Year: 2012

  • How to Win

    How to Win – Enjoyhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_HtSvcc2pk

  • When the journey is the destination

    When social change is protracted and long it produces a situation that has no closure. There is apparently no end to it. No classic ‘arrived state’. No final shining land of perpetual sunshine, timely rain, green fields or whatever our imagination tells us is waiting for us. In such a situation, the journey itself acquires…

  • Freedom of Expression or Freedom to Blaspheme?

    Freedom of expression must not be confused with freedom from the consequences of expression. Exercising freedom and abusing it are not the same. The latter forfeits the former. Just because we are free to express ourselves, it doesn’t free us from the responsibility for what we express. We are responsible for what we say and…

  • Tyranny of the Few

    Headlines scream out at you: ’80 killed in terrorist attack on two Pakistani mosques.’  ‘Lal Masjid threatens to give the call for jihad.’ ‘Clash with security forces leaves 16 students dead.’ And all this accompanied by pictures of women in burqas wielding lathis longer than themselves. Talk of women power!!  Another one: ‘Flaming jeep drives…

  • Independence must be earned

    Happy Independence Day to you. Independence doesn’t just happen. It must be earned. Let us reflect that real bondage is of the mind and spirit. Nelson Mandela for 27 years in the South African apartheid prison was actually free. But today in India we have accepted the slavery of discrimination against each other, of corruption…

  • Exit: Terminating Family Members

    This is a big one. Some people are of the opinion that family members can’t be terminated under any but the most extreme circumstances like theft or doing something detrimental to the family. My view is that like performance bonuses, termination must also be linked to productivity. To allow the business to suffer losses because…

  • Career progress for family members

    What must they do to progress in their careers? Is anything in this different from what professional managers must do? Short answer: Yes. It must be more difficult, the standards higher, the challenges more exacting because your child is an owner and so must be an example-setter. Also that is how he will gain respect…

  • Careers in Family Businesses

    There is much confusion in most business families about what to do with non-contributing family members. The only way of ‘taking care’ of family seems to be by keeping them in the business. However negative or incompetent people have a disastrous effect on the morale of others, especially when they are themselves seen as powerful…

  • Family business is more about family than about business

    “The business and family love are two different, mutually exclusive issues. When the two mix, both self-destruct.” Current Existence & Growth: Who has the power and why? Performance versus identity: Who are you versus what did you do? Succession: Family or business: Which comes first?           Competence versus connection: Which is more important? Families that understand…

  • The Question of Edge

    In GE, during the time of Jack Welch, there used to be what were called, ‘The 4 – Es’ of GE Leadership: Energy, Energizer, Edge, Execute. We taught this in Crotonville and focused on them in every GE Leadership Course that we taught anywhere in the world. The values statement of GE read: All of…