Manish Choudhary (VP & MD, Pitney Bowes Software India) emphasises that A leader should know the boundary between negotiable and non-negotiable factors in an organisation, in conversation with schweta chaturvedi

Q. Personally, how do you ensure the environment is motivated?
A. I still go back to the employees I hired and feel there exists a common passion between us. It is a special bond as they are the people who joined us when we had nothing. At times, you get to know people are happy by just a ‘thank you’.

I feel proud to share that we have lost less people to competition than to family-related and personal issues.

Q. How do you plan to capitalise on the opportunities in IT?
A. We have a large R&D department and 37 products on which our teams are working. Most of these are about creating different products and finding the points where we can reuse a lot of technology.

Our professional services business helps services teams across the globe by providing human expertise and consultations, both on-site and off-site. The sales and marketing business team works on building the domestic business by selling solutions to telecom, banking and financial, and public sectors and at the same time focus on building a strong partner business and compliance business to help companies get aligned to software usage. There is a large scope for growth.

Q. A piece of advice for young energetic professionals.
A. Do not be afraid of taking risks, be creative and trust your instincts which will leave you with a learning experience. There is no formula for success. This has always helped me and the experiences have been quite nice. I believe, experience is the combination of failure, success, and learning.

Q. What are the qualities a leader must possess? A. A leader has to maintain a balance and know the difference between negotiable and non-negotiable factors in an organisation. He should be analysing, mediating and facilitating the things which will work. A leader also needs to be culture savvy.

Q. How do you maintain your work-life balance?
A. I have an ‘evening job’ where I get most of the touchpoints from the U.S., and a ‘day job’ where I work to create those touchpoints. I balance and maintain a perfect work-life balance and keep weekends for myself and my family.

Q. Are there any projects you would like to take up in future?
A. We are active in most of the large scale projects existing in the country. We have a strong presence in water resources, postal department, mining department and places where there is asset management and maintenance is required. We are working on many different fronts with our solutions and software. click here to read full interview...

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Prof. Aaron Ahuvia (University of Michigan-Dearborn, School of Management) talks to Aamir Nowshahri and Smita Bhattacharya on India’s Unique Economic Advantage

Q. What inspired Prof. Burnett to recommend academics to you?
A. Going back to the finance example, I was not very good at thinking quickly about simple things. I love to think deeply about complicated problems. To this date, I hate answering my emails because it involves the constant strain of simple decisions that need to be made very quickly. I like to stop and think of all alternatives, which is a good way to be if you want to focus on a topic that you are willing to spend several years on and come up with good ideas.

Q. How was the experience working with Prof. Philip Kotler?
A. Prof. Kotler was the nicest to me during the PhD programme. He took the time to get to know me and be available, and I have a very strong lasting affection for him because he went out of his way to look after me as a student. He is a very intellectually interesting person, and has wide-ranging interests. He is very smart; he reads a lot and is able to integrate different ideas. It has been a real honour to have been able to work with him.

Q. What research areas are you presently focusing on?
A. Prof. Kotler’s initial classes during my course got me interested in the areas I have worked on till today. I would love to cover the topic of products and services that consumers love, and research on the psychology of love. I want to know what consumers mean when they say they love something. Click here to read full interview...

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Sandeep Goenka (Director, ECube Global College) Elucidates The Importance of International Alliances for Engineering Students

Continued...Thus began the journey of ECube, where students spend the first year on the Thane campus, and are expected to apply to enter the second year of the corresponding degree course at the Newcastle University. To further this mission, Mr. Goenka hopes for the day that India’s education policy opens up, so that they can help in creation of a full-fledged masters education programme within India. As of now, he claims that ECube’s USP lies in the comfort that the student group experiences during the course owing to the smooth transition after school, along with increased chances of success in the field of engineering.

ECube’s salient strength also lies in its small batch size of a maximum of 26 students per stream, as opposed to 70 to 80 in many other places, says Mr. Goenka. These students have all requisite facilities available to them for their first year of study, which includes access to Newcastle University’s resource-intensive library. Besides, Newcastle University is part of the Russell Group, a collaboration of 20 universities in the UK , which brings with it a whole host of benefits such as the recruiter’s preference for a degree from a reputed university.

On a similar note, Mr. Goenka admits that research conducted at academic institutions abroad is usually more application-based than that in India, which is a reason why ECube is also promoting workshops for its students to gain first-hand experience. Besides, they are also looking to tap into more of Newcastle University’s 250 programmes and bring them to their campus in India. Since the sector is still opening up in India, there seem to be no clear threats in the horizon for Mr. Goenka’s plan. “Being in its nascent stage, we have a healthy level of competition in education in India. This brings lots of opportunities for students and ECube,” affirms he. One such opportunity is his dream project of having a full-fledged Newcastle University setup with ECube, as the sector opens up over the next two to three years. Click here to read More articles...

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She Writes Story Contest winner: Jyotsna Jha

Jyotsna Jha is one of twelve winners of the MSN-Random House She Writes a Story Contest', as chosen by our judges. Her story 'The Tourist' features in the 'She Writes: A collection of Short Stories' published by Random House India and available at all leading bookstores.

Jyotsna Jha belongs to Kolkata. She has an M.Phil in English Literature and has worked as a teacher,

instructional designer, and editor. She is married to an army officer and has two sons.

read an extract from jyotsna jha's story 'the tourist'

The ungainly mass of yellow slowly navigated through the narrow Amherst Street of North Calcutta. As her rickety taxi approached that familiar-looking bend on the road, Michele felt an unexpected peace enveloping her, instead of her emotions spiralling into an uncontrollable rush like she had expected them to do. She was supposed the take the British Airways flight back to London the day after, but she needed to sort out a few matters before her departure.

It had been almost two months since her arrival in India. Taking such a long leave from the school she taught at hadn't been easy, but her mother had been adamant. She was not getting any younger and reminded Michele that she would be soon become incapable of undertaking such a long journey back home and she must visit Aunt May and her old friends from the school she had taught at for ten years. Reasons enough to pay a visit to her native country, she believed. Michele finally gave in to her mother's wishes after a great deal of persuasion. But the thought of visiting the country she had left fifteen years back as an eight-year-old was unsettling for her.

Having moved to the UK at such a tender age, she had almost forgotten that a part of her was Indian. Her grandmother was Bengali, whose large eyes and soft features she had inherited. However, the blue-grey eyes and white skin from her Scottish grandfather had made it easy for her to disconnect herself from her Indian blood.

Her initial experiences in the city of her birth filled her with disgust. Evading the insistent taxi drivers outside the Kolkata airport on her arrival and navigating through the chaotic crowds that never seemed to dissipate, she was certain it was going to be a difficult two months. In the days that followed, the leisurely trams, ubiquitous yellow taxis, claustrophobic metros, dilapidated brick houses, and tapering alleys only added to her exasperation with her mother's old infatuation. She tried to stir a faint connection, some faded reminisces about places and the people she was meeting, but all she could think about was the orderliness and flower-lined pavements of her London home and the cool, crisp air she missed so much.

Global Talent Leader Ed Cohen tells Jisla Xavier the need for corporate and academic worlds in India to have a greater connect with each other

Q. Which of your assignments has been the most challenging and why?

A. My most challenging assignment was when Ramalinga Raju confessed to cooking the books at

Satyam. As the chief learning officer, I was responsible for employee engagement and that incident turned my world upside down. Anything that comes remotely close was on September 11, 2001 when I was with Booz Allen in Washington DC. The challenge that came out of it was how do you care for the people and how do you help people realise that, because of a few people who did this, they are not guilty by association. How do we take care of these people and how do we save what is left of the company became my biggest challenge.

Q. How important is learning for businesses to succeed in today’s times?

A. Technology is changing fast and if people are not keeping up with it, the business is clearly going to be obsolete. If leaders today lead the Gen X people the same way as they did with people before, they will not be successful. The reason is that Gen X grew up with computers, media and entertainment and have a certain level of wealth that the previous generation did not have. So they have higher expectations when they come into the workforce; they expect their leaders to treat them with respect and to include them in business. It is an employees market now, so leaders need to be constantly thinking what they need to learn.

Q. Tell us about your experience of living and working in India?

A. Coming to India, in 2005, was a unique experience for me and my family because I really believed in the Satyam vision and we felt like this was the place where we wanted to be. Though I was initially sceptical, we were quickly surrounded by people who were friendly and cared for us and really became a part of our lives.

Q. Do you think Indian businesses have it in them to compete in global markets? What changes are required to counter competition?

A. Indian companies are already competing globally and buying foreign businesses in other countries. The question is whether it can be sustained; that can happen if the business world in India wishes to nurture leaders capable to take good decisions and not sacrifice ethics for short-term gain, which is happening worldwide. Another thing that needs to happen in India really fast is that the corporate and the academic worlds need to have a greater connect with each other because universities are not producing talent as the corporate world needs. This is why we see all these statistics about graduates who are not employable.

Q. Your book talks about managing people in different parts of the globe. Your thoughts on a diverse workforce?

A. I think having a geographically diversified workforce is incredible! What it means for a leader is that you cannot do one size fits all; you have to build a relation with each individual and understand the influences he or she is bringing.

Read full interview

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Where do you think you are going honey?!

As if the problems with global fuel prices weren’t enough, Kingfisher has gone ahead and undertaken strategies that only seem a do ‘and’ die effort. How is Mallya even sustaining the unbelievable losses quarter after quarter? B&E’s Shashank Tripathi and Angshuman Paul meet Vijay Mallya and other top Kingfisher executives and investigate...

We know why you stopped by this page [Surely, not because of your killing enthusiasm to understand complicated structural factors affecting the Indian aviation industry, huh!]. We call it the 3G of aviation. Glamour, girls and gizmos! Mallya was counting on the same three factors to ensure that passengers ‘stop by’ his airline. Well, passengers, like yours truly, did stop by in the thousands, but unfortunately, rather than striking the metaphoric gold, all that Mallya struck were three pathetic more Gs! Global fuel prices, government regulations and gadzillion godforsaken losses! Check the figures out! While the global aviation industry is expected to cross the $6.2 billion mark this year, the Indian aviation industry is expected to cross a loss of Rs.9,000 crore at the minimum, more than 33% of global losses. Forget forecasts, for the last financial year (FY07-08), the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA) has estimated the Kingfisher Airlines losses to be at a killing $500 million, or Rs.2,100 crore! If you add Air Deccan’s FY07-08 losses of Rs.834 crore to that, the combined loss comes to close to Rs.3,000 crore! That’s more than 33% of the Indian aviation industry’s losses!

When we met Vijay Mallya just a handful of months back, and had asked him the logic of such a business, Mallya had confidently parried, “I think other business leaders think of many strategies before investing into certain businesses; but for me, it’s just passion that drives me.” But really, can just passion make any group withstand such humongous and gut wrenching losses? Kingfisher’s Executive Vice President, Hitesh Patel, confesses to us, “We are just looking for survival first, and everything rest would follow.” It’s a serious question we ask now – Can Kingfisher Airlines really be sustained? Can it, in short, survive?

It’s not that such a situation suddenly crept up on Mallya. Various reports estimate that Kingfisher posted Rs.240 crore of losses in FY05-06, Rs.577 crore losses in FY06-07; and Air Deccan – India’s largest publicly listed loss making company – was never a profitable company in the near past! And one cannot forget that Mallya had spent a huge Rs.975 crore approximately of his invaluable cash to purchase 46% stake in Air Deccan in FY 07-08! All airlines in India, for that matter, are in losses and are bleeding bad. Where Jet has been facing a daily loss of almost over Rs.9 crore, Air India is expected to post well over Rs.4,000 crore losses in the current fiscal year as compared to net losses of Rs.2,144 crore in FY08.

All this has badly affected in-flight services and airlines are now even planning to charge for the water they serve on board. Would such process moves help Kingfisher? We found the question pretty hilarious. The per passenger loss for the combined entity of Kingfisher and Deccan is a confounding Rs.2,400! What help can charging for one bottle of water or even a meal help? So why can’t Kingfisher simply increase ticket prices? That’s the Devil and the Deep Sea conundrum. Competition ensures that the highly price sensitive consumer today has minimal loyalty to any airline [and is even ready to switch to the Indian Railways: read 4Ps B&M cover story, June 20-July 3, 2008, ‘Laloo has the last laugh’]. The initial 3Gs are no big help in increasing switching cost of the customer, neither are promo tactics like frequent flyer or advertising various quality awards.

The worst part is that the Kingfisher combine has seen passenger market share grow to close to 30%.That is simply fabulous! But if fabulous gets fabulous losses, then any self-respecting CEO should close down the business model. Air India has cancelled around 30 flights, Jet Airways 20 flights, SpiceJet over 17 while even Deccan has cancelled 50 flights due to mounting losses. To their credit, Kingfisher, which used to operate 218 flights on 38 destinations, pruned 10 percent of its flights and also sent 47 expatriate engineers back home to cut the operating cost.

Read more......

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
 

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Not our Scum!

Swiss Vote on Foreign Criminals

Swiss voters recently supported a referendum initiated by the far-right Swiss People’s Party (SVP) – the largest party in Switzerland – to throw out of their nation, all foreigners convicted of crimes. This proposal would force non-Swiss citizens to leave the country if they are found guilty of rape, acts of violence, drug trafficking, abuse of social aid; replacing the present practice of convicts being assessed by a judge and then being deported on a case by case basis rather than as a rule.

Undeniably, criminals and criminal cases (judiciary procedures) do cost a nation’s GDP to a very large extent. So much so that UK is paying murderers and rapists who agree to be deported from prison to their home countries an amount of £1,500, which collectively could sweep away £6.3 million pounds from UK’s economy. US “without regard to the existence of a treaty, [extradites] persons (other than citizens, nationals or permanent residents of the US), who have committed crimes of violence against nationals of the US in foreign countries.” Most countries do not allow extradition if the convict is charged with a political crime. Countries like Mexico, Canada and most European nations don’t allow extradition if the death penalty can be charged on the convicts. In India, Indian Penal Code, 1860 does apply to a foreigner “who has committed an offence within India notwithstanding that he was corporeally present outside.”

In countries like Switzerland and UK, the problem is that this issue is a potent election propaganda. If the new Swiss referendum is put into practise, this would increase the deportation level by threefold – for foreigners, who constitute 20% of the Swiss population, this is dire. This would also be contradicting the Swiss policy of freedom of movement & non-discrimination rules. Moreover, Switzerland, though not a formal part of EU, has agreed to EU’s code which allows EU citizens to stay in Switzerland without formal permission.

Read more.....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
 

Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
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IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
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Sustaining Capitalism!

CSR is Passe , Sustainability is in. And B-Schools alike are Waking Up To This Fact. B&E’s Amir Moin writes on why for The Moment, Sustainable Capitalism is the food for thought For Sustaining Capitalism

Had Darwin been a 21st century management guru, a capitalist thinker instead of a naturalist, his famous maxim written way back in 1874 would have read thus – “It is not the most profitable of companies that survive, nor the most fundamentally strong, but the ones that are most responsive to change.” Debates may continue to rage over what Darwin would have penned down, but the fact remains – the sole coffer-filling motive of profit-making is no longer worshipped as the mighty dam that can hold the growing volume of capitalism together. Cracks are getting more visible by the day, and B-schools around the world – the so-called budding grounds for next-gen CEOs – have started appreciating this. Four decades back, when Milton Friedman said, “The social responsibility of business is to increase profits,” the B-schools took it to heart. And the students, they memorised the lessons chalked-out on the green boards. To the extent that every MBA graduate aspiring to be a CEO knew that the day he would become accountable, top and bottomlines are what would be counted as his scores. Decade-long plans went out of the window, and in walked quarterly targets. This became the Holy Grail for the MNCs (led by the alumnus of various respected B-schools), which promised “day to day” accountability to make their shareholders lift the wine glasses in joy. But just like every new victory comes with a fresh backslide, this one too did. The global economic crisis, proved why the profit-based principles can crash. It did. This forced the proponents of management education the world over, to sit up and take note of the fact that it was their very belief in “book profits” that had led to the catastrophe.

While we may continue to criticise corporations and B-schools alike for the lack of integration when it comes to churning out business managers with a vision of “sustainable” profit-making, the good news is that CEOs around the world are increasingly realising the importance of sustainable corporate policies as a tool to not just leverage their reputation in the public domain but one which guarantees their company’s existence in the times to come. In an exclusive interview with B&E for a special CSR issue, Lakshmi Niwas Mittal, Chairman of Arcelor Mittal, had said, “Fundamentally, businesses exist to make profits. Rightly so, because without profits, you have no business and no economic growth and development. But simultaneously, we should work to ensure that our approach never compromises on long-term sustainability & on thinking about the generations to come for short-term profits.” As is apparent, the process has begun, and the breeze of sustainability has started blowing in the front lawns of multi-nationals and B-schools. The thought for the moment reaches out beyond the myopic realms of CSR. It considers responsibility in all elements central to the society – health & safety, environment, human resources, investments in R&D and much more...

Read more......

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
 

Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri's Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year
IIPM's Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri - A Man For The Society....
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman
IIPM B-School Facebook Page
IIPM Global Exposure
IIPM Best B School India
IIPM B-School Detail
IIPM Links

IIPM : The B-School with a Human Face