Crafting Strategy: The Harvard approach

“I don’t like crafts, i am not Craft types” the words echoed in my ears for good, a fashion student told her disliking for crafts, and perhaps of what the gen-next perceive of Crafts, ” reminiscences of bygone era, a holy burden which all of us are carrying unnecessarily”.

Let me try and interpret in simple words what exactly the student meant when she said ‘I don’t like craft’ 1) Is she telling that she doesn’t like going to villages OR 2) she thought that craft is something similar to NGO trying to help poor and hungry OR 3) a rural women doing time pass at home trying to do stitching or embroidery OR 4) is it something that a stocked at dilli haat has no appeal or value for bargaining?. May be any of these interpretations OR something different but one thing was for sure that Crafts have lost the luster. Later, during the week, we were invited by the same fashion college where this girl comes from, the faculty members told us in a worried tone, “last year there were 75-students who went for craft documentation, this year it has reduced to 20”, thrusting upon us a mammoth task to convince these 20-students why crafts are essential for business success. And our blunt answer to these kids were “If you don’t adopt crafts you are finished”, telling them that Craft is more than mere configuration of decorative products to a strategic point that is essential for business success in International Market and glocal communities. And at the end of the presentation most of them were in thinking mode trying to redefine what exactly crafts are, some of the excerpts from the presentation are:-

Crafts have certainly superior design or innovation aspect, excellent functionality, are multi-purpose, and culturally connected, for sustainable development, with timeless appeal. The Modern Industry is in horde of competitive mode engaged in printing bucks every second through mass production, and the board rooms are filled with debates & charts projecting double digit growth, without realizing that if rut is further produced, it would result in meaningless products flooded in market and real consumption would come to stand still, the markets today loaded with senseless & copied products and companies wonder “whats gone wrong with demand: it’s perhaps recession and people are not buying” without realizing that it is their mistake producing things that doesn’t bring value in true sense, government as usual busy charting out new schemes for artisans for making them dependent forever on petty schemes rather than self-sustenance.

Crafting Strategy by Henry Mintzberg, in 1987 Harvard Business Review has discussed a whole new approach of using craft as a strategy for business success, and he successfully demonstrated how pottery as a Craft evokes traditional skill, dedication, perfection through the mastery of detail. What springs to mind is not so much thinking and reason as involvement, a feeling of intimacy and harmony with the materials at hand, developed through long experience and commitment. Formulation and implementation merge into a fluid process of learning through which creative strategies evolve. Similarly, a new research by Psychologists at Goldsmiths, University of London demonstrates that traditional toys & dolls could work best in helping UK and immigrant kids friendships to reduce racial conflict. Similarly, Kathputli dolls in Indian context can act as a great connect between urban and rural kids, one may need to work on character/game design that can connect traditional sensibilities with urban forms. The other strategic points could be:

1. Consumer Segmentation: The craft products shall not be classified only as ‘hand-made’, it deals holistically with semiotics & semantics, cumulative experience that connects people, culture and lifestyles, tastes & preferences and much more. The consumer segmentation can be used for “Craft Clusters” as ‘sample size’ for identifying new consumer market segmentation for better adaptability of new products and services. Most of the community linked with crafts would behave in similar fashion, be it Luhaar, Sunaar, bhil, or peripheral connect such as Jat, Marwari (though they may not be essentially craft community, yet they form integral part of ethnic group constituting 80% of current Indian population) can be easily understood, through this process a better & clearer demographic mapping can be done for the community behaving in same manner through qualitative aspect rather than qualitative. The cash rich shift from urban zone to rural can be new market potential to be tapped, whose spent are surprisingly more than urban if you look at cases like Emporio Mall in Delhi on Luxury products or punjab farmers have more BMW or AUDI than perhaps what is sold in Gurgaon.
2. Semiotics: Craft is the only natural connect between consumers and products, all products today are virtually designed in Singapore, Hong Kong, Sanghai or at any other international product design hub, they could be technologically sound but tend to get disconnected with local sense & sensibilities. Later these products are being launched in indigenous context, the aesthetics doesn’t connect with people and culture, or color schemes may not integrate with lifestyle & preferences, functional and ergonomics mis-match, and have plenty of attributes far away from the user & their aspiration. Unfortunately, most of the products fail to strike a larger market share in India (a huge culturally diverse landscape). McDonald’s is a classic example in food craft, how Aloo Tikki was introduced for Indian consumers for success. Designers constantly need to reinvent semiotics, by studying signs and symbols and using right interpretation & translation of ideas into products. Craft demonstrate best use of local resources and adoption of aesthetics derived from deep rooted tradition & culture of a particular community. If it is understood properly by modern industry, the product developed would have ‘natural connect’ resulting in greater acceptance and less spent on forced brand building.
3. Innovation: Most often local common sense in crafts, also termed as grass-root innovation are built on principles such as self-reliance, sustenance and growth of communities. Khadi is the greatest example of all times on social innovation as a part Crafts of India. Crafts have greater problem solving ability derived from the crux of cultural milieu, rituals, festivals, celebrations, ergonomics, usability, multi-functionality, and are derived from issues of day-to-day lives, these problems or other factors have evolved many innovative forms that are prevalent today. If innovation needs to be learnt in true sense, they could be very well inspired from Craft Products, and to quote an example Camel Ply-Split Braiding technique is perhaps the only form of Craft that has surpassed Technology and Machines today, and has helped eliminate all industrial processes in Textiles and Apparels including printing, dyeing, processing, pattern-making, construction by creating garments and accessories that has “Seamless and Timeless” appeal. If the similar innovation are implemented to other products, it would reduce expensive processes, and can easily penetrate beyond 5-7% of market share.
4. Multi-Functural: Most of the craft products deals with multi-faceted aspects of design and usability, be it Saree, Lota or any craft product, they would always have universal design appeal, and these products have incredible character of adaptability as per consumer or community needs, occasions, events and many other attributes of life. The Saree or Dhoti as an attire has many multi-purpose character, from covering head in summer, to create as turban to lift loads on head, to carry money or even food items, these garments can adapt in any form fulfilling needs of people and their lifestyle. In my paper “Clothing for Habits” I have quoted many examples of how these cultural attires were build on human habits which contemporary products fail to tackle. Craft can also offers a great diversity in terms of new product and its offering, if it is explored properly, for example Case-1, If a fashion student has to make a design or final collection today, he/she would go to Nehru place or Chandini Chowk in Delhi for fabric or material sourcing, and at the end of the day when you measure the results of 30-students in a class, most outcome (garments) would be similar. Case-2: Imagine, these students or even group of students pick up 10-different craft forms and work on fashion collection, at the end of the day many inspirations would bring great designs in fabric/surfaces, styles, design, trims and accessories and would result in meaningful products that are not possible in Case-1.
5. Sustainable Development: While most products see end of life cycle management, Craft products work on beginning of Life Cycle management, which means that recycle or reuse is not an after thought, but all issue related to environment, society and others are taken care even before products are being conceived. These craft products are Sustainable, they use local resources, self-sustenance for community work, empowering women & children etc. with quotients of re-usability that determine the timelessness, be it Sujani from Bihar on how a saree translates afterlife into meaningful products. These products possessed greater value of responsible consumption, for e.g. sarees would be a part of marriage tradition, gifted by dad/mom, on the birth of baby, karvachauth, and many other celebrations, occasions and festivals making it a huge emotional asset. Hence, with limited number of garment pieces the satisfaction level used to be very high, as compared to present conditions where 80% of clothes in our wardrobes are either worn once or never. Now companies are coining new terms like ‘organic’ OR ‘slow’ fashion etc. which has been existing in our culture for hundreds of years.
6. Change Management: Nomadic craft life is the greatest example of how communities use to move from one place to another carrying their homes, the products were designed in the manner that it could survive climate variations, were multi-purpose, compact packaging and above all a well thought out product range that could fit all needs and wants of these communities while shifting from one place to another, climate variations and different terrains. What a thought process in those times when hardly mode of travel were existent, still these nomads traveled and adapted to new conditions without much difficulty and problems. Unfortunately, these approaches and aspects while designing modern products have been totally neglected thinking that these are age old aspects and are pieces of history. Honestly some of the approaches THEN were more futuristic than what we tend to practice now.
7. Cognitive Training: India’s greatest strength was documentation through story telling, much faster than facebook, twitter or any other tech apps. It also used to have credible value, the way epics and other documents have been written and preserved shows the strength of a culture & heritage more than 5000 years old. It had both visual and verbal medium for describing events, stories, lives and many such things. Look at the crafting mediums including Kalamkari, Phad, Madhubani, Chamba Rumaal, Patachitra and many craft forms, they have incredible narrations of god and goddess, epics, mighty kings, flaura & fauna, lifestyle of an era, ethical messages and had more holistic approaches, now when a generation looks at it today, they would see so much progressive culture. Today, though technology has been able to connect and make documentation simpler, it has an incredible impact on mind, to give an example do you remember mobile numbers in case your mobile phone is lost, OR do you remember most of the things you are surrounded with in case you loose connect with technology, how does life management skills are enhanced to deal with memory when common sense has become rare. Craft products has a greater impact on tactile and cognitive thinking, as result there is a profound ability to solve problems, with greater memory and observation skills for real-life issues and metaphors.

In Summary, Crafts has been one of the most essential tool to connect life with change, that have resulted in superior products, processes, people management, change management and many other aspects needed by leaders or managers of today to run successful companies. They just need a bit of humility to understand and deep dive for effective use of lessons on how “Crafts are strategic’ and not mere poor looking decorative objects, to save Crafting Tradition: India’s greatest contribution to the world for building sustainable future!

Craft Village