is known to speak his mind candidly dwelt upon the importance of social media touching how it has brought change in the public life. He mentioned that only such organizations succeed that allow its people to take decisions and only those people succeed who have capabilities to taking and own their decisions. Citing examples of highly successful multinationals and their fall down due to not adapting to the changing environment and not providing a culture for their employees to innovate, take decisions and own those decisions. He called for providing more and more chances to young generation as they are the real vehicle of change. They are fearless and have capability of take decisions and own them. Later in his speech he motivated all the research delegates and students for creating value to be the happiest people on this earth. He says that we are having whole world on our finger tips and we just have to access that information and utilize it for doing well in the current scenario.

After his speech, he showed some of the classic advertisements who have changed way of thinking and consumption patterns of people like famous Cadbury’s ad, Pepsi ad which introduced Aishwarya Rai for the first time, Google ad how it has brought a connectivity in people’s life and so on.

Vice Chairman Shri Shreevats Jaipuria proposed Vote of Thanks. Mentioning about the theme he said that social media will remain, only the forms will change. Quoting Mr. Sunit Tandon words about most of the people not knowing about fax machines in eighties, he said technology is changing so fast that after ten years from now again people will not know what a fax machine is as newer technologies are developing and being adopted at faster pace than ever today.

After his speech, the conference proceedings were released by the guests. After the inaugural session, the Annual Book Exhibition of Jaipuria, Noida was inaugurated by the guests where in about ten thousand books from over 100 international publishers were on display.

There were in all 10 technical sessions of the conference discussing the issues likes Leveraging social media for consumer engagement; Leveraging employee development through social media; Social networking innovations: risks and challenges; use of social media for creating sustainable marketing practices; Contemporary issues in financial research; Harnessing social media for sustainable strategies; Creating sustainable organizations for future; Digital communication: the new age channels; Mapping on line shopping behavior; and Digital communication – the new age channels. Out of about 150 abstracts followed by submission of 90 papers, finally 57 selected papers were presented during the conference and published in the book “Social Media and Organizational Sustainability” published by Bloomsbury India Pvt. Ltd., an International publisher. Selected papers were from all parts of the country in India right from Jammu & Kashmir up to down south i.e. Tamil Nadu and from eastern corner state of Assam to west coast of Gujarat. There were participants from many foreign countries who presented their papers in the conference including USA, France, China, Ghana and Poland.

Shri Nitishwar Kumar, IAS and PS to Minister of State, Railways delivered the Valedictory Address on 13th February evening. Program began with a brief report of the conference proceedings for the last two days presented by Dr. Shikha Bhatia. She then outlined the outcome and recommendations of the deliberations in terms of guidelines for responsible usage of social media for organizational sustainability.

After this Dr. Shikha Bhatia introduced the Chief Guest Shri Nitishwar Kumar to the audience. Mr. Nitishwar Kumar joined Indian Economic Service in 1995 and later in 1996 joined Indian Administrative Service. Later he went to London School of Economics and did his M.Sc. in Public Management and Governance in 2012-13. He has been presently working with the Minister of State Railways as Private Secretary. He has been instrumental in starting the IVRS based passenger feedback system for various services being delivered in 1500 odd mail and express trains.

Shri Nitishwar Kumar deliberated upon the conference theme citing the increasing purchase power of Indian consumers and hence need of social media by organizations to reach mass segments to promote their products. He mentioned that along with social media usage for business sustainability, individuals and organizations must also focus on inclusive development of India that include development of deprived sections of the society.

Shri Nitishwar Kumar deliberated upon the conference theme citing the increasing purchase power of Indian consumers and hence need of social media by organizations to reach mass segments to promote their products. He mentioned that along with social media usage for business sustainability, individuals and organizations must also focus on inclusive development of India that include development of deprived sections of the society.

Finally, after the valedictory function was over, everyone enjoyed the High Tea. Feedback from all the participants was gathered in order to overcome shortcomings, if any, and arrange the next year conference in a much better manner and on a much higher scale.