Lucknow: The Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow (IIM-L) today announced its fifth six-month General Management Programme (GMP) for Defence Officers.

The 24-week programme would provide the officers with varied managerial inputs across all functional domains, preparing them for a career in the corporate world.

The objective of the GMP is to provide the participants with a basic understanding of the managerial systems and processes.

The programme has been designed to provide the Defence Officers with basic functional inputs in subjects such as accounting and finance, decision sciences, organizational behavior, human resources management, communication skills, marketing, strategy, information technology and business environment.

Rajeev Karsolia, Principal Director of Employment was the Chief Guest for the inaugural session.

The first four programmes conducted by IIM Lucknow received an overwhelming response with the 49 officers of the first programme, 60 of the second and 59 of the third getting good job offers.

The fourth General management Programme is running at IIM Lucknow's Noida Campus with 59 Defence Officers out of which 7 candidates are lady officers.

In the 5th programme, after meeting the selection criteria, 65 officers (44 Army, 11 Air Force and 10 Navy) including 21 lady officers have been selected for the programme.

"We at IIM Lucknow will provide our participants with the latest management skills and techniques, which are the primary requirement of the corporate sector. The idea is to familiarize the officers with the requisite analytical tools and techniques; and develop a holistic perspective and global mindset to understand issues of an enterprise and provide the defence officers with a second career choice after retirement", said Prof. Prakash Singh and Prof. Arunabha Mukhopadhyay, programme coordinators.

The Indian Armed Forces carefully selects officers and continuously trains them in the art, science and craft of WINNING. Every year, hundreds of these officers retire, with rich experience in learning, critical reasoning, objective decision making, creative thinking, leading and motivating people, running organisations and managing projects.

The aim of the programme is to capitalize on these skills of the officers and optimize them to suit the corporate world's requirements.

"The fifth programme is expected to generate an enthusiastic response from the corporate world and given the intense nature of the programme, it is sure to equip the participants with the necessary skill set so very essential to conquer the corporate world", the coordinators added.