Book Review: Business the Richard Branson Way

‘Business the Richard Branson Way’ – 10 secrets of the world’s greatest brand builder; Third Edition
By: Des Dearlove
Wiley India Pvt. Ltd.

Richard Branson is now a legend. Few self-made men have ever achieved as much in this business world, as Branson has achieved with his Virgin brand. Though there is no dearth of available literature or articles about him, I think a business oriented biographical tribute had to be a wonderful read. This is what this book provides us with.

Here are the “10 Secrets” about the “Virgin King”:

1) Pick on someone bigger than you
2) Do the hippy, hippy shake
3) Haggle: everything is negotiable
4) Make work fun
5) Do right by your brand
6) Smile for the cameras
7) Don’t lead sheep, herd cats
8) Move faster than a speeding bullet
9) Size does matter
10) Never lose the common touch

After reading the book, now I feel like knowing Richard better. And not to mention that I too am fascinated by his sheer bold and honest leadership. This book reveals and gives us an idea of how Branson did what. A few minor takeaways in my opinion:

1) Living the brand
2) Creating the right impression around oneself and the brand
3) Become identified as a gutsy force
4) Very creative ideas
5) Trying out and executing a hundred ideas to get at least some very successful
6) Keep oneself in control of one’s business
7) Take very fast decisions
8) Understand other’s psychology and act on them
9) No disadvantage can’t be turned around
10)Be on the moral right side

This is an amazing book. Though the topics and dimensions were so many that at places not enough pounds have been spent on each, the book which is relatively thin (170 pages) gives a very fair idea to satisfy readers’ curiosities. It’s a quality read. Recommended.

- Rahul

Book Review: Freakonomics

Freakonomics: A rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything
By: Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
Penguin Books

I had heard about this book when in b-school but couldn’t lay my hands on it. Now that I got it, I started with enthusiasm. The front cover carries Malcolm Gladwell’s comment on it: “Prepare to be dazzled”. And WSJ says, “If Indiana Jones were an economist, he’d be Steven Levitt”. After reading it, I found that the book lived up to the hype!

It is an amazing book which doesn’t feel like trading on economics. It is common sense, in the most uncommon form. The book is an eye opener and I am sure all of us would learn so much new from it no matter how much we knew from before. It teaches us how to see the hidden side of everything.

I would reproduce portions from the front cover flip:

Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their mothers? Why do prostitutes earn more than architects?

One of today’s most original thinkers turns our view of the world upside down…

Life can be baffling and chaotic, and sometimes it’s hard to make sense of it all. The answer, explains groundbreaking thinker Steven Levitt, lies in economics. Not ordinary economics but Freakonomics. It is at the heart of everything we see and do and the subjects that bedevil us daily: from parenting to crime, sports to politics, health to education, fear to traffic jams.

In Freakonomics Levitt turns conventional economics on its head, stripping away the jargon and calculations of the experts to explore the riddles of everyday life and examine topics such as: how chips are more likely to kill you than a terrorist attack; why sportsmen cheat and how fraud can be spotted; why violent crime can be linked not to gun laws, policing or poverty, but to abortion; why a road is more efficient when everyone travels at 20mph; how the name you gave your child can give him an advantage in later life; and what really causes obesity epidemics. Ultimately, he shows us that economics is all about how people get what they want, and what makes them do it.

I would always remember this book for telling me, “If morality represents an ideal world, then economics represents the actual world.” And for proving to me how legalising abortion can help reduce crime rates…

A perfect treat for a reader like me. I highly recommend this book to all….

- Rahul

Book Review: Freedom from the Known

‘Freedom from the Known’
By J. Krishnamurti
Edited by Mary Lutyens
Krishnamurti Foundation India

I had heard about J. Krishnamurti and his philosophy and was eager to read him. Now that I found his book, there was no stopping. I loved this book and though I didn’t always agree with him or always found his thought in line with mine (for that matter I found him very radical), it was very interesting and enriching to know the way he looks at things. Without doubt he was a very powerful thinker and his thoughts are very logical and relevant.

I think all of us who are interested to explore some of the most puzzling questions of life should definitely read him. This book can be a wonderful start.

I have typewritten and reproduced some paragraphs from his book. The titles and choice or portions are personally mine:

1. Revolt

Revolt is not freedom because when you revolt it is a reaction and that reaction sets up its own pattern and you get caught in that pattern. You think it is something new. It is not; it is the old in a different mould. Any social or political revolt will inevitably revert to the good old bourgeois mentality.

2. Time

I am tempted to repeat a story about a great disciple going to God and demanding to be taught truth. God says, “My friend, it is such a hot day, please get me a glass of water.” So the disciple goes out and knocks on the door of the first house he comes to and a beautiful young lady opens the door. The disciple falls in love with her and they marry and have several children. Then one day it begins to rain, and keeps on raining, raining, raining – the torrents are swollen, the streets are full, the houses are being washed away. The disciple holds on to his wife and carries his children on his shoulders and as he is being swept away he calls out, “Lord, please save me”, and the Lord says, “Where is that glass of water I asked for?”

It is rather a good story because most of us think in terms of time. Man lives by time. Inventing the future has been a favourite game of escape. (P95)

3. Death

To die is to have a mind that is completely empty of itself, empty of its daily longings, pleasures and agonies. Death is a renewal, a mutation, in which thought does not function at all because thought is old. When there is death there is something totally new. Freedom from the known is death, and then you are living. (P104)

4. Love

So what you really say is, “As long as you belong to me I love you but the moment you don’t I begin to hate you. As long as I can rely on you to satisfy my demands, I love you, but the moment you cease to supply what I want I don’t like you.” So there is antagonism between you, there is separation, and when you feel separate from another there is no love. But if you can live with your wife without thought creating all these contradictory states, these endless quarrels in yourself, then perhaps – perhaps – you will know what love is. Then you are completely free and so is she, whereas if you depend on her for all your pleasures you are a slave to her. So when one loves there must be freedom, not only from the other person but from oneself. (P109)

5. Sorrow

Sorrow and love cannot go together, but in the Christian world they have idealised suffering, put it on a cross and worshipped it, implying that you can never escape from suffering except through that one particular door, and this is the whole structure of an exploiting religious society. (P114)

6. Art

Why is it that we depend so much upon art? Is it a form of escape, of stimulation? If you are directly in contact with nature; if you watch the movement of a bird on the wing, see the beauty of every movement of the sky, watch the shadows on the hills or the beauty on the face of another, do you think you will want to go to any museum to look at any picture? Perhaps it is because you do not know how to look at all the things about you that you resort to some form of drug to stimulate you to see better. (P121)

7. Teacher

There is a story of a religious teacher who used to talk every morning to his disciples. One morning he got on to the platform and was just about to begin when a little bird came and sat on the window still and began to sing, and sang away with full heart. Then it stopped and flew away and the teacher said, “The sermon for this morning is over.” (P121)

8. Quite

Thus we see it is not control that leads to quietness. Nor is the mind quite when it has an object which is so absorbing that it gets lost in that object. This is like giving a child an interesting toy; he becomes very quite, but remove the toy and he returns to his mischief-making. We all have our toys which absorb us and we think we are very quite but if a man is dedicated to a certain form of activity, scientific, literary or whatever it is, the toy merely absorbs him and he is not really quite at all. (P150)

- Rahul

Book Review: Zenobia

‘Zenobia: The curious book of business’
By: Matthew Emmens and Beth Kephart
Tata McGraw-Hill Edition

I would reproduce the book’s description from the back cover:

“Written by the CEO of a $14 billion pharmaceutical company and an award winning author and poet, this extraordinary book reminds us that imagination is one of the most powerful, and most overlooked, elements of business success. Moira, an enterprising young job aspirant, winds her way through a strange, sclerotic bureaucracy, never discouraged by what is, remaining tenaciously true to her vision of what could be. In the process, she inspires those she meets to help in her quest to revitalize the once-mighty but now moribund Zenobia Corporation.”

Well, I agree with the description but have to add that this was a very different book that I ever read. The story of Moira, a young lady going to do something different and change the status quo, is told in a symbolic manner. When I started reading, I found it too weird. But the later part was very perfect and it kept on getting a better read, as we the readers become habitual to the symbols used in the story. It is a story of courage and it is a story of hope. It is a story which tells us that everything can change, just we have to have the right attitude.

Should I recommend it to others? Yes, if you are curious about this curiously symbolic story. It is a small book running into about 100 pages. And it is fun reading.

- Rahul

Book Review: The 10 Distinctions between Millionaires and the Middle Class

‘The 10 Distinctions between Millionaires and the Middle Class’
By: Keith Cameron Smith
Ballantine Books

I guess the first thing in this book which would attract readers would be its title. Isn’t it so? But I think what will actually attract us towards this book would be our own wish to be successful in life. As the author writes, “The purpose of life is not to HAVE success, but to BE successful”. And he goes on to tell his own life stories and stories of others, all which would lead us to be successful in life.

I would list own the 10 ‘distinctions’ which the book elaborates. I would leave the explanation to your guess and if you are more curious, definitely the book is not beyond reach.

1) Millionaires think long term. The middle class thinks short-term.
2) Millionaires talk about ideas. The middle class talks about things and other people.
3) Millionaires embrace change. The middle class is threatened by change.
4) Millionaires take calculated risks. The middle class is afraid to take risks.
5) Millionaires continually learn and grow. The middle class thinks learning ended with school.
6) Millionaires work for profits. The middle class works for wages.
7) Millionaires believe they must be generous. The middle class believes it can’t afford to give.
8) Millionaires have multiple sources of income. The middle class has only one or two.
9) Millionaires focus on increasing their net worth. The middle class focuses on increasing its paychecks.
10) Millionaires ask themselves empowering questions. Middle class people ask themselves disempowering questions.

I highly recommend this book to all who want to learn from others’ success.

- Rahul

Book Review: Bangalore Tiger

‘Bangalore Tiger: How Indian Tech Upstart Wipro is rewriting the rules of global competition’
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By: Steve Hamm

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Tata McGraw-Hill

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Steve Hamm is a senior editor and the software editor for BusinessWeek. He has been tracking Indian tech services industry since 2001 and this book is a product of his research. Hamm wanted to thoroughly understand, in and out, an Indian IT major. He could have picked any one of the big-3: TCS, Infosys and Wipro. He picked up Wipro but in this book, he also mentions and explains things from TCS, Infy or even Mindtree (which was started up by Wiproites). I don’t think we would ever find such a comprehensive book and a testimony to Wipro’s success story.
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The author maintains a very fine balance – he explains the historical context – how in 1966 Premji while at Stanford University got a call back from home and had to inherit an ailing business of vegetable oil – but the author doesn’t get lost in it. He explains Wipro’s operational excellence and processes alongside the best practices and what other companies can learn from it. It is really a wonderful read.
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The author makes a summary of Wipro’s approach to achieving operational excellence:
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· Live your core values
· Plan like your future depends on it
· Reduce risks without foreclosing opportunities
· Adopt zero-politics management
· Make decisions quickly, but don’t be afraid to switch
· Spell out the rules, then follow them religiously
· Measure everything
· Demand value for money
· Put the right skills in the right place
· Perform routine jobs routinely
· Turn customers into partners
· Learn from others
· Make your own way
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Wipro’s policies for handling employees:
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· Act on your values
· Train, and then train some more
· Create a true meritocracy
· Make it about the job, not just the paycheck
· Celebrate employees’ successes
· Solicit ideas from the staff
· Aspire to excellence
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Reading the book, I can definitely understand the following other key features of the Wipro Way:
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· Stretch out to achieve Customer satisfaction
· Operational excellence as a sustainable competitive advantage
· Process improvements and optimization of everything
· Cost minimization through use of technology
· Maintain very high level of personal and professional integrity
· Vision towards nation building and improving the society
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Through this book, Hamm has also given a call to the world. In his own words, “Multinationals Beware: Here come the Transnationals!” He explains how the offshore-onshore or Global Delivery Model pioneered by Indian IT companies changed the whole business model for companies all across the world and now these MNCs have to adopt to the Wipro Way or the Infy Way in order to remain in the competition. The book also explains the emerging homogenization of what the author calls “The Wipro Way”, in line with “the GE Way” or “the Toyota Way”. The book is full of conversations with Azim Premji, Vivek Paul, Girish Paranjpe, TK Kurian, and Subroto Bagchi.
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Reading this book is a treat in itself and the learning from it is profound. I recommend it to all readers who want to understand how Indian tech companies operate, how they have grown so far and what are the visionaries behind them.

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- Rahul

Book Review: Supply Chain Management with APO

‘Supply Chain Management with APO: Structures, Modeling Approaches and Implementation Peculiarities’

By: Jorg Thomas Dickersbach

Springer International Edition

Since I am in this field, I would need to refer to this book for some more time now. Many seniors referred me to this book, which is like a text book to understand SAP APO (SAP Advance Planner and Optimizer) module. It is a smaller book as such, if we see the vast content it has covered. And I also found that though the subject matter is explained well, for those who are in the very beginning to work on APO, at places the explanations are not adequately enough and we have also to refer to the Help sites. But we can always come back to revisit this book and then it becomes a very good value add. The book is full of very good diagrams explaining processes, snapshots and the real treat is the case studies or problem explanations faced during implementation or while working with APO.

A must for all SAP APO consultants.

- Rahul