Prompted by a question I was asked, I decided to write a 4 part blog on the subject matter of India and doing business in India. The audience to me for this blog is anyone who is keen to do business in and with India, invest in India. I published this first on Linkedin but thought will share it here also. This is the first part of the blog.
In my long career with global companies meeting people across the world I have learnt to accept diversity of every kind including biases, discrimination but it has mostly been wonderful relationships, friendships and the positives far outweigh the negatives. The learning has been beyond compare or valuation.
One question that I get asked often is about describing India, of knowing India especially when it relates to foreigners making business or investment decisions. I get told about how they have met people who seemed to know India, know everything and making assurances while I come across as someone who is not making commitments at the big picture level, not telling them what they like to hear.
Over time I have replied to the 2 questions as follows. I don't know if I am right, but I think it has helped me build credibility sometimes a little late after the person concerned has learnt that I was right the hard way.
India I tell people - is like a skyscraper with a different facade, different colour at each floor, on each side on the outside, and inside, each floor is different - be it design, colour, business or housing, people, smell, temperature, - whatever you can think of. Yet the skyscraper stands tall and magnificent, thanks to a foundation that you cant see or understand but the collective effort of the cement, steel, walls, columns makes the building ONE, makes it UNITED, envelops everybody and everything to make everybody see the commonality, the bonding and the feeling that we are INDIAN, never mind how different we are in every which way. There is no standardization, there is nothing common, there is no discernible picture for you to see yet the building brings us together as ONE.
I also tell that if anybody claims to know India - they are bluffing. Everyone of us, inspite of having lived in India for decades can at best claim that we can possibly understand the differences, the nuances, the idiosyncrasies and maybe rationalize to accept them but - Do we know them all ? Do we understand them all ? Definitely not.
The way of doing business, dealing with people, the human interactions between regions, religions, communities is itself different not to speak of the food, dress etc that we think are actually what is different. They are just the tip of the iceberg.
I remember a meeting with a industrialist when exploring a JV and when it came to debating how to resolve disputes he said - Very simple, we will go to xxxxx village where mamaji (Uncle) stays and in the presence of the elders, we both present our case and accept whatever mamaji and the elders decide.
Another time a CEO refused to sign an agreement on a multi crore project deal because we refused to include the performance results achieved in the previous order as a guarantee in the new order. He actually threw the agreement papers across the whole office hall and stormed out in anger - but implemented the project with us without a formal paper - because he said - I trust you, even if you don't trust your own technology.
In one industry I found that many owners would simply hand over a bunch of their company letterheads, signed blank cheques and then tell me - we cant understand your rules, so please write whatever you want for your company rules, fill up the amount we have agreed and implement the project.
On one occasion after a multi crore deal for a unique and new technology for the first time in India was agreed upon by lunch time after 2 days of hard discussions with my senior management team at the customers office, the customer said that he could sign the papers only at the auspicious time - which was somewhere at 3 AM the next day. Having checked out of the hotel, we had to spend time and sleep on chairs in the customers office till the auspicious time, participate in a elaborate ceremony to collect the papers/cheque.
I can share many more such bizarre experiences - but try explaining these to a foreign company but more crucially try telling that you are aware of, can predict such situations and can safely recommend/ take financial decisions on behalf of the global company in such circumstances.
The best that I tell people is - While I cant predict in every case what is the likely outcome, I can surely better understand the googly/curve ball thrown and the reasons for it after which it then becomes a decision point.
The uniqueness of India, even as compared to other smaller countries is that, be it the simplest issue or the most complex space/nuclear technology - quite often the decisions are influenced by listening to those you trust. Be it private sector or government we Indians do so much of multi hat wearing roles that specialisation is a costly non option as yet at a larger scale. So to ensure that decisions don’t go wrong, decision makers seek to get answers from those they trust, those with whom they have had a long relationship which reinforces the trust. There was a time when I myself found that on technology issues customers preferred to believe a “white skin” than me, but with progress the self confidence has gone up. Today irrespective of what a foreigner may say the customer wants to hear what his local trusted person has to say.
This situation often confuses the hell out of global companies. It is often interpreted as a conduit for corruption and we Indians lend credence to such perceptions. But the fact is that trust is the entire foundation over which every decision however major is taken across India and global companies rarely if ever can even begin to understand this trait. Things are changing in India but only in very select segments like the Infotech industry. The rest are still rooted in this Indian-ness.
The next challenge in India that most don’t understand is that the perception is about Indians wanting things cheap, about everything being about price. While this perception is true and can equally apply to any human being, what is unique to India is that it is usually about cash flow not the amount perse. Indians representing India with global companies tend to make this mistake too – by focussing on the price and thus creating an impression that quality, performance, efficiency etc don’t matter to Indians. So you see, we don’t know ourselves in a manner of speaking.
Any treatise on India would need reams of pages and it is best addressed subject by subject, issue by issue but for now this glimpse is sufficient.
This is part 2 of the blog
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