Jugaad – Indian innovation
For ISB professor Prasad Kaipa, Indian innovation benefits from ‘jugaad’, the ability of local companies to innovate on a lower-resource budget. Here’s how
Ask professor Kaipa what drives Indian innovation, and he’ll first expound on his theory that innovation here has been marked by years and years of low-resource constraints. “Indian innovation is different from that in other countries,” he explains. “In developed countries, innovation is often more of a process. In India innovation is often the product of the focussed attention of a creative genius. It is more like a stroke of lightning.”
Professor Kaipa recalls how this worked out for Biocon, the Indian biotech company. “Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, the founder of Biocon, called this phenomenon ‘jugaad’, which could be loosely translated as ‘makeshift’ or ‘back-of-envelope’ development. It is when human beings sit down, facing what might seem an insurmountable challenge, and come up with a brilliant idea to solve the problem.”
An example of a jugaad moment at Biocon? Its sales people wanted expensive laptops in order to write field reports in justification of their sales pitches. Management considered their request and inquired about it with senior employees having solid and relevant fields experience. The consensus was that recipients of the reports wouldn't take the time to read them – but that very brief infos, rather than interminable reports, might do the trick. It was therefore decided not to buy the laptops but to have the field reps message their conclusions via cellphone SMS. These had a better chance of being read.
This jugaad innovation is not confined to Biocon, as professor Kaipa reveals: “In my work with many top Indian companies, including Tata Steel, Taj Group and Polaris, I have come across this ingenuity in human creativity. It is creativity that overcomes many limitations: resources limitations (financial, HR, talent, time, lack of best practices, and more).”
Professor Kaipa also believes in the power of the ‘di-electric’ in Indian – and other - innovation. “An innovative company needs a positive pole and a negative pole, so that sparks (or current) can flow. Top management is the positive pole and staff is the negative pole, so to speak. Together they can create the innovative spark.”
