IN todays world, business is rapidly becoming a dirty word. And worse, people are starting to see it for what it is. Doing something in the name of business is often used as a licence to be greedy and to cheat the common folk for as much as you can get away with. One product is put in three different bottles and given three different names. The objective, to triple sales. But when the sales are merely doubled, shareholders jump, heads roll, families are left without incomes. Subsequently, better cheaters are hired. The rich must be made richer at all costs, even if at the expense of the poor. As far as I am concerned, cheating is cheating which- ever way you cut it. After 20 years in an industry which lubricates the cogs and wheels of business, I see things for what they are. And I find myself gravitating towards corporations that have retained at least some respect for the common folk. (I refuse to call them consumers anymore.) When the sales of a product dip, we put housewives into little rooms with two- way mirrors. We prod them with various stimuli. We tick boxes. The housewife is no longer a housewife, but a Rhesus monkey, or a guinea pig, or a Pavlovian dog. Who do we think we are? Housewives are our mothers, sisters, and daughters. It can take us a lifetime to know our mother, but a large corporation believes it can know her intimately, within a couple of hours. Who do we think we are? Is there no room for humanity in business? Is there no place for respect and, dare I say it, love for the common folk in marketing? Fortunately, there is. The world is getting smaller. Something happens in Palestine this morning, and by lunchtime, we hear and see it on the BBC and Al-Jazeera. (I dont even bother with the international news stations like the Complete Nonsense Network now.) The rich people whose intention was to trick the rest of the world into helping them get richer are being eaten up by their own inventions - the common TV, the common radio, and the Internet. Now at least, I see a happy shift of power. From the hands of the strong, into the hands of the weak. So now businessmen have to start behaving themselves. If you employ child labour, people will refuse to buy your shoes. If you buy raw materials from poor countries at poor-country prices, then package them and try to sell them back at First World prices, they pirate your products and make imitation versions. I see hope. God bless the corporation that gives due consideration to the common folk and treats them with respect. God help the corporation that doesnt just take, but gives back to the people from whom it took. I know I would do business with such a corporation. I would gladly be the lubricant for their cogs and wheels. For certain, business will forever be a competition. Make no mistake, I am not against competition. Only I feel that competition can and should be conducted fairly, humanely, and in a gentlemanly manner. In a competition like this, products have to be made better. There must be no cutting of corners. And yes, by all means, make a profit. But with some consideration for the incomes of the people youre selling to. Recently, an American company wanted to patent basmati rice. The people of India cried foul. Good. (The people of Thailand werent so lucky, apparently. Having exported tons of catfish to the land of greed and patents for decades, they woke up one morning and were told they could no longer export catfish to anybody, because some greedy foreign company had patented the term catfish.) Who do they think they are? Recently, I attended one of those research sessions where you put housewives into small rooms with two- way mirrors. Our so-called C and D class housewives were very vocal and very articulate about how packaged food items looked better in advertisements than in real life. Well and bloody good. The worm has turned. In the past, international petroleum companies would go to under-developed countries, dig up their oil and gas, fence up their staff quarters, guard their knowledge jealously, pay royalty, and Ciao! Today, our very own oil and gas company goes to developing countries, helps them dig up their oil and gas, teaches them how to do it, sends their best students to the Petronas Petroleum Technology University in Tronoh, builds hospitals, clinics and schools for their common folk, and populates the local offices with more locals than Malaysians. By doing all this, theyve been winning oil and gas exploration contracts from under the noses of those old school oil companies who now spend millions on advertising, claiming theyre saving the trees, the sea and the frogs. (Could this be why we were being earmarked by them as a potential terrorist area?) The time has come for businessmen to think differently, act differently. So that when we speak differently, people will believe us. So that when we ask ourselves the question Who the hell do we think we are?, we can sincerely answer: We are decent folks trying to earn a decent living by selling decent products at decent prices to our own mothers, sisters and daughters. Who the hell we think we are, a speech by Yasmin Ahmad.
Posted on: Sun, 24 Aug 2014 05:39:17 +0000
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