Understated Hyperbole
Over Sunday brunch I finally admitted to a friend that I was not doing OK. And then he admitted back to me that neither was he. The most common question that friends and acquaintances have asked each other over the last 9 months has been – how are you doing? How is everything going? And…
To say that I was stoked about The Undoing is an understatement. David E Kelley is a master storyteller whose work I have been enjoying since my teenage years (I am a sucker for a good legal drama). Nicole Kidman is on a tear when it comes to picking great TV shows and characters tailor-made…
A young girl wakes up in a daze. “Where is everyone?” She walks out of her room and searches her house. Her family is missing. She can hear some noise outside. She can also smell smoke. She picks up her dada’s old wooden sword and walks out of her house. The entire village is burning….
This is the second in a series of character origin stories from the Mahabharat. They never gave her a name. She was her kingdom’s princess. She was her father’s daughter. She was the colour of dusk. Panchali. Draupadi. Krishna. She was born out of a sacrificial fire. So was her brother. He knew his purpose….
This is the first in a series of character origin stories from the Mahabharat. A young prince and his father, the king, are locked up in the deepest dungeon of their own palace. They have been utterly defeated by the enemy – their kingdom in shambles. The prince’s elder sister is to be married to…
No sudden wisdom has dawned on me. No life-altering epiphanies. Birthdays come and birthdays go. This will be just another day and the start of another year. But looking back is important. Weighing my current beliefs and recording them seemed important (especially given how this year has shaped up for the world). At 76, I…
A lot has been written about defensibility and moats in businesses. Strategists talk about barriers to entry (resources, patentable technology and processes, expertise, capital) in certain businesses and why it is usually difficult for new entrants to disrupt incumbents. But one of the lesser-explored areas of defensibility is building products which have a high exit…
Over a meeting, someone recently asked me to describe the archetype of a product leader. While I answered the question, a broader thought stayed with me. What are the various archetypes of product managers? An archetype is a powerful storytelling device – making it easier for readers to identify and understand a concept. And PMs…
This is the second in a series of essays focused on the future of storytelling: the “Story Stack”. The first one was on the movie industry and covered the history of films and the rise of curators (and how they became the arbiters of quality). This one focuses on the written word and the publishing…
I recently shared the Possession-Awareness Quadrant framework with a hall full of PMs in the form of a 20-minutes-long talk followed by a quick Q&A session. A format like this forces you to crystalize your thoughts in a more concise (brevity of thought) and precise (sharp, to the point examples) way. The process of putting…
I am working on a series of essays focused on the future of storytelling: the “Story Stack” – an entire ecosystem that I see developing around storytellers and creators. These essays will focus on the following topics: Part 1. Moving Pictures – Cut to the Chase (this essay) Part 2. Written Word – Here be…
I have been going through a friend’s notes from his favourite classes at NYU’s Stern business school. The notes from Professor Glenn Okun’s classes stand out. There are a lot of insights in there. One of the things he talks about is value propositions. Okun posits that one cannot create value propositions. They are perceived…