Looking Inward

Hope is not a Strategy!

Milind Wagh — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 21:08:16 +0000

Nigerians were once branded the happiest people on earth. The situation is rapidly changing but till now; they are just about “Suffering and Smiling.” Nigeria comes across as a nation where there is too much hardship and yet the people bear it with a certain inexplicable equanimity. In the midst of suffering, they would be seen smiling. A man pulling many times his own weight in goods, with a wheel barrow, under the baking sun, with sweat pouring down his face and cascading down his body, would be expected to be looking tense with a sad disposition on his face. But this is Nigeria. Inspite of the back-breaking work that pays little, the man would be smiling while making jokes with anyone that comes close to him as he makes his way through the busy streets. For decades, there are areas where there has been no electricity and hence the people are unable to run the fans or other equipment which no longer can be summarized as luxuries but sheer essentials. One would expect them to be mad at a government that continues to fail her people in the power-delivery sector or PHCN that has failed to get its act [...] No related posts.

Back to School!

Milind Wagh — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 10:44:03 +0000

Our car entered the narrow lane of the overcrowded Yaba area in Lagos as we proceeded to meet our prospect; a mid-size business into outdoor media. My colleague who accompanied me, had explained to me that the prospect was one of the leaders in the vertical and was in dire need of a suitable automation solution. He quickly spoke to my driver in local Youruba dialect and the car stopped in front of a dilapilated building. There was no road ahead. I gathered that we had entered a wrong lane. “Sir; Pls follow me. We are there”, he said. I was taken aback. My eyes wandered to locate the office of my prospect, but could find none. He guided me straight to the entrance of the dilapilated building! Two ‘roughnecks’ were standing at the entrance. Both were smoking and were engaged in an animated dialog. They had seen us getting down and walking towards the entrance. My heart missed a beat as their eyes sized me up from top to toe. I kept my face straight and walked past them to the building and entered a small room, which apparently was the reception! An old hawkish lady greeted us and [...] No related posts.

Oga! You are Welcome!

Milind Wagh — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 21:04:56 +0000

The frail figure in front of me offered me a hand and spoke in a heavy voice. “Good morning sir!, You are welcome”. I gathered myself hurriedly, least expecting the blunt welcome. I struggled to put on a smile and reciprocate his greetings. He led us to a dimly lit conference room and offered me a chair to seat myself. I sat lightly respecting the fragility of the chair and turned towards my host and offered him my visiting card. He took it, but offered me none and came straight to the point of our intended visit. It was my first sales call in the day and here I was; expecting a large corporate conference room of a supposedly ‘large’ media firm in Nigeria. The decor had shaken me thoroughly and I was finding it difficult to focus on my sales pitch and presentation. My colleague in sales who was accompanying me was at his eloquent best, oblivious of the shock I was reeling under. This was not the first time that I was taken by surprise in Nigeria. But today was different. We had struggled for several days to get this appointment and I was told that entry into [...] No related posts.

Addicted to Money?

Milind Wagh — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 19:17:16 +0000

Money is a part of human nature and has an intense addictive quality. It is no surprise that people want money and their success in earning money directly relates to their behavior in our society. Though economists argue that money is the most useful tool to attain power in the business world, they fail to explain people’s behavior before and after acquiring this tool. Why does a person who is already a billionaire want more? Why are they obsessed with money beyond rationality, beyond any easy explanation? what makes these people whose lives are already comfortable make sacrifices in other areas of their lives – family, friendships and their own sanity – just to get more cash? Behavioral experts argue that people’s actual behaviour towards money can’t be explained solely by the fact that it is useful. There is something more that provokes people into all sorts of bizarre behaviour that can’t easily be explained in terms of its function purely as a tool. Money as a necessity for survival literally looms large in our minds – we seem to imbue it with a special status. People respond to the face value of money irrespective of its real worth. The introduction in [...] No related posts.

Your Culture Is Your Brand

Milind Wagh — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 04:15:49 +0000

The method of building a brand today is very different from what it was 10 years ago. Gone are the days when a few people got together in a room, decided what the brand positioning was going to be, and then spent a lot of money buying advertising telling people what their brand was. Their spending capabilities decided their success in building their brand. The market space was not crowded with products and so an adequate level of noise was enough to promote a product or a service. Organizations were not transparent in their activities and the lack of media tools like the internet allowed them to pursue multiple images in existence. It’s a very different world today. With the internet connecting everyone together, companies are becoming more and more transparent whether they like it or not. An unhappy customer or a disgruntled employee can blog about bad experience with a product or a service and the story can spread like wildfire by email or through facebook or twitter. Organizations have to pull up their socks – not only on the quality of their deliverables, but also in the way they deal with their employees and their value chains. The [...] Related posts:

Understanding Brand Value