New Delhi: Institute of Management Technology (IMT) organised a one-day conference on the theme of 'Organizational Effectiveness in Economic Slowdown' on February 19, 2009 in New Delhi.

The conference was featured by distinguished speakers including Prof Robert J Aumann, Nobel Laureate in Economics, Mr Kamal Nath, Honorable Minister of Commerce and Industry, Government of India and Spiritual leader Swami (Dr) Parthasarathy.

While delivering the inaugural address, Dr A.M. Sherry, Director, IMT-CDL said, "The conference is designed to discuss how to manage turbulences in an organization in rise of global economic slowdown and to look for opportunities for organizational growth amidst global meltdown."

While talking about the underlying causes of economic meltdown, Prof. Aumann said, "Over leveraging by companies in financial sectors, high correlation amongst players, 'Negative Bubble' and excessive media reporting of the financial crisis led to the global economic meltdown." Prof. Aumann also suggested the remedies to cover the global economic meltdown. He recommended that government should regulate key aspects of financial system, and the firms should avoid over leveraging.

Commenting on the unexpectedness of the financial crisis, Mr. Kamal Nath said, "Yes, the global economic slowdown has caught us unguarded. No one had thought that we will be discussing this subject today. United States and European economies are badly hit; however India economy is on course."

While discussing the need of the day for India to come out from the economic slowdown, Prof VN Rajsekharan Pillai, VC, Indira Gandhi National Open University recommended, "Enriching organizational values is the need of the day for India. An efficient management system is needed for both public and private sectors."

Self governance and corporate governance are required to tackle the problem of recession. Explaining this, Swami Parthasarthy commented, "There is a scarcity of quality manpower in India. The Indian education system is improper. As a result, only 5% students take enrolment for higher education and 69% opt out at undergraduate level."

Dr. B. S. Sahay, Director, IMT Ghaziabad said, "India is very much affected by the global economic meltdown. Industry has to play a very significant role. The time has come for more Industry-academia collaborations. We have to put together the expertise from industry, faculty and graduates to do much better management of situation at hand."

Dr. Anwar Ali, Director, IMT Nagpur said, "The whole world is going through very tough times. India is also affected from economic downturn. The entire world is having lots of expectations from India. In fact, India has tremendous advantage of young educated people which come between the ages of 18-35 years."

Dr Farhad Rad Serecht, Director, IMT Dubai spoke on the topic of 'The real nature of the crisis & policy implications.' Dr Serecht said, "There is need of regulatory framework, tight control on finance, state participation, more balanced distribution of income and effective supervision at the managerial level."

Other prominent speakers at the conference are Prof. BB Bhattacharya, Vice-Chancellor, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; Dr Subir Gokarn, Chief Economist, Standard & Poor's, Asia-Pacific; Mr Ankit Fadia, World-Renowned Cyber Security Expert and Mr Anand Rajaganesan, Director, Human Resource, Organizational Effectiveness Vertical, HCL Technologies.