On the job!

The first thing that comes to anybody’s mind today when one listens to the term agriculture is a picture of a poor farmer and by far it is understood in a completely wrong sense. Trying to understand this space, personally, I don’t think there is any other profession that will directly impact the lives of people as much as the metrics of agriculture does. As a matter of fact, I have realized that there are a lot of short comings in the way farming decisions are taken as well as the way output from a farm is valued and consumed. The ecosystem of performing agriculture is right now in a complete mess. The big farmers do manage to survive, but the concern is about small and marginal farmers and farmers in remote locations. They are on the verge of an extinct as their younger generations have started to migrate into towns and cities as labourers. The silver lining is that there is a way to reverse the situation and it is no rocket science.  

It is inevitable that the farmers are all going small. The land holdings are fragmented as they pass on through to generations. This significantly reduces the value output from the fragmented land. And to add to this are the various cost elements in the supply chain before the actual value of the produce is appreciated by the consumer. If the farmer whose entire family’s livelihood and children’s education is dependent on the income from this land, then we know for sure he/ she has pressed the panic button. 

The above observation was a result of a case study conducted in a village called Komaranapura, 150 Kms away from the city of Bangalore. Some of the excerpts are here for the record.  

Farmer Land Holding – 3 acres
Produce/ Vegetable – Brinjal (R)

Farmer selling price – INR 8 per Kg
Komaranapura, Yelandur

Consumer buying price - INR 30 to 35 per Kg
Bangalore

The situation is clear as to who is consuming all the intermediate overheads in the entire supply chain. Of course, the consumer is paying for it, but the farmer is not able to realize the value. However, the value of the produce starts decreasing the moment it is harvested, and evidently we are increasing its worth at every stage. This may not necessarily mean that 1 Kg of Brinjal should be sold at around INR 10 or INR 12/- This doesn’t make sense as it has to be transported and marketed. So the intermediate cost factor is justified but not the cost elements, which leads to a pretty straightforward inference. Procuring it directly from these farmers and shipping it to kitchens directly will lead to better value for the farmers. 

The advantage in doing this is that the produce has very little transit and storage time before it reaches the kitchen. Everyone should eat fresh. Freshness of consumption just cannot be a unique selling proposition of a vendor. And our job on this front is to ensure people eat fresh. Concerned about the way we consume vegetables and being not too happy about the current ecosystem we were motivated to set it right. Inspired much by the cause of Madhukrishi and my visit to Naujheel, the existence of Tenesiri to support the small/ marginal farmers and farmers in remote location do better business became certain. 

Stacking up orders from consumers, forecasting the demand, aggregating small farmers to build inventory for it, and working out logistics to create a seamless supply chain of produce from the farm reaching the kitchen, Tenesiri has started its operations in this direction. We are on our way to change the way we consume and make farming more rewarding. Now, it is a matter of focused execution and perseverance that will lead us there. As I said, it is no rocket science. 

Untested waters!

You are warned regularly in life by your well-wishers about the dangers of swimming in untested waters. Mainly by your parents, as they fear the worst. Well, quite literally. However good you swim or however well you are equipped, once you are caught in a swirl and then there is no escape. Trying to put a few thoughts into perspective here, I realized how I was lost but have recently found myself in the middle of untested waters.

The startup bug had not bit me so hard when the whole buzz was going around Bangalore. As a matter of fact it still is with the investment space ever picking up and some crazy valuations being trusted. Nonetheless, a few friends of mine and I were discussing about starting up right from the college days. It was kind of like the bro code. You had to discuss about startups and how some young chap has gathered a few people to disrupt the current ecosystem. People like Bhavish Agarwal, Ashish Hemarajani, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, Jack Ma, Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal and others were of great inspiration. For me it was more like how as young kids we were looking upto Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Anil Kumble and others and hoping to hit cover drives, late cuts and bowl flippers like them. I didn’t intend to start business to the scale that these guys have. I always carried the fear of taking the next big step towards it. But there was and is an intent that is unmatched. I believe so at least.

Last year I came back from the Eastern Ghats and prior to that had just completed a project in the Western Ghats. Working with the tribals for nearly an year before returning to the city, my life had changed for good I hope. More importantly I came back with an idea. An idea I thought would change the way we look at our social systems. I still think the same by the way. But when you look at self-sustainability of whatever that is you are doing, lot of your ideas gets funneled out. As then, the financials are at play and your intuition and gut may take a backseat at this point. But you continue. People around seem like they were waiting all these while just to tell you that the thing you are upto is not going to work. You can actually trust them, as it may not. But the point is to make it work. And that is exactly where this fear of taking the next big step kicks in.

After having worked for this idea for nearly ten months now, I have come to realize one very important thing. Entrepreneurs around trying to create an impact with their ideas listen carefully. Ideas won’t bring about a change. It’s the solution resulting out of that idea that actually brings about a change. Your idea leads you to your vision. The idea in itself cannot be the vision. I will tell you how. One has to sell to survive. You need to create value, of course. But you just cannot sell your vision to generate revenue. You need to sell a different value proposition that generates revenue and eventually leads you towards realizing your vision. Currently we were stuck here and it is still a long way to go. Nobody appreciated the fact that they will have to pay so that their kids would be the next leaders of change. Leaders of change; you know, just what our country needs today. What do you mean by country, it’s the people isn’t it? So people want leaders of change and they aren’t willing to pay for creating one, of their own; confusing but damn real dynamics. We have only one option, to adapt to this mindset and work around it. And that’s why I said, that when the financials kick in, your intuition and gut takes a backseat. Trust your intent but. Your life right now is hell because you haven’t chosen the easy path. It is supposed to be hell. That’s why we are all here.

This leads me to a few more lines of an entrepreneur’s dilemma. You may call it, cribbing. It is in a way just to have a founder married to his/ her idea. But hey, you have got this idea because you have a very evident emotion towards something in particular. I am not referring to the entrepreneurs who start for pure investment prospects. I am talking about these passionate few trying to create value connecting dots like no one else before. I think, that is the root of it. The emotion that is driving you to do things that you wouldn’t have done otherwise. This has to be kept intact throughout your journey and never forgotten, rather, you should allow it to grow. Metrics will start kicking in even before you go operational. Yes, and it is bloody important. This is where a shrewd and an ambitious entrepreneur win. The challenge of working towards your metrics while you continue to respect and play to your emotions is the toughest I feel. And at this point the founder’s relationship with the idea is questioned. This will be the longest period of self-talk in the life of any creative and impact oriented entrepreneur, I guess. I am struggling to stop talking to myself.

After a lot of self-talk and mind work those passionate few, pivot. They may work on a whole new solution, alter their vision a bit but they will never compromise on respecting their emotions. I am telling all this as an honest confession of sorts because we have hit a similar roadblock and it has been quite a challenge to make things work. Communication halts as the run of ideas stop. The doubts creep in like never before. And you never thought about going through all this when you simply followed your gut. There will be a jolt. And it won’t be for long before you realize that you actually ended up swimming in untested waters about which your parents and well-wishers always warned you of. And that’s the fun at the end of it all. No? I think so.

A space of our own!

Everything begins with an idea. Everything innovative definitely begins with an idea. What is innovative? Is being creative, innovative? Or is innovative necessarily creative? I guess, you can see the mix up here, as much as I do. It is daring to say the least to jump into a thing you believe oblivious to the reality surrounding you. I am currently living one similar experience. Entrepreneurship they say is tough. We are just beginning, now. Trying to build an enterprise with an impact the money slips down to second place. Well, you need it! Damn, right! You definitely need the money, nothing works without it. But, you are seeing something beyond it as your key metric. And this impact entrepreneurship delves into your own self for answers. Perseverance is everything. 

Now with money rolling out of the pocket, I mean, shit just got real! Taking a series of personal loans to build something which I believe is necessary and also beautiful, it doesn't matter living my life on the line for a few more days to come. There is a lot of belief right now and frankly an equal amount of fear. I have been reading a lot of quotes on the internet. And this one, ' To be brave doesn't mean that you dont carry fear, it just means that you have got the nerve to overcome it'; the timing couldn't have been more perfect for this. 

There is another good 3 to 4 months of solid work before we will be able to put anything out or make public. The idea is no secret. There are quite a few people working on this already. But the format and the packaging, surely is, very innovative and necessary. We are figuring things out on the way. I am now more sure that something amazing will turn out for the world to see and experience. It is happening as you are reading this. 

Ideation and sketches by Shashidhar Subramanya

The music plays 24x7! There is a strange appreciation to most of the work place discipline followed in my earlier work places. There is a craving to create a space of our own. It has happened a bit late, all this. I could have easily started off on anything I wanted to an year back. But the team right now and the zeal surrounding our work wouldn't have been there. When you are focussing on social problems and trying to work out a solution for it, it better be easy to execute (like off the shelf) and it should be scalable. 

When you are addressing a social problem through business, the major hurdle one would face is affordability. We feel 'affordability' is one of the major decisive factor for an entry point into the market. And for the businesses in the social space, it is spectacularly spoiled by non profits which do work with similar vision and offer their services for free! Its very difficult to break this mindset in the Indian context, but it is possible. A whole new dynamics of smart networks and partnerships would help break the affordability barrier and reach a lot of users. Just take along with you all those who want to reach where you want to reach. It will solve most of your problems. We are learning this now. 

To try and build the startup in a lean way takes a lot of unlearning. I didn't know the full form of MVP a month back. Now we are trying to build one to prove our concept right. We are building one to take it to the customer to eventually decide whether to pivot or persevere with it. I think as any startup, decisions should be data driven as much as it is pure intuition. Data shouldn't just be a preparation exercise for your pitch to the investors. And you need to be with the customer even before you start selling it to them. Make them your partners in development. I would buy what I want. So if you want me to buy something from you regularly you better know what I want even before you sell it to me. And this is the challenge we face when we try to price a solution covering a market's needs.  

I am really excited about the challenge we have taken up to solve. At this point the air around me is extremely positive but also hot, noisy and polluted. The no of trees are reduced to a handful. You just cant have a free walk on the streets. The lakes are all eaten up for real estate development. You cant really blame them. They are hardcore businesses. They dont exist if there is no requirement. Damn! it is no more Bangalore like the old times. 

But, hey! There is always a solution. In our studio we believe, whatever the problem that is there around us, can be solved. And solved, right now!

A powerful weapon!

This one question started to bother me day in and day out. What is education in real? I mean, lot of people question themselves through their courses. Some fight it out, some drop out, some do enjoy, but my question today is how many of us can really derive a leverage from it. Yes, people do get jobs passing out of a university, but that’s not the leverage I am talking about here. It is becoming more evident these days to me that it is those learning that cannot be quantified in a grade sheet that will matter the most. Not because I decided to spend my time inside a forest with people instead of getting a Master’s degree. The civic issues around are only increasing. I am not being cynical here. I am in awe of all those people who are onto the job in real to tackle them to the roots. They are an amazing set of people with intent and a direction. I know some of them very personally. However the following discourse is not about them. It is about those set of people with intent and who have no direction. It is about to create that intent and give a direction to empower a whole new generation of citizens into problem solvers.

Well, there has already been a lot of talk on the government being open to its people in its policy formulation. Public policy is a field of research. The universities today are helping create practitioners and also scholars in public policy and management. We have highly motivated bureaucrats, at least a handful of them. There are a lot of voluntary organizations working in that space. There is however one sector that is not empowered enough to tackle civic issues. Them, citizens! Us! So where should we really start on this. Going through a few notes of mine I come to realize how ill-informed I was before. And one thing became clear that Public policy is not meant to be understood by the practitioners only.

After having said that, my life really starts becoming tough. You see, it takes just language to talk about an issue. It is only when we get down trying to solve a problem will the void start to show up; which is precisely why I started to speak about education upfront. Off late I am hitting a few books trying to understand certain things. I am amazed at the fact that there is a theory or more for anything you can think of in this world today, which means to say, the people before us have not sat quietly. And so the onus is clearly on us to take this forward. Of course not theorize further, but use them to provide ourselves a starting point to our work. Although it seems very boring to sit for hours and study all the theories on public administration, I feel it is extremely important. It gives you such a brilliant perspective about the society you are living in.

The social studies we have studied in school helped us get good grades in History, Geography and Political and Economic Sciences. Well, to share a personal experience with you, I have had an excellent teacher in higher primary and middle school who explained to us so beautifully about the kingdoms and increased the excitement in drawing and reading maps. The best was reading a physical map but for me now, and my work the political maps seem more relevant. However it was great fun understanding them. I loved understanding civics as a subject as much as I hated history remembering the tenure of various kings. But now I am not able to rule that out. Most of our social issues today have a lot of strings attached still to all those things we studied in a history class. I love the forests, which means I greatly respect the soil. Geography teaches the science behind them and a lot of nature’s behavior. Ideally it should help us connect more to nature, but we are somehow evidently pushing away from it. Learnt properly, social studies gives you the most relevant information passing out of school.

Especially in our country (I can at least be sure of my place, Bangalore) that social studies is treated as just a subject that shows up in a grade sheet and that it passes by without notice. Think about it, it is the only opportunity we get to learn in a structured way about our possible engagements in this world living inside the society we have all created for ourselves. All that we have created were not existent. All that is created therefore is not established but is evolving and so it does. And there lies an opportunity to work towards a more prosperous evolution. In my case and most of my friends we are still lost in understanding our ecosystem properly; forget working towards its betterment. There is a clear disconnect somewhere. It is not evident as we are not concerned about the gaps. It doesn’t really affect you upfront even if you remain ignorant about the gaps. You can still have a life.

The question however is, can that life be good? I am telling, this gap can be bridged. The evolution into a prosperous society is possible. At least I am sure of the first step towards it. What can possibly stop today to work on their interests in life? Our country has come through a lot of difficult times to be able to help its people develop economic safety nets to their capacities and under 70 years from independence it is able to help at least a few people follow their passion. You come to Bangalore and you will understand what I am talking here. The startup sector in India today is worth everything you have. I mean an investment of over 1.43 billion dollars in 2015 alone and we still have 5 more days to be done with this year. Speaking of which it is time we start believing that we can have executable solutions to the most complex social problems. It is time to get educated for real. As Nelson Mandela says, "Education is the most powerful weapon which can be used to change the world". It is time to get back to work. 

The third sector!

The state versus market debate has been on from a long time. It may be a century old debate or may be two. Looking back, it becomes clear, that the problems of the developing countries lies majorly in its administration efficiency and the political willingness to make things right. In my view, at least, it is certain that treating every transaction like that in a marketplace can solve most of our problems today. Nevertheless the limitations of this are pretty evident and therefore calls for an involvement of state at various quarters. But the opportunity to innovate that opens up will be surely visible for those who are concerned and a bit creative. The opportunity for larger social innovations will open up for the people to adapt and improve. The opportunities in a market place. Yes, market and social innovations, I think is the way forward. 

The societies have progressed from being a community to come together and form a democracy, driven today by the economy. Well this calls for a larger complexity in its processes and it’s services. And a direct impact on its delivery system of these services. There are just too many people today in India that calls for a lot of social innovation for solving most of our civic problems. And the kind of services taken up by the state are varied, some independent some in partnership and some by the private agencies we call today as businesses and the rest by the civic sector through the mission of the various voluntary Organisations that exist. What is actually required is a socio-economic progress, accountability to the people by the primary agency responsible, a positive, persuasive and a pro-active governance. To achieve this the state alone will not be capable. It cannot add much to the economy of the nation and retain profits in the national exchequer for the prosperity of the nation. It depends on the taxes paid by not just its individuals and the industries, but also the state relies on businesses to provide innovative solutions to specific social problems. 

On this regard, if we dig deeper into the current situation the ecosystem seems to be extremely co-operative for such businesses to thrive and make a difference. And I need not elaborate the impact today by companies that are coming up in the e-commerce and logistics sectors broadly making life more easy and comfortable. I would call them as not just a business, but as social machines. Social is a largely misunderstood word. Let us not even think about how social work is viewed. At least for me it is not something great that we get into it, it is something which everyone should. It is something you do still doing whatever you are doing for a living. It is a moral responsibility. I don’t see a greatness that needs to be showcased to the world for doing something ‘social’. I mean, what else can be done apart from it being social, right? At max, I can only sympathise for people not having a concern to the situation around them and not working on it. On that regard, businesses are social too, as long as they are solving a real problem. 

Business has a framework. It has a clear direction. It will be such a fantastic way to address the problems of our society if the solution to it becomes a reason for the existence of a business, right? For the sole reason that the solution providing system will be sustainable and scalable. The challenges however still remain. It is important to have a clear revenue model and that it addresses a real problem and offers a solution to it. If it does not fit into these the aforementioned requirements, one can simply trade to make money. Not much fun in it, isn’t it? We have all interacted with the various institutions of the government, more so with the businesses around. We spend our 70% day in the marketplace. That’s assuming nearly over 8 hours in a day. All this is not knew, not at all.

But a big question that stands tall in front of me today is, what are we doing in that remaining 30% of the day we get for ourselves completely every week. Assuming a 3hours per day for 6 days and 12hours a day, in a week, we have 1560 hours that gives us 65 days free per individual in an year, that we are out of this marketplace. With the population of India being 1.252 billion, we have 1900 billion hours free in an year by its entire population. If we can activate at least 30% of this we have around 585 billion hours in an year to work on addressing our social problems. So, time is not a concern. We have it. The more concerning issue is, how are we spending this time of ours?

It is clear and is definitely logical for us to accept that the state is not an one-stop solution for all the society’s problems. It needs participation. And for a business to attend to every social issue is near impossible. Like for example, one cannot charge for looking after a kid left alone by its parents and relatives. I mean the state run orphanages/ hostels or those run by non-governmental institutions cannot be treated with business-like solutions. And a lot of such such similar services too. But for those which can, should. And for the rest, there has to be a civic engagement. It is easier said than done. It is subjective to say the least, the idea of a nation's third sector after state and business, its citizens, participating towards better governance. For a developing economy like ours, Indians should come together with one single voice to tackle our internal issues. But, how? No, this post is not to start a movement online. If we have to see more objectively, the case becomes quite simple at the outset. I believe, that there is a solution and I have it. 

We have set up a democracy, for our sake. We elect a government which is responsible for a progressive public administration. It is our moral responsibility not just to vote, but to participate. To promote openness and transparency in administration, we need to participate. To measure performance of service delivery and evaluate it to suggest improvements we need to participate. To decentralize authority and get rid off pseudo power structures that exist today in the society, we need to participate. Speaking of which, I just realized how messy it is to participate today. But there has to be a way out. I am sure, there is. Why cannot we be positive about the systems we have developed for ourselves. I had just remarked on the social media, that, collectively we are all becoming more stupid, hitting on all the outbursts on #beefPolitics #Intolerence #AssemblyElections #RahulGandhi #Modi, damn!. We are becoming more stupid because we lack direction. We are concerned, but we are lost. Think about it now. 3hours of free time a day and how we are spending it fretting and ranting about these issues (on social media of course) instead of doing something to tackle them in real. Its easy to blog and post, isn’t it? I know this for a fact. I mean, why would I start another blog. Damn! Opinions are easy and they come free. Take this if you want.