Amity University Madhya Pradesh, in association with Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Development, Chandigarh Regional Center,organized a 5- day workshop on ‘Life Skills and Leadership’ from 10^th to 14^th March 2016. The workshop aimed at imparting values and life skills to students through interactive sessions and fun activities.

The day- one of the workshop was initiated by the welcome speech by the Vice Chancellor of AUMP, Lt. Gen. V. K. Sharma (AVSM Retd.), who in his address emphasized on the importance and requirements of being a good leader. He explained how positive attitude as a life skill helps in nurturing a good leader. ‘A good leader must know how to manage time, life and technology’, he said. Addressing the 50 students who were handpicked for this workshop, he said that it’s an opportunity for them to learn and implement maximum values out of this experience.

The session was carried forward by Mr. Stanzin Dawa, the Regional Coordinator of Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Development and the Chief Speaker for the day. He focused on the need of the hour to have good and efficient leaders for the society. He said, ‘If you want to be a good learner, then learn to laugh at yourself. No one can ever be great by laughing at others.’ He narrated various motivational stories to encourage the students towards effective leadership. Enumerating the qualities of a true leader, he said that he or she must be able to accept mistakes, take lessons from them and try to correct them as well. He inspired the students to chase the dreams that won’t let them sleep. He kept the entire session very interactive with various activities. The session was finally summed up by presentation of a memento to the guest.

The second day of the of workshop was loaded with numerous interesting activities that were designed to teach various skills like teamwork, coordination, innovation and many more with a different approach. The convener of the workshop, Ms. Amanpreet Kaur conducted various activities like writing one’s attributes on a piece of paper and analyzing how lives of different people are interconnected with each other. She gave a chance to students to shed their inhibitions and come forward to express their views. The post-lunch session was taken by the Director of Amity Business School, Dr. Anil Vashisht, who explained the importance of SWOT Analysis in one’s life.‘SWOT- denoting a person’s Strength, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats are the four most important aspects that a person has to consider throughout his path of success’, he said. He suggested to students to do continuous introspection to evaluate their position in this world. The students got a wonderful taste of teamwork and innovation through an activity called ‘Pilot Drop’ wherein the participant divided into small groups were challenged to make an aircraft out of simple items of daily use and make a successful landing of an egg using it.It was surprising to see students coming up with amusingly distinctive models of aircraft and successfully made the ‘Pilot’ reach the ground after being dropped from a height.

The day-3 of the workshop was yet another addition to the entire enriching package. Ms. Amanpreet conducted further interesting activities that added to fun and learning of the students. Col. Manrai (Deputy Commandant, NCC OTA, Gwalior) interacted with the students and gave several examples from practical life for one’s Personality Development. He encouraged today’s youth to join armed forces to serve the nation. This was followed by a very enlightening speech by the Vice Chancellor of AUMP, Lt. Gen. V.K. Sharma,whose talk revolved around ‘Change.’ He said that the only thing that is constant is change. He advised the youth to adapt and change to the transitioning scenario in order to survive and make a place in the society. He said that the change would be easy to accept if one tends to change one’s behavior and the thought process. The session was carried forward by Mr. Amanpreet Randhawa (Asst. Director HR and OSD to Vice Chancellor, AUMP) and Dr. Iti Roychowdhury (Director, ASCENT) who discussed the importance of communication skills with students. They explained how a systematized,sequential, logical and clear flow of instructions can facilitate good communication. Later, Dr. Arun Mittal (Asst. Professor, Birla Institute of Management, Noida) took an interesting session on personality development. He focused on the role of positive thinking in crafting the success stories of life.

The fourth day of the workshop was graced by Dr. M. P. Kaushik (Pro Vice Chancellor, AUMP), Dr. Sumit Narula (Director, ASCO, AUMP)and Col. Manrai as the chief speakers for the day. Col. Manrai took up the topic of Leadership and explained the attributes that need to be developed to become an efficient leader. ‘A bad leader creates followers; a good leader creates leaders’, he said. Further, Dr. Sumit Narula in his talk discussed about Conflict management and how it is essential in the current scenario of Intolerance. He depicted the ‘Problem solving wheel’ as a diagrammatic representation of different methods of problem solving. The students were further addressed by Dr. Kaushik who gave examples from his own life experience under the theme ‘Decision making Skills’. He narrated the course of his life in which he took life changing decisions that created his identity. He motivated the students to follow their dreams.

The final day of the workshop was dedicated to the issues dealing with stereo types of the society and gender sensitization. Students were asked to list out the stereotypical mindsets that have been carried through ages in the society,schools, colleges, sports and home. The students participated in an activity where they role played their opposite gender and empathized with their status.The students also circulated appreciation cards and wrote positive qualities for each other. The entire workshop concluded with the closing remarks of the Vice Chancellor and distribution of Certificates to the participants. The workshop proved to be of a very vital learning experience to all the students where they got an opportunity to learn the essential values of life, over and above the academic knowledge.