Flipkart Could Have Timed Their Decision Better: IIM Bangalore

A top official from IIM-B talks with BloombergQuint about the struggle between Flipkart and the Ahmedabad institute.

Campus of Indian Institute of Management. (Photo: IIM-A)

Flipkart has had a run in with India’s premier B-school, the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Ahmedabad.

After recruiting 11 students from the institute, the e-commerce giant refused to honour its commitment. The new recruits were promised joining dates in June, but Flipkart has backtracked, changing their joining date to December instead. The company has offered students compensation of Rs 1.5 lakh (per student) for the period between June and December.

Also Read: After IIM-A, Flipkart Could Face the Wrath of the IITs

The Bengaluru-based startup cited business restructuring as the reason behind the deferral of joining dates. According to IIM-A, however, students aren’t necessarily waiting to see if Flipkart is going to make good on its promise. They have been getting offers from other companies and are seriously considering them.

BloombergQuint reached out to several IIM-A students to respond to the issue. However students from the institute seemed unwilling to go on record.

Since this is an issue that concerns all IIMs, we reached out to Sapna Agarwal, Head of Career Development Services at IIM Bangalore, to comment on the issue.

How many IIM-B students have been affected by this?

Eleven students were supposed to join Flipkart. With the delay in joining dates, all of them are affected.

Is the Flipkart debacle unusual or have you seen this happen often before? 

The campus hiring process is a well planned activity for most companies. They plan for it well in advance and have headcount and budgets in place. It is a little unusual for a company to take this decision so late in the cycle. These offers were made in December/January and the students have been informed about the delay in joining date in May –just days before the actual joining date.

How have the students at IIM-B reacted to this?

Students are disappointed and shocked. Needless to say, the delay in joining date has created uncertainty and this is causing anxiety among students.

Could such a situation have been managed better by Flipkart? How do you think it ought to have been managed?

We are aware that changes in business climate can lead to a need for organisation structures to be reconsidered and that such steps may be required. But this could have been done in a more timely manner. If the students knew any of this when they were made the offer, they could have chosen other options. Most of the students declined other offers to join Flipkart.