Will and I will be moving to Pune in January. I have accepted a new position with iPlace USA, a recruitment process outsourcing service provider, running their sister company, iPlace India. In an expanded Senior Vice President role, I will be in charge of HR, marketing, leadership development and career coaching, and responsible for all new initiatives for expanding the company and achieving the business goals. It's going to be AWESOME. Even better, the CEO is American and we're in synch with where the company should go and how we can grow it together as a team. The company has made some amazing hires and while most of the staff are very young, they have tremendous potential. The company works hard to treat everyone fairly, there is parity across the organization, and employees are compensated based on their performance and effectiveness, not by who the managers like or are related to. Nice change. Some of the managers in place are extremely impressive and I look forward to working with these rock stars. :-)
We're super excited! Will is looking for the right college and there are plenty of very good schools in Pune. We'll be closer to Mumbai and south Goa, a couple of our favorite places in India, and will enable us to focus our travels in the south of India, where we haven't spent much time. We've been all over the north of this great country, but the backwaters of Kerala are calling, Pondicherry has been whispering in my ear for years now, and the fact that I've never been to Bangalore is almost embarrassing to make public.
So, this blog will effectively end with this post. My thanks to all my readers, for all of your great feedback, support, laughs and fury. It's been a tough slog these past few years. I will deeply miss my current co-workers, some of the best and brightest women (and a few good men!) I've ever worked with, here or overseas. But fear not, dear reader! I have set up another blog, focused on Pune at http://american-in-pune.blogspot.com. Check it out! Subscribe to it, like it, share it amongst your friends and we'll continue our brilliant conversations from there, okay? Follow me!
Onward,
Jeanne
Thursday, December 6, 2012
Thursday, October 11, 2012
All the News
RebelMouse has come up with a neat embed script that enables you to curate across the "interwebs" and post in one place. Kind of awesome. Actually, all sorts of awesome.
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Truth in Advertising - Recruiting Staff in India
At a previous company, I had to manage staff that were completely untrustworthy, never followed through on projects, always had excuses why they couldn't work on projects, completed work poorly and were generally difficult to manage. Exacerbating the problem was top management who never shared projects with middle management but went direct to managed staff to get work done with no regard as to how other work was to be completed.
That said, I did my work to the best of my ability AND their work. One individual, who had the title of Senior Marketing Manager was by far the worst. Whenever asked where he was with a project, he had always never started it because he was "working on another project for the CEO". His work was shoddy at best, rife with misspellings. Once he had an entire trade show project, booth panels, printed deliverables, etc. to work on and instead of using a reputable translation service, took it upon himself to pocket to costs and use Google Translate to put everything in Russian; it was a complete disaster. Did he get into trouble for this? No. When I asked for him to be replaced, the COO said that he had hired him personally and it was my responsibility to mentor him. While I agree with the concept, there is only so much that can be taught to someone who doesn't want to learn.
I'm no longer with the firm, but yesterday, I got a connection request on Linkedin from him. Here's what his Summary on linkedin states:
Hmm. Sounds familiar, methinks. First, he is writing sentences in proper English, something he was unable to do in the three years I got emails from him. Here's my summary:
Hmmm. So what does he say he does at the company we both worked for?
Interesting. While he played a role in packaging and did all of the photography, he was not involved in any other aspect he has stated were his responsibilities. There is no way that he could write a requirements doc, do social media, write a film brief - he can't write a decent sentence in English. Here's mine:
A lot of what's written on his is from a previous version of my resume, something which he has in his possession because one time I had given him my backup external drive while at a trade show for him to use in case a project came in that required him to work on projects I'd been developing. He had copied EVERYTHING, including my personal files, photos, etc. onto his computer while performing none of the work he was supposed to work on. No one seemed to think this was an issue.
Unless his title really changed, he's still Senior Marketing Manager, not Creative Head. And he's still no good.
This is not an isolated case. I see hundreds of resumes that are cut and pasted from other people's CVs. Recruiters tell me that the single toughest issue they fight in recruiting staff in India is the veracity of people's CVs. This manager will likely find something else to do, another employer who thinks he can actually do this work, which he very much can't. And that's too bad, because honest hardworking staff should get that position, not a liar. I feel bad for the company that hires him because what they expect as an employee is hardly what he represent himself to be.
What do you think about this issue? As a recruiter? Potential hire? As a company?
That said, I did my work to the best of my ability AND their work. One individual, who had the title of Senior Marketing Manager was by far the worst. Whenever asked where he was with a project, he had always never started it because he was "working on another project for the CEO". His work was shoddy at best, rife with misspellings. Once he had an entire trade show project, booth panels, printed deliverables, etc. to work on and instead of using a reputable translation service, took it upon himself to pocket to costs and use Google Translate to put everything in Russian; it was a complete disaster. Did he get into trouble for this? No. When I asked for him to be replaced, the COO said that he had hired him personally and it was my responsibility to mentor him. While I agree with the concept, there is only so much that can be taught to someone who doesn't want to learn.
I'm no longer with the firm, but yesterday, I got a connection request on Linkedin from him. Here's what his Summary on linkedin states:
Hmm. Sounds familiar, methinks. First, he is writing sentences in proper English, something he was unable to do in the three years I got emails from him. Here's my summary:
Hmmm. So what does he say he does at the company we both worked for?
Interesting. While he played a role in packaging and did all of the photography, he was not involved in any other aspect he has stated were his responsibilities. There is no way that he could write a requirements doc, do social media, write a film brief - he can't write a decent sentence in English. Here's mine:
A lot of what's written on his is from a previous version of my resume, something which he has in his possession because one time I had given him my backup external drive while at a trade show for him to use in case a project came in that required him to work on projects I'd been developing. He had copied EVERYTHING, including my personal files, photos, etc. onto his computer while performing none of the work he was supposed to work on. No one seemed to think this was an issue.
Unless his title really changed, he's still Senior Marketing Manager, not Creative Head. And he's still no good.
This is not an isolated case. I see hundreds of resumes that are cut and pasted from other people's CVs. Recruiters tell me that the single toughest issue they fight in recruiting staff in India is the veracity of people's CVs. This manager will likely find something else to do, another employer who thinks he can actually do this work, which he very much can't. And that's too bad, because honest hardworking staff should get that position, not a liar. I feel bad for the company that hires him because what they expect as an employee is hardly what he represent himself to be.
What do you think about this issue? As a recruiter? Potential hire? As a company?
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Will the "I" in BRIC become Indonesia? CNN Says So.
What Indian Management Needs to Understand About the Global Economy
I watch CNN a lot. Recently on "Quest Means Business", Quest asked an Indian business analyst, "Aren't you concerned about India's failure to deliver?" Fareed Zakari of "GPS" on CNN recently did a spot on the potential of Indonesia and forecasted that with India's slowing growth, and Indonesia's rise, that BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India & China) may soon replace the "I" in BRIC with Indonesia.
There are substantial flaws in India's ability to evolve, from its lack of quality education for the majority of its citizens, its substantial failing at providing infrastructure (roads, water, electricity, housing, etc.), and by far the worst, the deep, long term and entrenched corruption at local, state and national levels. Manufacturing and (some) innovation have been making substantial change, but I keep hearing, "Where is India's Google, Facebook, or Groupon?" What's built here, while some are wildly successful, are copycats, not gamechangers.
Indians like to point at the Tata Nano as a gamechanger and I scoff at that, especially for India. While the idea at heart makes sense, there problems that make it not a game changer:
1. It is a cheap car for the masses in a country of 1 billion that doesn't have roads to handle the current traffic.
2. It uses fossil fuels. If this car was green -- electric, or built on a Stirling engine using hydrogen, thereby reducing CO2 in a country rapidly succumbing to the worst pollution levels in the world, it could have been a gamechanger.
3. It's not as cheap as it was supposed to be. The design itself has issues (try fixing a stall on the road - you have to take the back seat out to access key components) so it won't work in Western countries (and I'm not sure it has the emissions technology built in to allow it to be sold in the EU or California).
4. An industry insider said that 25% of the components that make up the Nano are manufactured in China.
5. It was a marketing disaster.
Another weakness than many Indian companies have selling overseas is that many don't respect that the customer is king and you need to respond to them as such. One Indian CEO said to me. "Why should I bother with customer service when there are a billion of us here?" Ethics are expected in global business. Excellent customer service is expected. Product quality is demanded, on time at the price quoted. This issue becomes more dominant when working with Western buyers because we don't negotiate off proposal prices. What you've presented, we usually believe to be the final price. We respect that and pay it. Our Indian vendors consider us fools for doing so, thus their existing high profits. This is changing as salaries continue to rise and Western companies go elsewhere.
So where should Indian companies go? Start domestically. Every MNC is salivating on India's fast rising domestic market and there's a lot of money up for grabs. Foreign products go for high prices due to draconian tariffs, but people are willing to pay for them because they expect a quality product and customer service, things they're not sure they'll get with a domestic product. The Chinese have been successful here by producing low quality goods at a price that's more affordable, providing long term pricing contacts that allow for minimized risk, even though there are conflicts on their shared border. India is trying to keep the "Giant from the North" from flooding their market with cheap goods, but they're coming in anyway, cutting into the domestic market that India's companies should already be serving.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-magazine/huawei-will-china-conquer-the-world/article2243928/
Another issue is culture. Middle managers build fiefdoms for themselves and seek short term solutions, instead of convincing their seniors on long term strategies that will sustain them over the next decade instead of the next year. Incentives based on performance need to be standard practice. Communications from the CEO all the way down to the tea boy needs to be clear, measurable and effective. People need to know what you want, when you want it, and engage across the company, You're a team, people, not silos of information and skills sets to set upon each other in a drag-out fight for supremacy.
Invest in serious innovation, not copying other companies. Sure, you might be able to copy a widget, even make it better at a lower price, but that's not really innovation. Make a widget that the consumer doesn't know he wants yet. Find ways to see a problem and come up with a different, more elegant solution. Figure out how to change the world. That's innovation, and if Indian companies really do start investing in real innovation, no one would question the "I" in BRIC. Watch out.
Monday, March 5, 2012
Do You Have A Case of the Mondays? (NSFW)
I love istock. Yu Yu and I were looking for royalty-free images for a logo she needs to develop and we stumbled upon CSA Images. As we were reviewing these, we decided to come up with some captions for a few.
NOTE: We're using low-res comps because this is just for fun. We highly encourage you to visit istockphoto.com, which has a wealth of amazing images, illustrations, video available for download at very reasonable prices.
Enjoy.
NOTE: We're using low-res comps because this is just for fun. We highly encourage you to visit istockphoto.com, which has a wealth of amazing images, illustrations, video available for download at very reasonable prices.
"And this is how we plan to screw over the employees."
"Why yes, I DO lead the Marketing Department. How did you know?"
"Why yes, I did overdo the Xanax today... why is the wall paper moving?"
"Hey! You're zipper's open."
Man: "Honey, I have to confess. I'm a teabagger."
Woman: "Oh, honey, I love the Tea Party, too!"
"I hope he doesn't discover my balls are tucked in."
"Oh no, I think they know I peed in the office coffee this morning..."
Enjoy.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Why I'm in Love with Sarah Lacy and How to Improve Pando Daily
Sarah Lacy came to India for research on her book about entrepreneurs, Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky: How the Top 1% of Entrepreneurs Profit from Global Chaos. I was fortunate to meet her and take her to visit villages in Rajasthan where we met people who were benefitting from VNL's solar powered GSM and broadband equipment for rural networks. I think she's great and her work at TechCrunch was phenomenal. When Michael Arrington decided to sell Tech Crunch to AOL, my first thought was "Oh, no, tell me this is not true." I knew TechCrunch would never be the same.
Some time later, Sarah Lacy left TechCrunch and started a new venture called Pando Daily, which I love. It's TechCrunch, but even better. (You have to read this inspiring post from Sarah on why she started Pando Daily.) The writers and executives she's gathered together make for a formidable team and I can only say good things about their future. I joined and get regular updates in my email of valuable content that I can use in my daily life to improve the work I do. I find it that valuable. Really.
However, I do have a few concerns. How will they monetize their valuable content? Will I pay for it? Probably not. Do I visit their site often? Not as much as I should because the emails come to me fast and furious every day and I read all the complete posts as emails. I suggest they give me one paragraph and a link to get me back to their site. Their reader comments are good though, so I tend to visit on more interesting posts to read them and engage, but there's no like button. I'd love to be able to rate great comments that add to the story. Her readers are just as valuable as her writers in many ways. It's that awesome.
I'd also like a home page that lists the latest posts. I find the navigation to be cumbersome. I want to read more, feel more involved, but I have to decide between deals, people, companies, or culture, when I want to see all. It's not intuitive...
I encourage you to visit Pando Daily today. Sign up and get the posts in your emails. They're a fascinating take on the tech world from a global view point. Because Sarah has traveled everywhere, she understands that Apple in Silicon Vally equals China and beyond and it shows. I'm a huge fan and wish her the best in her new venture.
Friday, February 24, 2012
How To Market Luxury Goods in India
SO HOW DO YOU MARKET LUXURY GOODS IN INDIA?
Internet
Affluent customers are particularly heavy users of the internet for both gathering information and purchasing online. Globally, up to 90% of them regularly shop online (India's #'s not found.). The internet is their primary source for locating information on a luxury brand. In India, most people access the internet via smartphones and other handheld peripherals, like iPad and Galaxy Tabs. The digital programme is required to match the brand requirements on these items to the rest of the digital offering.
Many of the American and European luxury brands that are making huge profits in India are failing to deliver an online experience that appeals to an increasingly technologically savvy Indian market. In order to make the browsing and buying experience as engaging and appealing as possible to consumers, brands are going to have to bring newer technology into stores, on mobiles and to people’s homes. Luxury brands are going to have to be innovative, creative and at the cutting edge of technology, or they risk being left behind.
Web Site: Content strategy should be to communicate the mythology of your brand, using digital as a piece of the entire marketing programme. Tell the story of your brand's rich history, its craftsmanship, design and the history and background surrounding each product as they are introduced. Position the brand as a cultural tastemaker, and act as a trusted guide to lifestyle enhancement. Encourage a spirit of competition through exclusive online promotions and activities. Talk to younger affluent audiences to convert them to lifelong purchasers of the brand. Offer flawless online service and support. Finally, promote exclusivity via a closed extranet, available only to those who have purchased their products through the company. Within this, provide a Personal Shopping service that can alert them on product availability based on preferences they provide, e.g., a customer may prefer green, love organic materials, and only use a particular product type. With this information, the sales cycle is shortened when a product fitting all these parameters is introduced. (You could also provide this as a virtual personal shopper service on the public site as well or instead.) Users could provide profiles if they wish, and contribute by posting photos of their collection of your products. Offer members-only exclusive content, promotions, and contests that further reinforce the brand's image.
Blog: the focus should be primarily on lifestyle issues and fine living, essentially making the brand an arbiter of taste, recognizing and guiding consumers to cultural refinement. This content can be a valuable way to engage with the brand by associating it with other luxury products, events, etc. You can also provide ongoing educational content on how to care for the product, storage, cleaning, etc. adding value to the web site. Another section can be a virtual museum of your brand's technological breakthroughs and innovations - what makes them special.
Online Advertising:
Top Indian Lifestyle Sites
Top Indian Travel SItes
Social Media: Facebook Fan Page, Linkedin Corporate Page, and Twitter accounts should be deployed to act as intermediaries driving traffic to the web site and calls to action, including invitations to exclusive events, new store openings, new pen launches, etc.. Constantly updated content (daily or 3x/week) will include links back to the web site, exclusive content, and links to external sites that fit into enhancing the consumers' lifestyle. Twitter is essential for on-site reports, tweeting backstage from events, posting "live" photos, etc. These tweets enhance the brand's image by providing insight into exclusive events, particularly powerful to the Newly Rich segment and aspirational buyers. Campaigns can be reinforced through posting on social media and enable consumers to respond directly. The online engagement between the consumer and the brand is particularly powerful when these conversations take place publicly, enabling us to address issues and questions once and distributed to many. It also enables us to provide a digital archive of the history of our activities within India for those who missed them. This strategy ties in with building up younger, aspirational buyers and making them lifelong purchasers.
Email Newsletters: Weekly or Monthly HTML newsletters segmented to existing customers, existing leads that have yet to make a purchase, and one-off list rentals introducing the product.
Webinars
Rich Media Posts (Youtube)
APIs: Building phone apps that work with GPS location to identify locations closest to you in any Indian city. Later this can be expanded to included "(Your brand) Selects" - lifestyle-related selections of stores, restaurants, and other locations recommended to our audience.
Outdoor
Partnerships & Sponsorships
Internet
Affluent customers are particularly heavy users of the internet for both gathering information and purchasing online. Globally, up to 90% of them regularly shop online (India's #'s not found.). The internet is their primary source for locating information on a luxury brand. In India, most people access the internet via smartphones and other handheld peripherals, like iPad and Galaxy Tabs. The digital programme is required to match the brand requirements on these items to the rest of the digital offering.
Many of the American and European luxury brands that are making huge profits in India are failing to deliver an online experience that appeals to an increasingly technologically savvy Indian market. In order to make the browsing and buying experience as engaging and appealing as possible to consumers, brands are going to have to bring newer technology into stores, on mobiles and to people’s homes. Luxury brands are going to have to be innovative, creative and at the cutting edge of technology, or they risk being left behind.
Web Site: Content strategy should be to communicate the mythology of your brand, using digital as a piece of the entire marketing programme. Tell the story of your brand's rich history, its craftsmanship, design and the history and background surrounding each product as they are introduced. Position the brand as a cultural tastemaker, and act as a trusted guide to lifestyle enhancement. Encourage a spirit of competition through exclusive online promotions and activities. Talk to younger affluent audiences to convert them to lifelong purchasers of the brand. Offer flawless online service and support. Finally, promote exclusivity via a closed extranet, available only to those who have purchased their products through the company. Within this, provide a Personal Shopping service that can alert them on product availability based on preferences they provide, e.g., a customer may prefer green, love organic materials, and only use a particular product type. With this information, the sales cycle is shortened when a product fitting all these parameters is introduced. (You could also provide this as a virtual personal shopper service on the public site as well or instead.) Users could provide profiles if they wish, and contribute by posting photos of their collection of your products. Offer members-only exclusive content, promotions, and contests that further reinforce the brand's image.
Blog: the focus should be primarily on lifestyle issues and fine living, essentially making the brand an arbiter of taste, recognizing and guiding consumers to cultural refinement. This content can be a valuable way to engage with the brand by associating it with other luxury products, events, etc. You can also provide ongoing educational content on how to care for the product, storage, cleaning, etc. adding value to the web site. Another section can be a virtual museum of your brand's technological breakthroughs and innovations - what makes them special.
Online Advertising:
Top Indian Lifestyle Sites
- lifestylehub.com
- cscout.com
- shopping.indiatimes.com
- lifepositive.com
- ayurjeeva.com
- sify.com
- lifestyle.rediff.com
- 3to6.com
- living.oneindia.in
- imagesfashion.com
- Luxe Lore and Justdial- Lifestyle
Top Indian Travel SItes
- makemytrip.com
- yatra.com
- cleartrip
- expedia.com
- indianrailways.com
Social Media: Facebook Fan Page, Linkedin Corporate Page, and Twitter accounts should be deployed to act as intermediaries driving traffic to the web site and calls to action, including invitations to exclusive events, new store openings, new pen launches, etc.. Constantly updated content (daily or 3x/week) will include links back to the web site, exclusive content, and links to external sites that fit into enhancing the consumers' lifestyle. Twitter is essential for on-site reports, tweeting backstage from events, posting "live" photos, etc. These tweets enhance the brand's image by providing insight into exclusive events, particularly powerful to the Newly Rich segment and aspirational buyers. Campaigns can be reinforced through posting on social media and enable consumers to respond directly. The online engagement between the consumer and the brand is particularly powerful when these conversations take place publicly, enabling us to address issues and questions once and distributed to many. It also enables us to provide a digital archive of the history of our activities within India for those who missed them. This strategy ties in with building up younger, aspirational buyers and making them lifelong purchasers.
Email Newsletters: Weekly or Monthly HTML newsletters segmented to existing customers, existing leads that have yet to make a purchase, and one-off list rentals introducing the product.
Webinars
Rich Media Posts (Youtube)
APIs: Building phone apps that work with GPS location to identify locations closest to you in any Indian city. Later this can be expanded to included "(Your brand) Selects" - lifestyle-related selections of stores, restaurants, and other locations recommended to our audience.
Outdoor
- Billboards (Hoardings)
- Airports
- Hotels
Partnerships & Sponsorships
- High End Sporting Events (Horse racing, Formula 1, Polo, Golf, Regattas, Sailing)
- Fashion Weeks (Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata), Tie-ups with Indian Designers
- International Film & Fine Books Festivals
- Classical Performing Arts Festivals
- Gentlemen's Clubs (ex. Tollygunge Club, Kolkata)
- Hotels, Spas, and Resorts: 80% of luxury POS resides here, however, it is a restricted environment with limited footfalls and visual impact.
- Airports: Newer, modernised airports are creating dedicated retail space for luxury items.
- Upscale Shopping Malls (eg., Emporio in Delhi, UB City in Bangalore)
- Guerilla Marketing
- Special Events - Exclusive, invitation-only events with special guests and celebrities
- Launch Parties
- Store Openings
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
India's High Potential Gold Mine: The Luxury Market
Luxury marketing in India is a conundrum. With a booming economy, India is the newest and most challenging target for luxury goods manufacturers worldwide. Indian luxury goods market which was valued at US$ 4.3 billion* in 2007 has grown manifold. The Indian economy has one of the highest disposable incomes and 126,000 HNIs (High Networth Individuals) and another 3 million households earning above 10 lakhs also ready to consume luxury. The base is huge and the market ripe.
According to Forbes, India has the fastest-growing population of millionaires in the world. But for Western luxury brands operating in the country, grabbing a piece of the market has proven more difficult than anticipated and many are in the process of re-conceiving their India strategies. Part of the problem is that Western luxury brands don’t seem to understand Indian consumers. When they first entered India, they created splashy advertising campaigns targeting the old money elite. But the results were poor, largely because this customer segment consists of frequent international travelers who overwhelmingly prefer the experience of purchasing Western luxury goods abroad, where brands offer them wider choice, better service and more competitive pricing than what’s currently available inside India. This plan aims to counter this finding.
* According to India Luxury Review
** Thomas Kastgen, Chairman, Leading Brands of the World
Across all segments, the Indian consumer is always seeking value for their money. The customer is typically very demanding, expecting to be pampered with personal visits to their home or office, and wants to get extra value adds as part of the purchase. These are the segments of consumers you need too look out for:
- Luxuriented. Primary consumers of luxury goods. Source of affluence is largely traditional and inherited wealth. Most importantly, they have high levels of exposure and awareness to world class living. Increasingly showing a preference for European goods. Exclusivity, brand invisibility, and product quality are all important triggers for purchase. They are typically urban, and travel internationally a great deal, from 3 times a year to every month. Prefers to shop overseas for two main reasons: price is lower overseas, and the purchasing experience and surroundings are vastly superior. (e.g., picture the buying experience in Tiffany's on 5th Avenue in New York City to buying the same pen in Colaba Causeway, Mumbai or Connaught Place in Delhi.)
- New Rich. Adequate spending power. Acquiring orientation to luxury. Brand visibility and flamboyance are important, yet price point can be a barrier. Looking for aspirational labels - wants to show peers that they are successful and powerful.
- Getting There. Acquiring spending power. Spends mainly on high end white goods, education of children, better housing and larger automobiles.
- Mid Affluents are also acquiring orientation to luxury, however unlikely to indulge beyond a limit.
Market Growth
The growth rate for the industry is 14.6 per cent. India’s luxury goods market of Rs 717 billion is set to expand dramatically over the next ten years. India’s total retail market has been estimated at $160 billion or Rs 7,170 billion, covering eight million consumers. Of them, one million are considered to be in the luxury brands segment.
There are over one million luxury consumers, which is only a fraction of the eight million plus consumers who have HNW disposable incomes but are unfamiliar with the luxury segment. The growth rate for the industry is 14.6 per cent. India’s luxury goods market of Rs 717 billion is set to expand dramatically over the next ten years. India’s total retail market has been estimated at $160 billion or Rs 7,170 billion, covering eight million consumers. Of them, one million are considered to be in the luxury brands segment.
According to Mr Sanjay Kapoor, Chairman, CII Luxury Goods Forum and MD, Genesis Luxury Fashion Pvt. Ltd., "The luxury industry in India has shown very promising growth over the last couple of years and is set to grow at a minimum of 25% per year over the next few years with India emerging as a luxury shopping destination. We have the right environment in place for international luxury brands to have a retail presence across our major metros. I feel we are at the threshold of a great expansion and it is indeed encouraging to be part of this new drive."
Electronics is growing at the top end, growing at 25 per cent. The fashion industry, cars, and jewelry segments are growing at 20 per cent. Growth in the luxury pens segment is assumed to be similar to the growth pattern seen in the jewelry segment.
Critical Issues
Brand awareness activities should be commensurate with not only this year's middle and upper income group’s spending power, but must also develop their products and their brands so that they can meet the demands of a local economy which will have outstripped many European economies within 10 to 15 years.
Market microsegmentation will be required to ensure the appropriate products are offered to the correct buyer. Messaging, materials, distribution and approach need to be segmented to address their triggers to purchase.
The single most important reason for luxury retail not taking off in India is the lack of luxury retail environments. It is important to see how this segment will evolve in the future considering that existing retail formats in India are in 5 star hotels or as stand-alone stores. I've spoken with a number of high net worth individuals in India who say they'd rather go to Fifth Avenue in New York to purchase because a) the price will be lower and b) the purchasing experience is far better. Stay tuned for my next post on How To Market Luxury Goods in India.
How to Market Multiple Brands
One of the major challenges conglomerates have is managing their brands. With acquisitions, new product launches, new company launches, each needs a unique voice that instantly identifies what the brand represents. Some companies choose to let each brand speak in separate silos with no recognition of their parent company, while others consolidate under a specific set of branding guidelines that unify the individual brands, while also reinforcing the parent company.
There are reasons to do one or the other. Both are equally valid strategies, however, the best strategy depends on the products and services under the parent umbrella. For example, if Dow Chemical owned the company that made your breakfast cereal AND your paint thinner, would Dow's branding help or hurt the brand image for your breakfast cereal? I think it could significantly hurt sales.
Another of the challenges marketers face is what to do with the plethora of mismatched logotypes for their brands. Sometimes board members, who approved that PMS #185C red logo back in the early 1980s, really are invested in it, even though now it looks incredibly dated. The light aqua blue for the company you purchased last year, and the lovely green for the solar power company, may work well together, but that glaring red logo - no. The best way to present this to the board is show all the brands on one slide and a suggestion as to how to integrate them as a whole, if that's the strategy you want to pursue. Sometimes it may be similar colours or fonts, or an overarching layout that utilizes the parent company as the tag line.
Boards of Directors or CEOs can be their own worst enemies.Though they may be experts in their respective fields, unless they've specialized in marketing, they don't understand the consequences of their emotional decisions to stay with outdated or inconsistent branding. I've been told that the reason one CEO stuck with a bad logo was because he perceived it as lucky. No other reason. As companies grow and expand, acquire new companies, etc., their brand also needs to do the same.
DEVELOP YOUR BRANDING GUIDELINES
You'll need one for each company. Regardless of which strategy you decide upon, having a clear and succinct description of what the brand means and how it is to be presented, along with rules for how to use your branding will (hopefully) keep your brand from being destroyed by your HR department. True story: the company wanted to eliminate all the paper cups staff used for tea at the office. Someone "brilliant" in HR decided that everyone should have their own ceramic cup with their name on it. They used the logo in a light blue background pattern, with the names spelled out in a deep black rounded serif font. The colour was wrong, the font looked ridiculous. No one used them because the cups were so ugly. Paper cups remain to this day. If your employees are not going to support the brand image, no one else will either.
It should consist of a description of the logotypes, taglines, fonts and standard layouts that are approved for use. It should also show how NOT to use these valuable brand assets. There are numerous sites online to help you with this, but Smashing Magazine has a great list of examples to give you insight and inspiration.
DISTRIBUTE THE BRAND GUIDELINES TO ALL STAFF
You'd be surprised who makes the forms your HR team uses, who designs your recruitment ads, who buys the giveaways for a trade show or what your invoices actually look like. I recommend placing the guidelines online and whenever you add new staff, part of the HR package should include a memo on branding, the location of the guidelines and the consequences for not adhering to them. Each new staffer should sign that they will comply.
DEFENDING YOUR BRAND
Everything that has your logo on it should be vetted by the Marketing team, from internal paperwork to anything going to a customer or prospect. Without this, you're pretty much toast and each time something goes out without proper branding, it's one step closer to deleting your brand from your customer's memory and the carefully crafted impression it was supposed to make.
YOUR BRAND IS NOT JUST YOUR LOGO
Every touchpoint with a prospect, customer, partner or supplier should be treated with as much care as your logo, from how the phones are answered, the hold music you select, the signatures on your emails, to the content - my god, the content!!! If you're supposed to be a happy, breezy, friendly and casual company, your content can't come off as if it were written by your lawyers. (And no law firm wants to sound happy, breezy, friendly and casual either.)
Branding is a vital start to the rest of your marketing mix. Ensure you get it right and the rest will fall into place.
There are reasons to do one or the other. Both are equally valid strategies, however, the best strategy depends on the products and services under the parent umbrella. For example, if Dow Chemical owned the company that made your breakfast cereal AND your paint thinner, would Dow's branding help or hurt the brand image for your breakfast cereal? I think it could significantly hurt sales.
Another of the challenges marketers face is what to do with the plethora of mismatched logotypes for their brands. Sometimes board members, who approved that PMS #185C red logo back in the early 1980s, really are invested in it, even though now it looks incredibly dated. The light aqua blue for the company you purchased last year, and the lovely green for the solar power company, may work well together, but that glaring red logo - no. The best way to present this to the board is show all the brands on one slide and a suggestion as to how to integrate them as a whole, if that's the strategy you want to pursue. Sometimes it may be similar colours or fonts, or an overarching layout that utilizes the parent company as the tag line.
Boards of Directors or CEOs can be their own worst enemies.Though they may be experts in their respective fields, unless they've specialized in marketing, they don't understand the consequences of their emotional decisions to stay with outdated or inconsistent branding. I've been told that the reason one CEO stuck with a bad logo was because he perceived it as lucky. No other reason. As companies grow and expand, acquire new companies, etc., their brand also needs to do the same.
DEVELOP YOUR BRANDING GUIDELINES
You'll need one for each company. Regardless of which strategy you decide upon, having a clear and succinct description of what the brand means and how it is to be presented, along with rules for how to use your branding will (hopefully) keep your brand from being destroyed by your HR department. True story: the company wanted to eliminate all the paper cups staff used for tea at the office. Someone "brilliant" in HR decided that everyone should have their own ceramic cup with their name on it. They used the logo in a light blue background pattern, with the names spelled out in a deep black rounded serif font. The colour was wrong, the font looked ridiculous. No one used them because the cups were so ugly. Paper cups remain to this day. If your employees are not going to support the brand image, no one else will either.
It should consist of a description of the logotypes, taglines, fonts and standard layouts that are approved for use. It should also show how NOT to use these valuable brand assets. There are numerous sites online to help you with this, but Smashing Magazine has a great list of examples to give you insight and inspiration.
DISTRIBUTE THE BRAND GUIDELINES TO ALL STAFF
You'd be surprised who makes the forms your HR team uses, who designs your recruitment ads, who buys the giveaways for a trade show or what your invoices actually look like. I recommend placing the guidelines online and whenever you add new staff, part of the HR package should include a memo on branding, the location of the guidelines and the consequences for not adhering to them. Each new staffer should sign that they will comply.
DEFENDING YOUR BRAND
Everything that has your logo on it should be vetted by the Marketing team, from internal paperwork to anything going to a customer or prospect. Without this, you're pretty much toast and each time something goes out without proper branding, it's one step closer to deleting your brand from your customer's memory and the carefully crafted impression it was supposed to make.
YOUR BRAND IS NOT JUST YOUR LOGO
Every touchpoint with a prospect, customer, partner or supplier should be treated with as much care as your logo, from how the phones are answered, the hold music you select, the signatures on your emails, to the content - my god, the content!!! If you're supposed to be a happy, breezy, friendly and casual company, your content can't come off as if it were written by your lawyers. (And no law firm wants to sound happy, breezy, friendly and casual either.)
Branding is a vital start to the rest of your marketing mix. Ensure you get it right and the rest will fall into place.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Chaos = India
There's a term in Hindi, Jugaard, that pretty much sums up what living in India is like. Everything you need to do takes several extra steps, extra trips, extra paperwork, and many more passport photos than you could ever imagine.
Jugaard means basically by any means possible (legal or otherwise), using whatever you have on hand to get it done, usually at the last minute. This goes against every fiber of my being. I'm German and Scottish, both countries with tremendous craftsmanship, cultures that require absolute perfection, work environments that prize meeting deadlines, staying under budget, and getting the job done well.
Politics is a big deal here. More than any other country I have experienced. Respect is expected immediately, not earned as it is in the US. I am not political at all. I sometimes treat peons better than CEOs because they get no respect from anyone else. All the security guards love me, because I greet them when I come and go and ask in my very broken Hindi about their day. Due to the caste system (which, while illegal, is still very part of the culture), many people are "too good" to clear out their own wastebaskets or make their own tea. (They would never last in a US startup. At BuzzBoltMEDIA, a web consulting firm I co-founded in Chicago, everyone, including the two co-founders had the take the trash out once a week, vacuum the carpets and clean the bathrooms.) I have worked with a number of CEOs here and I am supposed to call them by their first name, with the "ji" at the end, a Hindi word that denotes respect, so if my boss' name was Sumit, I was supposed to call him Sumitji. I forget this all the time and insult people. I've taken to calling everyone Sir, even though I don't like it.
I have one superior that calls me "Boss" and I just love him. He treats me like an equal and I feel respected and appreciated for the work I do. I try to do my very best work for him. I'll go the extra mile. He's one of the very few leaders I've had the pleasure to work with here. For me, it's never been about the money, it always been about making impact, seeing the impact and having someone thank me for the good job I've done, nothing more. Another boss chastised me for making a public display of how happy I was with a worker's performance. He told that that will decrease his productivity. It didn't.
My first lunch in the basement at a company I worked for, I got my tray of food and went to sit with the staff on my team. They spent the entire time speaking in Hindi. Since it was clear to me that I was not to be part of the conversation, I never went back and ate at my desk. This made people think I was aloof and unfriendly. I'm not. People here isolated themselves from me. I have no Indian friends. All the people close to me are expats. I trust them. Most of them, except one Australian, never stole anything from me. But Indians have repeatedly stolen from me and laugh when I confront them. It's possible some of it comes from the fact that they think all foreigners in India are rich. I'm far from it. It's possible it goes back to the Colonial era and I'm just getting payback... Sticking with expats make me less homesick. They understand just how isolated I am -- we all are, not part of the culture we're immersed in, lost, not knowing how to do even the most basic things like getting cooking gas for our homes.
Chaos is everywhere, from the way people drive in my overcrowded city with no infrastructure, to the lack of electricity, and a wise man I met forecasted that in five years neighbors will be fighting over access to water. I believe him. Gurgaon has no water - they steal it from the poorest sections of Old Gurgaon to fill pools in the high rise luxury apartment complexes. There are no sidewalks and where they are, many small wallas (shopkeepers) have put up lean-to stalls to sell their tea and snacks. Pedestrians are forced to walk in the streets along side cows, trucks, buses, autorickshaws, bike rickshaws, cars and all sorts of other vehicles. People will ride their motorcycles, with the husband driving, a child perched on the gas tank, the mother on the back riding sidesaddle holding an infant in her arms. This seems to me to be one of the most dangerous of options in the already chaotic driving everyone does.
But I still love it here. Each morning we have breakfast ready to go along with our morning CNN news coverage of the world. My clothes are cleaned and ready for dressing - no ironing to be done. Our house keeper would do it for me. She has a good life working for me. They don't live in an unheated, non-air conditioned space on the roof - she has one bedroom in our apartment that she shares with her husband and infant daughter. Some maids in India have to sleep on the floor. We share our food with them and they are thanked all the time for their service to our household. I'm grateful for them and the energy they bring to my house. Outside it may be chaos, but within the walls of my home, we have peace and quiet, love and joy. When we leave the house, in spite of the chaos, India is blindingly beautiful - the brilliantly colored sarees and salwar khameez the women wear, the beautiful peacocks and brightly colored birds, the cows circumventing the cars in traffic (they always have the right of way!), the cute little feral pigs rutting around in the fields, even the packs of wild dogs with their adorable puppies are all part of the magic that is India.
Jugaard means basically by any means possible (legal or otherwise), using whatever you have on hand to get it done, usually at the last minute. This goes against every fiber of my being. I'm German and Scottish, both countries with tremendous craftsmanship, cultures that require absolute perfection, work environments that prize meeting deadlines, staying under budget, and getting the job done well.
Politics is a big deal here. More than any other country I have experienced. Respect is expected immediately, not earned as it is in the US. I am not political at all. I sometimes treat peons better than CEOs because they get no respect from anyone else. All the security guards love me, because I greet them when I come and go and ask in my very broken Hindi about their day. Due to the caste system (which, while illegal, is still very part of the culture), many people are "too good" to clear out their own wastebaskets or make their own tea. (They would never last in a US startup. At BuzzBoltMEDIA, a web consulting firm I co-founded in Chicago, everyone, including the two co-founders had the take the trash out once a week, vacuum the carpets and clean the bathrooms.) I have worked with a number of CEOs here and I am supposed to call them by their first name, with the "ji" at the end, a Hindi word that denotes respect, so if my boss' name was Sumit, I was supposed to call him Sumitji. I forget this all the time and insult people. I've taken to calling everyone Sir, even though I don't like it.
I have one superior that calls me "Boss" and I just love him. He treats me like an equal and I feel respected and appreciated for the work I do. I try to do my very best work for him. I'll go the extra mile. He's one of the very few leaders I've had the pleasure to work with here. For me, it's never been about the money, it always been about making impact, seeing the impact and having someone thank me for the good job I've done, nothing more. Another boss chastised me for making a public display of how happy I was with a worker's performance. He told that that will decrease his productivity. It didn't.
My first lunch in the basement at a company I worked for, I got my tray of food and went to sit with the staff on my team. They spent the entire time speaking in Hindi. Since it was clear to me that I was not to be part of the conversation, I never went back and ate at my desk. This made people think I was aloof and unfriendly. I'm not. People here isolated themselves from me. I have no Indian friends. All the people close to me are expats. I trust them. Most of them, except one Australian, never stole anything from me. But Indians have repeatedly stolen from me and laugh when I confront them. It's possible some of it comes from the fact that they think all foreigners in India are rich. I'm far from it. It's possible it goes back to the Colonial era and I'm just getting payback... Sticking with expats make me less homesick. They understand just how isolated I am -- we all are, not part of the culture we're immersed in, lost, not knowing how to do even the most basic things like getting cooking gas for our homes.
Chaos is everywhere, from the way people drive in my overcrowded city with no infrastructure, to the lack of electricity, and a wise man I met forecasted that in five years neighbors will be fighting over access to water. I believe him. Gurgaon has no water - they steal it from the poorest sections of Old Gurgaon to fill pools in the high rise luxury apartment complexes. There are no sidewalks and where they are, many small wallas (shopkeepers) have put up lean-to stalls to sell their tea and snacks. Pedestrians are forced to walk in the streets along side cows, trucks, buses, autorickshaws, bike rickshaws, cars and all sorts of other vehicles. People will ride their motorcycles, with the husband driving, a child perched on the gas tank, the mother on the back riding sidesaddle holding an infant in her arms. This seems to me to be one of the most dangerous of options in the already chaotic driving everyone does.
But I still love it here. Each morning we have breakfast ready to go along with our morning CNN news coverage of the world. My clothes are cleaned and ready for dressing - no ironing to be done. Our house keeper would do it for me. She has a good life working for me. They don't live in an unheated, non-air conditioned space on the roof - she has one bedroom in our apartment that she shares with her husband and infant daughter. Some maids in India have to sleep on the floor. We share our food with them and they are thanked all the time for their service to our household. I'm grateful for them and the energy they bring to my house. Outside it may be chaos, but within the walls of my home, we have peace and quiet, love and joy. When we leave the house, in spite of the chaos, India is blindingly beautiful - the brilliantly colored sarees and salwar khameez the women wear, the beautiful peacocks and brightly colored birds, the cows circumventing the cars in traffic (they always have the right of way!), the cute little feral pigs rutting around in the fields, even the packs of wild dogs with their adorable puppies are all part of the magic that is India.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Going Broke in a Third World Country
It's remarkable to think of going broke in a third world country. Because I look every bit American, people here assume I have a fortune hidden somewhere. I don't.
I was reading this article about Dubai (http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/the-dark-side-of-dubai-1664368.html) and I was very much struck by the homeless expat stuck there while her husband languished in debtors prison. Expats are vulnerable to the unique and particular laws of the countries they live in and the vagaries of how they are enforced.
People here can't understand why I'm broke. I'm told by some folks that I'm an expensive asset. I make less than half what I made in the States, but a lot more than the typical Indian office worker and pretty much the same as an Indian at my level. But some of my bills are different than Indians. Here's a breakdown of my expenses, bearing in mind, most expats live a far better life than me, being paid in foreign currency. (Okay, while I realize most people won't publicly declare their finances, I'm doing this as a service to those thinking of moving here and thinking they can live a cheap life here and save a bunch of cash to bring home with them. Seeing what a regular expat's expenses are would have been very useful to me before I moved here.)
MY EXPAT LIVING COSTS IN GURGAON
Sad, huh? :'-(
Liquor is expensive. We rarely go out for dinner, a ritual we miss. Will and I had a standing date every Friday night when we lived back home, for a nice meal in a fine restaurant when we lived back home, and I really miss that. Having wine is a rare event because the cheapest bottle of imported wine (think the 2-Buck Chuck from Trader Joe's) is 800 rupees (US$ 16.33). A decent bottle of Austalian or Chilean wine will cost you 1200; American or European will be twice as much, so we never have wine anymore. We rent our ACs, so they're 20,000 each for the season. I have to pay for household repairs, which cannot be planned ahead of time. Will's UK exams are an additional 100,000 rupee cost we pay in the final school quarter each year. Did I mention that we have practically no furniture in our house?
Plus there are taxes that I can deduct but corporations make it very difficult to know what can be deducted pre-tax and what is taxable. It helps if you know and trust someone who is an accountant here. Companies won't help you.
This also makes me even more sensitive to being cheated. Just because I'm white doesn't make me rich. Just because I'm white, doesn't make me stupid. Everyone tries to make a little extra off the foreigners because it's easy. We don't bargain at all, don't know how, actually. We usually go into a store and pay the price on the tag. Here, there are no tags - when you ask the price, a shop keeper has the freedom to charge what he thinks the customer can bear and if your skin is white, expect that to be ten times higher than what a local would pay.
Will is looking at colleges and wants to go back to the States or the UK. I've been trying to convince him to get his bachelor's degree here because it will cost less than his expensive private international school I'm paying for now. He was planning to take a gap year to help pay the bills, but that's just stupid. Like I said, I somehow manage to make things with work. There were rough times when we were kids, but we still spent each summer, all summer, away at horse camp or girl scout camp and stuff. I asked her recently how they managed to provide us with all those expensive experiences and she said, "We robbed Peter to pay Paul." Eventually everyone gets paid...
The article above was written two years ago, and depressing as it is, it has to be far worse now than in 2009. Expats have been fleeing Dubai, and the economy has hit expats particularly hard - we're expensive assets - as Indian employers like to remind me (even though I know LOTS of Indians at my level making more money than I do). It's easy to lose the expats when revenues fall and it doesn't undermine the status quo like it would if an Indian leader in the same position were to be let go. The dynamics are different. I've watched whole teams leave at once from a company with the loss of their team leader. Expats don't build fiefdoms like locals do. Simply don't support their visa renewal and they disappear. Quickly, with minimal fuss. We're at the mercy of our employer. We can't just quit our job and look for something else - we have to go home if we lose our jobs or want to accept a new position. It makes it hard to accept another position because the cost to join is high, making it unattractive for an employer. For me, it would require sending my family back to New York for a week - two round trip tickets to New York are around 200,000 rupees, and there's a risk that the visa won't be approved. Most companies don't want to take that risk. They don't have to, in a country with a billion other people.
I've wondered whatever happened to that homeless woman because I could easily see myself in her position. I'm lucky to work for a company that supports me, maybe not with the salary I'd prefer, but in many other ways. They help me negotiate rents and services, helps me figure out how to extricate myself from legal issues or get payments from people who owe me money. These things they don't have to do for locals, either. Being able to travel and see how other expats live helps tremendously as well - it provides perspective and helps me appreciate everything the company I work for does for me.
Follow me on twitter (@jeanneleez) or foursquare, or friend me on Facebook. I usually post there when I travel. Cheers. :-)
I was reading this article about Dubai (http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/the-dark-side-of-dubai-1664368.html) and I was very much struck by the homeless expat stuck there while her husband languished in debtors prison. Expats are vulnerable to the unique and particular laws of the countries they live in and the vagaries of how they are enforced.
People here can't understand why I'm broke. I'm told by some folks that I'm an expensive asset. I make less than half what I made in the States, but a lot more than the typical Indian office worker and pretty much the same as an Indian at my level. But some of my bills are different than Indians. Here's a breakdown of my expenses, bearing in mind, most expats live a far better life than me, being paid in foreign currency. (Okay, while I realize most people won't publicly declare their finances, I'm doing this as a service to those thinking of moving here and thinking they can live a cheap life here and save a bunch of cash to bring home with them. Seeing what a regular expat's expenses are would have been very useful to me before I moved here.)
MY EXPAT LIVING COSTS IN GURGAON
- Rent of 3 bedroom ground floor apartment = 30,000 rupees a month (US$ 615)
- Car & driver service = 25,000 rupees a month (US$ 511)
- Will's school = 20,000 rupees a month (US$ 408)
- Electricity = 12,000 rupees a month (US$ 245)
- High Speed Internet = 6,000 rupees a month (US$ 122)
- Housekeeper = 5,000 rupees a month (US$ 102)
NOTE: Her family of three also gets free room and board. - Yu Yu's Mobile = 4,000 rupees a month (US$ 81)
- My Mobile = 3,000 rupees a month (US$ 61)
- Will's Mobile - 500 rupees a month (US$ 10)
- Dog food = 2,500 rupees a month (US$ 51)
NOTE: We have three dogs. - Satellite TV = 1,000 rupees a month (US$ 20)
- Food & Entertainment = 20,000 rupees a month (US$ 204)
NOTE: For four adults, 1 infant.
Sad, huh? :'-(
Liquor is expensive. We rarely go out for dinner, a ritual we miss. Will and I had a standing date every Friday night when we lived back home, for a nice meal in a fine restaurant when we lived back home, and I really miss that. Having wine is a rare event because the cheapest bottle of imported wine (think the 2-Buck Chuck from Trader Joe's) is 800 rupees (US$ 16.33). A decent bottle of Austalian or Chilean wine will cost you 1200; American or European will be twice as much, so we never have wine anymore. We rent our ACs, so they're 20,000 each for the season. I have to pay for household repairs, which cannot be planned ahead of time. Will's UK exams are an additional 100,000 rupee cost we pay in the final school quarter each year. Did I mention that we have practically no furniture in our house?
Plus there are taxes that I can deduct but corporations make it very difficult to know what can be deducted pre-tax and what is taxable. It helps if you know and trust someone who is an accountant here. Companies won't help you.
This also makes me even more sensitive to being cheated. Just because I'm white doesn't make me rich. Just because I'm white, doesn't make me stupid. Everyone tries to make a little extra off the foreigners because it's easy. We don't bargain at all, don't know how, actually. We usually go into a store and pay the price on the tag. Here, there are no tags - when you ask the price, a shop keeper has the freedom to charge what he thinks the customer can bear and if your skin is white, expect that to be ten times higher than what a local would pay.
Will is looking at colleges and wants to go back to the States or the UK. I've been trying to convince him to get his bachelor's degree here because it will cost less than his expensive private international school I'm paying for now. He was planning to take a gap year to help pay the bills, but that's just stupid. Like I said, I somehow manage to make things with work. There were rough times when we were kids, but we still spent each summer, all summer, away at horse camp or girl scout camp and stuff. I asked her recently how they managed to provide us with all those expensive experiences and she said, "We robbed Peter to pay Paul." Eventually everyone gets paid...
The article above was written two years ago, and depressing as it is, it has to be far worse now than in 2009. Expats have been fleeing Dubai, and the economy has hit expats particularly hard - we're expensive assets - as Indian employers like to remind me (even though I know LOTS of Indians at my level making more money than I do). It's easy to lose the expats when revenues fall and it doesn't undermine the status quo like it would if an Indian leader in the same position were to be let go. The dynamics are different. I've watched whole teams leave at once from a company with the loss of their team leader. Expats don't build fiefdoms like locals do. Simply don't support their visa renewal and they disappear. Quickly, with minimal fuss. We're at the mercy of our employer. We can't just quit our job and look for something else - we have to go home if we lose our jobs or want to accept a new position. It makes it hard to accept another position because the cost to join is high, making it unattractive for an employer. For me, it would require sending my family back to New York for a week - two round trip tickets to New York are around 200,000 rupees, and there's a risk that the visa won't be approved. Most companies don't want to take that risk. They don't have to, in a country with a billion other people.
I've wondered whatever happened to that homeless woman because I could easily see myself in her position. I'm lucky to work for a company that supports me, maybe not with the salary I'd prefer, but in many other ways. They help me negotiate rents and services, helps me figure out how to extricate myself from legal issues or get payments from people who owe me money. These things they don't have to do for locals, either. Being able to travel and see how other expats live helps tremendously as well - it provides perspective and helps me appreciate everything the company I work for does for me.
Follow me on twitter (@jeanneleez) or foursquare, or friend me on Facebook. I usually post there when I travel. Cheers. :-)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)