Vision, Mission and Policies (VMP)

After a short vacation of travelling, roaming, learning, speaking, listening, and reading, it's back to the blogosphere.

In India, a few days back, one of the most talked about car of the world, the Tata Nano, has changed her house from one Indian state (West Bengal) to other state (Gujrat). It was a major switch for Tata as they faced lot of controversies in West Bengal. I believe West Bengal is not aware of what they have lost. But I really appreciate the efforts done by almost all the industrial states of India to house the Tata Nano in their respective states. But finally, it was Gujrat, who got this lucky chance. Actually, it is not by luck. It was a great effort by the Gujrat government; as a result, Nano is in their bucket. It is due to this reason only that Gujrat is said to be the strongest state of India. Both politically and financially.

But the question here is not about the “Home town” of Tata Nano. The question is that how Ratan Tata, the owner of Tata, one of the biggest business houses in India, thought about this car, which is supposed to be the cheapest car in the world. Actually, here come the three factors based on which any business line can work and establish and Tata is not an exception.

First is vision. It was the first face to face meeting between Ratan Tata and the media about the Nano. He said that once he was going to somewhere in India and he has seen a family of four (2 adults + 2 children) driving in a two wheeler. It was a very risky drive as four of them were loaded dangerously in that vehicle. And on top of it, it was raining outside. All the four passengers were on a very unsafe drive. Instantly, a thought came up to his mind and he decided to make a cheap car for lower middle class in India, just for serving the people, in the name of security, safety and social service. The amazing point is that he decided the price also of that car at the same moment. And that was INR 1 Lakh. Now that was the vision.

Second is mission. When he conveyed his dream car to the top management of Tata motors, it was a challenging task for all of the employees to work and make a car within the price band of what he had thought of. But Ratan Tata convinced each of them and a mission was established for each and every employee who has to work for Nano.

Third are policies. Nano team worked for more than 4 years and after that they were in the condition to present a car in the market with the same price tag that has been decided 4 years back. This was due to policies only. In that 4 years of time span, the Indian economy took a lot of bumps in the market. And the worst situation, that Nano faced, was of the location change from one state to other. And that too is when there were only 3 months left to make that car available on road for public. But the best policies and ultimate quality management kept the price tag of INR 1 Lakh only. Although there was a delay of 8 months after the Nano’s location change, but I am sure this will be taken care of by the Tata.

That is the reason, when Tata Nano came face to face first time with the public; there was a huge response in the hall where it was kept. The best part that I liked at that time was the driving of Ratan Tata. He himself came to hall showing his driving skills with Tata Nano. That was the first car shown to the public and his first line after getting out of the car to the public was “A promise is a promise”.

Same VMP (Vision, Mission and Policies) is true for one more business plan from another business giant of India, the Reliance. Dhirubhai Ambani, the owner of Reliance Industries, vision was to make a telephone call on the rate of a postcard. His vision was that each and every Indian should have a mobile phone with a very cheap call rate, that too on a price of a postcard. The vision was clearly understood by his team, a mission was made and implementing best policies and quality management, this is going to happen in India within a year.

My kudos to the visionary men of India, like Ratan Tata and Dhirubhai Ambani.

-- Sanat Sharma