In the complex world of Sales & Marketing across FMCG, Healthcare, NBFC, and Logistics sectors, I have navigated through 22 years of dynamic encounters with customers whose rationality seems as fluid as the markets they inhabit. The unpredictability of consumer whims has been both a challenge and a fascination, prompting me to delve deeper into the intricate realm of consumer behaviour—a discipline where perceptions, beliefs, emotions, and social influences converge to shape purchasing decisions.

Consumer behaviour, rooted in psychology, transcends mere transactions; it unfolds as a tapestry of human desires and motivations. From deciphering elusive wants to decoding the sway of social persuasions, this sub-discipline offers profound insights essential for any strategist in today’s volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) marketplace.

My journey, however, did not end with field experiences alone. For the past 24 years, I have embraced a parallel path as a Professor of Marketing Management, witnessing firsthand the evolution of academia to meet the demands of an ever-changing global landscape. The Indian market, an ’emerging’ force, spurred me to contribute to this evolving narrative through a book that not only connects theoretical frameworks of consumer behaviour but also enriches them with Indian context, examples, and case studies.

This book is a culmination of insights gleaned from interactions with students—each a catalyst for my own learning journey. Their diverse perspectives and probing questions have shaped not only my teachings but also this manuscript, which seeks to bridge academic rigor with practical relevance.

The book has been published by Kabdwal Book International. 

I extend my deepest gratitude to all my students and colleagues, the customers whom I have sold products, competitors, my critics, my supporters all of them. 

As you embark on this exploration of consumer behaviour, may these pages not only inform but also inspire new strategies, innovations, and a deeper appreciation for the intricate dance between consumers and markets. Join me in unravelling the mysteries of consumer behaviour—a journey where understanding leads to innovation and where every interaction offers a new revelation.

HAPPY READING!!!

Strategic leadership involves managers using their creative problem-solving skills and strategic vision to help team members and an organization achieve long-term goals. Strategic leaders are strong communicators, active listeners, passionate, positive, innovative, collaborative, honest, diplomatic, empathetic, and humble. This article throws light on some good Strategic Leaders who have turned around their organizations. The article also talks about Threshold Competencies in Strategic Leadership.

Threshold competencies include basic knowledge, skills, character, motives, self-image, and social role and these are essential for performing a job. Without these, some areas of performance will be of poor quality. To move beyond minimum performance, additional competencies are required.

The term threshold competency was coined in 2006 to describe the level of knowledge and skills an individual must have before they can take on a particular employment. This is typically measured by conducting interviews and written tests. Threshold competency is a term used to describe the level of skill or knowledge that an individual needs to be able to perform their responsibility in a job.

Can everyone become a leader? The answer is NO. Some people mould themselves in leadership position easily. Strategic leadership is a type of leadership in which leaders influence those around them to embrace a collective vision for the success of their organization. These leaders can work confidently in today’s VUCA world by approaching situations with creativity, vision and focus on long-term success and providing their team with a clear sense of direction and collaboration to work together toward a common goal.

Good leaders understand VUCA World

VUCA stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. It describes the situation of constant, unpredictable change that is now the norm in certain industries and areas of the business world.

Tactical leaders possess the unique ability to figure out the best strategies and implementing them methodically to help their organization remain sustainable. And, sustainability requires adaptation, whether it’s the available technology, the changing climate, fluctuating economy or other affecting factors, and organizations without strategic leaders are at risk of failure in the face of these factors.

What is Google CEO Pichai’s leadership style? According to reports, he is a modest, restrained man. He is empathetic, supportive, and graceful at navigating political minefields. He avoids confrontation, instead emphasizing cooperation. He waits out conflicts rather than confronting opponents. “He has great relationships. He’s just not a polarizing figure,” Minnie Ingersoll, a former Google product manager who worked with Pichai early in his career, told The Wall Street Journal.

EQ is an important threshold competency

Leaders with high emotional intelligence can utilize their emotions appropriately to influence positive outcomes. This is a must-have skill for leaders. It helps them effectively manage teams without causing rifts or conflicts.

However, there are some basic competencies that are essential for an employee to hold a leading position. These are: conceptual skills, integrity, humanity, communication skills, and business acumen. While the first four are basic traits that make an employee a good leader, business acumen is exceptionally important. Business acumen is an ability to understand and handle business situations. It is the collection of both general and organization-specific knowledge about how things get done and why they are important. 

Leadership competency is an essential element of a team leader at mid-level, or senior-level position in an organization. The most essential part of a leader’s job is to understand and convey goals, delegate tasks, set deadlines, and motivate employees. Good EQ helps leaders to perform well.

Employees who wish to progress into managerial roles are required to have leadership competency. The leadership ability of an employee is judged based on his interaction with other employees, subordinates, how he builds relationships with others, and how he handles conflict.

The leadership style of Mukesh Ambani is very distinctive. Mukesh Ambani doesn’t restrict himself to the traditional boundaries of monocratic, transformational, and situational leaderships among others. His has own unique style of leading. He is a visionary. He can think of the future – the unknown. He knows what technology will be feasible in the future. He understands the sustainability of a company and its potential not based on its present promises but what it promises in the future. It is this ability of the Indian billionaire that has ensured the unprecedented success of Reliance Industries, a conglomerate that was founded by his father Dhirubhai Ambani. Mukesh is an impatient man. He wants solutions to the problems at the earliest. For that purpose, he employs only the best hands. He doesn’t pretend that he knows the solution to each problem.

Effective leaders not only guide teams towards achieving strategic objectives but also foster a culture of innovation, collaboration, and continuous improvement. They inspire employees to reach their full potential, steer through challenges, and capture new opportunities. A successful leader ensures employees’ prosperity and the organization’s economic success.

Respects discipline

Employees get influenced by their manager’s discipline, his style, which in turn improves their work performance. Some leaders also use a compensation structure to promote the achievement of strategic goals resulting in the union of individual and company goals.

A leader’s role is to prioritize the team’s needs and create an environment where everyone can flourish and learn from one another. They know that investing in people and prioritizing their requirements results in unwavering loyalty and trust. To inspire the team, managers need to communicate a simple clear and relevant vision of the way forward. Solving internal conflicts is not an easy task. Differences of opinion and confrontations are inevitable when a diverse group of people gathers under one roof.

Narayan Murthy is known for his down to earth nature and friendliness. His achievements and hard work are a great example for any other Indian who aspires to be an entrepreneur. His encouragement has led to the revolutions of startup industries in India. He gives importance to passion and will to persevere. He says that leaders must give priority to the long-term interests. High levels of optimism and high aspirations.

Inspires Team

A leader’s job is to inspire their teams from time to time by appreciating/recognizing their efforts, comprehending complex situations, and acting appropriately towards creating a contented workforce. Leadership development programs help to reinforce the company’s vision, mission, and values. These programs bring employees together, and team-building events provide opportunities for socialization as well as encouraging employees to work as a team and better understand one another on a personal level.

Motivating employees is learning about their needs and desires, delivering what they require, and rewarding them for a well-done job. A leader inspires team members by listening to and appreciating their ideas, as well as recognizing their contributions.

A leader is accountable for ensuring that his/her team stays efficient and productive. They can encourage higher productivity levels from each team member by applying modern management strategies designed to improve time management, minimize employee stress, and increase the quality deliverables of meetings.

The Indian business tycoon Azeem Premji plays the role of chairman of Wipro Limited and has a net worth of US $7.2 billion as of October 2019. One of the top industry leaders in India quotes “Success is achieved twice. Once in the mind and the second time in the real world” among others demonstrate how he as one of powerful person in India thinks. Premji’s sharp strategic vision and crisp communication skills led his team to strive for excellence. He has been known for his modesty, simplicity, and non-extravagance.

Managing Change Effectively

Managing change especially when it’s traumatic is no joke. CCD, which once did roaring business through it’s over 500 outlets in India and abroad, has now plunged into debt, forcing the closure of these cafes that was thronged by youngsters and office goers. The founder V.G. Siddhartha committed suicide which called for change in leadership because the Bengaluru-based firm saw a sharp decline in its fortunes and piling losses. People thought that the Coffee Day company would not survive after Siddhartha’s death and questions thronged as to who would continue to run the company after him. People believed the company could not recover because of the accumulated debt. But Malavika Hegde, wife of V G Siddhartha, put all the suspicion to end and achieved a milestone by saving CCD from disappearing despite being a single woman and mother of two sons.

Good leaders uphold agreements and make sure others do the same. They don’t let people get away with not changing, and work to understand the underlying reasons so they can remove obstacles. Malvika Hegde aided CCD to sail through challenging times by improving employees’ ability to respond quickly in unpredictably changing business situations. Leadership plays a significant role during such times of layoffs, corporate restructuring, political turmoil, and new competitors.

Conclusion

Leadership is a vast subject and requires a necessary skill especially for team handling and senior positions in an organization. The list of threshold competencies that a leader should possess is immense. Many behavioural or personality traits can be observed and learned by leadership role in an organization. And leadership studies are a multidisciplinary academic field of study that focuses on leadership in organizational contexts and in human life.

A leader’s role can’t be overlooked because it impacts the entire business. A strong leader has the power to inspire, energize and motivate their entire team to work together to achieve shared goals, leading to more effective collaboration, innovation, and productivity.

The pandemic has changed our concept of time. Most of us by now have lost track of time wondering which day of week it is, which month and what time of the day we are in.  It feels as if time has come to a standstill. The pandemic is the absolutely perfect example of VUCA world – Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous.

We all are going through the COVID-19 pandemic; we are living through is scary, depressing yet a life-changing experiences. This pandemic is worst then world wars, terrorist’s attacks or the Great Depression. It’s bigger than a lot of previous social shifts, not only because of its tragic outcomes, but also because it is distressing so many of us at once and changing every aspect of life from our professional work, income, health, social life everything.

Because of the risk of viral transmission, many people are dying apart from their loved ones, and many others are mourning lonely without their friends and relatives for sharing their grief. It’s distressing to feel helpless to not go to see your near and dear ones suffering Corona… I experienced the agony when my sisters were admitted in hospital for Corona and I couldn’t reach out to assist them in this crucial time. I am so thankful to God that both my sisters have recovered and have returned back to their home. I could visit them only after two months because of the restriction on traveling from one district to another.   

Pandemic has created only chaos; the media constantly gives out news of number of deaths due to Corona, numbers of new additions of Corona patients and numbers of recovery of Corona. Countless people are anguished for losing their jobs, not being able to manage their basic daily expenses, worried about their children’s education, unable to pay their loan instalments…..in short  plans for the future have gone topsy-turvy. It’s only feeling of uncertainty all the while. Over and above all while we fear for our near and dear ones’ health and comfort.

The point is we all learn to live with adversities. When adversity hits us, we start to ask questions. The tougher it hits us, the deeper our questions become. Sometimes, those questions end up being unexpected gifts that take us on higher levels, where our souls demand us to go. Sometimes we tend to run away from these difficult questions, and sometimes we are left with no choice but to fight.

George A. Bonanno is a professor of clinical psychology at Teachers College, Columbia University, U.S.A. He is responsible for introducing the provocative idea of our mind’s agility to tackle loss and trauma. He is known as a pioneering researcher in the field of grief and trauma.

In situations as the present pandemic which is very difficult for people, George Bonanno says that people will get through it, probably the same way that people have gotten through other kinds of losses. They will just need to be a little more creative about it. Based on decades of research, Bonanno calls grief a “natural adaptive reaction” it is a painful but necessary mental recalibration to accommodate a new absence, new loss, new beginning.

Anything this big creates the opportunity for new thinking. If the size of the crisis is associated with the amount of new learning it can generate new opportunities. Our brilliance will be magnified many-fold when we emerge in the new normal. New and expanded points of view are generally a good thing. In fact, the roots of the word “emergency” come from the Latin “emergere” meaning to rise up or out.

Socrates said “The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.”

This phase will also  pass.

World Has Become Volatile: Volatility is ever increasing.  Brexit is a good example of VUCA world. Britain’s exit from the European Union took the world by surprise. A consequence of this political factor has affected economics, commerce, regulatory system and emotional perception of people at large. The British leaves alone isolated from their major trading partners, i.e the Euro Zone. That is surely not a healthy thing for world trade. The real shocks are yet to be faced. After Brexit, political and security effects would be more important to the US. The potential economic gains and losses for the U.S in Brexit are small, apart from the TTIP-like arrangement which would result in substantial economic gains for the US. The US will miss the influence and global perspective that the UK brings to the EU decision-making process, particularly around foreign policy, security and defence. TTIP (T-Tip) is a planned agreement focused on lowering trade tariffs and removing costly regulations on business across the Atlantic. These barriers include labour rights, food safety rules and banking safeguards put into place following the recession.

Syria’s war shows no sign of stopping. Syria can be described as several interconnected wars. It’s not the government-versus-rebels narrative it started out as in 2011. In the last few weeks, the proxy conflicts between Israel and Iran and Turkey and the Kurds have heated up in particular.

US’s pressure on Turkey to deal with Isis will actually make Turkey more vulnerable to attack from the terrorist group.  Brazil is unable to address its growing fiscal deficit, the war between North Korea and South Korea, the political instability in many parts of world has increased the volatility in world.  The geographical, political, ecological, economical changes are too much of burden on the business organizations.

Uncertainty everywhere: Uncertainty is linked to volatility. Business organizations are reworking on their decision making frameworks in which decisions can be executed. Management techniques were always based on assumptions about the future and the use of planning is a major tool of management control. Change is constant, products are living a shorter life span, to top it all, political and economical events are spinning the decision making of business managers like never before. Planning, budgeting and control methods lead to never-ending discussions in company board rooms; it just doesn’t reach any logical conclusion. Once again, just look at Brexit again. Everyone knew that the “leave” decision of voters had a 50% chance of occurrence but a few hours later the consequences of it were nevertheless still hard to predict.

Mergers, acquisitions and takeovers have reached a peak globally because firms are seeking to reposition themselves and protect profitability in the face of shifting customer demands, rising regulation and the need to embrace technology.

Complexities are only mounting: Globalisation has pushed the boundaries of doing business, which has only created a wide gap between developed and underdeveloped markets, increasing the competition from new entrants. Globalization has put pressure on businesses of all sizes to tap international customer base. From a technology point of view, s businesses need to review all processes and see how their legacy and systems can cope with training of staff, multi-lingual customers, foreign compliance and a whole host of other intricate and very time-consuming changes. The biggest fact today is the start-ups are giving competition to established businesses in many sectors, the bigger and established players are dumbfound due to ac of creativity and innovation. Organizations today need 24X7 innovative pool of employees, those who can just keep innovation pumping at all levels of business. And, another fact is however innovative people get information technology takes its own time to change. This means that businesses have become too reliant on their expensive legacy systems, restricting innovation as a result.

Ambiguity cannot be wiped out: Too much of information keeps pouring in from everywhere, and the media keeps people on their heels. Customers are having large information, they are confused about what to buy, how to buy, from where to buy, at what price to buy….  Everything has become complex: pricing, operations, R&D, firm’s infrastructure, supply chains, customers’ behaviors, big data systems, economic models, finances everything is challenging. Due to random organizational structures, the authority and responsibility lines grow blurred, which creates a big leadership challenge. Due to blurring responsibilities of managers, internal complexities keep growing in organization. Employees get busy playing the blame game and politicising the work atmosphere. The same is with Governments, blurring responsibilities gives way to non transparency in systems. Globalization has paved way for a growing number of multi-channels with customers, each with their own set of priorities and responsibilities. At the Government level, organizational level, channels level and customer level haziness exists.

Conclusion: One of the main challenges of today’s business scenario is to accommodate inconsistencies in (PESTLE) Political, Economical, Social, Technological, Legal and Environmental constituents. The complexity of today, demands managers to act by taking into account the complete picture, they should understand that pure statistical data cannot suffice for decision making. They should get ready for implications when wrong decisions are made, volatility and ambiguity in markets can lead in making wrong decisions. They should learn to accommodate the extremes; the dichotomy of good, bad, right, wrong desirable and undesirable does not exist any longer.

On a personal level employees must be tolerant to ambiguity and volatility by taking care of their mental and physical health, they must practice critical thinking and risk acceptance. VUCA World is here to stay.