More From Bihar

Image via WikipediaAs Mala had written earlier about our ongoing project in Bihar distributing children’s books at Pustak Mela‘s across Bihar. We have thus far covered:

And have distributed many 1000’s of books along with Eklavya and Scholastic.

It has been a fabulous experience – we’ve learned much, been awed by the response, thrilled at the possibilities of millions of more children reading and can’t wait to go back. We’d like to thank Pratham, Manipal Press and Gati for help and support without which this exercise would have been infinitely more difficult.

Here are a few pictures and a video from our experiences:

The full album is here:

And here’s a bonus video slide show:

And as a double bonus, JP Rangaswami’s musings on project management which is a must read:

A project manager’s first instinct is to insist on control. Control everything, end to end. Every ingredient. His own recipe. Not Invented Here. Clear work surfaces. Matrix not spoken here, go away.

It works. In fact, for amateur project managers, it’s probably the only way. But then let’s recognise them for what they are. This may appear fine from a results-oriented viewpoint. Until you look at the costs. Which is where the problem lies. The control-freak no-matrix project manager is an expensive proposition, expensive in terms of costs and time. And margin.

Shared-resource models and matrices did not enter enterprise life because there was some pinko lefty tree-hugger involved in organisational design. They did so because other models were not affordable.

Collaboration is not an option, it’s an imperative. Shared-resource models are not nice-to-have, they’re the only choice we have, particularly in these straitened times.

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