https://youtu.be/oCXvTxMLVn0

वारकर्यांचा देव

वारकर्यांचा देव
लहानपणी पुस्तकात स्वातंत्र्यवीर सावरकरांचा एक धडा पुस्तकात होता --- विश्वाचा देव आणि मानवाचा देव . त्यात सावरकरांनी लिहिले होते कि कसे विश्वाचा देव आणि मानवाचा देव हे दोन्ही अत्यंत भिन्न आहेत. त्याच अनुषंगाने आज वारकर्यांच्या देवावर लिहावेसे वाटते. वारकर्यांचा देव म्हणजेच पांडुरंग हा नामाचा आणि त्यातील भावाचा भुकेला आहे. त्याला तीनत्रिकाळ पूजा कर्म कांड नको आहे. त्याची पूजा बांधायला ब्राह्मणही त्याला नको आहेत. तो असे कधीच म्हणत नाही कि सर्व संसार सोडून माझे नाव घेत बसा. उलट कर्म करताना माझे स्मरण करीत राहा अशी संतांची शिकवण आहे.
ज्ञानदेव हे अत्यंत क्रांतिकारी संत होते असे मला वाटते कारण स्वतः नाथ पंथी असूनही सामान्यांसाठी त्यांनी सोपा असा भक्ती मार्ग सांगितला. नाथपंथी हे खरे तर निर्गुणाचे उपासक आणि म्हणूनच आदिनाथ अथवा गोरक्षनाथ यांची भजने निर्गुणी भजनेच. त्यांनी कोठेच मंदिरे उभारली नाहीत व त्यांची स्वतःची हि नाहीत. ज्ञानदेव तर अत्यंत कठीण अशा हठयोगाचे योगी. सर्व सिद्धी त्यांना ज्ञात होत्या पण सामान्यात, गोरगरीबात राहायचे म्हणून त्यांनी या सिद्धींचा उपयोग अगदी आवश्यक तेंव्हाच केला. ब्राह्मण वर्गाकडून कठोर वागणूक मिळूनही त्यांनी त्यांचे बद्दल कधीच टीका व उपहासगर्भ वचने काढली नाहीत. कबीर बहुतेक त्यांचा समकालीन पण कबीरा प्रमाणे कठोर मूर्तीपूजे विरुद्ध लिखाण त्यांनी केले नाही. परंतु ज्या भक्ती पंथाची रचना त्यांनी केली त्यात नामस्मरण व त्यातून चिंतन हि शिकवण त्यांनी दिली. सामन्यास कठीण वाटणारी योगमार्गाची सोपी वाट त्यांनी ज्ञानेश्वरी लिहून सामन्यासाठी मोकळी केली. वारकर्यांचा देव म्हणूनच मूर्तीत प्रकट असला तरी भक्ती मात्र हृदयात असलेल्या देवाचीच करावी हि खरी त्यांची शिकवण. आणि म्हणूनच वारकर्यांचा देव पंढरपुरात असला तरी तो खरा प्रत्येक वारकर्याच्या हृदयात आहे. हा देव श्रीमंतांचा वातानुकूलित भक्ती करणार्या भक्तांचा नाही तर शेतात राबणार्या दरिद्री नारायण शेतकऱ्याचा देव होय. काही वेळा अशा देवाच्या नावाने कर्मठ पूजाकांड करणार्या लोकांना म्हणून ज्ञानेश्वर आणि तुकोबादी संताना अभिप्रेत असणारा देव समजलाच नाही असे म्हणावेसे वाटते! आषाढ महिन्यातल्या या पवित्र समयी सर्वांनाच या देवाचे आशीर्वाद आणि कृपा लाभो हि त्याचे चरणी प्रार्थना!

मोहन कोतवाल
जुलाई 2016

“Innovation and Creativity in Marketing Value Chain with Specific Focus on Social

Services Marketing”

A paper submitted for ‘NICOM-2008’ Jan 9-11,Ahmedabad

By

Dr (Lt Col) Mohan Kotwal, Professor, I.M.E.D., Bharati Vidyapeeth University, Erandawane, Paud Road, Pune 411-038, Maharashtra,India

mohan.kotwal@rediffmail.com

mob. No.9890507803

“Innovation and Creativity in Marketing Value Chain with Specific Focus on Social

Services Marketing”

A paper submitted for ‘NICOM-2008’ Jan 9-11,Ahmedabad

By

Dr (Lt Col) Mohan Kotwal, Professor, I.M.E.D., Bharati Vidyapeeth University, Erandawane, Paud Road, Pune 411-038, Maharashtra,India

mohan.kotwal@rediffmail.com

mob. No.9890507803

Abstract

“Marketing challenges in the new changed paradigms of the intensely competitive international economies have become more and more knowledge centric wherein innovation and creativity play a very crucial role in the total Value chain management. The same is  also true for Social Services marketing such as the health care, mental fitness and management services, even the spiritual services such as the various Yoga and related services being offered to the people. There is a dearth of creative ideas and innovations in these crucial social services where there exist hardly any yardsticks and benchmarks. It is also necessary to apply some hardcore marketing concepts in these areas if these non-organized activities of emerging segments are to be made more customers friendly in terms of value addition as well as accountability. The paper focuses on these aspects in general and innovation in particular to highlight some of the strategies which can make these aspects more efficient and effective. The paper makes use of author’s own research in Self Development of Managers with a no. of techniques including meditation being offered to general public as well as managers and their effectiveness in improving managerial effectiveness.”

1.0 Introduction

1.1 The management doyen Peter Drucker wrote, ‘the business has two and only these two basic functions: marketing and innovation. Marketing and innovation produce results; all the rest are costs’. The Japanese, like all other philosophies discarded by the so called hard headed American business pundits, took this one also to their heart and even today the Americans do not know what makes the car giant Toyota come out endlessly with cars that cost less and are almost defect free. ‘I don’t know why is it that whenever I ask for a pair of hands the brain comes attached’ exclaimed the pioneer of American car industry, Henry Ford. Put that against the Japanese belief particularly popular with companies such as Toyota which consider its 1^st line employees not just cogs in a soul less manufacturing machine but a valuable asset in the practice of ‘wa’-cooperation and ‘nemawashi’-consultation. At the heart of any Japanese company is the principles of ‘Zen’ from which emanates the practice of ‘kai-zen’ or incremental improvements that are the building blocks of a culture of continual innovation and invention.

1.2 Innovation and creativity are no more a matter of choice for any business if it wants to survive in the present day bloody battles of business wits where the mantra is ‘innovate or perish’. Be it companies like 3M or Microsoft the real challenges are not in how you manage or strategize or even visualize your business , but in how fast and effective you are in putting new inventions and ideas into action. While many U.S. companies are still victims of what Hamel calls ‘intellectual feudalism’; the ones which are successful have realized that in a knowledge economy you can not and should not undermine any mind no matter to whom in the hierarchy of your company it belongs to and to under estimate the competitors in a strategic blunder of relying on outdated ideas. While focusing on the aspects and challenges in the field of marketing, ‘innovative marketing’ thus becomes an imperative that can’t be ignored. Marketing since its inception in the early 1900’s’ has undergone drastic conceptual and typological changes as brought out in the typology given by Sheth, Gardener and Garrett ( ref. Sheth, et al ,’Marketing Theory: Evolution and Evaluation’,1988.)

Some authors such as Cox, Alderson and Shapiro in proposing an ‘a normative theory of marketing’ where Alderson likened the firms to biological entities, said that the prime strategy of all firms is ‘strategy of avoidance’ where the role of an executive is to avoid malfunctioning in the system and to prevent it falling in the extinction mode. Many others such as Thomas, are alarmingly bold in proclaiming that ‘marketing profession at least in its academic ranks is suffering from ‘epistemopathology’ or the application of ‘diseased, sick, and bad knowledge that is mechanistically applied to contemporary global market systems, in self serving ways, to identify and solve immediate problems, problems which are not well understood, and without any consideration of the ripple effects on society as a whole.’ Sheth et al in 1988 raised also two questions regarding the marketing philosophy, which are in many a scholars’ opinion still relevant in 21^st century. These are,

a)     Why should marketing scholars even endeavour to develop  a general theory of marketing?

b)     Marketing is undergoing an identity crisis as also a credibility crisis.

Really speaking even today the question, ‘what is really marketing’ still remains largely un- answered and many practitioners of it are not satisfied by the answers given by the academics.

Without going in the whole evolutionary history it would be sufficient to mention here findings of Schultz and Kitchen, in 2000, which are,

a)     Marketing world requires new developmental pathways for marketers at all levels

b)     Marketers must balance marketplaces with market spaces.

c)     Organizational constraints must be recognized as such, and overcome over time.

d)     A research rich consumer understanding is vital.

e)     Both marketing communications and corporate communications are needed to effectively compete in today’s crowded and turbulent environment.

f)      Marketing training is required at all organizational levels.

g)     Mind maps – ways of seeing the marketing world – may need to be revisited, reviewed and re-adjusted to reflect current developments.

1.3    The purpose of quoting elaborately some of the latest writings and concepts in marketing thought was to define the context for this paper which tries to focus on the changed paradigms within the intellectual and practical domains of marketing as a theory and as a profession. Viewed in this background the context now can be  defined as-

a)     Definition of innovation and creativity and their role in the changed paradigms of marketing function, with respect to value chain concept in services segment in general and social services in specific.

b)     Assessing where we are in terms of value addition in these areas and a critical analysis of the situation.

c)     Defining the future vision and a framework of concepts within which to make this vision a reality.

2.0 What is innovation and creativity?

2.1 The National Innovation Initiative of U.S.,  defines innovation as, ‘The intersection of Invention and Insight, leading to the creation of social and economic value.’ It is also production and implementation of ideas. 3M defines innovation as ‘an action or implementation which results in an improvement, a gain, or a profit.’  Sam Palmisano, President and CEO of IBM says, “The nature of innovation –the inherent definition of innovation –has changed today from what it  was in the past. It’s no longer individuals toiling in a laboratory, coming up with some great invention. It’s not an individual, it’s individuals. It’s multidisciplinary. It’s global. It’s collaborative.” Hence innovation can be defined as using new ideas or applying current thinking in fundamentally different ways that result in significant ways. (IBM Global Innovation Studies 2006). There are three ways of innovation that contribute to wealth creation in organizations—

 a) Business Model Innovation: Significantly changing the structure and/or financial model of the business.

b) Operations Innovation: Improving the effectiveness and efficiency of core business processes and functions.

c) Product/Service / Market Innovation: Creating new or significantly differentiated products, services or go-to-market activities.

2.2 For innovation to flourish organizations must create an environment that fosters creativity; bringing together multi disciplinary, multi talented groups of people who work in close collaboration together- exchanging knowledge, ideas, and shaping the direction of the future. W.Somerset Maugham, the famous English novelist once wrote, “People grind and grind in the mill of truism, and nothing comes out but what was put into it. A moment’s departure from the tradition and the past, and art ,poetry, wit, invention discovery everything come to the fore in a continuous flow of spontaneity and creativity”.  The trouble is, that to innovate you need to traverse on completely un charted territories involving great risks to everything including your life some time. Real inventions and innovations are an outcome of daring and boldness in thinking which is very rare.

2.3 As Garry Hamel aptly puts it in his book, “The Future of Management”, “when it comes to managing innovations, the more unconventional the underlying principle the longer it will take for competitors to respond”. He states three principles for management of innovations to gain competitive advantage—

  a) Innovation is based on a novel management principle that challenges some long standing orthodoxy.

  b) Innovation is systematic, encompassing a range of processes and methods and

  c) Innovation is part of ongoing programs of ‘rapid fire inventions’ where progress compounds over time.

2.4 Innovations thus are products of calculated risks, daring in thinking something new, and a complete departure from the past. As will be amply clear in the discussion on creativity, our brain is conditioned to think in set patterns which are formed over years in our neural networks. Real challenge of an inventive and creative mind is to transcend these and create an altogether new way or pathway in mind.

3.0 What is Creativity?

3.1 Rollo May, in “The Courage to Create”, defines creativity as “the process of bringing something new into being… creativity requires passion and commitment. Out of the creative act is born symbols and myths. It brings to awareness what was previously hidden and point to new life. The experience is one of heightened consciousness –ecstasy.” Edward De Bono, who has authored a no. of books on Creativity, calls it an outcome of ‘lateral thinking’ a technique developed by him to enhance human creative abilities. Robert Galvino, CEO of Motorola says, “Creativity I fear is a void in many of our organizations, we simply do not know how much more creative we all can be.”

3.2 One of the earliest thinkers on serious creativity was Arthur Koestler who in “The Act of Creation” described it as ‘Bi-sociative’ thinking. He calls bi-sociation as release of ‘Tension’ or the ‘Aha!’ or ‘Eureka’ feeling. Koestler gives three domains of creativity as Humor or ‘Haha!’ Discovery or ‘Aha!’, and finally Art or ‘Ah!’. He outlines the process by eight I’s viz. Imagination, Insight, Innovation, Invention, Ingenuity, Intuition, Inspiration and Illumination. It is not intended here to go into the full details of creative thinking process and acts but only to outline the major conceptual formats.

3.3 In business, Creativity can be deemed to be generation of ideas within an organizational context that is capable of understanding, amending and taking the ideas to a further level of sophistication and adaptation. It is much more than just having ‘Eureka’ moment or a blinding insight. Ideas are cheap and plenty, to be effective they have to be in context, transmissible, and viable in terms of tactics or strategies…. Creativity as we see is a business skill, a vital competitive variable in thousands of industries, advertising, fashion, entertainment, bio-technology, software, publishing and many more.

3.4 Intuition- is there something like it?  Intuition which is probably the most intangible quality of mind is quite well known to every one and yet not taken much seriously. H.A.Simon, a U.S. Psychologist says, “Intuition is a quality everyone has. It is as simple as recognizing your friend or a relative in a crowd.” Easier said than done, since not all of us can be intuitive at will. For those who are doubtful about its rationality, Carl Jung has this to say, “The term (intuition) does not denote something contrary to reason but something outside the province of reason.” In a foreword to Jagdish Parikh’s book on Intuition, Warren Bennis has this to say, “If there is one thing that successful leaders seem to posses, it is that capacity to foresee future events, what I call the ‘Gretzky Factor’. This world-famous hockey player once said that ‘what is important is not where the puck is, but where it is going to be.’ Further, ‘If I can generalize from my 15 years of observing leaders, I would say that the most successful ones are those who have recognized that we are moving to a stage of idea-intensive production and away from material intensive production. They realize that if a leader is going to be successful it is going to be through intellectual capital. That is what creates wealth; that it is people with ideas who are going to make the difference.” Said somewhere in 1994, but what a visionary and insightful statement as is evident from today’s market space full of only new ideas and thus products. What it reiterates is the importance and recognition of the intuition and its role in business success.

3.4 From the above discussion we can safely deduct that no matter what business you are managing, creativity, intuition and innovation are imperative soft qualities which are essential for the success. Even Einstein said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” A whole science of ‘Synectics’ i.e. making sense out of non-sense has evolved and managers of future may have to be well versed in it.

4.0 Innovation and Creativity in Value-chain of Marketing

4.1 While innovation and creativity are vital in all the areas of business, in marketing probably they are the most important factors in the context of value-chain. In the present day scenario of market driven economies and customer driven businesses the whole paradigm of marketing in terms of value-chain needs to be redefined. Even the function of marketing is no more so simple as to identify and satisfy customer needs. No business today can survive by delivering customer perceived value alone in the competitive markets. Many a serious authors including Sheth and Sisodia have stated that the present day marketing may be violating its own definition. W.F.Van Raaij et al have suggested a new view definition of the future marketing as “the process of creating the experience of surplus value for all parties involved.” The operative word here is “experience of surplus value”, not just value but experience of “surplus value.” As per them and also as per Sheth and others while contemporary marketing is focused on the production of surplus value, it is no longer experienced by the consumer. These authors have gone to the extent of suggesting that marketing efforts of today are being aimed at wrong type of customer and his behavior rather than the one actually existing in the market.

4.2 The claims of this nature may be challenged yet, that there is very less creativity and imagination in the process of creating and more important making the customer experience the surplus value is quite evident. Real challenge hence is how to make this process of value creation and also experience more creative and innovative. Though the market may be flooded with a variety of goods and products most belong to the same genre and to a narrow band of quality range.

4.3 An integrated Innovation Value Chain—Authors M.T. Hansen and J.Birkshaw (HBR,June 2007 issue) have suggested an integrated model of generating ,developing and disseminating new ideas as a part of a strategy aimed at making innovations more effective. As per them, managers need to take an end to end view of their innovative efforts, pinpoint their particular weaknesses, and tailor innovation best practices as appropriate to address the deficiencies rather than copy other companies’ best practices blindly. The model suggested by them of the ‘innovative value chain’ offers a comprehensive framework for doing this. It breaks innovation down into three phases: idea generation, conversion and diffusion and six critical activities viz. internal, cross-unit, external sourcing, idea selection and development and spread of the idea. This model helps the company to identify its own weaknesses in the chain and then select the tools and approaches to implement. The overall strength of the innovation chain being the weakest link of the chain, it is imperative to strengthen this link.

5.0 Marketing of Services and Social services

5.1 Concept of Social Services--- For the purpose of this paper a slightly more innovative and different approach as well as definition of what constitutes a social service is followed as a context. A suggested definition is,

“Social Service is any service which from the point of view of value creation has a lot to contribute to the societal good and welfare in addition to the individual benefits and satisfaction.” As an example let us consider healthcare segment, in particular hospital services. Hospital services play an important role in creating social well being and are key elements in the cumulative health management of the society. Thus their role in creating surplus values and experience of the same from the point of a patient is an individual as well as social need thus adding to the responsibility of the hospitals to deliver this surplus value. The present scenario in India leaves much to be desired and there is hardly any serious effort by the hospital authorities to address this issue. In terms of innovative and creative practices the situation is even grimmer.

Even in developed countries opinions of customers about marketing in general is very poor with 83% agreeing with statement that company sees them only as someone with money to spend, 78% saying that almost all brands are same, and 70% having no trust in advertisements,(ref. survey by UK based Marketing Forum, Mitchell,2001, as quoted by Sheth and Sisodia,2003). If this is the condition in developed countries one can imagine the less developed, developing countries and the plight of the customers there. In case of services as hospitals, railways, public transport etc. the customer is completely at the whims and fancies of the service provider.

5.2 What is necessary is, as suggested by Sheth and Sisodia, not incremental policy change but a drastic paradigm shift from markets to customers and from transactions to interactions. In their case for a customer centered marketing approach, they propose a strategy based on the following:-

 a) Focus on creating end-user value- in case of a hospital it would mean the patient- and is outcome of high performance standards and constant innovation. It is also outcome of-

-- Performance value,

--Price value,

--Personalization value

 b) Use cross functional teams- in case of a hospital it would mean induction of some managerial talent along with medical and technical.

c) Implement automation and integration—In health services it will require a cautious approach.

 d) Use fixed cost marketing-- 

 e) View marketing as supply management

 f) Create P&L accountability for marketing

 g) Create a subscription model of marketing

 h) Bring marketing and business development together

It is not possible to elaborate each of the above points but the one of end user value and its experience is of paramount importance in all services especially social services.

5.3 Creativity and innovation in services—a lot needs to be done in this respect where the mind set is completely service provider’s prerogative and absolutely no effort is visible to enhance the end-user value. There is a no. of new services emerging which need redefinition and redesign from customer centric strategies. Here are examples of some new services which can be termed as social services—

 a) A great many ‘spiritual’ and ‘religious’ services not falling under any specific traditional categories. Some time ago the present author’s paper titled, ‘Managing of Spiritual Services Marketing’ was not accepted by one of the leading business institutions since it did not fall under any old categories of services. And yet everyday at least five media channels on the T.V. belt out various types of programs under various titles as ‘Yoga’, ‘health’, bhakti etc. It is time to recognize this altogether new segment and apply scientific managerial concepts including those of marketing to these.

 b) Health and Spiritual tourism--- Again a new emerging sector of social services which is lacking a value orientation and innovation.

 c) Health care segment—Based mainly on traditional Ayurvedic treatments is a flourishing business in many metropolises.

 d) Education and allied services—though doing crores worth of financial transactions is completely lacking in innovation and creativity in terms of end user values.

 e) Low cost air travel and budget hotels and tours—a sunrise industry needing valuable inputs in terms of customer orientation.

 f) Many other services that are flourishing in all major cities but lack any innovative problem solving inputs.

5.4 Future of social services marketing—Advance of technology will bring about drastic lifestyle changes and subsequently altogether new segments of services hitherto non-existent. An integrated approach based on innovative and creative solutions and concepts will go a long way in making these really “customer focused” with “interaction” as the main strategy rather than the present “transaction” one.

5.5 Concept of Social services—The present concept of social services as those which are essentially charity oriented and thus NGO governed, needs to be replaced by a concept similar to what Kotler et al called ‘Social Marketing’ in which the interest of the society are at enhanced stake such as mentioned above. A model than can be developed where empirical concepts in marketing and the latest philosophies in marketing are used with the end user value in mind.

6.0 Innovative Marketing of Social Services

6.1 Change in mindset—As mentioned by Michael Thomas (Thomas,2003) all professional marketers of today suffer from what he calls ‘epistemopathology’ , that is diseased, sick and bad knowledge which is mechanistically applied to global market systems. N.Ascherson as quoted by him called it ‘the sightless psychopath of market forces’, Lindbloom(1990) called it ‘impairment’ and Senge(1994) refers to it as ‘organizational learning disability’. In plain simple words, no matter what the companies may say about their customer focus and other big worded philosophies, what drives them is a spirit of  pure greed in terms of wealth for the few and society be damned! Thomas has given a clarion call to make the profession of marketing a ‘social trustee, civic profession’ rather than what it is today sick, diseased, mechanical market driven professionalism. This I feel defines what I want to call as ‘social services marketing’ practices. This mindset change in itself will be a great innovative input to present day marketing practices.

6.2 Social responsibility as the touchstone of all marketing and business activity-- It would be worth while to revisit our great Mahatma Gandhi who is all but forgotten in today’s blind rush of the stock market and filthy rich culture of the few, and remind ourselves of the few things that will surely destroy us, as given below-

 --Politics without principles,

        --Pleasure without conscience,

        --Wealth without work,

        --Knowledge without character,

        --Business without morality,

        --Science without humanity,

        --Worship without sacrifice.

       What is important is to believe that ‘morality’ is not an option but a ‘must’ for business

       to survive and the same holds true for marketing. No factor is bigger than the one of

       social responsibility if we have to destroy the sightless psychopath of market driven

       forces.  

 6.3 Some conceptual tips for making marketing more innovative and creative are as below,-

      -- Dare to think different and be ready for change but change does not mean letting go     of our moral principles.

      -- Change must begin from within that is in the mind and mindset. No outward change can ever be successful strategy.

      -- Creativity occurs by destroying the past first and builds on it, but do not destroy the foundation.

      -- Servitude is the best aptitude for any work and management including marketing. Those who serve the best survive others get destroyed.

      -- Social and civic responsibility are two pillars on which all marketing practices must be built.

6.4  “I shall be telling this with a sigh somewhere ages and ages hence; Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference”, this statement of Robert Frost best sums the attitude necessary for those who want to innovate. When you take the road less traveled there is danger of getting lost too but than there is also the possibility of reaching the rainbow at the end which lies the pot of gold as they say. In service industry mediocrity and ordinariness do not pay if you want to differentiate and get advantage out of it. “Within management research, there is no project equivalent in scope and

ambition to reducing carbon emissions, curing AIDS, imbuing machines with intelligence,

developing hydrogen-powered vehicles, or commercializing space travel. Where is management’s Human Genome Project? Where is its $100 laptop? Where is its manned mission to Mars? --------------- So, give it some thought. As managers, and management scholars, what’s our moon shot for the 21st century?” this is the question asked by Gary Hamel in his book “the future of management”. What fuels long-term business success? Not operational excellence, technology breakthroughs, or new business models, but management innovation--new ways of mobilizing talent, allocating resources, and formulating strategies. Through history, management innovation has enabled companies to cross new performance thresholds and build enduring advantages. In "The Future of Management," Gary Hamel argues that organizations need management innovation now more than ever. Why? The management paradigm of the last century--centered on control and efficiency--no longer suffices in a world where adaptability and creativity drive business success. To thrive in the future, companies must reinvent management. Hamel explains how to turn your company into a serial management innovator, revealing: the make-or-break challenges that will determine competitive success in an age of relentless, head-snapping change; the toxic effects of traditional management beliefs; the unconventional management practices generating breakthrough results in "modern management pioneers;" the radical principles that will need to become part of every company's "management DNA;" and the steps your company can

   take now to build your "management advantage." This is the final truth about marketing  and also for services marketing. “Innovate or perish” is the new age mantra.

7.0 Conclusion

7.1 In conclusion it can be said that innovation and creativity are two sides of the same coin and companies of tomorrow do not have any option in regards to these two skills if one may call them so. Future organizations whether business or any other type, will be too complex and the environments they operate in, even more complex and fast changing. In such fluid and volatile situation only way to survive would be to constantly innovate and create ideas faster than the changes occurring in the environments. It would not be out of context here to quote the parable of the “quick and the dead” as the appropriate description of the next generation marketing ventures as well as the business ones.

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                                                                 References

            Books-

1.     Apte Govind,(2004), ‘Services Marketing’, New Delhi, Oxford University Press

2.     Bono Edward De,(1992), ‘Serious Creativity’,  New Delhi, Harper Collins Publishers

3.     Doyle Peter & Bridgewater Susan, (1998), ‘Innovation in Marketing’, New Delhi, Butterworth Heinemann.

4.     Kitchen Philip J.Ed.,(2003)’The Future Of Marketing’, New York, Palgrave Macmillan

-‘A Meeting of Minds’, Ibid

5.     Koestler Arthur, (1964),’The Act of Creation’, London, Penguin Books Ltd.

6.     Lubart T.I. & Sternberg R.J.,(1995), ‘Defying the Crowd’, New York, Free Press

7.     May Rollo,(1994), ‘The Courage to Create’, New York, W.W.Norton &Company

8.     Parikh Jagdish, (1994), ‘Intuition-The New Frontier of Management’, Bombay, India Book Distributors (Bombay) Ltd.

9.     Pink Daniel, (2006), ‘A Whole New Mind’, Riverhead Books.

10.  Raaij w. Fred van & Poiesz, (2003), ‘Rethinking the Value Concept in Marketing’, in ‘The Future of Marketing’,op-cit ref 4.

11.  Sheth Jagdish & Sisodia Rajendra,(2003), ‘The Future of Marketing’, Ibid

 Articles in Journals-

12.  Basant Rakesh, ‘Intellectual Property and Innovation’, Vikalpa,Oct-Dec 2004,pp69

13.  Hansen M.T.& Birkinshaw J., ‘The Innovation Value Chain’, Harvard Business Review, June 2007,pp.99

14.  Nambisan Satish & Sawhney M., ‘A Buyer’s Guide to Innovation Bazar’, Harvard Business Review, June 2007,pp89

                         -------------------------------------------------------

       

“Meditation for Effective Decision-making”

A paper written for the 7^th AIMS International conference at Jaipur by Dr (Lt Col) Mohan Kotwal, Reader, Smt H.Nanavati Institute of Management, Pune.

Dwidal, Plot 3, Yashashree Society, near M.I.T. College, Pune-411038,

mohan.kotwal@rediffmail.com,Mob.9890507803, 020-25462348.

Subject code-10, key words- Meditation, effective decision-making, intuition and imagination.

1.0 Introduction

1.1 Decision-making is an important managerial function on which depends the entire success or failure of any business. Progress made in the field of analytical sciences and the information technology have no doubt made this task a little easier than what it was earlier. Yet in spite of all analytical tools and techniques available at the disposition of managers the role played by imagination, intuition and the whole lot of soft skills including even sixth sense can not be neglected. Many a serious thinkers as Adair, Mintzberg, and Bernard in their expositions on Effective decision making have included the role of non-logical elements of human mind such as mentioned above and the difficulties faced in developing such faculties. Meditation is now being accepted as a science, which has a more important contribution in the development of managerial minds than just a tool of stress management. Indeed, the latest medical research has brought out fascinating aspects of this essentially oriental science in the development of managers where it has been shown to have restructured the entire neural network and given access to those latent areas of brain which are essential in more creative ant intuitive aspects of thinking. The paper takes an analytical and critical look at possibilities of use of this science of Meditation in improving the effectiveness of managerial decision-making. The author’s own research for doctoral thesis also has been used as a take off point for this purpose.

2.0 Decision making –An Art or a Science

2.1 There are a no. of theories which try to explain the exact nature of the process of decision making and to explain the scintific and the artistic factors that contribute in this process. There appear to be no consensus about the real nature of this process. There are  thinkers like Henry Mintzberg and Chester Barnard who give more stress on non-logical elements and believe it to be more of an art than science. There is an equal no. of other theories which give more importance to the rational and logical elements of the process of decision making and to develop models based on this. Decision making hence remains still a managerial process which is both difficult to explain and even more difficult to master. A study of how exactly managers who are successful take decisions and are there foolproof methods to ensure qualitative as also quantitative correctness in decision making still remain issues which have not been studied in deatail. 2.2 Peter Drucker considers practice and performance as two main pillars of good decision making but considers there can’t be a perfectionist approach to decision making as it could prove to be quite costly. Drucker describes the elements involved in this process but does not clearly explain the modalities and design of good decision making process. John Adair’s thinking highlights the importance of this function and he goes to place it as the most important of managerial duties. He does give a step by step approach to theactual process of decision making, but also p[oints out the role played by the non logical or non rational elements such as emotions,power politics and few other.

2.3 Authors like J. Frank Yate call decion making a function of the decision management art and gives ten cardinal decision issues as,

a)      Need

b)     Mode

c)      Investment

d)     Options

e)      Possibilities

f)      Judgment

g)      Values

h)     Tradeoffs

i)       Acceptability

j)       Implementation

There are other thinkers such as H.Igor Ansoff who takes a strategic view of decision making and describes the type of decisions managers have to make by the level and strategic typology.

2.4  Chestar Barnard on the other hand firmly believes this most of the managerial problems and situataions are not logical since the information on which they are basedis not qualitatively precise and reliable hence to apply logical and rational mrthods to them can not really be correct. He thus believes this non logical elements such as imagination , intuition ,judgment play more important role in decision making.

3.0 An Integrated Model of decision making

3.1 Any integrated model of decision making hence must be a combination of rational, logical as well as non logical non rational processes. It must be a combination of the Prescriptive i.e. the how  the things should be done  and Descriptive, i.e. how the things are done. In brief both the scientific (knowledge based) and artistic (practice based) elements should be brought together to evolve an integrated approach to decion making function.

3.2 One of the ways of doing this is by using the context and form model as given by C. Alexander in his thesis on ‘ A Snthesis of Form’ and has been dealt with in more detail in another paper by this author. The aim of this paper is to develop a methodology that permits the optimal use of human brain faculties in effective decision making practices and the role played by Meditation as a science in developing the managerial minds to do this.

4.0 Meditation and its application for effective decision making

4.1 Meditation  can be described as fine tuning of human mind aimed at making it more efficient and effective in solving managerial and other problems. This is the applied view of meditation as science since as per the Eastern philosophical thought, where it originated, its main use is much nobler and spiritual in nature. The latest research being done on this most fascinating of the sciences has thrown up very interesting findings in terms of its effect on the way brain functions and many other aspects related to mind, human behavior, efficiency and effectiveness of thinking itself.

4.2 Some important findings about meditation and its impact on human brain and mind—Serious research is being conducted at Harvard and Massachusetts medical centers have found the following interesting facts about meditation. These findings are based on scientific experiments done under the latest of advanced laboratory and technological conditions on meditating monks. These are,

a)      Meditation activates large areas of brain which other times remain completely latent and un used.

b)     Meditation creates the Alpha, Theta and Delta wave conditions which have been known to those in which human minds are most restful and relaxed.

c)      Practice of Meditation seems to actually re-structure the entire brain neural network itself and the exact impact of this on efficiency and effectiveness is still not clear to these scientists. In the eastern world of science particularly,in the Yogic science these effects have been clearly documented and are open for any curious mind to experience.

4.2.1 Can Meditation help managers to be more effective?—Doctoral research of this author wherein a sample of more than 100 managers who were practicing meditation were actually asked to respond to a model of self development factors in areas such as Self management, People management, and Business management, has conclusively proven the hypothesis this meditation does improve managerial effectiveness in all these areas. Decision making too was included in this model and in this function too impressive improvements were reported in before and after abilities of managers. Though, how meditation helps in these functions is still not known it is proven beyond doubt that not only meditation reduces stress levels of practicing managers but it brings about an overall self development in almost all areas of their managerial functions. Some of the findings of the study done by this author are,

a)      Meditation improves managers’ inter personal skills and makes their people management function more effective.

b)     Meditation allowed managers to take a more balanced view of  managerial problems and situations thus making their decisions qualitatively better.

c)      Meditation reduces stress levels in managers under difficult situations thus making them more efficient and effective in dealing.

d)     Meditation improves managers self management function.

e)      Meditation improves managers general grasp of business environment and improves the business management functions.

 Thus it can be said without any trace of doubt that  yes, meditation does improve managerial effectiveness in almost all areas of management and hence is the most powerful tool available for managerial self development. More detailed analysis and statistical data is available in the author’s thesis submitted at the University of Pune for the award of Ph.D. degree.

4.3 A meditation based model of decision making—Since it has now been scientifically proven that meditation helps in giving access to more areas  of the brain and also makes its functioning more effective it is quite certain that it can improve managerial decision making function. Managers need to be made more aware of this execellent tool available to them to make their decisions more balanced. Following is a step by step process of meditation based decision making –

a)      Training of the managers in meditation—There are a no. of meditation techniques available for managers to select from depending on their specific needs and temperaments. How ever guidance of trained personnel in this regards is of utmost important. There should not be any ad-hoc do it yourself approach as it can prove to be non-effective and detrimental to the purpose.

b)     A change in the approach to business based on more holistic and humanitarian principles rather than just profit making. Actually, meditation should be used for an overall self development and not just decision making.

c)      Dcisions should not be viewed in isolation but must be seen as an outcome of the total process of managerial thinking and a part of a holistic process of management.

d)     All managerial processes should be viewed as not just analytical processes but a combination of analysis and synthesis both. As a matter of fact not just decision making but even other functions are an outcome more of synthesis rather than analysis, needs to be emphasized in all managerial training efforts. An excellent model of such an exercise of mind is given in C. Alexander’s thesis on a synthesis of form in the practice of design methodology. This model has been illustrated in more detail in this author’s other paper on the same subject. Meditation helps in developing a more integrated rather than fragmented view of any human function and management needs this approach more than just the analytical which tends to miss the woods for the trees.

e)      Most of the managerial decisions go wrong because of wrong orientation in thinking and a narrow and limited perspective of business lacking in long term vision and purpose. Another missing dimension which makes decision making difficult is un clear perception of the total business activity itself. Rising above the mundane and trivial and nurturing high values will help in removing this narrow perception. Meditation will also give the managers an detached attitude of viewing the results in a more philosophic and unbiased way reducing the trauma of decisions gone awry.

4.4 Meditation as a Self Development technique—The ancient philosophy of Yoga gives a complete model of self development of which Meditation is but one limb or part. Meditation or ‘Raj- Yoga’ as it is termed in the ancient text of sage Patanjali is a part of the same sage’s treatise by the name of ‘Ashtang Yoga’ or the eight limbed Yoga. This Yoga is the best technique of self development based on the king (Raja) of all Yogas viz. ‘Dhyan’(meditation) yoga. This author’s thesis clearly brings out the efficacy of this yoga of meditation in the overall self development of the managers any where in the world. It would not be wrong to introduce this self development system for the overall development of the business managers not just mangers but as human beings in pursuit of the highest of the goals of human life i.e. human evolution to a state of perfectness. It is thus necessary to widen the main purpose of application of meditation to this end and decision making will then be only one part of this enlarged vision and purpose.

5.0 Conclusion

5.1 In conclusion, it can be definitively be said that Decision making being such an important managerial functions needs the greatest of attention. As a matter of fact decision making can be said to be the ‘summum bonum’ of all managerial efforts on which depends not just the success of any business but also the fates of thousands of people involved in it. It must be studied in more details and all efforts must be done to educate and train the managers in this skill.

5.2 Meditation which now has emerged as the most scientific of human technologies ever dveloped by the human minds, needs to be given its rightful place in management development field and a good beginning can be made by using it to improve the managerial capabilities in the function of decision making. This is the right tool which can answer the challenging task of combining the soft and the hard skills so to say of human mind, the marriage of analytical and the emotional, the rational and the intuitive ,the logical and the imaginative ,the synthesis of all thinking faculties making it the most powerful, the ‘Brahmastra’of management techniques.

References

1. Adair, John,  ‘Effective Decision making’, India, Pan Books, Pan Macmillan, 2003.

2.Alexander Christopher, ‘Notes on Synthesis of Form’, U.S., Harvard University Press, 1970.

3.Ansoff, H.Igor, as quoted in ‘Makers of Management’, Clutterbuck David et al, Delhi, Rupa and Co., 1992.

4.Barnard Chester, ‘The Functions of the Executive’, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1938.

5.Drucker Peter F., ‘Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices’, New York,  Harper and Row, 1974.

--‘The Unseen Revolution’, London, Heinemann, 1977.

            --‘The Landmarks of Tomorrow’, London, Heinmann, 1959.

            --‘The Effective Executive’, New York, Harper and Row1966.

6.Flaherty John E., ‘Peter Drucker- Shaping the Managerial Mind’, U.S.,Jossey Bass, A Wiley Company, 1999.

7. Kotwal Mohan M., ‘A Comparative Study of Meditation and Other Self Development Techniques for Effective Management’, Pune, A Doctoral thesis presented at  University of Pune, 2005.

8. Parkinson, Northcote C.,et al.,’Great Ideas in Management’,Bombay,IBH Pvt Ltd.,1984.                                                                                                                    9.Yates, Frank J.,’Decision Management’, San Francisco, Jossey-Bass, A Wiley Company, 2003.