Picture this - Part 3. Is this Mumbai?

Despite all  the 7 wonders idea for Mumbai that several people  voted for, one thing that stands out in my mind is Kanheri caves. I don't know the exact reason why it did not figure. Whatever it be, you have to see this to believe the magnificence of the Kanheri caves.

Located in my backyard buried in the SG national Park, the various caves date between several years into BC and the newest , I recollect is first Century AD. Predominantly Buddhist, it is a climb worth any day but mostly when it rains.  

One question that will ring in your throughout the trip: " Is this Mumbai too?"

Yes. It is. Surely

Picture this! - Part 2

This week I want to take you through two stunning locations, one that most would have known and read about the other which is a replica of the original but is not as well known.

I had the opportunity to visit the replica first and at a time when the rain gods would spare none. It was pouring, blindingly lashing and mighty slippery. Still, whats life without a few thrills and some challenge.
The place of the replica of Bahubali is Karkala, about 60 odd km from Udipi. The idol is taller than Shravanabelagula except that it is mounted on a pedestal. The view is all consuming and to watch water slide over the idol is indescribable. I could only use the camera phone limitedly as the rains would not allow me stand still.

This is Karkala.

Watch this slide show.

And this is Shravanabelagola!!

Located about 45 mins from Hassan and the original place of Bahubali.  Stunning  and overpowering are two words which come to my mind when standing there. The attention to detail on the sculpting is noteworthy .. So real, so humanlike .

And taller than Karkala idol (without the pedestal by about 6 ft)


Let me know how u liked it. Pl do share with your friends and contacts. If not these  pics, at least the idea of exploring our own country.

Happy watching..

Picture this! - Part 1

Welcome back!

 I have had the luck to be in some super destinations over the past so many years. In an attempt to share it with my readers, I am trying a movie/slideshow route this time.

In my new 6 part series - Picture this! I would be showcasing/ Sharing some of the destination very few would  have visited  or viewed from the point of view I did.

In this episode I will take you to a fort called Chitradurga - as picturesque as the name sounds. On the Bangalore - Mumbai Highway about 200 kms  from Bangalore, its worth a visit..

Enjoy the trip!


** Do send me ur feedback.. Especially if u r not able to view this.
*** All pics shot on a Micromax Q7 ezpad...
**** If u need any of these pics for ur own use, do let me know,, Can send u the same.

Teachers taught.

Globally teachers' day is celebrated on Oct 5, while independent countries have their own set of dates just like we in India have September 5  as the dedicated day. I had all along  in my school, taken it as an opportunity for a holiday or to please my teachers with a smile and a wish, I mostly forgot about this courtesy in college. It was while in various jobs that I realised the need to thank the many who taught me , through formal education and those through matter of fact informal education.

My many sincere thanks to the academicians. and to the many other who taught me several good things in life.

In all, academic  inadequacies were brought out  in several walks of my personal and professional life. Two things stand out where despite all the best efforts and qualifications of the  teachers, they have not been able to elevate the students.

1.  Horses for courses: There was never an attempt to understand the learning nature of the students in order to teach them the subject. It was always a standard approach and routine and hardly an attempt to understand the students. Let me explain why.
 Children learn through Auditory measures, visual measures and through kinesthetic measures. A standard approach to all students in teaching methods will not work. A basic screening of the inclination of the students  would have done wonders to many of my friends and later me too .We  were classified as duds who have reached the peak of their learning curves. Attention was reduced to the many who were pleading to be taught differently.
It is true that experience comes after knowledge. That is what most of us have learnt  or at least taught. However, there are several times in our life that we experience something and then start exploring why we it happened. We do before we understand. Students with a kinesthetic sense of learning fall a lot in this category because they are "doers".  Similarly Visual learners always need an image. While Blackboards and charts help there is a certain image of things that students need to create in their minds.

Did my teachers really understand my friends and classmates to teach us the way we can excel? The answer could lie in their approach to teaching. Just as we have preferences for learning the teachers needed to equip themselves with the skills of understanding the students and imparting knowledge through the appropriate method. Unfortunately this was missing.


2. Ettu Surakka kootukku Udavadhu: This is a saying which means " Bookish knowledge wont help in practical life". How true!  My recent experiences with academicians and research scholars to impart us several  practices  has resulted in many a disaster. Their lab/ experimental and test condition methods do not work on field. Real life practicalities do not apply to bookish transfer of knowledge. The difference in the  results of the lab vis a vis on field is drastic.  While the foundation of what is preached is acceptable, the metrics of the lab situations cannot work for the formulation of a business.

I have always wondered what it would take for academicians to understand industry and actually work there practically . This will definitely bridge the gap between what they counsel and what happens on field.

I am not giving any scope for those who have the experience of  education - industry alliances. Several companies do so. But what I am speaking about is real life sustenance with lab results, especially where mass production agriculture etc are concerned.


Ponder over this: There are many schools emerging with several teaching techniques.  But please, can someone tell me who has assessed what the right style of learning  for the student is. Has anyone been given a note at the time of admission in those great learning schools of today as to what category your child falls under and what they school will do or what u as parents need to do at home?  It is always a postmortem of things with numerous deficiencies being cited. Are teachers and counsellors  -  doctors to judge biological deficiencies of our children and classify them as learning "disabled"? No. Let the qualified doctor do that. There are enough and more techniques today to assess what your ward wants. Let there be a system or a school or teachers who are willing to learn those so that their students can learn.

It is high time they did and practiced on their students too. After all what the student becomes in future is also a  reflection of who his teacher was,

Learn and Let Learn

I have often started some oratory sessions with this story. least did I realise it would pave the way for what could be a business transformation to  our future.

Years ago in this village was a wise man named Mullah Moinuddin. It was an event for many  villagers to listen to him deliver wise words. It was the turn of one of the more populated village. Some key men went to the Mullah and invited him for a sunday lecture. Mullah agreed and promptly landed in the village - a large gathering indeed. After the initial courtesies, the Mullah asked." Does any of you know what I am going to speak about?". The Villagers were silenced at the question, slowly everyone said, " No Sir, we do not know". The Mullah, said," In that case there is no point for me to speak to you all, as you don't know anything", packed and left. The village was stunned to silence.

 Slowly they all recovered and approached the Mullah and persuaded him  to visit them again.  Mullah agreed and promptly landed in the village the following Sunday- a large gathering again. After the initial courtesies, the Mullah asked." Does any of you know what I am going to speak about?". The Villagers smiled at each other at the question, then everyone said, " Yes Sir, we do know". The Mullah, said," In that case there is no point for me to speak to you all, as you already know", packed and left. The village was stunned to silence. 

Slowly they all recovered and approached the Mullah  and persuaded him to visit them again. The  Mullah agreed after much reluctance and landed in the village the following Sunday- a large gathering again. After the initial courtesies, the Mullah asked." Does any of you know what I am going to speak about?". The Villagers smiled at each other at the question, but one half of them  said, " Yes Sir, we do know".  The other half said, " No Sir, We do not know". The Mullah, gently smiled at the villagers and said," In that case, those who know please tell those who do not". Thus  packed and left. 

Many a time we have encountered such attitudes in our college days and more so in our respective organisations.. A few know  and several who dont. It has lead us to situations where business decisions are based on little knowledge  for either want of information or our reluctance to approach those who know. What Mullah Moinuddin did surely brings the irony of matters to perspective and also provides a very humourous  moment. 

Most importantly, it has led to a key message of "Collaborative Learning". In a public domain we may have a wikipedia. However, what is today's requirement is a collaborative organisational learning environment.   

How would it benefit?

A culture of management and people which will assist in decision making, share knowledge, make us grow in experience and ensure transparency, colleagues  who will never hold the company to ransom, no more going  to a few individuals who are the so called "information power centres" , no more worrying that knowledge walks out with the people who exit, no more long recovery time upon employee exists, lots of multi disciplinary idea contribution, synergistic new product innovations and a lot more flatter organisational structures, processes re-engineered , the transformation of silo-ed workers to knowledge workers..

Are you  ready to be knowledge worker?

Terms of Engagement!

Throughout my  corporate career, I was honoured to be associated with some great brands and good men. However, there were some mistakes which I did and have seen many other colleagues and industry mates commit too. Today I  want to give some pointers to readers on what to look for before your next big assignment.

1. Get your Job description  right: 

Make sure you are getting complete clarity on your job role , who your report to and how you are going to be  measured for your performance. Quite possibly you will be in an environment that will be  starting from scratch or having fairly informal HR setup. Push for the job description and understand what is to be delivered.  If the companies/ HR is not able to give this , give them time to come back on this . If they do not offer it in the time limit too, put a pin on that offer.

2. Get the right break up of your components: 

It is imperative that you get the salary components right.. Take it to a Chartered accountant and get help on a comparison of your current  pay package and benefits vs the new offer. Unless that difference is significant for you to change, put a pin on the offer.

3. Check for references:

Just as the company would check your reference, you need to get across to a few individuals to know/ learn about the company. In this connected  world, its easy to get to know such people and even easier to get advised. Safeguard yourself against internal policies . You may also look into Employer surveys/ great place to work rankings etc if they are  in public domain.

4. Know your age group:

It is imperative to know how many people are there in your age group in your cadre. You can be easily left out if you have to deal with varied age groups .. you are either going to do what others say or no one is gong to do what you say if  age class differences exist. You need to be fortunate to have a consensual decision making  group.

This can be found from Linkedin again where there is a bar graph of age vs designation for organisations.  Of course this is only for those members of the organisation who are in linkedin.  ( That itself  could say what the network culture of the organisation is.)

5. Look for Plans: 

Read a lot into the companies press releases/ annual reports.. Look for how much space they devote to products and services and their progress..  If you are likely to handle a P/L , be even more aware of this.

6. Who is in the Board ?

Look for what kind of profile sit in the board. If there are a variety of people then the chances of your CEO being advised right are high. For example,  If its a bunch of Chartered accountants, then forget this place.. There will be no product approach to anything here. Cost and Cash flows are the most that will figure in your agenda most often.

7. Never rush into joining:

Serve your full notice period and complete your assignment in your current place. If you leave things midway, there is every chance that your future employer will start interaction from day one with the opinion that you will get away some day- halfway.

I am in no way advising you to join without the money objective.  Pl make your shift for that alone if its your objective.  But make sure you land in a place which makes you happy.

BTW, these could be traits that you may find in your current organisation too. Discuss with the leaders and bring about a change where needed.

Happy Careers!

PS: I will be happy for you to share this  article with many of your friends and colleagues. Pl help them if the above are relevant.

Financial freedom!

Freedom is defined in the dictionary as follows :The power to act, speak and think  as one wants without restriction ; The state of not being imprisoned or enslaved :  The quality of being independent  of fate or necessity.

What I see  and learn by observing several of my friends, colleagues and associates and my own life, the need to be free financially is more than any.  While several advisors and companies are equipped to advise on this more than me, the true need for financial freedom is not the requirement to spend as one needs to  but to be able to spend on a rainy day.

I have somewhat learnt this about 10 years  back when I had to save for a longtime before I could afford the advance payment of my home. Most individuals (and all of them are well to do ones) I have spoken to have only told, I need someone to tell me where to invest. They have all claimed to to be well aware of their cash needs; however, I have also heard them constantly talk about not being able to expend a little more each month as they have to meet their ends. ( I have been in such situations too..)


Just as many of you would run your companies or at least your respective divisions,  it is wise to work out an income and expense statement for your personal life too. Just as your would work a cash flow statement, work out a similar one for your life / family too. Just as you would expend/ hold back expenses for your company do a similar act in your life too.  Just as it helps your company it will help in your life have a great lift.

Unlike in the past there are several financial planners who one can approach to help one plan financially.  For those who would not want to, at least make a simple cash flow of your annual income and expenses.  Anticipate your expenses, plan your purchases.  Have the freedom to spend when you want to .  For which, one needs to think and act. What I am talking is  not about investing  in stocks or MFs or real estate. But being able to have the right amount of money without having to maneuver  too much when needed. Your real estate may not be able to sell on time, your stocks can tank. But your liquid cash planning will never give you wrinkles. It calls for  some time and a bit of prudent financial thinking.

This may not be relevant to those who already know everything unless its a reminder for them if they have not acted upon.  Its easy to exercise restraint to your expenses. The second approach to happiness is to have the resources to spend when you want to.  Freedom is not about restraint.. it is the state of being able to move unrestricted..


Can we say financial freedom is the quality of being independent of financial fate or financial necessity?

Happy free life!

What is your Key Message?

I have resumed  following a particular domain  that I have worked on, after a couple of years through press reports. I did a a fair bit of reading and one glaring point seems to emerge. That is the lack of Key messaging.

Companies and people have been written about and interviews galore. Results declaration are happening and celebrations of successes figure  too. However, while I see a varierty of issues being discussed and various conclusions being drawn, I am unable to see how they connect.  The real reason seems to be the lack of Key Messaging strategy. What is key messaging? Why is it so critical? Key Messaging is that which the leaders of the company determine when they decide on their goals for the year. This is reflected in all of their business approaches but communicated most in their PR/ communication strategy. This helps in being consistent to the press in your communication, when the entire organisation goes about saying the same messages there is greater impact -  beyond the growth of genuine belief in them. Each and every opportunity that the organisation and its leaders get to present their pubic face, they are perceived through the key messages . Eventually the reporters start believing and the share holders too.- thus they spiral effect of the key messages - the objective, the progress, the results, all of these are written about through the period of the messaging strategy : ALL OF THEM LINK UP.

Key messages can be on your target market, technology adoption, austerity measures, people orientation, customer satisfaction etc. It is also in parallel important to keep the no of items in key messaging limited to 2 at best 3. Else it is possible not to prioritise. Key Messaging helps in communicating consistently, helps keep the focus on the communication  when multiple faces of the organisation starts speaking etc. It helps in the press writing what you would like them to write about.

Most importantly, it builds a believable PR image for your organisation.

The aggregator is dead ! Long live the aggregator!

Its about 10 years since the emergence of players into the mobile VAS market.  Feb 2002 is when Indiatimes 8888 set the trend in this market with multiple publications and media houses doing a ditto.  The key issues then was the oblique dynamics involving the carrier and what today we would call rest of the contributors in the eco system.  In a purely text based activity,  the carrier, the gateway provider and either the aggregator or the content owner formed the eco system.  In an voice based service the gateway provider was replaced by the platform provider , and in a data service, the players in the eco system remained similar.

It is with the advent of music that the revenues started booming but at the same time the imbalance in the eco system started growing bigger. Despite the attractive top lines , I am suspecting that there was very little attention that was paid to the bottom lines of the players in the ecosystem. If one draws up a very simple profit pool for the participants in the eco system, we may realise that the histograms suggest that the lowest bottom lines are with the aggregators  followed by platform providers and the the CPs.  However, we see the maximum no of players is in this category only. Huge upfront acquisition costs and wafer thin margins have ensured profitability does not grow in these segments. Also, the platform players saw their margins too getting down from close to 25% in 2002 to 8 % and even lesser today. Still the race is here too with many entrants or at least existing ones upgrading into that space. 

Even in the gaming space, if anyone can claim the real existence of one in India, the situation has come to be one of aggregation all through with worthy original locally developed  titles being a minor amount. There is every possibility that these players too will move to a platform play to survive in future, if they already have not done by now.

Once again if we compare a profit pool of  2002 to 2005/6 to 2011 one can clearly see that it is increasingly becoming a tighter spot to be an aggregator.  While we have witnessed the dual roles performed by platform players as aggregators or CPs as direct relationships with carriers, my guess is we will witness more of these in the coming future. The CPs ( and specifically music labels will be either direct in their deployment or will acquire aggregators ( possibly those who have been major partners primarily for their logistics and distribution strengths).   While this kind of a consolidation  could  be welcomed, those who have not figured which way to progress, the tech route or the aggregator route will possibly face a  shutdown.   2011/12 will be an interesting year for the mobile VAS segment in India.

Like the assemblers and box pushers  in the PC market whose value addition is practically zero today, the role of an aggregator has gotten marginalised as time progressed.  

The situation is not very dissimilar if one were to consider profit pools within product categories in the players' portfolio. The ability to constantly evaluate where your bottom line comes from and strategise to  create a mix that is advantageous to the player is critical. CPs  riding the  MG wave and sitting in a safe house  will benefit only as long as the aggregator space will exist gainfully. 

In a domain which has come to exist and grow for 10 years there is bound to be disintegration  and consolidation. Thats only natural.  How to remain stable after the shake out is critical. There is no dearth of resources in  creating  newer products and services.  There are plenty of opportunities to be original in your services. Create IP, retain them . 

The road may be hard, but companies  will still live to see the end of it.

How the Scriptures show us the path to Knowledge Management

I was personally pleased and pleasantly  surprised too at the no of reactions and feedback obtained for the random  observation of the Mahabharatha being our first wiki. In fact the more I dig , the more similarities I find  from our great past to our modern present.  I am a reasonably organised individual and have been able to run  fairly streamlined functions in my professional career too. However, one thing that has been tough and almost never been able to put to action is to collectively document  organisational knowledge, which I have been handicapped by the loss of personnel , inability to articulate matter which cannot be described in words easily, lack of transfer of knowledge gained through observation and other unstructured  content repositories. etc. 

In an era which is increasingly valuing specialists  and specialist domains, managing one's organisational learning has become paramount.  More thrust is being given to internal dependence for knowledge. Thus, we hear many a organisation and so many management gurus speaking about converting your organisation into a knowledge organisation and your employees into knowledge workers.

While the actual effort and method for such a transition can be deliberated , I found some cues in the way our scriptures are organised and how they determine their purpose.  Lets for a moment draw up a parallel . Just as the (sastram) Scriptures define a way to lead the human life and help us fulfill the human life, the  KM portal would tell anyone in the organisation, where they stand on their progress and how their own goals ( KPI's ?)  ought to move, where they could share and look out for information from various other related and interlinked departments/ domains.

Just as  the scriptures are more a " May I help you ?  - centre", the KM portal is also s May I help you centre for the organisation. If you want to know something , here is an help desk for you to approach. If you can manage on your own, just fine., else it is there to help.  The KM portal grows more out of volunteering and self initiatives and like the scriptures cares for those who seek help.

Just as "sas" would mean to teach, and "trai" means "to protect", KM would learn form contribution, teach us in turn and protect us as we go forward.

I was also intrigued by the way the structuring of the messages (which I see as knowledge) in the Vedas. They are not found in a single place or sub head... some are in Rg, some in Yajur so on and so forth. Just the way organisational knowledge on any single subject is just not resident only at some top echelons or in a single entity. Just as the vedas are non human products, it would be akin to a vision or passion/mantra of any organisation. 

The primary purpose of KM according to many experts is the transfer of "tacit " knowledge to "explicit " knowledge. This can be done only through interpretations, metaphors and analogies which eventually will drive home a message. Thats exactly how the Vedas are interpreted.. They are so abstract that it is not possible to interpret them. Thus the emergence of secondary scriptures, which have brought to us various ideas of the vedas though strories, some true and otherwise, which are systematically arranged, something we dont find in the vedas. This is a parallel purpose of knowledge management - transfer through metaphors, analogies to bring out a realistic product for the organisation.

Just as the vedas would guide us to lead a life of dependence or independence,  organisations also, eventually would attain their Sreyas by becoming tired of their dependence on knowledge elsewhere and start looking within. This exactly is where all members of the organisation will gravitate towards.. 

The knowledge Portal!!

Is the Mahabharath our first wiki ?

I have been brought up in a childhood surrounded by fair amount spirituality and as a matter of fact I for a period went to an oriental school where the uniform for a white shirt and Dhothi what with its huge insistence on sanskrit and learning of the vedas. Despite being honoured by the then Governor for the immaculate recitation of vedas and many such motivations, my  tryst with spirituality seemed to have ended there. Then came a more westernised life in thinking and everything in the world was in mind except my past; in fact our Indian past. Three decades later by sheer boredom I looked into the books and text  on Vedanta  which my brother has been attending classes for, the past 18 odd years.

The first few pages went about a little routinely when suddenly the concept of Prayas and Sreyas was disclosed. Prayas is the materialistic pursuit while Sreyas is the pursuit for actualisation. Let me remind you that these concepts were written and handed down  centuries ago and when I say that I mean at least about 4000 years and before.   It is no surprise that  there is a coincidence with Maslov's theory of needs. where the first parts of the pyramid is all about basic and materialistic needs  (Prayas) and the last one is of self actualisation (Sreyas)

More, as I read further down , there is clear evidence that a significant amount of concepts and knowledge rests within our scriptures and more importantly these have been handed over so many generations to reach us and our future by  potent knowledge sharing tools. They have been scripted and documented, interpreted and documented, discoursed and listened to, discoursed further and taught verbally , listened to and interpreted, transferred through further through repeatedly sharing the knowledge. Today we are so much in awe of the way wikipedia has managed to bring user generated content and documentation sharing which essentially is a compilation by mulitple authors. Simply put knowledge shared in multiple modes.

The scriptures are not the handed over notes of one individual but several who never had the inclination to proclaim themselves as  authors  for whatever reason.  For the ones who came in late , our greatest epic , The Mahabharatha , though widely credited to Sage Vyasa as the author, is a compilation of  and addition to by several contributors and was scripted over several centuries after the great war took place. Archeological dating of the period of the Mahabharatha is around 950 BC .  For those who know King Dhirdarashtra and King Pandu, may also know that Vyasa  fathered  these two Kings. The official date of the compilation of the Mahabharatha is, 400 BC - 300 AD which adds great credence to the argument that Vyasa also has not written the epic alone  ( very unlikely he lived over 450-900 years )  but it is a compilation of contributions.

Thus it would be the oldest and may be the first "WIki".

It is highly improbable that such sharing as in the first case and compilations as in the second,would have happened without any networking, interconnected -ness and interactivity.

The above two are  instances of what our ancestry and heritage holds for us. It is rather unfortunate in one sense that the western civilisation brags about these as an invention and revolution while we have forgotten or mostly unaware of what pedigree we come from. On the other hand it is fortunate that the western world has woken someone like me and many others I presume ,to revisit a worthwhile past and may be  go back to our roots.

Passion to Articulation

 I have often felt that it is the passion of the entrepreneur which he is able to portray as  a vision and translate it into  mission/ goals and objectives. Whenever this passion is not articulated properly, there is a generic struggle in envisioning and the statements of vision lands into being a string of words of numbers and targets;

While, I have gotten into  a debate on this a few times, I  would like to take up an example of how it can possibly be done without much fuss.

Firstly I believe the core of the organisation's vision has to emanate out of the prime mover who mostly is the owner/chairman or the CEO. He is at the centre of matters and interpretation of his /her thoughts/ words and sentences are key to the clarity in communication and goal setting.  Thus his/her passion  must be   profound and as open as possible  and be subjected to so many positive interpretations. Secondly, it must be  understood by the key leaders of the organisation and enable them to  subsequently work towards achieving this goal through  the business cases/plans  for the organisation for that year.

Thus the first round of leaders need to know exactly what the interpretations of the vision for their respective businesses need to be.

In my example , I would like to consider a media/entertainment house which is where I have spent most of my time.

What could possibly be a passion for the entrepreneur who has come to be in the entertainment space.

Thus he could start with a mantra  of  "We entertain"

One could interpret this by answering :

Who to entertain?
Demographically it could be a global market or say India or Indians all over. What it has given you is your target market /audience.

How do we entertain? Domains get defined when you say through Motion Pictures/ Broadcast / Internet/ Mobile

Thus your entire spectrum is covered. Now , if you put in saying Movies, soaps, Music, Games.

 etc, You have the via media ready.

This has instantaneously decided your devices of consumption: Theatres, DVDs, TV, PC, Handhelds, Mobile and others.

Which has further told you the formats of production of the content and possibly the pricing too.

Now lets say we extend to quantifying this.. (  25% of the Indians will be entertained by year xxxx). This leads to identifying how and what modes? ( Immediately distribution and devices take priority).. territories, theatrical, home videos, TV, Internet,  console, Mobile etc.

All of them start looking at how they can contribute to 25 % of their respective target audiences.
Theatrical says I will get 25% of theatre audience to watch my movies, 25% of TV audience will watch my programs, 25% of the games will be mine, 25% of the music listened to will be from my stable etc.

Now, it becomes that much easy to know where the company is headed and all strategies from, forming your slate, preparing your catalogue, the distribution network expansion, resource planning and funding will fall in place.

Most importantly, every single worker of the organisation knows where he is headed and how his profile and deliverables are quantified and what his contribution means to the company.


Year on Year, the quantifiable mission of the company changes from  entertaining 25% to say 30% and so on. The rest of the questions are answered automatically. You automatically add new businesses in the space, new distribution methods in the space, newer audiences in the space but the vision and communication is never changed.

It is even an easy decision to include or drop an emerging opportunity, lets say news or sports if the vision is clear.

I see quite a number of the new age companies working with unbridled passion but not well articulated  mantra/vision. It takes a bit of the Boss's  time and resource and certainly lays  the foundation for any initiative of the company in future.

Focus on the processes

We have so many times in the past year or so heard from the cricketers and the coaches that the key to their success has been to focus on the processes. Even after several astounding successes we still hear some of the younger generation players remind us of their effort to get the processes right and focus on the same.

This is not a word - "Process"-  only in the  cricketing domain but in several other sports and my provocation of this piece of logging thoughts today was when Dre in the Karate Kid also mentions to his friend on focussing on the process and the rest will follow.

It is true for our wards too. We have to enable them evolve a process for their eventual objectives of life -whether in studies or hobbies or sports that they pursue . Why , even in being a human being who respects others and evolves into being a respected human also has a process to focus on.

It is not often that companies do this ( focussing on processes)  , surprisingly , even while they speak about the same. they are too impatient in the end result fructifying and not in  how it happens consistently.
So whats needed to build processes?

A clear goal, an achievable and realistic timeline, a well defined way to reach the goal., an extraordinary belief from a team who will achieve .

Is that all?

Well, nothing that is not measured is achieved. Thus a performance metric for each of the processes. It helps in assessing where one stands as against the goal in each of the processes and lets you improve.

Easier said than done. But when done, there is success waiting.

Reversal of the Digital colonisation

The last couple of posts have been fairly popular with whoever has been devoting time on strategy. I have received some personal mails and a healthy debate and dialogue is ensuing. I am thankful to all who keep this going.

One of the mails doing rounds last 10 days is the further slide of Nokia's market share.

I was made to think about the trends and patterns on several aspects of what came across my life or what I learnt from them. However, some of the patterns that emerge are too good to be true  and ever more disbelieving is the way we as humans react so differently to the situations at two different times and eras.

This one emerged the first time in my mind  in one of the training programs a few years ago, when the third wave was being cited with reference to context of training.

What caught my eye was that during the Industrial revolution and subsequent colonialism under the precinct of international trade the Europeans did move the world, exploited it and made many a nation and its citizens subservient. was the cause of many a revolution and shouts for  indigenous  growth /production etc. The way people reacted to this invasion was more  adopting but never adapting . almost always hostile or subservient under fear.

The Europeans moved out of their respective countries as markets there saturated  and moved towards the East and Africa and upon either saturating these markets or a complete loss to local pressure and protest had lost their ground and retreated. Two markets they could not do much - China and Korea - were probably informing the world of something.

It may not be so evident to many but somehow the GSM era is witnessing a similar pattern; especially in the handset market. The Nokias and Siemens and Ericssons  of the world have looked beyond their states and beyond Europe and into the Asian markets and then now hoping for the African markets. The absolute dominance they had on the Asian markets and the subsequent rise of the eastern brands- Chinese and  Korean .

While in the earlier invasion cycle, their exit was more geographical and with violent local protests, their digital colonisation was welcomed in many ways with open arms. Eventually the retreat here too is as eventful and dramatic if not as violent - physically. If market shares are compared to the stretch of the kingdoms, then the erosion and shrinkage of the pie is for all to see as did the kingdom. Again, two kingdoms they never dominated even in this digital invasion is China and Korea are informing soemthing.

A reversal of the digital colonisation by the european brands has long set in.  Do I perceive it as the end of that as the beginning of  colonisation by our Asian neighbours ?

From protesting any foreign influence in the past, today in a truly global village, the citizens react prudently and adopt to their benefit. They allow any invasion, digital or fashion to happen as long as its meeting their developmental goal. However, they can be as ruthless in dictating an exist even in this era.

Such trends or reversal of trends , am sure is visible in many a field. If there are interesting ones pl do share.

Team Building: Cricketing Lessons !

I will have to set aside the cooking analogy that I promised to write about for another day as the IPL IV lessons seem to have more currency.

There are two key messages  that I have come across when it comes to team building.
One is  who you choose  and two is who you retain.

This is very relevant when we start new ventures and how you plan to scale. For a button start situation , we need to figure who the best and affordable are and make sure we get them. Just have a look at Chennai Super kings or for that matter Mumbai Indians. They did their best in picking and retaining their biggest bets. And they went all out in making the most in getting their combo in consistent winners.

Building the senior management team for yourself is also as important. Go behind the ones who you have trusted and make sure they believe in what you start and you showcase your belief in them.
It is not as easy as it is made out to be. Very difficult to meet the pay standards, very high degree of emotional connect needed, not easy to meet many unsaid expectations.  But as long as the vision is shared, there is success waiting to happen.

Retaining your team: This is even more difficult, especially if you have a investors who either do not understand the business or  are eternally impatient on progress.  It is not a rule to assume that each time there is success it is the product and each time there is a setback its the people.

Maintaining the team, allowing them to make their mistakes and adjustments and bringing them to alevel where you are sure they know what they are supposed to do takes time and does not come by nature to many and comes by nurture only to a few.

One of the success factor for consistent performance is a solid team which knows the job , each other and is retained for long. Slice and dice, cut and chop does not work.
In IPL IV, we can see the reason why CSK runs a consistent form, WHy RCB suddenly hit a consistent form,  Why Mumbai performed till they started shuffling and eventually dropping team mates.


It may just a sport but lets know that captains are running the company equivalent which is the team and their performance/wins is the equivalent of revenue and they also appraise members like companies do.

This is really dicey and difficult. But with a bit of care and shrewdness it is achievable.

Start Small, Plan Big, Grow Large!

In my last few assignments I have  been a victim of too many too soon. While I would partly attribute this to the management style of the owners and their inherent maverick approach, I would also attribute this to the way the industry in which I functioned.

A key agenda for growth that many companies  (especially at the start) would have is push many products and services, be present in all categories, get a virtual spread, de-risk, etc... Tell me , while most of us landed up doing all this, it is very late in the day that we realise that we had done one or two of this correctly and hence we are where we are today  in success terms and we did not have the plan and resource to do the rest well and hence we are where we are today.

My own personnel experience of the latter has had its own consequences.. Pushing for many things in parallel is essentially a result of
 a. lack of clarity on what we need to do
 b. A paranoid mind which keeps telling if you are not there then you will miss out.
 c. Your organisation does not have the key strengths to make it and hence you are all over the place.

The resultant effects,  multiple focus (de-focus) areas,  poor or incomplete planning, no growth period for any of them, highly burnt out team and resultant loss of steam in the products.

The lesson here is focus on one key initiative and make it big. I understand the need to have a portfolio of services and the de-risking etc. But don't worry about the portfolio in the first few years of your growth. Make that one thing happen and then  start pushing for many.

Once again Cricket has come to help in reminding the basics of Business. Steve Waugh the great Australian  Skipper once said on his belief in  on-field strategies and tactics," If you don't stand for one thing , You will fall for everything".

What a  depth in that statement!  Very true for any one in today's age and time when specialising in your domain is more important than being a jack of all trades.




In my next post lets figure out  how cooking teaches philosophy!

Parallels from Cricket

It is often that I try and bring analogies from either food/culinary skills or from Cricket. My madness for both has more or less been imbibed into my blood . However, some of those examples and parallels that I have drawn to motivate myself and simplify complex tasks have been absolutely effective.

One of the key complex tasks of any organisation is the achievement of sales targets. Every time a sales target is set either top down or bottom up , discussed, consultative or handed down it eventually lands up with one question ," How is it possible to achieve this? We do not have the time to do this. " etc.

The primary pressure point in achieving sales targets or for that matter any target is TIME. It just flies off as we discuss target and puts pressure on us.

One way to beat this pressure is to look at an one day international match a little more closely.  While every one in the world from viewers to critics to commentators to scorecards  keeps talking about run rate per over and analysing it, the only one who does not really bother about these metrics and focusses on the next ball and sees what he can score off that is the batsmen.

The ODI has 300  legal balls and give and take a few wides and no balls and a few extras , it may be about 310 balls. Any financial year has about 365 days and give and take the sundays (non earning and holidays) and this boils to about 300 revenue earning days .

See it is that simple.

Look at the sales targets from the point of view of the salesman on the street.  What is his overall target? Break it down to his daily target. Score of every ball and wait for the next. Score of each day  that days target and wait for the next day.

No batsmen ever overloads his mind with what he will do in the next ball. He focusses on the current. and waits for the weak bowler or the power plays.

Similarly focus on each day's target, wait for the big festival season, holiday offers, new pdts, big ad campaigns etc to score a flurry and push ur target up.

There is no way you can fall way behind target if you try something like this.

( Those who have been or known the way yellow pages slaesmen function would vouch for this approach)

While in cricket there is a win loss situation, in real life it is only a win as  you did all that you could, focussed on the current, didn't build castles or fool yourself on the big landslide you will achieve on a new product, you worked on a realistic timeline which you  are in control of (today) and still had a lot of time for yourself.

Any big target looks manageable in this approach. Well, it may not need cricket to teach this for many. But for me thats what taught this rule.

Did I land up achieving my targets. Well, every time I followed this method I did.  Each time I played a pre determined stroke ( meaning not assessing the situation and trying to do what had already thought was right strategy or an extravagant move), I failed.

However, when you have a good solid team strength, the chances of most of your team succeeding is very high. One or two falling short is recoverable with a little bit from those over achievers.

And the Managers' job?

Just sit back, relax and manage those daily metrics.

Care and let Care

I distinctly remember when the head of ad sales kept bringing in the erosion of sales personnel to the CEO in review meetings  but never once had any strong recommendation coming forth from the Boss.. Except that  he would say, "I understand your concern. Make sure you do something about it".

How many times in our growing professional life would we have lost personnel at ground level or at the immediate subordinate level  or really had tough situations in tackling them and found ourselves in a whining mood to our bosses. And many times the only support from the bosses would be " You need to handle it".

 Well, its true.. But while we realise this truth in a calmer mood do we really know why our boss said so.

I have been observing this situation in many organisations and have fallen into this cycle myself  though very early in my career.  While , each one can do a bit of an observation to understand what I am talking about, it is imperative to understand the real meaning and method how to convert this into an advantage.

One absolutely sane superior of mine did bring it to my senses the following:

1. As the ultimate boss, he /she is only interested in only in the interests of his immediate reports.  So the first level needs to worry about his next level. and so on. 

2. Encourage your first level to care about their first level.

3. Anticipate and make sure a you have a plan to handle it.

4. Guide to take action but keep the  interference minimal.

Try and not interpret this approach as non- committal or an hierarchical issue or lack of concern for lower levels..

What it means is while your first level knows you care for them , they also learn to do the same by mirroring to their next level. Really, my own experience of retention has been good but at the same time and definitely helped in developing able managers. 

It also gives your direct reports a sense of non-interference from you which I feel  is most critical in  handling personnel. 

Yes, it helps in building effective managers  and strong organisation structures and also lets each managerial level focus on their respective jobs.

Keep it Simple, Silly

I have been watching some of the ads on TV that urges silly you to keep it simple.   It is necessary to keep things simple. That will help us surely succeed. Google, Apple are renowned examples that we all know. Simple things stay with humans longer as they enable us to understand and serve the purpose without any effort. But its not that easy as it is said.

When Indiatimes 8888 was started as a project it had everyone possessed in all aspects due to the endless possibilities and the hockey stick growth it promised. The services were ready, the distribution on dot, the launch was super- what with a front page 200 col cm editorial in the Times of India.

The first of the lessons of simplicity came from the management  when the short code was chosen. In all our enthusiasm and euphoria surrounding the project, we took a short code 864- meaning TOI on phone as would anyone then.  It was unceremoniously shot down and asked to go back for something simple. Thus cam 8888.  Can anyone contest that?

But  still something else really worried. The keywords were aaaa, aaa, ccc etc for each service, the menu was  multi layered menu, m and life surely was complicated. No amount of education and publicity would have gotten us the desired adoption.

Then came the second wave of " keep it simple". Natural language progression, most english words are spelt the way they are pronounced (atleast the first three characters, except maybe words like psychology and others). So all things changed. Every single service was accessed with the first three characters. Most did not struggle to get their cri, jok, leo, sto, mov, res,  and even dat..

Numbers grew, following grew and so did many more services.

The easy recall and the eventual success is surely attributed to the simplicity of it.
Isn't it true that the simplest things are always the greatest.

With fear and lots of favour

It does not look like its 23 years since I joined this prestigious newspaper and I was so thoroughly ingrained  on my then bony frame , that The Hindu stands for A B C of journalism. Accuracy, Brevity and Clarity. It was with great pride that I would stride into every home during  research and take all feedback from readers and others - that The Hindu is for the aged , easy chaired, old world charm, very belated in breaking news and almost wont speak of anything not verified.

There were stories ( and in good humour too) of how the press used to be stopped for the final confirmation of the doctor's note to publish the demise of even great leaders. Well, invariably I would be  defending all the feedback and explaining the user that The Hindu stood for the ABC of journalism and will not publish anything that is not fit its editorial policy.

Cut to April  2011, when I visited some of my friends and past colleagues in this organisation , I cherished and relived some of the stories but prided at the fact that the "Mount Road Raja" stood for what few others did.

The 23 years that flew by had me witness some from close quarters and others from a distance of how editorial principles were misused, abused, disused and even refused, courtesy my career path in the media industry.
I have been happy at how principled some were: The publishers of PC Quest were always ready to inform the manufacturer about the possible poor review his product is likely to get and any publicity/advertisement in the concerned issue can be dropped. A clear message that you are important but our reviews cant be influenced.

I further witnessed the era of the internet when there was an abject surrender to the monetary pressures applied by advertisers on what appeared and what did not. In parallel there was a revolution of the open sale of column centimeter of editorial content, a blatant attempt to influence the user through glamour and clamour.

Today, I stand a bit disappointed after reading  the letter of Mr. N.Ravi to his colleagues and the narration of the editorial compromises that he claims have been made.   http://tinyurl.com/6ytln3n

The tussle between circulation ads and editorial promises were always interesting, one always supporting the other but now the wall that existed seems to have been an imaginary  line. 

ABC has quite slipped to mean Advertisements, Bias and Circulation.

Amidst all this I still feel there stood a few who will not possibly compromise. They will grow in stature, at least in my mind and a lot many like me.

Just a reminder of what  journalists stand for  - ''to give the news impartially, without fear or favor, regardless of party, sect, or interests involved"