Orissa as a Brand?

Lately I have been thinking about Orissa’s image (which I see it as Orissa’s Brand Image), compared to other states in India and as citizens of Orissa - our role & contribution in this process.

Fore more information on Orissa click this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orissa

Brand image/Brand equity is measured on how much its customers are aware of the product/brand. So, in this case, if we consider Orissa as a brand then we have to assess how much brand awareness/recognition/knowledge Orissa has among its customers (India and Rest of the World) and its competitors (other states of India).

Due to our poor economy (thanks to our politicians and their philanthropic nature!!!)…we have been pushed back 20 years – in terms of growth compared to other developed states in India. I am not here to talk about politicians and what have they done for our state, but here to talk about our soft points and where we come to picture to rescue/survive our states brand image. What we could have done and what we should do in the coming years to bring a difference in Orissa. Following are few points which I believe are the reasons why we are not witnessing strong sustainable promising growth. While bringing up the soft point, I would try to suggest few action items for us.

Not until mid nineties, we started to migrate outside Orissa in search of jobs (in a larger scale). Till then people were going outside Orissa, but the percentage of Oriya people working outside Orissa and India were relatively small. This might be for several reasons, one reason which I strongly believe is important to mention. In general Oriyas are not risk-takers, that is we are very much complacent in our little world and are happy in what we earn and lead our life. I do not say this is bad. Being happy with as little as you have is good, but at the same time makes us complacent, and we stop to thrive for more. Time is changing, and we are definitely coming out of the cocoon and spreading out to find more out of life. The good part of doing this is individual growth leading to the growth of the state.

The second reason is related to the first one. This is related to pursuing higher studies outside India. I do not mean to say that we do not have good education system inside India. But the benefit we get studying outside India (especially in USA & UK) is we not only enhance our subject knowledge but also helps to strengthen ourselves in the global map. If we want to look at any country or state which has witnessed growth in last 3-4 decades then that will be for two main reasons.
Either:

They ttracted lots of out-of-state or out-of-country talent inside the state/country (I could not think a better example than USA and Karnataka)
or
They went out and worked in other state/country and invested back in their state or country (no doubt Punjab and Gujarat are the tow eminent states who demonstrated this trend)

I was surprised to know that we do not have a GRE/GMAT coaching center in Orissa! Most of our engineering and science graduate wither do not know about GRE/GMAT or they do not know the importance of getting a degree from a college/university from USA. Again my aim here is not here to compare Indian university/study system with that of USA, but my aim is to give a reason why we should come out of Orissa for higher studies and then go back to Orissa with a knowledge that is hard to beat. And do not forget I want Orissa’s brand image to be spread in other countries. When we come out of Orissa and study outside then we mingle with people and spread the good word and our abilities among them. Rest of World will know our presence and abilities.

In last 8-9 years we have seen a linear increase in educational institutions in Orissa, which is a huge step towards brand recognition. The reason being if we have good educational institutions then we attract students from other states and countries. But when we compare this trend with Karnataka, we are nearly thirty years behind this educational revolution. So, even though we are in right track, we are way behind the developed states. We definitely need to do lots of hard work to succeed in this race for supremacy in talent. Now we have more than 20 Enginering Colleges and more than 5 Medical colleges in Orissa. Only one thing we need to watch is the quality of our education. With growth comes a chance of compromise in quality. So, all the Institution Heads and to some extend politicians to make sure that the quality of our education system is not diluted. Poor laboratory and teaching staffs may lead to this. Companies will come to a region where they can easily find quality talent pool. If we compromise in quality then we will create a situation where companies might go away to other place where they can find quality people.

So, the bottom line of my concern is going forward if we start behaving Orissa is our parent company, and we are here to create value for the company as employee or “Brand Ambassadors” then half of the battle is won. We should create a niche for Orissa in the Indian economy as well as Global economy. We have to constantly try to differentiate ourselves from others to have the competitive advantage in the talent race.

Open for comments.
-Sam