Last week, I had an overdose of motivational, inspirational and other ‘…ational’ books. And the result was a whirring, stirring and other ‘…irring ‘cerebral concoction, topped with ifs, buts and may beees.
Something so elementary that the working class, at present focusing on IT/MBA, has constantly refrained from turning their thoughts towards it.
This class is brought up to earn not only an income but also a set of dependents. And so the life is spent ‘managing’ the income around the periphery. Whatever is left is ‘saved’. Saved to acquire bigger liabilities in the form of an EMI backed house, car, vacations etc
Going about their routine, impervious to the lives on their fringes, they have only added to the swelling gap between them and their domestic helper, or so we like to accuse.
But is it actually so?
Take a closer look; this is the class that was made to mug the whole of science/commerce/arts when their minds wanted to look elsewhere.
Result, they kept chasing numbers throughout school. Reeling under the same inertia they chased entrance exams and went on to chase numbers again in colleges. By the end of it no one had the time or guts to ask here this chase was ending. Their peer group was their world and they thrived in it. They peered over each others’ careers only to better them. Thus the ‘peer bubble’ grew.
The focus was always on building better two page glossy summary of their lives that we call a resume which could land them within 1.6m * 1.6m ‘private’ spaces in ivory towers.
All through school never was the idea of setting out on your own and employing others discussed. No one talked about profit and loss, cost and sales, production and service.
All, their teachers/parents knew about was, working for others. How could we expect them to discuss money generation, when they only knew about earning a living through pay checks? Resumes were worshipped. Business plans hushed about in the corridors.
In short, as the middle class moves ahead under inertia, satisfied with statistics showing rising percentage of literacy and employment, the ground realities remain grim.
With such situation, we cannot expect magic to happen with our unemployment and migration numbers. We advocated each one teach one because we believed education to be the solution for all evils. But while education happens (with abysmal teacher absenteeism, delusional teacher student ratios et cetera) we need another movement.
‘Each one Employ one ‘
Schools need raconteurs to include stories of entrepreneurship beyond Dhirubhai Ambani. Business basics must be taught along with the periodic table and Quit India movement. With children observing business all around them, right from the milkmen to the malls, it would be unfair to underestimate the capabilities of young minds to appreciate the fundamentals.
Students deserve to know what it takes to start a business, what are the reliable sources of information, the laws and the ‘jugaad’ (why, we were told about it by a Singaporean faculty, who had had its unbeaten hands on in India) by the time they graduate. Entrepreneurship is not a prerogative of the MBAs alone. It has to seep down for the better.
In India, the biggest immediate motivation to start a business is another entrepreneur (27% of those surveyed). In China, the biggest motivation (23%) is what was taught in school or college. Clearly, Chinese schools and colleges do a better job in this respect. (Ref - http://swaminomics.org/?p=1875)
The advantages of entrepreneurship are well documented. India, with a working average age of 25.3 years, would be delusional to forgo the present. We need to ensure that this generation earns enough to fend for itself as it grays so that the future doesn’t have to cough up for their sustenance.
But this generation has to take the buck for itself. Every person standing up to the challenge will not only employ but also inspire others for the same. With every success we will certainly see more households encouraging it thus making it an innate part of the developing India’s way of life.
