Future India - lessons from Flies & Bees.

Behavioural scientists had conducted an experiment wherein a dozen bees were introduced into an empty jam bottle placed horizontally and without the lid. They then placed a bright light outside but near the closed (bottom) end of the jar. Being logical creatures they attempted to go direct to the light in a logical manner eventually dying from exhaustion and starvation.

However houseflies when introduced into the jar escaped within a few minutes. An analogy can be drawn when referring to people and cultures. 

---

Bees build complex and productive colonies whereas flies do not.

History reveals that colonialists like the Europeans, and North Americans  are logical, extremely systematic and highly disciplined  much like the bees. The conquered and colonised nations such as India which are like the flies, apparently illogical, unsystematic and highly undisciplined. Even today organisations within these countries also behave in very much the same manner.

The bees come together, surrender much of their individual freedoms in favour of a larger good of the colony and attempt to leverage each other’s strengths to  build for the betterment of all. There is more meaningful social and work collaboration. They are often proactive and take the long term view.

The flies are individualistic and concerned only with themselves. They hustle for their survival. They live in the present and are reactive in nature. They are street smart and know how to ignore or break rules, take shortcuts and somehow using ‘jugad’ (meaning fixes) to get what they want. They may not achieve a lot but it will enough to see them get by.

In any group endeavour structured and systematic work is essential.  That is why the developed economies all were able to industrialise and colonise the world.

Initially they ruled by their industrial-military might  and  nowadays increasingly by their technological,  military,  financial and political might. They have leveraged individual strengths multiplying them manifold to produce powerful juggernauts.

Organisations and governments within countries like India may have high intelligence, rich culture and history are individualistic and self centred like the flies. Energy and efforts are dissipated and rarely able to achieve critical levels where they can become sustainable world leaders. 

The underdeveloped nations who have been mainly nomadic or agrarian countries / regions merely exited, managing  somehow to survive.  They surrendered before the organised force of the bees, the might of the organised armies of the industrially advanced nations. Eventually  Indians permitted their  own aspirations, needs and necessities to be made subservient to their colonial and industrial masters.

 Is it any wonder why the world’s largest and most powerful corporations are in the Industrially developed world? A majority of the people there work for a large corporation or the government. They collaborate to develop innovate products and services, and hence succeed in conquering new markets and social space.

Similarly this could explain why there are so few Indian organisations of world class calibre and domination. Here majority work for themselves or in their own family business. The flies are happy with themselves.  Many bees do exist in India but the general pattern is that the vast majority of Indians are fly like in their conduct.

The future now hinges increasingly on knowledge, but applied in innovative ways and often involving a multi disciplinary approach.  One can observe  interesting developments that are unfolding in the world and in India.  

Nations and organisations  in the developed countries are struggling to become more innovative flexible and fly like. However they are unable to shrug off many of the bee like behaviour and characteristics which are cramping innovation.  The Japanese and the Europeans in particular appear deeply frustrated because they find their social DNA difficult to change as a result of their obsession with maintaining their so called ‘purity’.  

The most powerful approach is the flexibility and nimbleness of the fly, coupled with the discipline, structure and team commitment of the bees. This is evident from the fact that  America, Canada, Australia and the UK achieved higher growth rates and prosperity because of the open door policy which encourages constant and continuous influx of flies and new bees.

This cultural cross pollination often produce super-flies and super-bees, drawing on the stability and power of the bee colony with a fly like individuality to soon achieve remarkable success.

Flies will be flies but they can become super-flies with a blending of fly nature and bee discipline. Sadly instead of understanding and appreciating their individuality and fly strength, Indian political, business and educational leaders blindly copy and try to make flies behave like bees with frustrating results. Our education system based on memorising data and parroting them continue to produce  people who are good only at answering questions rather than asking them.  As a result Indians  have generally been unable to leverage their inherent fly like skill by adopting the organising capabilities and many strength characteristics of the bees.  The result may be of high growth but it lacks depth and sustainability.

The industrially developed nations are deconstructing large parts of their massive industrial infrastructure because they are neither environmentally or economically sustainable. The smart ones are not merely focussing on end results, they have understood thoroughly the processes involved in conduct of their business and governance. Many companies are shifting their design  and also manufacturing centres to Asia and in a significant manner to India.  This massive shift is happening in spite of the frustrations especially for the Japanese and the Europeans who find fly behaviour quite alien.

Many smart bees adapted and are conquering the Indian economic landscape. Ripples are turning into  waves.  Companies and institutions within the Indian economy are increasingly owned by entities from the developed world with an Indian face and merely have Indians working for them. Strong organisations owned by Indians will become increasingly  rare with many Indian businessmen shifting their wealth to investments into secondary and passive areas such as real estate, commodities, and stock markets and distribution services etc.

Take a Look at the insurance and financial sector, where ICICI Bank & HDFC Bank which are 66% and 74% respectively are foreign owned. The cement sector is predominantly owned by the French and Europeans. The wave has already started in takeover of the automotive, Automotive components, pharmaceuticals, infrastructure and soon it will be retailing, medical and hospitality sectors, defence etc. The stock exchanges and commodity exchanges are increasingly coming under the control of foreigners. Even benefits from bumper crops and yields will not pass on to the common Indian but to the commodity traders. 

The developed countries will have the queen bee and her core loyal assistants headquartered in their home countries but they will colonise the developing world.

This may not be necessarily bad for the Indian economy and the average Indian, who will receive better products and services. However this trend will thwart the development of a strong Indian political and economical leadership. While at home the industrial economies that have failed to shift to knowledge based work are facing increasing wrath of the deindustrialised citizens.

How can Indians can transform into super flies/bees incorporating the best of both organisms? 

For this to happen Indians have to;

1.       Take the initiative and evolve solutions by themselves or in collaboration with other like-minded entities.  They have to stop expecting the government to find the solutions. After all governments by their very nature are overbearing,  inept and often disconnected from reality.

2.       Invest significantly in developing knowledge and skills of their people, and further build capacity to impart that knowledge that they impart to their people.  Unfortunately too much attention is paid only to hardware as this is the visible part of investment, whereas the focus has to be on building good systems by focussing on the business processes. ( This does not mean merely ‘ERP’or Enterprise Resource Planning  systems)

3.       Overhaul the approach to education and dramatically change curriculum and learning to make it more relevant to the present and the future needs. They have to invest in the design and implementation of the education of their children, employees and associates in their homes and at their workplaces

___________________________________________________

The reader will inevitably ask about; "what about China?"

That interesting question my friends will have to be taken up separately in another follow up article.