Business to the Buddha

Category: Uncategorized

  • Showjumping







    It was a Monday morning I woke up at 6:00 AM, got ready for office. Call it Monday blues for others but for me Monday’s are s different type of race. Race to get to the main road, catch a cab (cabbies dont want to go short distance ~6 KM <60 INR), board a local train to Andheri station run from there too to catch an Auto or Bus; where there is already a big line! Seriously, at times I feel “life is a race” (reminds me of a dialog in movie 3 idiots), no one knows race for what and where! The story does not end here. Whenever I cross NALCO (a stop for buses in Andheri East area), I see kids walking to school. One thought comes to my mind – these kids too have their office! That office is called school.

    At least till 8th standard, I don’t remember if I had gone to school, after exams for 1 full month of April month. My niece, she is not even 5 years finished her LKG in March; goes to her office (e.g. school) at 8:00 AM in April Month – yes she is in UKG now – she has got promoted! In our offices too we have a system of promotion (at least examination in March-April) isn’t it?

    This does not seem to me as education – we are making machines. My sister teaches in a school – I asked her what is the purpose of education? Why are you a teacher? Her response was unconventional. She said I want to make the kids expand their horizons. I added do you think schooling is doing it right? She had a mixed response.

    I feel forcing kids to school is not education, it can at best be schooling. Here please think of “Schooling” – as a verb! Such as training a horse for Showjumping!


  • Amazing, isnt it?







    When I was thinking about the title of this blog – I literally went to Thesaurus. I wanted to write the best possible word for <Hindi> “आश्चर्य”! This word reminded me of Ashtavakra Geeta. Janaka repeatedly says “आश्चर्य” in that – a different Geeta. Well, I am no scholar to write on most succinct knowledge bank – Ashtavakra Geeta –  on Enlightenment. That book takes you in a different dimension.

    I was amazed with Nature. This is what this brief story all about.

    It was January 2000-2001, I was traveling to Gwalior early morning train reached Jhansi at about 1:30-2:00 may be 3:00 AM. Of course I was a student and thus was traveling in General (unreserved) boggy. It was so cold that I was wearing 1. thermocoat 2. Banyan 3. Shirt 4. Sweater and 5. a good quality jacket. I went on platform for having a cup of tea. Cold was such that I was shivering, even after wearing those many cloths. While sipping tea, hands were shivering and jaws wrecking. I have that image always as definition of cold one may face in North.

    Recently, I went to Indore and Gwalior. I have been living in Mumbai for 8+ years so had not seen in that cold thus didn’t have cloths of that kind with me either. The experience of winter I have raises hair, thinking of cold of Gwalior 3-7 degrees scared me. No doubt it was cold in Indore & Gwalior; for a Mumbaite (now at least), it was too much. Nevertheless I survived, in fact I did not have trouble in facing the cold. Neither I fell sick (which I was afraid of).

    No, before coming back to Mumbai, I asked my Art of Living Teacher Dr Shrikant Agashe – a professional MBBS Doctor. How is that possible? I haven’t been living in Indore; I was in Gwalior more than a decade ago, how could my body not give up on this cold? How is that possible, when every month or quarter – may be – at cellular level we are completely new! What he answered me, amazed me about us – more precisely the nature!

    He said every cell has a memory (somewhat amazing! For example, in case of any allergy even if you think that 25 years would be enough for forgetting about something at cellular level – your allergic nature wont be lost. Bigger amazement.

    I still remain amazed about this memory stuff. This amazement is overall for the nature, isn’t Nature amazing, functioning in its own surprising ways? “आश्चर्य”! I know I am no Janaka, nonetheless, I can be amazed with Nature

    Ashtavakra Geeta in English here

    Here Sanskrit verse, word meaning and English translation

  • Irony!







    I remember an opening of Prof Mankad’s class. He asked ‘What is money?…’ and so on and so forth. Money is what is accepted as money. The trust of acceptance gives value to money. Irony is this TRUST. This concept e.g. money creates maximum MISTRUST. The concept which, I believe, we think gives power, empowers us, creates fear of losing it. Money which should give us some security creates insecurity. Is not it an irony?

    I heard someone (If I recalled correctly it was Osho) saying – opposites are always together, if opposites are not together their value is nothing. White is white and does not hold much value if Black does not exist. Lord Rama and his values were/are magnified by none other than the existence of Ravana. If Jesus were not crucified we might not even have found records of him or might not have bothered about his greatness. For safety and security of our ‘Nation’ we buy/make arsenals and prepare for wars, is not it an irony?

    We avoid

    WAR by aggrandizing weapons
    Trust on Money, which creates lots of, perhaps maximum, Mistrust
    Good people are good because their are bad one’s out there.

  • Retail update







    I could not resist myself from posting this blog. I am passionate about retail industry and therefore since last three days holding on to the news and finally posting on the blog.

    Govt of India (CoS) has recommended to 51% FDI in Retail industry. As there are always positives and negatives in any decision we make. The FDI brings positives as well as negatives. According to various sources retail adds 13% to Indian GDP of 1.3 trillion, organized retail is only 4% (in any case less than 10%) of the overall retail business in India. So there are immense opportunity of growth for organized retail. If we compare the organized Vs unorganzied retail UK has about 85% of retail done through organized retail. Such high dependence brings a huge risk (take an example of diversifying risk in financial portfolio management).

    The positive for Indian economy here is – lots of jobs, increased in quality of service and affordability of products (due to inherent reason of business of retail). At the same time the challenge is – how to manage possibility of loss of Mom and Pop stores? These are small business people running their small shop for livelihood. A rider to manage that situation is – retailer can operate in cities with populations more than 1 million. Well no sane retailer would want to operate in all nook and corner of India from day one also smaller cities would not provide that much profitability to the organized retailers.

    Growth of Indian economy and possibilities of more growth (compared to other developed economies) brings in more questions (as opposition is asking) regarding the number of 51%. Someone said – is it giving giving control of our retail industry to foreign based giants? I said yes and no both. Yes because 51% investment and No because at the end of the day people and the Govt will control buying decision and policy decisions.

    The competitions will teach few lessons to local retailers as well as learn few lessons on the cultural. As they said – think global act local… let us see whether this lesson of books comes to practice, otherwise we would have other lessons from failures of foreign retailers in India.

  • This is how I remember it.







    When I was in Engineering, I used to write poetry, generally in Hindi and sometimes in English. I also maintained a diary however with time I lost touch with both. I used to bore one of my very dear friend, Vijayant Thakur, with those poems. Yaar Vij! you have a lot of patience. 🙂

    The way I remember few lines of one of my Hindi poem are here. Of course forgot the exact composition so trying to translate and write it in English here, keeping the crux. The following lines define where we are?

    Heaven and Hell are ‘here and now’
    The way you pass each moment
    You define whether you are in Heaven or a Hell.

    I sent the above poem for publishing in NCC magazine (I was in NCC in college). What happened to that poem and that diary, I do not recall now. Also, what are the next few lines, I do not remember that too. Its been more than 10 years. Oh! I remember its almost been a year I am writing blogs, I would take a small break from writing. Reason? I felt I am becoming addict to write blogs, so thought to check myself and see if I can control on myself.

    In this post I would want to thank everyone who was the driving force for the past blogs (…and of course the readers too). Specially, Prof Lopez who was the driving force right from the beginning of blogging – Playing Golf, Work and Meditation to Business of Religion! Prof Mankad who always supported my blogging and shared many things (I wish I could record them), Prof Natarajan, Prof Moradian, Prof Ramkumar who inspired me to put some thoughts together. Thanks you Akshat and Ramanan (Six sigma failed… not in reality but in the class simulation). KR (Kaushik Ramchandran) for suggesting and encouraging to continue writing.

    … and I am defining the time I invested with you – HEAVEN :).

    Heaven and Hell are ‘here and now’
    The way you pass each moment
    You define whether you are in Heaven or a Hell…

  • Power corrupts!







    It is an old saying – power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. I was wondering on the saying and the recent news. I thought to understand how ‘power’ has morphed in different forms, starting from the prehistoric muscle power to money, economy and authority.

    For a long time power was defined as muscle power of individual. When humans created concept of ‘money’ slowly economy took precedence over muscle power. European countries colonized more than half of the world and economic superiority took precedence worldwide. Until now economic power has been the major factor influencing force. So, countries having economic influence changed the world (for good or bad is disputed), such as oil crisis of 1970s, slow down of 1980s and recession of the last decade (which still continues and perhaps result in double dip).

    Then I started looking at ‘authority’ as power. Recent news about Egypt and arrest of Indian politician triggered this thought in my mind that authority is one major factor to prove the saying – “…absolute power corrupts absolutely”. We have debated enough on democracy and dictatorship, which one is good? There is no debate over this – authority given in either case corrupts.

    We see that power corrupts but who gives the freedom to others to exercise those ‘right’ to influence? Are we not equally responsible for the state we are in? Should not we take charge of ourselves and – rather than being spectators – act to bring the change?

  • The Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ)







    I have written few blogs using concepts of TRIZ, so let me explain what is TRIZ?
    It is a problem solving methodology, more below from my earlier post at other place.
    How do we look and try to solve our problems?
    Generally, it is observed that everyone thinks in his circle of intellectual dominance (emotional, intellectual, social or technical). But when our interest is to find out solution for any problem relating to any particular technical field this becomes rather more obvious and clear that we tend to search into our field of expertise to find a better way or solution for anything. I shall explain this with a joke I heard when I was doing my Engineering:-

    Once four Engineers, namely mechanical, Electrical, Chemical and Computer science, were traveling in a car. Suddenly the car stopped and everyone was puzzled. Mechanical Engineer suggested that that there is some problem with the engine. Electrical Engineer suggested that its due to the fault in ignition system. Chemical engineer said “no-no car was making some strange knocking and the problem was with the fuel.” Suddenly the computer science Engineer intervened and said that “I think we need to go out and then come in the car (log out and log in).”

    The above joke may give you an idea about the “circle of intellectual dominance” I am talking about, that is everyone tries and looks into his field of expertise for finding solution of any problem.

    A new look at same things
    This “circle of intellectual dominance” called “Psychological Inertia”, which limits even experts to come up with better perhaps “OBVIOUS”, solutions (in terms of expert of other field) for any particular problem or improvement.
    TRIZ provides a big leap for experts to learn to look beyond their area of expertise and get a general look at a problem, find a similar problem in other field and its method of solving the problem then customize the solution according to need. Thus, it gives a generalized method for solving virtually every problem in any field.
    History
    TRIZ is a Russian acronym which means “Theory of Inventive Problem Solving”. This concept and theory came in to existence when a Russian Patent Expert Genrich Altshuller and his colleagues studied over 200,000 patents looking for problems and the way they were solved. Of these only a small fraction 40,000 had somewhat inventive solutions; the rest were straight forward improvements. With these studies Alshuller came up with a systematic approach, termed TRIZ. It was a generalized way for finding out solution of any technical difficulty or for any further improvements.

    TRIZ concept in nutshell
    The method used in solving problems in TRIZ can be summarized in the following points –
    1. Identifying the problem or finding out opportunity for improvements in the present product, design etc.
    2. Formulating the problem and searching for similar, previously solved problems with an overview to understand the concept of solution.
    3. Looking for analogous solution(s) for presently defined problem or conceived improvement.
    4. Applying the best identified analogous solution.

    Thus, TRIZ gives a general concept, for virtually every field, to find out opportunity and solutions for problems or improvement sought. I myself have played with concepts of TRIZ beyond engineering fields such as social sector innovation, medical field, Travel infrastructure in Mumbai and currently working in management domain specially economics, marketing and finance.