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Referring to the influence of
husbands and fathers on educated women’s choice of vocation,
Karuna D’Cruz says, "Research findings show that women
are psyched by social expectations to accept such a position
of affairs" deemed fit for woman. A. Aravind gives
details of how a unit could be financed and the various
avenues open to women entrepreneurs to set up their industrial
or business units. Dr C. Ganesh dwells on the need for finding
markets for entrepreneurs, while Dr N.C. Pillai underlines the
conceptual framework for the empowerment of women
entrepreneurs. He avers that an entrepreneur converts a
vulnerability into an opportunity.
K.P.
Muraleedharan observes that despite Kerala women’s higher
educational and quality-of-life standards, most of the schemes
to empower them have produced unsatisfactory results. Quoting
various psychographics of Kerala women, he concludes, "…although
the women of Kerala possess some personality traits necessary
for successful entrepreneurship, they lack the critical
factors necessary for entrepreneurship like the ability to
take risk, self-dependence, an experimental nature and
innovativeness". Dr N. Thanulingam highlights the
cultural dimensions of today’s entrepreneurship. He says
that economists consider the development of enterprise an
outcome of capital availability, access to market, supply of
labour, raw material and technology. However, anthropologists,
historians, sociologists and psychologists emphasise "in
varying and contradictory terms, the influence of the
non-economic factors like social norms and beliefs,
psychological motivation for achievement, the legitimacy of
entrepreneurship, questions of social marginality and the ‘internal
bit’ between any and all of these in the rise of modern
entrepreneurship".
There are 22
contributors to this interesting debate. Even though the
discussion is Kerala-centric, the issues are of national
importance. Our women are even today dependent on male members
of the family for the majority of decisions that affect their
lives. More important, the processes of decision making and
their long-term consequences have to be understood not only by
women but the rest of the society also. Empowerment of women
is still in nascent stages in our society. Therefore it is all
the more essential to see that it does not die prematurely.
A thought
provoking tome.
***
Managing
Radical Change by Sumantra Ghoshal, Gita Piramal &
Christopher A. Bartlett. Viking, New Delhi. Pages xvii+344. Rs
495.
What happens
when the flabby Mr Lazybones suddenly discovers that in order
to survive in this world he will have to act snappy and put
his shoulder to the wheel? Of course, he whines, he huffs and
puffs. He would not acknowledge his own lethargy as the cause
for his inefficiency, but blame the rest of the
"wicked" world for making his life difficult. Ask
him to pull up his socks and he complains as if the polity has
inflicted grave injustice upon his person and psyche. Spoilt
and mollycoddled for long by a protective regime, our biz
world behaved in the identical manner when initially exposed
to international competition in 1991. Today it is time to act.
Corporate houses – big or small – must react promptly to
the fast changing market scenarios. For this they must bring a
radical change in their mindset.
This book
insists that in order to create and manage change, senior
managers have to develop the belief that radical performance
improvement is possible – not only for small and
medium-sized business units but also for the big ones and that
too in a "reasonably short" period of time. The
authors point out that incrementalism or the belief that
everything in a company happens slowly and incrementally is in
fact a case of misplaced faith. People like Dhirubhai Ambani
have proved that it is possible to debunk the rituals and
metaphors of incrementalism and get one’s organisation on
the fast track of growth by setting essentially new rules.
Those who thought that the Reliance group of companies would
burst like bubble have not only eaten crow in public but are
also now aping the trailblazer.
Say the
authors, "In a deregulated, competitive economy driven by
the cruel logic of markets, a company that fails to change
fast enough can and will die – as is manifest in the slow
march to extinction that has already become inevitable for
some of Indiagreat old companies. At the same time, in this
deregulated market economy, a determined management can
transform a company much more quickly and much more
effectively than was possible in the past". Here they
give the example of Motorola, which, in 1985, saw its profit
plummet from a healthy 6.2 per cent to mere 1.3 per cent due
to the competition from Japanese companies. Its cellphone and
pagers business was under siege and had virtually lost the
battle for miniaturisation and "featurisation". But
by 1988 the Motorola’s profitability returned to 5.3 per
cent thanks to innovative products and competitive pricing.
The authors observe, "Within these three years, Motorola
achieved dramatic improvements in its operations. Development
time for new products was shortened from an average of three
years to 1.8 years. Design improvements led to a fall in the
average number of parts per product from 3400 to 600. The
order-to-shipment period was cut from 30 to three days.
Defects per million fell from 3000 to 200, thanks to the
celebrated six-sigma total quality programme."
Another
malaise, according to the authors, that inflicts our
industrialists’ mindset is the debilitating "industrial
determinism". They seem to complain all the time,
"How can I do much better, my industry is in lousy
shape?" However, some managers do not respect the law of
industry averages. They use the best performers as the
benchmark and are competitive enough to better the best. For
example the Ispat International NV, though registered in
Holland and headquartered in London, is very much an Indian
company "in its spirit and its management". Amidst
the ruins of the steel industry, Lakshmi Niwas Mittal has
built one of the most successful Indian-led enterprises by
ignoring the law of industry determinism. An industrialist
must have the "energy of his own conviction" in
order to come up trumps when faced with daunting odds.
This tome has
14 chapters divided into four parts. These deal with such
aspects of management as the challenge of radical performance
improvement, shaping and managing the future, revitalising
people, organisation and relationships, and transforming the
corporate philosophy. Wannabe counted amongst Indian business
world’s movers and shakers? This book is for you.
***
Captors of
Time by Achala Moulik. UBSPD New Delhi. Pages 209. Rs 450.
 There are
several indicators of a civilisation’s progress. Among them
perhaps art and architecture play a pivotal role. Monuments
unerringly point towards the socio-economic, political,
religious and cultural status of a particular people during a
given period of time. Consciously or subconsciously man
immortalizes contemporary history in the form of buildings.
The author observes, "Monuments are links between time
and man…bring significance to the ephemeral events of human
destiny and is an expression of the craving of man to leave
behind a token of his presence in the terrifying abyss of
eternity."
Achala Moulik
further points out that monuments can be symbols of a nation’s
pride like the Eiffel Tower, or expressions of personal hubris
like the Versailles. Further, man’s expressions in the form
of monuments can take different forms; Neuschwanstein and
Fasil Ghebi are both castles – yet no two buildings could be
more different. Khajuraho and St Peter’s are both places of
worship but there is a quantum jump between the ribaldry of
the one and the solemnity of the other. She also observes that
there are monuments like the Vijayanagar’s ruins that need
the resources of imagination to summon the past, while in
others like the Versailles one expects at any moment the
flourish of trumpets announcing the entry of the Sun King.
The author
goes on to observe that monuments are captors of time. They
mark both man’s ascent and descent, his creative genius as
well as his destructive potential. They traverse the gamut of
human spirit. The aspiration to be free is expressed in
monuments like the Statue of Liberty that soars high above the
ground or in the salt sculptures in Wieliczka deep in the
bowels of the earth. Monuments like St Peter’s Basilica show
the exultation of human spirit, while the ones like Senegal’s
Slave House show the depths to which man can descend. There
are monuments to great ideas like the Westminster Palace – a
symbol of parliamentary democracy, or New York’s United
Nations headquarters – symbolising international
cooperation.
Moulik has
also included great monuments to worship – Angkor, Isfahan,
Byodo-in, Chartres, as well as citadels of power like the
Kremlin, the Forbidden City and the Versailles. Alhambra and
Borobudur exude melancholy enchantment.
When one goes through the
book one realises the futility of compartmentalising human
heritage. There is certainly a whiff of the local culture, yet
the spirit is catholic. The endeavor to create is at once
unique and universal. One hopes to read more of such
literature. More power to your pen, Ms Moulik!
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THERE
is hardly any male bastion left in India that women have not
stormed into. Armed forces, medicine, civil services,
mountaineering and other adventure sports, and much else. So,
could entrepreneurship have remained beyond the Indian woman’s
reach for long? Admittedly, a majority of Indian women are not
yet empowered but at least they are aware of their rights and
their possible usages. Some of these women have taken bold
steps towards emancipation with gratifying results. The book
under review is a collection of papers presented during the
UGC sponsored seminar organised by the University of Kerala’s
Department of Commerce.
