Air India next Continental?

The best thing in the MBA courses is a bunch of case studies, mainly from HBR ofcourse! It is said that 'Strategy' is the most used & most misunderstood word. I guess so.

We had a course named 'Operations Strategy' - aren't these two words exact opposites of each other in meaning? Operational excellence or efficiency is something that shows the results in the income statement i.e something that can be measured in numbers almost with an immediate effect - an assembly line is refined at an automobile manufacturing unit & it produces more vehicles - immediate numbers. Whereas any strategic initiative taken doesn't show immediate impact in numbers, and probably never would show as high impact in terms of numbers as that by operational efficiency, but it makes an amazingly powerful non-measurable impact - things like just addressing the staff in your restaurant by name; this is where I face the biggest paradox of my life - disliking the subject I am most interested in: Mathematics! And I dislike agreeing that Maths fails to measure the most important parameters, anything that cannot be measured in numbers. We could dig deep into these - operations vs strategy & maths not being useful enough, may be some other time.

One of the cases that we studied in this course was of the turnaround of Continental Airlines - a classic case [Click Here to download the case, thanks to Google I found the pdf] of how small things make a great impact and how consistency in certain practices take a drowning company to a path-breaking one.

Why I was thinking of strategy is because of a couple of Air India's announcements. Recently I went to Toronto & chose Air India for various valid reasons. What an awful experience I had! You could read in detail Here if you want to enjoy the details. I just want to tell them if they don't want to serve, better stop serving. I read the news of Air India wanting to turnaround, and achieve similar heights probably as that of Continental per the captain's statement. And then I read another news piece about the company cutting down the operating costs. Woo! Has the first step itself gone wrong, shouldn't the first steps in an attempt to turn around be focussed on strategic initiatives which probably would cause a hike in operating expenses initially & then with loads of seamless efforts, eventually profits would be made.
Can Air India do the turn around? Well, nothing is impossible so to say and I am very pessimistic about believing that this company can do a turnaround, but definitely extensively intense efforts are needed.

Let's wait & watch!

The roar..MULTIPLIED!

What A Match!!! What A Win!!!

Experiencing this win and in such a match with a couple of records broken, in this age of internet and accessibility especially in the world's fastest growing economy - WOW! Really great in many ways!!

What it is to see almost a billion and a half people happy together, for a consistent number of hours, days, weeks, months and may be years! - yes, at least for the next 4 years the wonderful memories of this big win would bring smiles on this mass of people certainly. Some statistics should start finding patterns in improvements happening, I seriously think.

They did it for Sachin, they did it for team India - no they did it for the country, India. This piece in Mint on saturday said that it is a misconception that India loves cricket, no. India loves India and cricket is a means to do that! What a wonderful statement by Aakar Patel here. True that India loves India and that is why the hatred creeps in too, not liking things happening around is probably because of our love for the country which makes us possessive about it and we want good things to happen to it & in it.

Let the celebrations continue in our heart though they might have ended explicitly! Let the 'roar' be at its peak as much as possible & all through!

The roar of 1.2 BILLION people!

Ravi Shastri comments in the India-Australia quarter finals of the Cricket World Cup 2011, 'If India were to win this match, there will be the MOTHER of all the matches on Wednesday in Mohali, India meeting Pakistan'.

When it comes to 'India vs Pakistan', there is something, but when it comes to Cricket match, and in a world cup, and in India - this is a combination which every single one of would get goosebumps for. For any sport for that matter, it brings up the same feelings of many together, but a combination like this is definitely very special.

The power of being united will be seen tomorrow, the roar of 1.2 BILLION people together, will be heard tomorrow. Roars from each household together heard on a boundary or a wicket, that's simply amazing to hear. Nothing so personal about cricket, about India/Pakistan, about world cup - but I will have a smile on my face on those absolute mad celebrations and there would be many like me around.

I remember the 1999 world cup when I was in Ahmedabad, India won against Pakistan, apart from the celebrations at each wicket, each boundary, almost every delivery which resulted in a run for India or, a no-run or wicket for Pakistan; once India finally won, people started dancing outside on the streets, there was a procession with a dhol and a bunch of people dancing on that stupidly played dhol, I liked the way they were enjoying, probably after a long time or never as before ever for many :-)

Whatever said and done, there is something about India enjoying like that together, there is a strange sense of satisfaction seeing people happy all around. I wish such matches happen often, and we celebrate madly like that more frequently.

To all the celebrations for tomorrow, ENJOY!

Rang Barse...

Would a Holi pass by without singing this song...'Rang Barse.....bheegey....chunar waali..rang barse...'

This is from the movie 'Silsila' as we all know, one of the biggest hits of Bollywood for several reasons & concerns, enacted by the two most iconic stars in lead roles, and other two most iconic stars in supporting roles. All the stories talked about the movie & its resemblance to the reality & it being actually the reality of the stars' lives and so on and so forth, definitely creates a lot of questions in our minds.

1981, is when the movie was released. And it is said & probably known to everyone now that the two lead stars didn't speak to each other after the movie, neither did they speak to the media about that, ever. The man of principles that the Superstar of the Millennium is! 2011, 30 years, definitely a very very long time!

Each year, when this song is played all over the country & people across the country unanimously enjoy the festival much more just because of this song, imagine what would this actress feel, especially when she confessed about her feelings towards this visionary actor on the Simi Garewal's show.

This song, created a history, each & everyone of the 80 crore people (assuming around 20% children wouldn't still recognize the song & its importance) dance on this song everywhere - absolutely no region in the country would play Holi without this song!!! Beyond imagination.

True, actors live 2 lives, one which we see on-screen & the other which they truly are - I wonder if anyone ever gets to see their true self ever or even if they themselves are able to live their true self. Harsh reality!

Question our question?

The answers exist, for any question that we can ask ourselves or to the others or to Google :)

Every time I have a question, I of course put in immense efforts to find the answer myself first - and for the obvious ones Google helps me, and for some others I think myself and eventually, do find the answer - sometimes the answer is a harsh reality, but that's how it is, I accept it.

The one thing I admire about Google as a company is how it puts in all possible efforts to thrive towards this factor called 'relevance' - not only in its search results but in almost every practice.

I type something in Google search, I don't get the answer. Then I edit my question a bit, I still don't get the intended answer. I tweak my query a bit more, and I finally do get the answer to it. Whenever this happens, I always say to myself, 'If you don't get an answer to your question on Google, question your question & not Google.' Wow! Isn't that an amazing thought!

This I see how truly is applicable to our lives as well. It is just that we lack resources to seek answers to our questions - sometimes time, sometimes ability, sometimes just that one bold step to go ahead and find the answer.

There are many questions which I am still seeking answers to, which Google can't find I know, but I know they exist - I just wish my life time is enough for me to find them.