Thursday 28 December 2017

CBS Batch 2016-18 : Story for the year 2017- from its student

Article by : Shalini Singh, Student Batch 2016–18

We have all heard that ‘Management studies is not only about getting the job’. Management study builds your personality and helps you learn how to tackle various jobs at one go with diligence and responsibility. For us this experience of management studies have been like a roller-coaster ride with tremendous pressure, different roles to play, and to keep up with the pace at class and other co-curricular activities we were involved in.

This year brought in amazing experiences starting from the opportunity to listen to Prof Vijay Govindrajan’s Strategy Edge seminar at J W Marriott, Kolkata organised by Confederation of Indian Industry in January 2017 on his best-selling book 3-Box Strategy. We were five students selected to represent our college to this seminar. Following this our trip to IIT-Kharagpur Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES 2017) on February 2017 where we stayed 2 days in the KGP campus and got the chance to broaden our network and experience the fest organised at a global level by the students. This learning was taken by us and applied in the 1st International Conference on CICBA 2017 which was conducted in Calcutta Business School in March 2017. We, students, volunteered the same and participants, volunteers, cultural-program participants and guest-speakers made it a huge success. Thus, the first quarter of the year was full of academics and lots of opportunities for Batch 2016-18 students and ended up with internship offers in the hands of students by March end.

The second quarter of the year was a completely different phase where we were exposed to learn corporate culture by working in the companies as a summer intern. Our internship period was from April 2017 to June 2017. Students did their internship in companies like Ernst & Young (EY), Berger Paints India Ltd, Britannia Industries Ltd, Kotak Mahindra Bank, ICICI Securities, Edelweiss, Cox & Kings etc. It was an exquisite experience for all of us. We successfully completed our internship project and now we were equipped with industrial experience to add to our profile.

The third quarter of the year was again full of excitement since we were back to our classroom training and hostel. We had to choose our specialization subjects as we were offered dual specialization so we had to make our choice and initiate our domain knowledge learning. This term was exciting to everyone from the academic point of view as we were learning the subjects in which we were interested to advance in our career. Professors from IIM were visiting faculty for some subjects of HR and Finance. The end of the term examination concluded on 23rd September 2017 and we were all set to go for the International Study Tour to Malaysia sponsored by our college. It was a 7-day study tour planned to make us equipped with the international business practices and corporate and education culture.

The fourth quarter of the term started with full of positive spirit and enthusiasm after an end to an excellent trip to Malaysia which was full of experiential learning and excitement. With the introduction to subjects like International Finance, International Management, Service Marketing our Term 5 classes were full of learning opportunities from the faculty of the college as well as faculty from abroad like Prof Kalyan Chakravarty and Prof Prithwiraj Nath. After our mid-term examination, we were taken for ‘Outbound Leadership Practicum’ to Manali in October 2017 for 7 days during puja vacation. This was an ultimate experience where we were marked by ‘Travel arc’ our trip planner on every activities/task we were given by them to do. Our tasks were designed in a way to give shape to the leadership capabilities in us and make us realise our strengths and weaknesses. We did the treasure hunt in the jungle at night, camping in the forest in day-light, we lived in tents, struggled with cold, we did river-crossing, Burma-bridge walk, zip-lining, rappelling etc. The trip concluded with a lot of learning about our inner strengths and weaknesses. I was among the four Research Associate appointed by the college at the end of our first year of PGDM program in July 2017. So I was involved in research work in finance domain assisting my faculty guide Prof Indranil Ghosh and our principal Dr Tamal Dutta Chaudhuri. I along with my colleague Sayan Satvaya wrote a research paper titled ‘Establishing the relationship between Business Efficiency and Business Sustainability- A Study on Indian Companies’. We participated in the 3rd International Conference on Economic and Sustainable Development in Mysore at SDM Institute of Management. So we travelled to Mysore in November 2017 represent our college and present our paper at the conference at SDMIMD, Mysore. We were obliged to hear from the eminent speakers who gathered from around the world to deliver there thought in respect on the topic of the conference. Almost all the paper were from the PhD students and only 4-5 papers were there from management students. We learnt about the contribution of researchers to our society and the need of good research work to be done with the fruitful recommendation to the Indian industry for a sustainable growth. We presented our paper and explored Mysore concluding our trip to Karnataka from Bengaluru airport to Kolkata.

In this way year 2017 concluded with a lot of experiential learning and industry exposure. With this, we are looking forward to the year 2018 with lots of hope and expectations since it is the outset stage of our career which has to be initiated with placement offers and apply our learning in the field of work with diligence and responsiveness.

With Warm Wishes.

Happy New Year to all!

Monday 25 December 2017

Survival of the fittest: Sustainability the biggest Challenge

Article by : Prof. Sanjana Mondal, Assistant Professor, Calcutta Business School

Natural selection is the idea for survival is not only true for species but also for the value offered in the market by its producer or manufacturer. Species that acquire adaptations that are favourable for their environment will pass down those adaptations to their offspring, similarly if the producer fail to adapt the changing environment of business and adjust themselves they will be out of the rat race. Eventually, only manufacturers/producers with those favourable adaptations will survive and that is how the offering and marketing concepts changes over time or evolves through speciation, i.e. generation of newer form of ideas, concepts, forms etc.

We often mistake by understanding “natural selection” and easily mean really is, "fittest" that means the best physical specimen or evidence of the manufacturer/ brand/product or service that is only those with the strong capital, best network, best strategy, best manpower , huge market share etc. will survive in nature or natural business environment.

But that is not always the case. The products/services/ brands/companies that survive are not always the strongest, fastest, or smartest or the best shape, size, looks, design, priced etc. Therefore, "survival of the fittest" may not be the best way to describe what natural selection really is as it applies to evolution. Rather “survival of the fittest” necessarily means the degree of adaptability that leads to sustainability.

The two biggest unexpected failure of the market leaders Kodak and Nokia could site a perfect example in this context. Kodak the leading film manufacturer just washed off the market not because of its competitors or not because they did not had the capacity to fight back the competition but because they were unable to capitalize on the invention for fear of cannibalizing existing product sales. They were resistant to change in the filmless digital technology. Though its digital camera invention was held back but because of management’s concerns about the negative impact on film sales they could not bring that out in the market. They actually failed to feel the changing pulse which Sony perfectly did. When Sony launched a filmless digital camera in 1981, fear permeated Kodak’s executive suite. Specifically, over the next decade, Kodak invested approximately “$5 billion—or 45% of its R&D budget—in digital imaging,” according to a 2005 Harvard Business School case study. Unfortunately, with disruptive technologies such as digital cameras, the firstmover advantage is too great for late entrants to overcome. By the time Kodak realized that their razor-blade business model was dead, the horses were already out of the barn. The company was unable to catch-up to the competition.

Similarly for Nokia, its demise in a short span of time less than even five years is a prime example to learn form. It’s a perfect example that reflects the fatal consequences of adaptation failure or inability to react to upcoming innovation from outside industry. The sudden downfall of the top rank dominant phone company aroused interest among researchers to find the answers for the questions like how did it happen? And can this happen to others as well? After the extensive research there are five major factors that came out as the relevant factors but most important connect between them is again indicating towards adaptation failure.

Therefore sustainability is the biggest challenge, survival in short run does not ensure fitness. Fitness in long run can be achieved only through adaptability and hence that survival is sustainable. Cadbury is the perfect example that explains this theory.

Importance of SHE : She walks, She inspires, She leads

Article by : Mr. Harsh Bansal, Student Batch 2017–19, Calcutta Business School

India is my country, my motherland (Bharat Mata). I love it and I am proud of it. Everyone says this thing but do they really mean it? It is doubtful. This doubt arose in my mind due to a conversation between 2 ladies who were upset because in their family a baby-girl was born. After seeing their expression I was shocked. On one side people says Bharat Mata ki Jai and on another side they say girl child is a liability.

India is the land of Traditions, Conceptions, Misconceptions and a lot more. Here there is a common misconception among many families that the Girl Child is a liability or a punishment or a curse to the family.

God has given life to nature and human being. Each and every birth of life brings happiness in surroundings then it may be birth of human or animal or environment. Child is a gift of God and only some human are blessed with it. Then either a baby girl or a baby boy S/he should be welcomed with a lot of happiness.

India is a religious nation which too much believes in God. Lakshmi Maa - the goddess of wealth, Saraswati Maa - the goddess of education and Durga Maa - the killer of evil. In India where on one side a girl child is considered as Goddess Lakshmi but on the other side it is considered as a liability or as a curse to the family. There is a lot of misconception in people that a girl is a liability to the family. When we worship a goddess with high respect and devotion then we should be happy at the time of birth of the baby girl.

Times waits for no one. Times have changed, we are moving into a new era, where we are achieving and developing drastically. But the only thing that remains the same is the way daughters are looked down upon in the society. Women are always considered to be inferior to men. She is always looked down upon, while the son of the house is considered to be the asset or gift or treasure or diamond for the family.

A girl has to face many challenges in her life starting from she has to bear the pointing fingers of society which are always ready to degrade her moral and image. She has to listen the scolding of her family and relatives for one or the other reason. Then next is she may have to sacrifice her studies due to low income of family as girl child’s education is not considered important because after marriage they have the job of becoming house wife.

I considered Dowry as one of the many causes for exploitation of women. Dowry custom has been a curse in Indian society. It has proved to be a greatest curse for the poor classes of India. Sometimes the girls commit suicide when their in-laws persecute them to bring more and more money from their parents. Sometimes the greedy husbands along with their parents also kill their wives, when they are not given huge dowry. From the birth till death girl only sacrifices & suffers pain.

Today we are in 21st century; girls are progressing in each and every field. We have so many examples where women have proved that if they are given an opportunity they are no less than any man. Kalpana Chawla, Saniya Mirza, Siana Nehwal, Phogat Sisters, Mary Kom, Pratibha Patil, P.T Usha, Kiran Bedi, and many more. The list will be endless of the girls who have proved their mettle in their respective arena. Girls are equally talented and if compared in many fields much better, superior and well ahead of men. Women are treated equally with men. Now women are free and are liberated from their ancient roles as housewives.

However in some places thousands of females are dehumanized by whoredom and therefore the trafficking of girls and youngsters. It exploits and violates the rights of girls within the developing world. Sexual exploitation, which incorporates sex commercial enterprise, temporary marriages, and sexual violence like rape and sexual harassment, has increased throughout the twenty first century and has become a huge concern. It has been rightly said that the condition of a nation can be judged by looking at the status of its woman.

As people say God could not be everywhere so he created women to play his different roles in form of your mother, sister, daughter, wife or a friend. So that's why she holds multiple avatars. Respect her and love her that is what just she needs from you nothing else.

Many people think Girl Child is a boon or blessing to them but many still think that she is a curse to them or their family. But they have proved that they are equal in every sphere of life and have reached the skies of success. Today is the high time we should raise our voice against the evil misconception that are against the girl child. Our little contribution will support to save a girl child. And make her feel that she is a boon, not a curse to the society and realize their family the importance of her.

Financial Inclusion in India: Initiatives and Achievements

Article by : Prof. Paromita Dutta, Assistant Professor, Finance, Calcutta Business School

With the progress of the Indian economy, especially when the focus is on the achievement of sustainable development, there must be an attempt to include maximum number of participation from all the sections of the society. But the lack of awareness and financial literacy among the rural population of the country is hindering the growth of the economy as majority of the population does not have access to formal credit.

RBI has been pursuing the goal of financial inclusion for a long time. RBI’s financial inclusion efforts can be traced back to the 1960s when the focus was on channelizing of credit to the neglected sectors of the economy and weaker sections of the population. While the Government of India nationalized the banking operations of few commercial banks in two tranches in 1969 and 1980; RBI also took initiatives like laying down priority sector lending requirements for banks, Lead Bank Scheme, establishment of Regional Rural Banks (RRBs-1975-76), Service Area Approach (1989), Self-Help Group Bank Linkage Programme (1989-90), setting up of Local Area Banks etc., all aimed at making available benefits of banking services to the masses.

The penetration of financial services in the rural areas of India is still very low. The factors responsible for this condition can be looked at from both supply side and demand side and the major reason for low penetration of financial services is, probably, lack of supply. The reasons for low demand for financial services could be low income level, lack of financial literacy, other bank accounts in the family, etc. On the other hand, the supply side factors include no bank branch in the vicinity, lack of suitable products meeting the needs of the poor people, complex processes and language barriers. On the supply side, absence of technology was a major impediment as it restricted expansion of banking services to far flung areas of the country comprising of 600 thousand plus villages. In the absence of technology, developing a cost-effective delivery model also remained a challenge.

Since 2006, RBI has adopted a planned and structured approach to address the issues of financial inclusion. RBI’s approach has been to focus both on the demand as well as on the supply side. This has in a large way been possible due to the availability of technology and its gradual adoption within the banking processes.

Some measures and consequent achievements which have been taken by RBI are given below:
  • Institutionalization of the framework of Banking Correspondents (BCs) has been a major step towards enhancing access of banking services. RBI advocated a combination of ‘Brick and Mortar’ structure with ‘Mouse and Click’ technology for extending financial inclusion in geographically dispersed areas.
  • The banks were mandated to open at least 25 per cent of their new branches in unbanked rural centers. Taking into account the difficulties encountered by common people in meeting the ‘Know Your Customer (KYC)’ requirements for opening bank accounts, several measures were taken.
  • RBI has granted in-principle approval to some entities to set up differentiated banks namely “Small Finance Banks” (SFBs) and “Payments Banks” to further accelerate the financial inclusion process in the country.
  • Banks in India have been mandated to set up Financial Literacy Centers (FLCs) for extending financial literacy.
  • No-frill accounts introduced by RBI in November 2005 to provide access to basic baking services to financially excluded peoples.
Banks issue Kisan Credit cards (KCCs) as smart cards to the farmers for providing timely and adequate credit support from single window banking system for their farming needs.
  • RBI also issues General Purpose Credit Card (GCC) which facilitate credit up to Rs.25000/- without any collateral requirement for rural and semi urban people based on assessment of household cash flows. Now as per the revised guidelines in Dec.‟2013 under this approach bank also fulfill Non- farm entrepreneurial credit requirement of individuals (e.g. Artisan Credit card, Laghu Udyami Card, Swarojgar Credit Card, Weaver‟s Card etc). There will be no ceiling on the loan amount as long as the loan is for the purpose of non-farm entrepreneurial activity and is otherwise eligible for classification as priority sector.
  • The SLBP or Self Help Group – Bank Linkage Program has been the major institutional based innovation in India for enabling access and covering the gap of reaching financially excluded population of the country in the last two decades. In this model, the banks involve themselves with a group of local people with the idea of enabling them to pool up their savings. The same is deposited with the bank against which the bank also provides a certain amount of credit facility. The group takes a decision to whether to lend to any member of the group. The bank provides the framework, accounting services and support to the group to manage their deposits and lending.
  • One of the most remarkable developments in terms of innovation in order to harness the full power of technology, the banks have tied up with mobile operators to provide financial services like bill and utility payment, fund transfer, ticket booking, shopping etc through mobile banking. Some examples of this model are m-Pesa by Vodafone and Airtel Money.
  • In some states, the state government has taken initiatives for providing kiosk based model for access to financial services. Also banks have used the technology to enable their ATMs to virtually act like a 24x7 branches.
  • In Aadhar enabled payment services, any Indian citizen having an Aadhaar number updates his account with the same. All accounts having aadhaar number updated are to be reported to RBI, which in turn reports it to various government departments.
  • Some of the leading banks have come up with this concept where there would be an online system with chat facility assisting the person to make use of various electronic machines for depositing and withdrawing cash and cheques, which can be termed as Branchless Banking.
Table 1: Progress made under financial inclusion plans – as on September 2016 (Scheduled commercial banks including RRBs)
Particulars Year ended Year ended Half year ended#
March 2010 March 2016 September 2016
Banking Outlets in Rural locations – Branches 33,378 51,830 52,240
Banking Outlets in Rural locations – Branchless mode 34,316 534,477 537,609
Urban Locations covered through BCs 447 102,552 91,039
BSBDA-Through branches (No. in million) 60.2 238.2 247.4
BSBDA-Through branches (Amt. in ` billion) 44.3 474.1 537.9
BSBDA-Through BCs (No. in million) 13.3 230.8 247.8
BSBDA-Through BCs (Amt. in ` billion) 10.7 164.0 181.1
BSBDA-Total (No. in million) 73.5 469.0 495.2
BSBDA Total (Amt. in ` billion) 55.0 638.1 719.0
OD facility availed in BSBDAs (No. in million) 0.2 8.0 8.4
OD facility availed in BSBDAs (Amt. in ` billion) 0.1 14.8 18.1
KCCs -Total (No. in million) 24.3 47.3 46.4
KCCs -Total (Amt. in ` billion) 1,240.1 5,130.7 5,543.4
GCC-Total (No. in million) 1.4 11.3 11.5
GCC-Total (Amt. in ` billion) 35.1 1,493.3 1,613.2
ICT-A/Cs-BC- Total number of transactions (in million) * 26.5 826.8 550.6
ICT-A/Cs-BC- Total amount of transactions ( in ` billion) * 6.9 1,686.9 1,199.2
Source: Report on Trend and Progress on Banking in India as on half-yearly ended September, 2016
References:
  1. https://rbidocs.rbi.org.in/rdocs/.../MFI101213FS.pdf, Financial Inclusion in India – An Assessment, assistance provided by Shri M. Sreeramulu, AGM, DNBS.
  2. https://iimb.ac.in/research/.../WP%20No.%20474, Financial Inclusion in India: Select Issues, Working paper no. 474, August 2014.
  3. https://rbidocs.rbi.org.in/.../PDFs/FII240916C9952578..., Financial Inclusion in India – The Journey so far and the Way Ahead, Address delivered by Shri S. S. Mundra, Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India at the BRICS Workshop onFinancial Inclusion in Mumbai on September 19, 2016.

Saturday 23 December 2017

RURAL ELECTRIFICATION CORPORATION – A GOOD BUY?

Article by : Prof. Tamal Datta Chaudhuri, Principal, Calcutta Business School,

Rural Electrification Corporation has a net worth of Rs.33326 crore, has a turnover of around Rs.23000 crore and a net profit of around Rs.6200 crore. It has a Price/Book value per Share of 1 and a P/E multiple of around 4.64. It has healthy track record of dividend payment and consistent profitability.

Figure 1 indicates that from 2014 to 2017, the trend line is flat, and after trending for some time, prices have fallen. It is trading way below the 200 DMA (red) and 100 DMA (blue), and the current price has intersected the 30 DMA (green) from above. The stock is currently in a bear grip and for me, it is good time to enter the stock.

Figure 1



From an oversold position, Figure 2 indicates that MACD is still giving sell signal and RSI went below the 30 level. It is an ideal time to buy the stock. Parabolic SAR also is giving buy indications. We will never be able to time entry into a stock, but given the indicators, the current price looks attractive for buy.

Figure 2



Figure 3

Supply Chain Management Beyond 2020: Implications for Talent Acquisition

Article by : Prof. Sanjib Biswas, Assistant Professor (Area: Operations Management), Calcutta Business School

Supply Chain Management has been playing a pivotal role in enabling organizations to gain competitive advantage for last few decades. Irrespective the nature of business, organizations have recognized the importance of achieving excellence in supply chain management. However, the future supply chain leaders shall need to take appropriate strategy to sustain in VUCA world wherein organizations need to handle with intelligent supply chains while striving equilibrium among triple bottom lines. Future supply chains needs to counter disruptions from natural disasters to the global credit freeze, adapt to rapid and critical changes and be capable to promise. In true sense this transformation calls for forward thinking spread across a multi-year horizon starting from today. Success of supply chain operations beyond 2020 shall largely depend on how fast they respond to the market needs even before it arises through disruptive innovations and supreme level of transparency and connectivity among the partners. Doing such, organizations can ensure real time visibility across all nodal points in a supply chain or extended enterprise per se and in effect, can reduce time to market, capital expenditure and mitigate risks. In this context, Jeff Dobbs, global sector chair, Diversified Industrials at KPMG, mentioned

“Moving toward a demand-driven supply chain is probably the single most important step a global manufacturer can take today. When implemented well, a demand-driven supply chain establishes a responsive flow of product all the way from the end customer up to the furthest upstream supplier. The demand-driven supply chain is more responsive to changes in customer behavior.”

However, it posits a significant challenge as far as acquisition of talent is concerned. Along with need to grow at a faster rate with disruptive innovations, organizations find evolving nature of job roles and skill requirements. The recruiters are confronted with the challenge to design competitive job descriptions in tune with changing nature of business operations particularly in the domain of supply chain management. Next generation supply chains expect that employees need to be aligned with the broad strategic requirements of the organization, adaptable to new technologies and build requisite futuristic skill sets for remaining relevant and competitive.

Rodney Apple, founder of the SCM Talent Group. Employment agency in Asheville, North Carolina mentioned that

“Many students coming up through our educational ranks don’t even know what supply chain is or they perceive supply chain as a blue collar industry where you either drive freight trucks or load and unload them at a warehouse dock….. Many companies haven’t taken the initiative to develop best-in-class talent acquisition resources and programs. Companies that perform the best are the ones that treat the recruiting department like a strategic, value-added program versus a low-level, tactical HR cost center. In addition, many companies are being too strict and inflexible with their hiring requirements. Instead of defining the job when they write out their job descriptions, they focus on defining the candidate by listing out a ridiculously long and unrealistic list of skills and qualifications that the “ideal candidate” must have to be “qualified”.”

Over the last two decades, organizations have witnessed enormous changes in the way the supply chain are being managed. With the development in information and communication technology (ICT) area, organizations, particularly supply chains have provided with unprecedented opportunities. We are experiencing Industry 4.0 now which has redefined business operations as it advocates for human-machine interactions and rapid digitization. Development of smart cities, increasing use of Internet of Things (IoT) in managing business operations, sensors, smart objects and networks have led to smart and intelligent supply chain management. Supply chains are flooded with data and being operated by automated machines and instruments. The point is how one can draw actionable insight out of this gigantic amount of data in structured, semi-structured and unstructured format and provide innovative solutions for meeting customers’ needs. In addition, designing and understanding automated operations and managing them, clearly demands for advanced skill sets, flexibility and innovative minds. The supply chain managers no longer needs to manage materials and fund only, they need to know how to use information as a strategic asset, they need to manage people as well as machines, they need to understand untold requirements of customers and subsequently translate them into technical requirements for designing, developing and delivering appropriate solutions to customers. In other words, supply chain professionals should inculcate creativity and advanced analytical capabilities in themselves. In this context, Jim Rice, deputy director of MIT’s Center for Transportation and Logistics, contended that,

“We often think about cool and sexy technologies changing our supply chains, but it really looks like the work we have been doing in supply chains forever, basically doing things that reduce costs, cut cycle times and/or improve quality. A lot of time people expect supply chain innovation to disrupt an industry but 98% of the time, the process changes are not nearly as disruptive as the smartphone was for the mobile phone world. Instead, most of the innovations in the supply chain give you incremental improvement and are what Clay Christensen calls sustaining innovations…. Companies may need people with different skills – for sustaining innovation, you need people who can refine a process, finding improvements on an ongoing basis. It’s a different kind of person though who can completely re-vision the supply chain process, seeing the possible big changes. They tend not to get caught up in what won’t work, but instead can see what could work. Both are needed, but the latter are needed for disruptive innovation.”

Further, while you are operating with data in a shared and connective manner, question of security and privacy also demands attentions. Researches are being made significantly in the area of cryptography. Of late, we have witnessed increasing use of the crypto-currency aka Bitcoin while transferring funds. The Blockchain technology is re-defining supply chain operations. Some of skill sets which would be desirable for supply chain professionals in addition to fundamental knowledge on supply chain management are: artificial intelligence, machine learning, deep learning, cryptography, digital manufacturing techniques, cloud computing, ERP based operations, Big Data management etc. In fact, it’s not the tool or technique, rather, it’s the human capability to design, develop and manage those tools and techniques which will decide the success or failure or supply chains, more comprehensively organizations. Hence, proper talent acquisition shall be a key factor. In this context, it is also not desirable to forget the lessons learnt from the Sociotechnical Systems approach to organizational development developed by Eric Trist and his colleagues at the Tavistock Institute. For acquiring appropriate talent, organizations need to develop their future employees. Hence, the role of HR managers as well as supply chain managers would be very critical tomorrow in a sense that, they will not only be required to spot and acquire requisite talent but also they will have to predict talent requirement for future operations and gear to develop that.

References:
1. Deloitte Survey (2015) “Supply Chain Talent of the Future: Findings from the Third Annual Supply Chain Survey”.

2. Kate Lee (2016) “Hiring Supply Chain Talent: What to Look For”

3. Kate Lee (2014) “ How to solve the supply chain talent crisis: a supply chain recruiter shares his ideas”

4.Gary Forger (2017) “Next Gen Supply Chain: The Next Gen Interview”, an interview of Jim Rice, deputy director of MIT’s Center for Transportation and Logistics.

5. Beth Platow (2015) “Talent-retention and succession planning for the supply chain”

6. Biswas, S. and Sen, J. (2016). “A Proposed Architecture for Big Data Driven Supply Chain Analytics”. The IUP Journal of Supply Chain Management. XIII (3), 7-33. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.21458.96966.

**IMPORTANCE OF BRANDING AND BRAND MANAGEMENT IN 21st CENTURY**

Article by : Dr. Suman Kumar Dawn, Associate Professor, Calcutta Business School

Branding or Brand is considered important not only for companies but they carry equal importance for customers or consumers also. From consumer or customer point of view, brand becomes important for various reasons. Brand for a customer will indicate commitment towards quality from sellers there by reducing time spent in coming to a purchase decision. Brand for companies will indicate a sort of benchmark in quality as well as customer expectation, a point of differentiation from competitors and a steady stream of profit.

Normally we associate branding from point of view common mass; and products or service displayed in malls and supermarket. However there exists another market where branding is equally important and that is business to business market (B2B). This is referred as corporate branding, which is again a challenge as decision making process for purchase order is different compare to individual customer. Here survival of organization as well as individual will be at stake. The key lies in developing a brand for corporation.

During the past decade, we have experienced dramatic changes in our world socially, economically, and politically We also experienced major re-engineering of large firms and the evolution from the traditional corporate structure to the virtual corporation. Modern globalized, technology driven world has thrown new challenges to branding. Customers/consumers have more access to information than ever before. Internet has become a strong tool through which product information proliferate raising expectation bar for companies. Companies have responded to this challenge by exploring new avenues to showcase their products. Like for example; sponsorship of events and teams or association with social cause.

In a given market, innumerable products and services are offered by different companies. The identity developed for this product and services over a period of time, through marketing strategies, sturdy performance etc is referred to as brand. A stage is reached where brand become synonymous with product e.g. - coffee-Starbucks, Nescafe, Amul, Maggi etc. This process is called strategic brand management.

With all these changes, it is clear that we are facing a new world order, a new way of running businesses, and a new way of living our personal lives. From a business perspective, the following are dramatic changes that have occurred in the past decade:

I. The pace is faster.
II. Businesses are instantly connected to their customers, suppliers, and distributors.
III. Globalization has produced a truly global marketplace.
IV. There is so much information available that corporations need to continually interpret it and turn this into useful “intelligence” for their corporation.

Brand Management after 1950
In the 1950s, consumer packaged goods companies like Procter and Gamble, General Foods and Unilever developed the discipline of brand management, or marketing as we know it today, when they noticed the quality levels of products being offered by competitors around them improve. A brand manager would be responsible for giving a product an identity that distinguished it from nearly indistinguishable competitors.

This required an understanding of the target consumer and what we call a "branded proposition" that offered not only functional but also emotional value. As long as the brand was perceived to offer superior value to its competitors, the company offering the brand could charge a little more for its products.

In the 1950s and 1960s, brands like Tide, Kraft and Lipton excelled in marketing activities (see above gallery), setting the benchmarks for all brands today. This marked the start of almost 50 years of marketing where "winning" was determined by understanding the consumer better than your competitors and the getting the total "brand mix" right. The brand mix is more than the logo, or the price of a product. It's also the packaging, the promotions, and the advertising, all of which is guided by precisely worded positioning statements.

But in the early 1990s, things started to change. The previous commoditization of product quality was followed by an almost equal push for build real brands. One by one the big retailers started to realize that they had an opportunity to also play the branding game and that by selling more, higher quality, but particularly better-branded products, they could not only dramatically improve their margin mix, but that they could raise the profile and reputation of their own brand as a whole. Therefore, retailers like Tesco, Waitrose and Sainsbury started hiring marketers from their suppliers like Unilever and P&G and today these companies and their portfolio of brands enjoy equal brand loyalty than any of the manufacturer brands they carry.

To build a strong brand, the marketers need sufficient expertise to impress people (reputation) and enough awareness (visibility) to achieve their regional, national or international ambitions.

There are five things that marketers can promote their product’s reputation:
1. Make expertise relevant. Promoting products or services may not be enough. Marketers need to understand the challenges of their target audiences face and communicate,.
2. Conduct research on target client: Proper research can provide true information that marketers need to make better decisions and address the challenges that are most important to prospective clients.
3. Be a customer, not a salesperson. They position themselves as customers, freely giving away knowledge and making themselves visible across multiple channels—in online search, social media, conferences, books and more.
4. Make expertise visible. Today's busy professionals access information through a variety of channels, so marketers’ must deliver their thinking in a variety of ways, such as educational blog posts, articles, videos etc.
5. SEO (Search Engine Optimisation): SEO has become a formidable marketing tool that gives a measure of control over how searchers find you online. By using SEO best practices marketers can promote content that people want to read that keeps them coming back for more.

Monday 18 December 2017

Service Quality – An Important Strategic Tool in Academics

Article by : Prof. Pinaki Ranjan Bhattacharyya, Associate Professor, Calcutta Business School

Quality has become an important strategic tool in the modern world as it ensures the viability of a business. Some prominent definitions include ‘conformance to requirements’ (Crosby, 1984), ‘fitness for use’ (Juran,1988) or ‘one that satisfies the customer’ (Eiglier and Langeard, 1976). Though initial efforts have been made to define quality in various forms, the present meaning of quality is meeting or exceeding customers’ expectations. Service Quality definition came into light when Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry (1985) emphasized that quality of manufacturing industry is largely different from services industry due to its inherent characteristics of intangibility, heterogeneity, perishability and inseparability. They stressed that services vary in their degree of intangibility with respect to lack of physical attributes of the actual service (outcome) and the lack of physical evidence of the process. Higher education is increasingly being recognised as a service industry. Therefore, this sector is emphasizing more on meeting the expectations and needs of its participating customers, that is, the students. Accordingly, Higher Education Institution's (HEI’s) therefore, try to assign more time and resources to enhance the quality of their pedagogical skills backed with industry exposure wherever necessary and practice to make them more interesting and application oriented, as perceived by the students. Management, as a stream of Higher Education and training has also acquired new dimensions in the last few decades. Since time immemorial, Indians are known to possess people, trained & well equipped with knowledge & intellect to tackle the problems which they face in the business world. Since B-schools are also a part of this service process, Indian B-schools are also likely to deliver the optimum in terms of quality. Moreover, globalization & liberalization has widened the scope and has encouraged entrepreneurs to venture into this industry to consolidate more in terms of business prospects rather than a social responsibility. It is in this context that the question of service quality comes into mind as education is primarily perceived by the stakeholders as a service sector. The challenges of operations and maintenance of quality has brought the B-Schools to a competitive level to showcase their ability in developing centres of excellence. But of late, Management Education is at the crossroads in terms of occupancy level as the number of seats on offer has increased significantly and several institutes at different tiers of B-Schools in India have not been able to train their students meet the requirements of corporate world. This is because, most of these Institutes are not focusing on Quality and excellence to identify a niche area which will differentiate them in terms of performance of their students at various corporate houses. A rigorous planning and strategic effort with an innovative curriculum from the educational institutes is the order of the day to create a brand in imparting quality education which may successfully help the industry in overcoming this problem.

  • Parasuraman A, Zeithaml V A and Berry LL (1985). “A Conceptual Model of Service Quality and Its Implications for Future Research,” Journal of Marketing, 49(Fall), pp 41-50
  • Eiglier P & Langeard E (1976) ‘Principe de Politique Marketing Pour les Enterprises de Service’, working paper of the Institute d’Administration des Enterprises Université d’Aix-Marseille
  • Three Experts on Quality Management: Philip B. Crosby , W. Edwards Deming, Joseph M. Juran, Total Quality Leadership Office, 1992

Is Rudeness is the new habit in our society?

Article by : Prof. Mukta Mukherjee, Assistant Professor, Calcutta Business School

The old proverb is that the habits die hard. Usually, an education brings some humbleness and politeness in a person, provided that the education is true in nature. Here true education does not mean in literal sense that whether the person has an education degree and to what extent but to what extent is that has been absorbed in true sense. As there is another proverb that empty vessels sound too much.

I will try to illustrate the above discussion with few facts that I have faced and led the readers decide who they consider educated in true sense and whether they consider a person polite behavior as their weakness. First, when I was almost in completion of my high school in a very reputed girls school in Kolkata where they charge exorbitant tuition fees for students and admission is difficult to obtain in such a school, a student was asked to get a duster from another class when the teacher found that the duster is not available, she flatly refused. On second occasion, when I was abroad to pursue my higher studies another Indian student who had already completed his Doctorate degree and on that occasion his parents were visiting his graduation ceremony made a visit to my apartment. While comparing notes on lifestyle of India and USA, the cold temperature of Delhi and USA were being compared. Then his mother stated that at-least it was a relief that she was getting warm water to do the dishes, and both son and father laughed that they at-least do not have to the dishes there because of the presence of their mother both in USA and India for his father(an IAS). Further, the son emphasized the fact his mother does not know what is a Doctoral Degree as she herself does not possess one. On a third occasion, I had seen the best student of our batch who had just got a tenure track Assistant Professorship job blurting out to my immediate advisor in a department talk that as he is not yet succeeded to a Professorial Position he does not know what is a Professor as such?

As all of knows that whatever goes around comes around also. The teachers in some case can also be rude too. In my opinion the situation is worse in that case as children imitate their parents we imitate our teachers consciously or unconsciously (as they also help to develop our up- bringing or develop our nature). This is purely mainly because in any educational institution the teacher and students spend a considerable time. I remember the Calcutta University Topper in Economics who was supposed to take some of our finance classes on monetary specialization, came and after self-introduction made a point that all the bright students have brain drain to either Delhi School of Economics or to Jawaharlal Nehru University and only the mediocre or below mediocre are remaining behind. Also, his immediate advisor of Doctoral degree was frustrated that the level of education in Calcutta University is comparable to that of Municipal Corporation School. I remember when I had to face an interview for my research job in Delhi the director learning that I had stood 8th rank in in http://M.Sc among 200 students in our batch, remarked that absorption rate of Economics in Calcutta University is that of a species.

The only hope that gives me when I saw that another male Chinese student who was very bright and couple of batch seniors wanted to pull my bag being a lady. His wife was a scholar from London School of Economics and he ultimately got a placement among the top university of China. The children’s in the street whose parents have a hard time to make their ends meet are trying to study on their own. Their so called tutor is just few years above their age is teaching them the study material. Although, the lights are not enough for them to study and can harm their young eyes when they are studying. Let’s, not forget that not all of us have the luxury to study and can enjoy our childhood. When you give them sweet or toffees they are very happy and have learnt to say thank you in many occasions unlike some of the adults who seek help from you to cross the road but do not say a thank you for the gesture.

I am a strong believer that a person politeness should not be considered his or her weakness. Therefore, if we are giving our sit to a senior citizen or our ex-teachers it should not be laughed out at either end. If we start take things for granted it usually blast at our face. At least a nice gesture should not be taken for granted then rudeness will become the alternative norm in the society. A tip I which is usually given to the job market candidates in best universities while hiring is that a thank you note should be written to people whose campus you are visiting. The department observes that how many of the fly-out candidates (people who are in the final round usually not more than three) write a thank you note. The purpose of a fly-out is to see whether a candidate should be absorbed in the campus as such. The small things make a big difference in a life. When life is short as such let’s make merry and enjoy it as such.

Marketing in 21st Century

Article by : Dr. Suman Kumar Dawn, Calcutta Business School

Marketing in the 21st century is very different from its early beginnings. Today's marketers have more choices in terms of support, media opportunities, and communications. They also have more competition from varied sources, especially as the Internet has made it possible for companies around the globe to compete virtually. The following are the major trends; shifts & challenges that the marketer and business people will need to take into consideration for formulating their Marketing strategies.

More Creative Options / Be Different
Technology has offered not only more options for sharing marketing messages, but more selections for creating these messages as well. Today's marketing personnel can use a range of tools to enhance communications through graphics, sound, and movement. The future will belong to those who manage uniqueness in their projects by being different. There is no point in trying to imitate others. In the current scenario, it is enough to be what you are and bring out the best in you. In the same way, companies that are different and innovative will be successful.

More Consumer Choices
More consumers’ choices in the 21st century mean more competition for businesses from many sources. The Internet, in particular, now allows even the smallest organization to establish a regional, national, or even international presence. Competition now comes not only from the business across the street, but also from across the world.

More Communication Choices
Marketers making the best use of social networking, online communications and digital opportunities are building bridges and connections that will prove fruitful in the coming years. Embracing new and emerging technologies hopefully rather than fearfully will position their organisation for the future rather than relying on out-dated marketing models that worked before but that are being quickly overtaken by those more cost effective and real-time. The 21st century offers many choices for marketing communications. Companies still have apply the traditional tools, such as newspapers, radio, and television, but also have a wide range of online tools, including social media.

Social Media Streamlines Word-of-Mouth
Word-of-mouth has always been an important factor in successful marketing efforts, but social media makes this method even more effectively. Consumers have the ability to interact with millions of people in the 21st century, in sharp contrast to the days when information sharing was minimal.
Digital revolution and 21st century have made companies fine tune the way they conduct their business. One major trend observed is the need of stream lining internal processes with the focus on cost reduction through outsourcing. Another trend observed in companies is, encouragement to entrepreneur style of work environment with glocal (global-local) approach. At the same time, marketers of companies are looking forward to building long term relationship with consumers. Marketers are looking at distribution channels as partners in business and not as the customer. Ultimately, successful marketing is about identifying a target market, understanding its needs, and communicating the business' compelling messages through multiple channels. These marketing messages all convey how consumer needs can be met by the business' products and services.

Saturday 16 December 2017

Sustaining Development of Libraries with TQM approach

Article by : Mr. Atanu Ganguly, Assistant Librarian, Calcutta Business School, Kolkata

Introduction
Library in the 21st century has started to focus towards customer satisfaction which can be done only by providing quality products and services to its customer. Every organization in present scenario can survive only by continuous development of their product and services. Library by nature is committed to provide quality service to its customer and this can be done by applying tools of total quality management. The application of total quality management can change the thought process of every library and ensure right things are done in right way and at the right time. Here in this paper we are going to discuss various components of total quality management and how it can benefit library and its users in the long term.

Concept of Total Quality Management:
Total quality management is simply the process towards the attainment of excellence by creating the best possible attitudes to achieve customer satisfaction by efficiency and effectiveness. It is a philosophy of thought that is for continuous improvement through participation at all levels of functions in a process. Oakland (1989) defines “Total Quality Management (TQM) is an approach to improving effectiveness and flexibility of a business as a whole. It is essentially a way of organizing and involving the whole organizations, every department, every activity and every single person at every level. TQM ensures that the management adopt a strategic overview of quality and focus on preventing rather than inspections”. Total quality management is a combination of three words Total+Quality+Management as follows:

Total: Everyone in the organization participates in creation and maintenance the quality of the services and the products offered.

Quality: Organization develops a standard policy or systems focusing on meeting the need and recognizing that customer perception identities quality.

Management: The system and the people are put in harmony towards continuously improvement of the process in order to achieve the best results.

Why TQM in library?
TQM represents a new age in the management of an organization. TQM can be effectively used in providing services to user. Current awareness service (CAS), Selective dissemination of information (SDI), Interlibrary Loan, access to national and international database through internet or other network (like DELNET, INFLIBNET), reprography service, attending reference queries and reference services over phone, fax or personal contact, indexing and abstracting periodicals, subject bibliography etc, all which can be enriched by TQM. TQM can be used in creating information awareness and consciousness among the users and reaching out to the potential users. TQM is at present not emerging as one of the management technique, but also felt very essential by several organizations and disciplines.

Strategy of TQM:
The total quality management assures that in all aspects within the library are organized and involved in maintaining operational policy which in turn can act as a control measure to ensure quality services without waiting for reporting deficiency presented after complaining received from the users or noticed by the committee members. The following steps may be formulated to overcome such situation:
-Spell out a quality policy for library
-Select or re-orient the functional head who is committed to set everything in order.
-Ensure performances from grass root level (from lowest post in library)
-Introduce communicate systems for spreading awareness
-Effort initiated must be continuous in nature.

Implementing TQM in library:
1. Leadership: Library purchase books, journals, other materials from its vendors and also subscribe to various online products and which requires reasonable maintenance and commitment so as to reduce customer dissatisfaction towards it. Quality leadership is perceived when commitment from all stakeholders is encouraged and knowledge base platform is created to deliver improvement in all dimensions. It can be established only when personal responsibility is there on the part of leadership.

2. Commitment: The key factor in implementing TQM is total commitment of librarian. The vision and mission of the library is inducted among the staffs through proper quality policy. Librarian should understand the issues involved and established policies to determine the long term goals. A typical library has the sections cells like acquisition, circulation, technical, reference, online resources, audio-visual, reprographic, documentation etc. and each section should have a policy which will guide and help to carry out their activities efficiently.

3. Recognition & Rewards: Recognition is a motivational process and also acknowledging the contribution of employees. It helps to improve cultural change in the organization and TQM itself is a quest for excellence. Librarian should look that its staffs should recognized for their individual contribution and equal privileges and respects along with other employees of the organization.

4. Education & Training: The librarian should provide education and training for all staff as a part of successful implementation of TQM. It will help them to understand the fundamentals of policy and create awareness so that they can help in building a system to achieve the ultimate objective of the library systems. It also develops the knowledge base and required skill that to needed to overcome certain barriers.

5. Customer Orientation: Since library has turn to be a service center, user is actually the customer and to satisfy them is only the main purpose for its existence. By applying TQM techniques library can be enlightened by giving quality service to customer and achieve it by breakthrough performance, invention, innovation and creativity.

6. Team work & Employee Empowerment: A particular work can be achieved more effectively when people work in team. One more advantage is that inter-personal conflicts are minimized and “much more can be gained at less expense”. Another traditionally accepted view is that the people who know most about what is right or wrong in the work are those who actually do the work. The librarian should give both responsibility and authority to the staff thus by empowering them. The most effective method of employee empowerment are the establishment of improvement team and use of feedback of employee suggestion systems.

7. Feedback Mechanisms: For real success of TQM programs feedback from both external and internal peoples are required. Library must take initiative to gain the information from its stakeholders. Library should develop a formal feedback systems and avoid such situation like no complaint-no problems.

8. Statistical Process Control (SPC): Adaptation of SPC in all the activities of library is also a part of TQM as they can help to reach to the root causes of the problems. Librarian should adopting plan-do-check-act cycle to improve the quality continuously as follows:

Plan- what library is going to do?
Do- what library has planned?
Check- on the result of library’s outcome
Act- to modify what library plan to do and ensures most positive result.

Conclusion:
Quality is an important tool for application of TQM in library system. It can be measured, managed and improved the customer satisfaction. TQM introduce a new cultural change which is lively to bring about greater participation of the employee to achieve the goals and objectives of the library. The success of TQM will vary from library to library. Libraries are the suitable to implement TQM for better library environment. It is well known that TQM is a management method by which each and every library can benefit. By formulating a strategic plan method and following it with a commitment to continuous quality improvement, library managers can transform and improve their organizations. The main purpose of TQM is the continual focusing on the users servicing and the satisfaction of their demand.

Reference Source:
  1. Negi, Ashok Singh & Srivastava, J. P. (2015). Total quality management (TQM) and its application in academic library and information centers. International Journal in Management and Social Science, Vol.03 Issue-02, (February, 2015), 676-688.
  2. Bhatt, S. (2012). Total quality management: An effective approach for library system. International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology, 2(4), 266-269.
  3. Dash, Jyotirmoy (2008). Total quality management: a perspective approach. 6th International CALIBER -2008, University of Allahabad, Allahabad, February 28-29 & March 1, 2008 © INFLIBNET Centre, Ahmadabad, 414-419.
  4. Mohanty, R. P. & Lakhe, R. R. (2006), Total quality management in service sector. 2nd ed., Kolkata: Jaico Publication, ISBN 81-7224-953-5

Workplace Counselling: A Growing Trend

Article by : Prof. Nitu Singhi, Assistant Professor, Calcutta Business School, Kolkata

Counselling at workplace is a way of the organization to care about its employees. Counselling helps the employee to share and look at his problems from a new perspective, help himself and to face and deal with the problems in a better way. In today's fast-paced corporate world, there is virtually no organization free of stress or stress-free employees. Apart from their personal problems, there are various reasons which can create stress for the employees at the workplace like unrealistic targets or work-load, constant pressure to meet the deadlines, career problems, responsibility and accountability, conflicts or bad inter-personal relations with superiors and subordinates, problems in adjusting to the organizational culture.

Generally, in any organization an average of about 10% of the employees are incapacitated by acute or chronic personal problems such as family and marital problems, financial difficulties, legal problems, drug and alcohol abuse, emotional upsets or career problems. All these will affect work performance. Studies also show that employees have three times as many accidents, four times the rate of absenteeism, make more health insurance claims and more likely to make mistakes at their work and take more sick leave, under such circumstances. All in all, this will add on to the loss of work time and productivity for the organization.

Organizations, therefore have realized the importance of having a stress-free yet motivated and capable workforce. Many companies have integrated the counseling services in their organizations and making it a part of their culture. Employee counseling can be explained as providing help and support to the employees to face and sail through the difficult times in life. Counseling is guiding, consoling, advising and sharing and helping to resolve their problems whenever the need arises.

A systematic study by McLeod (2010) showed that workplace counselling interventions have been found to reduce sickness absence rates in organizations by as much as 50%. This fact alone demonstrates the cost-effective nature of counselling, and the positive impact it can have on an organization’s productivity.

Technically, Workplace Counselling may focus on work performance but its emphasis is more on a problem solving approach, which is concerned with the discussion and analysis of problems and issues that affect an employee’s work performance in an attempt to find solutions.

Recently counselling is seen by the HR managers as a way of enhancing mental as well as emotional health of the employees in the organization. Counselling is meant to enable people to do as the world changes around them and improves the morale of the workforce because it shows concern for staff. More tangibly it enables employers to gain from their staff’s hidden talents and interests.

The HR managers have understood that counselling enhances the loyalty of the employees as they feel they are cared and listened to in a supportive environment which ultimately results in their commitment to organizational goals and job performance. Hence including counselling as one of the HR practices will helps in regaining the self-esteem and motivation of the employees, reduces the levels of workplace conflict, stress and moreover, workplace miscommunication. Counselling involves not only a good talking but thinking, understanding human nature and having compassion and kindness on the part of the manager for his problem worker.

Employers are turning to counselling as one way of helping to manage the mammoth changes taking place in organizations. Change is never easy: it disrupts, disorientates, causes grievances, and takes time. Support is needed for employees and teams as transition in organizations are managed. Employees do not leave their problems aside as they turn to face their working day. Eventually the organization will face financial costs of psychological and social problems. Counselling helps employees to deal with a variety of problems and if left unattended may and do affect performance in the working environment, a variety of which may lead to employee termination. If they successfully practice it they can cut down on costs associated with recruitment and training.

Conclusion:
More and more organizations are becoming aware that existing employees are truly their best assets and acknowledge the fact many employees seek to understand their personal characteristics, strengths and weaknesses which would help them meet and satisfy their future development needs that would satisfy their short and long term financial objectives. Employee counselling therefore is a very powerful tool in the hands of companies in attracting and retaining quality workforce.

“It’s better to take care of your employees in order to take care of your business.”


References
• Mcloed, J & Henderson. M. (2003). Does workplace counseling work? Retrieved from, Does workplace counselling work? Eisenberg and Delaney. Retrived from, http://www.citehr.com/26074-employee-counselling overview.html.
•McLeod J (2010). “Counselling in the workplace: the facts. A systematic study of the research evidence”. BACP.
• Pranati Raheja ,Employee Counselling – An overview

•Peter Tong Hing Tham (1998).Employee counselling programme in Malaysian workplace

HR Analytics : The next BIG thing

Article by : Prof. Padmavathy Dhillon, Assistant Professor, Calcutta Business School, Kolkata

Over the years HR has gained bad reputation in organization as the function that generates only expenses and has little or negligible effect on the organization’s performance. While in reality HR is one of the prime areas that have a major bearing on the performance of any organization. In order to fix this misconception regarding HR in the minds of employees of an organization, there is a pressing need for HR function to demonstrate its real worth by showcasing the worth of the value delivered by its services. As of now there is a dearth of means via which the real impact of the human resource activities could be assessed.

Human resource need to go beyond the usual qualitative and subjective measures like “least likely” “good”, “most preferred” etc. Jac Fitz- Enz, a well-known human resource expert, suggested that its high time that HR learn how to speak in quantitative and objective terms i.e. by making use of numbers to indicate the value addition done by the HR function. Other functions like marketing, finance, operations have been quite ahead in embracing numbers or to be more precise in using “analytics” to depict the value delivered by their verticals. HR is the only function that is lagging behind despite having access to a huge repository of employee data. With the widespread popularity of big data and ubiquitous demand of analytics everywhere, it has in fact now become a necessity for human resource to take a plunge in this direction.
People analytics can be defined as the application of mathematics, statistics and modeling to employee-related data to investigate and predict patterns. People analytics, also known as HR analytics or talent analytics and in some cases work-force analytics, is analysis that is used to make better and informed decisions with regard to all facets of HR strategy in order to improve business performance. The use of HR analytics can be varied; HR analytics has been used in predicting the accurate future demand of staff in organization or improving the levels of employee satisfaction by finding the reasons behind their dissatisfaction, performance measurement, compensation etc. By all this means, HR analytics tools help organizations in aligning their strategic business goals with HR metrics.

Google - one of the most successful organizations of recent times has taken the help of people analytics to create a way to achieve corporate greatness. The main tenet of “people analytics” approach is that in order to achieve superior performances it is imperative for managers to make accurate people management decisions. Accurate people management decisions are made when you hire top talent and provide them with adequate data. Till now all the functions except HR make extensive use of charts, graphs and data to complement the claims and proposal put forward by them. HR, on the other hand, pays more attention to trust and relationship building rather than data. Relationships can be considered as the exact opposite of analytical and quantitative frame of decision-making. Google’s incredible performance can be credited to the fact that they are the only company in the world to drive its HR function via data. Google’s success is an indication to other firms to consider the use of HR analytics to improve its employee productivity. People analytics have helped Google in producing remarkable workforce productivity results i.e. on an average, each employee generates nearly $1 million in revenue and $200,000 in profit each year. The fundamental key to Google’s people analytics team’s success lies in the presentation phase rather than in the analysis phase. By making apt use of data; the team is able to logically convince its highly analytical audience to accept its recommendation rather than demanding or forcing managers to accept it.

Thus, it can be said that any company that is aiming to improve its productivity by manifold in this competitive 21st century should immediately start paying attention to the next BIG thing of this century- “HR analytics”. The organization must also ensure that its HR professionals become adept in working with numbers else that time is not far when soon both the organization and the HR professional skills will become obsolete because other organizations and their professionals were quick to embrace this change.

REFERENCES
“How Google Is Using People Analytics to Completely Reinvent HR” by Dr. John Sullivan at
“The New HR Analytics - Interview with Dr. Jac Fitz” by Mihaly Nagy at

Thursday 14 December 2017

SET A GOAL – A FINANCIAL GOAL AS WELL


Article by : Prof Sanjeev Bajaj, Associate Professor - Finance, CBS

Friends,
During placement activity, I had to face a big challenge – the challenge of ‘Target‘. Often students would opt out from the ‘Campus Recruitment’ after the pre-placement talk of a company citing the reason – It’s a Target Based Job and I don’t want to do a target based job.

I am really really surprised that how come anybody in this world live a life without any target. For whatever we do there is a target / objective / goal and there has to be one. Without target or goal or objective doing anything is useless.

Similarly, when I interact with people during my ‘Investor Awareness Programs’, I often come across people, who simply invest – without knowing what is the Objective of their investment. During discussions have come across many people who complained about “Negative Returns” or even “Capital Wiped-out” due to investment. On probing further they would tell that they “Simply Invested in XYZ asset”.

Our biggest challenge is this – Simply Invested. If you follow this practice of ‘Just Invested because my friend said or the agent asked me to do’ be prepared for shocks, and sometimes the serious shocks. Plan for your Financial Goals. We all know about “SMART” Goals. So set SMART Financial Goals also. If you have limited knowledge of investment option, engage a qualified financial adviser. Pay for his services and I am sure, you will not experience “Shocks”.



Happy savings and investing.

Below are some financial goals.

Wednesday 13 December 2017

THE WEEK THAT WAS 4.12.2017 – 8.12.2017

Article by : Prof. Tamal Dutta Chaudhuri, Principal, Calcutta Business School
The week saw the Sensex gain some lost ground. Although the levels are higher than the predicted level by the long run regression, it is just about at the short run regression line (Figure 1). From Figure 2 we can observe that the market fell after the double top,(A), but regained and formed a double bottom (B). It has crossed the first Fibonacci resistance, but there are two more to go. My feeling is that the market will find it difficult to reach 33700 levels right away. Some news relating to capitalization of banks has created waves, but t is not sustainable. We have to await third quarter results for some fundamental shift. Although RSI has regained a bit (Figure 3), momentum is weak.


Figure 1

Figure 4 provides an interesting insight. Conceptually, when oil prices rise, the Indian rupee should depreciate against the US Dollar as demand for dollars would rise. This can be seen in Phase A in Figure 4. Red line is Crude Oil 1 month futures and Blue Line is Rupee to the US Dollar. However, in Phase B this is not clearly observed. Some increased confidence in the Indian economy has been perceived which has led to increased dollar inflow into India. Thus, in spite of crude oil prices hardening, the rupee has to some extent appreciated.


Figure 2


Figure 3


Figure 4

The Effect of Jingle and Punch Line in Brand Establishment: Success story of some Indian brands

Article by : Prof Sanjana Mondal, Assistant Professor - Marketing, Calcutta Business School
Positioning a brand and ensuring its sustainability is a tough challenge in a dynamic business environment. Creating an innovative message design to communicate the brand is one of the effective strategies adopted by the marketers. As creating an appropriate value that addresses the ultimate satisfaction to the consumers ensures the acceptability of the product, similarly communication strategy, at par with positioning objective can lead to a brand’s success. Some of the Indian brand success stories are the proof of the magical effect of the Jingles and Punch lines in growing market acceptance and sustainability of a brand. Let us take an example of Amul, the taste of India, Nirma- Washing Powder, Dhara cooking oil- 'Dhara Dhara Shudh Dhara', Vicco Turmeric- Vicco Turmeric nahi cosmetic, Airtel- Airtel instrumental.
  1. Amul Story- Over the years, Amul, one of the most beloved brands of our country, has become the taste of India, just as its tagline claims. Every Indian millennial has grown up listening to the jingles of its many dairy products, and the Amul girl, the brand’s mascot in the polka-dotted dress, has become a nostalgia-evoking symbol. Amul has truly come a long way since its founding in 1946. The Utterly Butterly Girl still wins hearts wherever she is, whether on a billboard or on the packet of butter. The butter girl with Round eyed, chubby cheeked, winking at the consumers, from strategically placed hoardings at many traffic lights hits the love and affectionate emotions that draws attention. This emotional attachment drives the same emotion towards the product she is holding out ie, her favourite packet of butter. For 30 odd years the Utterly Butterly girl has managed to keep her fan following intact. So much so that the ads are now ready to enter the Guinness Book of World Records for being the longest running campaign ever. The ultimate compliment to the butter came when a British company launched a butter and called it Utterly Butterly.
  2. Nirma Story- The Nirma washing powder advertisement has one of the most famous jingles. It’s been years down the line but the jingle of Nirma is still jingling in the ears of Indians. It was immaterial whether the detergent gave clothes the “Dhood si Safedi” or not, the most effective thing that impacted the product was its communication ie, the ad “Nirma, washing powder Nirma”. The company’s mission to provide, “Better Products, Better Value, Better Living” which was justly communicated through its message design, that in turn contributed a great deal to its success. By addressing Hema. Rekha, Jaya and Susma, the brand positioned itself in the hands of every common women in a community and successfully addressed belongingness.
  3. Dhara Story- Best recalled for its signature 'Dhara Dhara Shudh Dhara' campaign, the brand has been synonymous with 'Shudhata' or purity for a long time. Along the way, through its advertising campaigns, Dhara has adopted taglines such as 'Anokhi Shudhata, Anokha Assar and has also stressed on health-related propositions with campaigns like 'Happy Hearts are Healthy Hearts' and 'My Daddy Strongest'. Purity was relevant till a few years back. Today, health is more relevant to the consumers and as a responsible marketer of quality edible oils, it was inevitable to address the need gap."
  4. Vicco Story- Vicco Group successfully launched its ayurvedic cosmetic cream in the Indian market with ad jingles stating its importance. “Vicco turmeric, nahi cosmetic, vicco turmeric ayurvedic cream” ad positioned its product differentiation highlighting the utility of the turmeric. Turmeric being the most common and popular product used as homemade remedies for instant fairness and glow among Indian household, was wisely used in positioning the product among the young women. The jingle was finely tuned as the objective of the brand was to encourage the usage of ayurvedic products rather than chemical cosmetics. The best ad jingles becomes the ear worms and one can’t get them out of their mind.Vicco turmeric was one of such examples.
  5. Airtel Story - If there has been one tune that's been synonymous with cellphones for many years, it is Airtel's instrumental tune composed by A.R. Rahman. The magical effect of the jingle addressing the hearing sense of organ, returned high dividend in terms of audio branding and brand recall. A catchy jingle can sway the world, cutting across cultures and geographies. Airtel ad jingle was an example of the statement. The jingle fulfills the objective of connection which is the moto of any telecom service provider.
Hence it is recommended for all the brand to frame an innovative communication strategy that is at par with the specific objective of the brand. The positive the objective the positive should be the response if clearly communicated. The brand stories discussed above are the perfect example of the statement.

Understanding and Predictive Modelling of Global Equity Markets: Initiatives at Calcutta Business School

Article by : Prof. Indranil Ghosh, Assistant Professor, Calcutta Business School
Examining and decoding the behavioral dynamics of equity markets of developed and emerging economies are extremely critical due to the inherent influence of financial markets in overall economic growth. Proper assessment of empirical characteristics of stock markets assists in developing efficient predictive modelling frameworks to generate accurate forecasts which in turn can help traders immensely. It acts as a competitive differentiator for organizations looking to gain competitive edge in turbulent market environment. Calcutta Business School in its endeavor to conduct world class research in the area of financial analytics, has established advanced computational intelligence laboratory equipped with software packages like SPSS, R, Python, Rapid-Miner, Weka, etc. and data repositories like CMIE Prowess, Metastock, etc. to enable students and faculty members to accomplish the task. Over the last three years, cutting edge research has been carried out at Calcutta Business School in the area of stock market prediction, portfolio management, pair trading, etc. Students are always encouraged to be actively involved in research and guided by faculty members. Students at Calcutta Business School have also participated and presented their research work in conferences of repute in India. Continuous effort is being put into assimilating the knowledge of research outcome in design of course curriculum in order to make students more practice and industry oriented at budding phase. Some of the recent published research work in this area are enlisted below:
1. Indranil Ghosh, Tamal Datta Chaudhuri (2017). Fractal Investigation and Maximal Overlap Discrete Wavelet Transformation (MODWT)-based Machine Learning Framework for Forecasting Exchange Rates. Studies in Microeconomics, Vol. 5(2), pp. 1-27.
2. Indranil Ghosh, Tamal Datta Chaudhuri (2016). Understanding and Forecasting Stock Market Volatility through Wavelet Decomposition, Statistical Learning and Econometric Methods. Presented at 4th International Conference in Business Analytics and Intelligence (ICBAI-2016), Held at IISC Bangalore, December 19-21, 2016.
3. Jaydip Sen, Tamal Datta Chaudhuri (2017), Understanding the Sectors of Indian Economy for Portfolio Choice. International Journal of Business Forecasting and Marketing Intelligence (in upcoming issue).
4. Jaydip Sen, Tamal Datta Chaudhuri (2017). Analysis and Forecasting of Financial Time Series Using R: Models and Application. Scholars' Press, Germany, ISBN: 978-3-330-65386-3.
5. Payal Pattnaik (2016). Using Wavelet Decomposition and Cross Correlation Analysis for Portfolio Formation. Presented at 8th International Conference on Strengthening Strategies, Shaping Policies and Empowering Personnel: Key to Organizational Competitiveness, Held at Prestige Institute of Management, Gwalior. (Student Contribution)

Saturday 2 December 2017

Do Higher Education and Job Search Contradicts Each Other?

Article by : Dr. Mukta Mukherjee, Assistant Professor, CBS

I remember that when I had to go to USA to pursue my long nourished dream of doctoral studies in Economics I had to go for a visa interview to get my necessary visa interview. The lady at the US consulate beside other questions asked me what are my previous qualifications in my chosen stream are and why I want to seek further a doctoral degree. After learning that I had already invested eight years from my under-graduate days towards economics and was willing to invest further at least five to six years for the same subject she was astonished at my patience and knowledge hunt.
This is a major question in today’s education system before each student is that should they go for good jobs or go for higher education if they get a chance. Beside the fact, the higher education like doctoral degree in abroad countries is relatively also very competitive and costly (in some streams has to be borne by educational loan), there is another factor that is involved is the time cost. The time they would invest in an education system as a student is also the time they lost out in the experience that they would have gathered in the job itself. Second, the gap in the wage earning and the stipend they earn as student is beyond comparison. Finally, the patience and tenacity required to complete the higher degree requires a serious commitment.
The above are major factors for drop out from higher education streams in both India and USA. Further, the turnover from education to industry is very high in many streams. I remember just after I had successfully completed my M.Phil from Delhi School of Economics a premier institute in India in 2005, I had the option of high paid corporate jobs. My immediate advisor wanted me to seek the corporate jobs avenue. Those of our batch mates who have actively pursued the corporate sector have gained in both in earning and position. However, the educational system gives a freedom of choice to an individual although the salary is not comparable with that of the corporate sector but freedom is enjoyable as such. Beside if you enjoy teaching then the hours of labor that has to be put for the profession becomes less taxing.
A logic that I tried to formulate is that my skills would only enhance and my job market would expand in future with abroad experience. But in hindsight today I feel that the job market may shrink with a higher skills attainment if the market for such skills does not exist or if the earning from such skills is very low compared to their ideal state. Further, as skills is like a weapon which gather rust the longer it remains unused a gap of years can make it difficult to join the job stream or use it in future if there are age constraints. Degree itself is not meaningful , but the skill that is gathered to attain the degree are meaningful.
The only thing I can put forth before students of Calcutta Business Schools that whether they decide to join industry or education stream they should think before well they commit and should not deviate from their objective. If they make use of the time and give dedication to whatever field they have chosen it will be fruitful for them in future. A popular fable story is that a person was very thirsty and in order to satisfy his thirst for water he started digging a well. Then, mid- way he left and started digging water at another spot for well, which again he left and thought another spot would be better to gain water. In this way at the end of the day he found that he has dug at multiple spots for wells but did not get water from any one of them. He realized, that had he put the same effort at only one spot the entire day then no matter whatever was the depth of the underground water he would have been successful in getting the water. Therefore, it matters most that the track you choose do not leave it half- way but reach till the end. A complete bridge is better than an incomplete bridge.