Funde #07: Learning Strategy

Tags

Creative Thinking, Innovation, Lateral Thinking, Edward de bono, Start up, 9 dot puzzle, 9 dots

In our strategy guest lecture few days back, we had Mr. Sandeep Mann from Remorphing talk to us about two distinct topics. 1. Values & Goals for Companies  2. Innovation & Lateral Thinking. I don’t how much of it I would take it to my grave, but one of the few things I do know is that I found the talk quite different. For starters I also came to know a couple of things about Mr. Sandeep himself. Firstly, he must be a big Edward de bono admirer with the way he talked about him. Secondly, he is no straight forward simple lecturer one would see as he had a lot of patience and new method of delivering a talk. But ofcourse, my batchmates would disagree as most of them were peacefully in their ‘Fortresses of Solitude’.

We did several puzzles as well. Frankly, I realized that perhaps once we get into this study mode in an MBA institution, we do not think creatively much. We do not think out of the box. Surely enough, I know many of my batchmates, who are exceptionally intelligent, sleep in most of the lectures just because they think that the classes are a no value add. Another instance is also the dedication you show to learning. And there too, I felt that as time passes, we turn more and more slack.

Let me just share a small example of 9 dot puzzle as shown below,

Nine dots

If people are asked to connect all the dots without lifting the pen in as many lesser no. of lines as possible, then the best generally they could come up is 5. Now, try and connect all in only 4 lines.

Think…

Well, the solution can be seen here..

One could also read about such puzzles here..

Now, I googled ‘Lateral Thinking’ and got interesting information on the concept. This concept is in fact something that is really exceptional.

One of new things he asked us to do is think of our own start ups in Education and mention them here on our blogs. This way we may perhaps be able to think out of the box and try and visualize something not predefined. So, here is my idea.

Exercise 1: Assume your own startup in Knowledge management/ consulting

Name of Company: Motivsoft

Vision: To be leaders/ Pioneers in Intellectual Capacity development in India

Core Values: Constant Innovation, Integrity, Belief in People

Goals (30 yrs from now):

1. To cater to 1 Lakh schools/ institutions

2. To have trained/ lectured 10 million people

3. To be among the leaders in E – learning, Educational training in the world.

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Funde #06: Innovation in Class

Tags

Husk Power systems, Innovation, MDI Gurgaon, Remorphing, Sandeep Mann, Strategy Management, Super 30

About Innovation

We talk of innovation every other day and perhaps the scene today is that along with strategy and management, Innovation too perhaps has turned to be one of the most loosely used words. We read about Zara, Facebook, Southwest,etc and think that they must be great to look upto. Yes they are, but not the only ones. In India too we have several really ingenious innovators who have transformed the world around them. There are people like V. Kurien, Elaben Bhatt, Sam Pitroda who have brought about a great deal of reform as well.

But let me just mention two specific innovations that have fascinated me dearly.

1. HUSK POWER SYSTEMS

In Bihar, one of the poorest states in India, 85 percent of people are not connected to the electricity grid so households use kerosene lamps when they can afford it and businesses use expensive and dirty diesel generators.

Some view this ‘energy poverty’ as a development problem, others view it as an environmental problem. The founders of Bihar-based Husk Power Systems view it as an opportunity to build a social enterprise.

Husk Power Systems

Their motto is tamaso ma jyotir gamaya – ‘from darkness to light’

Husk Power Systems realized that one waste product in Bihar, rice husks, could be used to power a small biomass gasifier. Along with rice husks, they also use mustard stems, corncobs, grasses, and other agricultural residue. After five months of R&D, they developed a system that could produce 32 kilowatts of power by burning 50 kilograms of rice husk per hour. In the last four years, they’ve installed over 80 biomass mini-plants across Bihar, bringing power to more than 32,000 rural households.

This is just a fraction of the potential market. According to Salman Zafar, CEO of BioEnergy Consult and a renewable energy expert in India. The potential demand for biomass power generation in India exceeds 30,000 megawatts (MW); more than 1,000 times Husk Power’s current installed capacity.

Despite the large potential market, Husk has limited competition.    (Read more…..)

2.  SUPER 30

In a land where the curse of caste has often impaired the progress of the downtrodden, the story of Anand Kumar’s “Super 30” students cracking the IIT JEE is more than just a ‘feel-good’ Hollywood script with contrived plots and composite heroes.

Super 30 _ Anand

In news recently for its inclusion in TimeMagazine’s “Best of 2010 Asia” list, the personal tribulations of the institute’s students – often children of marginal farmers and landless labourers – reveal a larger, determined struggle to usher in a semblance of democracy within Bihar’s jaundiced education systems.

“This year, more than 20 students who made the cut-off were from the backward classes,” says Mr. Kumar, who, along with his mother, once used to sell papads in the Patna’s streets following the untimely death of his father.

For Anand Kumar and his dedicated team of teachers, the purpose behind setting up the “Super 30” goes beyond merely helping needy students secure a chance to have a go at the IIT JEE. It is a mission of social transformation – one aimed at subtly hacking away the fundamentals of Bihar’s repressive caste system.        (Read more….)

Shared Value Creation

Tags

Cisco, Foundation Strategy Group, FSG, Jain irrigation, Mark Kramer, MDI, MDI Gurgaon, Shared Value

At MDI Gurgaon, we recently had Prof. Mark Kramer (MD -FSG, Visiting faculty at HBS, Scholar for HBR) talk on “Shared Value Creation“. We generally know the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Charity if not anything else, but the concept of Shared Value Creation is relatively newer. Well, perhaps the idea still is not new, but its relevance in today’s world certainly is.

Mark Kramer

Shared Value Creation as I understand and take it is creating Social sustainable benefits for others as and when you create monetary benefits for yourself. It is a concept which according to Mark, the corporates and private entities should relate more to. For example, Novartis (the drug company) found that only 17% of medical drugs in India were available to rural population and there was no serious infrastructure to distribute to such a huge market, brought innovation. They provided 300 health educators to go around to different villages to educate the villagers about proper drugs. To make distribution more effective, they tied up with Vodafone and gave out cheeky – attractive deals for those who would promote the drugs in general. After 3 years, they broke even and now are profitable. They, according to mark reached out to 42 million people. After, huge success they now are replicating this idea to other south asian countries.

Such steps taken may not be solely for the purpose of social benefit, but are surely more effective than myriad list of government initiatives that countries take and lose out on the implementation part. Other examples may be of GE or Pepsico nutrition initiatives in southern India presently where they are coming out with a 3-5 Rs nutrition bar for the poor. What I really liked about Mark said was that he didnt give out gyaan. He said what we humans generally do. We are not excited about selfless help, we are not used to it. Perhaps, in this world, it is better to make social problems a business opportunity to properly address them.

Finally, Mark talked about 3 important parts of the whole “Shared Value Creation” concept.

1. New Product and Distribution design systems for new markets

2. Redefining the Value chain (For Eg: Walmart going green, SRISTI)

3. Strengthening the cluster.

The third concept is particularly interesting. What he meant by this was, you help societal sections improve themselves or strengthen other sections so that effectively you benefit. He took the example of CISCO, which had launched a massive distance learning drive to learn better concepts of networking, IT, etc. This way they helped increase more educational value and also improve the standards of the workforce globally. The other example he took was Jain irrigation in India.

This lecture really intrigued me. I thus am going to put out a couple of articles on Start ups or initiative which I come across.

Funde #05: Creativity Thinking

Tags

Creative Thinking, Crow Vending machine, MDI, Pranav Mistry, Remorphing, Sandeep Mann, Sixth sense, Strategy Management, TED, VS Ramachandran

Even though I write after a long time, I come with a lot of stuff. Recently, many thoughts have been coming to mind and its perhaps right time to pen them down. (uh.. type them down!)

In a recent guest lecture by Mr. Sandeep Mann in Strategy Management class, he talked about Creative Thinking. Quoting Edward de bono, Pranav mistry, Welch and other thinkers he also made us indulge in several creative exercises. Now, I would like to mention about a few videos I came across on creative thinking which I believe are really amazing.