Vijay Govindarajan

Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble are business rockstars. They have enormous amounts of street cred, having spent over a decade researching how companies successfully innovate. They have, by and large, put quantitative metrics to a system that, by its very nature, defies quantification. Their watershed book, The Other Side of Innovation, is full of well-documented efforts, internally sound conclusions and traceable thought processes. It's a blueprint for folding explosive innovation into your business.

Which makes it all the more disturbing they thought How Stella Saved the Farm would be a good idea. Full of racism, ageism, and misandry, this work of fiction promotes a "wishing will make it so" approach to innovation. At a 180 degree about-face from their prior work, one wonders if this effort wasn’t ghostwritten.

As the author(s) take great pains to point out in the preface, the book is marketed as an illustrated fable. This is a teaching aid, and the book's language and storytelling pattern are consistent with this premise. Because this is a fable, you must keep in mind the attributed subtext this simplistic style depends on in order to illustrate its point. Also, bear in mind that as a fable there are no wasted words or descriptions. In a "short, wise tale," everything must have meaning in order to highlight the fable's moral. Whether it's the story of the Greedy Monkey, or The Frog and the Scorpion, these tales resonate from the assumed context, as much as from the tale itself.

And, it's the assumed context, these attributed "teaching points," that I take the most issue with. Be advised, the remaining review contains spoilers.

Who is the innovator?
Stella - the fresh out of college, just back from world-saving walkabout. The individual in this tale with the most sense of entitlement and the least amount of real-world business knowledge. She has this great idea for getting her boyfriend over to the states...uh..saving the farm.

Who is the barrier to innovation?
Bull - Faster. Stronger. More Efficient - The individual with the most amount of real-world business knowledge and with the greatest amount of cultural experience. He knows the farm. He reacts violently to disappointment, abusing his fellow employees and threatening to leave if he doesn't get his way. He is a bully. He feels he is owed his due. His behavior is condoned and worked around.

Lessons to be learned?
1. Only young people can innovate.
2. Long-term employees will obstruct innovation. Their hard work must be marginalized and they must be isolated, and if possible ignored.
3. Hard work is bad. It will not solve the issue.
4. Confrontation is bad. Unacceptable behavior is to be ignored until it goes away.

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Who are the heroes?
The animals, they are better at farming and therefore have a natural right to a farm.

Who are the villains?
The humans, they have machines (which pollute, and pollution is bad). They are more efficient, which makes their farms bigger and more fiscally successful, but somehow they are just not as intrinsically good.

Lessoned to be learned?
People who strive for financial success are bad because they are selfish.

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Who is the chief villain?
Farmer McGillicuddy - what do we know about him? He's Irish. As a stereotypical Irish farmer, that makes him white. He's constantly driving around in his big red tractor, clearly compensating for something. He is successful (which is bad, because he isn't "family" oriented - due to his swallowing up of family farms). Deirdre is terrified of him, to the point of using one of her dreams about him as vilification. "Selling the farm-especially to McGillicuddy- was unthinkable." At that point, the only thing he had done was visit Deirdre.

Lesson to be learned?
Being successful is bad. Privilege equals meanness. Wealth is unearned because acquiring it is unfair.

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What is the pattern for innovative success?
Decide on a plan. Have a party celebrating deciding on the plan. Draw up an org chart so you know just where you sit in the company under the new plan. Deal with day-to-day business. Execute whatever part of the plan you can in the remaining time, and with the remaining resources.

Lesson to be learned?
Celebrate creation, because execution rarely occurs.

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Who leads the innovation?
Maverick - Young, full of himself, ignores established business practices, has no experience.

Lesson to be learned?
Young people are not only the only ones that can innovate, they are the only ones that can lead innovation.

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Who is the most (un)believable character?
Maisie - Holstein cow, the farm's top milk producer. But, she doesn't want the job she was hired for. She has a passion, but no training, for design, so Deirdre puts her in design. She's rather key to the success of the "the-silver-bullet-project-to-save-the-farm" and she hasn't a clue what's she's doing; it’s only been her hobby. She fails. Instead of putting her back to work in the diary, where she excelled, Deirdre not only doesn't replace Maisie's lost capacity, despite being in dire financial straits, she shoehorns Maisie into a position where she'll do the least amount of damage. The position kinda smells like design, so it's okay.

Lesson to be learned?
Style trumps substance, particularly if tears are involved.

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Who is the most unrealistically depicted character?
Bull - After spending years building the farm, his efforts are marginalized, his ideas ridiculed, and his leadership abandoned. Who do you know that wouldn't jump at a better job offer after that? Bull, after being a first class pain in the butt, suddenly showed his saintly side for a plan he never professed belief in before, for a farm that clearly acted as if they didn't need him anymore.

Who is the most realistically depicted character?
McGillicuddy - Despite the great effort at portraying him as a mustache-twirling villain, that very portrayal underscores a savvy businessman, continuing to present fair, and more than fair offers for the farm, despite its decline. He's the only character that acts in accordance with growing a business.

Biggest SJW flaw?
Unfortunately, this work has a bad case of "The Simpsons" Syndrome. Like pretty much any primetime television show, the caretakers, and leaders of the family, Deirdre, and Stella are female. The "idiot children," Bull and McGillicuddy, are male. This reinforces the stereotype that males are not capable of complex thinking, but rather distinguish themselves by exhibiting outbursts of stupidity, violence, selfishness, and greed.

But wait, what about Einstein?
In a truly deus ex machina moment, Einstein sudden appears and poof! Everything's gravy. This was confusing on a couple of levels. Had Einstein been so disconnected from the day-to-day workings of the farm (including the all-hands meeting and celebratory party) that he was unaware of the potential issues? He seems to have an automatic grasp of the problems and provides immediate solutions. His name indicates that he was clearly the smartest individual on the farm. Despite that, he isn't consulted until the reader is over 75 percent through the story? This has the distinct feel of "...and a wizard walked by." Also troubling, this would make it Einstein's story. He is the white knight, making Deirdre and Stella damsels in distress. Fortunately (?), this is mitigated through Einstein's use as an oracle only, in vending machine fashion --- put in your request, get your answer. As a character, Einstein could have also been named Wesley Crusher.

Who saves the farm?
Literary device. It's the only way the farm could be saved. The author(s) wished it so. Everything Deirdre did worsen the situation. The "miracle of wool" happened to justify the final act.

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How do you deal with someone you disagree with?
We've covered isolating, marginalizing, and ignoring; but if those efforts will not work, as the case with McGillicuddy, then ridiculing and, eventually, spitting on him is perfectly acceptable.

Lessons to be learned?
1. When dealing with people you disagree with, no act of revulsion is too much.
2. When dealing with lackwits, just wait and buy it at auction. Acts of kindness will only get you covered in loogies. No good deed ever goes unpunished.

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When this work was first released, I thought I'd just missed the boat on the story; that I just didn't "get" it. In an effort to understand, I read some of the initial reviews. They were all positive. Not one critical review in the bunch. Really, not one critical review? Was I the only guy that thought this book was a huge mistake? Well, it wouldn't be the first time that I have been wrong, but it would be the first time that I was the only one wrong. Usually, I have loads of company.… (más)

I remember reading some of this book in short form in Harvard Business Review a while ago. Dr. Govindarajan and Ravi Ramamurti focus on business management innovations in health care in India and they ask, not unreasonably, why these same ideas can't be adopted here. They use "reverse innovation" to describe the adoption process. My reaction to this consolidation and expansion into book form is about the same:

1. I don't think the term "reverse innovation" is a graceful one because to my literal mind it sounds like reversing innovation to go backward. However, it was coined by Dr. Govindarajan and colleagues for some of their earlier work and he certainly has naming rights. If he were older, though, he might have revived the more descriptive and philosophically aligned "appropriate technology".

2. The ideas in the book are important, but why haven't they caught on? Why is the USA such a health care, and health insurance mess when there are profitable business models we could be using for health insurance and health care?

In this book I was struck by the stories of Ascension Health and Iora Health, two of the US case studies described that were not growing until they self-organized insurance programs. One by partnering with a private health insurance company, and the other by working out a fixed fee program. Another of the US case studies, the University of Mississippi Medical Center telemedicine program, was forced to devise a workaround of a state rule that prohibited payment for the telemedicine. Eventually that law was changed.

I am covered by an international policy that pays my hospitalization and outpatient fees around the world. It has been a joy to be free of the stupid choices between work and insurance. I have friends stuck in the US health insurance nightmare so I tend to see insurance as the big evil. This book is not about insurance, but it is the gorilla in the room.

I realize that Dr. Govindarajan and Dr. Ramamurti are working in the USA, but I wonder if they have approached Sweden, a country that builds cars and has a single payer health program. Or Switzerland, an advanced country that is not in the EU. It would seem to me that countries like these would be a better first adopters than the USA where these sincere men seem to be tilting at windmills.

I received a review copy of "Reverse Innovation in Health Care: How to Make Value-Based Delivery Work" by Vijay Govindarajan and Ravi Ramamurti (Harvard Business Review Press) through NetGalley.com.… (más)

Even the name is clever as such " Reverse Innovation" - hence this would invite people to forced brainstorming !
Financial logical is unversed as well and provides with such 80% Functionality of occidental product over 20% of Price !
This is pretty ambitious Marketing & Financial exercise and therefore will definitively change Business Models and GTM learned all around WW MBA studies ...
Vijay Govindarajan is nevertheless the man who illustrated new Innovative Business model ; "Low cost Innovations over Low cost Countries " !

Sunday, April 8 - 2012… (más)