I've had a lot of personal experiences since my last blog post and a lot of learning. I traveled to Slovenia for my sister's wedding and have been back busier then ever in India- this trip is the main reason I've been out of contact via blog. Although it might seem completely unrelated, seeing my sister's wedding has made me think a lot about relationships, connections and what drives each of us. Explaining what I've been doing has given me new context and renewed my passion for changing the world through tackling problems at the base of the pyramid. One very important thing to remember is that whatever you do you can't do it alone. In life, as with my sister, it is important to have a partner to travel it with you and it is important to pick the right person. In many ways a business is also like a marriage with the people you work with. You need to pick the right people. Who your team is extremely important, because they can make or break your success. This is even more important when working for the base of the pyramid(BOP), because this a sector that is still being figured out and has, in many ways, a lot more risks than
Because of all of this thoughts of connections recently, my most recent project has been trying to see how other people think and trying to bring people together to share ideas. Before I left I tried to host a small workshop on launching a business with a friend of mine who works for a solar-powered BOP company. It had limited success with only 5 other people showing up, but though that was a failure in a sense we have learned from it and forged a couple of great connections. We are trying another small, focused event tomorrow and I am already certain it will be successful. It is called Make it Happen: Launching a Social Venture (https://www.facebook.com/events/369241823143688/) We are expecting 15-20 people, which is just what we are aiming for- not too big because we want some great discussions not a presentation, but not too small because we want to have a mix of opinions and enough people to direct. I'm partly trying to turn this into a more effective way to pick more peoples brains for ideas that I will use in my paper on the BOP.
I've also been trying to attend a few workshops, the most recent focused on marketing. One of the key points I learned there was the importance of experimentation and monitoring. Again, in BOP, it seems like everything is driven by money -saving money, paying less money, making sure things aren't too expensive for you customer. It is a very underlying theme, but it can also drive innovation. These days most marketing is done through online marketing and is much more interactive. For small companies you can't do blanket marketing, meaning do a little bit of everything- you have to make sure you money counts. One effective way to do this is via the internet. Facebook and twitter have become two of the most successful marketing platforms and are a great way to interact with your customer- if they have internet. This may not be the case directly for BOP, but it is important for donors, as many companies that are BOP are non-profit or are at some point funded by donations/investors even in the for-profit side. The second big way to reach people that Embrace uses as well is word of mouth. This may be hard to measure, but word of mouth and personal testimony is one of the most powerful forms of marketing.
I've continued volunteering and working within the team at Embrace, and I think this has been my most valuable experience. Through working within Embrace, I hear their complaints, their trials, what worries them, what is not so worrying. Going back to relationships and people, one thing I hear constantly is the importance of good management and company culture. Another aspect of people that is important is understanding your customer and designing for them. You have to design for what you see they need, not always what they say the need for something to be successful. More on this in lessons from Embrace in later blogs and in my report- I could talk for pages, and will make it the main focus of my next blog post. Also over the next week I will work on integrating more pics into all of my blog posts!
On a quick, less serious note, a few interesting wording quirks of India that I enjoy and have been compiling with a few friends
1) "Do the needful" which means "Do what you have to do"
2) "Please revert" which means "Tell me what happened" and is usually used with the above as in, "Do the needful and please revert."
3) Prepone - to move a meeting earlier in the day than previously schedule. Antonym: Postpone.
4) "Wallah" aka that guy that does that thing. you can pretty much use it for anything - that fruit wallah (fruit stand person), rickshaw wallah (rickshaw driver)...
5) "Parcel" - refers to what we call "take-out" or just taking food away from a particular place.
6) "Mango Milk Shake?". A common term used in greeting someone, to which the reply is "Yes, please". A related greeting is "did you eat the last of the Parle G's?", to which the reply is "I have no idea what you're talking about", accompanied by brushing movements to remove crumbs from your shirt.
Every day here is a new learning experience. Thanks to the Center for South Asian Studies and our donor for making all this possible!
Because of all of this thoughts of connections recently, my most recent project has been trying to see how other people think and trying to bring people together to share ideas. Before I left I tried to host a small workshop on launching a business with a friend of mine who works for a solar-powered BOP company. It had limited success with only 5 other people showing up, but though that was a failure in a sense we have learned from it and forged a couple of great connections. We are trying another small, focused event tomorrow and I am already certain it will be successful. It is called Make it Happen: Launching a Social Venture (https://www.facebook.com/events/369241823143688/) We are expecting 15-20 people, which is just what we are aiming for- not too big because we want some great discussions not a presentation, but not too small because we want to have a mix of opinions and enough people to direct. I'm partly trying to turn this into a more effective way to pick more peoples brains for ideas that I will use in my paper on the BOP.
I've also been trying to attend a few workshops, the most recent focused on marketing. One of the key points I learned there was the importance of experimentation and monitoring. Again, in BOP, it seems like everything is driven by money -saving money, paying less money, making sure things aren't too expensive for you customer. It is a very underlying theme, but it can also drive innovation. These days most marketing is done through online marketing and is much more interactive. For small companies you can't do blanket marketing, meaning do a little bit of everything- you have to make sure you money counts. One effective way to do this is via the internet. Facebook and twitter have become two of the most successful marketing platforms and are a great way to interact with your customer- if they have internet. This may not be the case directly for BOP, but it is important for donors, as many companies that are BOP are non-profit or are at some point funded by donations/investors even in the for-profit side. The second big way to reach people that Embrace uses as well is word of mouth. This may be hard to measure, but word of mouth and personal testimony is one of the most powerful forms of marketing.
I've continued volunteering and working within the team at Embrace, and I think this has been my most valuable experience. Through working within Embrace, I hear their complaints, their trials, what worries them, what is not so worrying. Going back to relationships and people, one thing I hear constantly is the importance of good management and company culture. Another aspect of people that is important is understanding your customer and designing for them. You have to design for what you see they need, not always what they say the need for something to be successful. More on this in lessons from Embrace in later blogs and in my report- I could talk for pages, and will make it the main focus of my next blog post. Also over the next week I will work on integrating more pics into all of my blog posts!
On a quick, less serious note, a few interesting wording quirks of India that I enjoy and have been compiling with a few friends
1) "Do the needful" which means "Do what you have to do"
2) "Please revert" which means "Tell me what happened" and is usually used with the above as in, "Do the needful and please revert."
3) Prepone - to move a meeting earlier in the day than previously schedule. Antonym: Postpone.
4) "Wallah" aka that guy that does that thing. you can pretty much use it for anything - that fruit wallah (fruit stand person), rickshaw wallah (rickshaw driver)...
5) "Parcel" - refers to what we call "take-out" or just taking food away from a particular place.
6) "Mango Milk Shake?". A common term used in greeting someone, to which the reply is "Yes, please". A related greeting is "did you eat the last of the Parle G's?", to which the reply is "I have no idea what you're talking about", accompanied by brushing movements to remove crumbs from your shirt.
Every day here is a new learning experience. Thanks to the Center for South Asian Studies and our donor for making all this possible!
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