A Brand New World!!!

Brands are becoming a new lingua franca for consumers all over the globe. One may like or dislike, brands are reality and no one can scape. Well, there are people around us including me prefer brands because it is all about quality. To an extent it is true, if more people buy brands better the quality becomes. Price equates quality and brand competition means continuous improvement. We are becoming so global, in spite of our likes or dislikes, it is a reality, falling trade barriers to regional trade integration, movement of people to telecom and internet boom. World is becoming truly a village, more we get connected more we become global citizen sharing common culture. Many people at Harvard University believe that "consumers look to global brands as symbols of cultural ideals. They use brands to create an imagined global identity that they share with like minded people. Global brands make us feel like citizens of the world and they somehow give us an identity". There are brand skeptics believing that brands are all about western culture but if we look at hundred of brands in terms of their value, Coke is number one "An American Brand" but Nokia, a Finish brand on no 5, Toyota a Japanese brand on no 8, Mercedes a German brand on no 12, Honda a Japanese brand on no 18, Samsung, H&M, Nescafe, SAP, IKEA, Sony, Canon, Nintendo, Reuters, Philips, L’Oreal, Siemens, Zara, VW, Nestle, Adidas, Blackberry, Rolex, UBS, Panasonic, Cartier, Allianz, BP, Nivea, Prada, Giorgio Armani, Lexus, Puma and Burberry all are non American brands.

Click here for best global brands list. We have to live in a global village and brands are reality, major question comes, it is fine brands are all about quality, they also create a global culture but the need of the hour is how much socially responsible organizations are?? To make world a better place, NGOs, consumers and human rights organizations' role has become more critical along with media. We have to collectively act as watchdog and consumers can use their buying power to punish socially irresponsible brands through product boycott. Let me share an interesting story about anti globalization and anti brand crowd, the other day I watched a video, most of the protesting guys were wearing branded shirts, Levis Trousers, Swiss Backpack, Apple iPods, Caterpillar Shoes, Police Glasses, Puma Shoes etc. Similarly anti west clerics in Pakistani helped KFCs Ramadan Iftar deal. It is need of the hour, we have to be more realistic and practical, on the one hand not ignoring our social responsibility and on the other hand saying no to mindless emotional outcry against brands.

Corporate Feudalism & Dirty Money !!

Corporate feudalism is a term referred to unethical and irresponsible corporations, their only pursuit is to earn money at the cost of society, law, people and environment. They turn laws and rules in their favor through bribes, harass smaller players, buy lawmakers and pollute environment like a feudal lord. New media always focus on small scale societal crimes but a large scale white collar crime and dirty money making machines often hide from the eyes of media.India’s booming economic and IT scandal of Satyam sent shock waves all around, finally it is official Satyam's Rs 7000 crore corporate accounting fraud has been acknowledged to be the biggest fraud in the history of India's big bourgeoisie. While Enron, an American corporate certainly outdid the who's who in corporate crime in India in recent years, there have been many contenders for the title in the last two decades. Global Trust Bank is still fresh in our memory. In this latest instance, Price Waterhouse Coopers is implicated along with Satyam. If one looks the capitalistic greed one finds that Neoliberlism arose as a project of imperialism to counter the increased power of the working classes of the metropolitan countries on the one hand and the Third World countries on the other. Near full employment in the metropolitan countries and social welfare measures had increased the bargaining power of the workers in Europe. An anti-worker ideology was nourished by trashing the achievements of welfare states. Simultaneously, the lessons of history were negated in persuading and bullying Third World countries with semi-feudal social structures to give up those kinds of measures of state patronage and state action which had promoted industrialization in Western Europe and its overseas offshoots. Economic liberalization to comprehend also deregulation of the financial sector became a major weapon in this neoliberal imperialist enterprise. Exploitation and greed is very nature of capitalism, it is high time to change the inhuman nature of the game or face the pitfalls of capitalism which may crumble the economic empires all around. Better governance, more control , media vigilance and social democractic parties are vital to stop the wild animal called CORPORATION “the corporate feudal”. Weak state of Pakistan has hidden stories of accounting crimes, every other annual report may contain fudged data, simply because of lose controls and weak corporate governance. Pakistan can not compete if unethical white collar crime is allowed to flourish all around.

The Corporation; A Ruthless "LEGAL" Person Without Soul !!

Documentary The Corporation (2003) by Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbott initiates an interesting discussion, it is an intriguing discussion. It talks about origins of Corporation as Legal entity, its development till today and its influence on our life.

The interesting question behind is: what is the connection between structure which corporation has set up and current social structure?

Does Corporation which has every legal right as human being, but lack of soul and emotions, produces pathological employees or at least pathological top managers which represent it? Corporations have limited liability, who suffers, who pays for the pitfall, it is the tax payer....doesn't this sound absurd!!! Tax payers are bailing out US Corporations.....why????

The most evident trait of psychopaths is lack of empathy and emotions (what surly corporation as legal but not alive personality misses).

The interesting argument documentary present is that "In corporate culture the one with lack of emotions survives the best", that's what i have noticed in my last seven year experience, working for Corporations.

There are several theories about Psychopathology from mental disorder to just adoption strategy. With social structure as we have is it than psychopath’s adoption strategy the most efficient one?

Is this the way how evolution allow survivor to the most adopted organisms? Are the people with empathy and social consciousness extinction species? Is life simply a utility? Are corporation all about bottom line, even beyond the public GOOD?Is civilization just all about materialist quest, in ruthless fashion?

Think over, intriguing question, as business graduate & corporate executive, questions loom in my mind but i have no answer!

Pakistan is Teetering at the Brink of Bankruptcy

 Friends of Pakistan Conference unveiled an economic support package to avert possible bankruptcy. Pakistani officials claim that “reserves are falling fast and if forward liabilities are included, the real reserves may go down to $3 billion. This cannot meet the import bill of one whole month”. If Pakistan is struggling to barely meet one month import bill, who is going to pay back debts, if misses the deadline, may lead to bankruptcy on overdue payment. This means stiff loan conditionality, higher interest rate on loans and negative rating by Standards & Poor’s and Moody’s. Recent reports in the western media indicate that Pakistan needs as much as $10 billion to avoid an economic meltdown. I just want to ask few questions to so called intellectuals with dumb head, how you can fight the world esp. US, with nothing to eat, with economic meltdown. Few analysts claim that lets fight, Pakistan can eat Onions & Bread (Peyaz aur roti)! Does Pakistan have enough money to give Peyaz aur roti to its people?

Beggars are not choosers!!

Financial Tsunami Struck US, Will It Spare the World?

Wall Street, the US financial hub has never seen such turmoil and uncertainty in last many years after 1920s worst recession. Lehman Brother (the biggest financial players) filed for bankruptcy; Bank of America is buying Merrill Lynch in USD 50 bill. Merrill Lynch buy out is as surprising as Lehman Brothers filing for bankruptcy. AIG is considered to be one of the leading insurance company of the world, already asking Federal Reserve for the bail out package of USD 50 bill. Citi Group, Goldman S and JP Morgan have formed a contingency fund worth USD 70 bill to rescue in case of SOS. Financial crisis is due to excessive loans from banks that lead to defaults, housing and mortgage loans were also excessive, people borrowed beyond capacity. It badly affected the financial sector. US housing crisis is deepening, economic slow down is seen all across. US is one of the global demand driver and consumers of products, if US slows down, world is going to feel the pinch, especially the third world. It seems that slow down is coming, oil price fall is an indicator of slowing down in overall demand. Is Tsunami over or it is going to engulf whole world? Let’s see, time will tell.

Mesmerizing Medici Effect

I came across an interesting idea in my Strategy Class “The Medici Effect”, pioneered by Frans Johansson. He asks one question what elephant and epidemic can teach us about innovation. Weird, yet powerful. When we step into an intersection of fields, disciplines, or cultures, we can combine existing concepts into a large number of extraordinary new ideas. The Medici Effect shows how to find intersectional ideas and make them happen. How ants & tank truck logistics are related? Ants always find shortest possible route efficiently. When Mercedez-Benz presented their bionic concept car back in 2005 they showed that they were capable of optimizing aerodynamic form in a very unorthodox way; they used the R&D of nature itself and modelled it after the angular but streamlined boxfish. Fish drove the innovation at Mercedez Benz.

A Big Wow for Indians and Awesome Creation of Mahindra Scorpio

Tata pioneer Jamsethji and Rattan have already inspired me a lot, I am mesmerized the way they have created wealth for the nation. Tata biography is one of my favorite books. List goes beyond Tata, Dheorbhai Ambani of Reliance is another figure I adore a lot along with BIRLA & Godrej Family.

Today I came to know about Mahindra & Mahindra, the Indian Vehicle & Tractor manufactures along with host of other businesses. What I like about Anand Mahindra ‘the CEO’ when he came back from Massachusetts to join business, he gave importance to INTEGRITY the ETHICS that is the driving force behind the USD 5 billion company. To him other things are easy to handle and secondary but future of a company holds with the integrity.

They have introduced Indian SUVs in US market, selling 40,000 vehicles is a big success; I am very much convinced that it is ethics and integrity that drives Indian organizations forward.

I was glad to see Harvard writing a case study on Mahendra Scorpio SUV, the success behind the company that set up production house in just USD 150 million and car designed by a 26 years old IIT student.

On the other side I look at Pakistani business houses, the Textile Tycoons and other businessmen ‘Robber Barons’ , the overall mindset and treatment of workforce and appalling business standards make me feel pessimist about Pakistan. Hardly expect to see Pakistani giants on global scene.

Inspiratorium Says Take Daily Motivational Shower!! Hey, What’s Wrong With Pakistanis????

Last evening I got an opportunity to attend an inspirational talk at T2F, it suggested that Pakistanis need inspiration from within to make a difference and vision is sold with the brand name of ‘INSPIRATORIUM’, a talk ‘developed by a local organization development firm’.

Theme of initial preview talk was that Pakistani nation has a bigggggg problem and need to be fixed, it is not the education but change in mindset and value system can bring the revolutionary changes. Inspiratorium is an effort to inculcate new value system in the social body of Pakistani society……a passionate dream to make a difference.

Speaker also referred Japanese success story, a nation, with no resources have become economic superpower, because of their mindset. It reminded me of my recent visit to Japan, to me present day Japan is made possible because of the enlightened rule “Meiji Restoration” that ended 265 year old feudalistic Tokugawa shogunate. Pakistan has to get rid of status quo to see drastic change; it would come through political consciousness.

Inspirational talk in west is a high selling product, satisfying the need of fast paced distressed workers, exhausted by the rat race and pressure form the capitalist system.

Because of violence, distress, despair and pessimism, an effort is being made to sale the inspirational talk to hungry, shelter less, starved Pakistani hmmm or may be to sale it to fat and rich corporate sector clients. There is nothing wrong in selling any product to anyone if there is any demand. However, commercialization need to be separated from social change dream, may be it is western replica product ‘wearing social attire’ developed for corporate sector.

Anyways, during the motivational talk, I could not stop thinking about the questions such as what is really wrong with Pakistani nation. Why as a nation we are confused? And what is Pakistani identity. Thought process also reminded me of my favorite book ‘The Indus Saga’ and its first chapter ‘The Pakistani Identity’.

It also made me think that value system is developed over the period and it’s hard to change in short span of time. To me daily behavior sets the foundation for norm, leading to the creation of values that moves all the way to generations and become the part of overall culture.

It made me think that instead of daily inspirational shower, the nation needs good governance, change in system, to break the status quo, rather than being inspirational at individual level. It’s the collective political and social consciousness that brings change and it requires continuation of democracy and political process, media freedom. This may involve people in sociopolitical affairs rather than being inspirational materialist, locked in rat race and blind to social surroundings, just like a hungry consumer, churning for more I see more I need.

At times, I get to hear stupid judgments from my so called ‘pseudo intellectual’ educated friends, at times in discussion they even do not know the cultural background of Balochistan or even the geography or without knowing the basics of Balochistan, yet they pass political judgment. At times they raise slogans that may make them look cool, such as, wearing Che Guevara T Shirt, without knowing Che’s ideals.

Vulgar Consumerism & Women Abuse is Disgusting!

We have heard a lot about vulgarity but these days vulgarity of consumerism haunts me. It is enough; people are running after satisfying material hunger, relationships are based on material fabric.

Consumerism has involved people into ‘more I see more I need rat race’, this means a blind eye to political and social problems and also people are apathetic to unethical things. Be it exploitation of women, environmental abuse and social fascism.

I was surprised to see an advertisement on an Indian TV, it was about a men deodorant ‘Wild Stone’…guy walks in, bump into female, coz of fragrance, woman feels as if she is being laid and screwed by the guy then she realizes its fantasy. Guy walks out and there comes the deodorant.

Come on, give us a break, this is no way of selling male products; it is simply the abuse of the sanctity of womanhood.