The Smart Manager - March-April 2016

En este asunto

This issue of the magazine explores how companies today are looking beyond just profits—they are trying to achieve a more balanced and sustainable growth across the value chain. We have large corporations such as the Aditya Birla Group, Marico Limited, Mahindra Group, L’Oreal, and FCB Ulka as part of our cover feature. Tony Henshaw, Aditya Birla Group, looks at sustainability through a different lens; Saugata Gupta, Marico Limited, asks companies to create a win-win partnership with all the stakeholders for long-lasting, sustainable growth; Anirban Ghosh, Mahindra Group, talks about the new-age sustainability risks companies are facing today; Alexandra Palt, L’Oreal, highlights the company’s commitment to make ‘sustainability’ beautiful; and lastly, Ambi M G Parameswaran, FCB Ulka Advertising, describes the ways sustainability needs to be integrated into a brand’s marketing strategies. This issue also features interviews of Morgen Witzel, based on his book Managing for Success, and Hap Klopp, co-author of Almost. Daminee Sawhney of Zomato offers insights into the company’s re-hiring mantra while Emile Wapnick, puttylike.com, explains the concept of being a multipod. We also have Arun Malhotra, Nissan Motors India, explaining their customer-first approach and Avinash Bharwani of Jetking Infotrain discussing the pros and cons of the franchising industry in India.

What Are You Doing Wrong In Business?

The havoc incompetent managers can wreak is immeasurable. And incompetence and failure have costs: financial, organizational, and human. When a business fails, or when it suffers a serious setback, its entire mission is compromised. It can no longer serve its customers; it can no longer perform the social function for which it was created. In an interview with The Smart Manager, Morgen Witzel offers a peep into the seven sins of management detailed in his latest book Managing for Success, and tells us how managers can shape cultures that minimize failure.

9 mins

How To Make Companies More Sustainable?

In the past year alone, sales of consumer goods from brands with a demonstrated commitment to sustainability have grown more than 4% globally, while those without grew less than 1%. Sixty-six percent of consumers say they are willing to pay more for sustainable brands—up from 55% in 2014 and 50% in 2013.1The numbers show how consumers today are looking for products that are good for them as well as society. But we need a transformation in the mindset of every stakeholder in the value chain—brands, consumers, and decision-makers—for an integrated sustainable future.

9 mins

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The Smart Manager Magazine Description:

The Smart Manager, India's first world-class management magazine, was founded in 2002 by eminent business historian Dr Gita Piramal with Harvard Business School Dean, Prof. Nitin Nohria with the mission of updating managers and business practitioners in India with the latest thought-provoking strategic ideas from experienced, world-class managers, academics and consultants from across the globe. Over the years, the magazine has carried articles authored by illustrious management gurus such as the late CK Prahalad and Sumantra Ghoshal, Jack Trout, Ram Charan, Gary Hamel, Gay Haskins, Jagdish Seth and Lynda Gratton. We believe that "managers are the best teachers of managers" and most of our articles are written in the first person by top-tier CEOs such as Kumaramangalam Birla, Sunil Mittal, Aditya Birla, KV Kamath, Santrupt Mitra, Rajeev Dubey and S Ramadorai. We also have relationships with a number of B-schools around the world, apart from most top-level schools in India.

The Smart Manager hosts the Tata Consultancy Services Smart Manager Case Contest, the most prestigious competition of its kind in the Indian print media. The contest, with a cash prize of INR50,000 per issue, sees wide participation from national and international business managers and students. 
The 'Smart" in The Smart Manager is an acronym for Strategy, Marketing, Analysis, Resources and Technology. Truly useful knowledge when you need it 24 x 365, year after year.