Prof M.S. Pillai is the Founder Director of SCMLD, Pune. India (Sadhana Centre for Management & Leadership Development) (SCMLD). For organizations, he has designed and delivered many training programs prominent being, 1) Inspirational Leadership for Performance Excellence. 2) Performance Management without Incentives and Rewards. 3) HR Architecture for Building Soulful Organisations. 4) Growing in careers, staying away from Politics. 5) Holistic Development for doing Work as Worship. 6) Discovering & Re-engineering oneself to be One’s Best.

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M.S.Pillai
He is the Founder Director of SCMLD, Pune. India (Sadhana Centre for Management & Leadership
Development) (SCMLD). This institute happened due to the initiative of his former students of SCMHRD
and SIBM. Perhaps this is the only institute in the history which was created by former students of a
teacher, for the teacher to continue the work which touched their lives positively. In 1993 he
conceptualized and established SCMHRD (Symbiosis Centre for Management & Human Resource
Development) for Symbiosis, on offering the opportunity to create a brand new institute free from
restrictions (license raj) by Dr. S.B. Mujumdar, the visionary and President of the Symbiosis Society.
SCMHRD was started with 32 students in 1993 and in 2004 when Prof. Pillai left the Symbiosis group,
SCMHRD had more than 20,000 applicants although it had no approval or recognition from and
affiliation to any government, statutory authorities or university. Prior to that he was the lead faculty at
SIBM. (Symbiosis Institute of Business Management). There he made the then MPM programme
(Masters in Personnel Management) as the third best in Human Resource Management after XLRI and
TISS. In the year 2000 or so he headed SIBM and SCMHRD at the same time for a while till SIBM found a
new Director.
He was the first one who introduced Insurance with life, accident and hospitalization cover for students.
He was again the first one anywhere in the world to have brought spiritual dimension in grooming Post
Graduate students. He introduced SSY (Sidhha Samadhi Yoga of Shri Rishi Prabhakar), Art of Living of Sri
Sri Ravishankar, Vipassana meditation (Gautam Buddha’s contribution to mankind, rediscovered and
disseminated by Shri S.N.Goenkaji), Vedanta sessions and so on as essential experiential processes in
cleansing the minds of students. He believes that whatever may be one’s intellectual attainments, if
one’s mind is not clean, clear, calm, peaceful, harmonious and connected to the pure, pristine and all
prevailing universal energy, the source of all living beings and non-living material resources, one is likely
to be blind with blurred perceptions far from truth and reality. One may have physical eyes but will have
no vision. This is the reason he named his institute as ‘Sadhana’- the sadhana to regain one’s ‘being’
more human than just a resource. (Human Resource). He believes that humans are the ‘Source’ of all
good and evil in the world. Every artificiality (all which are not natural) originates in the minds first
before it manifests as products, services, pollution, filth, conflicts, war, peace,………. Therefore,
education must focus on creating pure minds alongside intellectual uplift. The minds should be filled
with unconditional love, kindness, compassion, innocence /purity, for a nation to be clean, green, happy,
healthy, harmonious, strong, integrated and prosperous. That is, by uplifting individuals only, families,
society and a nation can be built. Enlightening education and training are the keys. While spiritualism is
the supreme science of discovering the inner being, science and technologies are for tapping the natural
laws of the unlimited eternal ‘being’ – the universe. Education must be integrative of both.
Thus in grooming his students, besides the rational intellectual inputs he introduced not only the above
meditational methods but also many other experiential processes like out bounds, village, farm, factory,
mandi and bazaar visits, sweeping the roads around the institute, visiting orphanages, old age homes,
general and municipal hospitals, bus stands, pollution filled water bodies and river beds, garbage
dumps, cremation grounds, cemeteries, rehabilitation centres of war veterans, and so on to open the
inner eyes- the real eyes of his students. Discipline, ethics, values, mindfulness and integrity in conduct
and behaviors were / are the non-negotiable rules of studentship at his institutes.
The days of students were / are full of learning facilitation from 7.00 am to 8.00 pm every day with a lot
of activities, including earmarked periods for discussions, debates, relaxation, theatre practice for
communication improvements, cultural activities, library time, teaching the underprivileged and so on.
‘First govern one self and lead oneself before attempting to manage or lead others’ is his dictum.

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According to him ‘positional’ leadership sans exemplariness is not leadership at all. Today we have too
many artificial leaders but not leadership, not at all to speak of inspirational leadership. Today faking
and masking sell, not truth. The education system is focused on how to appear good rather than being
good. Hence spiritual uplift alongside intellectual acumen is a must in grooming leadership.
He had also introduced uniforms for Post Graduate students so that the economically deprived students
do not feel poor, inhibited or low as compared to others. Today, he has almost 10,000 of his students
doing well and probably good too, around the world as professionals, senior managers, entrepreneurs
and so on. He believes in wealth creation, not currency notes creation which is nothing but fictitious
wealth, not real wealth. Also wants ‘oriented’ consumption driven approach and ‘need’ based
conservation and regeneration oriented approach needs to be taken. Hence he takes students to the
laps of nature for them to at least appreciate the natural endowment gifted to mankind without man
doing anything to create it, so that they understand that environment need to be preserved, for their
own wellbeing.
Before becoming a teacher he had served in the Indian Air Force for 15 years from 1970 – 1985. He was
a proud airman and had the honour of being in the IAF during the 1971 historical war, discharging the
roles assigned to him and thus participating in it.
He had to leave home at the age of 17 due to extreme poverty and a torturous life. He obtained his B.A.,
M.A., LL.B. and MBA etc. by self-financing. He often studied under street lights. He believes that
sincerity, seriousness at work, discipline, healthy body, mind and intellect, and the ability and nobility to
see the unseen truths ( not only the rational facts and data) are the essentials to lead one’s life. He
follows the principle of, ‘servant leadership’. Serving the purpose is more important than chasing the so
called success. He believes that even ‘businesses’ are meant to serve (not only to make personal profit).
If the organization serves the consumers / customers, profit will come. His definition of profit is that
one’s actions must profit all, not only oneself. Similarly, he believes that if one is not ready to fail,
success is not possible, and real success is in achieving a purpose. Even if the destination is afar the
determined and spirited journey towards itself is success. Therefore, he encourages his students to pave
new paths rather than walking on the existing ones if one wants to have the thrill and excitement in life
and make it meaningful. He inspires them to choose such paths without any fear of failure. He believes
in emboldening, experiential, inculcative, empowering and enlightening education, not information
centric memory testing qualification. If we claim that we are educated, then there cannot be garbage,
litters, polluted rivers, poverty, squalor indiscipline and indifference all around. That means we are not
educated but only qualified.
He is of the view that full time PG education should make sure that a student is ‘engaged’ in learning for
at least 10-12 hours a day. And learning cannot happen unless there is systematic study, curiosity,
search, research, observation, assimilation, application and reflection. Therefore, extensive reading,
deliberation and experiential, ‘learning by doing and realizing’ activities must be given more emphasis
in educational processes. Educational processes must be integrative of knowledge, skills to deliver that
knowledge into desired behaviors, positive attitude, aptitude, holistic health-physical, mental,
emotional, intellectual, spiritual and social, healthy habits, ownership, sense of responsibility, integrity,
devotion, dedication, social sensitivity etc. If not, education will be reduced to paper qualifications.
Absence of learning facilitation and more of teaching has resulted into the present situation of millions
of qualified unemployable and non-entrepreneurial youth in our country, although there is brilliance of
varying degrees in each one of them. Today we need performing leadership, not ‘knowing by googling’
and noise making leadership. Hence he focuses on ‘action leadership’

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He is an original thinker, designer and doer. He is 64 years old. Still works minimum 16 hours a day
without being tired. Work is worship for him. During the last 30 years of teaching and building
institutions he must have stayed away from official work for 200 or so days only which included Sundays
and holidays. He believes that celebrating life is working passionately following ones conviction rather
than being in a herd. He follows his way. It gives joy. Life is to live healthy, joyfully and continually
adding value. Today’s world is more of valuation, than value adding. He values value. One’s thoughts,
words and deeds should be of value to others.
May be because his above approach and achievements, the following awards came his way,
1) Rotary Club of Poona for inculcating values and qualities in students on 6th
October 1997.
2) Rotary Club of Pune, Kothrud, for Outstanding Contribution in the field of Education, on 11th
August 2001.
3) ‘Best Teacher in Management’ at Indus Ind Bank, India Leadership Summit on 24th
November, 2002
4) Guinness ‘world record’ certificate for SCMLD for its 85 students memorizing 250 random
objects on 14th
January 2007.
5) ‘Making Par Excellence Contribution towards Promotion of Value Based Management
Education in India’ by the Rotary Club of Poona North on 21st
May, 2008
6) ‘Best Teacher in HR’ at the 16th
Business School Affaire & Dewang Mehta Business School
Awards on 26th
September, 2008.
7) Outstanding Business School in Marketing – West by Impact (Marketing, Advertising &
Media weekly) on 6th
February 2009.
8) Dr. Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan Award for ‘Outstanding Contribution to Teaching’ at Dewang
Mehta Business School Awards - 2009, on 5th
November, 2009.
9) ‘Business School with Best Academic Inputs (Syllabus) in Human Resource’ on 5th
November, 2009.
10) ‘Best Social Entrepreneur of the year’- 2009 awarded by INDCOM.
11) Outstanding B-school (West) awarded to SCMLD at Dainik Bhaskar B-School Leadership
Awards on 12th
February, 2010.
12) ‘Project Management Excellence Award’ for contribution in the field of management at the
4th
International Convention on Project Management- Target 2010 on 14th
February, 2010.
13) ‘Excellence in Education’ at the 2nd
Annual Business & Social Awards of World Malayalee
Council, Pune Province on 24th
April, 2010.
14) ‘Achiever of Excellence’ Award – 2011 (Bombay Management Association).
15) ‘Grid Lifetime Achievement Award’ – 2011 (Dr. P.N. Singh Foundation).
16) Business School Leadership Award at Dewang Mehta Business School Awards on 26th
November, 2011.
17) ‘Qimpro Gold Standard Award’ in Education- 2011 by Qimpro Foundation, February- 2012.
18) ‘Karmaveer Puraskar’ – 2012 (Civil Society KVP Education) by International Confederation of
NGOs.
19) Best Management Teacher ‘Bharat Asmita Acharya Shreshta Award’ 2014 - 3rd
February,
2014.
He was born in a village, and completed his education up to twelfth standard in vernacular medium. He
earned all his degree while working. He has served in the defense of the country for fifteen years. Then,
has been instrumental in facilitating almost 10,000 of the youth of the country find their path to
prosperity and wellbeing. Set up three campuses for Symbiosis. Built SCMHRD from concept (1993) and
nurtured it up to (2004) as a unique institution of value based leadership. Established SCMLD (Sadhana)
for ordinary students who were / are not competitive enough to be in elite institutions and converted

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1600 plus such students as corporate executives/ entrepreneurs. Now he is in the process of complete
restructuring of SCMLD - the Sadhana of re-inventing Sadhana, the institution. It is being changed to an
institution for developing women leaders of ability and nobility. He is fully immersed in the work for
that mission to be accomplished. In that journey, probably the last of his innings, he looks forward to
welcoming such passionate and selfless partners in institution building. He needs money and all other
kinds of support.
For organizations, he has designed and delivered many training programs prominent being,
1) Inspirational Leadership for Performance Excellence.
2) Performance Management without Incentives and Rewards.
3) HR Architecture for Building Soulful Organisations.
4) Growing in careers, staying away from Politics.
5) Holistic Development for doing Work as Worship.
6) Discovering & Re-engineering oneself to be One’s Best.
SCMLD as an institute has the following Short Duration Programmes, which can be customized,
clustered and delivered for interested organizations, to upgrade the quality and productivity of their
Human Capital (source).
• Self-Mastery& Career Management
• HR Architecture & System Creation for SMEs
• Service Tax Compliances
• Legal Compliances (HR)
• Finance for Non- finance Personnel
• Performance Management Systems for HR Managers
• Communication Skills
• Negotiation Skills
• Conflict Management
• Stress Management
• Employee Engagement
• Project Management
• Personal / Family Finance Management
• Learning to Learn
• Supply Chain Management
• Logistics Management
• Operations Management
• Office Management
• Strategic Management for SMEs
• Marketing and Sales
• Business Analytics & Big Data
• Inspirational Leadership
• Discipline Management
• Digital Marketing
• Event Management
• First Aid & Life saving
• Converting Adversities into Advantages
• Leadership for Promotee managers
SCMLD has good faculty resources to design and deliver all the above. The revenue generated on all the
above will go for building the institution he is dreaming of.