I WROTE A BOOK!

Ok. i’m lying.

My sister wrote a Book. She’s this horrifyingly overachieving woman who is an inspiration to all, and a pain in my ass. She’s one of the youngest Women MDs of an MNC in the world. AND, in the 2 month between her switching jobs, she managed to write a book that got picked up by Penguin!

Its called Alice in Corporateland and its kinda chick-lit with a twist. It takes the route of fairy tales to give guidance to young people on how to build a strong career.

It’s actually pretty good. I hate to admit it because, y’know, Sis.

So she’s launching it in Mumbai on the 3rd (this saturday) at the Crossword at Kemp’s Corner. Anupama Chopra is in conversation with her.

The invite details are below… msg me on @probablytrippy (Twitter) if you can come? Free autographed copies for all attendees!

Also, because, i can shamelessly ask you, because its for Sis and not for me… can i count on your help in trying to get the word out about it (IF you like it and IF you don’t mind). Obviously, its her debut so she’s very excited and like i’m her brother so i’m excited for her etc..

Do RSVP to me on twitter if you’re coming to the event – also, once the book is launched i’d love to give you a copy and ask you to say nice things to it to your gazillion contacts you social butterfly you.

Participate in a Live interaction with industry leaders at IIML

Tonight and tomorrow, My Students at IIML and i have invited Leaders from the entertainment to have a videoconference interaction with us.

This interaction is also going to be streamed LIVE via ustream, allowing ANYONE (yes that means you!) to watch AND to ask the speakers questions

The schedule is as follows

Jan31st (today)

2035 – Clay Shirky (Yes.. THE Clay Shirky) on “The Future of Industry”

2130 – Alok “Rodinhood” Kejriwal – Noted Gaming expert and serial enterpreneur

 

Feb 1st (Tomorrow)

1720 – Siddharth Roy Kapur, MD, UTV on FIlms

1830 – Vijay Nair, CEO, OML on the “Indie Scene”

 

Dont miss this opportunity to listen in to these awesome speakers and ask them folks any question you want to!

The Live stream will happen on http://www.ustream.tv/channel/collectivity –  if youre there on time, but cant see the stream, just press refresh. Use the social chat box to type in your questions to the speakers!

This is going to be FUN!!!

Simple Quiz for kids

This is a simple quiz for indian schoolkids class 5-7

 

 

 

The New Wealth – Reputation, the gift economy and the #AD2012giveaway

Economic Theory talks about a society being comprised of the “Base” and the “Superstructure” – The “base” comprises of what are the true “forces of production”, whereas the superstructure is everything else – a society’s culture, its instititutions, its political structure, rituals etc.

SImply put the base is “What you do”, and the superstructure is “how you do it”. Both inform the other.

Any economic activity occurs within a superstructure, and the two evolve. For example, currently our economic base is primarily “Industrial”, and the superstructure is “capitalist/democratic”. Some 200 years ago before that, the base was “agricultural” the superstructure was “imperial”.

Given the base and superstructure, there is also a subtle change in definition of “wealth”. While wealth will always remain “the control of factors of production”, those factors of production have evolved – in the agricultural economy it was “Land”, in the industrial economy it is “capital”.

Everytime one system evolves, we can say it goes through a phase transition. And, as with any phase change, this evolution is accompanied by a period of turbulence.

The Russian and French revolutions, Asia and africa’s struggle for independence from the imperial yoke – all of these can be seen as “turbulence” that accompanies the phase change of economic systems.

There’s no reason to believe that the base and superstructure has magically stopped evolving. As a matter of fact, i believe we are on the cusp of another phase change right now.

A few days ago, @anaggh announced the #AD2012giveaway – he looked at the stuff he had in his life which he did not use and decided to give it away. He made up some simple rules and used twitter to announce it. Some other folks decided to join in as well, and they gave away some stuff of tangible value –  stuff like mugs, ipad cases and iphone covers, leather wallets and so on.

A few months ago @boozeandshooze and others were responsible for #booksontoast – an initiative where they collected old books from the library of many folks on twitter, and sold them at rock bottom prices, using the earnings to buy comic books for streetchildren.

We may give these attempts names such as “crowdsourcing” or some other moniker, but for me there was a deeper insight. For me these are perhaps clarion calls of new phase change in economic systems.

We moved from an agricultural age to an industrial age. And now from an industrial age, we are moving to the “Informational age”. And as an economic system evolves, the base, the superstructure and the measures of wealth of that system evolve with it.

what could the potential evolutions be in the informational age?

Firstly the factor of production in the informational age is “Human Capital”, or what clay shirky calls “Cognitive surplus“.

How will this Human Capital be organised? Well, the above examples, and many other 2.0 examples give us a hint.

The Base could evolve from “industrial” to “mass personal” – More and more people will be able to mobilise the factors of production – crowdsourcing and crowdfunding are umbrella terms, they couch something more fundamental – how people are generating value in the informational age, how they are organising themselves is changing.

And the superstructure may well change as well – more and more economists are looking seriously at the post-internet resurgence of the “Gift economy” an economic superstructure that is completely different to the superstructures of the previous ages.

Wikipedia defines the gift economy (or gift culture) as a “mode of exchange where valuable goods and services are regularly given without any explicit agreement for immediate or future rewards (i.e. no formal quid pro quo exists)”

As opposed to the other economic systems, the concept of a “transaction”  is turned on its head – you give something of value (money/time/some resources) without expecting anything in return. And others do the same. And within the system… it magically works!

Both #booksontoast and #AD2012giveaway demonstrate a new economic structure. In a sense they can be seen as prototypes of the new “organisation” in the informational age, with the Base as Mass personal, the superstructure being “gift economy” oriented and the factor of production is “Cognitive surplus” – the desire of others to altruistically participate in your goals.

At the start of this long post, i had given wealth a definition – wealth is the ability to control the factors of production. If “cognitive surplus” is the factor of production of the informational age, then wealth is the ability to control that cognitive surplus.

in other words, the truly rich in the informational age are those who are able to get as many people as possible to contribute their cognitive surplus to their cause.

What is the measure of their wealth? Well, simply put, it is their “Reputation”. The more of a “reputation” you have the more people will listen to you, the more they will participate in your actions, the more trustworthy “information” you will have the ability to generate.

Both @annagh and @boozeandshooze have shown that they are “rich” in the informational age – they have enough of a reputation to mobilise factors of production.

Do you have the same ability? Does your brand? Your company?

If not, how are you going to compete in the new era?

PS. Most of the links on this post are from wikipedia, a shining example of all the concepts ive underlined about the Information age – The base is Mass personal, The superstructure is gift economy, the facor of production is cognitive surplus. And its wealth/reputation within the informational age? Well, you know the answer to that, right?

Misleading campaigns – Gillette India’s Shave or Crave

Data is like a beautiful woman in a sari – what is concealed is far more important than what is revealed.

Gillette’s “shave or crave” campaign is just like that sariclad woman. what it reveals is quite eye opening  – 87% of women like their men cleanshaven in the evening. ANd this is AC Nielsen data!

From this data, Gillette goes on to imply “If you want to get luck tonight, you better shave”.

Well men  –  lets go out there and by more Gillette razors and shave of them beards, right?

WRONG.

Because, like a woman in a sari, what Gillette is CONCEALING is far more important!

The unstated caveat of gilletter data is that Gillette is ONLY TALKING ABOUT WOMEN WHO PREFER CLEANSHAVEN MEN!!

And THAT my fellow males, is quite a small proportion.

A spot quiz i did recently  shows it clearly.

WOMEN DO NOT LIKE CLEANSHAVED MEN.

As a matter of fact less than 1 in 5 women like their men clean shaved. The overwhelming majority wants you NOT TO SHAVE.

So, adding my data to gillette’s the ACTUAL learning is this

87% of the 20% of women who like cleanshaved men, or approximately 17 out of 100 want you to shave in the evening!

its funny no, how 17% can be made to sound like 87%, no

I dont blame gillette per se – they need to sell blades, and data show that men are shaving less. Plus, we are generally data challenged and headline hungry – so “87% Women want you to shave!!” sounds so much better than reality.

One way of looking at it is outrage etc. Another was to look at it is “Oh, its good marketing to ignorant sheep”

Could Gillette have had a different marketing strategy? Maybe not use the “sex” bait, rather use the “success” bait – you know, something like

“What do JRD Tata, Mukesh Ambani, and Bill gates have in common?” “Lots of money and no beards 🙂 ”

Whatever the case may be, i really do feel that Gillette, at best, is engaging in misleading advertising, by cherrypicking data and misrepresenting it.

your thoughts?

Your favorite physics Funda

I love Physics – sometimes i dont understand it, but often i do. And when i do, i see it everywhere – i see it in streetlights, and coffee machines, and pool tables and juhu beach and sunsets …everywhere.

At some point… some physics “Funda” really clicked for me. Like… How linear waves turn into concentric waves when they pass through a barrier – My teacher showed us a harbor, and things made sense.

Or using a rubber sheet, and placing a heavy ball bearing in the middle, and rolling balls towards it, demonstrating a gravity well.

Or the visual of a man tossing a ball in the air inside a train to explain relative motion (to the man the ball seems to have moved up and down in a straight line, to an observer outside the train the ball moves in a parabola)

Sometimes – some “funda” of physics just clicks because of some experiment you do, some image youre shown sometimes even an innocuous sentence a teacher has said.

SO my question to you is this

“Can you actually remember one Instance where some “funda” of physics became clear to you? And what happened precisely to bring about that Eureka moment? was it something the teacher said? an experiment you did? what?” DO try to be as detailed as possible?

I’d really really love to know!

Please do comment below!

The real Size of India’s Scams

So, there have been three major scams in India over the last few years – the “2g” Scam, Coal-Gate, and the emerging Thorium scam. Numbers like “20 Lac Crore” are thrown around. If we take the figures at face value, i just wanted to get a clearer idea of what those figures meant.

Estimated Values of Scams

2g scam – 2 Lac Crores – 2 Trillion

Coal-gate  – 11 Lac Crores – 11 Trillion

Thorium – 48 Lac Crores – 48 Trillion

The Estimated Value of the 3 scams – 61 Trillion Rupees or 61,000,000,000,000 Rupees.

What is this figure? What Does this figure *mean*?

I tried to find some ways of giving it some equivalence –

In dollar terms that is approx 1.1 Trillion Dollars (USD). Thats money that should be part of our national exchequer. It should be used to build roads, improve education, provide health care, utilities, perhaps invest in fuel independence. Instead, the concept of a scam implies that, rather than being part of the national exchequer, this money has gone into private bank accounts.

India’s GDP is estimated at $1.8 tn. So, apparently our scams equal some 60% of our GDP!!

What would that money buy us?

– Well, it is estimated that some 32.7% of india’s population, (some 500 million people) lives in abject poverty – less than 60 rupees per day. The scam amount, if shared amongst those people, would give each person some 1.5 Lac rupees!

– 1 in 7 people on this planet is suffering from extreme hunger. It is estimated that it would cost $195bn a year to ensure noone in the world starves. Our scams would pay fr TEN years of feeding the world. it would save 150 million children who would otherwise die of starvation in that same period.

– India spends 4.1% of its GDP on education every year. This scam money would pay for our entire nation’s education for the next 13 years! An alternative way of looking at it – We could give a 2 Lac rupee education endowment to every child under 15 in the country

– Even at 100$ per barrel, this would pay for our entire country’s oil consumption for the next DECADE! ie, it would give every individual, household, factory, carowner among us FREE petrol/energy/electricity/cookingfuel for the next 10 years!

THis money would pay for every indians income tax, AND every company’s corporate Tax for nearly 20 YEARS! Imagine, no more income tax for the next 20 years!

Lets bring it closer to something we can identify with. If every single indian on facebook got a share of the scam money – we’d EACH get 11.5 lac rupees!

The sheer size of these figures go on and on. It begs the question – what is the true impact to us due to these scams, due to the revenue our exchequer would have had, which it has been denied? Would our petrol prices have still risen? Would we still have to pay such high income tax? Would children die of starvation? Would half of our country be on the streets?

I think that this is yet another example of the cabal between the capitalist imperialists and the government, which is ostensibly supposed to protect its citizens from exploitation.

Our politicians are bleeding the country dry while we watch reality TV and outrage about apple vs samsung, and gleefully celebrate kasab’s death. Those are just distractions, keeping us from focussing on real issues.

We need to wake up.

Movies, Politics … and Memes

Here i am again, talking about my pet topic – memes. I’ve talked about them many times – here, or here. Or here. But here we go again!

First of all please understand that a “meme” (rhymes with cream) has only now come to be “merely” an internet meme. The idea of a meme was initially postulated to try and understand how cultural ideas are “transmitted” from one person to another. Richard Dawkins postulated that an idea was made up of memes (analogous to how genes make up the body).

For Example Take a look at this

At first glance you know exactly what it is – yet another one of those political posters that our wonderful politicians put up given any excuse they have. The “MEME” of a political poster is so strong that this is instantly slotted in as one.

… Then you notice that it has “Wasseypur” written on it – yes, its a promotional poster for Part 2 of Anurag Kashyap’s Magnum opus.

Then you read a news article about Some Congress Party workers in Ahmedabad and see THIS image

A typical looking street procession with a typical banner… wait a minute… Does that say Gangs of Chorpur? Yes! The Congress party has taken the “idea” or (meme) of Gangs of Wasseypur and used it to paint their opponents as thieves!

so yes, obviously there’s the whole ironic “Art imitates life” then “Life imitates art” deal, but for me, there’s more.

This is an example of how people use/co-opt memes as they tryto transmit ideas. Its a real life look at how the concept of using a meme is beneficial – the political meme for the film poster, and the movie meme for the politicians!

There’s more to a meme than we give it credit for. Its much more than “Bad Luck Brian”.

Watch out for Assumptions

Imagine – You are the CEO of a company that provides a product whose service to its customers is absolutely undeniable – people will always want the service you’re selling (though not necessarily “your” brand).

Apart from some refinements, the technology of this product has remained essentially unchanged for hundreds of years, but it seems to suit everyone well, and all your consumers are happy.

One fine day, out of the blue, your R&D head comes to you with a breathtaking innovation. Made a product innovation that will solve the one “problem” with your product. It will make your product extremely easy to use! This is the next step!

What would you do, Mr. CEO? Would you embrace this innovation?

Well, obviously there’s a trick in this question somewhere, but some quibbles apart, usually people are forced to agree that, yes it makes business sense to “go for it”.

OK. New question – How many of you wear digital watches?

I am sure I can guess the answer. If you *do* wear a watch, nine times out ten its a good old “normal” watch, with  those familiar hands moving inexorably in that familiar circle.

But have you ever wondered…WHY? Why are you wearing that kind of watch and not a digital one? Isnt LED/LCD technology undeniably superior? Doesnt it make it so much easier to tell the time? Then why isnt it the “top choice”?

When digital LCD technology came along it heralded a brave new dawn for the wristwatch. Imagine! You could finally see, in numbers, what time it actually was! This was a godsend! All watch companies gleefully embraced this technology, and it seemed that how we “tell the time” was finally going to change for the first time in a hundred years.

But did it? No.

Why not?

Well, LCD/LED technology seems awesome, because there was an unspoken assumption that seemed so obvious that, well, no one bothered to think about it.

The assumption was that we use watches to tell what time it is.

Believe it or not, this assumption isn’t true – we don’t use watches to tell what time it is, at least  “right now”. Rather we use our watch to calculate “How much time left till a predetermined time in the future”. And when we understand that, we can why digital LCD watches have not been the “hit” they promised to be.

Lets take an example – you have to get to a meeting at 1045. On your way you look at your watch – why? To find out “how much time left until 1045”. If you’re wearing a digital watch, and the time is say 10:09 – you have to do a little bit of mental math to tell yourself how much time you’ve got – some 46 minutes. wait… 36 minutes. Right?

However, with a normal watch, telling how much time you have left is a breeze – this watch gives you a VISUAL representation of time. You look at it and you see “How much of the arc of the circle” is left till 1045 – you see that its a shademore than 50% of the circle, you know you have slightly  more than 30  minutes to get there.

Think about this assumption the next time you look at your watch, and you’ll see that the only time you actually care about what time it is “right now” is when someone actually asks you what time it is. And notice how when that happens it actually takes you that split second of time to answer – Because youre not USED to using your watch in that manner; usually, you look at the watch to find out “how much time you have left” to some predetermined time in the near future.

All around us, such assumptions abound. From using GDP to measure wealth, to “established” business models even to the reason why women’s shirt buttons are on the left, these are remnants of certain environmental conditions that necessitated design in a certain manner. Very often these assumptions lose their raison d’etre in a changed environment, but we persist with them, simply because we never bother to question them.

As our environment gets more chaotic and turbulent, it becomes increasingly important for all decision makers to question the underlying assumptions behind the situation, and exploring if those assumptions still remain valid.

After all, the clocks ticking.

What they don’t teach you at IIM

This month, i complete 10 years of working after my MBA. And, well, its been an interesting journey. If its worth it to anyone, i thought id put down what i learned.

1. Your “well-meaning” Colleagues will give you advice. DONT TAKE IT.

When i graduated from IIM in 2002, i had job offers from HLL and Phillips – both were the “dream jobs” that a Marketing graduate hopes for. But it just didnt seem interesting. So, instead, i took a 50% salary cut to Help Yash Raj Films set up their Marketing Department. This was BEFORE the “corporatisation of Bollywood”…. people were still thinking that movies were all about black money, underworld etc. I think i was the first Marketing MBA in the industry.  My classmates and teachers strongly dissuaded me from taking the job. Some thought i was “Starstruck”. I’m glad i didnt listen to them though.

2. You’re not going to become a CEO in 3 months

Everyone equates my time at Yash Raj Films with the boom in Marketing, starting with “Hum tum” which quickly became a case study and established the rules of Marketing in bollywood. Hum tum was followed by dhoom, veer zaara, bunty aur babli, Salaam namaste, Fanaah, Chak de india, Dhoom 2 etc etc…. suddenly i could do no wrong. However, noone remember that it was TWO YEARS between me joing YRF, and the release of Hum Tum.

That was TWO YEARS of toiling, of making mistakes, of being disheartened. Two years of wondering if i’d made a mistake in choosing this career. MBAs have a habit of quitting their first job within a year. If I’d done that, well… i wouldnt have done some of my most well-known work.

3. When you’ve gotten really good at your job, QUIT

Why do we do a job? To earn a salary? or to become all that imagined we could be?

Some 5/6 years into my Job at Yash Raj Films, everything had gone into autopilot (or so i thought). My learning curve had become less steep, and life was, frankly, easy. Now one would be tempted to feel “Well, ive done the hard part, let me sit back and enjoy it”. However, i saw it differently. It was simple – i wasnt learning, i wasnt growing. You only have one life, only one chance to push yourself – is it really worth it to just… take it easy? I quit, after following the advice of a student. Which leads me to the next two points…

4. Your education isn’t over, keep paying attention.

You think you’ve done all the hard work, or maybe youre proud of having done so little but still having conned the system. In either case its over, you’re DONE! No more studies! Right? Wrong. Boss, the party is just starting. If it is not your priority to constantly upgrade your knowledge, to learn then, in a few years, you will become strictly mediocre. Like your cousin brother, who did engineering, and is working an IT job but isnt really “going” anywhere. And dont wait for someone to organise a “training”.. you should be studying now!

My first 2 years at YRF, i went right back to study. DId my own research. Worked with students across the country – i still use results of their research when i teach. Suddenly all that “Research Methodology” really made sense. One of my biggest eureka moments was when i equated the faffy “Product Lifecycle Curve” into a movies release earning, and actually LEARNED something for once!

Also, For me, Teaching was a great way of Learning. I had to stay sharp, i had to be organised, and over the many hours and  years of teaching the same thing over and over, i had to learn how to keep it interesting for me! And that somehow made all my fundas clearer. I threw in a few of my own too!

5. Shut up and LISTEN

We cant help it. when we are in our early 20’s we are full of exuberance and invincibility. We know best. Well, I’m sure you do. But do yourself a favor and really… Listen. Pretend you’re a master samurai who treats his enemy with great respect, and learns everything he needs, so that the master stroke is…exquisite. Just … listen. Then, the times you open your mouth, you wont be just adding to the static, something im sure you agree happens in most meetings!

While i was teaching “The Business of Entertainment” some years ago at MICA… i think it was 2007, i kept harping on and on about how “the internet will change the world”. One student piped up “THen why arent you working there”. And it made me think…  “you know what… she’s got a point” .And, because i was really  listening, some innocuous words from a student were a clarion call for me to change track. I started looking for  job change.

6. If you’re in a Job because “The money’s good” get out. NOW

I dont mean that you shouldnt earn money. It just shouldnt be the “reason” you’re doing what you’re doing. When i joined MySpace, i was earning really well… mucho dinero. But… i slowly realised it wasnt what i thought it would be. I thought Myspace was a guerilla/fast organisation. But it was an MNC, owned by newscorp. It was less “free flowing” than i thought. After a year and a half, i was desperately unhappy. But man, i was earning so MUCH!

…. but then, i actually LOOKED at my life.

I was still smoking the same cigarettes, drinking the same amount, eating the same food, living in roughly the same house. My “lifestyle” wasnt very different. SUre money was accruing in the ol’ bank account, but… was it worthi it? We spend75% of our waking life at our job – how much money is worth “losing” 75% of your LIFE?

I was about to turn 30… and i thought… is this really how its meant to be? I quit. And took the biggest risk of my life.

7. Life is short, but DONT RUSH.

We have very short event horizons. Its hard to think about the fact that life will be longer than a 3-4 yr window. So we’re always hurrying. Hurrying to get a raise, to get a promotion, to take a better job, to close the deal, to prove ourselves. And when we are hasty, we sometimes make hasty or shallow decisions…

Your career is going to be unbelievably long. You’ve got more time than you think. Take it from me. Ive been working for 12 years now, and trust me, ive barely BEGUN! SO dont be in a rush. Dont try to do it fast, try and do it RIGHT. Try and do it WELL. Trust me, as your career progresses it will make you stand out.

When i quit myspace, i had 150 job offers. Instead i thought… before i know what im going to do next, im going to really explore my passions, my daydreams, see which ones im truly serious about, see what i really wanted to do.

I worked in Fair Trade, Architecture and Urban Development, Independent Music, as a teacher across Business Schools, i wrote (and sold) a TV show, helped a movie get crowdfunding. I learned how to survive earning 30k a month – which was 10% of my previous salary. I realised that even then, if the work was exciting, nothing else really mattered.

I took all the time i needed before i aligned myself to my life goal. And because of that, there is a strang “certainty” about my life, which is irrespective of how my “job” is going. Because, well, Life’s good.

8. Understand that this is your LIFE

THis isnt a movie playing out. This isnt an ignored moment fading into another. THis is YOU, dying, slowly. How do you want to be remembered? When they write your obituary, what do you want them to say? What is actually worth while?

For me, I came to a conclusion that a good life is one that helps as many as possible. You may come up with something else. But itd be nice if you thought about it.

 

I wanted to have 10 neat bullet points, i have 8. On reareading this i feel that maybe its a bit rambly. Maybe its a bit trite. Maybe you’ll read this and laugh at me. WHo knows? ….which, DOES  bring me to another point.

9. Life is Unpredictable – so enjoy yourself right NOW.

We keep thinking that “WHen THIS happens, THEN life will be perfect”. WHen i earn this much, or hen we get married, or when i have a child, or when my children graduate…. But think about it. Right now, this moment. You’re healthy. Your family is happy. THings are pretty much ok. Nothing massively catastrophic happening. People love you. Your stomach’s full. Its pretty damn perfect, no?

You’re going to look back at this time with such nostalgia and wistfulness na…

So, dont wait for something to make you happy. just… BE happy. NOW. Because life is unpredictable – store up your happiness today for a potential rainy day.

 

The rest, will take care of itself. I think.