The Lightbulb Moment

Leave it to The Economist to give words to the cultural shift I've been feeling these past four months.  Their front-page special report this week is on the emerging economies, particularly India and China, and it's a fascinating read. This link is subscription only, sadly, but it's worth picking up a copy from newsstands if you get a chance.

The argument is that a management shift is occuring in the emerging economies analagous to the "lean manufacturing" shift which happened in the 1980s thanks to Japan.  The new concept being propogated by Indian-based multinationals turns the American system on its head.  Where our companies are making products which are nicer, fancier, with more gizmos and gadgets -- think the iPad -- Indian companies are focusing on "frugal innovation", defined as "taking the needs of poor consumers as a starting point and working backwards. . . . [stripping] the products down to their bare essentials".

I've seen this concept at work, but it's not until now that I've been able to put a finger on it.  This explains why the Tata Nano is such a big deal.  It's a car produced by one of India's biggest car companies, for the low price of 1 lakh rupees--roughly $2,200.  Then there's the cost of health care, which I've marveled about.  Indian medical centers are famous for frugal innovation.  The Economist describes one example:

Aravind, the world's biggest eye-hospital chain, performs some 200,000 eye operations a year.  It takes the assembly-line principle literally: four operating tables are laid side by side and two doctors operate on adjacent tables.  When the first operation is done, the second patient is already in place.

So, the consumer pays for their doctor's expertise only where it's most needed, saving themselves money and time.  Back home, I think American consumers would balk immediately.  We want the personal touch.  We want the doctor to sit with us and hold our hands, even though really his most crucial moments are those ten minutes he's actually working on our eye.  Assembly-line surgery completely offends our sensibilities. No wonder I was so traumatized by my trip to the hospital.

Maybe that's why I've occasionally struggled to figure out what's so difficult about customizing books in India and customizing books in the US.  I think this has something to do with it.  We see custom publishing back home as making a book better.  We're adding a syllabus, we're giving you a prettier cover, we're giving you exactly what you want for your course.  American consumers love this treatment.  I had assumed that Indian consumers do, too, so every step I took was towards that goal.

Turns out I should consider a different tactic.  Maybe customization in India goes in the opposite direction.  We're stripping books down so that students pay as little as possible, and they don't have to wade through the bells and whistles.  They have exactly what's on their syllabus and nothing more.  When looked at this way, it makes sense to be as aggressive as possible to rip out the fluffy bits and map directly to each topic. Instead of a finished product to improve on, our traditional textbooks become raw material to mine.

I kind of wish I'd known this before coming into the job, but like I said, it's difficult to put your finger on the difference until you're really immersed in it.  From the outside, US and Indian custom books look the same.  Let me tell you, though, there is a different world inside of each.  There is so much more behind what's on the page.