EDITOR
Gp Capt R Vijayakumar ﴾Retd﴿, VSM
READERSHIP OUTREACH
Gp Capt Dr R Venkataraman ﴾Retd﴿
Sundar R
Vakeeswari M
DESIGN
D Rajaram, Tayub Refai
MADRAS MANAGEMENT ASSOCIATION
Management Center, New No.240 Pathari Road, ﴾Off Anna Salai﴿, Chennai 600 006
Ph:044‐2829 1133 / Email:mma@mmachennai.org | mandate@mmachennai.org
Iam filled with immense gratitude and pride as I reflect on this year's MMA Annual General Meeting (AGM) and the awards function for Managerial Excellence. The event was exceptional, thanks to your presence and unwavering support. Your participation and contributions have been the driving force behind our growth and achievements.
The highlight of the AGM was the enlightening address by our esteemed Chief Guest, Mr. T V Narendran, CEO&ManagingDirectorofTataSteelLtd. His invaluable insights on achieving managerial excellence deeply resonated with all present, leaving a lasting impression on our minds. Equally captivating was Mr. Josh Foulger, President, Zetwerk, whose wisdom provided a fresh perspective on effective leadership in dynamic environments.
In this edition, we are pleased to present an article capturing the essence of the Chief Guest's address, accompanied by an embedded video. We believe this
content will be a valuable resource and a source of inspiration for your professional journey.
Additionally, we are delighted to share the video presentation showcased during the AGM, spotlighting MMA's activities and achievements in 2023-24. This progress is a testament to the collective efforts of our members, well-wishers, and Managing Committee Members. Click to view the video highlights.
With the support of our esteemed members and well‐wishers, we are committed to achieving our objectives and surpassing all expectations.
For a country like India, hosting multi‐city games would require a tremendous amount of new infrastructure to be built. The question that really needs an answer: Why India wants to host the Olympic Games?
I extend my sincere gratitude to all of you for your continued support of MMA and its activities. Your unwavering commitment and involvement have paved the way for our achievements, and we look forward to scaling even greater heights with your support in the coming years. Together, let us strive for excellence and continue to drive positive change and growth for MMA.
The new managing committee was announced during the MMA AGM on July 5, 2024. It is a privilege to work with this team of highly accomplished leaders. Led by President Mr.KMahalingam, Partner/Director of TSM Group of Companies, for the second term, the committee comprises experienced professionals and new entrants with vast corporate backgrounds. Their collective expertise will guide MMA to greater heights.
As we embark on this new chapter, we are filled with promise and determination. With the support of our esteemed members and well-wishers, we are committed to achieving our objectives and surpassing all expectations.
The 2024 Summer Olympic Games were inaugurated on July 26, 2024, in Paris. This sporting extravaganza is expected to bring a wave of athletes,
tourists, and experts to the French capital for the smooth conduct of the event.
A strong contingent of 110 athletes is representing India, and we wish them the best of luck in winning as many medals as possible. The Union Sports Minister has observed that a large percentage of our population does not engage in recreational sports, let alone competitive sports. His focus is on making Indians physically literate. Olympic medals are never born out of compulsion; they are born of passion, of that fire in the belly that refuses to be extinguished by adversity.
Sporting events such as the Olympic Games are so expensive that in the past that many nations have suffered huge setbacks. In October 2023, the Indian Olympic Association formally declared India’s interest in organizing the 2036 Olympics at the 141st International Olympic Committee session at the JIO World Centre in Mumbai. For a country like India, hosting multi-city games would require a tremendous amount of new infrastructure to be built. The question that really needs an answer: Why India wants to host the Olympic Games? It cannot be for economic reasons. Considering the cost of hosting the Olympics, it is worth asking if the country really needs such a spectacle.
A recent study by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) shows that 70% of individual investors in the equity cash segment ended up making losses. The number of individuals actively engaged in trading has shot up by 300% from its 2018-19 level. That said, we must not clamp down on investment activity that resembles gambling. Financial education is the most important tool to mitigate the larger risks posed by it. Markets have their own way of teaching investors lessons, as past episodes of difficult times have shown.
The budget for 2024-25 continues to adhere to the government’s fiscal consolidation path, with the fiscal deficit at 4.9% of GDP. Subsidies across the board, from fertilizers to food and petroleum, have been reduced.
It is commendable that nine priority items have been framed for focused attention to ensure overall development. Financial support to students, with a sum of Rs.10.00 lakhs for higher education in domestic institutions, and upgrading thousands of ITIs into hubs are novel initiatives. The budget seems to have balanced political and fiscal compulsion to some extent. To stay on course for a Viksit Bharat, our economy needs to emerge less unevenly.
The challenge of becoming a developed country by 2047 cannot be overstated. The approach paper on Viksit Bharat outlines what is needed. India's economy needs to grow from $3.3 trillion currently to $30 trillion, while the per capita income must increase eight times from $2,392 per annum. This would require an annual growth rate of 7-10% for the next 20-30 years to achieve this objective.
In this context, MMA is organizing a discussion on the theme of the book, "India@100: Envisioning Tomorrow’s Economic Powerhouse," authored by Mr. KrishnamurthySubramanian, ExecutiveDirector,IMF, and Former Chief Economic Advisor, to understand more about this complex issue. Please join us on Friday, August 9th, at 6:00 PM at the MMA Management Center.
The concept of mental health is gaining considerable attention. Eight out of ten employees are at risk of burnout this year. So what is the solution?
While depression impacts both men and women, men are particularly reluctant to seek help.
How many times have you been unable to fall asleep due to thoughts racing through your mind?
We live in a hyper-stimulated world where we are constantly bombarded with visual, auditory, and digital inputs. This overwhelming sensory load can lead to overstimulation, causing fatigue, irritability, and decreased cognitive function. What is the solution and the way forward?
The World Health Organization (WHO) states that depression is the primary cause of disability worldwide. While depression impacts both men and women, men are particularly reluctant to seek help. Prioritizing one’s own mental health needs can help individuals overcome the pandemic of loneliness by enabling mutually nourishing relationships in life. Ultimately, mental health interventions need to embrace an intersectional approach that can tackle the multi-dimensional challenges of mental health issues.
In this context, MMA is organizing a series on the theme “Unleashing Inner Potential: Cultivating Mental ResilienceforWell-Being” to explore this complex issue further.
Additionally, MMA organized a lecture on the theme “Harnessing the Power of Hypnosis for Effective LeadershipandTeamManagement” by an international speaker to showcase the power of the mind. I am
delighted to present the article on these lectures as the cover story. Please read on and enjoy, or click to watch the video.
World Population Day was observed on July 11, 2024, and it is essential to examine India’s demographic journey. The world population is expected to reach 8.5 billion by the end of this decade. Two significant changes are anticipated: an imbalanced distribution of population across regions and a skewed age structure. The average life expectancy of Indians has also increased over time, leading to a demographic shift towards an aging population.
Despite this, India continues to have a large population in the working and earning age group. Factors such as the opening up of the economy, significant private sector investments in higher education, and FDI investments in the Indian manufacturing and services sectors over the past decades have put money in the pockets of a new generation of youth with aspirations, both in terms of career and personal life. Many believe this trend will continue indefinitely.
In this context, MMA is organizing a seminar on the theme "DemographicDividend:BoonorBane" on August 12, 2024. To explore this complex issue further, eminent speakers will share their thoughts, which promise to be thought-provoking and inspiring. Please mark your calendar and watch this unique event at 06.00 pm on August 12, 2024.
The Swachh Bharat campaign has made tremendous strides but India's solid waste crisis
persists with burning landfills and choked streams. One in three plastic waste generators in Tamil Nadu do not recycle according to norms, leading to severe environmental impacts such as pollution of lakes, water sources, and sewage systems.
In this context, MMA is organizing a seminar on "Solving India’s Solid Waste Crisis: Lessons from Madurai," on Saturday, 17th August 2024 at 06.00 pm in association with Sundaram Climate Institute, which has conducted a study on over 2000 household during 2018-2023. One insight the report cited was the lack of awareness on why managing solid waste matters.
The seminar will delve into successful strategies and practices adopted in Madurai to tackle solid waste management challenges. By examining these lessons, we aim to explore practical solutions to improve recycling rates and mitigate the environmental impact of improper waste disposal.
We urge you to constantly send in your feedback, both positive and critical, as both are equally important inputs in helping us improve what we do. As always, we would be happy to hear your views, comments, and suggestions.
Thank you for your continued support and readership.
Happy reading!
Let me speak on managerial excellence the way I see it or the way I've seen it over the last 36 years of my professional career. So when you reflect on managing excellence, I think the starting point is your personal experience as a person. It's to do with a value system; it's about what you stand for; it's about the dignity with which you treat people; it's about the pursuit of—if not perfection—at least excellence in whatever you do: it may be education, sports, arts, hobbies, relationships, friendships… How deeply are you engaged? How authentic are you in your engagement? All these, in some sense, reflect on who you are as a person and what you are as a person. All of us evolve. We grow up with the value system that is embedded in us with our upbringing, then we try to preserve it or strengthen it as we go along. Then, you get married; you have children, grandchildren… And you also keep learning from those experiences and keep developing yourself based on the value system that all of you together as a family come in. To me that personal excellence journey is something that you go
According to Mr. Narendran, CEO & Managing Director, TATA Steel, three essential ingredients drive managerial excellence. One does not guarantee the other, but all three are important in defining the future of business, growth and success. He was delivering the address at the 22nd MMA Awards for Managerial Excellence 2024.
through all your life. It reflects in the authenticity that you are seen with, the credibility that you build, the trust that you build, and all this is very important because that reflects in your workplace.
The other day, a colleague of mine who teaches in a business school asked me what your advice would be for students who are joining MBA and how they can be excellent MBA students. I said that advice is very clear: You work hard; you do well in your grades and things like that. You can call yourself an excellent MBA student, but does that make you an excellent manager? You will become an excellent manager depending on how you deal with people, how you deal with situations, and judgments that you exercise... And all that depends on the foundations on which you've been built as a person. To me, personal excellence is a very important part of managerial excellence. Sometimes the hard work that goes behind personal excellence is not seen. I mean, often times you see it in sports: no successful sports person at any level has achieved success without a lot
of hard work. Sometimes, sports people say that I'm called an overnight success because nobody has seen the 10 or 15 years of hard work that goes behind it. That, to me, is a very fundamental ingredient of managerial excellence.
The second ingredient of managerial excellence is professional excellence. I draw a distinction between personal excellence and professional excellence because, it's like personal integrity and professional integrity; they're not necessarily the same—personal integrity may be about the value system that I have; professional integrity is the way I behave in the workplace: Do I walk the talk? Do I stand by what I say? Do I say something in some meeting to get away with that meeting? Am I in a hurry to take the credit when it's not due to me? Am I in a hurry to share the blame when I should have taken it? As a person, you may be a very honest person but, as a professional, are you an honest professional? Are you willing to stand up even if your neck is on the block or for whatever your team
stands for? Professional excellence is slightly different from personal excellence. One does not guarantee the other, but both are important in your pursuit of managerial excellence.
The third part of managerial excellence is institutional excellence. How do you build excellence in the institutions that you can influence? If MMA has won the best management association award for 14 years, that's a great example on how an institution has built excellence into its DNA—despite it having multiple leaders, there may be some common factors, like Captain Vijayakumar, but fundamentally it's an institution which has consistently seen as excellent by the All-India Management Association. So how do you build institutional excellence? To me, it is one of the biggest challenges for managers. In the sphere of influence that we have, can we build that culture or DNA of excellence? So here, I go back to the company I work with. Tata Steel. I know Tata Steel better than I know any other company.
I’ll give you a couple of examples or critical points in Tata Steel's life where the DNA of Excellence was built and rebuilt in the company. The starting point was of course when Tata Steel was formed. The story of Tata Steel is actually the first atma nirbhar story: It was set up because at that time the founder of the Tata Group, J N Tata, felt that any country which needs to be able to stand on its own needs a power industry and a steel industry. Tata Power and Tata Steel were two of the earliest Tata companies. He conceived of a third one when he met Swami Vivekananda on one of his journeys. The Swami was going to Chicago to deliver his famous address, and they were discussing about how important science is for the advancement of any nation and hence the thoughts on Indian Institute of Science came up. The point is, sometimes the founding values also play a very important role. So when Tata Steel was conceived of, the founder passed away in 1904. But he had articulated what he wanted to his son Dorab Tata who then built Tata Steel. But there were so many dimensions of it which even today are relevant— probably more relevant today than it was then; for instance, he said, “The community is not just another stakeholder but the very purpose of our existence.” It resonates today when there's so much of mistrust between society and corporates. Also, because people were coming from the countryside to work in the factories and they had no accommodation or place to live in and there was chaos in all such places, he got some of the leading thinkers of that time—Sydney and Beatrice Web, who were Fabian socialists and had set up the London School of Economics—to help plan Jamshedpur, a place where the workers can live with dignity. That was the spirit! Even today, I don't know how many of you been to Jamshedpur, but we try to keep that ethos—the steel plant is in 1800 acres but we
When you have a founding value which is strong and if the purpose is good, then it's easier to build institutional excel‐lence...
run a township of 15,000 acres—because that was part of the founding values of the group. So when you have a powerful purpose, when you have a value system, then it's easier to pursue excellence all through the life of the institution because a lot of people are attracted by that value system. So over the years, professionals join the organization and everyone has an opportunity to go to the top.
In Jamshedpur, if I go and tell someone I worked for 36 years in Tata Steel, they'll ask you, “Which generation?” So there are people who are in the fifth generation, sixth generation… People feel so emotionally connected to the organization that they want to work for it. One of my customers once said, “One of the things I find strange in your company is that everyone in your company thinks you're the owner. In my company, I'm the only one who thinks I'm the owner.” The way you negotiate with me sometimes looks like it's your money but you're all just professionals. That's the emotional connect you have with the institution. It's not just the employees; we have multigenerational shareholders (5 million of them). When you have a founding value which is strong and if the purpose is good, then it's easier to build institutional excellence because people join it for the value system not so much for the salary or something else. I'm not for once claiming that Tata Steel is a
perfect company and that it’s an epitome of what a good corporate should be. All I'm saying is that at least the intentions are right and that, over generations, there is a responsibility each of us have to make sure that those intentions are not compromised.
The Tata group itself was really questioning whether Tata Steel will survive, and that was another wave in the pursuit of excellence that we went through.
I think, in the '90s, soon after I joined the company, we went through an existential crisis. In ’91, when the Indian economy opened up, a lot of people wrote off Tata Steel simply because we were used to steel market where the prices were fixed by the government. We only had to be more efficient because the prices were fixed based on the costs of sale. We didn't have much competition because you needed a license to set up a steel plant and import duties were more than 100%, so it was a very different era that opened up ahead of us in '91. People were setting up steel plants closer to customers and we were far away from customers. So for many reasons we were written off: We had 880,000 people working for us at that time making 2 million tons of steel and doing 3 million tons of mining. The then CEO Dr Irani decided that it's a matter of survival.
While I've only read about the first part of the journey, but this part of the journey I experienced it. I was then a very junior person in Tata Steel but I could see the change which was being driven in the organization. We all talk of labour laws and how difficult it is to work in India, but in the 90s, Tata Steel reduced its workforce from 880,000 to 40,000 without a strike. We were very generous in our packages that we gave to our workers.
So every year 4 to 5,000 people left the company and by the end of the decade we had come down to about 40,000 people.
Dr Irani realized that we need to learn from the Japanese. Mr Venu Srinivasan of TVS was one of the first proponents of this journey. They went and saw how the Japanese did it, and we had a team on TQM at that time working directly with Dr Irani. He took all the union leaders to steel plants in different parts of the world, to show them what productivity is right and convince them so that they could convince their members on the importance of this journey. We were a company where the joke was that if you wanted steel,
Large, old, or complex organizations set up with the right founding values but operated in a different context can also change rather late.
you go and sit in front of the sales manager. The most important piece of furniture in his office was the sofa where you sat and waited for your steel allocation. Those were the days. You had to change the culture to become more customer oriented. So a lot of these changes happened.
Even within the Tata Group we had an excellence program which was based on the Malcolm Baldridge award; it was called the JRDQV Award. Tata Steel was the first company within the Tata group to win that award. Realizing how Tata Steel was a decade earlier, Mr Ratan Tata remarked, “It would have been the last
It doesn't depend on which industry you are in. Excellence obviously as has been said many times it's not a destination—it’s a journey, a mindset that you as an individual should have.
company I thought could win that award!” Large, old, or complex organizations set up with the right founding values but operated in a different context can also change rather late. Tata Steel was already 80 years and could change. If you have the right leadership, right intention, right communication, right engagement with all the stakeholders (explaining to them why they need to change and what it means to drive that change), then you can still pursue that excellence journey.
Within a decade we became the lowest cost producer of steel in the world and are still in the top three or four in the world. We also constantly subject ourselves to assessments because you always need to look at a mirror otherwise you will not know and you need somebody else to show that mirror to you. Sometimes when you look at the mirror yourself, you don't really see the flaws but when you have someone come in from outside and you tell them that what's more important is not the award but the feedback then they take you seriously you give get your feedback and that's how you improve. When you pursue excellence, it's not about benchmarking with other people in the industry; it is about benchmarking with who is the best in that area and even today we do that. If you have to make benchmark maintenance, we look at aviation companies because their maintenance standards are
very different: you can't have a failure. It also depends on who you benchmark with. It doesn't depend on which industry you are in. Excellence obviously as has been said many times it's not a destination—it’s a journey, a mindset that you as an individual should have. Whether you're an entrepreneur, a professional, a leader, or a manager, you should have it. As a professional, you should have it and then you can influence people. To pursue excellence as a team or an organization, it's about consistently walking the talk. It's not about saying all the right things but doing something else; it's also about constantly looking at the future.
Organizations like ours that’ve been around for some time and had reasonable success have a tendency to talk more about the past than the future. The famous academic Vijay Govindrajan said that companies that only talk of the past don't have a future. That's also something we remind ourselves as much as we are proud of the past. How do we make sure that we spend more time thinking about the future, talking about the future, what are the changes which are going to impact us… Companies like Zetwerk are disrupting the value chain for fabrication. It's an opportunity for us because we buy a lot of fabricated stuff; it's also sometimes a challenge because many of our customers as they consolidate, then it's a very different approach that we need to do work with them. So constantly looking out for what are those patterns which are emerging and how do we anticipate them, plan for them, and prepare for them. Even if you're not able to predict all that's going to happen, if you are better prepared for five or six or seven of the 10 things which are going to happen, you'll have more time to deal with the balance things. So managerial excellence is when there's a congruence of your personal value system, your professional value system, and institutional value system.
Every behaviour is provoked by a stimulus
Dr Ennapadam S Krishnamoorthy Founder, Buddhi Clinic and Neurokrish Foundation
Mindfulness exercises help you to take control of your mind, even if for a brief period. You are able to be mindful and perceive in depth a lot of things. Doing these exercises repeatedly is tremendously beneficial. A lot of people use short meditation as a way of being mentally sharp and stress free.
I want to discuss why childhood is very important. There were some studies done in the 70s and 80s called
Experts offer insights and strategies to help individuals unlock their inner potential and build resilience. This is the first of a series of talks under the “Unleashing Inner Potential” banner, organised by MMA and KAS in association with Buddhi Clinic.
the New York studies of temperament. They showed us that the roots of human temperament, who we are, how we behave and how we react are laid out in childhood. One part of everything that we are is biological. It is the way our brains are wired.
We talk about brain and the mind. To tell you the difference in a very simple way, you have a physical structure called the brain, which has millions of neurons and nerve cells talking to each other through chemical systems. The working brain is your mind. The brain is like the computer—the hardware—and the mind is like the operating system that exists in your computer. It doesn't occupy any real space.
With that difference in mind, one part of who you are is laid down in childhood and it's biological. Then, of course, you go through life experiences. Positive experiences have the ability to make us stronger. Negative experiences can also make us stronger but if we don't deal with them, they leave us with scars. The
balance of the positive and negative is what you are, at any point in time, and that is your psyche or your operating mind. Then, there are social circumstances around us. Many of us went through COVID, when life was uncertain. The social circumstances around us were not very good and they were very stressful.
When you go through difficulties at work or with your family, the social circumstances are not very good. How you react to all this through your life is determined in childhood to some extent. Childhood is the basis for your long term mental well-being and resilience. We
We must set right those childhood experiences in our minds so they don't continue to trouble us.
may think it's too late to change. But on the other hand, it's not too late to make things better for other members of your family and people whom you love and people who work with you. We must set right those childhood experiences in our minds so they don't continue to trouble us.
We spend our life learning. Learning is the acquisition of new knowledge or the modification of existing knowledge. We either acquire or modify behaviours, skills, values and preferences as we go through life. It occurs as part of education, personal development and training. It can be goal directed or it
can be aided by motivation. Learning involves synthesis: putting together different pieces of information and connecting the dots. We do this right through our lives.
We have memory. Memory is a process by which any information that you come across is encoded, stored and retrieved when you need it. There's an important reason why we don't remember things when
When one has a problem, you must ask: ‘Is it a problem in learning? Is it a problem with memory? Is it a problem with behavior?’
we need them. If you save a file with a certain name, you can retrieve it only if you remember and use the exact file name. For something to be accessible to you, you need to store it well. That is one of the reasons why we all remember things that have emotional salience to us. You can recall a story than a fact.
Every behaviour is provoked by a stimulus. That stimulus can be something as mild as the attitude of the person opposite to you and which makes you very angry. A lot of our behaviours find roots in our childhood. We also learn through modelling. We watch people around us and we end up believing that's the right way to behave. For example, when you lie to someone, in front of your child, the child models its behaviour on you and the child thinks that it is okay to lie. Humans are social beings. There is no universal behavior that is acceptable everywhere. What is acceptable in one group, community or society may not be acceptable in another. A lot of our behavior is also driven by the lessons we learn from the environment.
We all know about Elon Musk and that he is famous for his Space X. He is also famous for one more thing. He went public with saying, ‘I am neurodiverse. I don't think, feel, behave and act like other people.’ He has acknowledged his neurodiversity as high functioning autism spectrum disorder, where one has problems with language, communication and socialisation. Elon
Musk's behaviours were laid down in his childhood. When you have that kind of brain development, you may lack empathy, which is one of the reasons why he can be brutal. If you read his biography, he's a CEO who can fire someone who has worked with him for 15 years at the drop of a hat.
He is a living lesson that people who are neurodiverse can have enormous inbuilt potential. Bringing out that potential is very important. People who are in the family or those who work with you may be neurodiverse. If only you're able to put aside the problems that they have, you can unlock their potential. Some parts of the brain can be super normal and they can work really well.
When one has a problem, you must ask: ‘Is it a problem in learning? Is it a problem with memory? Is it a problem with behavior?’ This is especially relevant if you're dealing with a child or a young person in your house, who's struggling a little bit. Then you must ask: Is this a problem that's developmental? Is this a problem that's acquired? Maybe they were perfectly alright until a certain point in time, but they now seem to be experiencing a problem. The two are very different. The problem could be with your wiring, your psyche or your circumstances. The solutions are not one and the same. Neurodiverse people find themselves as round peg in a square hole—be it school, college or organisation. Unfortunately, our education system doesn’t differentiate the two. It's very important that we understand where the problem is, in order to find the solutions.
We must know about aptitude also and that's extremely important in the workplace. To put it very simply, aptitude is what comes very naturally to you-
your innate potential. If you put an accounting temperamental guy in marketing and sales, it can be a disaster and vice versa. You will be surprised that a very large number of people find themselves in the wrong department. Their aptitude is for something, but they are being made to work in some other way.
One very global workplace aptitude check that I ask people is: are you a front office guy or a back office staff? Fundamentally, front office guys like to shake hands with and talk to people. They like connecting with people. They can push through and even sell a snowball to an Eskimo. If the guy is meticulous, knows everything, goes by the book, looks down at each thing and goes by a checklist, then I know he is a back office guy—a process oriented person. They can't do each other's jobs. Knowing your attitude becomes so important in terms of life and success. It is very often set in childhood but it can be modified through education and learning.
Neuroscience: The developing brain and how it affects learning, memory
Vivek Misra Director‐Neuroscience & Neurotechnology, Buddhi Clinic
The human brain weighs about three pounds and it is the ultimate organ of adaptation. It has some 86 billion neurons that form 100 trillion connections with each other, numbers that ironically, are far too large for the human brain to fathom.
In 1949, the famous neuroscientist and neuropsychologist, Donal O’Hebb, in his book, ‘The Organization ofBehavior,’ postulated how neuronsfire
together, wire together. They make a special bond. After 16 years of this postulate, it has been proven molecular biologically and chemical composition wise also. What is strengthening of connections? I will give a very simple example. Fifteen years ago we would remember at least 10 or 15 phone numbers but today we can’t do that. The cells which were used to remember those numbers, are used now to remember passwords and ATM pins. Our brain re-adapts. The old connections are removed and new connections are made for different types of information.
Some information is acquired early in a critical stage or at a sensitive period while some information can be acquired at later stages of the life. Sometimes, it enhances the rapid development of the brain. It characterises the early childhood period or the brain’s lifelong capacity to grow and change- what everyone calls it neuroplasticity. Neurogenesis is in hippocampus making new memories and making new cells coming together. It goes up to 50 to 60 years of age. But on the other hand, higher cognitive functions like reasoning or skill development can stop at 16 years of age. Learning a foreign language gets harder with age. The
Neurofeedback is another promising avenue and it is a form of biofeedback that uses real‐time displays of brain activity to teach individuals to self‐regulate their brain function.
brain development is influenced by the neighbourhood or what we call as our social environment.
It was found that when parents and even grandparents interacted more with a child, the child’s brain areas get activated and formed. In a study, two groups of children of 12 to 14 years of age were taken.
One group was from the orphanage, who never had interaction with parents and the other group was children who had parents. They found that the children from the orphanage had lesser gray matter in the brain.
Factors such as parent-child relationship, peer relationship, prenatal and postnatal stress, psychoactive drugs and diet and gut bacteria play a role in a child’s brain development. There is growing evidence that if parents are exposed to drugs, it can impact the child. Though it's not evident immediately at the birth, over a period of time, there are changes in the behaviour. If we can eat healthy, we can change our gut microbiome.
Having talked about the problems, we must look at the solutions. Through training, the potential cognitive functioning can be vastly improved. Training effects in the developing brain are driven by a complex interaction between learning, brain development, genetic differences and prior experience. Depending on the type of training and the level of maturation of the individual, training may speed up development; improve the individual’s actualised genetic potential; or both.
On the one hand, there are great changes in neural efficiency during development, which could make this period well suited for neural interventions. On the other hand, there might also be limitations on the effects of training in childhood. That is, the maximum achievable performance could be constrained by the current level of structural brain development and cognitive
functioning. Neuroimaging studies can provide a deeper level of insight in the underlying cognitive neural processes that are involved during training.
We have visual, auditory, sensory, language, attention, salience (what is important) and default mode networks (what brain does at rest). Through neuropriming, the brain can be stimulated for enhanced learning. Neuropriming is a form of brain stimulation that involves the use of electrical stimulus to alter the excitability of neurons in the brain. This technique is based on the principle of neuroplasticity, which is the brain’s ability to reorganise and form neural connections in response to changes in the environment or behaviour.
Neurofeedback is another promising avenue and it is a form of biofeedback that uses real-time displays of brain activity to teach individuals to self-regulate their brain function. This technique has shown promise in treating a variety of mental health conditions, including ADHD, and depression. Another technique of brain stimulation is using binaural beats, which are an auditory phenomenon that occurs when two different frequencies are presented separately to each ear. It elicits the sensation of a third tone oscillating at the difference in frequencies of the two tones. tDCS or Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation is used to finetune brain circuits with electricity. Different noninvasive brain stimulation methods exist, each with its own strengths and target areas.
To conclude, the developing brain is responsive to a wide range of factors that modulate its development, beginning with preconception experiences of the parents, gestational experiences; and postnatal experiences. Just now, we begin to understand how
different factors might interact with one another and how it's going to produce a cumulative effect. The effect of early stress or psychoactive drugs are the more studied negative effects and are likely to be most powerful. On the positive side, early experiences such as tactile stimulation would appear to be more influential its ability to reverse some of the negative effects of stress and perhaps other psychoactive drugs.
Psychology Childhood behaviours and their implications
Every child of a growing age will have some issues or the other. It's completely normal. There are several reasons why personal behavioural problems can happen. There are three broad categories due to which behavioural problems occur and is explained by through Venn-diagram or the Biopsychosocial (BPS) model. First is biological causes, such as inherited defects, traumatic brain injuries during infancy, prenatal exposure to teratogens, toxoplasmosis, alcohol or other illicit drugs, perinatal environment and perinatal stress.
The psychological causes include temperament of the child, observational learning, behavioural conditioning and stage of the development that the child is in. Social/environmental causes include
Children who have been separated from their parents have huge trust deficit and don't move past the first stage.
attachment style and parenting style; sibling rivalry and birth order; peer-influence; socio-cultural aspects and moral development.
BF Skinner proposed the operational learning theory. You condition a child based on rewards or punishments, given in fixed intervals or variable intervals. Social learning theory states that you learn through observation of role models. Piaget said that there are multiple stages of cognitive development as we go through stages such as sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operation stage. In every stage, there are different things that are explored.
How do children develop emotionally and socially in their social environment? The attachment and parenting styles play a very important role. Does the child feel secure around their parents? Does the child feel like the parent is available for them? Is the child able to communicate the needs to the parents? There are broadly four types of attachment styles. The best one is the secure attachment style. The others are disengaged, ambivalent and avoidance attachment styles. In all these three, in the growing or developing stages, the parents do not meet the child's needs in some way or the other. Obviously, it's unintentional. Every parent has their own reasons for not being
available for the child. But it does have an effect on the child’s development.
According to Erickson, in every stage of your life, you will go through some conflict. And if you deal with that conflict, your development is pretty smooth. For example, the first stage is trust versus mistrust. If you have issues in the first stage of development, say the child is not able to build secure, trusting relationships with the primary caregivers, it causes a lot of issues in the child’s behaviour. Children who have been separated from their parents have huge trust deficit and don't move past the first stage. Moral development also happens when there is engagement with the environment and the child learns to solve their own problems and make decisions based on what's appropriate; not based on if they will be punished or not.
There are two broad categorisations of behavioural problems. Either there is a lack in behaviour or there is too much of behaviour. A lack could be termed as internalising behavioural problems. The child may not be comfortable in their environment, it may withdraw, be extremely depressed, anxious; they may cry a lot, may feel worthless, and will demand excessive amount of attention. They may show withdrawn behavior, they may be shy and they would complain that they have physiological symptoms.
The child wants to avoid school all the time; they have complaints of stomach pain, leg pain or back pain. They feel extremely uncomfortable in their own bodies and the environment they are in. They find reasons to decrease engagement. An extreme of internalising behavioural problems is that the child gets so socially emotionally withdrawn that they may have different /
The bottom line is that all these problems stem from a space of wanting that the needs are met.
bizarre ways of thinking; their thinking shifts from reality to fantasy. They try to find safety in their own ruminations and thought processes.
Another end of the spectrum is externalising behavioural problems, where the distress of the child may actually come out outwardly as abusive, aggressive and violent behavior; the child will be extremely hyperactive; they may or may not be able to sit in a place; they may be disruptive; they dismiss adults’ requests; they may be rude and argumentative. The bottom line is that all these problems stem from a space of wanting that the needs are met.
The positive aspect is that there are assessments to identify and diagnose behavioural problems like Vineland Social Maturity Scale; Childhood Behaviour Checklist; NICHQ Vanderbilt Assessment Scales (for ADHD, etc); Screen for Child Anxiety Related Disorders
The first agenda is to understand which stage of development the child is in. How is the child able to perform in a social context? How is the child able to adapt in relation to the chronological age? We find a social age for the child. It may be average, below average or above average. Based on that, we will come to an understanding of how much the child needs to be integrated in the society and what adaptive functional supports are to be provided or if we need to help the parents in engaging with the child.
When you deal with behavioural problems, follow the below steps:
• Notice changes in behaviour.
• Understand individual needs and provide support.
• Seek help from professionals to understand the root cause of the problem.
• Use positive or negative reinforcement to increase desired behaviour.
• Change the narrative; limit advising the child and have an open dialogue about their behaviour.
• Engage them in peer support groups.
• Model desired behaviour and have realistic expectations in terms of progress.
My grandfather is Indian. He was born in 1924 in Bombay. His mother was from India and father European. He then moved to Calcutta and spent time there. Then he served as part of the crew of the big transporter type aircraft—Skymaster. He moved to the UK in 1951. He had seven children.
My father Freddy Jacquin and I are both hypnotherapists. When my father was in his 40s, he came across hypnosis and fell in love with it. I was studying at the time; he had started to do some sessions and had some results. People quit smoking; they got over their fear. It was very early days and we didn't quite know what he was doing. But I remember him sending me a letter. He said in that letter, ‘I feel like I'm wearing an invisible cloak,’ meaning he felt like he had a new power. This new power is just made of words and the imagination of the person you're speaking to. Now we both work as therapists. I also provide coaching services, helping people realise their vision.
By leveraging hypnotic techniques, leaders can guide their teams to achieve a state of relaxation and clarity, promoting overall well‐being and productivity. At a talk held in MMA, Anthony Jacquin, Founder, Jacquin Hypnosis Academy, the UK, explained the role of hypnosis in stress reduction and management.
Therapy is getting rid of problems. Coaching is working with someone over an extended period of time to realise their goals. I also provide consultancy to business and sports teams. I believe hypnosis will enhance whatever it is that you are interested in. If you're in business, it will enhance communication and relationships. If you're into a sport, or you have a hobby, or you're a teacher or a parent or a nurse or a friend, it will enhance what you're doing
First let me clear some of the myths and misconceptions around hypnosis.
Well, it is about giving you control of your mind. I am not going to control your mind. Hypnosis is a collaborative act using the power of imagination. We collaborate, so that you can have experiences that are normally outside of your everyday experience. It's not that somebody will be controlling your mind, without you on board. It doesn't happen.
Myth #2: Hypnotised people become unconscious
The other thing people seem to be afraid of is that when someone is hypnotised, as you may have seen it on TV or stage, they appear to be asleep and respond with their eyes closed as if they are unconscious or in a deep trance. No. They're perfectly conscious. They can hear and respond. In fact, the only reason they look that way is that they have agreed to imagine. So, when you're hypnotised, you're very much awake and part of the process.
Myth #3: Only the weak can be hypnotised
In fact, the opposite is true. It does not work on people who lack intelligence or imagination. It's not about being gullible. It's about finding the courage to engage.
Myth #4: Hypnosis is a magical cure
I'm afraid it's not a magical cure. But it is the closest thing you will see. You can meet someone who
has had a block or a fear or phobia for decades. Sometimes in a single session, it's gone. You can meet people who have had a habit that has been wrecking their life—it could be overeating, binge eating or nail biting. Sometimes in a session, it's gone. The need for the habit has gone. They have literally changed their mind. But more often, therapy involves a few sessions.
I don't have a special power. I do make it look that way sometimes. Hypnosis is a skill, not a power. It is a skill made of words and imagination. Because it's a skill,
I put an idea into your mind to provoke a response. That's no different from medicine.
you can get better at it.
Hypnosis is a natural free-standing ability to alter your experience. It's not reliant upon me. It's not reliant upon a therapist. It is a natural ability. Think of some of the ways human beings alter their experience. They might do it with prayer, meditation, exercise, music or even alcohol. They might do it by spending time on their own. There are so many ways that human beings actively alter their experience. Hypnosis is one of them. That's all. It is simply that culture has provided us with a lens to look through.
I see hypnosis as simply ‘ideas that provoke responses.’ I put an idea into your mind to provoke a response. That's no different from medicine. It's not that the medicine does the healing but it provokes a response from your body. Hypnosis is a collaborative act of the imagination. You might think, ‘Well, if it's so normal, what's different about hypnosis? Why do we even need this concept?’
There is one difference. It doesn't just provoke a response. It provokes a response that's automatic. It feels like its happening rather than just something you're doing. If I ask you to imagine that you are carrying a bucket in your hand that is gradually getting loaded more and more, you may start feeling a pain in the hand. There is no bucket and everything is imaginary.
How can we use this in our business? For some people picking up the phone to make the next call fills them with dread. They've already heard the word ‘no’ 20 times a day. For some people, approaching their boss and asking them for a raise for promotion fills them
Over 10% of the population have stress and anxiety and sleep disorders. Hypnosis can help here.
with dread. They'll spend years thinking about him. For some, the thought of taking the risk of starting their own business, could be horrible. They may never do it. All those things are just thoughts. You didn't choose the thought; it just appeared. It can end up weighing you down. You must understand it's just your imagination. You can imagine something else.
The good news is that with hypnosis, there are five international journals with 10s of 1000s of pieces of research. We know that hypnotherapy is literally words that are as effective as any other medical treatment or any other pain relief. For 70% of people, just words will show them they can reduce their pain significantly. In some cases, they can be free of it. Irritable bowel syndrome affects 15% of the population worldwide, often to the point where they are afraid to leave the house. Scientific research shows that hypnosis can literally take that problem away. Over 10% of the population have stress and anxiety and sleep disorders. Hypnosis can help here.
Self-hypnosis provokes automatic responses within yourself. I'm sure some of you have your own strategies for doing that. You may not call it self-hypnosis, but you may call it just your ritual. It can help in your getting ready for the meeting, how you get dressed, how you wear your tie, or any of these things that get you in the mood, to bring your best self to that meeting, or whatever else it happens to be. There are many
You can take the language therapy and apply it to leadership and management or sales or communication.
academics who believe all hypnosis is self-hypnosis. Even when there's a hypnotist present, they just act and enable you to imagine in a particular way.
We want ourselves to be able to cope with the pressures of business. We want all our teams to be able to do it. Do you know the number one cause of burnout in business? It is not overwork, not too many hours at work nor too many emails. It is not being appreciated by your boss. It's a lack of feedback and appreciation.
What are the biggest communication failures that cost your business? Whenever I sit down with someone who wishes to change their life, the first question I ask them is: what do you want? 95% of the time, they have no idea. They only know what they don't want. ‘I don't want to feel anxious. I don't want to be overweight.’ They never even conceive an outcome. In business, everyone should have the same vision. Everyone should be on board.
I mentioned the issue of irritable bowel syndrome that plagues so many people. It's awful for people that have it. Often, I work with those people over five sessions. In the beginning, I ask them to rate between zero and 10, how bad each of their symptoms is. They give 8 to 10. Weeks later, they might say, ‘I'm
still suffering’ but their rating will be three or two. It has gone down significantly.
Without a feedback mechanism in business, you can end up with people repeating mistakes and continuing to go down. Therapy really changed about 40 years ago with a gentleman called Carl Rogers. He brought a more humanistic approach to helping people and one of his popular methods is ‘active listening.’ Very often, we're not listening. We've already made up our mind and decisions. When someone asks a question, we're not really interested. One of Carl Roger’s simple techniques was, when someone said something, to state it back to them, word for word, as if confirming their thought.
It is communication failure that costs businesses. You can take the language therapy and apply it to leadership and management or sales or communication. Over reliance on digital communication is another issue and I've been spending more time doing programs around this problem in the UK, since covid. There's so much of working from home and there's a backlash to it now. Companies are trying to get people back in the office. There's a balance to be struck. When it comes to real human connection in the workplace, so much of that happens over the coffee break. We can get lost when we're just communicating digitally.
Meeting people at their model of the world and adjusting your communication strategies to suit them will help. Some people need things to be shared to them in steps. Some people do need to know if it feels right before they make a decision. Adapting your communication style is a wonderful way of doing that. There are other things that we can learn from therapists like how to ask the difficult question.
Often enough, if you analyse the problems in organisations, it will not be a resource issue. It will not be a time issue. It will not be a money issue. It will be a communication issue. There is something that we can learn through the lens of hypnosis. We must recognise that it's just words and the imagination. Each of us builds our personal reality. If we change the way we communicate, then we can reach much higher levels.
Addressing these communication failures requires leaders to be proactive, transparent and empathetic in their interactions. Enhancing communication skills and strategies can significantly improve the overall health and productivity of the org
He said that one day when he was working there, a young nun came in, obviously looking for some donations. He asked her, ‘What's your lucky number?’
She said, ‘Seven.’ He gave her seven loaves of bread, seven packs of butter and seven bags of flour. Since then, she'd often come to the bakery. He very casually said that this was nurse Teresa, who would go on to become ‘Mother Teresa.’ I said, ‘You have never told me.’ Grandfather continued to share his stories after that. He passed away peacefully in 2022 at the age of 98 and thankfully, it wasn’t covid.
During Covid, living on his own of people around him. I live in a different part of the country. We hadn't been speaking that much. He was 96. During the first lockdown, I put in a call. We were on the phone for two and a half hours. He told me about his time in Bombay. He told me about some of the horrors he saw during partition. He worked for a bakery in Calcutta.
Pradeep Aggarwal
Founder, Institute of Mind Control & Development, India
Imagination is much more powerful than willpower The most important thing is to manage our mind and more so, the subconscious mind We breathe automatically without any effort The subconscious mind takes care of it Many other activities that we do automatically, in a pre‐programmed manner, like driving a car, is because of the subconscious mind
When we are in business or management, we do so many things in a wrong way because of the automatic negative programming of the past I work with top level sportsmen in India The first thing I do with them is change their programming and the words they speak Words are very powerful I'll give an example The event was 1996 Augusta Masters It was the third day of the
four‐day golf tournament. Golf is an individual game. The top people were interviewed about what they think of the last day of the tournament. The person who was having a big lead on the third day by six shots Greg Norman said, ‘Oh yes, I'm playing well. But I have to play 18 tough holes tomorrow morning. I have to do a lot of hard work.’ The person trailing him by six shots was also interviewed and he said in a very relaxed way, ‘I'm playing well. Anything can happen in a game of golf.’ The next day, the second guy won the tournament.
Change your words. You can change your life and become more successful in whatever you're doing. If you say the word ‘sad,’ you get a negative image in your mind. But if you say, ‘happy,’ it triggers a positive image in your mind. Thus, it is easy to change your state of mind through positive vocabulary. We have been programmed since birth to speak all the wrong words. We must ask the right questions. For example, somebody fails in an interview. If he asks himself repeatedly, ‘Why did I fail?” the subconscious mind will give him all the reasons why he failed. Instead, if he asks a few times, ‘What can I do next time to become successful in the interview?’ the same subconscious mind will guide him to succeed. Our mind works very fast. Everything we have done since birth is all recorded in the mind. All of us have good mobiles but not many are familiar with all the features of our phones. Successful people know how to use all the features of the phone Likewise, successful people know how to program their minds effectively Remember the positive moments in your life and use them as anchors
“A defining period for women”
Dr Latha Rajagopalan Kumar Consultant, Communication for Development
Just a few decades ago, a large percentage of people in India did not own phones or televisions. Computers were a rare sight. The internet did not sneak into our lives until much later. Communication involved time and physical effort. Connectivity was a word we used only for transportation. Yet somehow people reached out to each other and engaged in meaningful communication.
Winding queues at phone booths was a familiar sight. The anxiety of receiving telegrams, the
Seven women achievers share their perspectives and understanding of today’s media and discuss what it takes for one to make it in a world of competition and technology.
anticipation of receiving a long overdue letter, the excitement of listening to a favourite song on the radio at night, or just the morning ritual of having a cup of coffee, chatting with the family and reading the paper were all indicators of the need to be informed as well as connected. Time has not changed this human need. However, it has certainly changed the way people keep themselves informed, entertained and networked. We live in a world of networks; it is interconnected and there is convergence.
An important outcome is the window of opportunity all this has created. According to a report in the Deccan Herald published last May, Indian media is a Rs 2 trillion plus industry and growing. There are hundreds of media entities in India employing over 500,000 people. Media industry has been growing exponentially after digitisation. This has resulted in a deluge of jobs that demand new skills. What naturally soon followed was a spectrum of mass media and communication courses in all the leading colleges and universities.
One of the noteworthy trends is a steady increase in number of women, making an impact in media education and industry. This could be a defining period for us, perhaps the best time to talk about media, learn about life in the industry and how to prepare for it.
India is a leading player in E-commerce, online gaming and online learning. The most groundbreaking innovation today in media technology is virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality. With time, interfaces have become simpler, and the experiences better. Using synchronicity and multiplicity, along with portability of device, technology has redefined creativity. A major innovation, which is all set to revolutionise newsrooms in the near future, is simultaneous personalised updates across digital sites. All this can be measured. Quantification is one of the most important features in media technology.
New media includes a host of web related
Multimedia is now deploying spatial computing, which seamlessly merges physical and digital spaces...
~
Dr Latha Rajagopalan Kumar
communication tools, like blogs, social networking, virtual worlds, websites, and streaming services. Multimedia is now deploying spatial computing, which seamlessly merges physical and digital spaces to offer realistic experiences, interactions and immersive educational simulations. Video Creation and streaming technologies have leapt forward. Digitisation has empowered learners. The significance of virtual education is that there is no age, geography, or financial barriers. Free online content has helped people realise long cherished dreams of learning about any topic.
The downside is the rise in crimes using media technology. This necessitates even further knowledge of technology, and ways to protect oneself online. But even with all this happening, one thing continues and will hopefully remain the same. At the core of all the advancements lies our basic human need to stay informed and stay connected. “The consumer is a partner”
Latha Menon Filmmaker
Every brand has a target audience and the concept of creating communications aimed specifically at a particular audience is older than advertising itself, as we all know. A brand has to continuously evolve based upon what is authentic, not only to previous generations, but to the current generation at any given time. This means that to appeal to them, you not only have to showcase your brand's values, but you also have to embody them.
Essentially, consumers have also become part of advertising rather than just passive onlookers. They want connectivity, trust and assurance. The communications of the brand must be flexible enough to adapt to all the tribes out there. What does the brand stand for? An extraordinary brand is something that is constantly evolving, that has its ears on the ground to the ever changing trends of the environment.
I have been closely working for two decades with Arogya, the flagship brand of Hatson Agro Products (HAP). It is India's largest private dairy company and gets its milk directly from over four lakh farmers, spread across five states and 13,000 villages. It has created a model in which there are no middlemen between the company and the farmers. When my company Iris Film began working with them in 2002, they had a turnover of around 500 crores. We had done a campaign for comparative advertising, when it was the trend. We had referred to Arogya milk as white gold.
More women have a point of view and speak up about that point of view. It changes and impacts the work in a very authentic way.
~ Latha Menon
Then the brand decided to switch the entire idea. It evolved from selling itself as just a milk product to a wholesome product with its campaign of ‘goodness with love.’ Along with the agency Iced Pepper, we developed a simple story that shows tender moments between people of all ages, gender and types coming together.
In 2011, we went further and added the little tagline: ‘from the villages’ to the ‘goodness with love.’
We did these as documentaries because we noticed the trend was changing. Rather than just having models, even real people were beginning to be portrayed in
commercials. We came upon the concept of docummercials—real life stories of dairy farmers. Arogya no longer captured the moments of its consumers. Instead, they let the consumer peek behind the curtain and see the life of those who provided the milk that came to their homes. It was one of the first campaigns that showcased farmers as individuals who lived and loved the work. The positivity and joy of its farmers in the film brought about a positive reaction in the consumers, who began to see farmers in new light. They were people just like them with families and dreams. It utilised a campaign using emotion and aesthetic.
The company today has a turnover of over 7000 crores. I continue to work on different campaigns with them with Rubecon Creative. Arogya's journey is important to understand that we don't necessarily have to completely change the personality of the brand. Emotions and ideas are universal. Arogya was growing as Indian advertising also grew. Gender stereotypes were slowly breaking down. We have built heroes in a way that we haven't built heroines. These boundaries and perceptions have started changing as more women have started entering and narrating and directing stories.
In 1996, when I had begun my company Iris Film, I was just one of the few or the only woman in the unit. As mass media has slowly become a career option, many women are entering the fray. More women have a point of view and speak up about that point of view. It changes and impacts the work in a very authentic way. Media redesign is to reimagine the consumer as a partner, not a target audience; to increase engagement for the consumer and to align themselves with a brand that has a cause. We, as advertising professionals, and
insiders know that no successful advertisement can stay very far from where the audience live.
“Theatre should be included in the curriculum”
Deepika Kumaravel Theatre Professional
Theatre is a field that has evolved and continues to evolve with man. It was born from man's propensity to share his experiences and stories with fellow beings in a way that held their attention. They involved role playing, mimicking others and everything emotional, all to grab the wide-eyed attention of the listeners. Over a millennia, that desire to hold the audience rapt, has not whittled down. The stage may differ but the performance lives with the audience. That's why, this completely live human-to-human, raw dynamic between performer and audience is so powerful; theatre will always have its lovers. Of course, in the last few decades, the change has been incredible. But it has been incredible in every field.
Movies and OTTs are big factors, and not necessarily negative ones, mainly because both offer the trained theatre actors and technicians more and very lucrative avenues to work. In fact, OTT is an almost natural new ground, a stylised auditorium, so to speak, with its ability to tell shorter, more intimate and more intuitive stories. Theatre is gender neutral. The challenges that beset women are the challenges that
beset men too. Today, shorter plays, like T20s, are gaining more audiences. Theatre, which used to stay static in a performance arena, has become mobile. It has become flexible enough to be performed in your park, on your terrace and in the playground. To that extent, it has evolved and gone towards people. That is a fabulous new movement.
The world needs young people adept in these things. Theatre can provide the vital soft skills needed.
~ Deepika Kumaravel
When it comes to economies, theatre that thrives has to consider economies of scale. Bring in a scale that cannot be matched by screens, like Magic Lantern did for Kalki's Ponniyin Selvan. I wish that theatre must go into schools and education and into corporate organisations. Theatre training is all about being the best you can be as a person, discovering your potential as a human being, finding ways to engage with different people, even with completely opposite ideas, and finding the humanity in you to be there for your co actors, colleagues and teams.
The world needs young people adept in these things. Theatre can provide the vital soft skills needed. I call upon educational institution to make theatre a well conceptualised part of curriculum, and you will see leaders emerging in almost every other field. There are theatre groups that can offer tailor-made corporate
workshops. Theatre training can make a dramatic difference. For those wishing to professionally take up theatre, there are courses offered by the National School of Drama and other institutions. Do check them out or contact us.
“Radio is still indispensable”
Joy Andavan
All India Radio
All India Radio was once ruling the roost. I grew up listening to AIR news. But then in the middle, something happened and we are not in the scene just like what we were. But we are still there, changing according to the trends of the day. We are there in social media and we make our presence felt everywhere. You can't miss our radio commentaries. People are still addicted to radio, either while they are traveling or at home. They listen to a lot of music programs coming out of radio. They listen to news.
As a news editor and as a correspondent, my day starts at one o'clock at night and I have to be widely awake 24/7. It's just like any other media. It was quite new for me because I had worked in the Press Information Bureau where we are just mouthpieces of the government. But in radio, it's different. We have to take into account all the activities going on in our state, and also out of our state, which are of great importance to the nation.
As a communicator, my communication is very important. In 10 minutes, you can read only 140 lines— however fast you go. We have to read a lot of data and gain knowledge on technical things and also about everyday happenings. We have to make it very interesting, so while travelling, a traveller can keep things up to date.
Every hour, we are having news bulletin, which is just for two minutes. We must be simple and brief, so that people will understand our language. Radio doesn't differentiate between man and woman. There are so many women engineers who are working in the radio. During natural disasters and emergencies, we work round the clock and issue frequent bulletins. We keep giving awareness messages to the people. All India Radio is the only organisation which has so much reach in the country and so many people listen to radio.
I've done Parliament and Assembly coverage many times. I've travelled with the Prime Minister to at least ten countries. I've attended G7 and G20. All these things have given me vast experiences as to how to go about reporting in simple manner, which a child can understand. The challenges are high and you can't have excuses.
Once we went to ISRO Sriharikota to cover a midnight launch. At 9.30 pm, we started from Chennai and we were almost near Sriharikota when some animal came on the road and our vehicle turned 360 degrees. Still, I kept going for all those coverages. When challenges come, you must stand up. Once when I went to Indonesia to cover the Prime Minister’s trip, my luggage got lost. But I had to rush out to report the news bulletin. We can’t say any excuses.
Working with radio in the era of social media, is quite challenging.
~ Joy Andavan
Youngsters nowadays don’t find news to be interesting. But you have to listen to news just to know how we are reporting, because radio is the best place where you can learn many things. Make it a habit to listen to any type of radio. You can listen not only for entertainment but also for infotainment, for which AIR is very popular.
Working with radio in the era of social media, is quite challenging. We don't get carried away by any news, which is around us. There will be so much of temptation to just note down what is going on in the television and then give the story, but we never do that. In Tamilnadu, we have correspondents in every district. They work part-time with us. Whatever happens, they just report to us. We always give the correct news.
“Advertising remains a challenging industry”
Lalitha Vaidyanath Advertising Consultant
Advertising gives a lot and it also takes a lot. It gives you freedom to express yourself, think creatively, think differently, and think on your feet. And if you're someone like me, you can enjoy freedom from hierarchy and convention. If you have a bizarre idea, we love it. The outlandish is always
embraced, because people remember it. When they remember it, they hopefully remember to buy the product that you advertised for. Anyone out here with wacky ideas, come over. There's a whole industry waiting for you.
Advertising gives you fun on the job. Your work doesn't feel like work. Advertising is very collaborative. You always connect with many people and with consumers. Advertising opens up opportunities in allied fields. A lot of copywriters go on to become film script writers and filmmakers. Some join the television industry. Others start ad agencies or become planners and get into market research and so on.
Anyone out here with wacky ideas, come over. There's a whole industry waiting for you.
~ Lalitha Vaidyanath
That said, advertising is also a very challenging industry, as you need to constantly come up with new ideas, new ways of saying things and create new stories for a demanding audience. Your ad is competing for attention with Instagram reels, podcasts and Facebook posts.
I was very keen to join advertising right from high school. The printheads fascinated me. I remember memorising slogans and jingles, while my classmates were memorising chemistry equations and maths formulae. I joined a small ad agency in Bangalore where I started my career. I have worked in ad agencies in Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad and have
collaborated with agencies in Delhi and Mumbai. Each stint has been very wholesome, enriching, and packed with a lot of fun. In Chennai I have worked with leading brands and one of the highlights was creating the tagline for Sun TV Direct years ago—the Sun Tan Tana Tan campaign. That was translated into various languages and used across India.
“Parents require education about media”
Rangapriya Goutham Media Management
Iwanted to be a media professional, but I just couldn't because of constraints and family demands. I did one small course, which was offered as a part of our college internship—Media and Mass Communication. I failed miserably because I did not understand anything. I somehow managed to clear with A+ grade.
I wanted to do something about media and media education. As part of my career, I always stuck to education. Whether it was technology based or computer based training, education was always my career pathway. An opportunity came when I was heading an institution. I grabbed the opportunity. We started an architecture college, a music school and a school of media, about 75 kilometers away from Chennai.
We need to educate parents more than the students that there is opportunity and life beyond what they think as the core disciplines. Today, many engineering students are writing media content. Many of them have broken away from their core. There are 4 million plus job opportunities. There at least 40 media careers in my hand. Those days, we only had universities that were giving media education but today private institutions and media companies are also hosting courses for people to upskill, reskill, retool and take their journey forward.
have visual communication, electronic media, journalism, communication, media management, animation and many other courses.
We have a real struggle with the syllabi, because our syllabi have to be updated along with the industry. We cannot have students going in to the industry not knowing anything. In an institution, there are so many formalities to go through to get the syllabus approved.
“Upgrade the Syllabi”
Dr Susan Sridhar Retd Professor, MOP Vaishnav College
There are two main goals of media education.
First is to make the students media literate.
Second, a media student wants to enter media to be employable. He/she must fit into the industry.
There are many forms of media. Somebody has to create content for the media. The challenge comes in making the content relevant for a particular media. A student has to be trained to do that. Punjab University started the first journalism school in India in 1941. The second was our own Madras University in 1946. In 1965, The Indian Institute of Mass Communication came up in Delhi and in 1989, Loyola College started off with Viscom. Today there are so many courses. You
The other thing, which sounds crazy, is that the nature of media courses is still not understood in the colleges. Most of our students have to be out of the classroom. They have to run around with cameras, find locations or get a story. They cannot be in class like for the other courses. This definitely disrupts the setup. I've been 35 years in the media education. After my 25th year, I began to see a great change and people have begun to understand the course and the needs of the students.
An internship exposes the student to the general environment of the media industry. It also helps them to get a good hands-on experience. The first internship is for one month, where the student gets exposure and sees where they fit in.
The second internship is for three months. Here, they specialise in what they want to do. Most of the students get absorbed once they go for their second internship. They can go for internship in traditional media or startups. In traditional media, the brand name and the certificate matter but you can hardly make your presence felt. In the startup, you have to do many roles. So, the students must decide which one they prefer. A media student must have interest, curiosity, a lot of energy, good communication and basic interpersonal skills. Without these, they cannot succeed.
We have two important topics that are common to all the media. Ethical constraint is one topic. Women are not merely joining the industry, but leading some of the big media houses today. What does it take for women to get here? How does this impact the industry?
Lalitha Vaidyanath: Advertising always demands speed. A lot more women come in for various reasons, primarily because their journeys have been aided by technology. They work from home and report, and therefore they're able to find a very nice work‐life balance. Covid has facilitated that and it has opened up a lot of avenues for people and especially women.
Latha Menon: It has taken a while for women to enter film. It isn't an easy profession to make your mark; it takes time. You have to learn new skill sets. But definitely the glass ceiling has been broken. Women are able to create strong narratives. This year, in the Cannes Film festival, a woman broke the glass ceiling. Payal Kapdia’s film won the Grand Prix. 1946 was the last year we won an award from Cannes. Women are going to tell more interesting stories.
Joy Andavan: Ownership of media is becoming a problem for women. But there are many new fields where women are leading and these fields are overtaking the prime media. Social media, online media, digital media, and other kinds of media are growing and they are all picked up by women who were once sitting at home.
Rangapriya Goutham: You can be anywhere, you can have any medium, but you will still be able to produce
good content which can be used in any case. You can co‐create now.
What advice would you give to aspiring copywriters?
Lalitha Vaidyanath: Keep yourself abreast of trends and technology and keep a sharp eye out on what other advertisers of other products are saying. There are so many stories out there right now. You need to know about them. It is getting increasingly difficult to come up with one original idea. You must be willing to work very hard. Don't rely on things like ChatGPT, though it may be very tempting. You must use your wisdom. You must have passion and willingness to succeed in this profession, especially copywriting
What advice would you give for young journalists who aspire to work in broadcast?
Joy Andavan: It's very difficult when you start your career because of the time constraint. For 10 minutes, you can read only 140 to 145 lines of news. You can imagine how crispy your story has to be. I would encourage all the young journalists to read a lot. You have to equip yourself, look out for better words and read your story again and again. Once you learn, it will become very easier for you. That is a unique skill which you have to develop yourself.
How has media education evolved now? What changes do you foresee?
Dr Susan Sridhar: With technological developments happening in the industry, media education has to change. The syllabi and the studios have to be revamped. We are going to see a lot of software development and
use of AI in labs. Education has to keep pace with the industry growth.
Can you discuss the challenges of producing documentaries on social issues? How can you ensure their impact?
Latha Menon: Documentaries are still a growing medium of narrating stories, but it is definitely growing thanks to OTT platforms which encourage documentaries. There are opportunities now. But to make real impactful documentaries like the Elephant Whisperers, which won the Oscar, you must collaborate with different sources, like a good producer, a good person behind the scenes who can market the documentary and funders to support the project. It may take a year or two, but one has to have the patience and not give up on a documentary. It is definitely a long process.
How has your experience in advertising, influenced your approach to theatre production and storytelling?
Deepika Kumaravel: They are both highly creative fields and both require reaching out to the consumer. In that way, they are similar. But the dissimilarity is also very much there. Advertising is marketing of a product. Theater is an extension of literature; of ideas; and sometimes of protest. One is a consumerist endeavour, while the other could just be the opposite.
What are your views on AI as a game changer and the concerns it evokes in the media?
Latha Rajagoplan Kumar: AI is definitely a game changer because of the way in which it creates content. There are also the ethical aspects of using AI and chatbots. It is impossible to predict what will happen in the future. I can only say that if the machines can start thinking like us, then all of us would lose jobs and we will have to reinvent ourselves.
How important is collaboration and networking in your field? How can we develop that?
Rangapriya Goutham: Without networking,
nothing works. Word of mouth is the biggest marketing tool. Communicate clearly and ethically and let people know what you do. Advertising brings a trust in the brand.
Deepika Kumaravel: Theater and performing arts depend entirely on collaboration and networking. We share our expertise with other theater groups and people around the world. The incredible experiences of others help us too.
Latha Rajagoplan Kumar: Technology has empowered people to work from home. This is possible only if there is a network. The moment you isolate, you're out of the game. You have to know what the other person is doing. You must work together with people, especially when you're away from people.
Dr Susan Sridhar: Good communication is the answer for good networking.
Lalitha Vaidyanath: Advertising is people's business. You must have very good interpersonal relations. You must connect internally with your team and also with your consumer at the other end. Collaboration and networking is the mantra for success.
Joy Andavan: The responsibility of being ethical rests with those who collect the news and those who read and display the news. Media should not focus too much on the human emotions, especially when people are already in pain. Nobody can put a restraint on you but you have to do it yourself. Unfortunately, that is missing today.
Latha Rajagoplan Kumar: You must be honest with copyright. You must also be ethical in relationships and interactions with people.
Deepika Kumaravel: In performing arts, intellectual right is a huge problem. You don't know where your plays are being performed. In the days of technology and innovation, strangely enough, nothing has been done in this area.
Our story started in 2012 with a sum of Rs.3000. Till date that is all the money we have invested into the company as personal funds. We grew the company from a three-person team to a 250-member team without any sort of extra investment or the kind of ludicrous things that you read in the news today.
Three of us—Bhargava Adepalley, Jana Pillay and I started Notion Press. When Bhargava and I wanted to publish a book, Jana was a publisher and also a friend for 14 years. We thought Jana would publish our book. But contrary to what we thought, when we approached him, he asked, “Who are you guys? Why would anybody want to publish you?”
We were super shocked that our friend would give such a response. We started as engineers and so we wanted to solve our problem. We searched for answers
Naveen Valsakumar, Co‐Founder & CEO, Notion Press, shares his vision and influences that shaped his company’s success in a largely trust‐deficit market helmed by traditional publishers. P C Balasubramanian, Director, Matrix Business Services, led the conversation.
and googled how publishing works. Publishing as an industry, started with the invention of the movable type press around 1440; along with it came the commercialization of the printed text. The movable type press was a technological breakthrough that kickstarted the publishing industry. In the early years of publishing, a lot of experiments were done. People would print books, go from city to city in carts, hoarding them and selling them to people who wanted to read. As the industry went along, over the next couple of years, it started getting more organized.
The new age of publishing was born somewhere around the 1930s with the invention of the paperback. Publishing as a business started becoming mainstream. Large players emerged and started writing the rules of the industry. Books were mass produced, sold through
bookstores and promoted through mass media.
Over the years, a lot of publishers started looking at minimising the risk and the industry started becoming anti-author. Basically, they were looking at celebrities and trying to get them to write a book. They became extremely risk averse to new authors. What they also provide is the editorial expertise and the supply chain. They make sure that your book comes out well and it hits the bookshelves, in exchange for which the writers get a royalty, which is usually about 7.5% to 10% of the cover price.
In 2012, we read online about the indie publishing movement, which was brewing largely in the West, where authors were taking control of their own books. We realised that this could be an opportunity. A group of very passionate people who were growing something themselves, could be a huge industry. This created Publishing 2.0, which was the rise of platforms. A lot
of other people had very similar ideas.
Players like Amazon emerged, who started their own venture into helping authors publish. All of us follow the same rules. It made logical sense to make sure that books are printed on demand, sold only through online commerce and promoted through social media. All our books are available on Amazon. If an order comes, we print them within 45 minutes of the order and we send it to the buyer the same day.
We're going one step ahead and thinking of content publishing, in whichever format and we help creators to monetise them.
In the self-publishing model, writers are free to produce and publish their content and they own the intellectual property. As a writer, you can hire your own experts or work with a publishing platform like ours. As you take the risk, you earn profits from the book sales. You're no longer earning a royalty out of every book sold. You are the author and you're the entrepreneur. We flipped the publishing model completely.
We offer two solutions. One is a premium publishing program, where experts will deliver the publishing services that you want. The book will be available in about 150 countries. Over the years, we realised that providing services by using experts was becoming a bottleneck. We launched a technology platform, called the DIY (Do It Yourself) Publishing, where a writer could design the book themselves, and make it available for sale in 150 countries across most ecommerce channels, absolutely free of cost. We take a profit share.
Currently, we operate on both these models. We offer a whole suite of services ranging from content services, ghostwriting, editing and designing the books either through our tools or services. We also provide marketing services where we help authors promote their books.
So far, we have published about 110,000 books for authors in about 61 countries. We currently publish a new book every 30 minutes. We have offices in India, Singapore, Malaysia, and UAE. The last three are newer markets that we have just entered this year. We run a community of over a million writers who engage with us constantly. We grow our revenue by 40 to 45% yearon-year. What is most exciting for me is that 82% of our
So far, we have published about 110,000 books for authors in about 61 countries. We currently publish a new book every 30 minutes.
revenue comes from book sales and not from the sale of services.
What is the future? We feel that real democratisation comes only when an author can transact with the reader without a middleman, including us. We are building a democratic and decentralised model where an author can do business directly with the readers. We've identified that generative AI is going to be used massively in publishing. All the content that we have today in India can be available in other countries, in other languages and in other formats. We no longer think of us as a book publishing platform. We're going one step ahead and thinking of content publishing, in whichever format and we help creators to monetise them.
The second area which I am very passionate about is to build tools by which we can decentralise the relationship between a publisher and an author. Today, no matter how much you democratise, you still need an Amazon who will not give you the data. True decentralisation comes when authors are able to build their own community.
The past of publishing industry may have been built in Europe. It may have grown in the US, but I strongly believe that the future of publishing will be built in India in our own Namma Chennai.
P C Balasubramanian: I'm an accidental author. I have also published two books through Notion Press. When you approach a traditional publishing house, you face a lot of difficulties that I'm not putting them down. Their business model works like that and they prefer to publish books that are authored by celebrity authors. There is every business reason for them not to risk their money or effort on an unknown author.
But what about a passionate author or an upcoming author, who wants to get his/her book published? Thanks to Notion Press, you have a platform, a company which will help you to bring out your book seamlessly. They may not assure you readership but at least the book is out for readers to pick it up. You become the ambassador for your book and you have to keep promoting your book.
Naveen, you were working in HAL as an aeronautical engineer. What made you leave a good, stable, secure job and get into entrepreneurship? What was the trigger?
I am one of those kids at school who would always reply, ‘I want to be an entrepreneur’ when asked, ‘What do you want to do in the future?’ I'm very passionate about entrepreneurship. There is no qualification necessary to become an entrepreneur. You can learn on the job. I don't think there is any other job that allows you to do that. I am a third‐generation entrepreneur in my family.
After I worked with HAL, I worked with a cybersecurity firm for about five years. There was a point where my boss called me and said, “You have an onsite overseas assignment. There are three countries and you can choose one country.” I quietly went back to my desk and sent him my resignation as I thought I was getting too comfortable in the job. The minute you get comfortable in a particular job, I think it's time to quit it, at least, as a young person. I started Notion Press at 25.
What gave you the faith that Indian authors would pay money and get their books published?
We started out of foolishness of the youth. We decided to give it a try for six months and see what happened. Our first goal was to find if there were authors in India who were like us. We built a platform on top of Facebook, and launched a short story contest. We wanted writers to send in short stories and announced that the best stories would be published into a book. We thought maybe 50 or 80 people would write stories but we had 1200 people writing stories in a span of 30 days and 10 lakh people read those stories. We were taken aback by the response.
When we started, we used to get a new inquiry for publishing a book once every five or six days. When a new author signs up on our website, we would get super excited. I have travelled to people's homes, trying to explain our model to them. Today, we have 10,000 people registering with us in India alone every month.
AI will take your ideas to different languages and if your idea can be spread across so many people, then that is going to be a killer use case.
How long did it take to get the first set of 50 authors?
It took a year. For the first 150 authors, I was the spokesperson. There was a news story about Notion Press and the unique model that we were trying out. People started reaching out based on that. One of the best things about the business is that every book that I publish becomes an ambassador.
If you go to a traditional publisher, it goes through a filtering process. But in self-publishing, any crap can get published. How do you respond to this criticism?
I say, ‘Yes, bring it on.’ We do not publish anything illegal. The definition of crap may vary. An old person may write his story because he wants to document his legacy to an audience of 10 people in the family. Who are we to say ‘no’ to that? Who are we to judge that this man's story is lesser important than the story of a Prime Minister? I have worked on a book personally, where a guy said, ‘Tomorrow is my girlfriend's birthday. I want to document our love story and publish it as a book in one day.’
We have books that sell 250,000 copies very easily, but at the same time, because we are democratic, because we love all use cases, we get very interesting stories that a traditional publisher would never notice. One of the problems with the industry is that it has become so formulaic. If there is a campus romance that becomes a hit, the only thing that is going to happen for the next six months will be campus romance books. It works very similar to the movie industry. Then how do new artists break in?
When we started, the validation came from the fact that six out of 10 writers in India at that point, had started out by self‐publishing a book. Chetan Bhagat, Amish Tripathy and all of these guys had started out through an alternate process. The question is, if an editor is so good at identifying the next big thing, then how did these guys get missed out?
We have lots of other distractions today like YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook, OTT and so on. Where is the time for people to pick up a book? Is readership coming down or is it growing?
In a country like India, where the literacy rate is on the rise, readership is going up and the industry is growing at 19% CAGR. A book organises the content and presents it from an expert’s perspective. That is why people buy textbooks and nonfiction books. AI will take your ideas to different languages and if your idea can be spread across so many people, then that is going to be a killer use case.
The question is, if an editor is so good at identifying the next big thing, then how did these guys get missed out?
What role does social media play in your overall business strategy? How has it impacted your growth?
We have a very clear view of social media. We use Instagram and LinkedIn for two different purposes. On LinkedIn, we try to demystify publishing and build more awareness. But on Instagram, our goal is very different. We make publishing fun and bring the next set of writers. On Instagram, our content is geared towards the 14‐ to 25‐year‐old, which is why over the years, we have found that we've been able to reduce the average age of writers and that's something important for a business like ours because it increases our longevity.
What marketing and promotional strategies proved most effective in building your brand?
What we did was very simple. We knew ours was an industry that nobody knew about. Can we then give a phone number and say, “We are there for you!”? We displayed a phone number and said, “Whatever questions you have about publishing, call us.” By far, that is one of the best decisions that we've ever made. The fact that we are available to our customers, to our authors who want to publish books, whether they want to publish with us or not, is the killer strategy that helped us grow.
How do you handle competition from other similar selfpublishing platforms and traditional publishing?
I used to be a guy very obsessed with competition and doing something better than our competition. Now, we don't even talk about it anymore. I want to know what my authors want, even before the competition does. The only way to do that is to be very close to all my authors, to be grounded and to keep my ears close to the ground.
How do you approach talent acquisition and team building at Notion Press?
This is one of the most difficult challenges right now. I'm 37 years old and I am not in the average age of a business leader. Even at 37, I feel so disconnected from the current team that we work with. As far as talent acquisition is concerned, I let the younger people in the team do their job really well and they know what people want. I focus on talent nurturing. From the minute you enter Notion Press, you have life goals; not work goals. Having very honest conversation with people and bridging their aspiration is what has helped us retain people. We bring more women into the workforce. 65% of our team is women.
In what ways did your background as an aircraft engineer contribute to your approach to running Notion Press? Is it always a safe landing?
I'm a risk junkie. There are times when my team feels that I'm too stupid to understand about risk. There are times where I pull the company in a direction where the existence is questioned. It is never safe landing. It's always turbulence. Only in turbulent weather, a great pilot is born. What personal habits or routines have contributed to your success as an entrepreneur?
I'm extremely regimental. That's one of the habits that I feel has helped me. I wake up at 3.30 in the morning, every single day for the past 12 years. I have my routine jotted down to the last bit. Even my lunch is on my calendar. Entrepreneurship is nothing but chaos. If you have to thrive in chaos, I think, you need to be organized.
What role did customer feedback play in shaping the services and features of Notion Press? How successful are you in customer retention?
We do make mistakes and that's the honest fact. If you're building something, obviously there will be people who are extremely unhappy at things that are not working. On the other side, this is one of those businesses where you enter into a relationship with an individual customer, across 18 touch points. My first author who published with us is still an author with us. Today he could be extremely happy. Tomorrow, if a book goes out with a small flaw, he will be very upset. We understood this very early on. We treat this like a relationship. Like any marriage, there will be ups downs. As long as we're able to have an honest conversation about it, it works. About repeat authors, the average number of books published today is about 2.1 books per author.
How do you ensure continuous innovation within Notion Press to stay ahead in the industry?
I don't think we faced major challenges in the early days. A market like India is usually trust deficit. We were lucky enough to have a lot of trust.
Innovation is the only thing you should not be worried about with Notion Press. We have a crazy team that is working on crazy ideas all the time. There is a lot of content innovation and technology innovation happening at the same time. From a tech perspective, we are trying to achieve true decentralisation, whereas every tech company gains its power from centralising and making sure that they control the relationship. Innovation is part of our DNA. We innovate to break our own business model. We have already done it twice, so that more people can be served.
How do you see the role of digital media evolving in the publication industry?
Digital is just one more format. A writer sits down to write the story. Even for a movie that's visual, the story is still written. That is the medium of expression as of now. I still have my social media team that makes reels but they sit down and sweat over the script for two hours. We don't distinguish between digital media and print media. We only look at quality content and quality presentation. Print is a format and digital is a different format.
How important was building a strong company culture? What steps did you take to cultivate it?
I have gone from being a micromanager to one who totally delegates everything. Now, I say, “Please don't bother me.” From very early days, I have been lucky to have people around me who cared enough about the company that we were building. I don't think culture is something that is built from the outside where you plan and say, “This is going to be my culture.” Culture is about how you behave with each other. Why should it be any different from how we are at home or in other settings? If we see elders, we get up. These are things that are not imparted to us every single time through training. We see somebody do it and we also do it.
Can you describe a major challenge you faced in the early stages?
I don't think we faced major challenges in the early days. A market like India is usually trust deficit. We were lucky enough to have a lot of trust. People trusted us with their books and money, though we were a non‐entity in the early days. The first important juncture where we were completely lost was during covid. We had made out of print, a massive business and were pumping out thousands of copies per day.
Suddenly for the next eight months, nothing happened. We were worried about the future. ‘Is print even going to work after this?’ we thought. People said that schools won't work after covid. Online schooling business generated billions of dollars. That was an uncertain period. But luckily, we had authors who had super conviction in our model. We kept talking to them and they assured us that print would be back. During covid, we published about 20,000 books, without being able to sell a single copy. That was the level of commitment that our authors had, and the desire to express themselves. Also, a lot of people got free time to write. What role did mentorship and networking play in your entrepreneur journey?
I've learned a lot from people I call mentors. They always ask the right questions and tough questions. For an entrepreneur, the best thing is to face tough questions. They will provoke your thoughts and actions. Every single mentor of mine doesn't give me the answers. They ask tough questions like, ‘Tomorrow, if X event were to happen, what would you do?’ That is how we get better. I'm not a huge fan of networking.
As a CEO of a growing company, are you writing a book? If so, who will be your publisher?
I've been approached by a publisher to publish the Notion Press story. In fact, I'm writing a book called ‘The Notion Press Way.’ We're publishing it very soon and it will surely be a national bestseller. It is getting released by this December.
What do you do to promote readership? I feel you have the responsibility to do that since you are in the industry. I'm always concerned that I don't see people with books at the airports, railway stations and so on. Earlier, it used to be. Are you taking conscious efforts to do that?
We work with a lot of bookstore partners to promote readership among young people. But again, with any industry, the challenge is that everybody has got their own agenda. We could be doing a lot more to promote readership in the country. I don't think we do enough. Our authors do that, with a motive of selling their own
We work with a lot of bookstore partners to promote readership among young people. But again, with any industry, the challenge is that everybody has got their own agenda.
books.
How do you ensure good quality of books, as you encourage everyone to publish?
There are a couple of ways to do this. One, you have an amazing idea but you're not a good writer. We can solve that and we are on the verge of incorporating that into our platform. Two, we want to reward good quality. We are launching an author development program, possibly by next month, where we're rewarding writers with phenomenal quality and phenomenal marketing abilities. You have a platform like Facebook or Instagram. You could use that to give quality content or entertaining content or you could use that as your personal blog. That is up to you and that is the democratic nature of the platform. But as quality gets rewarded, more people will want to pursue that. That is our take on it.
When we talk of best-selling books, what is the quantum that you refer to? A publishing house told me that if you manage to sell 5000 copies, you're a best-selling author. Is it true?
Bestsellers are there, category‐wise; it's not overall. The whole concept of bestseller is very much flawed. But to answer your question, in a category like poetry, which doesn't sell really well, something like 5,000 could be construed as a bestseller. You have to think of a bestseller against all the other books that are published in that year. A fiction can be read by a lot of people. Here, a bestseller can sell 10,000 to 12,000 copies. A true national bestselling book will crack 100,000 copies.
What next at Notion Press?
My co‐founder Bhargav and I are very passionate about democratising writing further. There are also people who have great ideas, but they lack writing skills. We want to solve that problem. These are two areas that we are working on, to make sure that there are more writers; and writers have more readers and that they are all connected.
Babu Krishnamoorthy: The year 2016 was an epoch-making year in various ways. It was the year when demonetisation was announced. While we may argue whether it worked or not, one significant outcome was the shift from physical currency to electronic currency. This transition facilitated the adoption of digital methods for managing finances, including the use of UPI and other mobile apps.
Unexpectedly, this shift also sparked a surge of interest in the stock market. With just a simple mobile phone, people from any corner of the country could now easily invest in even a single stock. This newfound accessibility led to a wave of new investors entering the market. Currently, there are millions of new investors entering and participating in the stock market.
The democratisation of the capital market among the general public is a positive development for the country. However, amidst this surge of activities in the stock market, many investors lack a structured investment approach. "Coffee can investing" offers a valuable framework for entering into stock investments.
Discussion on the theme of the book ‘Coffee Can Investing: The Low‐Risk Road to Stupendous Wealth’ held on 20 June 2024, under the ‘Read & Grow’ series. The panellists were Babu Krishnamoorthy, Chief Sherpa, Finsherpa Investments Pvt Ltd; Ajit Gautam, Partner, Chartered Accountancy firm and Director, Accounting Services Company; and Satyanarayan Yanmantram, Partner, Sri Krishna Capital.
The book "Coffee Can Investing" is authored by practitioners of the craft: Saurabh Mukherjea, Rakshit Ranjan, and Pranab Uniyal. Saurabh Mukherjea is renowned for his successful fund management at Marcellus Investment Managers. Previously, he held positions at Ambit Capital and has a strong background in equity investing, with education in London. Pranab Uniyal and Rakshit Ranjan have worked with Saurab Mukherjea at Ambit Capital.
There are multiple philosophies of making money. You may have a trading philosophy, which means you buy and sell constantly with the idea of making money. Investing is another philosophy, in which you buy stocks, hold them for long term and make returns. Coffee can investing is not a trading strategy but an investment strategy.
Ajit Gautam: There are two fictional characters in the book: Talwar and Sanghvi. They are both aged 54 years. Both graduated in 1991. One is in employment and the other is in business. They made some wrong decisions in their investment portfolio. The theme of the book typically covers people who entered their
earning years in the 90s, areas where they could have gone wrong and what they should have actually done better. The authors argue with data, illustrations and graphs as to why one should put money into financial instruments and move away from real estate.
When the book was written in 2017, 77% of household savings went into real estate. There have been many developments over the last seven years. They recommend allocating 20% of our investments in coffee can portfolios. They also suggest that the portfolio should include large cap stocks, exchange traded funds and small cap funds. What is important is that we must invest in clean and good companies, which are transparent and free of scams.
Within financial instruments, we should have diversification. The authors feel that the Indian residential and commercial market is overheated and it may take a few more years for it to correct and hence, people should become part of the world of financial instruments in a significantly better way.
The book relies on information available over 25 years, starting primarily from the post‐liberalisation era of 1991.
~ Ajit Gautam
The book relies on information available over 25 years, starting primarily from the post-liberalisation era of 1991. If you stay invested in good stocks for a long term, without worrying about what is happening in the market today, then you will get great returns over the long term. That's the message from the book in a nutshell.
The term "coffee can" originated from the practice where investors used to put their money, gold and other valuables into a coffee can and forget about them for years, allowing the investments to grow steadily.
Satyanarayan Yanmantram: To me, the message the authors try to convey is loud and clear. Focus on quality stocks. Irrespective of market cycles, they will
Brand is similar to fundamental analysis. It will help the investors to pick the right company.
~ Satyanarayan Yanmantram
perform. The quality covers areas such as corporate governance. In the last four years, we have seen a bull cycle and we have to be a little bit cautious now as millions of new investors are entering the stock market. We must read and grow, like what they say in mutual funds, 'Read all scheme related documents.'
Before getting into equity, you should know the promoters, the quality of the company, what they produce and what they are going to give us back. Everything is notional until you sell. My father might have bought a land for 10 lakh rupees and it may fetch me one crore after several years. When they go for a war, they wait for the right time. The same thing applies to stocks. You have to wait for a longer duration. Though the book was written in 2017, the formulae for financial ratios like PE, EPS and PEG remain unchanged. The numbers, though, will be different.
Babu Krishnamoorthy: To create a coffee can portfolio, the authors suggest five filters. Create a portfolio that has anywhere between 10 and 25 stocks only. You don't have to keep 150 stocks. Do your homework. 10 to 25 is their magic size and it is easy to monitor on an ongoing basis. Within this, we must reasonably diversify.
Ajit Gautam: Let's look at some of the filters that the authors prescribe for the coffee can portfolio. The first is a listed company with a market cap of not less than 100 crores. Two, the company should have been in existence for ten years and in those ten years, they should have grown in revenue, year after year, by not
less than 10%, net of inflation. The third criteria is, they should have generated a return on capital employed of 15%. For companies in the financial services sector, it was a return on equity and not on capital employed, because financial services companies typically borrow.
Babu Krishnamoorthy: Can you elaborate on the criteria of evaluating the 'brand and moat?'
Satyanarayan Yanmantram: Brand is built over a period of time. It is not built within two years or three years. Once a brand is built, that becomes unshakable, like the Tata brand for example. Brand is similar to fundamental analysis. It will help the investors to pick the right company. Within a brand, there could be many companies and sectors. For instance, within Tata brand, Tata Teleservices did not do well. Everything is subject to market risk. We must remember that no company will allow a decent brand to die.
Today, as per the SEBI's categorisation, the top 100 companies form the large cap. The earlier criteria for a large cap was a market cap of more than 20,000 crores. Earlier, in the Sensex, 75% was in large cap. Today, it is only 63 or 64% and the rest is mid and small cap. Whether you are buying a large cap, a mid-cap or small cap, you must be cautious and see if the brand is already established. You may have 500,000 followers on Facebook but only a few may be your close friends. Coffee can investing is similar to this, where you focus on good quality rather than quantity.
Babu Krishnamoorthy: Year on year revenue growth of 10% is a tough criterion but a good one. It really speaks volumes about the management. But apart from financial numbers, the company must have a reasonably good brand. The brand must be recognizable in the field that we talk about. Third, it must have some competitive advantage or what we call as 'moat' in the
financial services space. Let me take the example of Sundaram Finance, just for illustration. Someone may have money to start a company similar to Sundaram Finance but to get to where Sundaram Finance is today, it will take them another 50, 60 or 100 years. It's not just about the money. It's about the trust and the network. They have about 700 or 800 offices. In every small city, town or village, they have a representative who knows how to finance trucks, who knows the truck owner and his family and who knows everything about financing. That information or knowledge is intangible and to replicate it is very difficult. That's what the authors mean by 'moat.' Every business has a moat. It's important to understand what that moat is. Look at the financials. It is really important, but also marry it with the non-financial aspects like the brand and moat.
The authors also advise us to consider the expenses and costs. In the mutual fund space, there is the DIY or direct form of investing. You can also invest through a regular distributor. While the direct option is cheaper, what criteria should people use to differentiate when they are going from direct to regular or from regular to direct channel?
Satyanarayan Yanmantram: For a registered investment advisor, you may pay some fees like how you pay to the doctors. If you're buying the stock directly, there is just an one-time expense involved, which is a commission that you pay. It may be 0.25 or 0.5% or even zero in some cases. But we must always be cautious about zero commissions and combo offers.
If we avoid wastages, we can make wealth. In mutual funds, there are two platforms available. One, you can buy directly, which was introduced five years before, where the expense ratio could be 1% approximately. It may differ from scheme to scheme and category to category. Just like savings getting
compounded, expenses also get compounded. So, we must definitely look at the expenses that we incur.
But generally, an ethical option can be costlier initially but cheaper in the long run. An ethical doctor may charge a high-fees but he will avoid an operation. In any profession, nothing comes free. I am a registered investment advisor and we are a population of less than 2000 people in a country whose population is 140 crores. India is not a mature market yet and we have a long way to go. If you use a DIY platform, you must be well-informed. The distributors, in my opinion, help you to manage your behaviour. If you manage your behavior, definitely you will make money more than buying and selling.
Ajit Gautam: Most investors are not aware of the extent to which expenses compound. That's why, over a period of time, as it's happening in the US, in India also, more funds have started moving into being passive funds. Exchange traded funds are an example. They are less distributor-driven and more advisor-driven, to take care of the power of expenses that tends to bring down the returns substantially over time. Therefore, as the market matures, in the mutual fund market, more money is pouring into passive funds.
The real estate was a very unregulated market. A lot of black money was in the system and that invariably went into real estate. The real estate saw a boom between 2003 and 2013. But the authors refer to that boom as overpricing. Probably, there is a little bit of bias, but all this bias is also backed up by data. The prices of residential and commercial real estate during the period between 2003 and 2013 went up so much that even though there has been a correction after that, it is still not up to the expected levels. The real estate market has not grown in the last 10 years. When there's no appreciation, the yields will be low. Therefore, it
doesn't justify in the short term to stay invested in real estate or to make new investments into real estate.
Babu Krishnamoorthy: We can't take the advice of the authors that equity is any day better than real estate as a gospel truth. That's not true. But two points emerge. One, equity as an asset is an easier asset to hold. You can buy an equity share with just 500 rupees in your bank but you cannot buy a meaningful real estate unless you have a couple of lakhs. Equity is an easier asset to buy. Two, if you want to unwind an equity share today and if you sell before the market closes, tomorrow evening, there is money in your bank account. In real estate, if you set your mind to sell, it could be a couple of months before you realise a deal.
Warren Buffet says that investing is simple, but not easy. It's a beautiful phrase that brings out the essence of equity market investing. The factor of patience and behavior of an investor is a big factor in creating wealth.
Satyanarayan Yanmantram: I will give you a small example. In Velachery in Chennai, when the floods came, how many people sold their property? When Tsunami came, how many people sold their assets in Besant Nagar? Hardly a few. But when it comes to the capital market, we lose the patience, because we see it regularly.
Warren Buffett says, "Defer your taxes." We pay the taxes when we sell. What Warren Buffet means is that you must have the patience and you have to wait. He also says that if the market is closed for the next ten years, then he will be happy. That is the mindset that we need. Buy quality stocks, hold it for a long term and enjoy the returns. Many middle income people bought real estate and are spending their salary on EMI. They have very little money to diversify and invest in capital market. Also, short term and long term perspective may differ from person to person.
