Glocal Khabar in association with Samriddhi Foundation, hosted a panel discussion event entitled “Dissecting the Nepalese Business Eco-system” at FNCCI Teku in 14th Nov, 2016 in celebrating the Global Entrepreneurship Week 2016. The panel was moderated by Asish Thakur of Glocal Khabar and the speakers included education entrepreneur Mr Narottam Aryal of Kings College, Human Resource Specialist Rajiv Sharma of Job Dynamics, and the conglomerate tycoon Suraj Vaidya of the Vaidhya Group (VOITH).
The focus of the discussion was rooted in acknowledging the present challenges and opportunities in the Nepalese business eco-system, and the analysis of possible roles and potentialities of our education system and HR Development institutions to strengthen it. Dialogue regarding avenues for strategic collaboration between the education sector and corporate sector was also carried out among the panellists.
Panellists were open to expressing an increased sense of social responsibility among corporates, need of global expansion of local Nepalese brands and business process, and effective mobilization of foreign remittance in local business eco-system.
Critical evaluation of the contemporary education system in Nepal was also made especially on grounds that the system had not been reflecting the dynamic need of the current business environment. In fact, panellists even grieved upon the inability of the contemporary education system to get rid of the primitive method of only sticking to classroom style of teaching. They recommended educational institutions to let students undertake unconventional ways of exploring the ways of doing business in real life while also exploring the same opportunities in rural Nepal. The panellists agreed that such educational processes were essential to foster the spirit of entrepreneurship among graduates in future. Besides, panellists also urged the educational system to create the culture of learning by experimentation and failure. While criticizing the tradition of reprimanding failures in Nepalese society, they regarded failures to be fundamental of success in every entrepreneurial journey.
Likewise, while dissecting HR challenges in the prevailing business scenario, panellists urged upcoming graduates to carve their professional goals in terms of adding value to society or business than simply earning certain amount of money or holding certain job title. They also expressed the need for corporates to carefully value new employees and interns because they could help innovate novel strategies. Additionally, fostering leadership and “intraprenuership” spirit among young blood was expressed to be imperative for channelling ideas of new comers for business growth and value-addition.
Moving on, Suraj Vaidya who charters a conglomerate constituting numerous products spoke of the necessity to discover competitive advantages present in diverse geographical & climatic conditions of Nepal and create a niche market in new product development. He also expressed his willingness to partner with individual entrepreneurs with promising business cases in order to make the best use of the idling resources reserved by such business powerhouses on realizing revolutionary business concepts. Moreover, Vaidya also openly proposed opportunities to collaborate with new talents in the country as he recognizes growth saturation in family-run conglomerates and difficulty in transiting leadership down the family tree. Given the unwillingness of Banks and Financial Institutions to take higher risk in financing potential ventures, panellists agreed this collaboration between business powerhouses and fund hungry potential ventures to be a good alternative to the non-value adding obsolete financing system in Nepal.
Moving on with the program, panellists also discussed different avenues for collaboration between educational institutions and business entities in areas of business research, channelling Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) budget towards social entrepreneurship, and venture financing. Panellists also requested aspiring business persons to sharpen their competitiveness through the process of continuous learning and effective mobilization of resources.