Shobha Das

Professor, Strategy

Prof Shobha Das has a PhD degree from the Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota Twin Cities, a PGDM from IIM Calcutta, and BA (Honors) in Economics from Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi University. She was a recipient of the National Talent Search Scholarship for her higher secondary, undergraduate and postgraduate studies.

Shobha worked as a Management Consultant in TCS after her PGDM, and after her PhD, she worked at the Nanyang Business School, NTU Singapore (1994-2009), Qatar University (2009-2019), and joined IFMR GSB in 2019.

She pioneered the use of simulation software in Strategic Management in Singapore and Qatar, and now in IFMR GSB. Trained in the case method at the Harvard Business School (PCMPCL program), Dr Das has taught undergraduate, masters’, doctoral and executive courses. She has published research papers in well-known journals such as the Academy of Management Review, Management Science and Strategic Management Journal. She regularly presents her research at international conferences.

Gayathri Sampath

Gayathri Sampath, Ph.D. is a seasoned management professional with over 20 years of industry and academic experience. After her MBA from NMIMS (Mumbai), she worked for over 10 years with Deloitte India; Avalon Consulting providing consulting solutions to reputed Indian and global organisations. Her assignments included advising companies on Marketing and Business Strategy including Go-to market strategies, Opportunity Identification, Entry strategies and Evaluating Business Models and Plans. She then moved to head the Research and Consulting Practice at SmartAnalyst India, the Indian arm of SmartAnalyst Inc – a knowledge service provider to Fortune 10 companies. At SmartAnalyst, Gayathri put together a young team of researchers comprising fresh graduates and postgraduates who could provide analytical insights and custom research services to the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies. Her experiences in working with her young team at SmartAnalyst led her to appreciate the importance of building a pool of trained talent who could be absorbed in the knowledge-based service industries, and she started V-Skill solutions with a colleague. V-Skill was among the top 50 businesses shortlisted for venture capital funding in the inaugural Economic Times Power of Ideas competition.

Her experiences in the corporate world fuelled a desire for greater understanding of the drivers of strategic thinking and prompted a switch to academics in 2011. She was awarded her PhD from NMIMS – School of Business (Mumbai) and joined them as full-time faculty in the Business; Strategy Department in 2015. At SBM she designed and delivered various courses relating to strategic management in the MBA and PhD program. Her portfolio of courses included Ethical issues in management, Dimensions of strategy implementation, Managing strategic alliances, International business management, Understanding business models and plans and Strategic management. Her electives were almost always fully subscribed, and she was consistently rated by students as one of the best faculty for strategy courses. She is trained in the Harvard case-based pedagogy and uses case and simulation-based pedagogy extensively in her courses.

Her research work has been in organisational strategic agility and digital payments. She has presented her research work in conferences and published papers in domestic and international journals. She has written two cases published with Ivey Publishing on a pan India running club (Striders) and a well-known social enterprise (Shrujan) which are used in various strategy courses. She is currently working on an international research project on women social entrepreneurs and two case studies on social entrepreneurship models. She is fascinated by the impact of mythology on management and is pursuing a course on comparative mythology. She hopes to connect mythology and managerial styles in her next research project.