Praxissemester in Indien (englischer Bericht)
Internship Program at Madras Management Association, Chennai, India
by Max-Martin Wilhelm Deinhard
After some time of preparation and nine hours flight, the Boeing of Lufthansa landed smoothly at the Anna International Airport in Chennai. Chennai, former known as Madras and the capital of the state Tamil Nadu, is one of the five biggest cities in India The city is located in the southeast at the Bay of Bengal. Already at the Airport I got an idea of the differences between my home country Germany and India. But with a bag filled with advises and good wishes I was ready to start a big challenge, my study semester abroad.
This semester is supposed to be in the area of Marketing and Public Relations and Organization and should give me experience in the work of a non-governmental organization. The Madras Management Association MMA offered me the chance to get my experience within their organization.
MMA is organizing Seminars, Workshops, Lecture-meetings, Video Discussions, Out-Bound Training and Forums to improve the skills of managers and employees in various areas. Most of these events handle with typical management topics, but there are also other events with an emphasis on health-care or learning through experience. Beyond these activities, MMA organizes Corporate Training Programs, especially to cater the needs of a company. For the growing number of student members, MMA also organizes frequent programs and conventions for young managers.
Madras Management Association gave me the chance to get experience in almost all areas of their work. I got fruitful insights into the work of marketing, organizing and carrying-out of events, designing of information material, administration, searching for information and preparing presentations.
In September 2003, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation and the Institute of Youth Welfare, Bangalore, jointly organized the “Joint Staff Development Program” in Goa. The topic of this program was “The Role of NGOs in Social Transformation”, attended by NGOs, which are supported by KAF. The aim of this program was to develop a “Joint Action Plan” to help the poor and backward people in the globalization process. MMA also took part in this program with the topic “Role of NGOs in Economic Transformation”.
It was a pleasant and memorable exercise for me helping to develop the MMA`s report and to take part at the presentation.
Another important event during my internship program was the “2nd All India Management Students Convention” organized by MMA in Chennai. This convention, with around 900 participants, gave me good insights in preparing events of this scale.
Beyond my internship-program I had the chance to get work experience with Polaris Software Lab. I was asked to give two short presentations about Germany at the Polaris German classes. Together with Polaris I had also the chance to co-organize an Indo-German cultural Festival. Under the topic “Let our cultures flying high” we created a mixed cultural program with Indian and German songs, theatre and interactive games for 100 participants. The Deputy Consul of the Federal Republic of Germany Mr. Gottfried Sauer and the Director of the Indo-German Chamber of Commerce Mr. T.R. Gopalan inaugurated the evening.
My Internship Program at Madras Management Association was a very fruitful period time of experience. From the first moment on, my colleagues gave me the feeling of being a member of the team and I got immediately involved in the daily work. In every doubtful situation someone was there to help.
In this way, I am very thankful to Major S Lakshmanan, Executive Director MMA, the whole MMA-Team, who gave me the best help and support, and of course the Konrad-Adenauer-Foundation, which made it possible to get in contact to Madras Management Association. Together they gave me the unique opportunity to learn and live in a very impressive country and I am looking forward to return.
