The MMA Annual Convention day dawned bright and clear on 15 February ’08. The largest MMA Convention so far with more than 800 delegates actively participated in all the Business Sessions. The hall was over-flowing. All the speakers from all over the country arrived on time with not a single speaker dropping out at the last minute. We had a galaxy of eminent speakers with Mr R Seshasayee andMr Subodh Bhargava for the inaugural and Dr C Chandramouli, IAS and Mr S Mahalingam for the valedictory. The feedback from the delegates is excellent. Our sincere thanks to all the delegates, speakers, sponsors and Convention Committee without whose support it would not have been possible to organize such a great Convention. We at MMA thoroughly enjoyed organizing the MMA Annual Convention 2008.

From one convention to another – the MMA Women Managers’ Convention on the theme “Women Unlimited – Challenges in a Global India”. The theme and the speakers have been finalised with great care keeping in view the challenges of managing a global environment which is new reality in India. The response as you can observe has been phenomenal. I must also share with our members that it is our commitment to organise diverse activities for spearheading managerial excellence among women managers. Hence, the Women Managers Convention is being organised with highly subsidised fee for women delegates i.e special discounted fee of Rs.500/- only charged as delegate fee as against actual cost of Rs.1,400/- incurred by MMA for each delegate. Our congratulations goes to Women Managers Convention Committee for putting up this great Convention which is looked forward to by women managers in India

I am pleased to inform you that MMA in its endeavour to bring in high quality programmes to its members has instituted “K Eswaran Endowment Memorial Lecture” on “Entrepreneurship” an annual event with the support of Easun Group of Companies. We are indeed privileged to have Mr C K Ranganathan, Chairman & Managing Director, CavinKare Pvt Ltd and past president of MMA to deliver the inaugural talk on “Entrepreneurship” on 12 March 2008.

I am pleased to place on record our sincere thanks to Easun Group of Companies for instituting K Eswaran Endowment Memorial Lecture on “Entrepreneurship” as an annual feature in the calendar of MMA events.

In view of the overwhelming support to our earlier programme under IT for Non-IT professional managers, MMA is organising a lecture-cum-seminar on “Special Focus - CRM” with Tata Consultancy Services as Knowledge Partner on 25 March ’08 at Hotel GRT Grand. This is part of MMA’s and TCS’s corporate social responsibility series which I am sure will meet the aspirations of our members.

In February, MMA celebrated the Management Day – AIMA Foundation day on 21 February ’08 in a big way by organising lectures at Salem and Hosur chapters and our student chapters. The theme was “Managing Quality”. On the occasion MMA had organised a talk by Mr S Nagarajan, Past President, MMA and Former Executive Director (Projects), Ashok Leyland Ltd on “Managing Quality”. The programme was a grand success.

The Union Finance Minister presented the Budget on 29 Feb 2008 which is popularly termed as “Aam Aadmi” budget. The budget clearly indicate the sound financial position of our country with a fiscal position relating to revenue deficit at 1.4 per cent. With the country’s economic fundamental strong and investment climate full of optimism, we are bound to achieve average GDP growth of 9 per cent during the 11th Plan period i.e 2007-08 to 2011-12. While India is required to respond to the evolving global economic situation so as to ensure that growth achieve is sustained, we at MMA are proactive to the current economic situation and are designing all our programmes to meet the ever challenging demands and requirements of our members.

One year of successful functioning of the Salem Chapter has been achieved. We thank each and every one of the committee members who have put in a very great effort to establish Salem Chapter. We place on records our sincere appreciation for the excellent efforts put in by the outgoing Office-Bearers of Salem Chapter. We also wish good luck for the incoming office-bearers in all their future endeavours towards spearheading managerial excellence at Salem.

We have a number of events planned for the months to come. Do participate in them. We thank you for your support and encourage-ment.
Wishing you all the very best.