The menace of "Amway" social marketing in India

While returning from Mumbai around 3 months back, I happened to meet with a gentleman working with Standard Chartered Bank in Bangalore..As good passengers, we exchanged our phone numbers, interests, hobbies, work related trivial matters etc..

After reaching back to Bangalore, I got a call from him regarding an exciting business opportunity and his eagerness to meet me at my place..I readily agreed..What started since then was his four visits along with his wife during off hours and explanations regarding how one can make money by joining Amway band wagon..While, I tried to give him pointers that I was not keen in joining this network, he kept on insisting and also gave me two CDs to listen to what others are preaching about Amway..While, the products from Amway could be of superior quality, but such tactics leaves one with bad taste in mouth..

I think, I would call this tactic as social marketing and including the spouse in the whole cycle as cheap way to earn money..I am not saying that people are entitled to earn extra money in whichever way they think is right, but leave others who are not keen..

After, I had refused to entertain his further calls, I am not getting his pestering calls any more..I am not in favour of rejecting people out right. In this case, I thought, this person is educated, well mannered, but even then, such a behaviour is uncalled for..Some one should take strong actions against this type of propaganda marketing..

The mentality of India's premier space agency towards its employees

I happened to meet a senior person associated with India's leading space agency recently and it was shocking to learn thier vision towards the young generation employees - no wonder, they think their employees as mere utilities to develop some programs for them..

I was reading an article on how NASA is considering their employees as assets and how much attention they give to their employees productivity and satisfaction..While, in India, the agency think tank thinks that mere pride for working for nation will attract the talents - they may be right to some extent, but not in longer run..ultimately the apathy towards the employees in longer run is proving costlier to them..While, they may be able to launch the space missions with small budget, but the delays, lack of vision and leadership is technology is proving costlier to them..While, NASA on the other hand, spending lot of money in research and development of their employees..They spend considerable amount of money and energy enhancing productivity, ways to keep the satisfaction level high all time..

While, in India, nationalism can be used as a tool to lure the talent, but common sense prevails in longer run and that is the reason, we see brain drain..The current recession is seeing more job applications coming towards them, but in good times, this will never be the case, because of the lack of positive thinking and thinking to save money on trivial matters, while spending lavishly on road shows like statues, momentos, models...They try to put their resources on working on such things, which will demoralize their work force and no one wants to work on such trivial work, for which off the shelf products are available - this is called re-engineering by exploiting the workforce. People had joined this organization to do space research and development, not developing something which is not of their interest..

Look how NASA has allowed its workforce to collaborate on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2208274185 in keeping their interest in mind..Nothing wrong, they did not even spend any money to do this...All that was required is the thought process, which I have to accept is lacking with India's Government Organizations..