"CEOs can't wait to read Sunny Bindra's articles every week."

“There are three givens of human nature that queuing psychologists must address: 1) We get bored when we wait in line. 2) We really hate it when we expect a short wait and then get a long one. 3) We really, really hate it when someone shows up after us but gets served before us.” […]

To be widely respected in Kenya today, you need to have just one thing. Just one. All of the things that normally generate respect – virtue, compassion, wisdom, knowledge – have been thrown in the gutter. In the society we have crafted, only one thing matters, and you know what that one thing is. Money. […]

“RIM’s woebegone story is the stuff of science-fiction epic. A technology juggernaut that emerged from a sleepy Canadian backwater, RIM came to dominate the smartphone industry in a few years. Its BlackBerry managed to become an indispensable tool of the global elite in Davos and Washington D.C. as well as a status symbol to tweens […]

Picture water dripping onto a large rock. The drops of water seem utterly ineffective in making even the slightest dent on the rock, which is sleek and solid and immovable. The water keeps dripping, for days, months, years. Yet there is no effect on the rock. One day, however, that rock will crumble completely. The […]

“The three directors who oversee risk at JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) include a museum head who sat on American International Group Inc.’s governance committee in 2008, the grandson of a billionaire and the chief executive officer of a company that makes flight controls and work boots. What the risk committee of the biggest U.S. […]

While watching a cookery programme on TV the other day, I came across a most interesting word. The word is “kodawari,” and it is in Japanese. The programme in question showed a master sushi maker at work. Sushi has always fascinated me: for its artistry; its painstaking attention to detail; its insistence on the finest, […]

“The corporate world is emerging from several weeks of boardroom turbulence dubbed the “Shareholder Spring.” In annual meeting after annual meeting around the world, boards have been taken to task by investors and other stakeholders on a wide range of issues: remuneration, board composition, competence, diversity, voting control, dual stock, and more. In the meantime, […]

Tesco is the United Kingdom’s most dominant retailer. For a couple of decades now, the supermarket chain has been all-powerful, accounting for one in eight pounds that Britons spend in shops and commanding 30% market share, in addition to being the nation’s largest private employer. And Tesco is not merely a grocer these days; it […]

“The fatal fact about nepotism is that the really good people won’t go to work for you in the first place or will quit or quit trying for your job when they spot your uncle, brother, nephew, wife, mistress or son on the payroll… …If there’s even a bare possibility that you’re prejudiced, the smell […]

Picture yourself at one of our many fruit-and-vegetable markets. If you frequent these places, I have no doubt that you have a favourite vendor that you habitually buy from. Why is that, when there are usually dozens of stalls before you, all offering very similar products at very similar prices? What makes you choose one […]

“…Sony, which once defined Japan’s technological prowess, wowed the world with the Walkman and the Trinitron TV and shocked Hollywood with bold acquisitions like Columbia Pictures, is now in the fight of its life. In fact, it is in a fight for its life – a development that exemplifies the stunning decline of Japan’s industrialized […]

Back in 2003, we thought we had put the era of truly horrible state corporations behind us. The new government of the day, swept into power in a massive rejection of the failures and excesses of the 1990s, promised to reform the public sector and revitalize all of Kenya’s dead or dying parastatals. A good […]

The biggest problem with the reputation industry, however, is its central conceit: that the way to deal with potential threats to your reputation is to work harder at managing your reputation. The opposite is more likely: the best strategy may be to think less about managing your reputation and concentrate more on producing the best […]

Whatever happened to “First-Time Quality?” It seems to have become an irrelevance in Kenya today. The idea is simple enough. If you get something right the first time, you don’t have to incur the cost of inspections, revisits, rework or repeat jobs. If you pay acute attention and maintain a high standard when you do […]

“Pep Guardiola has defended Lionel Messi after his penalty miss as good as cost Barcelona a place in the Champions League final. Messi has enjoyed an extraordinary run of form in the past four seasons, scoring 63 goals in all competitions this season alone. However, he failed to find the net in either leg of […]

Kenya has spent more on infrastructure projects in the past decade than at any other time in its history. And there is more to come. That is a great and necessary thing. Projects like undersea cables, superhighways and bypasses, link roads, rural power connections, bridges and port expansions will all have significant impact on our […]

Diplomacy Today Today yesterday tomorrow Diplomacy is was will be hollow Say it like it is What’s with the “excuse me please?” Do you, in the boxing match Hold back the power of your punch? Or do you fail To fully exhale? Coat words with honey? No! Claim back your money! Is the smell of […]

“I’ve been living in the Thank You Economy since a day sometime around 1995, when a customer came into my dad’s liquor store and said, “I just bought a bottle of Lindemans Chardonnay for $5.99, but I got your $4.99 coupon (later) in the mail. Can you honor it? I’ve got the receipt.” The store […]

I was sitting by my favourite ocean (there is only one) the other day (I was on a break, remember) and I noticed some ominous-looking dark clouds over the ocean. I asked a passing waiter whether he thought it might rain. He looked at the sky, and said with gratifying certainty: “No chance. Those clouds […]

1. The Victims (“Can you believe what they want us to do now? And of course we have no time to do it. I don’t get paid enough for this. The boss is clueless.” 2. The Non-Believers (“Why should we work so hard on this? Even if we come up with a good idea, the […]

To rate the leader, study the followers. Here’s the first reason why. Good leaders seek out, and attract, good followers. Bad leaders seek out, and attract, bad followers. So if you want to know whether the leader you are about to follow is any good, look around you. Who are your fellow followers? Are they […]

“TODAY is my last day at Goldman Sachs. After almost 12 years at the firm — first as a summer intern while at Stanford, then in New York for 10 years, and now in London — I believe I have worked here long enough to understand the trajectory of its culture, its people and its […]

The Encyclopedia Britannica has ended print publication after 244 years. I must admit I fell silent after hearing this piece of news earlier in the week. Anyone who admires books and has encountered the venerable encyclopedia in a home or library cannot fail to feel some sadness. The weathered leather covers, the musty pages, the […]

“Our strategy requires time to play out. It is a strategy designed to build sustainable long-term value for our constituents, beginning with serving our customers best. The performance metrics that matter to us are not the typical Wall Street trailing financial output indicators. Instead, they are the metrics that reflect industry thought leadership, high customer […]

If you attend a corporate retreat in Kenya, you just know what you’re going to do during the outdoor dinner, don’t you? After sufficient alcohol has been imbibed and inhibitions have been sufficiently loosened, you will undoubtedly do a “Mugiithi” dance. This is where you form a human train with the leader at the front, […]

The 2 hashtags, #TwitterBigStick and #TwitterThumbsUp were never intended to be finished products in any sense. As I have said from the outset, they were simply a demo of what focused tweeting can do. They play on very human needs: to express frustration when good service or value for money is not provided; and to […]

“One of the odd questions I keep being asked about the iPad is “Where do you plug in USB stuff?” It’s a sister phrase to the weird criticism oft thrust at Apple’s device, “Ah, it’s too limiting for me: I can’t plug in USB sticks.” This is weird because other makers, notably Apple’s biggest competitor, […]

Another year, another set of Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education results. And another year in which parents, children and the media go into a seemingly uncontrollable frenzy about the significance of the results. I have written about this peculiar phenomenon before, and no doubt will again. For I fail to understand why we have to […]