Stakeholderism - key to any relationship management

With the new government under the leadership of Ms Mamata Banerjee taking charge in West Bengal, people of the state are seeing some basic changes, they have waited for decades now. Is it so tough to meet expectations of people who show confidence in someone and entrust him/her with the responsibility to shape their future- be it a company, city, state or even a country.

So many ideas, so many principles - Capitalism, socialism, Communism, Marxism - all founded to bring happiness to people but each one of them has failed in it own way to give good governance or build a good system. Corruption and vested politics is everywhere. Lack of accountability is key to every problem. In India, there is already a lot of public activism to bring such accountability of public servants to public through the Lokpal Bill. What actually happens is yet to be seen but that is not the point I want to highlight.

I wanted to point out that Stakeholder management can be used to solve every problem. Be it a company, a small shop or a government, you have different set of stakeholders. In a Government, you have employees and just as in corporate world their position and salary should be incentive based. The elected Government is the Management board elected by people- hence the latter should be considered as Shareholders. And these shareholders are mostly your customers too. Meeting Customer goals should be the aim and there should be someone to check the progress. I often fail to understand why we fail to deliver when it comes to results if we follow these base rules of Stakeholder management and compete on how best o make it happen.

May be in reality we do it, but just do it the other way round in India. Compete how worse we can be, or may be it is just become the accepted way.

Hope we change for the better.

Analyzing Indian way of business- International eyes

I am back...Long time no see...no blogs....loads of work and only reasons to stay way from my once favourite pass time- penning my thoughts electronically though. This was long due and I hope to make up to my heart. Well this is about a seminar we had sometime back and my interpretation of it. It was a wonderful morning with speakers from international business at our campus- HEC MBA. The main connection was EIEBG ( Euro-India Economic and Business Group) an informal network for contacts and exchanges among business enthusiasts between India and Europe. I will keeps names out of this as this is my personal interpretation of the thoughts they expressed. But thoughts they were and it is worth reading ahead :)

1. The Ganesha Attitude - It is believed that Indians do business with a Ganesha attitude. We always pray to this handsome God before we start off our business. Every Shop in India has a place reserved for him and Lakshmiji which is well lighted and close to the cash counter. True. Any person who has been to India and did a bit of visit to the shops would have see this.

This is often interpreted as lacking professionalism and slow progress mindset in business world. Yes the red tape is bigger than usual in India to start business but if you look into it, Ganeshji has nothing to do with it :D. The lethargy is part of bureaucracy which is fast fading away. Visit Ahmedabad, Bombay, Hyderabad and Gurgaon.

And the habit of a small prayer before business start- well religion has nothing to with it. It is part of our culture. From childhood, we have been taught to pray and seek God's blessings before we start our day. Be it in business, work or studies. Be it any God. Ganeshji just appears to be a favourite one with most businessmen. With his pot belly and beautiful stretched eyes, he just fits into the picture of satisfaction and success.

2. The Family Corporates - Most business in India are family run business houses. True. Because that's how Indian business grew post Independence. Be it good or bad, not everyone has the acumen to run business. We all know that we have different qualities- some are able businessmen, some able administrators, yet some other researchers. In India, somehow it ran in the families, may be because traditionally the father always passed the baton to his first son- be it the kings or now in business. But things have changed a lot over the last few years. Rarely you will find these days a son who has followed the foot steps of his father. Globalization, generation next and open education system has had its combined effect. Yes Reliance ( a business powerhouse) is still family run, but do any one of us think that some one would have done it better than the 2 sons holding the throne. I beg to differ if someone does. But then there are other sides - look at Infosys, the children of the founders have been denied official position..they are shareholders not managers. So has the the evolution at the TATAs happened. I cannot think of a more diversified,respectable, equal opportunity and well managed industrial conglomerate. One that has contributed a lot to the country where the group was formed and to the society at large. Thought the baton was passed along to people who had been a part of the family, you cant name one in the line who were not worthy of the position they held.

In the discussion, what caught my attention most was the blood group concept to explain how different Indian cultures participate in business. Like Tamils and Bengalis were representative of Blood group O- universal donors; they can work anywhere under any boss. While Punjabis and Parsees were representing Blood Group AB- universal acceptors, they can make everyone work. I am not sure how true all definitions are, in this changing semi globalised world but I loved the thought process for sure.

3. Not only Business but Sell - This was the best one of the lot. Not because it was about Indian business but because when I pondered over the speaker's thoughts, I found out how true it was for every market. We know it, but we just dont realize it well to apply it. Business without selling is not going to do any good to the person setting up the business. In India, if you want to sell, you have to go for the Indian hearts. Examples- BATA shoes; it is a Switzerland headquartered company but most Indians take it to be an Indian brand especially Bengalis. They are so head over heals over its products. HUL- Hindustan Unilever Limited is another big example.

Well, want to learn from failures. The speaker laid it all out in plain English language. An example- Kellogg's initial entry to India. They had come to India to sell cereals; how to have it ? In cold milk. well that's how they have it in western countries but we Indian traditionally had hot breakfast. Hot Milk for the Kids, tea/coffee for the elders. Followed by Idli/Sambar in the south, Puri Sabzee in the north so on..but whatever you choose all are served HOT. There they met failure till situation changed a bit.

When Mcdonalds came to India- well they never sold burgers they sold fast food, they sold lifestyle. They created tables and places to sit together with family to eat- Indian way of enjoying food..going out together.

The one that touched my heart was the example of baby products. Let me explain how the speaker put it forth to us. When a baby is born in India, by tradition the baby is born to the family more than to the mother. Everyone from the new grandmas, grandpas, mama/ chacha(uncles), masi/ chachi/mami (aunties) ...and...well also the parents no doubt... are excited and want to give all the warmth and love to the new born. At this time there are two advisors to the mother- the doctor and the midwife/experienced mothers. Johnson used the former channel to the market while Wipro the latter. How true I realized. A consequence - look at the market. Both are successful but while Johnson is popular with upper class city customer segment, the latter, Wipro baby products is dominates the suburban middle class and lower middle class customer segment. Wow..that's what I call practical view of the segmentation theory I learnt in Marketing class and statistical method called clustering....the thought process rocks...

I loved them all..and wish to learn more...reflect more...realize more....till then...tata!!

P.S.: This are personal interpretations and thoughts; has no bearing with any institution or organization I am attached with.

"STAR" the "BUCKS"!!!

Starbucks..it is a coffee shop..very very popular in US. Personally I love starbucks coffee.What amazes me, is people coming down there remember and spell out complicated versions of the tasty coffee to be served. Like "Café Estima Blend® Fair Trade Certified".There are many others with "decaffe" and "with/without cream" options and so on.I find it hard to remember all these combinations...but there is no doubt that I love their coffee....especially "CAFE MOCHA"..I love that ..and these days...I have found a shop five minutes from my office; so now I am a regular visitor atleast once, in the morning..after I have checked my first lot of mails and finished my first meet with my client....
Hmmm!!!this short blog is not about their quality and fame but about an incident that quite impressed me. Usually the people attending the customers at the point of sale are cute beautiful girls from college.....:)) but the thought process I saw there, were beyond their beauty.... Let me explain the situation. The entrance to this coffee shop is a glass door where you form a single line queue waiting to be attended to, at one of 3 the cash counters where they electronically complete your transaction and pass on the order to the group ho complete the order. Now morning time is the peak time and the pain area is that the electronic transcation takes a bit of time which inturn delays the order and after they start the order, they take some time to give you your favourite coffee. At times, the order queue gets mixed and you have to wait a long time watching customers after you, being served off, which is a bit irritating as morning time is crunch time; more so for places like Canada where morning starts at 4 am in summer.
One of the store attendants got the pain area and identified the bottle neck- the order intake and the cash counter. She got one of the attendants to stand at the begining of the queue, who took the order even before the customer paid her dues and passd it on to the Serving group. There came the process improvement....the orders were taken before you paid and passed on to Coffee serving group; and by the time you completed the account transaction, your coffee is ready.....maximum a minute wait.....bingo.....process improvement..kudos lady..!!!you are the "star" for the "bucks".

Blonde Theory Unplugged!!!

Blondes.....the golden hair......even the fairy tales have them...children grow up with the notion that blondes are fairies...and all wish to have them...see a blonde with cat eyes and everyone is after her....and at the end only one can win her. Nowadays even Indians have started to get their hair colored..golden brown...can we win....??well it is not about winning nor is about the demand supply graph of blondes in this world..it is about the reality of this theory in real life.I think I first learnt about it in the dashing movie, A beautiful Mind, when the phenomenal John Nash proposes this theory.
The other day...walking down to my office a few blocks from my home, I was just thinking about two friends,both interested to concentrate in BFSI domain. Though they came from different industry backgrounds, with different ambitions in life, one wanting to be a business analyst and the other a Business development manager in Business Intelligence consulting company, yet they met somewhere and that is BFSI...banking,finance and insurance sector. Investment Banking is the other buzzword, everyone wants to be one and one who does not want to be one would love to marry one.Reasons given but do not need to be elaborated here.Hey!! I am not against them.Even I was there only; I mean I also wanted to be in BFSI in BI; finance was first a maze for me and later a craze; today I have changed; may be trying to nail down my priorities as to what I want. About that later, lets talk more about the theory.
The theory states that since every guy runs after "a" blonde, there is too much crowding around one unnecessarily when there are many other girls waiting to be woed away(please this is the theory I understood and no puns intended). So the end result is too much demand with minimum supply and collision of interests; some lose and some gain.This is bound to happen.Extend it to everything in life from food to job to ambition.Let me start off with a very small reference. Education in India. Every parent wants his or her son to be an engineer or a doctor; all others are worth less. Today, we do have chefs who are respected but there was a time, not many years ago, when they were not.Thanks to Media and stalwarts like Sanjeev Kapoor who have made cooking an "art" to be respected today. But otherwise, just evauate, we have so many engineering colleges, hunderds of computer engineers and most of them does not know why they did it or what to do with it..a degree for a job he or she will never enjoy. I have seen this when I was about to enter college and I still see it in the prospective professionals I meet today. Oh!!investment banking has also set MBA flying..everyone wants an MBA degree...a very good marriage qualification for a guy it seems; you are a manager...even if you dont have people management skills you are a manager after you have some 5 years of experience in this booming software industry even though your interests are somewhere else, may in technical architecture or may be in consulting. So what is the end result? you end up spoiling your career and also a few more who get frustrated working with you and just let life flow as it is. MBA immediately after bachelor's degree, personal opinion- it should be stopped". What does MBA mean? Master in Business Administration; how can you master something without knowing what are the real life problems in it; where are the loopholes;how can u add value to it and that too in a different way.Exceptions are there; some people are too focussed but exception do not define life.
So the problem with us....we, Indians, is that we are too stereotyped. I dont say it is bad, but I do say we can fly higher if we change the perspective. Start thinking..and there will be jobs everywhere.Everyone should think that the education they get, the job they do, add value by creating more jobs. Not just to earn and fill some pocket but create jobs...not criticise India, nor the disadvantages we have but use it to drive more.
Let me give a specific example. Two weeks back, we had been to a trip to Jasper, a a beautiful town in Canada. Some amazing friends planned an amazing camping trip to this place.Please take camping in the real sense of the word.The western way.We had to camp in a jungle or rather a national park with rules and regulations and revenue was generated out of it.I told this to my JB(jiju); he just asked me "why dont we do it when we are in India?" Well I had no answer.Good point.Then while retiring to the make-shift bed in the car during the trip, my present roomie and senior colleague just thought aloud,why dont we have such camping grounds in India; if it is organised, it can bring tremendous business to India.BINGO!! do I need to tell more or are we lost.
Let me link it. If we stop the stereotype thinking and stop running after the "blondes" we can create more jobs and yet give more value to this world. Just think about it in the NRN way; the six stalwarts created an organisation to bring world to India and they did..but today every other enterpreneur is doing the same thing without adding a new value.Line extending the concept (the El Ries way). Projecting India as the cheap labour destination.I dont think that is true enterpreneurship.generate new value chains.Why not bring the beautiful forests we have to the world? why not start a new organised sector within tourism?The northeast is still to be reached out.Indian Cuisines....bring them to the world. We have so many varied cultures, innumerable food styles. Each one can bring a hindred jobs, more value to economy. Just a few minutes back, a very close friend of mine was sugegsting opening one.Kudos!!buddy...if he can think others can, we just need to propagate it. There are innumerable such ideas waiting to be tried out in a new way;many others...leave the "blondes" alone...run after new ideas.....tcheus!!!

..Aiye Aiye General!!

No, this is not an account of a brave general nor it is the diary of a self sacrificing patriotic soldier taking the last order from the General in a bid to save his motherland.Well, I always believe those people standing at the front line of defence at the borders of our motherland have something more than just guts and patriotism to stand there, taking a bullet just for the noble cause that his country men can sleep in peace in their cozy bed, expecting at the most a garland by the political helm of his motherland on his grave or the salute of a few bullets at his death ceremony and a meagre compensation for his bereaved family.Yeh alag baat hain ki the closest look we can have on their sacrifices is through a newspaper report or a Bollywood movie made as a tribute to their noble sacrifice.Well the greatest honour they get at any point in their life is to get the national flag to adorn them before their cremation. An honour no other job can get you, an honour and a feeling I always feel worth dying for.

Well, see this is what happens to me.I am so emotional about this topic that I strayed from my main subject.Let me start of.....the following few paragraphs are my feelings or rather a reflection on the book titled "Marketing Warfare" by El Ries and Jack Trout, a book written in lucid English on a topic which appears to have nothing to do with battles and wars. The world as its seen today has seen and experienced more than 2500 years of war.Yet today in this civilised world of ours where wars are least common(at least those in the open), we have a lot to learn and apply what we have learnt from history of wars, to a profession so plain and noviolent.Only the context has changed.Today market is the battle field, competitor products and consumer the target and a MBA graduate the strategist.General Karl Von Clauswitz is the role model and his principles of handling war is the Bible to successful marketing.The very first quote in the book reflects on the thoughts of a strategist and how well he understood or rather predicted the modern day battlefield in the early half of the twentieth century. In the quote, Karl points out that war is like business or the market as both arises due to conflict of interest between groups of individual. Aiye Aiye ,sir!!!

The principle of force is as much the principal factor in marketing as it is and was in a battle.The leader always has the luxury. All other factors equal, a bigger army always enjoys the upper hand and so does a bigger company.It can spend more on Branding,advertising,R&D and even afford to lose money by reducing cost.It is not that a smaller company stands no chance; its just that it must realise that it cannot take the leader head on nor can it hope to win with notion of a superior product.All boils down to strategy...which depends on the battle ground and the ones own position. In a market, the Leader should always play defensive as it has to maintain its dominance; the second should always play offensive and attack not the others but the leader instead so as to increase market share. After all what can you get from the poor, the rich should be attacked, then one can get maximum ROI.:-)The third should wage a flanking attack against the leaders using a product that can be positioned differently in the market. I guess "Appy Fiz" is just the right example in today's scenario.Its a cold drink but it is neither a juice product , a market dominated by Tropicana and neither is it a cola or an "uncola" product.In a "Maggi Ketchup" way, ...."It's different". I am sure that great positioning and great flanking.
The rest in the market should wage a guerrilla against all.Now whats that.Well ask any Indian in the northeast and they will tell you.Everyday Naxalite guerrilla attacks kill hundreds of innocent people. In simple words, its taking a small segment of a big pie and just concentrating on that with an attitude to move out whenever there are little signs of danger. In today's world,...hmm let me think..I think Tag Heur in watches and Rolls Royce in cars..they just make it for the upper class people; only a select few can afford it.Oh yeah I forgot my favorite, Idea Cellular...wooah...let me explain how I interpret their strategy.They saw the national market already dominated by Hutch and Airtel.They can't stand against them let alone win.Hmm..so what to do..lets take a small segment of market and launch a guerrilla attack.How to segment, the rich the poor..no...the zone.Lets take only Pune and adjoining areas and lets start.They won.Today they are doing whats called line extension in Al Ries' words.I have more ..I remember Reliance did it by attacking the student market segment but they formulated it in a way which in the longer run had cost them a lot.
In every market today we can find all these categories and those who follow these principles are the best strategist and the winners in their own perspective. A true general or a strategist is a shrewd strategist.He is flexible to listen to all opinion and does not have false attitude.He is courageous enough to stand by his decisions and does not play a blame game.After all it's his army;he owns their decisions.A trait displayed by Ajay Devgan in the movie flick Gangajal where he takes the reponsibility of a brutal and henious action by his juniours to punish the criminal.He upholds law above all and says that law is equal for a criminal too and only the designated court has the right to decide the punishment; otherwise we shall return to the days of uncivilization where everyone does what he thinks is right.He is bold and knows the facts and the rules and even how to use them to the best of his advantage.He uses a mix of instinct, knowledge, experience, rules, facts and then leaves it to fate. Well the latter does always have the upperhand...no doubt.. as history says it the minister and the general is more important to the king than the king himself and fate or luck seals the ultimum.So..what say.....

Leadership and Management:Education or Virtue

Well this topic was doing the rounds in my thoughts for quite sometime but I had never put down my thoughts. An article by Larry Bossidy on the latest HBR issue drew my attention and I decided to collate my thoughts. Larry Bossidy was the CEO of AlliedSignal and also the vice Chairman of GE. In the article, where he outlines his expectations of Leader-team relationship echoes his unique leadership strides and also the matured thoughts of a true leader.
A good leader expects that his direct reports get involved with the work they do and generate ideas for every situation even if the idea may appear to be a bit crankyat first thought. He makes a point when he says that the best solutions actually are presentable and tried out crazy ideas; all may not be practically viable or pragmatically fruitful but sharing does bring out the possibility of a better solution. Collaboration amongst responsible professionals is something he gives high impetus. True enough from an example he gives, that an entire industry may suffer because the Marketing and the Production Managers do not collaborate. We may not be friendly but its professionalism to collaborate for a bigger interest otherwise the person does not deserve to be called a professional. A stark characteristic of a true professional is to be able to lead initiatives and to take risks. Life is a risk. One cannot grow without taking risks. I have learnt it the hard way; risk taking capabilities at times may turn one down but are appreciated and rewarded in life.
The capability to keep calm at times of crisis and to take up risky ventures not only makes one visible to top leaders but also makes one learn and grow. In my career I have come across brilliant programmers but they become stagnant in the industry because they would not be ready to walk that extra mile to take up something risky or more responsibility. Even candid feedbacks don’t change them; one even told me during an appraisal session that he looks at work as an assignment; give him a program to write, he will do it to the best of his abilities but nothing more.
“Develop Leaders as you develop"- a statement which truly echoes my thoughts on the industry. I believe a person who cannot motivate and develop people working with him is not fit to be a manager. A mere appraisal feedback at the end of the year just because the system mandates it, is worthless and actually does more harm than good. I believe not everyone can be a manager or a leader. My definition...a manager can motivate and develop people within his boundaries; he fails when the person in his team is equal or more capable than him; a good manager moves him out so that he can can find his way while an incapable, selfish manager feels threatened and suppresses wherever he can. A Leader is above all; he can not only motivate and develop people to his level but once he understands that the person is more capable than him, guides him beyond that. He realizes his dream through grooming a talent; he creates value; he is a visionary. History has many examples; behind every great man we have in history there was and will always be on great MENTOR or a leader. In my life I have seen such people; they have been my managers and I have seen both types.
Staying current or abreast with market news, technology is a must these days; we are advancing faster than we can grasp. Anticipating problems, market, opportunities is a trait that makes one the best suited for future leadership roles but then as Larry says “If it isn’t in your DNA to anticipate, you don’t. You can find ways to compensate but can’t change your nature”. What he essentially means is a metamorphosis in character is not possible but a good professional will find the work around.
As a CEO, Larry puts forward what he feels is expected out of him or any leader. The points, I believe are true expectations of any Leader be it at the top of a company or at the helm of a project. He should be able to give clarity of direction to the entire team and set clear goals and objectives. A rudderless pilot ship drowns the entire fleet. Ability to give frequent, specific and immediate feedback shows that the leader is interested in his team’s growth. I believe this days, most company appraisals are subjective rather than being objective and hence serves little purpose. A comment like “you need to improve your communication skills” in the appraisal meet adds no value; it needs to be specific and nailed with a pin. “You need to adjust to a varying pitch during your presentation to make your communication of an idea more effective.”- I believe that is better. A leader should be accessible not an aloof boss to a team; he should drive the initiative not be a mere spectator and turn p when in crisis and play a blame game; believe me,it motivates the team beyond limits. Honest and candid feedback helps reorient people and furthers their growth but it has to be in the right spirit both from the giver and the taker.Most often than not we fail to do so and fear that it may be destructive.The capabilty to convince people is not essential only to win over customers, its needed to win over people and a leader leads people.
Well, at the end of this discussion and the insights given by a worthy CEO coupled with my experience, I would love to conclude Leadership and management are both outputs of education and also inherent as a virtue. Not everyone can be leaders, visionaries and managers but yes you can groom to close the gaps. Not everyone can be Iococca or NRN but yes one can groom oneself to be at least a better professional.But the debate continues.......

An Idea can change your life

Today I decided to write about something which has fascinated me over past few years.Its simple.Technically called Positioning.For layman and people in the market its simple advertising while for industry its called Branding.
"An Idea can change your life"-punch line for Idea Cellular,"A lot can happen over coffee"-Coffee Day,"The network Follows you"-Hutch..and so on.Among these I like the Idea best.Its how they deliver the intended message of marketing.They dont say we are the best or second in telecom services.They have "positioned" their products differently in the prospects mind.Well these are not my words.These are the polished words of the book by Al Ries-"Positioning-A Battle for Your Mind".
In the book, the experts point out that marketing a product is not about the market but about the prospect's mind.Its the prospect's mind thats the target of a product be it a place,an item,a country....a person.Its either with respect to something already established or a new idea.All such terminologies apart,this polished concept is best exemplified by "Dalda" - Vanaspati; an alternative for ghee in Indian Cuisines.If you refer "Vanaspati" to an Indian housewife or a middle class head of the family who does the monthly shopping for the family, he/she would think twice but talk about "Dalda", they would immediately recognise.They identify the Brand more than the product.I personally know this as back in Kolkata during my school days, "Luchi" or Puri cooked in dalda was a common delicacy in functions at home.And often I would hear Ma(thats what I call my mother) calling out to me or Baba(thats my dad) to get some Dalda from the market.Thats what we call positioning in the prospect's mind.Another famous example is Cadbury;even to this day when a child visits a shop, he would ask for a "cadbury" rarely a chocolate.He may eventually chose to take an Amul Chocolate but still he identified the product by the brand Cadbury not by the product "chocolate" itself.
Such marketing or rather positioning has been done by few other companies like Xerox-the copier and Noodles-the chowmien product.Even Maggi positioned itself well; different from noodles; well enough to identify itself as a separate product though essentially its similar to noodles.The others were the first in the the target market while brands like Idea positioned itself differently in an already crowded market;not as the best or the first but as different.
In life too, the fact is that we have to market or position ourselves;be it profession,marriage,academics(specially MBA schools)...everywhere in the repective prospect's mind.Summing up..to win you dont have to perfect ; you got to be different in one way or the other to leave a mark in the prospect' mind.Oh !! thats marketing extrapolated to philosophy of life; thats truly a step in transitioning.