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May
-June
2010
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" A true ‘teacher’ is someone who succeeds in opening up her students’ minds to all the possibilities in the universe. A true ‘teacher’ is someone who throws down the gauntlet to her students and challenges them to constantly question the status quo. A true ‘teacher’ is someone who considers that her biggest achievement is when her student becomes the teacher. There are, however, very few teachers with these qualities. In this context, the management world was fortunate to have CK Prahalad, who was not only one of the finest management thinkers but also a remarkable teacher.
Managers who have interacted with him and students who have had the privilege of being taught by him fondly recall his lectures and advice. Though he began his career as a manager in Union Carbide, he left it to pursue teaching and remained a teacher thereafter. So what made Prahalad such a great teacher? That question is best answered by Prahalad himself who once said to Kamini Banga, “My goal is not to teach tools and techniques because those will change[,] but if I can give students a perspective on their role as managers and if that makes a small difference to the way they approach life, that is good enough for me. I am most passionate about how to get people to realize their own potential and how to get people to think as much about others as they think about themselves.”
As a teacher, Prahalad was open to change and constantly questioned the status quo. His initial works, Managing the Multinational and Competing for the Future presented a firm-centric view. Typically, most people would build successively on their initial ideas and further extend or strengthen them, but not Prahalad. He loved to push his own boundaries and that of others. His next two books, The Future of Competition and Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid, presented a diametrically opposite view—a consumer-centric view of the firm. The retrospective section on Prahalad in this issue captures some of the facets of the wonderful genius who influenced and touched many lives (and businesses) around the globe.
Marico Limited is one of the corporates in India that seem to understand the importance of the role of a business organization as an agent of social change. In our cover story, Harsh Mariwala, Chairman and Managing Director, Marico Limited, writes about how Marico assumes the role of a teacher and mentor and helps all its stakeholders—members, customers, associates, shareholders and the community—to ‘Be More. Every Day’.
Elsewhere in this issue, Rajiv Rao, National Creative Director, Ogilvy India, talks about the genesis of the ‘ZooZoo’ campaign. Plus all our regular features.
Happy reading."
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