Sunday, May 08, 2005
Arun Maira-Shaping the Future
Mr Maira on his book "Shaping the future"
Question 1: Your new book published by J. Wiley & Sons, "Shaping The Future: Aspirational Leadership in India and Beyond" is a book about Leadership with a focus on many Indian examples but also with a sprinkling of non-Indian case studies. When you started to write the book, did you intend to focus predominantly on problems in India and the use of new techniques to resolve them or what was your initial focus?
Answer: My objective was to highlight that new approaches of leadership are required to solve problems arising in business and society all over the world, as a result of a combination of three forces that have come together in the past two decades. I have explained these forces in the book. India is experiencing the combination of these forces, which I call the Perfect Storm, at least as much as any other country, perhaps more, and hence India needs a new class of leadership to accelerate economic development. However, the conditions and solutions apply globally. I had a choice: I could give examples from all over the world and not focus so much on Indian stories, in which case the universality of the problem and the potential solution may have been more easily evident. Or, I could go more deeply into analysing the situation in India and use more examples from India, which would give the book more depth, though at the cost of breadth. Ultimately the publisher and I chose to delve into India, to make the book into a richer story.
Question 2: In your early chapters, you note how what you call a "Perfect Storm" of forces – you note Globalization, The Death of Distance and Atomization – are coming together to test leaders as never before. Could you explain your thinking on these forces and how the challenges created are different today from those of say several years ago?
Answer: The significant development on the economic side of the world is ‘globalisation’, which is the opening up of the countries of the world to trade and to flows of finance across borders. This is not an entirely new phenomena to mankind. Trade and investment were not restricted in the nineteenth century. However in the first half of the twentieth century, the boundaries had gone up with protectionism, and so the opening up again in the latter part of the century created new opportunities. It would appear that this openness will initially cause that which is stronger to roll over that which is not yet so well developed: hence MNCs will grow, US brands and entertainment will spread, etc. Which makes the smaller feel threatened in many ways, including concern for survival of traditions and identities.
Opposing this force, in a way, is the most significant development on the socio-political side which is the spread of the values of human rights, the rights of individuals, minorities, and democracy. The weak do not want to be steam-rollered and the world will support their rights. This force has gathered universal strength only in the last three decades since the collapse of the Soviet empire.
On the technology side, the revolution in communications has been startling, with computers, telecommunications, and the internet, providing people instant access to information from anywhere. This development has accelerated rapidly only very recently, in the last ten years or so. This force has increased the interaction between the other two forces. The combination of rapid, ubiquitous communications with trade and financial globalisation has opened up all parts of the world to rapid contact and influence from other parts as never before. At the same time, the weaker who feel threatened by the stronger can take advantage of modern communications to strike back anywhere, as September 11th demonstrated so gruesomely. Hence anything can happen now it would seem.
The development of this Perfect Storm has two consequences for leadership. It is very difficult for leaders to set a detailed course because of the uncertainty. And it is not easy to get people to fall in line because people will not accept authority so easily any more.
Question 3: In Part II of the book you set out the new learning that leaders must embrace to get out of the trap created by these forces. You propose a framework, the Learning System, distinguished by four types of learning – know-what, know-how, know-why and know-want. Could you explain this system more to us?
Answer: I would like to highlight two features of the Learning System. The first is the distinction in it of levels (or depth) of different types of learning and knowledge. It points to levels of learning that are deeper than traditional ‘knowledge management’. These are the levels of "Know Why" and "Know Want". Know Why is are our hidden ‘theories-in-use’, at the back of our minds as it were, which guide the way we think and determine what is useful information and what is not. Know Want is our deep aspirations. The Learning System guides us to these deeper levels at which lies the greatest leverage for change in attitudes and for innovation in ideas.
The second feature is the recognition that social systems such as organisations, and even societies, learn and collectively apply new ideas, and that this wider organisational and social learning is not merely a summation of the knowledge of individuals within the organisation and society. To produce change in the way organisations and societies behave, one has to do much more than train and educate the individuals in them. The book suggests some processes by which organisations and societies can learn and adopt new ideas.
Question 4: Also in Part II, you give examples of different companies, groups, etc. that are using this system and talk about some of the results they are achieving. Are there key specific examples, both in India and beyond, that you can mention that you believe are effectively using this framework and achieving promising results?
Answer: In the book, I give several examples of large-scale change mapped onto the Learning System. These examples include the transformation of a public sector oil company in India, the evolution of a business association, development of a new business model by a poultry company, and the beginnings of the development of a new state in India.
Question 5: In part III, you describe five "tuning knobs" – shared vision and values, delineation of decision-rights, measures and accountability, means of influencing behavior and leadership skills that can assist companies and communities to coordinate and govern. Can you explain how these variables work to help the system work correctly?
Answer: I would make three points to explain how the five variables are tuned to produce transformation in an organisation. The first is that the ‘tuning knobs’ are connected to the both the so-called ‘soft’ side of the organisation viz. aspirations and emotions, and to the ‘hard’ side of organisation structures such as distributions of decision-making powers and design of financial incentives. The second point is that the knobs have to be tuned together. In many efforts to produce change in organisations, the people working on the ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ sides do not have an explicit model of how their efforts are linked together, and end working like a bone and a heart surgeon both operating on a person at the same time without a common view of what makes the human body really work. The third point I would make is that generally deeper change begins with tuning the ‘soft’ variables such as aligned aspirations (a shared Know Want), then moving to the tuning knobs for the ‘harder’ variables such as organisation strategy and structure.
Question 6: You also note in this section that these five variable work must be directed at four principles derived from a study of living systems otherwise the system won’t work. Can you describe how all of this works and perhaps give an example?
Answer: Having understood how the tuning knobs work is the first step. The next is to know the condition of the organisation one wants to produce by turning these knobs: in other words, how will we know our instrument is properly tuned up. What is the sound we are using as our guide to tune up? The four principles are the guide.
Many organisations must be wondering how they will tune up their cultures and governance systems to avoid the problems that are now surfacing at many companies in the USA and elsewhere. Creating more rules and regulations seems to be one approach. However this may violate a basic principle of healthy social systems that have the ability to self-adapt, and that is "Minimal Critical Rules". I have given an example in the book of a multinational company in the USA that got tangled in a web of alliances and joint ventures and was worried about how good governance would be excercised. Rules had to be laid down but they were concerned about the difficulty of framing an agreed set of rules between the partners without creating two many rules merely to achieve a consensus by accepting too many suggestions from all sides. Another principle they realised that they may have been inadvertently violating was the principle of "Permeable Boundaries". They then looked for best practices from other organisations of how a set of applicable rules can be a kept to a minimal critical set and how boundaries within an organisation and between partners can be made suitably permeable, and thus they were able to focus their approach to improvement of governance.
Question 7: Finally in the last section of the book you talk about Generative Scenarios Thinking which you note can give an observer insights into how complex systems actually work. Could you explain what exactly Generative Scenarios Thinking is and how it relates to your learning system and to effecting change in modern structures like businesses, etc.?
Answer: Generative Scenario Thinking is a way in which organisations and members of larger social systems can practically apply the insights into organisational learning and transformation that the book explains. Generative Scenario Thinking enables large groups to develop a shared aspirational vision and to understand the deeper forces in their environment through which they have to navigate to realise their aspiration.
The process works at the deeper levels of learning of Know Wants and Know Whys. It enables many people, crossing social boundaries and boundaries within an organisation, to think together. Thus it applies the ideas of the Learning System. It combines ideas of change in ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ systems in the organisation or society.
Question 8: You now head the Boston Consulting Group in India and have worked both in the U.S. and in India plus numerous other places in the world. In addition, you travel often and are constantly meeting business leaders from many different areas. Given your experience, do you think Indian business people in particular have a different view of leadership than their more Western counterparts? Further, is the Indian way of doing business more related to Asia in general or to the West and Why?
Answer: People everywhere are creatures of their histories. And the wise are always in tune with their own surroundings. Indian business leaders have been deeply involved with the socio-political development of India in the last century. They were partners of the political leaders during the Freedom Movement. They have have been deeply involved in social development also. They have created some of the best institutions for education and scientific research in the country as well as effective community development programs. I think Indian businesses are not as separated from other social institutions as businesses in the West may be.
Many Indian business leaders were educated in the West. India has a "Western" system of higher education. For over 30 years, India has had some excellent institutes of management associated with US business schools. Therefore Indian business leaders are very close to Western business practices. At the same time, as I mentioned earlier, they are close to Indian, and hence Asian values.
Perhaps India may be the place where there is the deepest synthesis between Eastern and Western ideas of the role and conduct of business.
Question 1: Your new book published by J. Wiley & Sons, "Shaping The Future: Aspirational Leadership in India and Beyond" is a book about Leadership with a focus on many Indian examples but also with a sprinkling of non-Indian case studies. When you started to write the book, did you intend to focus predominantly on problems in India and the use of new techniques to resolve them or what was your initial focus?
Answer: My objective was to highlight that new approaches of leadership are required to solve problems arising in business and society all over the world, as a result of a combination of three forces that have come together in the past two decades. I have explained these forces in the book. India is experiencing the combination of these forces, which I call the Perfect Storm, at least as much as any other country, perhaps more, and hence India needs a new class of leadership to accelerate economic development. However, the conditions and solutions apply globally. I had a choice: I could give examples from all over the world and not focus so much on Indian stories, in which case the universality of the problem and the potential solution may have been more easily evident. Or, I could go more deeply into analysing the situation in India and use more examples from India, which would give the book more depth, though at the cost of breadth. Ultimately the publisher and I chose to delve into India, to make the book into a richer story.
Question 2: In your early chapters, you note how what you call a "Perfect Storm" of forces – you note Globalization, The Death of Distance and Atomization – are coming together to test leaders as never before. Could you explain your thinking on these forces and how the challenges created are different today from those of say several years ago?
Answer: The significant development on the economic side of the world is ‘globalisation’, which is the opening up of the countries of the world to trade and to flows of finance across borders. This is not an entirely new phenomena to mankind. Trade and investment were not restricted in the nineteenth century. However in the first half of the twentieth century, the boundaries had gone up with protectionism, and so the opening up again in the latter part of the century created new opportunities. It would appear that this openness will initially cause that which is stronger to roll over that which is not yet so well developed: hence MNCs will grow, US brands and entertainment will spread, etc. Which makes the smaller feel threatened in many ways, including concern for survival of traditions and identities.
Opposing this force, in a way, is the most significant development on the socio-political side which is the spread of the values of human rights, the rights of individuals, minorities, and democracy. The weak do not want to be steam-rollered and the world will support their rights. This force has gathered universal strength only in the last three decades since the collapse of the Soviet empire.
On the technology side, the revolution in communications has been startling, with computers, telecommunications, and the internet, providing people instant access to information from anywhere. This development has accelerated rapidly only very recently, in the last ten years or so. This force has increased the interaction between the other two forces. The combination of rapid, ubiquitous communications with trade and financial globalisation has opened up all parts of the world to rapid contact and influence from other parts as never before. At the same time, the weaker who feel threatened by the stronger can take advantage of modern communications to strike back anywhere, as September 11th demonstrated so gruesomely. Hence anything can happen now it would seem.
The development of this Perfect Storm has two consequences for leadership. It is very difficult for leaders to set a detailed course because of the uncertainty. And it is not easy to get people to fall in line because people will not accept authority so easily any more.
Question 3: In Part II of the book you set out the new learning that leaders must embrace to get out of the trap created by these forces. You propose a framework, the Learning System, distinguished by four types of learning – know-what, know-how, know-why and know-want. Could you explain this system more to us?
Answer: I would like to highlight two features of the Learning System. The first is the distinction in it of levels (or depth) of different types of learning and knowledge. It points to levels of learning that are deeper than traditional ‘knowledge management’. These are the levels of "Know Why" and "Know Want". Know Why is are our hidden ‘theories-in-use’, at the back of our minds as it were, which guide the way we think and determine what is useful information and what is not. Know Want is our deep aspirations. The Learning System guides us to these deeper levels at which lies the greatest leverage for change in attitudes and for innovation in ideas.
The second feature is the recognition that social systems such as organisations, and even societies, learn and collectively apply new ideas, and that this wider organisational and social learning is not merely a summation of the knowledge of individuals within the organisation and society. To produce change in the way organisations and societies behave, one has to do much more than train and educate the individuals in them. The book suggests some processes by which organisations and societies can learn and adopt new ideas.
Question 4: Also in Part II, you give examples of different companies, groups, etc. that are using this system and talk about some of the results they are achieving. Are there key specific examples, both in India and beyond, that you can mention that you believe are effectively using this framework and achieving promising results?
Answer: In the book, I give several examples of large-scale change mapped onto the Learning System. These examples include the transformation of a public sector oil company in India, the evolution of a business association, development of a new business model by a poultry company, and the beginnings of the development of a new state in India.
Question 5: In part III, you describe five "tuning knobs" – shared vision and values, delineation of decision-rights, measures and accountability, means of influencing behavior and leadership skills that can assist companies and communities to coordinate and govern. Can you explain how these variables work to help the system work correctly?
Answer: I would make three points to explain how the five variables are tuned to produce transformation in an organisation. The first is that the ‘tuning knobs’ are connected to the both the so-called ‘soft’ side of the organisation viz. aspirations and emotions, and to the ‘hard’ side of organisation structures such as distributions of decision-making powers and design of financial incentives. The second point is that the knobs have to be tuned together. In many efforts to produce change in organisations, the people working on the ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ sides do not have an explicit model of how their efforts are linked together, and end working like a bone and a heart surgeon both operating on a person at the same time without a common view of what makes the human body really work. The third point I would make is that generally deeper change begins with tuning the ‘soft’ variables such as aligned aspirations (a shared Know Want), then moving to the tuning knobs for the ‘harder’ variables such as organisation strategy and structure.
Question 6: You also note in this section that these five variable work must be directed at four principles derived from a study of living systems otherwise the system won’t work. Can you describe how all of this works and perhaps give an example?
Answer: Having understood how the tuning knobs work is the first step. The next is to know the condition of the organisation one wants to produce by turning these knobs: in other words, how will we know our instrument is properly tuned up. What is the sound we are using as our guide to tune up? The four principles are the guide.
Many organisations must be wondering how they will tune up their cultures and governance systems to avoid the problems that are now surfacing at many companies in the USA and elsewhere. Creating more rules and regulations seems to be one approach. However this may violate a basic principle of healthy social systems that have the ability to self-adapt, and that is "Minimal Critical Rules". I have given an example in the book of a multinational company in the USA that got tangled in a web of alliances and joint ventures and was worried about how good governance would be excercised. Rules had to be laid down but they were concerned about the difficulty of framing an agreed set of rules between the partners without creating two many rules merely to achieve a consensus by accepting too many suggestions from all sides. Another principle they realised that they may have been inadvertently violating was the principle of "Permeable Boundaries". They then looked for best practices from other organisations of how a set of applicable rules can be a kept to a minimal critical set and how boundaries within an organisation and between partners can be made suitably permeable, and thus they were able to focus their approach to improvement of governance.
Question 7: Finally in the last section of the book you talk about Generative Scenarios Thinking which you note can give an observer insights into how complex systems actually work. Could you explain what exactly Generative Scenarios Thinking is and how it relates to your learning system and to effecting change in modern structures like businesses, etc.?
Answer: Generative Scenario Thinking is a way in which organisations and members of larger social systems can practically apply the insights into organisational learning and transformation that the book explains. Generative Scenario Thinking enables large groups to develop a shared aspirational vision and to understand the deeper forces in their environment through which they have to navigate to realise their aspiration.
The process works at the deeper levels of learning of Know Wants and Know Whys. It enables many people, crossing social boundaries and boundaries within an organisation, to think together. Thus it applies the ideas of the Learning System. It combines ideas of change in ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ systems in the organisation or society.
Question 8: You now head the Boston Consulting Group in India and have worked both in the U.S. and in India plus numerous other places in the world. In addition, you travel often and are constantly meeting business leaders from many different areas. Given your experience, do you think Indian business people in particular have a different view of leadership than their more Western counterparts? Further, is the Indian way of doing business more related to Asia in general or to the West and Why?
Answer: People everywhere are creatures of their histories. And the wise are always in tune with their own surroundings. Indian business leaders have been deeply involved with the socio-political development of India in the last century. They were partners of the political leaders during the Freedom Movement. They have have been deeply involved in social development also. They have created some of the best institutions for education and scientific research in the country as well as effective community development programs. I think Indian businesses are not as separated from other social institutions as businesses in the West may be.
Many Indian business leaders were educated in the West. India has a "Western" system of higher education. For over 30 years, India has had some excellent institutes of management associated with US business schools. Therefore Indian business leaders are very close to Western business practices. At the same time, as I mentioned earlier, they are close to Indian, and hence Asian values.
Perhaps India may be the place where there is the deepest synthesis between Eastern and Western ideas of the role and conduct of business.
