SLIM PGDIP students to gather for networking forum

Thursday, 20 June 2013 00:04 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

The Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing has organised for its students and lecturers a networking event mixed with fun activities and games with a flair of marketing, dancing performances and an auction to raise funds for the student’s council on 21 June 2013 at SLIM Home, Borella. The objective of this event is to enhance networking among the students of all four stages (operational level, managerial level, strategic level and synthesis level) and for them to carry forward the friendships and the relationships built in the classroom on to the corporate world.

The Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing has three branches in the main parts of the country: Kandy, Colombo and Galle, and it hopes to establish its educational programs island-wide. Business has been very dynamic in modern context and especially bound with relationships among professionals, making networking a very important component in progress of the business. SLIM believes that academic knowledge alone will not be sufficient to help students and networking is a vital ingredient for success in the marketing arena. The warm-down party is set to take off on 21 June 2013 from 6:30 p.m. onwards and will be a milestone achieved as it is the first-ever networking forum for marketing students. “Networking is essential in our day-to-day life as marketers and I am delighted to be a part of the networking forum. At SLIM, we always look forward to enrich the future marketing fraternity of this country to succeed beyond borders,” stated Etisalat Lanka Marketing Manager Gammika De Silva. “This is a step forward and I assume that this networking forum will benefit those young talented marketers by giving them a glimpse of networking to take it to the next generation. Marketers are the driving force behind in any business and it’s our duty to help our students to get expose to global marketing techniques so that they can handle challenges at global standards.” The diversity of the cultures, values and believes may hinder them when building relationships with each other. The SLIM fraternity, as the national body for marketing in Sri Lanka, believes that it is its responsibility to build networking among the students and help them start practicing what they are learning in theory in the classroom. “Networking is a vital tool for marketing, which is being neglected and we need to start initiating networking with our colleagues to build up a strong networking base,” noted Project Organiser and Central Finance Company Senior Marketing Executive Buddhika Pitiyegedara. Hence, this event is an initiative of the institute’s ultimate goal of producing great marketers in the country. The body also believes that students will build great friendships and relationships among themselves and that they will carry it forward to the corporate world after this event. To see marketers with great qualities and leadership skills developing through the fraternity is indeed an investment with returns. “It is an ideal platform for future marketers to engage in networking and we must thank our institute for helping us to initiate this project and we look forward to organising larger networking forums with marketing students of all parts of the country in the future,” added Project Organiser and APL Logistics Business Development Executive Ramzan Raskeen.