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It’s a Jungle Out There
C'est La Vie

It’s a Jungle Out There

The jungle is not a place of predator and prey, instead it’s about collaborating and sharing the same waterhole. For so long, I have heard the phrase “it’s a jungle out there” mentioned in the context of the cruel world of business , and understood it to mean that only the fittest will survive and it’s each man to his own, constantly watching his back, in the fight for survival. There are various other metaphors used which underline this sentiment. At a top management conference of a large, politics ridden organisation, one of them pithily said “let’s face it, either you are the road roller or the road – there is no third option”. Either you are the hunter or the hunted, the predator or the prey. So, when I actually went into the jungle a few months ago, I realised pleasantly that “it’s a jungle out there” isn’t about […]

April 1, 2012 0 Comments
End of Ride-the-Wave Growth
Demand Drivers

End of Ride-the-Wave Growth

Consumer demand is still a large pie, and the bigger share will go to agile consumer-centric businesses Is consumer demand alive and well, even after the Budget? Prices will go up, driven by service tax and excise duty increases; cost of fuel, freight and utilities, and EMIs too, have shot up. India Inc will most likely take a one-shot price correction and pass on even past-absorbed cost increases to consumers in for a penny, in for a pound being their logic. And, in any case, the stock market is too woebegone to react too much. Of course, the absolute truth is that when prices go up, demand comes down, and it is tempting to conclude that consumer demand is heading for the ICU and tough times lie ahead. However, business logic should not be as simplistic as that, and before FY13 business plan targets are slashed, consider this: the total […]

August 24, 2012 0 Comments
India Inc needs a strategy makeover
Business Strategy

India Inc needs a strategy makeover

EXCERPTS from Rama Bijapurkar’s new book highlight a framework for integrating customer centricity into business strategy India Inc, since 1991, has operated with the implicit logic that “if you expand supply and manage operations skilfully, you are sure to win”. As is evident from revenue and profit growths over the past decade and a half, this logic has served it well. Consumption growth rose steadily year on year, riding on the back of significant increases in household income as a result of overall economic growth. Consequently, and understandably, the demand side of business did not occupy a prominent place in business-strategy development for India Inc. The strategic focus has almost entirely been to build an efficient and scalable supply machine that could make the maximum hay while the sun shone. Of course, over the past two decades, there have been several anxious moments when demand blips occurred due to environmental […]

March 11, 2012 0 Comments
Ladies First
C'est La Vie

Ladies First

Stories of successful women Almost all the “aha” thoughts I have had that helped me navigate through the self-inflicted pain of super-woman-itis, chip-on-the-shoulder gender bias, guilty motherhood, to be she-male or female dilemmas, came from women icons, celebrities, and regular people who were part of my life journey. Last week’s Women’s Day calls for sharing some of these stories. I tagged along with a bunch of senior journalists, on the campaign trail during the last Bihar assembly elections. That’s when I met Rabri Devi. As I watched her impassive face and her placid, “homely” demeanour, I asked her how she managed to do all this chief minister stuff with such little training. Her answer, which I will use as a title if ever I write a book on Indian women, went something like “samay samay par adjust karna padta hai, so kar lete hain.” My takeaway? Hey nothing is such […]

March 11, 2012 0 Comments
New Mindset to Open New Markets
Business Strategy

New Mindset to Open New Markets

Renaming ‘the poor’ as ‘modest-income’ consumers (MIC) helps remind us that these are regular consumers, who do have a little money apiece to spend. The task of making markets work for them is to enable their money to stretch and buy them the things that they need. Some ways to achieve this: Remove additional middlemen, who thrive in MIC areas, where because the total demand is too low for viability, regular company distribution channels stay away; middlemen also provide the service of breaking economically viable large packs and selling smaller parts, but at higher price per gram e.g. biscuits or edible oil. Removing the middle man, yet offering the same quality and price as for other customers, is the challenge to make markets work better for MIC. Financial services are creating techheavy, people-light systems to do this. Hindustan Unilever is creating new, low-cost, company-controlled, lastmile channels like Shakti Ammas. Indian […]

March 2, 2012 0 Comments
Improving Corporate Governance
Corporate Governance

Improving Corporate Governance

It would help to reduce the familiarity quotient on boards and factor in business health beyond profits. Corporate India has been calling attention to two issues: one, in the context of the proposed Companies Bill, is reasonableness in non-executive director liability and penalty for misdemeanours pertaining to day-to-day operational management of the company. The other is the call for better public governance. Suddenly, there is more open complaining to ministers in public meetings about extortion by government agencies and blatant rent-seeking behaviour. This is probably a good time for corporate India to also look inward and improve its own corporate governance, moving it beyond regulatory compliances to better oversight (an unfortunate corporate governance term that means the exact opposite in the English language). There is enough low-hanging fruit to be taken advantage of in the form of improvements that can be quickly implemented. The first area to improve is board […]

February 27, 2012 0 Comments
Needed A More Honest Vocabulary!
India My Land

Needed A More Honest Vocabulary!

Are we getting trapped by our own spin doctoring? The television footage from Davos showed Indian leaders talking of the steady onward march of the Indian economy, with healthy investment and household consumption growth. Meanwhile back home, corporate bankers were privately foreseeing tough times ahead, because the ‘mood’ (spin word for confidence?) of Indian large corporates was not upbeat. Reasons given were the usual suspects of political and policy uncertainty, bad governance and corruption, food inflation, high interest rates etc. But FII analysts are beginning to ask some very hard questions indeed. One set of questions is around why Indian companies are choosing to invest overseas rather than in India; did they not believe in the India story? The politically correct – and truthful – answer is that India Inc. must have a global footprint too, and if this is a time offering an opportunity to do so, then why […]

February 19, 2011 0 Comments
Growth and Inequality
India My Land

Growth and Inequality

Inclusive growth is when more and more Indians benefit from the growth of the economy, by way of better incomes and a better quality of life. Has this happened so far? The answer is yes, it has happened to a certain extent, but has not happened enough. To say that there has been no “trickle down” at all to the common man, of the benefits of economic growth is belied by all available statistics of income and consumption. Practically, everyone is earning more today than they were the previous year or the year before that, or even the generation before that. Yes, those who were at the top half of the income ladder to begin with, have had their incomes grow much more than those who were in the bottom half. But the rising tide has lifted the average income of the bottom 25% of Indians also. But this unfortunately […]

March 14, 2013 0 Comments
The Helping Hand
India My Land

The Helping Hand

Unlike her Bombay counterparts, Yellamma doesn’t worry too much about job descriptions. Her paradigm is different. She offers head massages to all my mother’s visitors, some of whom accept and tip well. After my initial splutter at this, I thought she had managed what retailers in malls struggle to do – monetise footfall! She offered me an oil massage too, and suggested moving into a room at the far end of the house to relax better. I thought happily about a conversation that I had with the chairman of an MNC making premium beauty products, who said that they had to recalibrate their notion of luxury and pampering for India; customized massages to home are available only to the very affluent in America, but easily accessible to middle-class India. My happiness was rudely interrupted by Yellamma using the opportunity to tell me to recommend a salary raise for her, in […]

February 12, 2012 0 Comments
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