What is your SEX sorry SEK !!

As they say 'Hidden is beautiful' and that seems to be the mantra driving marketers worldwide. Early in the morning was watching a short film titled ' Jab Naam Hoga , Tab Kaam Hoga' and while I was completely soaked in the style and content of storytelling I realized that it was also trying to talk about Asian Paints, in an extremely social and shuttle manner.

In my numerous conferences where I do keynotes or attend hearing marketing wizards like Harish Bizoor and Ambi Parmeshwaran, one common marketing theme or challenge is always discussed which is  to double guess the thinking process or behavioral pattern of an individual or individuals and accordingly lay down a treasure hunt leading to brand goals.

Visualizing oneself as someone who can lay down a Treasure Hunt is very stimulating because you can at every stage predict outcome and most importantly can place bets of what's going to happen next. This is a more integrated thought than thinking of FB , SEO , Google etc which are more of Knowledge devoid of Skills & Experience.

So what is your SEK ( Skills, Knowledge, Experience) and how does it map to your current profile as when you have a seamless blend of these 3 aspects Magic happens.

As a Business Transformation specialist with 17+ years of experience I tried doing a bit of soul searching on my SEK as well and sharing with you so that it can help you to do yours as well and do share once you have found yours as well....

Skills : Communication, Presentation, Problem Solving, Perception Building ( Attributed primarily to my upbringing and my sign of being a LEO :) )

Knowledge : Maths, Computer Science , Management ( Attributed primarily to my Graduation, MCA and MBA degrees)

Experience : Retail ( Attributed mainly to my consulting , technology and marketing exposure in this vertical for close to 10 years now)

Why Japan was called Fampan - Part I

One time , China ruled on Japan. Japan was fully trapped. There were Chinese people , Chinese Food and Chinese language was spoken all over Japan and China.
At Hiroshima ( where one Japanese general was killed) one brave Japanese fighter's team was left. China doesn't know that.
Kentaro , the head of the team , was not afraid of dying. So he hoisted the Japanese flag , and said to his armies " We have to fight against China !!!"

To be continued .......

How are you feeling?

On the blogging space after a long span. To say that it has been hectic would just be the 'Tip of the iceberg' the fact is that the journey has been addictive very addictive.

I chose such a non serious title for this blog because this has been the question which I have been facing almost from everyone whom I meet nowadays.

Though I normally try to give a very formal ( read decorated) answer to those queries but when I sit and think back now it is a very intriguing question ' How do I feel '.

Well the first response which comes to my mind is that ' I am feeling very light' , a free spirit , seems like a lot of frills which was creating unnecessary weight has been suddenly removed. Now I work from whereever I can , work on whatever I feel like, meet whomever I think is important and feel great about everything I do because there are no compulsions

Puritans may argue that entrepreneurship is all about creating an enterprise and that has a framework for success and I fully agree but I guess in order to reach that stage you need to first soak yourself in this state.

More to come so stay tuned and cheerio !!!!!!!

Creating Leaders

Watching the IPL since the last 4 years , Rajasthan Royals was and still remains my favorite team. It is a coincidenec that they have won a IPL and have had a decent outings in all the IPLs but my linking for them stems because of Shane Warne who has led a bunch of unknown players ( Naman Ojha, Ravindra Jadeja, Yousuf Pathan) and created a unit which can challenge any decorated outfit.

This weekend I was watching 'Para Cricket' and observed an argument between the non striker and the bowler on whether the batsmen had nicked the ball and the moment the non striker was told he can bat as a single man ( for people not familiar with para cricket rules, a batsmen can bit single if all other players are out) he agreed that the batsmen was out. He preffered himself batting alone and felt he could win all by his own. Suddenly I felt that perhaps this is what singles out a leader from the rest of the pack. A leader is one who has the guts to back his troops as much as he backs himself perhaps more in some cases.

After spending 11+ years in the industry somewhere I have a feeling that we need more of such leadership to groom the current crop of people coming in and create a ecosystem where excellence becomes the key. These young guys need to get the right exposure, mentorship and most importantly a feeling that they are important to convert them into assets in the long run...

Wish will see another para cricket match where I will see a leader who fights to get his team chasing a target rather than trying to get the runs on his own

Understanding the 'Voice Of Customers'

Sitting in a government office and waiting for a presentation was draining my energy off so thought of doing something interestin to activate my neuron cells :)

For the last few weeks I have been participating in a lot of discussion forums where opinions were flying in terms of Target Addresable Market (TAM), Social Media intrusion, scope of consulting services etc and honestly lot of noise was being created without much sense

What I feel personally is that too many things are happening for sure Social Media, Internet Technologies, Process Automation etc but somewhere in midst of all these the 'Voice of Customer' is getting feeble , unheard.

I beleive that in whatever you do ( Product business, services or consulting) the key is to acknowledge the customers voice. I still remember a meeting where after presenting a 60 slide presentation on process effectiveness the customer whispered in my ears 'Mitul, I have 90% employees who just have class 10 as a formal education so do you think we can implement what you are presenting here' and I understood what I had missed. In all my enthusiasm to present my idea I had missed the context and hence was presenting something which was not implementable.

So treat every customer as a unique entity and present something which matches with their maturity to be acceptable. At the end of the day Technology has to make business easier rather than demanding change in business to do Technology adoption

Cheerio
M

Proud to be an Indian

Perhaps just heard the best analysis of Dhoni, the crowned king of Indian cricket by someone who himself was the crowned prince a few years back.

Sourav (aka dada) said that the process which gave India the world cup after 28 years ( my kid is of the same age as was I when India won the world cup in 1983...) started at least 3-4 years back, the nucleus of the team was created , the fearless spirit was taking shape. So in essence it is the same team albeit a different captain leading it but where Dhoni is unique is that he has moulded this unit from 'We have to Win' to 'We will win' and the results are there for everybody to see.

This man has a clutter free mind, doesn't believe in historical data and has the guts to back his instincts and above all gives you an impression that he is born to win and thats where he takes himself and the team to a differnt league.

The QFs with Australia when Dhoni got out, Brett lee was spitting fire, the australians were slowly closng on the Indian batsmen ( how many times have you seen 8 australian fielders in the ring closing on their prey) and the situation demanded an watchful session. But what we saw was just raw aggresiveness from Raina and Yuvraj attacking every loose ball, walking down the pitch to Brett Lee and all of a sudden you could see the crack in the famed Australian wall. Thats what Indian team is all about now , a raw energy and a clutter free mind which says 'We are there to win'

It has just been a very emotional night, perhaps a begining for all of us who aspire to hit a different league in years to come. The sign is on the wall if you want to hit the sky take the jump now. There is nothing called a right moment, a right context all of that has to be created and created now.

I would have loved to hug each and every member of this team and perhaps take a iota of that spirit from them ...

Feeling very proud to be an Indian today...

Online Model = Brick&Mortar Model

It was a strange thought that came in and I thought of writing this down. Today when the world moves towards web for almost everything from marketing to sales to knowledge management the most interesting pattern to observe is that to gain Success you need to follow the basic principles of brick and mortar model

Like in the conventional way you go and block a piece of land and if you can choose your land strategically there are chances that you can get a very high returns because some one would need that land as a part of his business expansion plan. Interestingly the same happens when you block a domain with a bit of strategic thinking and then you realize that the domain you have blocked is so critical that people are ready to pay you 5 times more than the original plan.

Similarly create a site increase 'eyeballs' and then attract retailers to put up there merchandise and let them pay you a percentage of your sales so what have you created essentially a 'Market Place' or now more well known as 'Mall' which can attract both the Buyer and the seller

So from now onwards whenever you design a eChannel do remember the basics which the conventional model follows and you are sure to get more success

Cheerio
M