Starting January 1, 2010, the 27 nation block (EU) plans to impose value-added tax (VAT) on services delivered from non EU nations, including India, this may lead to renegotiation in the billing rate and impact on bottom-line of leading IT companies who has major revenue from EU.

Europe accounts for around 25 to 30% of revenue of Indian IT industry. With the new tax rule it is likely to increase cost of outsourced project by up to 25%. In this scenario the outsourcing customer likely to negotiate the billing rate at least by 10 to 15% in order to offset their increased tax burden.

In this scenario, some customer may either move certain projects to onshore or insist on local delivery.
However, industry expert says, cost benefits may outweigh the tax impacts…. We all IT professional should hope so and be optimistic with the continuous project flows in the coming quarters to bring back the rosy days of the IT once again….

The above draft is an abstract of views published in the ET dated 16th Nov 09 under, ‘VAT effect companies may seek better rates’.

Warm Regards

- Nilesh

When things are going great and you are doing well, it’s the time you should proactively think about plan B i.e. contingency plan for the adverse test of times. The rationale behind plan b is to continue maintaining same lifestyle even if money inflow stops. The plan B should be such that it provides the required bandwidth and breathing space for an individual to sustain his or her lifestyle at least for six to eight months ahead on the bad times.

Contingency plan in place not only provide breathing space for an individual but also reduce the stress and strain. It helps to make more experiments and takes a leap of faith to move on the journey to better times, which is inevitable for an individual’s life who works smart converting tough times into opportunities to excel by ensuring contingency plan place.

Readiness to plan b provides better and controlled life moving on the journey rather than the victim of uncertainty in human life

Nothing can be controlled which can be monitored and measured …….have a contingency plan in place to have secured lifestyle moving ahead..

Warm Regards
- Nilesh

In today’s competitive world, the sense of urgency needs to be realized by all entrepreneurs with regards to the process institutionalization. Institutionalization significantly contributes to the maturity and sustainability of an enterprise that are best in class especially in respect of people process and technology.

The sustainability creates the additional bandwidth to the various potentials and in turn leads to breakthrough innovations within the enterprise. Innovations are the key drivers for the growth engine and possible only when we have sustainability with process institutionalization in place within an organization.

In absence of institutionalization, we witness chaotic situation where the business results (deliveries) are unpredictable, difficult to control on key ingredients such as cost time and quality, success are depend on individual heroics, there is as lack of clarity of purpose within an organization, lack of willingness on part of employees etc.

Therefore in order to build, grow and sustain any organization we have to have innovations and it is possible only we have high process maturity and sustainability.

Process improvement is a journey and not the destination, maturity evolves over period of time and it takes ages to build process institutionalization…..

Warm Regards
- Nilesh

The below article inspiration based on the John Mullins latest book, Getting through Plan B: Breaking through the better business model

According to Mullins, most of start-ups fail because they tend not to be receptive to market reactions. The most common excuse is cash running out, a simply a symptom of business model not being viable and not the reason for the failure of the model.

Further Mullins says, Test your business model as quickly as possible. The answer will tell you whether Plan A will work or whether you need to move to Plan B.

If we look back to the history of successful entrepreneurs and their ventures, we will witnessed, most of them are agile and adapt to the new route to success i.e. detour on to Plan B, when their ideas hit to brick wall and saw the roadblock ahead…..

Often, we will see transition to new business model comes with its own share of peculiar problems; here I would to quote my own experience with one of the leading Indian ethnic fast food chain…when they have started way back in 2004, opening their first fast food retail outlet in high street of Mumbai suburb , their initial business model (plan) focusing mainly on self managed outlets and target to urban areas with very little focus on rural market and gradually they have shifted to so called ‘Plan B’ i.e. They have shifted to franchisee model and focus more on rural areas rather than the urban areas ….

After spending almost four dedicated years in Mumbai region (Urban Areas) with their self managed outlets, the management team has realized that there are too many roadblocks to scale up the operations and maximize the potential available in the industry….In the last of one year, they have started implementing Plan B with the more focus on the rural areas of Maharashtra, such as Nasik, Aurangabad, Dhulia etc to name a few with franchisee option rather than self owned and controlled and gradually either started closing or transferring their self owned & controlled outlets from urban areas. With the change in the business model, they have grown from 15 outlets to 65 outlets and revenue in ten folds… and started journey to the big idea of the decade …

The critical element in the success of venture is to be adaptable, listen to market reactions & conditions….. With the leap of faith – Detour on to Plan B and so on, You are never going to go back to scratch and start out, its always about how to make the change going ahead from where you are…..

Wishing you all a leap of faith to make a successful venture on the journey….

Happy Deepavali

Warm Regards
- Nilesh

With my second inning in the entrepreneurial stint, I have realized that aspiring individuals have to have strong willingness and passion for piloting marketable ideas with risk taking appetite. As a startup, an entrepreneur needs to understand there is nothing called as short cut to success, it is purely based committed hard work to excel.

The key ingredients for aspiring startup entrepreneur are,

• Good Ideation, marketable ideas
• Indentified potential market segment
• Sound value system to be instilled within the DNA of entire team
• Knowledge, skills and aptitude
• Team work – Multitalented and complimentary
• High tolerance level across the levels
• Think globally and act locally (Understand target customer and their taste and preferences)

Even though it has been well known that entrepreneurship is within the blood of an individual, a raw talent can be developed with the best in class guidance, mentoring, training, and counseling in the area of entrepreneurship.

Aspiring friends, in nutshell you need strong willingness on your part, with knowledge, skills, good value system and marketable idea to explore untapped opportunities under the guidance, mentoring and coaching to start your journey on road less travelled.. I.e. entrepreneurial stint

I have collated and drafted the above dispatch based on the inspired thoughts from NR Narayan Murthy and Mr Dinesh Awasthi

Wish you all the best

Warm Regards
- Nilesh

After a significant capital expenditure locked in my initial retail fast food joint, I have realized that, in order to pilot the fast food joint at various locations to scale up, you have to have a low risk model option to go for… and their we came across with ‘RETAIL KIOSK’ either using fabrication (MS) with MDF or a traditional plywwod based as a low investment and low risk option to opt for.

The best part of these retail kiosks are they are mostly built on ready to assemble (RTA) concept, easy to transport, build, deploy and start operation at ease. We as a startup Indian Fast Food chain company has witnessed various influential proposition with KIOSK solution, such as;

• LOW INVESTMENT
• EASY TO BUILD, DEPLOY AND OPERATE
• START OPERATION IN QUICK TIME
• EASY TO RELOCATE
• REUSABILITY
• LOW RISK

Most of the new startups in retail who would like to expand were constrained due to lack of capital in their kitty; KIOSK is a great opportunity to experiments with their ideas before taking it to a large scale with high CAPEX. As in today’s hyper competitive market, it’s making huge sense to test our ideas with low risk and low investment option rather than high risk with high CAPEX. It also gives you live feedback without having too much money invested initially and easy to customised based on value added feedback…..

Wishing all new entrants a great success story ahead using a KIOSK ….

Warm Regards

- Nilesh

Today we witness majority of the enterprises whether its small scale or large scale are exploiting technology to their best of abilities for driving innovations for growth story e.g. An Indian ethnic fast food chain ‘GOLI’ who’s using process automation for large volume production, innovative technologies are indeed driving force to sustain their existence. But is it enough?, Most of the renowned management and quality gurus keep on saying improvement (In People, Process and Technology) is a journey not a destination therefore continuous or continual evolution should be at the core of an organizations DNA and not a discipline on to itself .

In order build, grow and sustain , creating lasting value in this world, one has to look beyond economic value generated for promoters, partners, shareholders and all the associated stakeholders such as its customers, its employees, its suppliers and the society in which it operates. The above mentioned are the critical ingredients for any successful business having longevity, management must have strong willingness and ability to create value for all of them else they may not be able to sustain value for any. Continuous improvement also implies disrupting the status quo in how organizations go to market and serve the changing needs of its stakeholders. Ingraining such principles and thought process is not easy, it requires accepting the broader purpose of an organizations existence, taking a longer term view on value creation and fostering the culture of continuous innovation….

IF YOU DON’T KNOW WHERE YOU WANT TO GO, MAP WON”T HELP YOU, ANY ROAD WILL DO …

MAP WILL HELP YOU IF YOU KNOW WHERE YOU ARE AND WHERE YOU WANT TO GO …..

IF YOU KNOW WHERE YOU WANT TO GO YOU ARE MORE LIKELY TO REACH AT THE DESTINATION…..

The above dispatch is the inspiration from thoughts of Sachin Sondhi of Deloitte, strategy and operation….

Wishing everyone all the very best for creating enterprise that will create long lasting value for its stakeholders…..

Warm Regards
- Nilesh Ozarkar

Standing @ fast food joint, leisure moments amidst flowing satisfied customers, when I look back and start comparing my days of the employment career and the road less travelled, so called entrepreneurial inning to transform my dreams into reality… something which I would like explore from long time, which is very near to my heart as FOODIE, yes of course Fast Food Joint of my own…..

Standing @ joint … I am realizing the great differentiator which is nothing but dramatic shift in the mindset or out of box thinking as an entrepreneur, in a true sense it is nothing but an application of knowledge and skills which I have learned during my academics, practiced and experienced at employment tenure as well as entrepreneurial stint…..

Inspiration from K. Smith, the unique influential proposition between the entrepreneur and the salaried individuals are;

• Entrepreneur thinks for the long term whereas as middle class thinks for short term … look for immediate gains rather than a long term winning story.
• Entrepreneur always talks about ideas and pilot it to taste the success or failure whereas middle class talks about things and others
• Entrepreneur embraces change whereas middle class threaten to change
• Entrepreneur takes calculated risk while middle class afraid of taking risks
• Entrepreneur continuously keep on learning and growing while middle class thinks his learning completes at school and college
• Entrepreneur works for making profit while middle class salaried works for monthly pay check (Salary)
• Entrepreneur believes they are more generous while middle class believes that they can’t afford it
• Entrepreneur have multiple revenue streams or sources whereas middle class has only one ( Monthly pay packet ) or two
• Entrepreneur focus on increasing net worth moving on the journey while middle class focus on increasing pay checks through out life…
• Entrepreneur ask themselves empowering questions while salaried middle class ask themselves disempowering questions …

…… the above are the critical thought provoking differentiator between entrepreneur and middle class… 

Be an entrepreneur who would like to be a millionaire moving on the journey rather than being a middle class…..

Sense of urgency needs to be realized …. Mindset shift and Change is inevitable to be successful on the life journey……

Wishing you a grand success story …. And be a millionaire

Regards

- Nilesh

Long awaited dream came into reality… Indian cricket started dreaming top slot in ICC ODI Ranking at the  Ganguly’s ( Dada ) era and then Rahul ( Mr Dependable ) , Anil strengthen the foundations and under the leadership of MSD ( Mahi) Dhoni brigade has done it @ Colombo with knocking out New Zealand from Compaq Cup….

Hope to see te winning story moving on to final….

Regards

- Nilesh

The CMMI for Services (CMMI-SVC) model, scheduled for release by March 20, is available now. The model was released early on Thursday, February 26, 2009.

CMMI for Services (CMMI-SVC) is a model that provides guidance to service provider organizations for establishing, managing, and delivering services. The model focuses on service provider processes and integrates bodies of knowledge that are essential for successful service delivery.

CMMI-SVC provides best practices that service providers can use when they

• Decide what services they should be providing, define standard services, and let people know about them
• Make sure they have everything they need to deliver a service, including people, processes, consumables, and equipment
• Get new systems in place, change existing systems, retire obsolete systems, all while making sure nothing goes terribly wrong with the service
• Set up agreements, take care of service requests, and operate service systems
• Make sure they have the resources needed to deliver services and that services are available when needed—at an appropriate cost
• Handle what goes wrong—and prevent it from going wrong in the first place if possible
• Ensure they are ready to recover from potential disasters and get back to delivering services if the disaster occurs

To download your copy, visit

http://www.sei.cmu.edu/publications/documents/09.reports/09tr001.html

Regards
- Nilesh