Dr. Bala V. Balachandran
Distinguished Professor, Accounting and Information Management Northwestern University, USA
In addition to his position at Northwestern University Dr. Bala Balachandran is the Founder and Dean of the Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai, India; the Founder and President of the Mumbai Business School, India; and the Executive Professor and Strategy Advisor to the Dean at Bauer College at the University of Houston, Texas.
Dr. Balachandran is one of the best known names in the Indian Management Education landscape. His teaching days began as early as in 1960 while as a student at Annamalai University, India from where he moved to Carnegie Mellon, Dayton and finally Kellogg at Northwestern University in the USA where he served as Distinguished Professor for almost 35 years till his retirement in 2008.
With more than 85 research publications to his credit and several books being written, Dr. Balachandran’s research interests focus on strategic profitability through customer-centric business strategies.
His groundbreaking work in the areas of accounting, forecasting, and strategic decision support systems has earned him numerous scholastic honors, awards, and fellowships. He serves as a consultant to the senior management of many companies, educational institutions as well as the governments of the United States, India and Malaysia.
Dr. Balachandran has been actively involved in setting up Management Institutes in India and was part of the team that recruited the first set of faculty members for IIM Bangalore in the late 60s. He has been instrumental in designing the MBA Programs at MDI, Gurgaon; at ISB in Hyderabad; and at the Great Lakes Institute of Management at Chennai. He has recently donned the mantle of Founder and President of Mumbai Business School at Mumbai, India.
The Indian Government conferred on him the ‘Padmashri’ in 2001 (India’s fourth highest Civilian Award) in recognition of his contribution towards higher education in India. He also has the rare honor of having an endowed chair professorship in his name in recognition of his invaluable and tireless service to the Institute over the last three decades.
