Memoirs from IIM-A

Background: I am here to attend a Corporate Education program at IIM-A ( organized in association with Duke Fuqua Business School, United States)

Today's session was about exploring the possibilities. Understanding the various environments we operate in and how to identify trends. Marty Anderson - a fantastic professor from Duke - with domain expertise in business innovation, process re-engineering, and high tech, took us through the 'brief history of economic trends" development and how it will change our future?

Some food for thought :

• What economic power can 2.6 billion people have over the remaining 4.0 billion people?
• What will happen if China decides to send 300 million people from 'the mainland' to the 'African' continent?
• How will wireless ( Mobile handheld) change how we live in the distant future?
• Can "electricity" solve the problem of 'world peace'?
• What is common amongst 'Grameen Phone", Google, Apple, eBay, Amazon?

I personally feel ( since innovation is my area of interest) that it is absolutely critical for us to acknowledge that we are at the 'cusp of a global shift.' Never before( in the known history of human civilization ) has technology and innovation played an important and accelerating role in transforming our lives.

Think again :

• I-Pod from Apple has redefined the music industry( is it high tech-I doubt!), but what is powerful is the entire business proposition based around a single concept' that people no longer want to buy music albums, they want to buy songs' hence give them the option to combine their own 'playlist.'
• The world's biggest library is just a click away ( or better still Google it);
• Grameen Phone has changed the way we perceive communication companies.
• Zopa.com, Bill me later.com, etc, are changing the way we 'lend' or 'borrow'.
• Mobile phone penetration across the globe is 3.6 billion; can it change the way money moves?  We are already seeing massive progress in M-commerce.
• Blogging - who needs a newspaper, publisher, or editor; the future of embedded thinking.

More on this later.. the dinner was announced 20 minutes ago.