Business to the Buddha

Month: March 2020

  • Pandemic – why companies should choose to spend

    Coronavirus pandemic is a global phenomenon, as of now 160 countries out of 193 recognized countries are affected. Many countries are in lockdown. All the developed countries are affected, therefore, the economy worldwide is severely affected. In this trying time, the whole world needs Keynesian economics. In nutshell, the concept says – “Increase government expenditures and lower taxes to stimulate demand and pull the global economy out of the depression.” Here I am going to discuss my opinion on why companies should choose to spend and continue working on their ongoing plus upcoming projects.

    https://business2buddha.com/2013/11/24/keynes/

    Keynesian economics considers or provides guidelines to the Governments. You can check India approves 1.70 lakh Crore package for poor, $2 trillion package US Congress has approved recently. Apparently, this is the biggest package US or for that matter, any government has approved. Government spending is only one part. I am of the opinion that every industry must seriously consider not only spending but also sustaining employees. Short term “shareholder value” can wait for better long terms sustenance. I know this sounds counter-intuitive – special when all companies are losing revenues due to lockdown, expecting retaining employees and to sustain a business. Surely this will impact the survival of many firms, projections and revenue targets of almost every company and shareholder returns. Let me give you some basic reasoning for my opinion of private firms too should continue their investment and how can it help bring the economy on wheels again.

    coronavirus-hospitality-industry-impacted

    Due to Coronavirus few industries are directly affected, namely; Airline, Hospitality and discretionary expense items e.g. beauty or apparel. People are going to spend on their basic necessities for the next few weeks or who knows months. The impacts revenue and therefore growth-related projects of these industries. Let us take an example as an explanation.

    Example

    An apparel company wanted to increase its footprints in a new region. That would require – finding retail space, employees for the store, furniture/store interiors design, products to put in the shelf and technology e.g. internet, hardware, POS and marketing to bring shoppers in-store. Due to the impact of a pandemic the apparel company will delay all these. The domino effect will be on – real estate, prospective employees, interior designers, producers (who produce for the apparel company in terms of aggregate demand), internet service provider, IT company planning to provide hardware and software and the marketing activation agency that was supposed to engage in the project – right from printing flyers. Why I brought flyers? Because this and interior decorators have many unskilled laborer working for them. The result – the domino engulfs many part-time workers. When these part-time workers do not have money they will have an impact on purchasing many other things. A self-fulfilling prophecy – read more about self-fulfilling prophecy here.

    At this time, what should private businesses do? At whatever negotiated discounts – they must continue their projects be it starting footprints in new regions as given in the above example. The companies must continue their spending because sooner or later things will fall in place. People will start consuming and the economy will be on track again. If spending is done as usual – the economy will come on its feet faster than it other would. Therefore I am suggesting that after the lockdown due to pandemic – why companies should choose to spend.

    Summary

    I fell in love with research of McKinsey and company, “Grow Fast or Die Slow” sustaining growth in technology companies. Paraphrase of this research is –

    1. Growth matters more than margin or cost structure
    2. No correlation between cost structure and growth rate

    Net-net one cannot cost cut to grow the business. Business growth requires “growth”. This is why I suggest that companies should choose to spend. Cost rationalization is important, questions are the discretion, putting costs in the right perspective and strategic decisions on these investments. This is the time when project costs will be more rational compared to a booming economy. At this tough time, many companies will look at cost reduction – what leadership across the globe must know is that – this is the time to look at a big picture and work towards completing the unfinished projects, starting the planned projects and reopen the businesses as usual after lockdown. Why? Because sooner we start spending on our planned projects, sooner economy will be back on track and most importantly we will be able to reach our projections, targets, and shareholder value.

    The concept of interdependent co-arising perfectly fits this conclusion. When we keep our investments on, the fund will be available to others to either spend or pay as salary. This spending results in moving the circle of growth.

    Related news – Cognizant to offer extra 25% of base salary

  • Gratitude – clap your hands

    A few weeks back I had a chance to meet an Art of Living faculty. During his discussion with us, he said to be grateful. Be grateful to what you have and life will be full of abundance. There were wonderful examples and stories he shared with us. It was fascinating to listen to him. I remembered this discussion on gratitude and Prime Minister Mr. Modi’s suggestions for clapping and applauding many unknown people in healthcare or essential services sector who are selflessly working day in and day out. Show your gratitude – clap your hands.

    Have you ever thought of those who pick up your dustbean everyday morning. The sweeper, the cleaner or for that matter the car washing young man of your society. Many of us may not even know the names of these people whom we pass-by every morning. However, bad is the status of cleaning in Mumbai – compared to Indore, my home town – but it works at its own level of efficiency. Is not it? Should not I be grateful to this cleaning system too? Yes there is room for improvement, yet grateful to the existing levels of cleaning.

    https://business2buddha.com/2015/07/12/gratitude-by-coincidence/

    Gratitude – an example

    Last week, I went for a haircut to a nearby saloon with my father. Since, I was with him, it was nearby and finding parking was difficult I took two wheeler. While returning, my hair were oily, we lived nearby so I took it for granted and did not wear helmet. Murphy’s law kicked in. Police was challaning, I was charged INR 500/- (roughly $70) for not wearing helmet.

    This is another story that I paid the challan outstanding within 15 mins on Mumbai Traffic Police App, ICICI Bank has cut the amount from my account and yet Mumbai Traffic Police App shows the challan is unpaid. On a lighter note a lesson – do not use the app to make challan payment.

    Coming back to the story, I told the police sir I live nearby – literally 300 meters from here, I am coming after a haircut and my hair are oily. So I did not wear the helmet, it is in my dickey. He replied – it is for your safety, you should have worn it. He didnt budge, completed the process. I asked now can I go without helmet it is just 300 meter! He replied what is more important – your head, you and your fathers safety or helmet getting oily? You can go you be a better judge, no one is ahead to cut another challan for you.

    https://business2buddha.com/2018/02/06/driving-in-india/

    I was upset, my father told me he was right. My father always wear helmet (it was even when there was no one wearing it about two decades back). He continued – you should have worn helmet. I made payment on the app instantly and gave it a thought later on. That policeman was not wrong, he was doing his duty, he could have done his job and let me go. However he was kind enough to politely remind me – what is more important “your safety”. This lesson costed me 500 rupees. Though I am rarely that careless, in last 24 years challaned second time. Once for stopping ahead of stop line on signal which where stop-line was barely visible. I felt bad but grateful later on for the policeman – I even wonder if I would see him back in life (I would not want to too :)). Small cautious act can go a long way. In current times it is home quarantine during Coronavirus spread. This small act of individuals can go a long way for the whole society.

    Gratitude – clap your hands – be grateful to the unknown

    Gratitude

    Today is the day when we have to be grateful to the healthcare and essential services professionals. Prime Minister Mr. Modi has said that we have to clap for these people whom we have not seen, not known. They are doing their best to help us fight the biggest challenge our generation is seeing. The graveness of Coronavirus cannot be ignored – especially when there is no known vaccine or medication for that. It is immaterial whether we are sick or healthy, rich or poor, youngster or senior citizen. We must be thankful to these professionals.

    We miss-out on thinking about so many people working on so many things on a daily basis. Some are directly associated with us many are not – be it the local trains of Mumbai or bus or Metro trains services across many cities. If you work in a stockbroking company, you may be taking a local train to the office. Your boss or the owner of the company is not. But to come to work in the owner’s company the employee needs to take the local train. Unknowingly or indirectly the local train driver is adding value to the stockbroking company’s owner. Many a time’s people do not consider this list for gratitude.

    Be grateful

    There is a good amount of research on this – check Harvard articles. Gratitude is a virtue, one must inculcate it. You are alive, be happy about it. Someone told me a couple of days back, you woke up you are fortunate, respect that you have got time and today to live. Especially we must be happy, restrained and grateful at this tough time when the world is facing the pandemic of Coronavirus.

    Be happy today; be grateful for so many known and unknown people and things in your life. Take care and do not forget to Show your gratitude – clap your hands on 22nd March 2020 at 5 PM for 5 minutes.

  • Coronavirus – Lock down? Stop and introspects

    Coronavirus has put many people across the world in a lock down situation. Many cities in Europe, China and US are standstill. In India also, some states govt or cities authorities have closed malls, cinema halls, schools etc. Who have got the luxury for them, it is a great time to sit at home to stop and introspect. People should not become couch potato at home and watch Netflix / Youtube day in and day out. This is a time to sit and introspect, what I did and what is my take? Here it is.

    Phylogenetic analysis of Coronavirus

    Introspection

    I started off with asking a question to myself – have we become dinosaurs of current times? Animals evolve, even the virus evolves check this last para of CDC website on Coronavirus – “…coronaviruses … can evolve….” This research by The Lancet states the virus has evolved and closely related – 88% – to two bat derived virus. Imagine how fast the virus is evolving from 2002 to now. It is an amazement that the tiniest virus evolves. How about human beings? How are we evolving? We’ve improved our healthcare system from outside, is this healthcare restricting us from developing our inherent immunity that has been there in every organism naturally? If your belief system does not allow you to accept the theory of evolution be it. However, this evolution is evident scientifically and being researched and discussed on the science fraternity widely.

    Dinosaur’s extinct one fine day, we are still struggling to hypothesize how this happened? Is it a possibility that something like Coronavirus happened with them too? I do not intend to scare with conspiracy of dooms day. My thoughts are still on introspection, we have developed a lot of technologies. Example is mobile phone, I have a 6 GB RAM mobile, I hardly require such configuration, My father has a smartphone too, he only accesses calling feature and one fitness app. Our technologies have grown multi-fold; many of us we do not even know how to use these. During this lock-down of cities, people are going to waste time on entertainment and create havoc on social media. Instead, we must spend this time with self sitting silently. It could be above conspiracy theories war, economy, healthcare and evolution.

    Conclusion

    I introspect on evolution and meditation. We spend time on how we can remain fit. Here is an interesting research done by Oslo University on a Breathing technique (Sudarshan Kriya) taught in Art of living courses. The research says Yoga Changes your Genes (Oslo university, Norway) and improve your immune system. Until the natural selection helps human beings evolve, practice Yoga and meditation it will help you – as the research states that “…changes in 111 genes expression patterns were observed, improving immune system…”.

    I leave you with this thought – stop, meditate and introspect.

    Image Source – The Lancet “Phylogenetic analysis of Coronavirus”

    Disclaimer – I am associated with the Art of Living foundation and practicing Yoga, Meditation and Sudarshan Kriya from 2004 onward.

    Related other blogs –

    https://business2buddha.com/2013/07/06/yoga-secular-or-not/
    https://business2buddha.com/2019/04/06/the-observer/

  • Coronavirus and questions on wealth

    On the wake Coronavirus and market bloodshed, I leave you with some question this week. These questions are directly related to Coronavirus and on wealth. Our sense of defining wealth – and at times success – need a contemplation. To begin with let me share a story with you:

    Church

    Once a man won a lottery worth ten lakhs (1 million) rupees. When his wife heard this news, she was worried, how should she break this news to her husband. The man had a weak heart and a sudden such news might give him a shock or he might even suffer a heart attack due to sheer excitement. So, the wife went to a priest requesting for help. The priest said “Don’t worry, I will come with you, and together we’ll give him the news”. Next Sunday, priest went to the lottery winner’s home and asked him “My child, suppose by the grace of God you won a lottery of ten lakh, what would you do with it?”

    The man answered, “I will give half of it to the church Father.” No sooner the priest heard this, he had a heart attack.

    Wealth should bring peace. Being wealthy should not bring arrogance, hostility, jealousy, disgust or boredom.

    Coronavirus and questions on wealth

    Wealth should not be something that becomes a reason for happiness or sorrow or a cause of shock. We live in such an artificial world that a virtual belief in wealth governs so many things. Recently I read worldwide markets are down and names of people who lost millions because of outbreak of Coronavirus. The shares are down and thus many people are losing their unrealized profits; some have lost the previous day’s profits and squared off at lesser margin. What to do with riches that are dependent on outside influences. A virus hits the world and (for no faults if yours, you become poorer) the wealth is wiped out.

    I leave you with some question this week – what is wealth? How money / wealth should keep you? How should it affect you? Why do we define wealth the way we define it? Should we’ve a different way of measuring wealth? Should we revisit our definition of money / wealth?

    Relevant other blog

    https://business2buddha.com/2012/10/14/currency-for-the-future/
    https://business2buddha.com/2016/03/13/kanhaiya-to-mallya-why-lessons-from-buddha-prevail/

    Story source – Commentaries on Shiv Sutra by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, The Art of living foundation.

  • Managing Emotions

    Rioting is an antisocial activity. Most of such activities are emotional outburst and inability of managing emotions. One must look for alternatives of discussion and proper method of reaching out to authorities to drive home the point – provided your point has merits. If your opinion has no merits, you’d get to learn the larger perspective and understand appropriate reasoning. If your opinion has merits you get to reach a consensus.

    Most of the times, rioters are more interested in creating problems rather than getting to a solution. In fact riots are more politically motivated rather than actually a problem in society. The Delhi violence (I wrote on Paris Attack earlier) reminded me one an incident in my life.

    The story

    It was a winter’s morning in the year 1999. We read news that previous night one of the students of our college met with an accident and passed away on the spot. Those days, there was no WhatsApp, mobile phones were expensive and limited news local channels so news spread next day. A friend read name of deceased recalled this student had joined recently and was from our part of the state – Malwa (a region in MP). There was natural – read regional – connection for us. We spoke to some other friends of ours who were from the same region. These friends were very closely connected with the student. In fact, at the time of accident, he was riding bicycle of one of these friends. All in all, we were about 10 students very close to the dead friend of ours – we knew him personally, stayed together, from same cities and he used cycle of one of our friends. Naturally we were emotionally attached and angrier than many other students.

    We went to the college, students were angry. It was an unfulfilled demand for quite some time that across both the entrance gates of our college plus other colleges on this road there should be speed breakers. Students were planning protest (about 50 or so). They blocked the road just outside our college. In this crowd 4 of the 10 friends were there. This road blockade turned violent within no time, one of my friends got a wooden stick (god knows from where). They attacked the very next bus they saw. Some threw stones and my friend went and started breaking windshield, windows of bus. In fact he cared less if any stone thrown at bus hits him. My friend came back towards the college gate. Passengers sitting inside the bus somehow ran for life at the very next opportunity. Besides, the driver, an old man was also hurt and his hand was bleeding. Some local antisocial elements too joined the protest plus the violence. Someone brought kerosene and put one wheel of bus on fire.

    When I saw my friend had wooden stick, I warned him to leave it, it is a peaceful protest. When he started running towards bus with intention to attack bus, I kept on shouting – don’t do it. The moment I, few friends and other saner students saw violence, we left the site. Soon local police came on the site and dispersed the protestors, antisocial elements and took control. They booked some students also.

    Since, the deceased friend was using my friends bicycle and was neighbor of his, police had asked him to go to the hospital, identify and help them with informing deceased family etc. So, the emotionally charged friend who attacked bus, bicycle owner friend and one more went to the Govt Hospital of the city. The emotionally charged friend was ashamed when he saw the same old man in the hospital for treatment. [Those days, police case based medical treatment used to be managed mostly by Govt Hospitals].

    Learning

    The world indeed is round; whole world came full circle for the emotionally charged friend of mine. He was sorry, never accepted it verbally though, but was not ready to accept his mistake of emotional outburst. I think until today he has not accepted his mistake [I remember at least after 5 years when I asked him about the incident he did not accept he was wrong]. When someone resorts to violence the things get worsened at times to the point of no return. The speed breakers were never constructed, a cause completely lost.

    Take an example of Delhi riots, media is not reading out a small paragraph of Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), it is an amendment to offer citizenship, it is not about taking citizenship of a particular religion. Our constitution has a problem of not defining minority accurately, when and how a religious group should be defined as minority. When a community should be considered as minority; when it is 10%, 25% or 50% of total population? The riots are politically motivated, no one wants such unrest. These riots may worsen the chances of reaching a more balanced resolution to CAA. The way it happened during our college – no speed breaker was constructed, people got hurt, public property (bus) was gutted and a day wasted – same may happen in this case too. Though, CAA protests are more politically motivated than people’s emotion driven. The worst – Indian leftist media is adding fuel to fire. The media has more so become a harbinger to cause trouble rather than be impartial.

    It is good to have emotions. Yet emotions are good to have a resolve to act responsibly and get some solutions out. Emotions – when taken to extreme – become problem rather than opportunity to do something good for self or society. Humans have an ability to manage their emotions. Managing emotions require awareness; awareness comes from understanding oneself better. Awareness also helps one to take logical steps and actions. Lastly, easiest way to improve awareness and thus managing emotions is meditation.