Shershah
Uri The Surgical Strike
Lagaan
Ain't these the titles of Hindi feature films?
Uri The Surgical Strike
Lagaan
Ain't these the titles of Hindi feature films?
Yes.
What about them?
These films make excellent teaching and learning aids.
How?
We let the students watch the film and then select few clips/instances for discussions in the class.
What do you discuss?
The lessons that can be drawn from the story. The correlation with relevant concept or theory being taught otherwise.
How does it help?
It helps in understanding the concepts and how is it useful in real life. It helps in internalisation of the concepts and theories as applicable. It makes the learning more experiential.
Sounds cool.
Add to the above list real life incidents or events in real-time. Such real-life events also help in experiential learning. And if done in real-time (immediately after the event), it generates a lot of debate and excitement in the class.
This story is based on a real-life event, Operation Sindoor. Although it happened in 2025, yet it re-surfaced few weeks ago. While teaching a one-semester core course on Project Management(PM), we chose Op Sindoor to bring out many concepts of PM. Sharing below some of the takeaways from the case discussions.
Was Op Sindoor a Project?
In simple terms, a project is one-off, not repeated, has a start and end, a well defined objective and outcome, which demand resources. The MBA class unanimously said yes it was a Project. See the pictures below of the two cohorts of 50 students each. They look energised after the case discussion, right?
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Any reader who thinks otherwise, your views are welcome in the comment field.
Similarly, the discussion on following topics saw active participation from the students:
Who was the Project Manager?
What was the Objective of the Project?
How was it achieved?
How was Project Planning done? What were the options?
Who executed the Project?
Were multiple agencies involved in execution? How were they monitored and controlled?
What was the outcome? How was it measured?
Who were the stakeholders?
How was the communication to the stakeholders managed? Was it effective?
What were the risks? How was risk mitigation done?
Was it just a Military Operation? If not, what else and why?
Sharing another picture of the 'live' case discussion steered by Vaishnavi, one of the students.
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Another student Vishwashanthi was present in J&K at the time of Pahalgam attack. She wrote, "In April 2025, I went on a trip to Jammu and Kashmir with my friends to explore its beautiful tourist destinations. We had been enjoying our journey and visiting different places. On 22 April 2025, while we were near the Vaishno Devi Temple in Katra, we heard the heartbreaking news about the Pahalgam attack."
"The news came as a complete shock. I felt scared and anxious because we were also in Jammu and Kashmir at that time. The atmosphere suddenly became tense, and everyone around us was talking about the incident and checking for updates. I immediately called my family to let them know that I was safe.Although we were safe, that moment reminded me how quickly situations can change. It was an experience I will never forget, and my thoughts and prayers are with everyone who was affected by the tragedy."
Thank you Shanthi for sharing your memories.
An opeartion like Sindoor has lessons in many other subjects and areas like, Strategy, Leadership, Decision Making under Uncertainty, Team Work, Goal Setting, Contingency Planning, Resource Mobilisation, Technology Adaptation, Media Management, International Relations etc. But we had restricted our discussions to the lessons in Project Management to keep the story short.
Corporate Lessons
While discussing the above questions, we also brought out the corresponding lessons for the corporate world. The whole exercise appeared very meaningful. The students seem to have internalised the Project Management topics with clarity and ease. Thank you the PGDM Class of 2027 at VVISM Hyderabad for your wholehearted participation.
Question for the Reader
Whether you are an MBA grad, student, working professional in any field, home maker, parent, grandparent, veteran or any other netizen, what was the most significant outcome of Op Sindoor? Mail your response to hbindia@gmail.com or leave a comment. Selected responses with names will be included as Postscript.
Postscript 28th July: None of the readers responded to the above query. However, two of the students nailed it! The most significant outcome of Op Sindoor was not the destruction of the terrorist camps but enhancing of the National Pride. Don't you think so?
End of Postscript.
The Title
Did you like the title of this story? The credit for suggesting the title goes to Padma Ramesh, an accomplished journalist and former Dean of a PG Institution of Media Studies. In her own words:
"I thought of Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen's novel! (When I saw the word) --a Literary echo.
There is pride in what we achieved with Op Sindoor. The phrase "without prejudice" implies pride that isn't driven by bias or hatred."
Thanks Padma for creating such a befitting title for our story.
Experiential Learning - Some More
Ghumakkad has been a strong proponent of experiential learning. As a child, most of our learning has been experiential. Learning by doing, simple yet effective. But as we go up the 'education' ladder, experiential learning takes a back seat. It is more of lecturing. Sharing below some of my endeavours at experiential learning for my MBA students. You may click the link to browse the corresponding story.
Uri The Surgical Strike - Many lessons in Management from a feature film
Shershah Beyond The Movie - Based on the real-life story of Capt Batra of Kargil fame, the movie brings out many lessons in Leadership, Team Work, Task Orientation etc
Teachers Also Love Outdoors - Real learning happens outside the classroom.
Real-Time Cases for MBA Teaching - How to design and conduct the classes for enhanced experiential learning. Faculties are free to reach me for details.
Thanks for browsing. Do share your experience of making the teaching and learning more experiential.
We firmly believe that knowledge gets multiplied when shared.
Stay connected.
- Harsh-the-Ghumakkad/ Secunderabad/ 18th July 2026/ hbindia@gmail.com
Postscript:
21 July: Vinay Bhargava, an experienced marketeer wrote; "Indeed military operations are very inspirational as it involves clear aim, astute planning, dedicated research, inputs, execution etc.
In our marketing campaigns to inspire sales team we based many on wars and used terms as pincer movement in strategies. Excellent!"
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