How do you deal with an invisible hurricane? The COVID-19 pandemic is reaching a tipping point in India, the point where numbers do not need to be interpreted, the picture on the ground speaks the entire story. For the countries who have done a decent job in combating the pandemic, this Financial times extract captures the essence. Early travel restrictions, aggressive testing and screening of contacts and strict quarantine rules have been crucial. Universal healthcare, clear management structures for the public health response and proactive communication to get the population on board have also helped. Lets break it down. Early travel restrictions Aggressive testing Screening of contacts Strict quarantine rules Universal Healthcare Clear management structures for public health response Proactive communication The WHO advice to all countries is “Test, Track, and Trace”. Test for Virus Infection. Track the infected patients movement in recent days. Trace people who interacted with the infected patients. When you trace people, you quarantine or test them. The cycle begins all over again if the people traced test positive. The WHO advice when executed to perfection…
Leadership this month – Heroes are not always right.
From the barber to the CEO, everyone in India loves to hold court on what ails Indian cricket. The latest news is that Anil Kumble, the coach & Virat Kohli, the captain do not see eye to eye. To make the two reconcile is not my task. That said, this is a great opportunity to ask – Are we as a society and a people also blind to how things are? How often do we believe that choices made by our heroes will always be right? In the case of the Tata Group, it was Ratan Tata himself who had a role in appointing Cryus Mistry as the chairman in the first place. Anybody disputes that? We all know how that turned out. In the case of the Indian cricket coach, it was the famed trio of Sachin Tendulkar, Saurav Ganguly & VVS laxman who chose Anil Kumble. And things have apparently not turned out well on the internal harmony front. Now, who is going to challenge the cricketing pedigree of these legends ? Not me. And yet, going by…