My Thoughts: Interesting times in mobile commerce in Sri Lanka

My Thoughts: Interesting times in mobile commerce in Sri Lanka: On last Friday , I saw Dialog launching a mobile point of sales service (MPOS). Today I saw that Hatton national bank ( HNB) also launching ...

Interesting times in mobile commerce in Sri Lanka

On last Friday , I saw Dialog launching a mobile point of sales service (MPOS). Today I saw that Hatton national bank ( HNB) also launching a similar service .

MPOS is targeted at the medium to small  scale merchant who cannot afford a credit card machine . There are many out there in Sri Lanka . They could not afford a credit card machine so far due to the rentals and the minimum committed business volumes stipulated by the issuer ( bank). With this solution all what the merchant need is the smart phone a the swiping component . 

Is this a banking product or a telecom product is million dollar question. However, the gap between a bank and a telco getting narrowed in the traditional transaction based products .

Apart from the technology which is available to all the banks , telecom and IT companies ,what is important in this business is trust , reputation and the distribution.

Both dialog and HNB are reputed an trusted brands in Sri Lanka. So the distribution is the key.

Dialog has a strong presence in SME so as HNB. In my opinion both are equally powerful in reaching the SME sector . Whilst dialog is the telecom partner in the SME sector ,  HNB could be the banking partner . So both are equally powerful in reaching the segment. So we will see this important battle in the MPOS.

Both HNB and dialog has taken some bold steps in mobile commerce field in Sri Lanka . Dialog being a technology company it could be assumed that the innovation is part of the organizational DNA. Generally , it is assumed that banking sector is governed by risk and compliance at the expense of innovation. In such a situation the ability of HNB is to challenge a telco is commendable.

Industry insights

http://www.cimaglobal.com/en-gb/Thought-leadership/Newsletters/Regional/The-CIMA-Edge-South-Asia-and-Middle-East/2013/March--April-2013/Industry-Insights/?id=52485

Our Talents

I was at the University of Moratuwa in this evening to participate the Presidents Installation Ceremony of the Gavel ( Toastmasters) Club. I was amazed to see the enthusiasm and the professionalism they have shown. The speeches were superb and fantastic and no doubt they are as good as many trained professional speakers.

Also they have not limited themselves for their technical studies. Most have completed CIMA and some are in the managerial level. Many have represented Sri Lanka either in sports, robotics and more importantly engineering students representing Sri Lanka for CIMA and CFA competitions.

All of them are great assets to any organisation in Sri Lanka.

Sadly the HR Practices of the corporate world in Sri Lanka is not geared to tap this talent pool. As a result we will loose most of them to Australia and UK.

It is pathetic but I do not have an answer.

what we study in the university

I was an Engineering student in the university sometimes back. After few months of graduation I gave up my carrier in Engineering and moved to Business Management, which I was passionate about. Recently, I met few of my friends who are practicing engineers. I asked them how useful the education that they had in the university for your present job? Many said they do not even use 1% of things that they have studied other than the analytical and problem solving skills that they mastered as engineering student. on contrast I still use the fundamentals I studied in CIMA, CIM and MBA.

Is our university syllabus was geared to the few who continue to study for Masters or PhDs? What about the majority who goes to the industry? Are we completely ignoring them? Is it a problem with the syllabus or with the lecturers who are pure academics?

Time accountability

I was working for a apparel manufacturer sometime back. There were team of work study officers who measure time for all the activities for sewing girls. The objective was to maximize the productivity by eliminating non value adding activities.

Now I am holding a senior managerial position of a multinational. Most of our time is spent on meetings, discussion and reviews. Are we spending our time productively?

Time is measured and accounted at the junior positions. But who is accounting and measure the time of the senior management?