DANCING WITH DISRUPTION - 18th MAP CONVENTION ADDRESSES THE ADVANCING TSUNAMI OF CHANGE

FOCUSES ON RE-INVENTING THE MODERN ORGANIZATION; OCTARA & MAP IN HIGH-ENERGY TANGO

Report filed by Adil Ahmad (Correspondent, OCTARA & TCS CONNECT Corporate Magazines)

The grand ballroom was brimful with corporate warriors both male and female. These were all high value human assets with the potential of becoming effective first responders as and when the promised Tsunami of accelerating change hit our shores.

This was not a strategy session. Those would come later. On the 28th of September 2016 the Movenpick Hotel was the setting for a real-time face-to-face with knowing the ‘enemy’, no holds barred. There was going to be no sugarcoating the enormity of the situation in hand.

Battle hardened ‘gurus’, with hindsight and foresight as their weapons of choice, had been gathered from the four corners of the globe by Octara and its dynamic duo Muhammad Arif and Jamil Janjua for this annual MAP Conclave, the 18th such in an unbroken series.

They would map the terrain and render advice on how to deal with disruption for the younger sets of corporate warriors yet to be bloodied in battle.

Mental and physical agility were clearly at a premium, with the ability to see the ball early and go with the flow, much as in Judo, flagged as the top priority. When you have a strong wind you don’t build barriers, you build windmills, said one guru.

Formidable Line-up
From the United States of America we had the crème de la crème of the Ivy League represented by Kate Sweetman and Shane Cragun, co-authors of the book ‘Reinvention’ that lays out the latest thinking on how to cope, and indeed profit from the phenomenon of accelerated change.

From Malaysia came Raj Kumar, the champion of Blue Oceans and the search for competitive advantage.

Seasoned global campaigners included Wajahat Husain (President & CEO, UBL), Dr. Daniel Ritz (President & CEO, PTCL), Dr. Zeelaf Munir (MD& CEO, EBM), Dr. Asim Jamal (Country Chair & MD, sanofi-aventis Pakistan), Adnan Shahid (Chief Commercial Officer, PTCL), Jehan Ara (President, P@SHA & The Nest I/O), Humayun Bashir (Member Executive Committee MAP) , Sarfaraz A. Rehman (Member Executive Committee MAP), Shahzeb Mehmood (CEO & GM, RB West Asia), Saqib Shirazi (CEO, Atlas Honda), Furqan Qureshi (Coach  & Consultant), Khurram Khani (Group Head Information Technology, IT Division, UBL ), and the host and president of MAP Syed Masood Hashmi, ably and amply assisted by the MAP secretary-general Salah Uddin.

In the audience, at the head table, sat Khalid Awan, Chairman of the logistics behemoth TCS, and the visionary engineer-pioneer who has built this vast enterprise from scratch and in the process laid the foundations of Pakistan's logistics sector. If anybody in the audience knew what it was all about to dance with disruption then it was him, having done it for three decades and more, harnessing the energy of sometimes stormy winds of change, building windmills instead of barriers with quantum growth the outcome by the grace of Allah.

Consistently Ahead of the Curve

United Bank Limited was the Platinum Sponsor and chief enabler of this critical Convention, and its CEO Syed Wajahat Husain delivered an impactful opening statement in his keynote address. The age of disruption is upon us, he said, and the VUCA environment is a fact of life. Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity had come to define the challenge of doing business in the contemporary world, and the exponential age would see technology disrupt most traditional industries in the next decade or so. “UBL is acutely aware of the need for effective management and constant reinvention, and takes pride in being ahead of the curve ever since its inception in 1959, emerging as a pioneer in branchless banking with over 40,000 agents across the country enhancing the outreach of UBL’s 1350 branches.” Those who have danced successfully with disruption have solid business foundations, said Syed Wajahat Husain. “UBL has earned its reputation as a progressive and innovative bank.”

Shane Cragun

The three Keynote Speakers occupied center stage during the course of the day, with Shane Cragun launching a blistering attack on the status quo first thing in the morning, drawing heavily from the book ‘Reinvention’ which he has co-authored along with Kate Sweetman. The Ballroom bristling with corporate warriors was rendered shocked and awed by Shane’s relentless rendering of the bad news that would come riding on the back of accelerated change if we failed to bob and weave with greater agility and align for the massive disruptions that the coming times were sure to bring with quantum gains in technology and Nature’s flexing of muscle through global warming and climate change.

There was no option anymore. Each one of us would have to leave our comfort zones and assume action stations at the battlefront, but instead of trying to stonewall the advancing Tsunami of change and being utterly swamped in the process; adopt a strategy of going with the flow and riding the crest yielding quantum growth. Judo was Shane’s weapon of choice; developing the ability to dance in step with a force much larger and greater than oneself and looking for opportunity to maneuver and gain advantage, rather than taking it head-on and being rendered senseless.   

Shane raised the curtain on his and Kate’s Reinvention Formula wherein Reinvention is equal to ‘Dissatisfaction’ multiplied by ‘Focus’ multiplied by ‘Alignment’ multiplied by ‘Execution’, and all together multiplied by ‘Leadership’ operating as the Force Multiplier. The sum total of this must be greater, far greater than the Cost of Change for reinvention to happen.    

Kate Sweetman

Kate Sweetman brought up the rear and was the last speaker of the day, applying soothing balm to corporate warriors reeling under the impact of tidal waves that had hit them during the course of the day. She spoke of Stora, the Swedish company founded in 1260 and still going strong due to its incredible ability to change.

We are naturally inclined to do things the way we have always done them, and it’s the job of leaders to work on mindsets so they are more alive to the changing environment around them. She gave the example of the British and Norwegian race to be the first nation to reach the South Pole, and how Englishman Robert Scott’s rigid mindset lost him his mission and his men, while Norwegian Roald Amundsen was more sensitized to the environment he and his men would be encountering and succeeded with all hands on deck and alive and well at the end of the mission.

How do we deal with newness is the big question, the answer to which lies in ‘The Leadership Code’, a book that Kate Sweetman has co-authored with Dave Ulrich and Norm Smallwood and which had been the subject of much discussion earlier in the year.

“We suggest there will be only two leader-types in the 21^st century,” she said. The Leader-Accelerator will blow life into and inspire both people and processes, and the Leader-Decelerator who will suck life out of everything and everyone.” Of the latter we are unfortunately all too aware of in Pakistan.

Raj Kumar

Holding the middle ground was Keynote Speaker Raj Kumar, CEO at the UCSI Consulting Group and a certified member of the global Blue Ocean Strategy Community of Practice based in Malaysia. Raj Kumar laid out his concept of Strannovation wherein Ad-hoc and Proactive comprise the two sides of the leadership matrix, with leaders beset by the Ad-hoc mindset gravitating to Reactive and Defensive measures, while those possessing a Proactive bent of mind favoring Reconstruction and Disruption, with Reaction and Reconstruction falling under the purview of Strategy, and the decision to Defend or Disrupt drawing upon Innovation.

Raj Kumar peppered his presentation with case studies from Malaysia (ride sharing), China (electronics) and Singapore (tableware), confidently asserting that Asia is the new engine of economic growth for the world, and we must stay focused on developing innovation eco-systems.      

Global executives provide insights

During the course of the day Wajahat Husain, Dr. Daniel Ritz, Dr. Zeelaf Munir, Adnan Shahid, Dr. Asim Jamal, and Jehan Ara delivered engrossing presentations on the state of their sectors and what to expect in the days, months and years to come. Dr. Ritz spoke of how he keeps his 20,000 employees motivated at PTCL, while his chief commercial officer Adnan Shahid gave the detailes of the PTCL operation that had put 23 million televisions in 30 million households.

Dr. Munir asked the question why fix it if it aint broken? Change has its enemies she warned, pointing out that courage was in shorter supply than genius. She said she had created a disruptive freethinking space at her factory in Korangi, and a gym to keep her people fit.

Jehan Ara had just returned from California and pleaded to being jet-lagged. Technology was allowing for collaboration, she said, and there was great opportunity for Pakistani tech practitioners.

Dr. Asim Jamal spoke of how technology had enabled disruption, and the great potential that Pakistan’s pharma industry had and which was waiting to be leveraged for national benefit.

Panel Discussion – the more things change the more they remain the same?

The Panel Discussion comprised Humayun Bashir acting as moderator and Sarfaraz A. Rehman, Shazeb Mehmood, Saqib Shirazi, Khurram Khani, and Furqan Qureshi comprising the panelists. The panel produced some thought provoking material. It found a need to focus on what’s not going to change, like cost consciousness. People will still want a cup of tea they like and a price they like. The question that beckoned was what does the customer want? There was not enough emphasis on people.

There is a huge question mark on how things are happening the way they’re happening. Disruption was desired at the policy level much more than the technology level in Pakistan, and also elsewhere in the world. Old industries were very valid in Pakistan today, and Pakistanis were amongst the top ten video watchers in the world. The next wave of technological disruption in the coming five to ten years will take away another 100 million jobs. Disruption has always been there throughout human history, but in the present day and age it has been amplified requiring speed over perfection.

Quickly adapt or perish

We sat there in a very large contemplative huddle, pondering the flow of information and taking notes. Testing times were already upon us. The private sector had polished up its act, and the public sector was groaning and moaning under the strain of non-performance. Change was inevitable, and the more accelerated and disruptive of the status-quo it was the better for the nation. The law of the business jungle stood out in this melee. Quickly adapt or perish.