Happy New Year!!

Happy Diwali! In India we have the New Year today according to the Hindu calendar.

The first of the New Year in the middle of October is always a nice surprise. Last night the amount of fireworks set off was very impressive; like you live in a war zone...Fire works are a little bit different here.

It quite an experience to buy creative piece of fireworks that would NEVER be sold legally in the West. Here we have no restrictions in that area at all, and with that we had an amazing show last night.

As one of my American friends SMS’ed me last night that we would at least be arrested in the US with the amount of fireworks in the back of our cars…

In Holland we think it’s cool to get the better stuff from Belgium… here they make the best fireworks in the backyard for 10% of the European cost! and on top of that it's 100% legal!

Yesterday and today were holidays. Tomorrow morning at 9:00am it is going to be a surprise who will show up at work. Most of the time we have a few people who do not show up at our workplaces and add a couple of extra days to their holidays...without notice.

The common excuse for late deliveries (for that same reason) from our suppliers will be as follows: “My workers have not come back from their village and I don’t know when they will be back”.

Many people go back to their families living outside the urban setting and will travel for a few days. On an average it takes 2 weeks from today before all the projects are back to a normal planning. A less fortunate start of the New Year I would say, but here it is the way to go.

In general, the best time to start a project in India is a week or two AFTER Diwali, but NEVER few days before.
It’s like between Christmas and our New Year where business is often slow in the area of manufacturing (expect for Candle Making in our case).

The construction of the new factory and the corrections being done are also depending on the availability of workers.

From India we wish you a Happy Diwali!

Check- Check - Double Check

Checking details is in general not the norm in my daily environment. This means that I have to check, check and double check EVERYTHING :). Checking the values on a blood test or checking dimensional properties of a product sample or production. In general people care less which causes some serious challenges.

Coming from Holland where literally everything matters to India, where simply not everything matters is a mission in itself. The company that is responsible for the structure of our new location simply assemled the entire skeleton not bothering about the dimensional properties.

The structure is not plumb-line at all :( ... 200mm out of line. The response from the builder was even more shocking : "No problem Sir...don't worry".
Over here many things are "No Problem". I learnt that when people already say there is "No Problem" there is a problem for sure!!

So, I simply continue to check everything. Quality does not come automatically anywhere in the world. In an enviroment where people throw their garbage on the streets and 5% of the people uses a restroom inside a building.... you will need some additional quality measure systems in place. In order to improve the quality of life people have to change the way they think. Long and slow processes, but every first step in the right direction is one of progress!

Just keep checking :)