Mr CEO - Re Engineer Or Perish

I visited many organizations in South India since the FINAMI struck in early Ocober of 2008 .Spoke to many CEOs who are running huge businesses . All I could hear and see was they are all busy having several rounds of meetings on a new found subject called COST Cutting . One of them has organized this cost cutting meeting in a nearby five star hotel !!! I saw from News papers and TV that many are in serious problems and hence cost cutting ..

One very reputed firm have gone to the extent of asking Sharukh Khan to give us confidence .
This time the King Khan himself did not appear very convincing and it appeared that things are really much worse than what is .

My immediate response was to minimize my risk by using all the cash and getting ready for the end of the world irrespective of the fact whether Mr Khan is going to get an OSCAR for this great act of "courage " that he risks his own reputation .( he get paid a Kings Ransom anyway for all this deceit ) Kal Ho Na Ho . Well other Stars have a good opportunity now to have some CBM for the Aam Admi ( confidence building measures )

One CEO in the automobile component sector called me up to say that he wants my help immediately to rework on cost cutting and has admitted that his business which was growing at 25 % per annum has already lost 60 to 70 % of business as the Truck Manufactureres have cut back on production and he is very worried .He wants to tell all those who are going to loose their jobs that he would have never done any of these retrenchment on hos own ,but the consultant has convinced the investor to do so and hence he is helpless now . All except his favorite boys and 'men for all seasons' please look for other jobs with out any further delay .!!

Another CEO of one of the first ten Indian corporates has already removed all powers from all others and decided to approve for himself all bills and stopped water supply .

Yet another decided to cut severly the payouts to contractors and decided to delay the payments till such time he gets paid by his creditors .

Yet another decided to send back as many employees ,especially the ones which are yet to be confirmed ,in additon to the not so useful ones .

Another one went on to try reducing the salary payable to all employees by 50%

All CEOs were not so lucky to sack employees as employees could get the blessing of one of Modern India's most progressive and upcoming political leader from Mumbai - I am shifting my loyalty to him as he is so powerful and perhaps can save my job as well - who made just one telephone call and the CEO reversed his decision immediately and came up with the classic lie which managments have been specialising " employees are our most valuable assests" .

Instead the CEO has opted to sack many of his expat staff and made a huge saving and unfortunately there was no plitical party working for the rights of employees from other countries . May be International Labour Organization should come up with soem solutions esp we have millions of Indians working abroad and if the CEOs out there does the same thing nothing can be doen about it .

Well another CEO thought that it is better to sack the junior most employee and save the firm from disaster.

Many organizations in Garment Exports, Software , BPO , and anyone having business incomes arising from USA has lost out the maximum . Shiping companies have decided to put vessels on anchor and lay off the crew as the freight rates have fallen so badly .

Some of the richest guys . ( a rich guy is is defined as " very poor guy with lots of money" **!!) whose name appears in the Forbes richy rich boys have lost the maximum as their share prices saw a south eastern dive .And the guys made good by buying out their own shares at much lower prices with the expectaions of a future rise .

Steel prices have fallen. Cement prices have fallen , Crude prices have fallen . Wow the Finance minister must indeed be given a nobel prize for bringing inflation down by one percantage point to the benefit of the Aam Admi .

But when I went to buy vegetables in the market I was shocked to see the prices of many items have seen growth like never before .

May be I get back to my village and start growing vegetables in the fields than working in a metro where I got to buy all things .

I have heard the Sub prime crisis has made investments in housing a foolish activity . Yet my efforts to find a house with an affordable rent is not making any headway as no one is reducing the rent in line with the market realities .In fact it is going up . I think it is time to search for the nearst railway station to have a roof over my head .

Micheal Champy will find new customers soon as RE-ENGINEERING is going to get fashionable again and LEAN manufacturing will be forced on firms who had the tendency to splurge in the cool breeze that graced them for over the past five years and fuelled growth . Any way I am going to take those books from the attic as some day soon I will be in demand trying to save the compnies in distress . This reminds me of the Movie TITANIC where the hero hands over the life boat to save the heroin after the ship is broken and passngers and crew are in the chill waters without sufficient life jackets or other ships to save them .. I am sure some of them will survive but many will perish and if I am able to save a few it must be a miracle .

I found a new definition for height of optimism as I heard someone saying that Barak Obama will change the world .

Jesus are you Listening ?