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

“Executive expatriates are expensive, as many multinational firms have learned. Moving a manager to a factory or corporate office in Dubai, Russia, or India can be a costly experience after providing relocation dollars, tax equalization, and housing allowances. For that reason and others, Western and non-Western companies competing in emerging markets are dramatically reducing the […]

I imposed a two-week television news blackout on myself recently, and what a pleasure it was. We all need a ‘detox’ from time to time, and there is nothing more toxic than an unending stream of news about Kenyan politics. I am delighted to have been spared the sight of groups of parliamentarians calling facile […]

“On July 1st (Starbucks), based in Seattle, said it would close a further 500 stores in America (in addition to the 100 closures it announced earlier this year) and reduce its workforce of roughly 172,000 by around 7%. A remarkable 70% of the stores due to close were opened after 2005, which seems to confirm […]

Do you want your child to become an ‘expert’? Who wouldn’t? Being an expert in something usually brings great rewards in life: recognition, money, and a sense of deep accomplishment. But what is an ‘expert’? Do we ask ourselves that question often enough? Are experts born or made? In other words, are the factors that […]

“In the late 1920s, a German psychologist named Max Ringelmann compared the results of individual and group performance on a rope-pulling task. He expected that the group’s effort would be equal to the sum of the efforts of individuals within the group. For instance, three people puling together should exert three times as much pull […]

We are all deeply concerned about the state of our education system these days, so allow me to stay on the subject for a while. There can be little doubt: if we want to haul ourselves out of the murky waters of third-world status, education is the only known method. Educating our people properly is […]

“…Mr (Gordon) Brown’s most damaging flaw: he is a lousy communicator. A failing in any leader, for Mr Brown this weakness has proved catastrophic…Sadly (for him and for Labour), Mr Brown has a bad habit even more damaging than saying impossible things: saying nothing at all, often at excruciating length…Beyond the universal if dispiriting fact […]

As Kenya taxis on the runway preparing for take-off, it is important to get a sense of priority. We must all realise what’s hot, and what’s really not. Otherwise we are going to go round and round this airport and watch all those other planes zooming around in the sky. I have designed a special […]

The 2007 Fortune Global 500: 1. Wal-Mart Stores 2. Exxon Mobil 3. Royal Dutch Shell 4. BP 5. Toyota Motor 6. Chevron 7. ING Group 8. Total 9. General Motors 10. ConocoPhillips Fortune (July 21, 2008) What’s new in Fortune‘s Global 500 List? Well, 6 of the top 10 corporations by revenue are oil companies, […]

For all my optimism about the future of this fair land, I am now deeply disturbed. What is a society to make of itself when its children start burning down their schools? That society should be very, very worried. We now have a spate of copycat arson attacks leaving a trail of burnt dormitories across […]

“A bitter rivalry between two Indian billionaire brothers has scuttled negotiations to combine two of the developing world’s largest mobile-phone carriers. South Africa’s MTN Group Ltd. and India’s Reliance Communications Ltd. called off talks Friday over a potential multibillion-dollar deal that would have created a wireless giant. Behind the collapse of the talks is the […]

When at a certain stage in my life I finally managed to generate some surplus cash (it took a long time), I immediately decided to invest in some stockmarket shares (as many do). I started reading the financial press trying to seek out a real winner of a company to back. I noted that many […]

“So the summit ended as such summits always do. The delegates agreed on the importance of the problem, the urgent requirement to spend more money: they emphasised the need for co-ordinated action, and resolved to meet again in future to reach the same conclusions. If you have no substantive analysis or common principles beyond acquiescence […]

I will be in attendance at the inaugural meeting of the Storymoja Business Club, Books First, Nakumatt Lifestyle, Monrovia Street, Nairobi, 6.00 to 8.00 pm. The Storymoja Business Club is a new forum for managers and students of business to discuss business books in a convivial gathering of peers. Members meet once a month to […]

The amazing success of the Safaricom IPO confirms that we are on our way to becoming a shareholder democracy, does it not? Hundreds of thousands of new shareholders have been brought into the bosom of capitalism, and are basking in the promise of the new wealth that will follow – yes? Anyone who thinks we […]

“…In a 2005 Australian study published in the British Medical Journal, researchers interviewed, during a 27-month period, 456 hospitalized cell phone users who had each been involved in a crash. The scientists combed the drivers’ call records to see how cell phone use affected their driving. Whether they talked hands-free or with a phone clasped […]

If you want to go up Nairobi’s Museum Hill, you have to turn in from Uhuru Highway. There is usually a policeman stationed at the roundabout to make sure that only cars using the extreme right lane do this. Many a driver gets into trouble trying to turn in from the highway’s middle lane. The […]

“Throughout your career people will approach you with all manner of real-life problems resulting from your work. A wonderfully effective response is to invite them to have a look with you – in other words, “Let’s Go See!” It is seldom adequate to remain at one’s desk and speculate about causes and solutions and hope […]

The debate on whether parliamentarians should pay tax on their all income is rightly attracting the opprobrium of Kenyans. This is not a new issue, by the way, nor is it particularly Kenyan. Members of parliament and leading bigwigs in other countries have also, in the past, felt that their role is so special and […]

“According to a recent Gallup Poll, the number of men who wear ties every day to work dropped to a record low of 6%, down from 10% in 2002. U.S. Sales have plummeted to $677.7 million in the 12 months ending March 31, from their peak of $1.3 billion in 1995, according to market researcher […]

The Edge is a quarterly management knowledge series, jointly produced by the Business Daily and Strathmore Business School. I am the Consultant Editor. The current issue is out today, free with the Business Daily and on sale all weekend. This issue’s theme is Connecting with Customers: why we have forgotten the primacy of the customer, […]

A minister reads out a written speech full of numbers, for more than 2 hours. A couple of hundred people, mostly elderly males, gather round him. Most are in varying degrees of somnolence. From time to time they wake up and clap – with their feet. And all of this is presided over by a […]

“Of the 500 companies that appeared on the first (Fortune 500) list, in 1955, only 71 have a place on the list today. Nearly 2,000 companies have appeared on the list since its inception, and most are long gone from it. Dozens of companies on this year’s list did not even exist in 1955. Some […]

Safaricom CEO Michael Joseph is perplexed again. His company’s latest promotion has turned out disastrously. The offer of ‘free’ calls after 9.00 pm every day has clogged the network and proved a nightmare for people trying to make calls at night. Why? Because Kenyans keep piling in in droves to make their calls at precisely […]

1. You learn 20% faster immediately after exercise than after sitting still. 2. If our ancestors sat still in the savanna for eight hours straight…they became somebody’s lunch. Our brains developed while we walked about 12 miles a day, seven days a week, for several million years. 3. The brain’s executive functions – higher-order capacities […]

I am writing this in the dark, afflicted by a power blackout. It seems a good time to pass the blame around. So let me start, obviously, by blaming our notorious power company, which has been a blight on this country for decades. Let me also pass some blame to my landlord, who seems incapable […]

“Twenty-five years ago, when most economists were extolling the virtues of financial deregulation and innovation, a maverick named Hyman P. Minsky maintained a more negative view of Wall Street; in fact he noted that bankers, traders, and other financiers periodically played the role of arsonists, setting the entire economy ablaze. Wall Street encouraged businesses and […]

Let’s talk football this Sunday. But only briefly, so the rest of you don’t run away… A few days ago the captain of Chelsea Football Club, John Terry, stepped up to take a Very Important Penalty in Moscow. His team was facing Manchester United in the final of the European Champions League, the world’s most […]