General Management

Introduction | Sweet - The Pros | N' Sour - The Cons |  
Employment Tips | Corporate Recruiters

Introduction

General management is sometimes a misnomer: it might not be general, and you may not get to do a lot of management. These jobs are called general management because the kind of job on offer is tough to peg into most traditional holes.
If you see boardroom chairs and corner offices when you close your eyes, forget it- it's not going to happen in a long time. As in all corporations, and rightly so, such perks are a result of some serious mud-shoveling in the trenches.

Indian MBA's fresh out of B-school usually have two choices here, The Tata Administrative Service and The Birla Management Group. If you have a couple of years of work experience, then avenues like the Motorola 2000 programme and the GE Leadership programme are available.

Most general management cadres at this level are called so because they refuse to be tied down into a functional straitjacket. They reserve the freedom to pick up people through a centralised process, to be placed where the need arises. This is convenient for the recruiter, because he leverages a large portfolio of possible offerings while retaining the flexibility of placement. And what's in it for you? If you feel ambivalent about choosing electives from either marketing or finance, have an eclectic reading taste, and open to moving across functions and industries - then this is probably what you're looking for.

Two things you have to be clear about before applying - one: ultimately, you have to decide what your area of specialisation is going to be, and two: what you do depends mostly on you. Most management cadres of this kind give you a pretty long rope to do both. The amount of money you earn differs from place to place, but a safe starting bet can be above Rs. 3.5 lakhs p.a. But it's not the money, it's what comes with it that counts.

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Introduction | Sweet - The Pros | N' Sour - The Cons |  
Employment Tips | Corporate Recruiters