It's a jungle out there.....

Trip to the Kabini lodge.

What an awesome two days. We traveled on roads that for the standards in India were ok until we reached the last ten km which was a dirt road plagued with pot holes and debris. According to Varma, (p164), from the time he wrote his book through 2007 the Government of India will have spent 12 bil on road construction, covering 13000 km’s or 8125 miles. With the current road ways, that will barely dent the landscape. The significance of the road showed the contrasts of India and its culture and the challenges that they will face.

The time was very relaxing as we spent the first couple of hours hanging out on a hammock that held 10 of us. After a brief stroll around the compound we stumbled across the second flattener of Friedman, an old style satellite dish what was five feet in diameter. The last time I saw such a large satellite dish was off of hwy 42 in Minneapolis where there is a satellite grave yard. This giant piece of equipment is keeping this peaceful hide-a-way resort connected to the world.

The evening safari was awesome. There were 9 of us in the TATA jeep that drove around the park. The sides of the jeep open and our guide hung off the side scouting for various wildlife. We were able to see elephants, deer, Guru’s, peacocks, and various other birds during the three hours that we spent traveling the country side.

Safaris have some a long way since the back packing and horse days. The off road vehicles where equipped with Motorola radios that the guides used to communicate back and forth with and where the animals were. Our guide also had a high-tic pair of binoculars that we use to zoom in on the various animals that were almost too far to see with the human eye.

There was an event that happened at dinner that evening, that bothered me, and it bothered me enough to inquire about the next day. When we were sitting at dinner that evening with our guide from SDM, the driver from the school went through the food line and sat at the table next to us, even though there was ample room at the table. I motioned for him to come and sit with us, but as he looked around the table and saw who we were sitting with, he declined. Varma spoke of the hierarchical society in India, however I did not recognize that it existed to that degree. That is where I like how India handles the school system in India. Other than a few private schools, the government runs the schools and the students are given uniforms to wear each day and the meals are also paid for by the school. I like how the government has taken class structure out of the clothing and meals and gives each student a chance to education where by looking at a student you do not know if they come from money or not.

With a wake up call at 5 am to do yoga, we started the am fresh and rejuvenated. I have come to the conclusion that I will never have the flexibility that I once had. The morning safari yielded the same animals, although we spent the better part of an hour looking for a tiger. We finished the morning with at fantastic breakfast day with eggs over easy and a grueling 3 hr buss ride.

The flattener of the evening was at trip to Regallis Hotel, a five star hotel for my first Indian hair cut. For $140 rupees I received a hair cur, head, neck and back massage, straight razor shave done twice and a shampoo. What a deal. The event was an Indian barber that used French shampoo, Gillette razor blade and shaving cream and Axe after shave. What an international event.

After 4-5 hrs of paying attention to my real job, I joined the group for a night cap at a club called The Road. They try very hard to immolate the American society, with theme nights. They had a hip-hop night where the dance music was from the 80’s and 90’s but the weird thing was the staff was dressed in cow boy outfits. What a warped sense of the western world.

Good night.

site seeing

This will be a short blog as we spent the day sight seeing various places around Mysore. The high light of my day was the Mysore palace and the lighting of the palace. The pictures can be seen on my Picasa site but we visited the palace in the am and observed its history and beauty, but we went back in the evening when the palace is illuminated with 96000 light bulbs. The light show was incredible and very worth while to see. In the morning visit we were attacked by the street vendors and got roped into buying snake magnets, which you toss in the air and they sound like a rattle snake. After some practice I got very good at it and they helped pass the time on the bus.

Golfing in India

I meet Harvey in the lobby at 8am for an Indian golf adventure. Our guide for this event was Rahul, Ramesh son who had moved back to India from the US to work for GE Medical. The course is located off of the race track in Mysore and some of the holes go across the track. The cost of golf was very reasonable, with a caddy it was about $12. Purchase price parity did not happen until we had to buy golf balls. Three top flight 3000 balls cost $9, which in the US, for another $3, I could have purchased a dozen balls. My caddie had a 12 handy cap and did a great job helping me read the greens and directing me around the course. It was not my best round but golfing in January was treat.

We rushed from the course and headed to the hotel to catch the buss for AT&S, a circuit board factory.

AT&S is a high tech, circuit board factory or (PCB), the factory was very loud and I could not hear the person giving us the tour, however I observed them making boards of all sizes, from cell phones to computer servers. Depending on the customer the boards even included precious metals such as gold. One of the most interesting facts that impressed me was their quality control area. To determine if the PCB had the appropriate holes punched into it they had a template that was held over light with the PCB and reviewed. That was incredible, for someone to sit and review this all day long and be 99.9% accurate. With inexpensive labor, there is no need to automate this process.

Meet the press

Meet the press. We started our day with a group of reporters from New Delhi. Ramish, the director of SDM-IMD and has done a lot of work to promote our visit and the school so we were on the hot seat. This visit was for us to ask the media any questions we had on India, but instead there were more questions for us on what we though of the country.

The morning lecture was on HR & Business – a symbolic relationship. Not that interesting.

Based on my work experience I had a great time at our visit to TVS motors. TVS is a manufacturer of 3000 motor scooters and motor cycles per day and even more interesting they had 72 inventory turns on their raw material, (35 on finished goods). During their presentation they talked the language of lean and 6 sigma, TQM and TPM, I knew I was in for a fabulous tour. When we walked on to the shop floor it was what I expected to see in a world class manufacturing facility. There were metrics boards, clean and orderly manufacturing cells, process flow and a work force that looked that they were busy at all times, no one standing around chatting. This was even more impressive as they pay their average shop employee $200 us a month of 9000 rp. They also had a mix of 40% company employees and 60% temporary employees, which they say is a low ratio, as they want 60%/40% Company vs. temp employees. Need less to say, I had a great time and felt at home in a factory.

Labor is cheap!

The lecture on supply chain was more geared toward a high school business class and did not add much value to my over all supply chain knowledge. The tour to Automotive Axle was awesome. Automotive Axle (AA) is a US JV that was previously a Rockwell Automation Company, that now is a JV with Arvin Meritor.

The CFO went through the Company’s history and cost structure. The amazing fact was the $0.90/ hr average labor rate. Also the tour of the factory was very amazing. Since AA has just started their lean journey, there are some very evident flow issues; however at $0.90 per hr labor they can afford some inefficiency. There is not much for a safety program there. Material handlers were loading trucks in flip flops and painters were in the booths with masks, welders were given helmets but held them in their hands 6 inches from the welding area, not an OSHA approved safety program.

The highlight of the evening was another American dining experience at Pizza Hut where their pies are just like we get at home. It is nice to experience 1/3rd of our meals in a familiar setting.

The legal system

The day started with a lecture on “The Indian Legal System” by Mr. Shivakumar. It was a very interesting over view of the legal system and if there is one thing that I will remember is that you never want to have a reason to utilize the system.

After the lecture we went to the court house (lower court) and observed the proceeding. The buildings were run down, the transcriptional used a manual type writer and the tables and chairs were dilapidated and mostly broken, it was a very, very run down area and not typical to the US system. My expectation for their legal system was much higher because of their years under British rule and how diplomatic the British system is, from the law that they practice to the building that they practice in.

Later that afternoon a group of us went to the down to the local vegetable and craft markets and had a blast. I had the opportunity to play Cricket with some of the locals in the street and observe Harvey Ma get a traditional arm rub with sensual oils from one of the local men. Thanks Harvey for taking one for the team.

That night was one of the best meals in history. We actually found a Subway. Although it was a chicken meatball sandwich, it was very tasty. With their free wifi service and North American music, I will be back often.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year from India.

Against all I believe and have ever stood for, I went to class on New Years Day. On a national holiday where I would have spent the day relaxing, watching football and eating junk food I sent the morning in Professor JM Subramanya class talking about business ethics from Indian Scriptures & Gurus. Ethics abroad take on a different meaning when there is poverty everywhere bribes are expected to do business. What I have witnessed for bribes the locals call tipping. This kind of activity reminds me of trade show activities in the USA. You can not get anywhere or do anything with out slipping the rupees. I believe that Varma called bribes a “creative way” corruption is accepted.

With some R & R in the afternoon, we were treated to a concert by the local police band. It was not Sting and the boys but the locals in uniform.

Having a professional musician in the family, I have high expectations for concerts and this was one of the worst. Besides that fact that all of us just wanted to get back to the hotel, it appeared that the band did not want to be there either. 4 of the members arrive 30 minutes late and just walked on to the stage and started playing. The high light of the evening ties directly into 10th flattener, “the steroids”. I want to remind the readers of this blog that was a police band, a group of professionals that in the western world are known for discipline. There was piece with a flute solo that was going along smoothly until there was a cell phone that went off. My first reaction was some one in the band was going to get their ass chewed for having their phone on while performing, but to my amusement the flutist stopped in the middle of his solo, reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone, looked who the caller was, put the phone back in his pocket and continued his solo as if nothing happened. Unbelievable.