[V Krishnamurthy. From IIMB/Twitter]
Good morning,
V Krishnamurthy, who led BHEL, Maruti and SAIL at various points, and is a doyen of India’s public sector organizations, passed away in Chennai last Sunday. His book, At the Helm: Memoirs of a Change Agent, gives us some glimpse of what it takes to navigate the intersection of government and business.
One of the decisions that he took when he sewed up Maruti’s agreement with Suzuki (SMC) was that Maruti could not do certain things unilaterally. For example, every component produced in India by Maruti vendors must be homologated or approved by SMC.
He writes in the book: “Suzuki thought I did this because I was not confident about Indian vendors being able to supply quality products. Indeed, that is the impression everyone reading the contract would have got. But a lot of what was seen as capitulation to SMC at that time was actually a reflection of my own apprehensions about the way the public sector was managed as well as my desire to protect the long-term interests of Maruti. The company would have built up a particular supplier only to find that it would be forced to shift to another supplier with a change of minister or chief executive.”
“This clause came in handy later when we started developing the vendor base, as it helped allay apprehensions in the minds of the vendors who were hesitant to make the huge investments required. I also believed that this was the best way to ensure that there was no compromise on the quality of components. All this was against my pride. Earlier in BHEL, I had fought similar conditions that collaborators wanted to impose. However, in Maruti, I myself had to suggest such conditions only because of the nature of the project. What was remarkable was that no one from the government objected to these decisions. Finally, the agreement was concluded with SMC agreeing to offer all the four models we had zeroed in on.”
In fact it was also the same reason why he insisted that SMC pick up 26% stake in the company – when SMC itself was reluctant to do so.
Krishnamurthy wrote: “I was not being altruistic when I suggested all this. Getting SMC to take a 26 per cent stake was a way of insulating Maruti from political interference. I knew Maruti was more vulnerable than other public sector undertakings since it was identified with the Gandhi family. I would not be there permanently, and even if I was, the political bosses could change. In times of fluctuating political fortunes, Maruti would be a target since it would be seen as a way of hurting Mrs [Indira] Gandhi. I could not say this then. How could I have said that I was trying to protect the organization from political interference? Mrs Gandhi may not have liked it. Telling Suzuki to retain the option of increasing the stake to 40 per cent was also to ensure that SMC always stayed with Maruti.”
Have a good day!
Big Tech and regulations
While Rahul Matthan is a lawyer, he understands technology and how it may evolve like few others do. That is why we often turn to him for pointers about what lies beyond the obvious. By way of example, in a recent conversation with him, he spoke about why most of us assume that all of what is happening around us is new. But when looked at from the long arc of history, the cyclical nature of all things makes itself apparent. And then, suddenly, it doesn’t look so new. That is why we read a recent post of his on his blog Ex Machina with much interest.
“Even though it (the internet) was originally designed to be open, our access to it is today almost exclusively facilitated by services that determine what it is we get to see. All the content, commerce, entertainment and social connections we consume has been pre-packaged into endlessly scrolling feeds of information in an online experience that is a far cry from the original open vision of the internet.”
“I mention this not to denigrate those platforms or decry the current state of the internet, but because I believe the pendulum has already begun to swing in the opposite direction. As much as the last two decades have been about the centralisation of the once-open internet in the hands of a few, over the past five years, it is impossible to ignore the decentralised solutions—blockchain-based services and decentralised autonomous organisations—that have sprung up as a counterpoint to this narrative of extreme centralisation.”
“While I broadly agree that we must have appropriate regulations to protect consumers from harm, I am not yet convinced that we need to do so because Big Tech has grown too big to fail. To the contrary, if history is anything to go by, we are probably on the cusp of a major cyclical transformation.”
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Learning from pain
In a recent column in The Atlantic, Arthur C. Brooks offers an interesting way to deal with painful experiences and memories. It’s important. As he writes, “You can’t alter history. You can, however, change your perception of it. The next best thing to a time machine is rewriting the story of your memories, making the baggage of your past a little lighter on your shoulders as you travel through the present and future.”
One of the tools he offers is simple, but profound. He writes:
“Every life contains authentic bad memories. I am not suggesting that you try to reconstruct a past that expunges them or makes them rosy. In some cases, that would be impossible—they are just too painful. Furthermore, some terrible memories can lead us to learning and progress or keep us from repeating mistakes.”
“Try methodically to see how such painful memories help you learn and grow. Scholars have shown that when people reflect on difficult experiences with the explicit goal of finding meaning and improving themselves, they tend to give better advice, make better decisions, and solve problems more effectively.”
“In your journal, reserve a section for painful experiences, writing them down right afterward. Leave two lines below each entry. After one month, return to the journal and write in the first blank line what you learned from that bad experience in the intervening period. After six months, fill in the second line with the positives that ultimately came from it. You will be amazed at how this exercise changes your perspective on your past.”
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Social media etiquette
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Warm regards,
Team Founding Fuel
