The Disruptive innovation: Can the "New" propel the "Old" ?

Online book stores in India are a confused lot as according to the latest US data from The Association of American Publishers (AAP), the iPad isn't just proving to be a category creator but it is threatening to be a category killer as well. The threatened category is our very own "physical books" or hard-copies with variants like hardcover or paperback. The AAP data shows that in January as well as February 2011, trade print sales witnessed double-digit declines, thus confirming our worst fears that digital sales is cannibalizing print. So "e-book" is the disruptive innovation that we love to hear about and if the online book stores are increasingly focusing on e-books then it's not a surprise. Isn't it? Let's now shift our focus to India. I know it's a bit abrupt but please bear with me.

The Indian Scenario

We can say that in the US, the digital version could very well maul the printed ones. By the way the traditional print newspapers have already learnt it the hard way. So should the online book stores in India go the same way, i.e. shift their focus from the printed versions to the electronic ones? After all in India things are a bit different as online book shopping in India is currently growing at 50% y-o-y driven solely by print sales. Most of us know that India is under-penetrated with low literacy levels (65%) vis-à-vis US and has low internet connectivity. Thus even "print newspapers" is a growing category in India. So how can the advent of e-books affect their counterparts i.e. the printed books? Will online book stores in India achieve more growth in e-book segment than printed books? To answer these question let's go through a major happening centered in India. It's the case concerning the telecom boom.

The Five steps to Success

We all want to be successful. Isn’t it? But how many amongst us feel that we have achieved success? They say that success is relative. True, but even when we feel good about an achievement on a given day , someone else’s opinion may make us ponder whether it was worth the effort? As they say in a famous ad we keep asking ourselves, “have I really made it large?”

In this blog, I’ll discuss the five simple steps that can help you judge whether your achievement comes into that premium category that we all know as “success”. But if my personal experience is anything to go by, I must warn you that though the steps are simple but implementing or imbibing them isn't.

Entrance exams: Are they asking the right questions?

The last decade has been a decade of changes and reforms. You can also include the entrance or competitive examinations to that fold. In this post I’ll discuss some changes as well as existing gaps in various competitive examinations.

There was an era when three posts were considered to be the most prestigious in the Indian set up. They were the PM (prime minister), the CM (chief minister) and the DM (district magistrate). When it comes to competitive examinations, three of them stand out for their rigor. They are IIT-JEE (for entry into the IITs), CAT (for entry into the IIMs) and civil services exams conducted by the UPSC. Let’s consider the changes in the formats of respective examinations one by one and consider the likely fallouts.

IIT & IIM: Do we really need to expand?

As India looks to outpace other countries in terms of economic growth - higher education, because of its criticality, is in the limelight (better late than never). With the focus being on higher education, two of the best known Indian Institutes, IIT & IIM find a mention in our day-to-day discussions. As efforts are being made to increase the number of IITs & IIMs , questions are being raised whether that's leveraging the brand or diluting it?

We do know that India needs more quality educational institutes. With the claim to fame of many IITs & IIMs being “one of the toughest institutes to get into”, it’s more a commentary on the paucity of seats rather than intellectual rigor. So doing nothing is not an option.

Before I start putting down my views, I would bring to your attention a group that opposes expansion of IITs & IIMs even if brown-field i.e. increasing capacity of existing institutes. They argue that it might commoditize the brand (make no mistake quality is not their concern). Such arguments make no sense as IITs & IIMs are not Guccis & Armanis. IITs/IIMs stand for quality not exclusivity. 

Let us now look at some pressing concerns that justify the “need to expand”.

“During 1955 to 1975, the growth rate was high (10.5%) as the IITs were being set up and establishing the UG programme. In the next twenty years, there was a slight increase in the output (less than 1% per year). Since 1995 the growth rate increased to 4.2% per year mainly due to the addition of IIT Guwahati and IIT Roorkee.”

Source: ENGINEERING EDUCATION IN INDIA (2007)

The above data clearly shows that we need Greenfield investments i.e. open new IITs & IIMs as they mainly power the growth in intake. In fact IITs that accounted for 5-8 % of total output of engineers in 1980s now account for less than 1%. 

Many feel that expansion might lead to quality of education being compromised with. It’s a valid concern and needs attention (I will try to come up with remedial steps in the later part of the blog) but do you feel that the quality of new colleges will be worse that the existing private set up where students are forced to join if they can’t make it to the sought after colleges. I don’t think so as the “quality gap” is so enormous that we would certainly find the new ones, in terms of quality, somewhere in-between.

Even though IITs & IIMs might be under funded by global standards but they are still much better off than their Indian counterparts. So the question is whether we would be better off opening new colleges under new names rather than using the umbrella of IITs & IIMs? My answer would be that the name provides them greater attention and care which a new institute desperately needs. NITs have been greatly benefitted by the tag.

We all have great faith in the brand name of IITs & IIMs. Are these brands that weak that expansion would dilute them to the extent that it threatens their existence? That’s not the way, great brands operate. In fact, if properly carried out, expansion would only strengthen them. Greater student & alumni base would mean greater reach, influence and impact. Mind you, it would come in handy when we face the onslaught of foreign universities. By the way these are the outputs of some well known international engineering institutions: Urbana-Champaign 1950 degrees, Purdue 1840 degrees, Georgia Tech 2300 degrees, Tokyo University 3000 degrees, Tsinghua university about 4000. (Source: ENGINEERING EDUCATION IN INDIA, 2007)

Let’s now look at some of the methods that can expedite quality enhancements at the new colleges:

• With increased intake, we must aim at increasing the bandwidth of well known professors i.e. number of students that s/he can address at a given time. This can be facilitated by ICT based live or recorded lectures. Technological intervention would also help in facilitating better educational aids or resources. The Masters as well as Fellowship programmes need to be strengthened as well.
• We have buddy system in place where an old IIT/IIM mentors the new IIT/IIM but that doesn’t include student set-up. Peer learning and mentoring by seniors can help students at new IIT/IIM catch up faster. We should provide online platform to facilitate such exchange of information. Student exchange programmes can also be incorporated to facilitate co-operation. 
• At least for the first few years, mentor IIT/IIM should help out their new members with their placements. It might seem unthinkable given the sort of competition but modalities can be worked out as new IITs/IIMs have relatively fewer intake.
• Private sector, both India and abroad, have been the biggest beneficiary of the outputs of IITs/IIMs. PPP model for faculty development where industry provides visiting faculties or funding can be looked into. The academic exposure would benefit the employees as it could be a welcome break or “going back to basics” for them. It would be a win-win situation for both as private sector stands to gain through quality output and colleges through quality faculty.

Some reach out only for the riches whereas some reach out to help each other out. So if alumni and students of established IITs/IIMs reach out to their newer counterparts, they can certainly consider themselves better IITians if not prouder. Else a caste system in the intellectual and educational set up is in the making as there is a very thin line between being elite and being elitist. Please avoid it.

The Theory of Relativity

Friends, just like most of us, even I am not fascinated by the complexity of Science. So you can be rest assured that this post is not about scientific applications of the theory of relativity. But the essence is derived from it. That’s why this theory assumes so much importance as it touches us every day. Let’s explore how?

Einstein's theory of time and space, special relativity, proposed that distance and time are not absolute. The ticking rate of a clock depends on the motion of the observer of that clock; likewise for the length of a "yardstick.” So if you haven’t guessed yet, this post is about Relative Grading. A much used term in academic set up especially in the past few decades. As the common saying goes, “Nothing is absolute, everything is relative.”

This is how IITK introduces Relative Grading, “Many ideas and things were shipped from Washington DC to Kanpur. When a packet from one of these shipments was opened, a brilliant proposal of adopting "relative grading" emerged. And IIT Kanpur was amongst the first, in the country to adopt this relative method of evaluating performance.” Their inputs have been used in the following paras to shed more light on this topic.