Bad Politics Drives Out Good Science

The pressure on national governments to formulate climate change policies and enact stringent environmental legislation is on the rise. With extreme weather events increasing in frequency and ferocity worldwide, nothing much is left for the political class to skirt around the issue. 

However, the political reaction to climate change seems to have missed out on a critical aspect – to build public consensus so as to gain a wider acceptance among people who vote and participate in the change process. Read the full post at EditorSpeak@ThinktoSustain.com.

Why Climate Change Eludes Action?

The impact of climate change is fast becoming prominent across the world. Our review of recent research works on climate change and developing events worldwide suggests a few points.

First, it is more than obvious that what we know of climate change, as of today, is just the tip of the iceberg. 

As more research findings from different parts of the world focusing on different aspects of climate change impacts come to fore, the more baffling and alarming it is to assimilate the depth and complexity to which our natural systems are interlinked – those that we are now putting under strain. Read the full post in Editor Speak@ThinktoSustain.com

Superstorm Sandy and the US Elections: The Social Cost of Political Ignorance?

Hurricane Sandy may have been an untimely event during the course of election campaigning, but it puts the spotlight back on climate change despite collaborative attempts by the presidential candidates to clearly steer off from any debate on it.

The rigorous campaigning by US President Barack Obama and Republican candidate Mitt Romney is about to end in a few hours time. The intensive debates between the Presidential candidates in past few weeks might have ruffled apprehensions on contentious security issues, clarified positions at-length on foreign affairs, and proposed future course of action on creating jobs, but what they collaboratively steered off from speaking on, was climate change.

Read the full post in Expert Speak @ ThinktoSustain.com

Businesses Must Innovate to Become Sustainable

Thoughts-On-Brew

“The business of business is business” – this could have been an apt statement a few decades ago when business leaders were primarily concerned about economic profits. Social responsibility seemed too amorphous a concept that pro-business critics preferred to shrug off their shoulders. The focus was predominantly (and solely) on profits. This business paradigm dominated most of our history that followed the industrial revolution. The plumes of smoke that rose into the air – were considered as harbingers of prosperity and a symbol of success. Nobody thought it relevant to question the limiting factors that circumscribe our natural wealth.

Read the full post @blog.thinktosustain.com

Sustainability - The key agenda for 2012

Year 2011 sprang unexpected challenges for governance as a whole. Both - Polity and Corporate were seen at the receiving end as people marched onto the streets to vent their anger and frustration against a system that failed to maintain equity.

In the Middle-East, the epicenter of revolutionary protests, unprecedented turmoil prevailed as civilians challenged the might of firmly entrenched dictatorial regimes. The slogan ash-shab yurid isqat an-nizam -"the people want to bring down the regime" - echoed throughout the Arab world. As governments in Libya, Tunisia and Egypt fell, it rocked other nations that immediately tightened control over possible uprisings.

Read the full post at blog.thinktosustain.com

Corruption In Organizations: A Behavioural Perspective in the Indian Context

@ bhagwad.com

Most of our management concepts and theories have hardly anything to deal with Corruption. Many of our so-called Consultants and Management Gurus do not dare to tread upon such concepts. Probably, they think that it is outside the realm of their elitist body of knowledge and would rather dismiss this word by calling it a “Social Evil”. 

Dear reader, let me sound a word of caution - this social evil has become a phenomena that is ‘widespread’ and ‘dominant’ and has gained great powers to influence whatever under the name of ‘management concepts’ that we have ever known till date!!

Why Jan Lokpal Is Not Sufficient?

"In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of

In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of"

Confucius

The deepening interest on Jan Lokpal (Citizen's ombudsman Bill) has no doubt captivated the Indian masses. A society burdened with a corrupt administrative heritage is now seeking redress. While differences continue to persist between the government and civil society, there is much awaited expectation among the general public that longs to put an end to corruption.

The government would obviously like to closely guard its citadels of power and keep its key officials ‘immune’ to any prosecution process. The Jan Lokpal on the other hand likes to see strong powers in its hands to take action against erring officials, bureaucrats, judiciary and politicians. But where this debate on exposing government officials to punitive measures would lead to is a bit uncertain. Let’s assume for a while that the Jan Lokpal, as proposed by the civil society, gets accepted and takes a formal structure. Will it be sufficient to put an end to corruption? What would be the ultimate outcome? In other words, what do we want to achieve by putting corruption to an end?

Japan Nuclear Fallout: Global Carbon Emissions Likely to Rise

Fukushima Nuclear Disaster

Japan's nuclear crisis has started rubbing on to nuclear programs of other countries. Germany has already announced its plans to close down its nuclear plants by 2022. Italy's people have recently voted to block revival of its nuclear power plants. Italy's nuclearpower plants were shut down by a 1987 referendum after the Chernobyl disaster.

Elsewhere, notably in United States, public pressure on governments to close nuclear plants is also on the rise. There are concerns about safety, social and environmental costs and ambitious civil nuclear plans in the fast growing economies of China and India. 

Read the full post at blog.thinktosustain.com

We Live In A Spam World

@ www.glasbergen.com

Bothered about getting cranky calls from over-enthusiastic sales persons in the middle of a meeting? or are you getting more annoyed these days by the spam mails that creep into your inbox?. If you are an average internet user - one who just loves to hit the net 2-3 hrs a day and possesses a strange gadget with innumerable and audacious powers (called mobile), I'm sure you would be at the receiving end and would know what I am talking about !

Its SPAM - everywhere !!

Igniting Passion: Motivating Employees Intrinsically

This is an experiment told to me by my Prof in a management class about an experiment carried out on chimpanzees. 

The chimps were divided into two groups – say, A and B, and kept in two different large rooms. They were given canvases, some paint brushes and color vials. 

When one of the chimps of group-A managed to take color from one of the vials and made a stroke on the canvas, it was immediately rewarded by a banana. The others in the group followed suit and were also rewarded. This carried on for sometime and whenever the chimps made a stroke, they would get bananas. This excited the chimps initially.

At the same time, in a different location, the chimps of group B also started off exploring the new things given to them and made some strokes on the canvas with their brushes. But they did not receive any reward. They started making strokes after strokes on the canvas. The new colors made them more inquisitive and excited other chimps too as they made number of color combinations out of the same set of colors.

Wither Indianness ?

This article takes stock of the changes in the Indian mindset and its relentless vigour to hob-nob with the glitterati of the new society.

Recently one of my senior colleagues frantically called me up from abroad and told me that he is coming back to India with his family. I was surprised – not because he is coming back but because of the reason that he had labored hard to get to the States and was doing well, so what made him feel like returning to homeland now all of a sudden. Later I found that he was finding it difficult to manage his children. Born in a foreign country, they had slowly started adopting the culture of the land. This transformation was not liked by the couple who could barely find time to teach their children the right type of values. After numerous efforts and failures, they decided to come back.

Relevance of Behavioural Management: Exploring the link between Strategy and Change Management

With the present times showing a greater level of uncertainty and ambiguity, it has become pertinent to understand the deeper determinants of sustainable competitive advantage. If we look at the developments over the last three years, the Indian Industry has witnessed tremendous changes – the unbundling of electricity sector, revision in mobile tariff-structure, banking norms, disinvestments in PSUs, liberalization of foreign investment regulations etc. All these indicate that reform and deregulation would be a norm. Traditional bureaucracies would be struggling to come out of a protectionist regime and don the mantle of Corporate; domestic players would be evaluating the opportunities of strategic alliances, cross-border mergers and acquisitions to enter transnational markets. Competition would become fiercer as entry of new players would be easier.

Hard Times for HR

It's quite some time that we must have got used to the t u m u l t u o u s changes in the global markets. We now hear words such as ' s l o w d o w n ' , ' s t o c k - m a r k e t crash' and 'financial crises' are now used superfluously in daily parlance to what seemed to be an exclusive domain of the qualified financial expert. So much so that even our kids now know about it, as Ma & Pa are curtailing their spends and saving more. The rapidity with which this phenomenon has engulfed every nook and corner of the world, the spiraling uncertainty and untamed volatility have sent shudders across the spines of brave hearts. This brings forth the degree to which nations' economies have become inter-twined. Companies are going bankrupt, people are loosing jobs, projects are being shelved-off and salaries are taking a 'nose-dive'. I wonder what my HR brethren are doing these days. I guess they must be busy 'slashing' jobs and salaries, planning cuts in training budget, making restructuring plans etc etc. Many of us must have come across this news line - "PM asks industry to refrain from "knee-jerk" reaction such as large-scale lay-offs, which might lead to a negative spiral". There was such a panic regarding lay-offs that even PM Mr.Manmohan Singh had to pitch in with words of caution and restraint. These are truly the "Hard Times" for HR.

This is the most undesired but critical phase for any HR team in an organization - showing the door to its employees. Training and development efforts put in over years are going down the drain. Moreover, career aspirations are taking a hit. But what matters most are the HR processes by which these are being done. The socio-cultural context also matters here. In high-context countries like India where values like long-term employment, job security, relationships are cherished and there is an 'emotional investment' in organizations, this can have a more serious and negative impact unlike in western countries where the cultural values are more supportive of hire-fire rules. The psychological impact can be in terms of 'low confidence', 'low level of trust' feelings of 'insecurity' and 'frustration'. Some companies have found innovative ways to deal with this crisis by giving partially paid leave, promise of taking back when 'good' times come, but this may not be possible for every firm. These are the challenging times for HR professionals. 

This is the time to contribute more than ever in terms of maintaining the culture of organization, managing relationships with employees and helping them in making transitions in a less painful way. Leadership is what is needed and more so this initiative has to come from HR. Keeping people motivated when you cannot offer lucrative incentives, eliciting commitments when the annual salary hike has been kept aside, is going to be more daunting. Grape vines galore in these times, apprehensions, fear and anxiety sap organization's vitality. It will be difficult to ensure that right communication is propagated. HR has a bigger role to play - to keep the organization's credibility intact. Every action counts and reflects the true values of the organization. It is imperative to face these hard times with a humane touch and compassion. Things will come back to normal for sure but when that happens, there will be lot of effort required for organizations that are on a rampant spree to cut human resources at the tick of a second. Perhaps, it might be impossible for them to re-establish their 'image' once again.

There is lot of stake for HR in terms of its relevance and legitimacy both in the short and long term. The rebuilding exercise can make or mar the fabric of the organization. We cannot lead lives like that of Dickens characters - 'Gradgrind' - a man of facts and calculations or that of 'Bounderby' - a man perfectly devoid of sentiment. Dickens in his novel 'Hard Times', set in the socioeconomic context of the mid-nineteenth century, discounts the assumption that prosperity runs parallel to morality and highlights the importance of imagination in life. The message is that HR must not get bogged down by this 'crisis of figures' but look beyond and develop strategies that provide support to businesses and give direction.

(First published in NHRD Newsletter Jan 2009 Issue)