Some legacies do not fade into memory; they continue to teach, challenge and inspire. The second edition of the Dr Bala V. Balachandran Memorial Lecture, hosted by the Great Lakes Institute of Management, was one such occasion.
The event brought together academic leaders, industry veterans, alumni and well-wishers to honour the life and ideas of a pioneer who shaped management education in India.
The highlight of the evening was a keynote address by Vijay Govindarajan, Coxe Distinguished Professor of Management at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.
His lecture, Fusion Strategy: Data and AI for Strategic Advantage, emerged as the defining moment of the programme, seamlessly blending strategy, technology and personal reflection.
Govindarajan spoke both as a global thought leader and as someone deeply influenced by Dr Balachandran’s ideas and mentorship. He outlined how organisations must rebalance strategy across time horizons using the Three-Box framework—managing the present, disengaging from the past and deliberately creating the future. He traced the evolution from production-based scale to data-driven scale, from linear change to exponential speed, and from rigid industry boundaries to an environment where data enables participation across sectors.
He also highlighted the convergence of data, compute, connectivity and cloud, explaining how concepts such as product-in-use data, datagraphs and generative AI are redefining value creation through real-time, hyper-personalised solutions delivered at scale.
Reflecting on Dr Balachandran’s influence, Govindarajan said, “Bala was not just a colleague or a founder. He was a conscience. He pushed so many to think more clearly, more boldly, and more honestly about the future. If he were here today, he would be asking the hardest questions about data, AI, and strategy, not because it was fashionable, but because it mattered.”
Speaking on the occasion, Gautam Lakhamraju, CEO and Member of the Board, Great Lakes Institute of Management, said, “This memorial lecture is a reminder that Dr Bala’s legacy lives on through ideas. The depth and honesty of Prof. Govindarajan’s address captured exactly the kind of thinking Dr Bala stood for.”
The Dr Bala V. Balachandran Memorial Lecture continues as an annual platform where legacy meets the future, reaffirming the belief that institutions endure when their ideas continue to evolve.
