MyTake

माँ लक्ष्मी के दर्शन हुए। साक्षात गुलाबी रंग में। लगभग ७० मिनट सपत्नी कतार में प्रतीक्षा के बाद। अनुभूति ऐसी कि मानो क्या पा लिया हो, एक अनूठी उपलव्धि की तरह। मेरी स्मरण शक्ति ने मुझसे कुछ कहा, पिछली बार कब इस प्रकार कतार में खडे हुए थे। उत्तर मिला, माँ कामख्या देवी के दर्शन के समय, लगभग दो, ढाई वर्ष पूर्व। वह भी अविस्मरनीय अनुभव था, क्योंकि दशमी का दिन था, किसी प्रकार का प्रवेश शुल्क नहीं था और विशेषतः कोई वीआईपी दर्शन की कतार अलग नहीं थी। सभी को लाइन में खड़े होना था। कभी कभी भगवान के मंदिर में भी दर्शन हेतु समानता का भाव देखकर अच्छा लगता है। साल में कुछ दिन के लिए ही सही, कम से कम इतनी संवेदना अभी जीवित तो है। अर्थशास्त्र व राजनीतिशास्त्र की घनिष्ठता जग जाहिर रही है। कौटिल्य के अर्थशास्त्र से लेकर ऐडम स्मिथ के अर्थशास्त्र तक राजा, प्रजा, व नीति के परिप्रेक्ष में अर्थ की महत्वा हमेशा केन्द्र-बिंदु रही है। शासक, शासन व शोषण नीतिशास्त्र का अभिन्न अंग रहा है। शासन की क्षमता व्यक्ति विशेष के ज्ञान, पराक्रम व साहस से अधिक धन-बल पर निर्भर रही है। इसी कारण शासक की शक्ति उसके पास संचित लक

During the monsoon of 2005, I was in Hongkong for an international seminar on Happiness and Public Policy at Lignan University. One of the evenings while we visited IFC mall, a big board displayed in one of the lobbies of the mall caught my attention which read as - Whoever said money can’t buy you happiness simply didn’t know where to go shopping. It seemed as if shopping made people happy provided one had money to spend. Elizabeth Dunn of University of British Columbia suggested through research that spending money on others makes us happier than spending for ourselves and further it is the experiences that we pay for adds to our happiness much more than the material things that we buy. Investing in others makes us feel happier and healthier even when it might make us poorer by few bucks. Seminal contribution of Richard Easterlin (Easterlin Paradox) help us understand the relationship between money and happiness much better. Increase in incomes (at national level) does not

The future has always been there. Today shall be past tomorrow and history shall determine the future. So the future can never be isolated with the past or present. Future is here and we are deliberating on the nature of the future and the expectations of today's generation for staying alive, relevant and sustain in changing and challenging times. Yes the future is going to be different than the present as it has always been. The only thing which is important in this context is - whether we are prepared to face the future or are we putting efforts to develop systems, structures and styles that would successfully deal with future. Do we need to be effective or efficient in order to perform at the front to face the challenge or we can afford to allow the mighty to fall. The trend shows that the future is going to be more technology driven and the speed shall decide the future of an organisation. Economies of speed shall spearhead organizational performance. Artificial Intelli

Government and industry face a dire challenge of responding to the expectations of the citizens. Government responds through public policy and industry through products and services. In independent India our economic policies were driven with a unique model of mixed economy whereby addressing industry and society. Welfare of the people was the primary concern and an intention of following Gandhi’s principles was initially visible. Gandhi who believed in small scale industries and village oriented economic policies had strong view on self-sufficiency concept which questioned western model of economic development. Nehru was all for socialistic pattern of society hiding away his thinking on capitalism. Nehru’s contribution is acknowledged in creating the temples of modern India. Or to say it laid the foundation of India’s economic development. Our grandparents always emphasized on the moral learnt through the story of Rabbit and the Tortoise – slow and steady, wins the race. It

Organizations have to chart out strategies in order to respond to competitive forces. Strategy is nothing but a game-plan. The intention is to put forth full potential and come out with flying colors and to win the game following the system, rules and procedures of the game. Competition is a prerequisite for strategy and in the VUCA times it has become further challenging to compete. The belief that competition is with the external forces drives the organization to target only external parties or rivals. Surprisingly organizations have to learn to manage the competition from within and with the situation with more rigor and responsibility. And that is where leadership becomes key. The whole science of game theory provide a guide to a leader to follow the principles of sports in order to make effective decision. The whole premise of team-building is built on the principles of work satisfaction. One enjoys doing what one does. It allows one to put across full strength to a

‘He is the most uncoolest guy I have ever seen. I wish he was she… he should have been a girl… he would have had more following.’ One of the girl told her friend when they were travelling towards Bangalore Airport in the public bus. ‘And she you know, she has lot of attitude, she shows of all, many times she brags and she knows she is doing wrong, she is hurting me, she still never says sorry. She has lot of ego. You know last time she told me she got KPMG job because of me, I felt good, I felt really nice, she is a good girl, but you know, kind of attitude she shows, I don’t like.’ The other girl who was listening to her was speaking in a very low voice. It was just a whisper, politely punctuated prose. The voice of her fingers on BBM keyboard were louder than her verbal cord. I couldn’t make out much what she spoke. I wished I had the sixth sense and skill of making it out from the keyboard punching what really she was typing. Anyways by now the other girl started again talking

Lexical semantics of ‘Ethical Leadership’ drives me to believe that the very activity of leading should be ethical. Ethics are generally accepted moral principles to be followed by individual/s. Leadership as such is a group activity but ethics have to be followed by individuals. The broader message that I get from these two words is that the leaders should follow moral principles and thereby expound their discourses through ethical practices. So ethics have an important role to play in the behavior of a leader and in the whole process of leadership. We need to look beyond just lexical semantics and explore as to the role of ethics in leadership. Success or failure of an organization depend on the person who leads it. It is a general belief that an organization has three types of people working for it - 10% belong to the category of hard working group (highly committed employees) and 10% belong to hardly working group (laid-back employees) and remaining 80% follow the leader (Co

We grew in an environment which was surrounded by people who kept preaching us all through that ‘work is worship’ and somewhere in our inner self it got imbibed that we live to work and there is no escape from work.  The meaning of work changed according to time, for a child it was to go to school, learn and study and perform best in the examinations.  After studies it was to get a job and work as per the nature and requirements.  So the school and the workplaces were believed to be temples.  Temples where we worshiped our work, temples where we were allowed to meditate, temples where we were groomed and mentored by experienced and learned people, temples which helped us build ourselves, temples where we could find our call, temples where we learnt and discovered the purpose of our life.  These were places where we met different types of people and we learnt to deal with them to their and our satisfaction.  We debated, argued and quarreled on some petty issues as well as on some soul

Academia has always been differentiating a leader from a manager. And it is believed that a manager can transform himself/herself into a successful leader by learning the art of leadership and by developing those traits that a leader possesses. All business students and practicing managers have to deal with this dilemma often and to come to terms that ultimately if one has to manage affairs of business successfully and produce expected results, one has to have a perspective of a leader. This is something which needs further elaboration for the cause of clarity and for the purpose of practice. The whole idea of leadership stems from the sense of followership. No follower, no leader. So it is the followers who make a leader. Honest intent for the cause, art of articulating the vision, winning attitude, guts to take risk and providing rock solid support to the followers are some such virtues which help one to put forth efforts to attain organizational goal. The vision has to be f

A lot has been written on what makes one a great leader. I approach leadership from another angle. What does not make one a leader? It is an ALERT to be precise. A for Aloofness (as against friendly), L for Lawlessness or Lack of control (as against Systematic), E for Enigmatic (as against Clarity of purpose), R for Repetitive (as against Original or Innovative) and T for Timid (as against Confident). Leaders cannot afford to stay aloof from the people and purpose as they are expected to lead through their involvement, guidance and support at all levels. They need to portray friendly behavior in order to lead the team. Abiding law of the land is important as nobody and nothing is beyond law. Lawlessness does not just mean abiding by law, it also reflects on orderly structure and flow of things and activities as it drives measurable outflows. Absence of systematic planning and implementation takes away much of what a leader is expected in an organization which aspir

Raju burst out, ‘This rock is a sign from Lord Ganesha, I want to worship it.’ Chetan raised his voice even louder and said, ‘No no, this rock is going to be used for my next sculpture.’ The merchant shouted, ‘I have invited all my friends to rest on it! It is ours!’ Ajit was giving order to remove the stone to his soldiers. Bholu now grinned and said, ‘But this rock has been there for years and years! Earlier half of it was submerged in the mud.  Now with the rains the mud has got washed off, and you are seeing more of it.  The washermen of Chitpur have been using this rock to do our washing for many, many years! There’s nothing miraculous about it.  Now off with all of you, I have work to do.’ So saying Bholu emptied his bundle of clothes and set to work.  What could the others do? They had to go away grumbling quietly to themselves. This is the last part of the story titled ‘the way you look at it’ , from the book Grandma’s bag of stories, penned by Sudha Murty, the ch

It was some five years back when I visited a Mall in Gurgaon with some friends and afterwards, thought of sharing my take on their present and future.  It was put on my blog and my friends, who read it, were skeptical as to whether what I was preempting was really something that was reality of the future. In this backdrop in all these years whenever I visited a Mall, whether in NCR, Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Guwahati, Lucknow or any other small city my belief got confirmed.  Of late I kept reading stories of empty malls and some of them closing down, it started giving me a feel that business opportunities when not defended by viable research and when it is just following herd behavior, it is bound to result in what is happening in many of the cases.  And that is the challenge before entrepreneurs of all sizes and from all geographies, to respond and work on. One of the issue raised in my earlier post on sustainability of malls was that many of them were involved in some kind

In the month of January, the prime minister of India, Narendra Modi launched Startup India Action Plan to encourage entrepreneurship and to facilitate startups. This Action Plan consists of detailed scheme of things and addresses the issues relating to obstacles which generally entrepreneurs have been facing. The bureaucratic hassles, problems in raising finances, and availability of networks to reach out to the customers have affected the conversion of idea into reality for many new starters. The fight between big and small, old and new has also been one of the deterrent to start a new venture.  Ever since the NDA Government took the office they have been pushing the industry and inviting foreign investments to boost economic growth. It has also created a positive market perception and corporates have welcomed the initiatives, though the hassles like passing of GST Bill by the parliament has posed political challenge and discouraged industry as a whole. It was around six mont