Sujavna 2015 (15)

Sunday 18, April 2015 1730 hrs

Triple Bottomline is a concept that many businesses are aware of; it is also true that most businesses are not aware of this concept and, even amongst those that are aware of, very few actually incorporate these objectives.

So how can economic, social an environmental goals become the normal corporate objectives of businesses? Where have the efforts of the proponents of TBL – whether they belong to multilateral bodies such as UN, World Bank or NGOs and academic think-tanks – failed and why have they failed in making this as a mainstream corporate concept across both developed and developing nations? What innovative approaches may help them fast-track the adoption of TBL as a normal corporate objective?

Honestly I do not have answers, but I am convinced that the answers will probably require us to go back to our drawing boards and re-define the concept of a business-entity itself. Any ideas on how and what will be the outcomes of such re-definitions? Please share your views and ideas.

Have a great week ahead.

Sujavna 2015 (14)

Sunday 12, April 2015 1800 hrs

What are the innovation-imperatives for human resource managers? Much has been said and written on what fresh theoretical perspectives and empirical evidences are shaping the practice of human resource management, but I strongly believe that there is a fundamental issue that still needs to be resolved. And this will be the theme for today.

Top managements and HR professionals advising them in most organizations still start with the basic premise that “human-beings” are resources and in knowledge-industries they are sometimes thought of as “assets”; and by corollary, that this resource  needs to be managed (in the most gentle f contexts) and exploited (in the most mundane of contexts). If considered as assets, then they need to realize best-returns from their estimated value. Very little empirical evidence exists that human beings are simply partners with stakes in the growth of the organization.

And at a functional level, it is indeed surprising that there is almost no collaboration (between functional leaders who desire to recruit team-members with their HR colleagues) to actually define needs, scope out the human capabilities for the particular need as well as how this will help the broader organizational needs for current and future environments, research internal capabilities for meeting such needs and developing a program of recruitment and induction that not only helps the candidate and the team but also helps other teams that may lose out by such a recruitment. The moot question is why role-specs for recruitment should be the unquestionable rights of the departmental head and why HR should only play a referee role?

Hope you are having a great weekend.

Sujavna 2015 (13)

Sunday 05, April 2015 1630 hrs

Firstly apologies for missing out on my last Sunday’s post.

Today, I would like to share some thoughts on smart cities. I am very conscious of the fact that this is a politico-economic idea that if hotly debated in India. Many conferences are being organized; many more blogs and thought pieces are being churned out by the hour and the arguments for getting the smart city of India implemented are getting shrill. So why am I joining this bandwagon and what is my purpose?

Honestly I am confused and anxious with all that I hear and read on the subject. So perhaps this blog is a desperate attempt to set on record my own aspirations for what I think any smart city should attempt to be.

Smart cities, in a most elementary manner, need to facilitate I a smart manner, an effective (read that as easy and efficient) way for all of its citizens and floaters as well as its governance institutions to communicate, transact and evolve.

Now that does not necessarily have to mean digital technologies will be the only backbone, though such technologies can help. It also does not mean that smart cities will need to be “freshly-minted” – they could be existing cities that can “re-purpose” themselves to become smarter.

So what are the unambiguous “gold-standards” for effective communications, transactions and evolution between citizens, floaters and governance institutions? Has there been any such smart city frameworks tried in any other part of the world? How much can technology help? Where and when will technology fail in implementation? What should the role of citizens of the smart city be to decide on how much smartness they are willing to absorb? How does a smart city become “un-smart” if its future citizens decide so?  What are the limits of smartness for smart cities – is the theory of diminishing returns equally applicable for smart cities? And one last question – can smart cities become gender-neutral? can they become caste-neutral? and will they support pluralism or will they end up fostering only homogenic technocracy?

What are your views?

Wishing you  great week ahead.