Strategizing Indian firms - The Futuristic MNC's

STRATEGIZING INDIAN FIRMS

With the world getting more and more integrated, with the Indian firms gaining scale and importance at the international level, I strongly wonder whether Indian firms are truly geared up for sustainable challenges that they will be witnessing at this turf. Is operational effectiveness in terms of their strong execution capabilities the only answer or has the time evolved when the indigenous firms have to start thinking towards staying ahead, adapting different difficult-to-replicate capabilities and drawing up a solid strategy for a longer term?

Managing global businesses has been a business challenge for centuries. Despite the recent economic downturn, India is still highly diverse and one of the fastest growing economies in the world. The inherent strength of the country’s economy can be gauged from the fact that indigenous businesses are alive and healthy. Every major family-run business in India, like Mahindra's, Tata's, Birla's, Ambani's, and Ruia's (Essar Group) is in more businesses today than ever before. They have successfully forayed into steel, shipping, oil, real estate, power, telecom, consumer goods, pharmaceuticals, retail - you name it and they are into it. And it is not that they are restricting themselves to within the geographical boundaries. They’re making their mark abroad, too and are aggressively entering into Joint Ventures and Alliances with the foreign counterparts. Wherever they are finding an opportunity, 100 percent acquisition is the route being adopted. For e.g.: Tata bought the troubled Jaguar Land Rover in 2008 and turned it around successfully, Mahindra's bought 70% controlling stake in Korean Ssangyong and have successfully placed themselves on a Global Map.

The growing complexities in business arena is giving the strongest push to young corporates in India to carefully strategize and plan their every business move. The core competencies of the business have to be protected intelligently to fend off fear of getting acquired by your competitors. One bad or delayed move in this dynamic business world can cost your existing successful business dearly and can put the same in jeopardy at worst. A live clear example to this fact is Nokia's delayed response to smartphones (once a world leader in mobile phone handsets got acquired by Microsoft in Sep-2013) and Kodak's delayed response to emerging digital photography (once a worldwide leader in photographic films filed its bankruptcy in Jan-2012). It is imperative that Indian business houses continue to act locally but think globally. 

Undoubtedly, with the Indian economy opening up, foreign companies are evincing greater interest in the India and are trying to make their entry into their own areas of expertise. However, presently the local firms are far better at overcoming issues such as poor logistics network, poor infrastructure, frequently changing regulations etc. than multinationals. This is not because they’ve somehow developed a superior operating model but simply because they’re often still run by their founder members: well-connected industry veterans who are adept at finding practical work-around solutions and still make most important decisions by themselves. In contrast, multinationals lack the local market understanding and personal relationships with government officials and other stakeholders, and are often hindered by their own time-consuming global decision-making processes. One thing which has to be kept in mind is that these one-time fixes pile up to create a hotchpotch of ill-fitting processes and ad-hoc solutions. Without a solid foundation and carefully planned strategy, the companies will soon begin to experience operational problems, such as poor quality, customer defections, low employee morale, and poor  management.

Indian corporates must understand the importance of linking industry to academic institutes. India is proud of its world class institutions like IITs and IIMs. To leverage on the research going on at these institutes, the futuristic Indian MNC's must come forward and start engaging brightest minds at these institutions at a much higher level by exposing them to real time unsolved business problems. This will in turn groom and better prepare the talent coming out of these colleges to be productive when making an entry into industry. To succeed not just in global markets but even at home, these companies must combine their traditional advantages - the vision, risk tolerance, flexibility, and speed needed to capture early-mover gains - with a relentless focus on developing the capabilities required to catch up with world-class competitors elsewhere. The leadership succession has to be well planned so as to avoid getting into the problem of leadership vacuum. In other words, Indian companies must master a new form of strategic and organizational ambidexterity that goes far beyond execution alone.

Abishek Mittal

NMP XXVI - Class of 2014

MDI, Gurgaon

Firm Focus = Shared Value + Value Proposition

Value proposition is nothing more than a believable collection of most persuasive reasons that your customer notices you and takes the action you are asking for. Focusing on the prime needs of your customer is how the businesses try to create value in the ecosystem. Each customer has the tendency to search 4-5 different options before arriving at the final selection. Firms try to stay ahead by uniquely positioning its product/service offerings different from its competitors. Regardless of whatever one firm does, it always has a competitor who is doing better (barring the one who is leader).  There will always be existence of companies whose brand sells more than yours, people whose blogs have more readers than yours, there will be websites which will have more per day hits than yours and the list is endless. We can find innumerable comparisons from our daily interactions as a customer with different firms. But is it that staying focused only on the value proposition front means that it is also serving the larger purpose of creating value for the society? Businesses need to extend their thought process further, reinvent their strategies and must evolve towards creating shared value.

The society in which the businesses operate cannot be completely ignored. Firms need to look for opportunities in the manner they can uplift the society. Apart from creating employment opportunities for the individuals living in the peripheral areas, firms need to think on formulating clear business strategy to create shared value. They have to unleash their power to create a strong impact on the society and work on tackling the common global issues. Opportunities do not remain static but constantly keeps on changing with the advancement of technology and with the changing dynamics of the highly interlinked economies. It must be a win-win situation for both - firm and stakeholder and not the win-lose relationship. 

Over exploitation of natural resource by the firms is a major topic in discussion these days. Especially the companies which are into direct association with the use of environmental resources like mining firms (which leave a major impact on the environment in the areas of their operation) have to work substantially on creating value for the society at large. The leadership in these industries have to engage their employees by providing clear direction in achieving ethical & sustainable objectives along with the core business activities. A good example of creating shared value can be Rio Tinto (a British-Australian firm active in mining business), which defines a parallel target of creating project positive impact for every project it works on. It tries to identify the opportunities available on the social-economic front before proceeding for the project and holistically works on the same.

Measuring the impact of firm's actions becomes an important parameter in evaluating the impact of shared value. As the concept of creating shared value is still its infancy, the complete framework for measurement of social impact on the economic business is evolving. But firms have started accepting the ideology that there lies a congruence between the improvement in productivity of the firms and creating shared value for the society. More the firms start thinking of the innovative ways to make the societies progress, the more they benefit and thus, the more they become more productive in the value chain. Sustainability standards have also increased awareness among the corporates of their impact on society and thus have triggered meaningful improvements in social and environmental performance. For eg.: Recent energy price spikes have challenged everyone to think in terms of higher efficiencies in energy utilization and has thus brought a wave of revolution in this energy efficiency market. It has helped the companies reduce their energy costs and also created new employment opportunities for the society. 

The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) has laid down voluntary reporting standards on ESG (environment, society and governance) and many Fortune-500 organizations are already part of this reporting network. Many corporates like Siemens are already working proactively on sustainability front and are promoting same by conducting sustainability awareness programmes. The success of companies in future shall be linked to their evaluation on social, environmental performance along with the financial aspects. These firms will have an integrated strategy to target financial goals and simultaneously create value for the society and its stakeholders. Taking consistent, persistent and focused action is always easier said than done. The challenge that still remains is daunting and task is tough and the firms have to really delve into it to make it a success !

Abishek Mittal

NMP XXVI - Class of 2014

MDI, Gurgaon

Building a Perspective

Perspective is simply the state of one's own ideas. How come that this term has garnered so much importance these days? Why is it insisted time and again to have your own perspective? Be it a business place, home, educational institute or anywhere else, having your own perspective on an issue is important and is deeply stressed upon. It is distinctly visible that perspective does play a major role in B-School these days during the lively group discussions. People who have developed this habit excel in thinking and are good in communicating their thoughts with clarity and precision.

The world has become really a complex and smaller place with the penetration of technology and round the clock availability of cheap transport. Humans are being bombarded with loads of information everyday from various channels. Each one of us is hooked to internet day in and day out via WiFi hotspots, Smartphone, laptops, tablets etc where we regularly come across many current hot issues. It is solely for us to decide when to keep hold of the information, when to agree to the viewpoints presented, when to differ from what is said and when to let it pass freely. But, after going through the issue, sitting back and pouring in your thoughts is what matters the most. This is where the originality plays its role and can lead to a change. It is a beauty of human ecosystem that each one of us have our unique way of living, unique way of thinking and unique way of viewing the things. This is because all of us have come across different experiences in our lives and represent different cultures of shrinking global village.

Building a perspective imparts overall clarity to ones thought process. We must not develop the habit of passively believing and uncritically accepting whatever we have learned over the past years. Rather, we should start raising questions and rejuvenate our thoughts to find a reason whether our viewpoint is well deserved or not. There will be many times when we may not be accurate but the fear of being rejected should never deter our thought process. On the other hand, holding a perspective without any valid reasons (solely on ones intuition) can be negative and must be avoided. Once we have reached this level of clarity and purpose, it will help us to overcome the existing challenges, thus leading to achievement of our goals. 

So, i will close today's blog by stating that we must "Think Original, Think Different !"

Abishek Mittal

NMP XXVI - Class of 2014
MDI, Gurgaon

Why do I avoid Procrastinating?

TIME for SUCCESS

Each day, each one of us is on our toes running here and there to manage the things and to bring the things in order as per our own personal expectations. Many a times, I do have same question popping up in my mind that is I the only one who is getting confused in managing the things or it is common to all of us? Time is a finite resource" - A fact which is known to everyone but still widely misconstrued by most. I see it in a way that it is the only resource which is unbiasedly distributed to every single person on this planet and thus, a unique parameter, whose efficient management forms the basis of comparison among individuals.

I personally fight each day to manage the things in the best possible manner but still there is a learning happening each day. In crux, I will state that "One who fails to plan in turn plans to fail". Keeping oneself organised is of utmost importance in today's fast moving life. Therefore, one must allocate some time for scheduling and planning the things in advance. Why is it that most of us struggle to slice 24 hours of the day in the best possible manner? There is not even an iota of doubt that there will be many uncertainties coming on ones path to goal achievement. Formulating a clear plan for all these uncertainties may be almost impossible for anyone but from here originates the concept of prioritizing. One must be capable of taking a decision of what to do first and what not to do. An intelligent handling of such uncertainties is what brings the manager out of oneself, thus developing ones core skills of time management and uncertain events handling.

Apart from this, I will also like to highlight the importance of being flexible in daily life. Though planning in advance is a vital ingredient to success, but on the contrary, one must not be rigid enough so as not to accommodate even a minor change in the micro-plans. Change is a part and parcel of human life and we should accept changes in environment with an open heart rather than cursing it. One must have a positive attitude, clear motive in mind and mobilize ones mental energy towards his goal by systematically focusing on activities. This will also prevent the building on undue stress on one's mind because it is commonly seen that uncertain situations lead to stress piling.

A Quote By Swami Vivekananda

Why do I avoid Procrastinating? I personally avoid it because of one single thought in my mind that procrastinating just leads to an even bigger problem somewhat later. I am of the opinion that I should be ready to face the situation at present than handling it in future when many other things may crop up additionally. I must collate enough energy so that i should not keep on delaying the things unnecessarily. I should not let the lethargies overrule my plans. Now, this does not literally mean that I must perform the entire daily planned chores (without missing out on anything) irrespective of whatever the demand comes. This is where the act of balancing comes into play and it is finally I who takes a call on balancing the activities. One must be decisive enough on what can be given up temporarily, what can be done for a smaller duration and last but not the least what needs to be continued without a break/change? 

Once a person has clarity on this simple concept of time management, I think most of the problems related to "lack of time to do everything" will get solved on its own. Don't wait for the good things to happen to you automatically on their own, rather work consistently to make the good things happen. My consistent effort to manage my time effectively is one of those most important things that keeps me happy and stress free most of the times. In simple terms, to be able to have control over your life, manage your time and do not let it manage you.

Abishek Mittal
NMP XXVI - Class of 2014
MDI, Gurgaon

PS: Thank you Shilpa for enlightening me to key in my thoughts on this important topic !


 

Inclusivity in Education - An Indian Perspective

India has truly been a great nation since ages with a rich legacy running back to 5000 years. The earliest evidence of education system prevalent in India was found in Rig Vedas, which deals with the philosophy of life and practices of learning. During this Vedic era, the system revolved around the Gurukuls, where students used to live with their Gurus and learn by precept as well as by actual study and debates.

Since its independence from the British Raj in 1947, India hasn't been too much successful as a state in providing basic needs like education, healthcare and electricity to its citizens especially those residing in rural areas. Though India has consistently grown with a 8% average GDP growth over past few years, but how much benefit out of this growth has been transformed into building a better education system in this nation of 1.2 billion people? The education system in this country has persistently failed because of the vested political interests in framing policies and also due to consistent stress which is laid on getting marks in the exams at all levels (primary, secondary, graduation). More focus is laid on passing the exams rather than true learning. Students are taught by the society to join the race of pursuing additional degrees without introspecting whether it is actually adding any value to them personally or to the society. I believe that it is the overall negative culture in the system which is propelled by the various forces acting in unison - personal, social, political and economic interests.

Inclusivity in education, that I am referring to is about strengthening the current education system from its core and expanding its reach to all those who are willing to learn. As Swami Vivekananda has rightly quoted, "Education is a manifestation of the perfection already present in man", India needs to have a belief in itself and harness its strength by giving rightful access to education to each and every person living in this country who is willing to learn. 

To meet the current demand supply gap, government has already started taking some steps and is trying to expand the reach of educational institutes at all levels like establishing primary schools in rural areas, bringing in RTE (Right to Education Act), establishing new IITs, IIMs and AIIMS. But is government really monitoring the real effectiveness of their approach to tackle this menace or are we just converting an existing problem to a much bigger problem? In spite of these actions, education in India remains an opportunity to a select few. With high poverty and high drop-out ratio of students prevailing in rural schools, we need to give a clear thought on building an educational ecosystem keeping aside vested secular and political interests. 

The availability of cheap hardware, indigenous technology and coupled with higher broadband penetration can facilitate effective delivery of education electronically. Private institutes can be asked to help their government counterparts solely in the interest of nation. These institutes can come forward by offering nationwide courses and can utilize the revolutionary model of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) like Coursera and edX. As a citizen of this unique country, each one of us who has access to this scarce opportunity shall contribute for the development of this healthy ecosystem. We must start having firm faith in our unmatched educational history and leverage the power of knowledge sharing and collaboration.

It is to be clearly understood that foundation to build India as a strong nation has to be laid down at primary and secondary level by delivering quality education. Each one of us is more or less involved in a rat race by following one's parents dream or by working consistently to turn down the social neighbor's finger. On the contrary, we must devote our energies to promote free thinking everywhere. Innovative ideas must be encouraged right from school to college level. Young start-up firms shall be supported in their ideas to the full extent. It is to be imbibed that investment in education is for lifetime of an individual. Using the synergies of educated Indian youth, the growth of this nation will become truly inclusive and the day will not be far when we can rise up once again as a citizen of this proud nation INDIA !

Abishek Mittal
NMP XXVI - Class of 2014
MDI, Gurgaon







Disclaimer:  This is a personal weblog and the opinions expressed here are solely my own thoughts and are not written under any undue influence.

Is B really for Business?

NMP XXVI Participants Enjoying Sports

Things started settling down post the induction week and after enjoying a very peaceful weekend, I geared up for the regular courses in the coming week. Having a quick glance through faculty teaching pedagogy in this world class institute (MDI currently has tie ups with around 50 Top Global B-Schools), core courses began with a full bang, with loads of assignments, pre-reading material and group case studies to discuss. Unknowingly, many parallel activities started to pool in my daily chores. I had the opportunity to express my views in the Group Discussion event @ SharmaJi hosted by Daksh Creative Solutions in collaboration with Samsung on the "Role of Technology in Future Education in India". In the meantime, I was also invited to join the NMP26-Badminton Group on facebook and there I found my badminton partner who was unknowingly staying just opposite my room. Ashish Thakur, you have extended my nights and deprived me of my sleep in these past two weeks but I am really enjoying every moment of my stay at this place, learning to manage things practically. The creation of fear of surprise quizzes and CP marks (class participation) by each faculty member, insight into "Darna Mana Hai" type questions in Accounting class and brief guidelines by the Startegy Prof. Dr. Amit Kapoor at the fag end all made this week very happening.

Ice Breaker Party NMP XXVI Batch

With sense of formality still prevailing in the batch, and participants not knowing much about each other, my colleague Harleen and her friends took the bold initiative to organize an ice breaker party @ Takashila Wing-B. For the first time, EPGPM batchmates came together to meet informally at this event and exchanged their interests with everyone. Many talented colleagues finally got the stage to showcase their hidden talent openly and generate huge fan following among batchmates on facebook. The ball was kept rolling in the coming week and there was another pleasant surprise birthday party of Amit Gupta hosted by Wing-A mates. There were many live performances but the party ended with late night wild dancing on Punjabi hits.

Myself, being in consistent touch with the senior batch guys right from the beginning collected information on different hosts of activities undertaken by the previous batches. After discussions, I invited nominations for the formation of official Corporate Communications team and Alumni Relations team. With the batch support, the team was successfully elected within stipulated deadlines and officially put in place before the end of April '13. Along with these activities, the course silently kept picking its pace day by day. Asst. Prof. Rupamanjari Sinha (Microeconomics) was the first one to turn our fears into reality on coming lazy Monday morning; surprise quiz leaving each one of us with our eyes wide open after the class.  

Participants with Dr. Bhagwan Khanna

During the past week, I personally attended my first ever Book Launch event @ India Habitat Centre, New Delhi where Mr. Vineet Nayar (Vice Chairman, HCL) launched "From Smart to Wise by Prasad Kaipa & Navi Rajdou" . A couple of days later, Kevin Stolarick, Research Director, Martin Prosperity Institute (Rottman School of Management, Canada) delivered an influential guest lecture on "Importance of Creativity & Innovation". To introduce us to International Accounting, Dr. Bhagwan Khanna - an eminent faculty in the field of accounting (Ball State University, USA), delivered an interesting 5-lecture series citing beautiful examples from our daily lives. 

With so much happening each day and gaining knowledge from experienced international faculty has turned this course (National Management Programme @ MDI) Truly Global sitting here in India. Lengthy group discussions on HBR cases of Strategy, trying to convince every other folk of your group, has already started conquering my pleasant evenings. To be very frank, 24 hours in a day has really started seemingly so less to me for the first time that i am daily longing for few more hours.

Abishek Mittal
NMP XXVI - Class of 2014
MDI, Gurgaon

Kickstart to My 15 month MBA Journey

MDI, Gurgaon

It was a cool Sunday morning on 07-April-2013. Usually, my Sunday's were filled with laziness but today it was altogether a different day as I was finally about to vacate 1546, First Floor, Sector-17C, Gurgaon i.e. the place where I have been staying for the past almost six years. On the one side, I was nostalgic to leave the place and my friends whereas on the other hand I was all together excited to be a student once again. 

My dream of attending oldest Full Time MBA programme (NMP) at one of premier B-Schools in India @ MDI Gurgaon, was getting realized. Though I have visited this campus many times earlier (used to stay just approx. 200 meter from campus gate), but this time I was here with some clearly defined future goals in mind. I assure you that taking a call to attend Executive MBA Programme after resigning from well settled MNC job was not that easy.

EPGPM Batch Inauguration Banner

Once I landed in the campus, I was having the feel of hitting an oasis in the so called corporate desert. The lush green fields for recreational activities, lots of open spaces dotted with trees and specially designed Red Brick buildings gave me initial comfort that future is definitely going to be better. On payment of fees, I was directed towards the Parthenon building for Room Allocation @ Takashila Hostel. Immediately after shifting luggage to my room, I started with brief introductions to whomsoever I was meeting in the corridors, at the dining table etc. The next morning was the NMP-26th Batch Formal Inauguration Ceremony wherein Chief Guest of Honor - Shri S.P. Singh, Director-HR, NTPC, officially lit the flame along with batch participants and declared the programme Open by delivering an inspiring speech on ethics and integrity. 

Participants at Business Lunch

For the next four days right from 8:30AM to 5:30PM, I was exposed to Expert Faculties @ MDI briefing our batch about their respective field subjects that we will be studying in the forthcoming year. They made us walkthrough of case method teaching pedagogy followed in this institute and importance of business education these days in the complex corporate world. Apart from this, each of us was allotted a formal identity i.e. the roll numbers, pigeon box numbers (something which was new for me) and email-IDs (something which gives you good feel in the beginning but usually it comes with loads of tensions each day). Though sitting at a stretch for 90 minutes lecture was something I have to learn fast but a cup of coffee at the end of each lecture (Mind it, only for Executive programme participants) was something very exciting at this institute. And to conclude the Induction week on Friday afternoon, Mrs. Neera Jain (Faculty) organized a complete 4 course business lunch for us to demonstrate the dining etiquette's which finally ended with raising a toast for the 26th batch. 

Presently having stayed here for only one week, I will continue posting my experiences in the days to come. But really the first week was full of events and exciting one with lots of new friends in the making. All this ingrained in me the urge to do something bigger and better in life that can have a long lasting impact on society and to make the best out of my stay at the campus.

Abishek Mittal
NMP XXVI - Class of 2014
MDI Gurgaon