Core Rigidities

A definition:
Flip side of core competencies, and caused by overreliance on any advantage(s) for too long. While a successful firm's management relaxes its improvement efforts, others keep on getting better and obsolete its competitive advantage.

Are we by nature also like this?
We stop challenging ourselves - and relax our individual improvement efforts - and what used to be a core competency for me when I was 30 yr, becomes a core rigidity by the time I'm 35??
If its true for me - in past few years - imagine the rigidities I have developed over last 32 yrs of my life!!
And now think of a culture that goes beyond decades - and is measured in Centuries!!

Came across this concept of "Capitalization Problem" by Malcom Gladwell. It talks of what stops us from reaching our full potential!
He gives an example:
He refers to James Flynn, an academic who got really interested in why Chinese immigrants to the US vastly outperform white Americans. Within one generation, they’re achieving at an extraordinary rate. The difference is not usefully described by differences in IQ. The cap rates for people who are smart enough to be a professional who end up being a professional is vastly different in different communities: 78% in Chinese American community rather than 60% in the white community? How are they able to capitalize on this? Flynn suggests it’s because they work harder, and Gladwell agrees. But why?
If you take a group of Chinese schoolkids and a group of American 10-year-olds and give them a complex maths task and time them at it, you’ll find the American kids give up after 2 minutes; the Chinese kids will still be working after 15 minutes. It’s about persistence: it’s the consequence of ingrained cultural notions of how hard you should work.
This is a cultural problem.

Core Rigidities and competencies of Indian Population?
So how do we go about unlocking the great potential we have within our nation?
Do we have core competencies and core rigidities that need to be unlocked? How do we go about identifying them and then leveraging them?
In my quest of contributing to alleviating poverty - to go beyond mental masturbation - and really act - I feel the key is in:
identifying these rigidities - against which I will have to fight, and
identifying the competencies - they will have to be leveraged

Let me start with identifying the core competencies of the "Rural Indian Market" - thats where the 70% of people reside - people who do not participate in the great debates in popular media - people who still die of hunger, malnutrition and preventable diseases...
I'm sure they don't want to die - and I don't have any data, but I'm sure their IQ and zest for life is not below their Urban bretherens..

So why do they die? Why are they poor? What core competencies can we leverage upon and get them going?
I need your support in identifying the core competencies first.
Please do post comments about your ideas - what could be the core competencies of the "Indian Rural Population"

Diwali-away from home

Despair not for diwali is here...
They lift up our heart: the flower-pot and the crackers..
So what if we are all not together (with our families),
This too shall pass –
and next Diwali will be much more fun,
But don’t forget to as well enjoy this one!!

Where the mind is without fear

and head is held high:

CRPF open fires in Srinagar 21 injured
India in the elite club of PSLV owners
India a trillion dollar economy

Where knowledge is free;
The data released by the ministry to the press information bureau is a bit outdated as it relates to figures from 2002 to 2005. Nonetheless, the trends are an eyeopener:
Compared to the national average of 60.92 per cent, Bihar dropouts from classes I to X were over 83 per cent in 2004-2005 followed by Meghalaya and West Bengal. Is even a drop put rate of 60.92 something to be happy about?
IISC, IITs, IIMs, XLRIs provide India with the young leaders of tomorrow. The institutes are world class! Indian diaspora is shining in silicon valley, the financial hubs and the centres of power. This is something to be proud of :-)

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow
domestic walls:
Cauvery water dispute, Telanagan agitation, Separatist movements are the walls dividing the nation into fragments.
SKS Microfinance, Amul, Aravind eye care on the other hand are few initiatives trying to span across the domestic walls and make an impact.

Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Bribe money allegations Rock Lok Sabha!
Medha Patekar goes on a 20 day fast to protest against the Narmada Dam!
Dr. Binayak Sen spends a year in Jail.

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Bangalore has a flyover with a traffic light on it - perhaps the worlds first flyover??
ISRO announces Chabrayan, India's frist mission to moon - wow we have come a long way.

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the
dreary desert sand of dead habit:
India gave "Zero" to the world - perhaps the single most important gift to mankind.
Witches are still burnt alive in the remote villages!

Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought
and action--
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake

This poem from Rabrindranath Tagore is a prayer that we have partially answered. We have all the means to achieve it. We are perfectly poised to take the next big leap - only thing we need is to be awake!!

Mob: Is anonymity the pillar for it?

Mob, why is it so dangerous?
Is it because it brings the dark side out of the otherwise pleasant human beings.
But how come the beings with a hidden dark side manage to be pleasant outside the mob?
The very person with whom you had a meaningful conversation over a tea at your own home - does not think twice before breaking your bones once in a mob.

What gives mob this enormous team power? Why is an innocent bystander lynched, a woman molested, a thief killed by the mob? What clouds the individual rational behaviour? Why at work our teams don't have the single mindedness of a mob?

I think what gives mob its power is Anonymity!!
Take a deep breath - and now think:
What are the top three things you will do if you woke up from sleep and found yourself invisible? What are your darkest desires?

Once there is anonymity, there is no more social policing left. You are left with just you - no other social obligations to worry for. Have you ever logged into the web under a pseudonym? What keeps you in check is just you, your discipline and values.

Mob is like logging into this world with an anonymous account - and it brings out for all to see what we are deep inside.

So how to control this mob? Is there a way to break the anonymity? Is there a way to break the trance and make an individual think? Lets try it out the next time - by NOT addressing the mob, but the individuals inside it! Lets see it we are able to break the trance - and get the people back to rational state.

It hurts...

To be so crass - that too twice in a day!

But then some days are like this - and what is sunshine without few clouds?
Atleast I'm back to terra firma from the cloud nine.

Acceptance or non-acceptance of your mistakes (by others) does show you where you stand? Doesn't it?
Had to utter those magic words "sorry" twice today - hope I don't tread on many more feet, toes and toenails in days to come!
Won't like to have all my friends hopping mad, saying sorry twice as such, is already quite sad.

Those who made the bridges will be called monkeys

I still remember that poem from Agyeya :

Jo pul banaaenge Vo piche rah jaaenge.
Paar utaregi sena
Vijayi honge Ram
Mara jaaega Ravan
Jo nirmata the Bandar kahlaange.

Sarcastic, but what if it is true? Will you put in your sweat and blood to be the foundation stone? Will you not like to be the facade to be admired and sighed upon? But then, if the bridge was not made, Ravan would not have been killed.

The bridge has to be made - it is quite immaterial what the makers are called,

For every facade, there are many foundation stones that stay on.

Haven't heard the birds of late

Wow, It has been a month since I'm at XLRI !!
The learning curve has been quite steep, the topics have been new, the discussions exciting.

I still remember the initial days - how I loved the greenery, the view of the distant hills, the tall trees with intricate arrangement of leaves. I had the patience to take snaps, to soak in the atmosphere, enjoy the tea, seek out company. It wasn't so long way back in past that birds had called out, a robin darted about, there was a hill myna up in the tree, and was there a snake up there as well?

Now, I don't hear the birds anymore.
They must be still there, its just that I'm preoccupied with my lessons. Learning is the REASON why I'm here, but I guess I will give the birds a chance to be heard as well.