IIPM- News Articles: October 2008

Friday, October 31, 2008

MODIFIED FOR YOUR PLEASURE

A lowdown on what you could do with your car for a few bucks more...

Ever since The Fast and the Furious and Dhoom (the movie it

apparently inspired in Bollywood) spun their tires on the silver screen some 5-6 years ago and left some seriously impressionable kids (and more than a few adults) drooling at the sight of amazingly curvy, deliciously proportioned and meticulously modified cars, nothing has ever been the same. Oscar Wilde said, “Life imitates art far more than art imitates life.” Well, in this case it has been both in equal measure. The Fast and the Furious was inspired by the American culture (specifically Californian) of modifying cars, where enthusiasts and gear heads lovingly tuned and modified almost every nut and bolt of their cars, to get them to look and feel just right, just like a modern day Picasso. Transplanted to India by two blockbuster movies, the same culture took hold without the requisite base to support it. Meaning, that after seeing the movies, everybody wanted to modify their cars but didn’t have the faintest clue as to how to go about it resulting in a lot of copycats. “I hardly meet any car owner who has any knowledge about car modifications; they look at others and come to me saying that they want this look or that look. They pick up technical terms like turbochargers and free flow exhausts from the internet and ask me to install the component, without knowing what it does,” laments Piyush, owner of a car modification garage in Lajpat Nagar. Finding the problem widespread in our research, we at B&E magazine decided to give our readers a brief intro course on the do’s and don’ts of modifying cars and how to keep things in your specific budget while still managing to look cool.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
ZEE BUSINESS BEST B SCHOOL SURVEY
B-schooled in India, Placed Abroad (Print Version)
IIPM in Financial times (Print Version)
IIPM makes business education truly global (Print Version)
The Indian Institute of Planning and Management (IIPM)
IIPM Campus

Top Articles on IIPM:-
'This is one of Big B's best performances'
IIPM to come up at Rajarhat
IIPM awards four Bengali novelists
IIPM makes business education truly global-Education-The Times of ...
The Hindu : Education Plus : Honour for IIPM
IIPM ranked No.1 B-School in India, Management News - By ...
IIPM Ranked No1 B-School in India
Moneycontrol >> News >> Press- News >> IIPM ranked No1 B-School in ...
IIPM ranked No. 1 B-school in India- Zee Business Survey ...
IIPM ranked No1 B-School in India :: Education, Careers ...
The Hindu Business Line : IIPM placements hit a high of over 2000 jobs
Deccan Herald - IIPM ranked as top B-School in India
India eNews - IIPM Ranked No1 B-School in India
IIPM Delhi - Indian Institute of Planning and Management New Delhi ...domain-b.com : IIPM ranked ahead of IIMs

Thursday, October 23, 2008

When the world deceives Honda, it receives a warm ‘India’ welcome

Masahiro Takedagawa, President, Honda Siel shares his India stance and future plans. A B&E exclusive...
B&E: How has Honda’s India experience been, especially considering that India has proven lucky in more than one regards for Honda?
With a market share of 24%, Honda has been at the top of the premium segment. We will continue to provide the latest technology to the customer on a regular basis.

B&E: What are Honda’s small car plans for India?
We have planned a plant in Rajasthan that is currently under construction. We have a couple of models from Honda’s international line-up, which we may also consider for India in the near future.

B&E: Is launching of the hybrid a technology demonstrator?
Honda is a leader in technology and likes to make statements with technology once in a while... (laughs)

B&E: How will you market a relatively new technology like hybrids to the Indian customer? How many hybrids have you imported initially?
First of all we require the support of the media. Then, we have instructed all of our 80 dealerships to offer a test drive to any interested individual. We have imported about 130 units from Japan.

B&E: The automotive sector is on a downturn. Has that affected the company?
This is specific to the particular Indian market and we are trying our best to come out of the situation.

B&E: Will the 1.3l used in the new Civic hybrid also be used in the Jazz?
The 1.3l unit is too large for a small car as it does not qualify in the small car norms.

B&E: Will you manufacture the hybrids in India?
No, the cars will be manufactured in Japan and will attract a 110% duty. We cannot make the cars here because of technical issues. The government should however cooperate with us in this endeavour.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
ZEE BUSINESS BEST B SCHOOL SURVEY
B-schooled in India, Placed Abroad (Print Version)
IIPM in Financial times (Print Version)
IIPM makes business education truly global (Print Version)
The Indian Institute of Planning and Management (IIPM)
IIPM Campus

Top Articles on IIPM:-
'This is one of Big B's best performances'
IIPM to come up at Rajarhat
IIPM awards four Bengali novelists
IIPM makes business education truly global-Education-The Times of ...
The Hindu : Education Plus : Honour for IIPM
IIPM ranked No.1 B-School in India, Management News - By ...
IIPM Ranked No1 B-School in India
Moneycontrol >> News >> Press- News >> IIPM ranked No1 B-School in ...
IIPM ranked No. 1 B-school in India- Zee Business Survey ...
IIPM ranked No1 B-School in India :: Education, Careers ...
The Hindu Business Line : IIPM placements hit a high of over 2000 jobs
Deccan Herald - IIPM ranked as top B-School in India
India eNews - IIPM Ranked No1 B-School in India
IIPM Delhi - Indian Institute of Planning and Management New Delhi ...
domain-b.com : IIPM ranked ahead of IIMs

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Jhakuapara or Vandithavalam?!

Where is your next rural branch opening? It’ll help eradicate poverty!

Here’s a no-brainer – what can the rural banks in India do

to the poor in the country, which the poor can’t do to the banks? Can’t guess? Read on... A paper by Burgess and Pande of the London School of Economics titled ‘Can Rural Banks Reduce Poverty?’ proves that “rural branch expansion in India between 1977 and 1990 significantly reduced rural poverty”. Sadly, even today, while corporate entities from all segments are foraying into the Indian hinterlands, national banks are literally crawling ahead at a pace which even a snail would mock!

Even as per a 2008 survey by IIMS DataWorks, only a pathetic 44.9% of “Indian earners” held bank accounts in 2007. Even worse, only 38% of those in rural India held any bank account as compared to a healthy 62% for urban Indians. If you though we were missing out the hub of capitalistic acts, here’s a shocker – even in New Delhi, only 62% of population had any bank account. And if literacy was to be blamed, hold your breath – Tamil Nadu which has close to 75% literacy rate has only 18% of its State residents making their way to the banks! Literacy be damned!

Surely, if solving national poverty has solutions, this is an obvious one. Microfinance, ‘no-frills’ banking accounts et al are simply tools by which those 80% unfortunate Indians (who live on less than $2/day), can hope for higher standards of living. A UN report also clarifies that a “voice and fingerprint navigated ATM will be of great help for the poor.” Now to answer the question asked in the first line... mmm... well, you’ve got it by now, haven’t you?!

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
ZEE BUSINESS BEST B SCHOOL SURVEY
B-schooled in India, Placed Abroad (Print Version)
IIPM in Financial times (Print Version)
IIPM makes business education truly global (Print Version)
The Indian Institute of Planning and Management (IIPM)
IIPM Campus

Top Articles on IIPM:-
'This is one of Big B's best performances'
IIPM to come up at Rajarhat
IIPM awards four Bengali novelists
IIPM makes business education truly global-Education-The Times of ...
The Hindu : Education Plus : Honour for IIPM
IIPM ranked No.1 B-School in India, Management News - By ...
IIPM Ranked No1 B-School in India
Moneycontrol >> News >> Press- News >> IIPM ranked No1 B-School in ...
IIPM ranked No. 1 B-school in India- Zee Business Survey ...
IIPM ranked No1 B-School in India :: Education, Careers ...
The Hindu Business Line : IIPM placements hit a high of over 2000 jobs
Deccan Herald - IIPM ranked as top B-School in India
India eNews - IIPM Ranked No1 B-School in India
IIPM Delhi - Indian Institute of Planning and Management New Delhi ...domain-b.com : IIPM ranked ahead of IIMs

Monday, October 20, 2008

Fractured infrastructure?

Only an efficient public transport system can reduce the usage of personal vehicles

Statistics have been conspicuously crowned as the king of lies. But

the fact is that there is no other logical way to prove truth other than the damn statistics. Figures don’t lie and they definitely don’t when we say that lack of proper public transit systems and infrastructure leads to high usage of private cars in India.

This trend is most visible in urban areas. For instance, Delhi has a very high rate of migration. While the population continues to rise, the city has seen a marginal rise in the number of buses in the last four years. Result: the rise in personal vehicles has been 100%. China was facing the same problem till 2006. To solve this, they came up with Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) lines in 2006. The system has been a run away hit and presently 50% of the all the trips in Chinese cities are done through public transport, majority of which are through buses. On the same lines, BRT has been started in India but is still in the trial phase and its future remains uncertain. Japan is another classic case of this trend. The market for new cars in Japan has shrunk from 7.78 million in 1990 to just 4.13 million in 2007. The reason for this is lack of proper parking facilities and the efficient public transportation in Japanese cities.

Not that high number of cars is a bad thing, but too many of them create problems. Pollution, accidents, jams are just to name a few. Indian city roads on an average occupy 12-14% of total land area. It’s 10% in Mumbai and 6% in Kolkata. The same roads carry more and more vehicles which lead to jams and accidents. “Indian cities are in the grip of motorisation which is why smooth mobility on roads is increasingly becoming a distant dream,” Anumita Roy Chaudhary, expert on transport in Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) shares with B&E. If one considers Europe, (known to have one of the best public transit system in the world), the whole economy depends heavily on efficient road transport, where 85% of the people travel by buses or coaches; which leads to less motorisation of roads.

Though there are big plans like setting up of 16 new flyovers and monorail in Mumbai, other Indian cities still don’t have such roadmaps. Indian policies, too, are not very supportive to public transportation. In other words, they encourage purchase of private cars. In India, one pays road tax only once during the purchase of car which is much less than the annual road tax paid by a public bus owner. Contrary to this, in Singapore, one has to bid for getting a licence even before buying a car.

‘More’ is increasingly becoming ‘less’ in India. However, not many want such a thing to happen. With fuel prices going up and inflation surpassing two digit figures every now and then, it is getting tough for Indian consumers to buy a car and maintain it. So, it’s only investment in public transit system that can substantially reduce this burden.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Saturday, October 18, 2008

“The AMP target is achievable”

Dillip Chenoy, Director General, SIAM
B&E: On the Automotive Mission Plan.
DC: As far as the AMP is concerned, it is well on track and I

think the 10% (as part of the GDP) mark is achievable. Earlier the government thought that the AMP was a bit conservative. Soon the Ministry of Heavy industries will start to initiate the plan and things will move in a positive direction.

B&E: Causes for general market volatility in the Indian auto market.
DC: Increased operating costs, interests rates and a depressed market is putting pressure on the industry as people are postponing their purchases. If the interests rates are reduced, it is beneficial for the consumers. When sales increase it is good because there is volume in the market.

B&E: On the resurrection of the two-wheeler industry after a continuous bad phase.
DC: The two-wheeler industry has gone through some tough times in the last few years, therefore it has now taken a couple of initiatives and plans like launching new products and schemes which have brought back the sales numbers.

B&E: On the July 2008 sales.
DC: There are three factors discussed this month, first growth of passenger vehicles has been lower then expected. Secondly, the two-wheeler industry has grown well, and thirdly commercial vehicles and three-wheeler sales have improved this month as compared to the last couple of months.

B&E: What factors helped the commercial vehicle segment?
DC: For commercial vehicles, I think that apart from infrastructure, a great emphasis has been provided by the government through public transportation programmes like the BRT. This has helped increase sales.

B&E: Is the two-wheeler industry suffering because of the four-wheelers?
DC: There is enough scope in the market; therefore four-wheeler sales will not eat away the market shares of the two-wheeler industry. We hope that the industry continues to grow at double digits.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Friday, October 17, 2008

American ‘prejudice’ can steamroll Obama’s ‘pride’!

The 2008 elections have quite a peculiar connection to Jane Austen’s all time bestseller
It is a truth universally acknowledged that Barack Obama must

continue to grovel to Hillary Clinton’s dead-enders, some of whom mutter darkly that they will not only not vote for him, they’ll never vote for a man again. Obama met for an hour on Tuesday with 3 dozen top Hillaryites at a hotel here, seeking their endorsement & beguiling their begrudging.

The LA Times reported that Hillary die-hards want to enshrine a whine in the Democratic platform about how the primaries “exposed pervasive gender bias in the media” and call on party leaders to take “immediate and public steps” to denounce any perceived bias in the future. That is one nutty idea, perhaps because feminists are still so busy cataloging past slights to Hillary that they have failed to mount a vivid defence of Michelle Obama, who has taken over from Hillary as the one conservatives now like to paint as a harridan.

Despite Obama’s wooing, some women aren’t warming. As Carol Marin wrote in The Chicago Sun-Times, The Lanky One is like an Alice Waters organic chicken – “sleek, elegant, beautifully prepared. Too cool” – when what many working-class women are craving is mac and cheese. In The Wall Street Journal, Amy Chozick wrote that Hillary supporters – who loved their heroine’s admission that she was on Weight Watchers – were put off by Obama’s svelte, zero-body-fat figure. “He needs to put some meat on his bones,” said Diana Koenig, a 42-year-old Texas housewife. Another Clinton voter sniffed on a Yahoo! message board: “I won’t vote for any beanpole guy.” The odd thing is that Obama bears a distinct resemblance to the most cherished hero in chick-lit history.

The senator is a modern incarnation of the clever, haughty, reserved and fastidious Mr. Darcy. Like the leading man of Jane Austen and Bridget Jones, Obama can, as Austen wrote, draw “the attention of the room by his fine, tall person, handsome features, noble mien. ... He was looked at with great admiration for about half the evening, till his manners gave a disgust which turned the tide of his popularity; for he was discovered to be proud, to be above his company, and above being pleased.”

The master of Pemberley “had yet to learn to be laughed at,” and this sometimes caused “a deeper shade of hauteur” to “overspread his features.” The New Hampshire debate incident in which Obama condescendingly said, “You’re likable enough, Hillary,” was reminiscent of that early scene in “Pride and Prejudice” when Darcy coldly refuses to dance with Elizabeth Bennet, noting, “She is tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me.” Indeed, when Obama left a prayer to the Lord at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, a note that was snatched out and published, part of his plea was to “help me guard against pride.” If Obama is Mr. Darcy, with “his pride, his abominable pride,” then America is Elizabeth Bennet, spirited, playful, democratic, financially strained, and caught up in certain prejudices. (McCain must be cast as Wickham, the rival for Elizabeth’s affections, the engaging military scamp who casts false aspersions on Darcy’s character).

In this political version, the prejudice is racial, with only 31% of white voters telling The New York Times in a survey that they had a favourable opinion of Obama, compared with 83% of blacks. And the prejudice is visceral: Many Americans, especially blue collar, still feel uneasy about the Senate’s exotic shooting star. So the novelistic tension of the 2008 race is this: Can Obama overcome his pride and Hyde Park hauteur and win America over?

Can America overcome its prejudice to elect the first black president? And can it move past its biases to figure out if Obama’s supposed conceit is really just the protective shield and defense mechanism of someone who grew up half white and half black, a perpetual outsider whose father deserted him and whose mother, while loving, sometimes did so as well? Can Miss Bennet teach Mr. Darcy to let down his guard, be more sportive and laugh at himself?

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Thursday, October 16, 2008

The Golden Solitude

Attempts are on to isolate the CPM general secretary Prakash Karat
He is the most dreaded politician of modern times who almost managed to topple the UPA government, but for the massive cross-voting by BJP MPs. But, the CPM general secretary, Prakash Karat did forge a third front within hours of the UPA victory in the confidence vote sought by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

His firm ideological moorings have won him accolades, but his

stubbornness in not being appreciated across the political spectrum. In fact, efforts are already on to alienate Karat within the CPM and the Left Front. Ironically, it started within Karat’s own party when Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chaterjee defied his diktats to put in his papers. On the other hand, CPM leaders from West Bengal like Biman Bose wanted Karat to be soft on Chatterjee especially since the latter was holding a constitutional post and was enjoying goodwill among all parties. But, party leaders from Kerala – Karat himself is a Keralite – egged him on to sack Somnath from the party.

During Left Front’s coordination committee meeting, when the CPI general secretary A.B. Bardhan proposed delaying Somnath’s expulsion from CPM for a few days, CPM polit bureau member from Kerala S. R. Pillai butted in, “We had decided to sack him five days ago but delayed it till the Vote of Confidence. We can’t tolerate him any longer." Same evening Karat read out the sentence on Somnath’s expulsion, much to chagrin of the West Bengal cadre of the CPM.

Karat’s style of functioning, too, has received a lot of flak. Unlike his predecessor, Harkishan Singh Surjeet, Karat is completely inflexible in his approach. This is why after withdrawal of support from the UPA, he deputed the task of coordinating with UPA allies to polit bureau member Sitaram Yechury. But the latter went off to UK and Canada. An embarrassed Karat had to issue a clarification that he had no differences with Yechury. In Yechury’s absence, Karat himself had to convince UPA allies like Ram Vilas Paswan, Lalu Yadav and Sharad Pawar to desert the UPA, but none of them obliged him.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in his speech during vote of confidence in the Parliament, sought to exploit the hostility for Karat among the Left leaders and UPA allies by accusing Karat of wanting the PM to be his “bonded slave”. He paid compliments to Jyoti Basu and Surjeet while saving his best barbs for Karat. Karat, on the other hand, tried to square the score by propping up BSP leader Mayawati as leader of proposed Third Front and prospective Prime Ministerial candidate. The hasty move met strong protests from Third Front leaders like HD Deve Gowda.

Though UPA leaders like Lalu Prasad Yadav still hope that the Left parties would have no option but to come back to the UPA after next elections, Karat completely ruled out the possibility. A piqued Lalu in an interview, retorted by terming Karat as the “only person hell-bent on rolling out a red carpet for the saffron forces”. Other UPA leaders like Mulayam Singh and Amar Singh, too, have been trying to portray Karat as the “villain of the peace”.

But, Prakash Karat is unfazed by these developments. “The Third front under Mayawati’s leadership would be on such a strong wicket after the next elections that it would need neither NDA nor the UPA to form its government”, he said. Noble thoughts indeed!

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Let’s agree to disagree

Together, India & China can extract better gains in trade talks
The conclusions of the Doha round of talks have become quite

predictable. They always start on a similar note, with lots of promises to deliver on key issues related to world trade, but end up just about where they began. The same happened to the recently concluded Doha round of talks. While in the beginning it seemed that the developed and the developing countries would finally settle down to something. In the end, the talks simply broke down.

But what was different this time from the earlier talks is that the point of influence has shifted from the Quad (which includes EU, US, Japan and Canada) towards China and India. Till now it was the Quad group that decided which way the talks would go and why and on what matter the talks would end. This time, unlike the past talks, it was the rigidness on the part of the two Asian giants (India and China in one rare act of solidarity), which forced the talks to end in a deadlock. The two countries simply refused to accept the cut in the subsidies that the EU and the US were proposing and said that these cuts are just not enough. As per Celso Amoriumn, the Brazilian Foreign Minister and trade negotiator, the collapse was a sign that the nature of talks has changed.

The shift is because China and India have grown substantially and have huge markets; which means huge stakes for first world companies. “But at this point, India and China are not very powerful alone”, said Henry Y. Wan Jr., Professor, Economics Department, Cornell University to B&E. But together, they are a powerful block. By forming more consensus with each other, they could further strengthen their bargaining power.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Friday, October 10, 2008

I do Dad proud...

.by contributing to global GDP!
f game is a part of life, gambling has been an integral part for

economies. And North American economies greatly benefit out of it. Though the industry has not yet achieved legal status in all countries, it contributes to more than $3 billion to global GDP; thanks to millions of glamorous luxurious casinos. While the gambling industry has been witnessing slow and steady growth for the last few years, big players like Harrah, Foxwoods, Mohegan sun are undergoing a makeover to attract more eyeballs.

Foxwoods, North America’s largest resort casino has put aside $700 million to expand its business, increase hospitality standards, add glamour and attract more visitors in partnership with MGM mirage. The grand casino attracts over 50,000 visitors daily (mostly from the nearest city, Massachussetts). It further hopes to enchant more New Yorkers, which at present contributes just 9% of its total visitor count. Harrah, the world’s largest casino on the other hand, is doing something different – it has linked up with tribes in Arizona & California (for word of mouth marketing?!). Gamble on (legally), flip that Ace and be a contributor to global GDP, we say!

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Tuesday, October 07, 2008

The best em‘ploy’ee to win calls

Everyone talks about customers being top on priority for any company. Learn from vCustomer why this is not a universal rule. By sachin bharel
Trouble comes in many guises at the workplace. However, the

most potent difficulty arises when one comes across a troublesome client and in such circumstances even your boss is of no help. Leaving you in a lurch, he too runs for cover at the sight of the potential troublesome customer. But you don’t have the option of running for the exit door, for, the day you joined B-School, till date, the only thing you have been taught – Customer is the King. But, for many companies their employees are also considered as kings. The BPO industry, which is perhaps the most human centric industry, has given the vast workforce a new lease of life. From pick-up and drops to providing them career growth opportunities and other facilities, the industry has tread a path, hitherto unknown to other employers and their employees. The industry has shown to the world the real meaning behind ‘Employee is the King.’ In an exclusive interaction with B&E, Navin Joshua, Executive Director, vCustomer, revealed that human resource is an integral part of the company’s core values. “HR is a very basic existence of our company’s DNA,” adds Joshua.

Started in 1999, with a focus on improving customer satisfaction for its client through a combination of technology driven, cost effective outsourcing solutions, vCustomer is now gung-ho to improve its employees’ satisfaction too. Little wonder that vCustomer was ranked at the top in Employee Satisfaction Among Contact Centers in the annual DQ-IDC India BPO ESAT Survey. Today with work strength of 3,500 employees, vCustomer has four support centres in India. vCustomer recognises the importance of each employee’s contribution to the organisation and has created a unique initiative – Employee First. The overall purpose to foster an ‘Employee First’ culture is to create a workplace and environment that fosters performance. Build Confidence, an initiative that’s part of vCustomer’s Employee First culture, empowers managers to instill confidence in their teams and allows them the freedom to enhance productivity within the work environment. And what differentiates vCustomer from others in the industry, is the opportunities it gives to its employees, which can be quantified and measured afterwards. “The key to get the employees perform at different levels is how we deal with these employees at a human level,” avers Joshua.

vCustomer believes in empowering its employees to become tomorrow’s leaders. A culture of training & leadership development automatically builds talent, facilitating both lateral as well as upward movements. Adds Joshua, “Our customised career development programme allows both lateral & vertical growth through accelerated promotion programmes based on performance.” Like every other industry, vCustomer also has its own set of people challenges and the company has its own unique style of dealing with such situations. According to Joshua, “Challenges start from the day we source folks (employees) and I think sourcing is the biggest challenge. It is really turning out to be an art.” He further adds, “With 80% of the workforce in the age group of 20-25, people’s maturity is a big challenge. For instance, people reaching for shifts on time is a big challenge we face at vCustomer.”

Just like any other company, vCustomer too lays great emphasis on learning and training for an employee’s career growth and personal development. To implement this, the BPO company has in place, organisational and individual development programmes, for each and every employee. These programmes have in fact been charted according to the different roles an employee plays in the organisation and to complement his/her career objectives. A team of trained professionals leverage industry best practices & process-specific training programmes to impart customised training solutions. vCustomer’s result-oriented work culture fosters a spirit of individual initiative, teamwork & celebration. The company believes in creating an environment, which is exciting yet filled with fun. To alleviate the work-stress level the company conducts training on well-being and health-related issues. Yoga, meditation and stress management programmes are conducted regularly for the employees. Fun activities too are a regular occurrence at vCustomer. vSports (indoor & outdoor sports club), vEnergy (regular health & fitness camps), vRiders (the vCustomer bikers community) & vCampus (the monthly magazine) are some of the popular activities at the BPO company. What’s more, flexible times & parallel employee engagement programmes such as higher education plans, common interest groups and festival celebrations ensure that there is a healthy work-life balance for all employees. Like a family member, vCustomer also celebrates employees’ ‘Birthday Bash’ every month. It is a rare occurrence when a company understands the demanding life of its employees and creates processes and structures to suit the needs of the workforce. But it is this understanding of the employees’ needs that has set vCustomer apart in the highly demanding and stressful BPO sector.
right on top

Named among Top 10 Contact Centers in Global Services 100 Survey for 2008.

l Ranked No. 1 in Employee Satisfaction Among Contact Centers in the annual DQ-IDC India BPO ESAT Survey, 2007.

l Ranked among the top five BPO-IT companies in the list of 15 “Exciting Companies to Work For” by NASSCOM in 2007.

l Data Quest ranks vCustomer No.15 among ‘Top 20 BPO’s in 2007.

lIn the top 20 list of ‘India’s Top BPOs’ by Everest Research in 2007.

lAmong the Top 10 ‘Hot Players in Offshore Outsourcing World’ by BusinessWeek in 2006.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Friday, October 03, 2008

Survival of the fittest, for what?

Stop elephant poaching – the state will be doing it anyway in South Africa
South Africa is doing a China. While the latter, even as the

whole world looks on, has not shied of a frantic and fierce crackdown on unarmed freedom hopefuls, South Africa is proposing to sentence a perfectly healthy population to its death, merely for having survived long enough to add up to a sizeable count. South Africa is possibly doing worse thus, for elephants don’t protest.

In the last week of February this year, the Environment Ministry of South Africa issued Norms and Standards towards Elephant Management in the country to be effective from 1 May 2008, which includes among other things culling, none the better quoted as “the option of last resort”. Currently a strength of 20,000, the last time jumbo populations were discussed was in 1995 in a contrasting scenario – instating a ban on elephant killings after their numbers had whittled drastically owing to poaching and habitat encroachment. Eliciting a furious backlash from animal welfare groups, the debate has been particularly jacked up with renowned conservationist Richard Leakey voicing his no-objection to the cull in his very own WildlifeDirect blog, warning against “serious problem unless some key populations are reduced and maintained at appropriate levels.” Michele Pickover of Animal Rights Africa however argues that “…neither the Minister nor any of the pro-culling lobby has been able to produce one shred of evidence to show that there is an ethically or ecologically defensible reason to kill even one elephant in South Africa.”

Both scientifically and ethically, says Raman Sukumar, consummate authority on the Asian elephant and director of the Asian Elephant Research and Conservation Centre, the cull is hardly a remedy. “Next to the primates and cetaceans, the elephants are highly intelligent animals that are sensitive and capable of emotion. To be subjecting a society like theirs to a cull can be traumatising and is certainly not recommended. Besides,” Sukumar explains, “our ecological systems are dynamic in nature. For us to assume the carrying capacity of the land and conclude that x number of elephants in y area is ideal, is unrealistic estimation.”

The debate goes back to the 50s and 60s when relative abundance of elephants resulted in clearing up of woodlands into grasslands. Gradually the jumbos were pushed into smaller and smaller pockets of habitat, where the increasing density of the animals made it difficult for vegetation to replenish at a proportional rate, setting off the spiel on ‘over-population’. “Now, what if there was a drought like the one in Tsavo National Park, wiping out the numbers that we condescend to spare in the cull,” Sukumar reminds us of Nature’s ways of checks and balances. In 1970, a particularly dry period seared dead much of the flora and fauna in the area, establishing the eternal efficacy of Natural Selection as a tool to restore ecological equilibrium, over any man-made “toolbox of options” as Minister Marthinus Van Schalkwyk made sound of in his policy statement.

While India has yet to find itself in such a quandary to date, South Africa claims to have learnt its lessons from the last cull, promising to adhere to a “culling plan… with the assistance of (…) a recognised elephant management specialist.” What remains to be understood is that no amount of jargon can disguise the doom inked for the benign beasts, or reason the meddling with the concerns of the already weary Mother Nature.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Wednesday, October 01, 2008

“The business of sports is very interesting and profitable...”

Bollywood superstar Shahrukh Khan discusses his IPL franchise in an exclusive with angshuman paul of B&E
He has ruled Bollywood for years together and now he is lending his phenomenal brand equity to cricket. In this exclusive with B&E, Shahrukh talks about his newfound passion for the game:

B&E: What role are you playing to generate the maximum ROI from IPL?

SRK: I did it out of passion and the passion and zeal

for cricket is still there, but yes, when I invested such a huge amount, I do expect a return. But that’s being taken care of by some other concern, I am focusing on the publicity and promotional activities as it’s required in a business of sports.

B&E: How do you plan to promote your IPL team?

SRK: I personally will be present in each and every match as when I have invested, I should know what’s happening. I am also having a contract with Tag Heuer to make special watches for all team players. We will also launch a promotional website.

B&E: What are your long term plans with respect to the business of sports?

SRK: Right now after IPL, I don’t have major money to invest. At this point, I am willing to do every possible thing for my team members (even taking water for them while they are playing) but I know that initially it won’t make a business for me and it will take me ten y ears to think of other businesses of sports.

B&E: What are your aspirations for your IPL team?

SRK: I dream that the kids and young generation of Kolkata (and of the entire country) will be fans of my team. That’s my dream as an entertainer and more importantly, my passion for sports and cricket. Let me remind you I have acquired the IPL franchise, not only from the business point of view, so my plans aren’t efficient corporate plans. I believe that to do future planning in business, you must be experienced & I don’t think like businessmen.

B&E: So you will not be adopting any conventional corporate strategies in order to generate revenues?

SRK: I have invested a big stake and as an investor I am concerned about every move of the team but as such, as I said, I don’t know the art of business. Even I don’t have huge funds which big business houses or other industrialists in the field of sports have. So at this time I do feel I won’t be able to survive in the business of sports. But yes, overall the business of sports is very interesting and profitable, both for businessmen and for our country too.

For Complete I I P M Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative