An Encomium to CKP

            Coimbatore Krishnarao Prahalad (CKP) was born into a Madhva Family on 8^th August 1941, with eight siblings.  After doing Physics in the Loyala College, Chennai, affiliated to the University of Madras, joined Union Carbide at the age of 19 and worked for four years.  After that he did his post graduate in IIM – A, in 1966 and later married Gayathri. Blessed with two children – Murali Krishna and Deepa (and three grand children) he pursed his doctoral thesis in Harvard Business School on the topic Multinational Management.  He completed his Doctorate in Business Administration in just 2 years and half years in 1975 and returned to India to teach at his Alma Mater – IIM-A. He was appointed to Position of the Paul and Ruth McCracken Distinguished University Professor of Corporate Strategy at the Stephen M Ross School of Business in the University of Michigan in 1977. Time Periods in Ross School of Business is divided into “time CK teaches” and time “CK does not teach”. A crowd puller with a magnetic personality and visionary outlook did not use PowerPoint Slides; this passionate teacher stressed on the students to listen and make their own notes – the old fashioned way.

He is a world celebrity but very humble, generous and kind. He is an explorer, discoverer, and developer. He has advised many of the top management of the leading organizations in the world. The Chairman and founder of “The Next Practice” served on the board of NCR Corporations, Hindustan Lever, TVS Capital Funds and the World Resources institute, and was a consultant to a host of global companies namely AT&T, Cargill, Citicorp, Kodak, Oracle, Philips, Quantum, Revlon, Steelcase, and Unilever. Committed to India and its economic development he believed in good governance and ethical standards. He was the co-founder of Praja Inc (“Praja” in Sanskrit means “citizen” or “common people”). He later became its chief executive officer. He believed that India had an excellent opportunity to shape the new world order but this he stressed was possible only if India innovates, address issues such as poverty, inequality and corruption.

Honors:

• A winner of Economic Times Award (Global Indian) for the year 2004.
• Ranked thrice (2005; 2007 and 2009) as the world's most influential business thinker, by the "Thinkers 50" list of the top 50 management thought leaders in the world published by the leadership consulting firm Crainer Dearlove.
• A professor at the University of Michigan since 1977, Prahalad earned the university's highest distinction, Distinguished University Professor, in 2005.
• Among the numerous other awards he received were the Faculty Pioneer Lifetime Achievement Award from the Aspen Institute for contributions to social and environmental stewardship, the Italian Telecom Prize for Leadership in Business and Economic Thinking, first recipient of Lal Bahadur Shastri Award for Excellence in Management, 2000, presented by the President of India, and many others.
• He was honored with Padma Bhushan, in 2009, the India’s third highest civilian honor for his contribution in the field of literature and education. He also received Pravasi Bharatiya Samman for his accomplishments.

His admirers believed that he is a potential candidate for a Nobel Prize in management and public administration.

Recollections about CKP:   

CK Prahalad was regarded as the visionary management guru of the core competency and bottom-of-the-pyramid models. The author here has compiled what others articulate about CKP:

Robert J. Dolan, the Edward J. Frey Dean of Business at the Ross School says about CKP

"His thinking was far-reaching and commanded the attention of business leaders. I expect it will continue to be influential for a very long time. The passion he had for connecting thought leadership to business practice exemplifies what we are all about as a business school. On a more local level, he was an invaluable advisor to me, as well as to previous deans."

Ted London, senior research fellow at the William Davidson Institute and director of its Base of the Pyramid research initiative, said:

“Prahalad was extraordinarily supportive of the work we were trying to do. He was always willing to offer his time and advice to help us achieve our goals and push us to do even better work. He helped us think about the direction of our work and gave great advice on next steps."

Robert Kennedy, executive director of the William Davidson Institute, said

“Prahalad was one of the top two or three management thinkers in the past 25 years. He opened up four different fields of inquiry: the concept of strategic intent; the concept of core competency; bottom of the pyramid; and innovation. Each was a big and important idea."

With Ross professor M.S. Krishnan, CKP examined how companies can build organizational capabilities that allow them to achieve and sustain continuous change and innovation. Krishnan says:

"Whether working with faculty on new research ideas, engaging senior executives of companies through our executive education programs, or teaching his MBA classes, C.K. always had the passion for pushing us to realize our full potential. C.K. was a unique management scholar in contributing at least three or four big ideas that have had enormous impact on management thinking or policy making globally. He was a brilliant thinker and unique in his way of synthesizing complex management problems."

Business Week Magazine:

“A brilliant teacher at the University of Michigan, he may well be the most influential thinker on business strategy.”

Gopal Srinivasan, director of TVS Capital Funds said:

"If there was a Nobel Prize for management then Prahalad would have won that for India. Prahalad was passionate about India getting its rightful place in the comity of nations. He always used to say that India got independence in 1947 but not the freedom. Encouraging entrepreneurship in India is the way to get that freedom." 

Condoling his death, Indian industry paid rich tributes to the management professor. CII Director General Chandrajit Banerjee said,

“We have lost an outstanding management guru and a visionary who was committed to contributing towards India’s growth and development,”

            Former CII President Bharat Ram described Prahalad as a path breaker and out of box thinker. Industrialist Jamshyd Godrej said Prahalad was one of few professors and thinkers of management who spent a lot of time in India and dedicated much of his research to innovation, environment and opportunities at the bottom of the pyramid.            “I am sure the sociologists - in the future - will explain how the microscopic Madhwa Brahmin community could produce at the same time such global management legends in the area of theory and practice - like CK,” Narayana Murthy states.

Anand Mahindra, past president, CII said:

            “CK was a management guru to global business practitioners. But he will always hold a special place in the hearts of Indian managers as the man who gave us the courage and the confidence to compete, as equals, on a global stage.”

A Message from C K Prahalad family

            “A prolific author, Prahalad contributed to fundamental business concepts such as strategic intent, core competence, and co-creation arising from his work with multinational companies. His most ambitious work, the “Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid,” outlined a model for large firms to engage with the poor.”

Writings of CKP:

The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty through Profits:

            This book is divided into three sections: the first section narrating the theory; the second part proves twelve extensive case studies (such as Aravind Eye care, E-choupal, Jaipur foot, ICICI Bank etc.,) and the third present the details through video clippings. The last section seeks to describe how the poor feel about the BOP economy. In this book CKP suggest that alleviating poverty is possible through “inclusive capitalism” He suggested a transformation from lose-lose situation for the BOP and companies alike into win-win situation removing structural obstacles. CKP proposes that businesses, governments, and donor agencies must stop thinking of the poor as victims and instead start seeing them as resilient and creative entrepreneurs as well as value-demanding consumers. He visualized that there are tremendous benefits to giant companies who choose to serve these markets in ways responsive to their needs. He believed the poor of today are the middle-class of tomorrow. He suggested to companies to think glolocally. A must read by all social researchers.

The Core Competence of the Corporation:

This book co-authored with Gary Hamel states that core competence is the source for competitive advantage for a firm. Core competencies arise from the integration of multiple technologies and the tests to identify these competences are:

1.      Providing access to a vide variety of markets,

2.      Contribute significantly to the end-products benefits and

3.      Be difficult for competitors to imitate

Business units to succeed need to identify their core competence and recognize its contribution. Reading this book gives the managers the ability to identity and allocates the core competencies.

The New Age of Innovation: Driving Co-Created Value through Global Networks:

This is book co authored with M S Krishnan states that “value is based on unique, personalized experiences of customers” and “all firms will access resources from a wide variety of other big and small firms – a global ecosystem.” The authors illustrates with examples of established companies that a “significant transformation from a business process focus on the firm to the business process focus on each unique customer experience.” This book is a valuable briefing to stay afloat.

The responsible manager:

CKP in HBR in January 2010 writes: “managers will be successful in terms of income, social status, and influence, but managers must remember that they are the custodians of society’s most powerful institutions and therefore hold themselves to a higher standard.” He says to future managers:

·      Leadership is about change, hope and future and therefore leaders have to venture unchartered territories.

·      Display a commitment to  learning and developing themselves;

·      Humility in success and courage in failure are the hall marks of  a good leader;

·      Good leaders are inclusive.

·      People seek fairness and don’t mind even if decisions don’t go their way.

·      Realize the importance of loyalty to organization, profession, community and above all family.

·      Assume responsibility for outcomes, process and people.

·      Balance achievements with compassion and learning with understanding.

·      The bias toward action must be balanced by empathy and caring for other people.

·   Finally Leadership is about self-awareness, recognizing your failings, and developing modesty humility and humanity.

He claims “Executives are constrained not by resources but by their imagination”

            The thought leader for the past two decades, a visionary, a guru who connected himself to the “Praja”, bridged the gap between academia and business world is now no more with us. But he has left behind a legacy of theories and models for generations to come which will remain mortal. CKP said: "I work hard and I work quickly," he said. "But once I'm done with a project, I like to move on to a new one, and leave it to my collaborators to deal with the legacy of the last one."Post Comments

 Let’s cherish his legacy while saluting this patriot.

Reference:

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._K._Prahalad#Career
2. http://www.bus.umich.edu/NewsRoom/ArticleDisplay.asp?news_id=19158
3. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Policy/Eulogy-to-management-guru-CKP/articleshow/5834072.cms?curpg=1
4. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/et-cetera/Management-guru-C-K-Prahalad-passes-away/articleshow/5825234.cms
5. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/5825936.cms
6. http://www.deccanherald.com/content/64381/management-guru-c-k-prahalad.html
7. http://business.rediff.com/column/2010/apr/19/guest-what-made-ck-prahalad-a-management-guru.htm
8. http://www.livemint.com/2010/04/17162527/Management-guru-C-K-Prahalad-p.html
9. http://www.quickmba.com/strategy/core-competencies/
10. http://www.pluggd.in/c-k-prahalad-death-few-bop-lessons-297/
11. The Mint, April 21, 2010 p. 10

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© Padma Shankar, “An Encomium to CKP”, Reader’s shelf, Volume No. 6, Issue No. 8; May 2010

Visit the following webpage to learn more about him:

 http://ckprahalad.com/