Quarter 9 - Week 7

By this time of the quarter, everyone's done with their midterms and they're scrambling to prepare their projects and presentations. The profs have by now made it clear that their time to drive the classes is almost done, and they're about to hand the steering wheels over to us. Looking back now, it doesn't seem as hectic a quarter as we've made it seem.

Consumer Behaviour

This week we had three other groups do their ApExs... the topics, having been already chosen by our prof at the start of the quarter, were meant as examples for illustrating our learnings from the topic. The teams compared products from different FMCG categories, and looked into why or what prompted certain responses from the market, and what the orgs were doing to better their standing.

The second session was a case on Ethnic Consumer Consulting, and it spoke of what drove people to try different skin care and hair oil products. So these guys go out to do a survey, and get a feel of what women are looking for. Based on this data, our guys try and draw parallels to the theoretical principles from our textbook, and explain where the different brands are placed on a graph that they make up. The prof seems happy, so everyone's happy. Look at us budding managers, with original thought. Sometimes, I wonder...

Strategic Leadership

The midterm last week seems to have struck some fire in the students, or put something out in the prof. The first session was spent on Cognizant's growth and strategy. Honestly, while their approach was interesting, the lesson was the same ol' 'this fits into that as a system of gears', and 'that system of gears fits into this system of gears', and 'this geared-supersystem fits with this geared-supersystem'. The standard thingy of you do a lot of things right, not just one 'competence'. Don't get me wrong, quite a few interesting tidbits, but as an awe-inducing principle, I think we've run out of cases.

The second session was devoted to Hindustan Lever Limited, and its connections with Unilever. I must confess, I thought I did a more involved case preparation by looking at the issues they were facing, and omg, were they facing issues! Being the top-dog in an FMCG industry is not easy. You don't know where your attackers are going to come from. Once in a while, your favourite nemesis attacks you, cuts price, at another time, a complete newbie comes in and attacks you. Now you have a large portion of the market, sometimes 3x-4x that of the closest competitor. So do the simple math... what happens when a new player enters the field, and attracts a set of first-tryouts... where would the biggest proportion of these trial-ers come from? And so these guys battle it, day in and day out... reducing prices here, consolidating brands there, reviving brands that they laid to rest, and laying to rest brands they thought were great. It's not easy. And I go in, thinking I know what the problem is. What does the prof do? He brings in a whole different perspective. He asks: Where in the entire picture do you see Unilever, the parent? To what level is a subsidiary allowed to question the parent's strategy. If the parent does well in one category globally, and you do well in an entirely different category... which one do you focus on? Who drives that focus? Then we see that the ex-top-dog at HLL had been promoted to Unilever's top kennel. And we are asked to think, who's line is he going to walk... Unilever's or HLL's?

For a moment, I'm thinking 'traitor'. Putting yourself ahead of the company (the subsidiary, that is). And then flash forward to today, the new top-dog at HLL (from the case), is ALSO now in the Unilever top-kennel. What does this mean? Can one of these actually become the CEO of the one of the biggest global FMCG companies? An Indian? So then again, we ask... who's line was the first top-dog following... The prof ends with a simple sentence, as you grow, your decisions are not going to be only based on hard fact... it's also going to cover all these hazy areas where you don't have openly-available data. That doesn't mean you don't do your best analysis, but the point is you will still not have all the info. Those instances, when you make your decisions, when you navigate those potholes, is what defines you as a leader.

Personal and Interpersonal Effectiveness Workshop

This week continues off on self-belief and confidence, by looking at being optimistic, creating rapport, persuading people, and the power of the self-conscious. There are enough people out there who are too busy being practical, and realistic, that the idealists are treated as dreamers. And rightfully so... who'd follow a dreamer into the hazy future? But then again, which practical/realistic/sane person would WALK into the hazy future... he'd be pushed into it, or the haze would come over.

The article was not so much about being the starry-eyed dreamer, it was about looking at the positive side of things as well, instead of just focussing on what could go wrong. You get the drift, I'm sure. The other articles were to do with how you could strike rapport with a person, and how you could persuade people. Reading those headings, I thought for sure this involved some sneaky convincing and deliberate half-lies. But as it turns out, it mainly involves showing integrity, and having your thoughts and voice aligned, before you find a goal that is mutually satisfying to the two parties involved. It's not 'Fix my problem!', it's 'What are our problems, and how do we go about fixing it?'.

A normal week thus far, and the only thing that's worthy of eagerness, is the upcoming Eximius fest at IIMB. Should be interesting to see ideas bandied around, on what needs to be done, and how they plan to get it done.