Title - The New Rules of Business: Get Ahead or Get Left Behind
Author - Rajesh Srivastava
Genre - Personal Development / Self Help
Publisher - Penguin Portfolio
ISBN - 978-0-143-44692-7
This book is an absolute delight to read. When the contents are praised by eminent like Neeraj Roy, Founder & CEO - Hungama Digital Media Entertainment, Neeraj Kakkar, Co Founder - Paperboat, Ashish Bhasin, CEO of APAC and Chairman - Dentsu Aegis Network(India), Harish Bijoor, Brand Strategist Specialist and many others, these stands as a testimony to the amazing content the book has to offer. Rajesh Srivastava, the author needs no introduction since he held higher positions in companies like United Spirits(now Diageo India), J.K. Helene Curtis Ltd coupled with education in IIT & IIM which helped him in spearheading various brands. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book as the contents were completely new and offered a unique way to approach the business which would capitulate to success.
I cleared my mind as was advised by the author in the very beginning which made me to grasp the contents as it is. I would suggest you to do the same.
The book is divided into 16 Rules which are as further sub-divided into various divisions.
Customer - Rules 1 to 4
Employee - Rules 5 & 6
Leadership - Rule 7
Brand - Rule 8
Workplace - Rule 9
Communication - Rule 10
Supply Chain - Rule 11 &
Business Strategy - Rules 12 to 16
Each of them gave a clear hindsight as to what were done by the successful companies like Amazon, Google, Microsoft, IKEA etc o be where they are today. It all begins with 1CQ(Central Question).
I was pleasantly surprised to read about Zappos which fired its customers for being rude to their employees. I could very much relate this to HSBC(UK) which did the same by closing the accounts of the customers for being rude to their contact center employees. I have witnessed this first time almost a decade ago.
When I read how the author handled one of the irate customer despite the brand not being at fault which pacified the customer, I found myself in the similar position of being a customer of a famous pen brand whose refills were at fault and when I complained, I received a dozen of them(some of them had the same issue though).
There are many intriguing events which found its way to the book which is worth mentioning here:
Do you know what is Warren Buffet's ABC rule?
What is the 5-Hour rule that is followed by Bill Gates, Warren Buffet & Oprah Winfrey?
Do you know from who did Nelson Mandela got his inspiration from?
Jeff Bezos's two pizza rule to name a few.
The book talks about B2B and B2C.
The distinction between a Brand, Cool Brand and a Super Cool Brand is worth the time and read.
Being a Digital Media Marketer myself, I found something really helpful to me in Page 199. Surprisingly, the book did not have any mention about Cashback sites which is playing a major role these days and found investors like Ratan TATA.
Page 216 talks about ease of returns in case of inordinate delay in delivery of goods. Amazon India has already implemented this rule which I have invoked it on few occasion.
The detailed study about SIA(Singapore Airlines) as to how they spend a lot in purchasing and upgrading their aircrafts on regular intervals and how it enables them to save on costs is a real useful information. Wish this was followed by some of the airlines in India which would have prevented from going into liquidation.
Last but not the least, do give more importance to Chapter 15 & 16 which talks about different business models and how you need to disrupt your business at regular intervals. I would highly recommend this book for those who are into business and for those who aspire to become an entrepreneur.
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