Professor Bala V Balachandran (1937-2021) was the founder, chairman and dean emeritus of Great Lakes Institute of Management in Chennai, India

Following receiving his undergraduate and post graduate degrees in Maths and Statistics at Annamalai University in his birth State of Tamil Nadhu, a young Bala Balachandran followed the path of many bright young Indians in the 1960s and moved to the US where he had a very successful academic and management consulting career ending as Professor Emeritus of Accounting Information and Management at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University (which was ranked the #3 US business school in 2025 ). However he always yearned to establish a business school in his home state of Tamil Nadhu which could offer management training courses (equivalent to an MBA in the US) . This wish became a reality when in 2004 he founded Great Lakes Institute of Management in Chennai whilst continuing his professorial role at Kellogg. Under his guidance, until he passed away at the age of 85 in 2021, the Institute has gone from strength to strength. Great Lakes has been accredited by the Association of MBAs in the UK. It is the youngest and 7th institute in India to get accreditation from this association. Great Lakes is also accredited by the South Asian Quality Assurance System and by the US based Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business which is one of the three bodies authorised to accredit business schools. My interview with Professor Bala is contained within my book, "Profiles in Enterprise - inspiring stories of Indian business leaders" published by Roli books in 2015 ((https://rolibooks.com/). Please note that these interviews took place some time ago - over 25 years ago in the case of the South East Asian life story book and around 10 to 15 years ago in the case of the two Indian life story books. However, their stories are correct to the time of the interviews and the objective is to demonstrate the entrepreneurial skills they exhibited at the time of the interviews in building their businesses.