Tag Archives: society

Lost opportunities: Mahatma Gandhi and Gwen Thompson

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To most people, Mahatma Gandhi stands for truth and non-violence. There is also a subtext of renunciation, austerity, simplicity and community. There was a predictable outcry when Montblanc announced a limited edition, 18 carat gold pen with Gandhi’s image and a saffron garnet on the clip. Only 241 gold pens would be made available for the price of Rs1.1M (or $23,000, €15,800, £14,400). Gandhi walked 241 miles in the Salt March of the 1930s.

Gandhi’s great grandson Tushar Gandhi had opposed the auction of Gandhi’s spectacles earlier in the year. He however sees nothing wrong with the pen and his charity will receive a small sum from each pen sold. Montblanc’s CEO says the company wanted to talk about Mahatma Gandhi’s values including non-violence, peace, education and tolerance. There is now, however, a court case in India for Montblanc’s violation of the Emblems and Names (Prevention of Improper Use) Act, 1950 which specifically cites Gandhi’s image. So much for discussing Gandhian values – between commerce, marketing, image rights, blame and counter-blame.

Let’s talk about Gwen Thompson then. She is a doll launched by the American Girl Doll company in 2009 and costs $95. What’s so special about Gwen? Well she is homeless and lives in a shelter with her mother. Her deadbeat father has apparently abandoned them. Beside the obvious ‘homeless people cannot spend $95 on a doll’ argument, the doll faces other flak too such as portraying men as irresponsible, women as helpless and the fact that some people are homeless as just another reality of society.

American Girl Doll company, who will not be donating any proceeds from the sale of the doll to shelters or charities helping the homeless, says: “Our singular goal with these stories is to help girls find their inner star by becoming kind, compassionate and loving people who make a positive and meaningful difference in the world around them.”

The similarity between both stories is that companies sought – whether strategically or as an after-thought – to spark a broad conversation about certain values. And that the way they went about it backfired. The companies look cynical and exploitative and their noble explanations a hasty ex post rationalisation.

Why? In Montblanc’s case, they have misread how Gandhi’s memory is revered in India. I say this with confidence as an Indian who also recognises the cynicism which makes it legitimate for some to exploit the Gandhi name more than for others. But in the case of the American Girl Doll company, I only offer a working hypothesis. The company underestimated the conflict between the American value of self-help and the collective guilt a society feels about not helping its unfortunate members enough.

Leaving aside the question of taste, in both cases, genuine opportunities were lost for the brands to get more real, more involved with the issues at hand. With my sceptical hat on, I would not be surprised to know if both companies are secretly rubbing their hands in glee over the free publicity and dialogue generated about them and their products. Very Skokie-like. Not very smart.

So, should companies not touch some topics and some people? That is definitely not my suggestion. But it is wise to pick the person, the message, the timing, the marketing message and any beneficiaries carefully. All public conversation should not be sought or courted. Sometimes the best conversations are those that are private, low-key and purposeful without publicity.

Related reading:

Gandhi sells and how (from India Today; may require registration)

Top 10 Dubious Toys where no. 1 is Homeless American Girl (from Time magazine)

Beyond privilege: managing information asymmetries

Lessons for success from Darwin's life

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For nerds, scientists and Charles Darwin fans, the year 2009 is a bumper year. It is both the 200th year of his birth, and the 150th year of the publication of The Origin of Species. Through the summer, I spent many a fascinating afternoon in Down House, where Darwin lived with his family after returning from his five year voyage on HMS Beagle.

Spending time poring over the artefacts and manuscripts, and indeed re-reading The Voyage of The Beagle, I find that Darwin’s life has much to teach entrepreneurs, business people and other human beings.

Disciplinary walls constrain thinking; an open mind plus a multidisciplinary approach may catalyse serendipity and insight.

During his time at university, Darwin had read medicine, natural history, geology, natural philosophy, logic and reasoning. As part of his preparation to becoming an Anglican parson, he had also studied William Paley’s Natural Theology which argued for divine design. He also had developed several skills – collecting, classifying, dissecting and above all, critical thinking.

What others saw as fruitless pursuits and digressions during Darwin’s time at university, including hobbies such as beetle-collecting, were his first steps to becoming a naturalist. The interest in collecting and classifying was crucial in his time on the Beagle where he kept copious notes and collected specimens that led to one of the most influential works of our time.

Ample examples exist in business, and in life, of how breakthroughs come from non-traditional thinking about problems. From 3M’s innovations such as Post-It(R) to Pfizer’s Viagra. Are you being walled in by linear thinking or the NIH syndrome?

It’s not only what you know, but whom you know that can shape your success.

The Origin of Species was published to a stormy reception. Defending Darwin and arguing for him were his friends: lawyer and geologist Charles Lyell, botanist and explorer Joseph Hooker, botanist Asa Gray and zoologist and comparative anatomist Thomas Henry Huxley. Huxley called himself “Darwin’s bulldog”. His 1860 debate with Bishop Samuel Wilberforce is seen as a turning point in the acceptance of evolutionary theory. Wilberforce reportedly asked Huxley if it was through his grandmother or his grandfather that Huxley considered himself descended from a monkey. Huxley responded that he was not ashamed to have a monkey for his ancestor; but he would be ashamed to be connected with a man who used great gifts to obscure the truth.

For a business, its best advocates are happy customers. Do you know who they are, how to find them and how to engage with them meaningfully?

In any success, luck is under-rated.

Darwin was born with good fortune. His father was wealthy and his paternal grandfather was a slavery abolitionist, champion of women’s education and inventor. On his mother’s side, he was related to the Wedgewood family and his maternal grandfather was not only a creative genius and entrepreneur, but also an abolitionist and a pioneer of many marketing tricks that endure today.

Darwin’s father tolerated his inability to focus on the structured work at University and yet bank-rolled his voyage on the Beagle. Upon his return, Darwin was able to buy Down House with its (then) 21 varieties of orchids and a kitchen garden big enough to feed his family with 10 children and several domestic staff all year round. His wife was a devout Christian but remained his faithful companion despite their differences.

Do you recognise what your sources of fortune are? It is wise not to over-attribute the successes  in business and life to individual decisions; it is wiser rather to be aware of the multitude and complexity of factors that make that success happen.

Related reading:

Janet Browne’s excellent piece on Darwin’s friends who defended him.

Lost in Translation

Beyond Privilege: Managing Information Asymmetries

Learning to Love – And Solve – Multivariate Problems

John Kay’s Sept 30th column on why Evolution is the real hidden hand in business (FT may require registration)

Creativity in the time of recession

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Or, why the brand should never take a back-seat (pun unintended, but why miss the glorious chance anyway?).

In June 2009, Mercedes Benz launched a related diversification. The Mercedes Benz Driving Academy was inaugurated by the F1 driver, Lewis Hamilton. On offer is an early start to safe driving. Young persons over 12 (minimum height 5′) can take  early lessons; persons over 17 can take lessons leading to a driving licence and take post-licence classes. Experienced drivers can do much more including improve skills or do AMG days.

The launch of this academy was propitiously timed with the British schools on summer holiday. Mercedes Benz World in Weybridge, Surrey is positively teeming with kids and their parents and grandparents these days. But on the whole, this is a great example of creative thinking about the strategic management of the brand in a time of recession.

The driving academy is a related diversification for Mercedes Benz into a service category where incumbents BSM or AA cannot compete meaningfully. Sure they can offer driving lessons but can they deliver the aspirational value of Mercedes Benz?

While driving lessons with the Mercedes Benz Academy cost about the same as those with a good BSM/ AA/ independent instructor, the brand association has effectively premium-ised the pedestrian (sorry!) category. Lessons take place, for instance, in a Mercedes Benz A-Class, a far cry from the Nissan Micra, Ford Fiesta or similar cars used by driving schools.

By offering children as young as 12 the possibility of driving lessons and experiences – and the promise of a finale with Lewis Hamilton for this summer’s driving experiences – Mercedes Benz has upped the ante, catching them young, in a product category that has traditionally not had much to do with children except use them as points of concern for selling the safety features in a car.

But more important from a strategic and a branding point of view is the positioning – making younger drivers safer. Catching them young could look cynical but statistics suggest that those who learn at young ages are less at a risk of accidents than those who learn at later ages. What does this do for Mercedes Benz? It scores the firm valuable corporate social responsibility points in driving stakes.

When times are tough and money is tight, brand investment must get creative, not become the sacrificial goat at the altar of cost-cutting. This is a fabulous example and some news will follow for my own business, later in the year, along similar lines.

More info: Mercedes Benz’s targeting strategy includes social media. The Driving Academy is on Twitter. Others can become their fan on their Facebook page.

Full Disclosure: In this case, I am paying Mercedes Benz Driving Academy. So this post comes with the full disclosure that I am doing track and road sessions with the Academy and enjoying my experience.

Related reading:

Leverage and strategic creativity in tough times

"I'm just a dumb pipe": Two strategy lessons from the PirateBay saga

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Years ago, when I was a Research Fellow in MIT, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) sued MIT asking to identify the student who used MIT’s network to upload copies of copyrighted music. Of course, while this was going on outside our freezing office – for some reason, MIT’s air-conditioning was regulated centrally from a building on the other side, the west campus – inside our freezing office, one of my fellow, er, Fellows was quite busy downloading episodes of Friends and Cold Feet. Obviously on the MIT network. He is a supersmart guy but the knowledge of the subpoena made no difference to him.

Now we have the PirateBay case where several content owners including Hollywood studios and record companies won the case against the Swedish file-sharing site, sending the young founders to jail and hopefully receiving $3.6 Million in fines.  What is PirateBay’s defence? That they are just a directory; they do not host content or otherwise enable swapping of files, like the original Napster did. They say they are “like Google” in that respect.

Businesses can learn from the PirateBay case and related emerging technology trends.

This is an interesting line of argument. Ever since YouTube was bought, it has been sued several times for copyright violations. The lawsuits began the minute YouTube had a wealthy parent i.e. Google. In contrast, it is highly unlikely that the young founders of PirateBay have the wherewithal to trump up $3.6 Million to the complainants. So, will Google be next in the firing line of the studios and record companies? After all, it enables people seeking illegal or free downloads. Can Google use the “I’m just a dumb pipe/ algorithm” excuse to defend itself?

The dumb pipe excuse is slowly losing ground. ISPs, the purveyors of dumb pipes to your and my offices and homes, are required by law to block certain categories of content. And it is not as if Google has not done some content filtering, whether it is for fear of offending some people or for fear of offending certain governments.

Businesses and content owners would do well to pay attention to the two emergent themes in this discussion.

What’s the strategic intent?

MIT’s network is used for several purposes including research, computing, email and web access. But it was not created with the intent of enabling students to do illegal things including upload content in violation of copyright and other applicable laws.

Google’s intent, in their own words with no added value judgements – is ‘to organise the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful’. Its efforts at universal indexing however is famously stymied by the ‘walled garden’ nature of social networking sites such as Facebook. Randall Stross’s book Planet Google has an interesting chapter on the dilemma and you can read about some interesting new developments here.

Strategic intent is important for corporate mission statements as well as to ensure the business model is robust.

PirateBay differs from MIT’s Network and from Google in intent. PirateBay was created to track and index BitTorrent files around the world. I don’t know about you but I find it hard to believe that despite BitTorrent’s superior technology, highly valuable or confidential business documents are flying around on the web and are indexed on PirateBay. The PirateBay founders are smart and cannot have missed this point. Does that enable us to file PirateBay’s strategic intent under ‘reasonable doubt’? I think so.

It is worth reiterating that many lawsuits turn on ‘motive’, another word for ‘intent’. Those seeking to create legitimate businesses need to be clear – and not just in the corporate mission statements put out for public consumption – that the strategic intent is not to enable illegal activity. So thinking through business models is crucial including asking questions such as ‘if I were a swindler, how would I go about using the business model to my own ends?’.

Sounds obvious? Well, then we are good to go.

What’s the societal contract?

It is easy to see why child abuse and porn needs to be blocked. Our societal contract is to protect children who can’t always protect themselves. The logic is that if we can starve the supply and cull the demand simultaneously, as recent crackdowns around many countries show, we can deal with the scourge.

But what about films and music? Do copyright laws need overhaul? Or is it that the music/ film industry is out of sync and needs to reconsider their raison d’etre?

I have written about the issue before. My point was that: as consumers of music, our relationship is with the musician, his story, the mystery of his song-writing, his musical abilities, not with his record company. Record companies and musicians are not on the same side in this debate and recently a coalition of recording artists was formed to redress the balance.

So what is the societal contract here – for rewarding talent and for paying for what we consume, whether music or films? I think, at best, it is evolving. 

Businesses are not just dumb, legal entities. They function within a living, breathing society and must understand their societal contracts.

Musicians are trying to cultivate fans through album giveaways, pay-what-you-want downloads and ‘intimate gigs‘; some are even doing ‘fan-financing‘. But at the same time, musicians are trying to get copyright extended. Record companies are suing with enthusiasm. And consumers? As I mentioned early on, the subpoenas being served made no difference to my friend’s enthusiasm for downloading stuff from the web. Likewise with PirateBay’s user base.

But let’s apply the societal contract question to any other business. Your business. Does the business model serve the implicit societal contracts in its context? e.g. If you make a life-saving drug, will you only sell it in rich countries? Or will you at least try and negotiate with governments of poor nations to make the drug available? The questions you ask will be tough and specific to your context but they do need to be asked.

Alas, as growing evidence shows, the “I’m just a dumb pipe” excuse doesn’t fly anymore. Businesses operate within living, breathing, organic societies. Businesses aren’t just dumb, legal entities either. Understanding the societal contracts – and their evolution – is essential to creating business models that deliver the strategic goals as well as deliver on the societal contract.

This is an evolving discussion so do contribute your views.

Related reading:

JP Rangaswamy’s A Simple Desultory Philippic about Copyright is one of my favourite posts. I may not wholly agree with him. But he makes the point eloquently.

The social media opportunity in India (1)

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My investor and business clients are increasingly interested in investing in India. While many of the conversations are about the less glamorous sectors, the chatter about social media is unavoidable.

A quick Google search on the ‘social media opportunity in India’ brings up over 0.5 million articles, in English alone. This suggests a considerable degree of interest in the topic. This interest is evident in conversations with some investors in London too. Understanding the opportunity however needs more than interest. It needs clear analysis.

Although things are changing for the better and the more efficient, setting up a business in India remains quite challenging for most. Two sets of problems come up instantly – corruption and infrastructure.

The former’s many facets need no explanation. In Transparency International’s 2008 Corruption Perceptions Index report, India has an unflattering 85th position. The legendary ‘Mr Fix-It’, admitted by many executives as being essential to success in India, has recently had his own cover story in a recent issue of Wired magazine, titled The Godfather of Bangalore.

Infrastructure in India is a multi-headed Ladon ‘guarding’ the golden apples of the Indian market. Investors admit to their first-time-in-India shock rather candidly but truly getting over bumpy roads, snarly traffic, unreliable telephony infrastructure and rolling power cuts (although I find it hard to imagine The Taj ever has one) takes a thicker skin and a very deep commitment to cracking the Indian market.

(c) Encyclopedia Mythica at www.pantheon.org

(c) Encyclopedia Mythica at www.pantheon.org

Social media businesses bypass both these bottlenecks with relative ease. An internet-based social media business can be set up with minimal permissions. If the business can find a reliable bandwidth and storage provider, of which there is no paucity in India now, we are in business. Prima facie, the social media scene in India does seem to offer an attractive investment proposition.

In the next post, I shall write about some of the most popular social media businesses in India and what investment opportunities may be around.