Sunday Posts

Entrepreneurship may be the biggest myth of our time, but it is worth teaching still. I say this because less than 10% businesses owned by new entrepreneurs actually succeed. Also, the road to entrepreneurship is actually all sweat and tears, and involves mundane things like legal details and cost controls, rather than how it's generally portrayed, a world beating idea coming out of dorm rooms. The world isn't silicon valley, and there are big businesses which usually bully the smaller ones out the moment an interesting opportunity arises. For all the disruptive force of a Facebook or a Google, which powered themselves into the Global Top 10 brands quite quickly, Fortune 500, where real numbers matter, are increasingly resilient. And, when one rules out United States of America and a few other countries like Israel, Entrepreneurship seems to be a sure way to destitution rather than a limousine drive to Heaven. This is not what the conservative politicians want you to think...

Protesters keep coming to Tahrir Square. The scenes, thousands of people chanting, camping up, are now part of our daily lives. The silent Egypt, oppressed and tortured by Hosni Mubarak and his thugs, is as much a history now as the Pharaoh's one. As no futurist would have crystal-gazed the scenes of a tragicomic Muammar Qaddafi, with a tattered silk robe and wielding a golden gun, being lynched by a mob, they would not have envisioned the whole Arab world enthralled by a permanent state of revolution, which seems so self-evident and self-propelling now. In a sense, twitter revolution is over. We are now in serious territory. Freedom is no longer a word in political spin, but a real aspiration. Obama recognizes that his rhetoric is catching up with him, the monster he wanted to selectively peek into has now been unleashed on the streets. This is no longer a right-wing American politician's mid-afternoon fantasy, but real blood and sweat revolution. And, if it goes on, it has ...

I spent the first half of the day attending an interesting discussion, hosted by the Social Market Foundation , an Westminster think-tank which is doing some interesting work on the transformation of the British Welfare State. This well-attended event, which was to be about Encouraging Responsible Universities, but somewhat ended up becoming a discussion on the University funding regime, drew participation from different sections of the British society, including Press, Businesses and various think-tanks and public intellectuals. In fact, there were people from only eleven universities, some of them on private capacities rather than as official representatives, which was rather interesting and was in fact pointed out in a question to the panel. However, the discussions were nonetheless worthwhile and threw some light on the current policy thinking on British Higher Education. The two keynote speeches of the day were delivered by Shabana Mahmood, the shadow Minister for Universities a...

Start-up isn't what any Higher Ed business wants to call itself, as the prevalent notions are all about history and tradition, lineage and claims. Every institution wants to say that it has always been there. But that should be changing: Hopefully, as Higher Education becomes an industry, because millions of students all over the world are aspiring to get Higher Ed, we may start seeing some start-ups. The language of conversation may finally start to change. My favourite story in this context relates to Woolworth's. When Frank Woolworth opened his first store in New York in 1879 (which, admittedly, failed in a short time), a more established rival down the same street put up a sign 'FIFTY YEARS AND GOING STRONG': Woolworth's response was to put up a rival sign 'JUST OPENED! NO OLD STOCK'. A start-up in Higher Ed may start with 'No Bureaucracy' sign, or something similar. One has to accept that except a few pockets of excellence, the current public...

Here is a movie I loved: Loved so much that I saw it four times within my return flights between London and Calcutta. This beautifully crafted Woody Allen movie, third in his series of exploring various great European cities (after Matchpoint in London and Vicky Christina Barcelona in Barcelona), puts middle class Americans in an alien setting yet again. But this is a different movie from the depressing Matchpoint or the erotic Barcelona, this is magical. Like the other two movies, this is indeed about love and human frailties, with an acute understanding of American (shall we say universal) middle class values and lifestyles transposed in the middle of an unfamiliar, yet stereotyped, setting. I shall be honest: I love the movie because I love Paris. Those who know me know that I shall much rather live in Paris than anywhere else in the world. And, this movie touches my heart, exactly where it matters: Isn't my greatest wish to escape my conformist surroundings and be able to l...

Vidya School Of Business Vidya Knowledge Park As I have written earlier, my recent visit to India was my facetime with the real new India, one full of challenges, but also promises and aspirations. And, while I have written more about the challenges that beset India, it is only fair to talk about the enormous possibilities and the relentless effort that is taking India forward. Indeed, I saw these new energies coming from India's countless small cities. In context, I should indeed mention my visit to Meerut, which was only a day long but one that opened my eyes to the possibilities. This visit, as the photos show, was to Vidya School of Business , housed in an enormous 200 acre Knowledge Park that the eponymous publishing group has put up. If there was any doubt in my mind about the seriousness of India's Private Education players, one look at the complex, which includes an International School, an Engineer college and a School of Business, alongside sprawling lawns,...

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