For Khera, the secret of success lies in patriotism

Manjari Raman

It was a crackling study in what happens when fireworks meet pyrotechnics. The sparks flew at the first plenary session of the CII's Sixth Quality Summit, with first, Suresh Rajpal, president and CEO, setting a fire under Indian corporates with `The Burning Platform' and next, Shiv Khera, burning bright with evangelistic fervour on `How to Win'.

The presentation of the president and CEO of Hewlett Packard India--who is also presiding over this year's Quality Summit--was vintage Rajpal. A sharp, opening quote (this time, Nirad Chaudhary's, `If you want to look at progress, you have to be critical.') Apocryphal stories (The man who jumped from a burning oil rig into the freezing North Sea because he preferred possible survival by taking action to certain death if he stayed still. Corporates are you listening?).

Extracts from his vast repertoire of readings (Wall Street Journal, Oct 17, 1989: 18 factory managers shot for shoddy quality in Chien Bien Refrigerator Company, China). And a flotilla of flotsam andjetsam facts-n-figures (The number of companies that went to the BIFR in the last six months, is two times the number of companies referred to the BIFR in the whole of last year; Workers per vehicle are 2 for Nissan, 2.2 for Toyota, how does Maruti compare?).

And finally: a peppery round of Rajpal rhetoric. Remember, when an organisation is on a burning platform it's a good decision to institute change, because the cost of staying still is even higher. Family businesses need to hand over power to professionals and stop lobbying with government. Don't be insular, think global. Indian companies need to set goals to increase productivity by 15 per cent a year. Not enough people are worrying that their company is going to die. And finally, this isn't a quality control summit, so remember to share best practices.

He certainly had the delegates charged up, but Rajpal was just the warming up act for the real showman: Shiv Khera. With his resonant exhortations in a deep bass, trademark audience-awakening gesture(a hand cocked behind his ear followed with a pre-emptory Hullo?), and rapidfire counsel, Khera held the one-minute manager rapt. Some gems from on the soapbox--and off:

Measure progress by the quality of the character of the people. What is the secret behind Japanese success? Patriotic feeling. Pride in a country means that any product made in India carries the respect and dignity of every citizen of the country and the product says `I'll give you more value than the money you give me' rather than `Give me more money than the value I give you.' Remember: the country comes first, the company second.

The air we breathe, the water we drink, your children's education, the food we eat, it's all a result of politics. It's not political differences that kill a country, it's the indifference of the people. We need good people to come into positions of power. Otherwise nothing will change. There is no bad game. Only bad players.

We don't need to be ten times smarter than the competition, only by anose--but the rewards are 10 times. It's like a horse who wins by a nose at 10 to one odds.

The most important word is attitude. You can't have total quality management unless you have total quality people. It's about attitudes, values, character, integrity.

Companies which say why should I train my employees if I have staff turnover are stupid. If you don't train, you have untrained employees. So now you have the risk of losing customers. Which is a bigger risk? In fact, if you train, you have employees who are more loyal and the turnover actually comes down.

Finally, measure yourself against Khera's snappy checklist which separates the stripes of the winner from the spots on the loser.

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