Professor C.K.Prahalad’s passing away is sad news. Distinguished Professor in the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, he was a worldwide authority on management and the originator of at least three important concepts in management:
- Core Competence
- Fortune at the bottom of the pyramid, and
- Co-creation

He grew up in Chennai and graduated from the Loyola College. After briefly teaching at Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad he moved to the United States. A brilliant academician, prolific author and consultant to major international companies of the likes of AT&T, Sony, Philips and Tata. For example, Ginger Hotels, the Tata group’s hotel chain says that “The concept was developed in association with renowned corporate strategy thinker, Dr. C. K. Prahalad”. A Padma Bhushan awardee, his name has been included in every major top ten list of management thinkers worldwide.

Here’s a link to an interesting series of videos in which he speaks on competing for the future.

What is it about robots of any kind that simultaneously inspires fear and awe? While there is an understandable fear of the unknown, in the case of robots there’s the science-fiction-inspired fear of whether these mechanical monsters (marvels, anyone?) will take over the world.

Modern robots represent man’s highest achievements in invention, imagination, enterprise, and technological skills. Robots are presently being used in many applications, from surgery to arc welding to defusing of explosives. Individuals, companies and governments all over the world are working on various developing kinds of robots.

Honda has developed the ASIMO, which it states is an abbreviation of Advanced Step in Innovative MObility, and is not a reference to the science fiction writer Isaac Asimov. I’m reminded here of “The Robots“, a single by the influential German electronic music pioneers, Kraftwerk, released in 1978.

In the article “Robo Spiders Are Multilegged Mechanical Marvels“, Wired magazine has included a gallery of images and videos of “the most amazing, mind-bending mechanical spiders ever to emerge from the fevered brains of roboticists”. In it you’ll find the 50-foot La Princesse (partly seen in the screenshot on top), the 10 cms Military Micro-Spider Bot, a tree climbing variety, and more.

Oh, here they come.

Stephen Wiltshire has been called the “Human Camera.” In this short excerpt from the film Beautiful Minds: A Voyage into the Brain, Wiltshire takes a helicopter journey over Rome and then draws a panoramic view of what he saw, entirely from memory.

I came to know about this from my friend Kamlesh Dave. When we watch Stephen perform we understand that the power and capacity of the human mind is awesome. Here, I’m reminded of this quote from Herbert Otto:

We are all functioning at a small fraction of our capacity to live fully in its total meaning of loving, caring, creating and adventuring. Consequently, the actualizations of our potential can become the most exciting adventure of our lifetime.

I was first introduced to the above quote by my mentor, Aporesh Acharya, founder of MILT who constantly reminded us of it. Aporesh was always urging us to “go beyond yourselves”. I understood that to mean we must constantly challenge ourselves and our beliefs. In similar vein Arthur C. Clarke has said:

The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.

The commercial brand Adidas has seized this idea and used it as their brand’s tagline, Impossible is Nothing:

I like the core thought behind “go beyond yourself”. Living it on a daily basis enriches life and makes it more meaningful and enjoyable. Do you know of any examples of people who have gone beyond themselves that you’d like to share in the comments below?

I’m taking the King’s advice in Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland wherein it is advised to “Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop”. Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who is better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll, wrote many books amongst which Alice in Wonderland is my favourite. I have long owned a 1986 edition of The Complete Illustrated Works of Lewis Carroll published by Chancellor Press, London.

Though Wikipedia says that Carroll’s works belong to the genre of literary nonsense, his writings continue to be remarkably relevant even today, more than a century later. For example, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences has chosen to use a portion to illustrate a section titled Writing Objectives. This is the part where Alice meets the Cheshire Cat in the forest and asks:

“Could you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to”, said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where…” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.
“…so long as I get somewhere,” Alice added as an explanation.
“Oh, you’re sure to do that, said the Cat, if you only walk long enough.”

The above is a great way to understand the importance of goal-setting. One definition of success is “achieving your goals whatever they are”. The important thing is to have a goal, otherwise how will you know that you’ve arrived!

I’ll also heed the King’s advice and end this post, my first, where it should: here.