The Battle of Minds Legacy

Md Sabbir Osmani Khan

The corporate world is becoming increasingly competitive every day, demanding excellence from young graduates as they enter this arena that provides promising careers and self-development opportunities. The leap from student life to a professional one is not easy. Real life opportunities, for individuals to get exposure to the corporate world, are limited. British American Tobacco, Bangladesh, one of the leading multinational companies, plays a central role in developing the nation's talents through their platform - Battle of Minds. This competition engages the young talented minds of Bangladesh to discover their maximum potential and compete against the best.

	Battle of minds engages students to discover their potentials. Courtesy

A lot of careful thought and planning goes behind crafting this platform every year. British American Tobacco, Bangladesh, has been organising Battle of Minds since 2004 and each year this event has been taken to a greater height. Since 2004, over 50 young individuals have been recruited from the Battle of Minds. It is an exposure like no other to the job market, enabling graduating students to showcase their talent to the corporate leaders. Starting with five universities in 2004, Battle of Minds has come a long way involving hundreds of students every year. Over the years, the competition has evolved to include contemporary issues to provide talented individuals a platform to display entrepreneurial acumen by working over the issues related to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

In recent times, a large number of universities have been taking part in this competition and above a thousand young talents come from various institutes like the Institute of Business Administration (IBA), University of Dhaka (DU), North South University, Faculty of Business Studies, DU, Department of Soil, Water and Environmental Sciences, DU, Department of Botany, DU, Khulna University, Islamic University of Technology, Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Jahangirnagar University, Shahjalal University of Science and Technology, Bangladesh Agricultural University, Chittagong University, BRAC University, East West University, American International University, Bangladesh, and Independent University, Bangladesh.

This year, Battle of Minds promises nothing less than a brilliant showcase of competition, team work and creativity. Students who have gone through the Battle of Minds development platform have always described this as a rewarding experience in terms of learning. This year, candidates will be tested on their ability to work under pressure, think on their feet and amaze the audience with their creativity and innovation.

Battle of Minds 2012 has already hit the campuses engaging graduating students of business, engineering and agricultural schools. Submission of applications opened in the month of August and it required applicants to fill up qualitative information from where they sketched out their unique achievements and personal characteristics that make up their profiles. Apart from this, the candidates also had to take an aptitude test designed to measure their numeric and verbal aptitude. The journey of Battle of Minds, 2012, is gathering momentum with 1257 registrations from 16 universities already submitted their applications at the registration portal. The organisers are yet to reveal the myriad of challenges that they have designed to grill the candidates. The journey will end in October with the usual grandeur that can only be expected from Battle of Minds. In 2012, British American Tobacco, Bangladesh, is looking for talented young people who can become the leaders of the company in the future.