Rajesh Tripathi

My views as published in the Times of India, 30-April-2014

In one of my earlier blogs I wrote about how strategy is different than a problem. Let me try giving some more insights about strategy and ‘misuse’ of the word strategy in the corporate. If I say that the strategy is futuristic in nature which defines decision of making thoughtful choices. These choices explain assumptions about choices and reasons of choosing to do something and why not to do something. But the reality is different. Very seldom, you will find the word strategy being used alone. Generally, it is sufficed with ‘planning’ or ‘plans’. Therefore, the strategy becomes strategic planning or strategic plans. This change leads to very catastrophic change not to the word itself but even to the thought process in the organisation. Plans or planning denotes actionable events which are scheduled in advance to carry out in an agreed manner later. It means aligning some doable actions. More so in organisations, strategic planning starts with referring to th...

Strategy – the most abused word in corporate corridors, is perhaps least understood. Different people use it for different reasons, giving different reasoning. However, the most common misuse by top executives of organisations is when they change a challenge into a problem and then try tackling such a problem by tried and tested tools. These tried and tested tools are put on piece or pieces of papers after long discussions – sometimes running from weeks to months, under the pretext of Strategy Making. Sometimes, another name of ‘Comprehensive Plans’ is used instead of strategy. Agenda remains only one, tackling s problem – far away from their real intention of making a strategy. Idea behind such activities in organisations is to feel safe & secured in the dynamic market conditions. The feel predominantly is that as they have well placed strategy in place, hence their business is secured. The reason of such acts of learned well educated executives around the world is overcome ...

You may find organisations struggling to make profit, despite their been having best quality producst in a different category.  Reasons - failure on their part to respond to customer need and ever changing world, complacency to shrug off need to change themselves and the worst, looking for reasons to justify not to change. One of causal relationship in these companies is their ‘inward’ looking approach. Cost and quality are hygienic factors in business today. No company can survive if it does flirt with quality or cost. At the same time none of these two provide, any base for differentiation and therefore no reason to charge premium. Companies which do not have ‘anything’ in their product or services to charge premium can only make ‘Survival Profit’ for short run. Lucky companies can slower down their speed to death as they luckily got a distinct product category. But question comes how long? New world has given a more serious threat as they lowered down their cost of p...

"Leaders need to 'see around corners' - to see something significant about the future that others don't see.' An apt saying for the current VUCA world, where everything & anything is volatile, uncertain, complex in nature and ambiguous by its presence or absence. Leaders make plan well in advance and try achieving them by organising resources around those plans. But the reality hits them hard on their faces when these plans are either under achieved or not at all achieved. This can very well be seen in slipping down financial numbers in majority of cases. Learning by most of executives to my mind is cribbing about the conditions & cursing it, instead of taking appropriate actions. At the same time there are leaders and organisations which undertake diagnostics and change themselves to 180 degree. It therefore means what all needs to be taken into account in this VUCA environment and come out successfully are. a.      Actions & Compreh...

Published in Education Times, The Times of India, 31-March-2014

Who wants to see their products becoming a commodity? But it happens. Market forces are relentlessly striving to make every other product a commodity product. Reason, it is easy to ‘imitate’ than to innovate - a short term haul to become successful. Whose mistake is this to see happening, their products becoming commodity products?  I am sure; you will agree with me, it is companies who allow it to happen. Reason, ‘Product Differentiation’ requires relentless innovation at the end of the sellers - but this needs a different mindset along with resources. Yes, there are companies who defy the ‘rule’ of commoditisation and continuously, unabatedly try putting in time, efforts and resources to innovate. Result, these companies charge premium and ensure for themselves Sustainability. Each and every product can be differentiated or allowed to become a commodity, I believe in it. You simply need a different mindset. As rightly done for his company by Franklin D Raine...

My views got coverage in many daily newspapers of India.  Also, find enclosed below the online link regarding the same: 1.        http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/jobs/domestic-companies-go-slow-on-expat-hiring-turn-to-indian-talent/articleshow/32538899.cms 2.        http://www.financialexpress.com/news/domestic-companies-go-slow-on-expat-hiring-turn-to-indian-talent/1235155 3.        http://www.business-standard.com/article/companies/domestic-cos-go-slow-on-expat-hiring-turn-to-indian-talent-114032300139_1.html 4.        http://www.hindustantimes.com/business-news/india-s-job-market-set-to-brighten-as-domestic-companies-focus-on-indian-talent/article1-1199214.aspx 5.        http://www.biznews.in/news/domestic-companies-go-slow-on-expat-hiring-turn-to-indian-talent 6.   ...

Every one - organisations to people - want to be successful, in this rapidly changing world. Success means different to different people. However, bigger part of the society, including organisations and people generally, do measure success in the term of monetary advancements? So what organisations and people have to look at continuously to make advancement in the set direction of success are Soft and Hard Resources. It is not only availability of these two ingredients which make someone successful or otherwise, but the proper mix of these two is of paramount importance. Of late, it has been seen that soft part is gaining utmost importance. The world today is primarily facing two challenges - understanding & making sense of the changes around us at both individual and organisation level, and setting direction & making progress in an increasingly unpredicted world; rather on positive tone, daily unfolding world. It would not be of prudence here to talk about the Hard R...

You inquire CEOs about what sort of companies they head. More often than not, answer you get is, they head, 'a Customer-Focused Company’. But, you find them fumbling at your second question of who their customers are? Most of the time, you might have noticed, you get generic answer to this specific question. Reasons could be many. One general reason could be overwhelming ‘use to misuse’ of the world ‘Customer’. However, the specific reason which I see is the  hurry on the part of CEOs to make quick bucks, covering as much catchment of customers - relevant to irrelevant, as possible. Coming back, this fumbling you can see in an entire organisation, where you even come across the word, customer being used for interdepartmental relations; by employees of one department to the employees of another department. More difficult it becomes for me to even understand about their intention for this ‘misuse’. On one hand companies insist on departments, calling each...

A customer when is out for a purchase, he is not miffed about his purchasing decision. Mind already has taken a decision, what to purchase & why to purchase. However, sometimes you become jittery when you see an advertisement about a new product in the same product category, you intend to purchase while on your way to the shop. Did you ever experience it? Two theories come in play. One theory explains mind’s continually attempting effort to minimise hidden costs and hidden risks. Therefore, it is the force of mind, compelling the customer to buy a known product only. The second theory describes what all goes inside when you look at a new product. However, the underlying facet of both the theories is where ‘Advertising’ plays its role. In my one of earlier blogs, I explained about resistance of brain to experimenting newer things. It always tries going a beaten track. It always looks for stability so that it does not have to apply its ‘brain’ again to know about the new...

Human is slave of its behavior. Brain makes behavior for the reason of not doing his job. Brain does not want ‘one’ to change; not only this, ‘other brains’ do not want other to change too. In essence, we all seek stability. We do not want to go through the grind every time, despite the fact the ‘grind of time’ is ever running. Everyone wants to keep hold of everything and anything. Brain, I say is not in one’s control. It literally takes granted the ‘holder’. Conclusive impact in the corporate world can be seen when you see a manager talking to his subordinate, ‘This is the way to do it.’ How come there is only one way of doing one thing. It is not managers only who stop creativity, out of their fear of losing control?? Look at other manager, saying ‘I have experience of doing it, so you have to do it the same way’. How unfortunate it is. How mindless we become due to our habits of seeking stability by stopping other from attempting something afresh. Let the experience peopl...

A surprising but the fact is that the Indian Economy grew at the rate of around 8% till 2011-12; quite opposite to the general perception. This reality does therefore give a hope that nothing much has slipped out of our hands in terms of the Indian Economy. It was just one year back we were crunching average 8% growth per year that too continually since 2005. A well deserved appreciation for the economy which was known for the ‘Hindu Growth Rate’. This is just opposite to the wide spread criticism of late, for the Indian Economy not only in India but across the world. First, let us look into what all made India achieve ‘Accelerated Growth Rate’ . Primarily the reason of this continuous feat for a period of 7-8 years was that every single sector contributed to the growth. Although, the blue-eyed services sector which made it largely possible, others were not left behind. However, other two sectors which contributed immensely to this success were agriculture and manufacturing....

Our brain is not under our control. The utmost seat of Lateral Thinking, brain makes everybody go into wilderness; knowingly but most of the time unknowingly. More you wander, more you go deep. This brain wilderness, help in finding answers to many complicated questions; but sometimes it makes everything around very confused & blurred. This wilderness gets aggravated, for corporate citizens primarily, when one has fair understanding of business subjects like Sales & Marketing, Supply Chain, Business Strategies, and Finance etc. In corporate, answer to the very basic question, every other CEO does want to know; what makes a company successful and other fail. Every subject and more so every professional with specialized subject knowledge seems like giving a panacea for challenges coming the way of building a sustainable-successful business or what products can make a company successful in real sense. Benchmark could be Apple, today.  One day, on my journey to mental wilde...

Stephen Hawking needs no introduction. To me, ‘ he is a scientist by nature, a thinker by passion and a challenger to his physical disability by determination.’ Exclusivity has been in the nature of Human Being. The moment, someone is in majority out of any defined to undefined parameters, people create exclusive clubs for themselves. Since ages, people are discriminated based on such unethical & ‘acceptable by some' norms. Society has revolted on such exclusivity norms in past, time & again, in every part of the world. Still, we see discrimination in every society. Sometimes, some points make me think, does Exclusivity follow Darwin's Law of Survival? But when I introspect, it seems to me, it is not matter of survival but ‘Law of Majority’ that makes it happen, by & large. As majority wields power, people tend to follow it more. Majority could be anything – physical to even beliefs. However, people have started realizing of late, that this exclusivity, in...