‘Every crisis is an opportunity and it brings out the best in us’
By Shobhana Nair In order to guide marketers and business leaders on how to thrive and survive in this Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous (VUCA) world, ISA has organized the first ever global CEO conference titled ‘Navigating a VUCA World’. Hemant Bakshi, the new Chairman, ISA, and Executive Director, Home & Personal Care at Hindustan Unilever shares the relevance of this mega-event and how companies, like his, can cope with the current bleak market sentiment As advertisers, one of the key challenges we face is that the world is becoming turbulent. The events which happen thousands of miles away now affect our working environment too, whether it is a crisis in Syria or the shutdown in the US. We have seen a lot more volatility than what we have in the past like the recent rupee fluctuations. The challenge is to work in a world which is VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous). As advertisers, we need to learn from each other and understand the best way to lead businesses during such a period. With the Indian Society of Advertisers (ISA) Global CEO Conference on Navigating a VUCA World, ISA and advertisers are determined to get the best thought leaders in the world together, to share their experiences which can be valuable for everyone. We are not doing this as a one-off event and we will be doing this annually. Q] What are your responsibilities as isa’s new chairman? What are your immediate goals which you have set for yourself? My personal ambition and vision in ISA is to create a platform where we as advertisers can do two things. Firstly, we should share the best practices so that everyone can benefit from it. Secondly, since the environment around us is becoming complicated, we must ensure the interest of the advertiser, whether large or small, is considered and taken care of. Q] As isa’s chairman, what efforts are you putting in to help companies in these VUCA times? To be honest, different companies are finding their own ways and it is something for them to figure out. It is extremely difficult for us to say that we can solve someone else’s problems and that doesn’t come under ISA’s mandate. But we have, in the past, organized a workshop on ROMI (Return on Marketing Investment), where we invited leading companies and very senior people to talk about what that means. At that time, ROMI was not well-known and most people were focussed on returns from a financial point of view. Marketing investment was not understood, but we started sharing with people what it can do. Also, recently, we put together a digital seminar to explain how new media can help in these difficult times. However, our marquee event is going to be the Global CEO Conference. Q] The market sentiment isn’t upbeat right now. as an Executive director of a consumer brand, how are you keeping your chin up in these dark times? How do you motivate your team and peers? I personally think that every crisis is an opportunity and it brings out the best in us. People who strive to reinvent during this period are those who come out really strong. We must also keep in mind that businesses go through cycles. Good times eventually follow difficult times and companies come out stronger during such crises. Q] What did you learn from the 2008 economic slowdown that you plan to implement this time around? For me, the most important learning was that we must stay close to our consumers. We must not forget that while we are all going through a challenging time, they are suffering even more than we are. Therefore, we must make sure that we stay connected with them and that we keep doing things that are right for them. We need to question every cost that is there in the system and which is not visible to the consumer. That doesn’t mean that one should cut the latter, but anything that we are doing internally which doesn’t add value to consumers must be questioned. Therefore, scrutiny on cost is important. Lastly, this is a great time for innovation, not only in terms of products and services but also in terms of processes, because this is the time when you have the license to do things differently. Q] The slowdown has affected the entire world. How are your global partners currently dealing with it? I don’t think in terms of principles there is any difference which I have mentioned earlier. Different people do it differently and some of the best practices come out of our country. In fact, sometimes small advertisers are more enterprising than others. Q] 2013 is almost coming to an end. How do you look at the year gone by and how excited are you for the coming year? 2013 has been a VUCA year, a year in which situation leadership, directed by an inspiring vision, is required to succeed. At the start of the year, I wouldn’t have predicted that we would be in such a state right now. But I personally think if you have a clear vision for your business and if you are willing to be adaptive, you don’t get too fixated on the path you take. ABOUT NAVIGATING A VUCA WORLD The Indian Society of Advertisers, in partnership with exchange4media, is hosting the first ever global CEO conference on ‘Navigating a VUCA World’ on October 30, 2013 in Mumbai, India. The goal of this conference is to sharply dissect the tough times we are facing in the current economic situation, and to find out how organizational processes and practices need to be recast to deliver to this new VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous) world. Paul Polman, Chief Executive Officer of Unilever, will be the keynote speaker at this conference. He will share his thoughts on how business leaders can navigate in these tough economic situations. His views on the subject are thought provoking and widely acclaimed in the corporate world. Other speakers at the event will be R Gopalakrishnan, Director, Tata Sons; Manu Anand, President – India & South Asia, Cadbury India; Marten Pieters, CEO, Vodafone India; and Ravi Kant, Vice Chairman and Former Managing Director, Tata Motors. For more details, email emily.boral@exchange4media.com and visit www.exchange4media.com/ISAVUCA2013 Feedback: shobhana.nair@exchange4media.com
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