Published in Corporate Dossier, Economic Times, Oct 31, 2008
Author: Devdutt Patnaik
The water from a river that flowed on the eastern edge of the kingdom
was not reaching a farm. So the farmer went to the king and the king
said, Build a wider canal. This was done, but still the water did not
reach the farm. If anything, the flow dried up much earlier than before.
Maybe, said the old minister, You should consider connecting the farm
to the other river that flows on the western edge of the kingdom. The
farmer followed the minister’s advice and sure enough water flowed
effortlessly to his farm. What was the difference? It is the source,
sir, not the canal, explained the minister. The eastern river is
rain-fed while the western river is snow-fed. The former has a very
limited reservoir; the latter has an abundant reservoir. The impact of
irrigation depends not so much on the channel as much on the source.
The story made sense to Shekhar after his field trip to Satara. Eight
months had passed since the new sales strategy had been rolled out.
Satara was a very small market and Shekhar wanted to see the impact of
the new strategy at the grassroots level. He was horrified to find that
the team had not implemented the new strategy at all; they were still
using the strategy that had been declared a failure a year earlier. But
the new strategy was so clearly communicated in my presentation at the
sales conference and in my email updates thereafter! he told the local
manager. The manager looked at Shekhar and explained, rather sheepishly,
Sir, who really listens to presentations and who actually reads emails?
Shekhar felt like a fool.
On returning to Mumbai, Shekhar informed the Sales Director of the
situation. He then declared his plan of extensively touring small
markets and enforcing the new strategy. The Sales Director said, You are
wasting time and resources widening the canal. Focus on the source,
instead. The Sales Director then narrated the story of the kingdom with
a rain-fed river in the east and a snow-fed river in the west. You
created a rain-fed river when you rolled out the strategy. Your
presentation was good, very logical and systematic. It helped explain
the sound foundation of the strategy to the management but it did not
connect emotionally with the sales force. There was no attempt made to
sell it to the sales managers. Your presentation lacked drama. Your
words did not inspire. They did not feel any need to change from the old
ways. So they went back and carried on as before. Now, you are paying
the price. Instead of wasting time building canals for a rain-fed river,
focus on creating a snow-fed source. The Sales Director then told
Shekhar how this could be done.
At the next annual sales conference, everyone was invited to a resort
away from the city. Everyone had to come dressed in formals. Everyone
was expected to register. Everyone got a conference kit and a name tag.
There was a powerful audio visual presentation explaining how the new
strategy came into being.
The background music was grand. Trumpets were
blown when the sales performance was announced and drums were beaten to a
crescendo when the target for the following year was presented. Break
away groups were formed to study and discuss the new strategy and the
change in tactics. Opinions of every sales person were documented
carefully. The final document of strategy and tactic was presented by
Shekhar to the Commercial Director who nodded his head, signed it and
presented it in all solemnity to the Sales Director who then, along with
his regional managers took a pledge. This was followed by a minute long
silence for the pledge to sink in, after which the day ended with a
thunderous applause.
Why this drama? The Sales Director explained – while emails influence
the eye, and logical presentation appeal to the head, dramatic
conferences seep into the soul. The drama communicates the passion. It
reaches out directly to the heart. It transforms the rain-fed source
into a snow-fed source. This time, he told Shekhar, every manager
carried the new strategy to their market. The source was strong – the
irrigation would be widespread.
He then told Shekhar, in a Hindu temple rituals are performed
regularly to re-charge the divinity of the enshrined idol. The more
intensely these rituals are performed, longer is the divine potency of
the deity retained. You too have to regularly re-invigorate the potency
of the strategy otherwise time and distance will cause it to wane. So
take full advantage of monthly and quarterly reviews to re-establish the
source. This will prevent or delay eventual contamination. All rivers
are sacred at the source but only the river Ganga is sacred even at its
delta because its source, Gangotri, is the most powerful : it is located
in heaven, in the locks of Shiva. Try and make the source of your
strategy as powerful as Gangotri.
The Gangotri of the Jewish religion is so strong that despite
centuries of persecution and exile the religion still thrives, as
evident in the legend of the Bene Israelis of Maharasthra. A few
centuries ago, a Jewish Rabbi stumbled upon a group of people on the
Konkan coast of India who were known as Shani-vaar-Telis, oil-pressers
who did not work on Saturday. While these people looked no different
from others in their village, and behaved no differently, this ‘no work
on Saturday’ policy singled them out. He asked the women to make him a
meal of fish and noticed that the women selected only fish with scales
and fin, and ignored the rest which as per Jewish dietary laws is
non-Kosher hence forbidden. Why did these people who looked like
Maharashtrians and spoke Marathi respect the Jewish Sabbath and follow
Jewish dietary laws? There was only one explanation: they were one of
the lost tribes of Israel, the Bene Israel, or sons of Israel, perhaps
descendents of oil-pressers who were shipwrecked off the coast of India
as they were driven being out of Judea by Assyrian kings over two
thousand years ago. Separated from their Jewish homeland by space and
time, these people still clung to the practices that reinforced their
identity. The Jewish elders had always been obsessed with ritual
practices of Sabbath and Kosher. Their rigid enforcement of this
practice had annoyed many young Jews who did not like rituals; but it
was this very insistence that had endured the test of time and ensured
that the Jewish Diaspora, despite centuries of persecution and exile,
did not lose their identity. Such is the power of the source.
