Aug 10, 2011

GDS Member Selections



Hi people !!

       Hope you enjoyed today's workshop. Tomorrow i.e on 11th August, 2011, we will be conducting interviews for inducting enthusiastic members into our club. Be there if you have a desire to learn and be a part of a fantastic, enthusaistic team ! Come with an open mind and remember, we dont expect you to have any prior knowledge of Game Theory, Finance, Consultancy ....

Date : 11th August, 2011
Time : Names A-M : 6pm - 8pm
          Names N-Z : 8pm - 10pm
Venue : EDP Room, Dept of Industrial Engg and Management

       See you all there tomorrow ! :)


Mar 22, 2011

Winning a rigged game - An interesting puzzle




          In a distant kingdom lived a king and his beautiful daughter. The daughter was in love with a peasant which the king strongly objects. However, he decided to show his fairness.


          He gave the peasant a chance. He said he will let the peasant draw from 2 slips of paper, one of which has the word MARRIAGE written and the word DEATH on the other. The peasant agreed. On the way to the castle, the peasant over-heard the king and his knight talking.

Knight: “Sire, how can you let someone like him have the chance to marry the princess?”

King: “Don’t worry, I have written the word DEATH on both the papers

Being a clever boy, the peasant found a way and later that day, married the princess. What did he do ? (Note : He cant lie and he cant change the slips in any way)


Can you figure out the answer ????

Happy solving :)
Cheers !

P.S : Please DON'T post your solutions as comments on this post. Mail them to me at  harshgupta1987@gmail.com. I will post the solution on the blog after 1 week.

Mar 12, 2011

The How What and Why of Indian Growth

THE HOW WHAT AND WHY OF INDIAN GROWTH


Have you ever wondered why all the fuss is created around India as a major super power .As India keeps on the persistent pursuit for a permanent seat in the UN security council while the countries of Germany , Japan looks on. The aura that brand India” has created over the years has been backed by phenomenal and unprecedented growth rates and industrial development .Lets see what the facts have to say .

India is the best place for budding entrepreneurs, as stated by the global services location index by AT Kearney. India has been the best place to start a business for some years now and the experts belief that it will continue to be the same for the years to come .India’s foreign reserves stands at US $300 billions. This crude cash helped to survive the bitter recession that brought down major company to the blink of a bankruptcy. This crude cash helped India still put on 9% growth rate when countries and their shares where falling like dominos. India has also of late displaced USA as the second most favoured nation for (FDI) Foreign Direct Investment after China. If you still don’t find statistics staggering check this out, poised at a phenomenal growth of 500 per cent, the Indian insurance industry is expected to reach US$ 80 billion in the next four years. India adds about 10 million phone subscriber every month and the total subscriber stands at 755 millions, making it the second largest user of cellular service and the third largest user of Internet.

India has one of the largest road networks in the world, aggregating 3.34 million kilometersIndian ports handled cargo of around 570 million tonnes, the passenger traffic rose by 25-30 per cent and is expected to grow by 25 per cent year-on-year over the next five years. While international and domestic air traffic grew by 35 per cent, cargo witnessed a 12 per cent growth. India is the Sixth largest crude consumer in the world it is also the Ninth largest crude importer in the world. India has the sixth largest refining capacity - 2.56 million barrels per day representing 2.99 per cent of world capacity .Estimated to be a US$ 350 billion industry, the Indian retail sector is growing at a growth rate of 47%.The travel and tourism sector in India is generated a total demand of US$ 55,544.5 million of economic activity accounting for nearly 5.3 per cent of GDP and 5.4 per cent of total employment. International Iron and Steel Institute (IISI) has ranked India as the seventh largest steel producer in the world with an overall production of about 40 million tonnes in 2006.India exports US$ 6 billion worth of garments. India is the largest consumer of gold jewellery in the world and accounts for about 20 per cent of world consumption. India is the largest diamond cutting and polishing centre in the world. India is the second largest producer of rice and wheat in the world; one of the largest producers of sugar, sugarcane, peanuts, jute, tea and an assortment of spices. The Indian pharmaceutical industry, consistently growing at 9.5 per cent in the last 5 years, a zip at 13.6 per cent between 2007 and 2010 has made the market size of US$ 9.48 billion in 2010 from its present level of about US$ 6.2 billion. Healthcare delivery is one of the largest service-sector industries in India. The country will spend US$ 45.76 billion on healthcare in the next five years.

Astonishing! WOW! These were only some of the underlined facts that have made India a pioneer of world economy as it slowly and steadily climbs the ladder for world supremacy .But the way ahead is not as simple as it seems. With the “Dragon” as hot as never before India’s first major challenge is perhaps the toughest. However we should never forget the might of the US, the current state of India is same as that of USA during 1960. India will have to rise at the same rate for 50 more years and US has to remain static, for India to be at par with the USA.

:-ABHINAV YASHKAR

Mar 6, 2011

The King's test of intelligence






           Once there was a king who wanted to find out how intelligent his 3 chief advisors (AD1, AD2, AD3) were. So he called them and started a game with them. He wrote a number on the back of each of the advisors and asked them to guess what number was written on their own back. 

           The rules of the game are :
  • The advisors have no way of seeing the number written on their own back.
  • They can see the numbers written on the other advisors' backs.
  • No communication is allowed between the advisors.
  • All the three numbers are integers and are greater than or equal to 40
  • AD1, AD2, AD3 have integers which are in strictly increasing order.

      Five minutes after telling them about the rules, the king asked all the advisors whether they knew what number was written on their back. All of them replied "I don't know".
       After five more minutes, the king asked the same question again. This time AD1 and AD2 replied "I know" but AD3 still replied "I don't know".
        After five more minutes, the king repeated his question. This time, all of the advisors replied "I know".


        Are YOU intelligent enough to figure out what were the numbers written on the back of each of the advisors ?

Happy solving :)
Cheers !


P.S : Please DON'T post your solutions as comments on this post. Mail them to me at : harshgupta1987@gmail.com. I will post the solution on the blog after 1 week.


Feb 25, 2011

ACING THE CASE



Winning a case competition is a quite difficult task. The line between success and failure is often thin. In this article we bring the views of Shahzeb Irshad, a freelance writer on acing the case.

Acing the case: how to be successful in case competitions

You’ll be surprised by what you hear when I say that “anyone can ace a business case competition”. Its no wonder why business case competitions are becoming popular by the day. Apart from the monetary motive amassing $50000 to $100,000 per competition, participants gain experience and a chance to meet successful entrepreneurs.

When you talk about “acing” a case competition, you’re not talking about the winner’s business acumen, you’re talking about their ability to grasp the core of the problem and present a viable solution to it while being creative. The one thing you need to know about running a successful business or presenting an idea is the selfish nature of human beings. People won’t come to you or spend money on your business unless you provide them with value for their money. This value can either be in the form of intangible or tangible articles. Keeping this idea in mind, whenever you are presented with a case problem, write the problem on a piece of paper and brainstorm ten different solutions (no matter how they crazy seem at first). It doesn’t matter if you found the optimum solution in the first try. Then list the merits and demerits of each solution and you might be surprised of the outcome. Suddenly an answer might seem more appealing which at first sounded crazy. This is one of the many mistakes students make during these competitions.

Whenever you are stuck with an idea that you can’t grasp for a case, stop thinking of yourself as a vendor and start thinking as a customer. This technique would be sure to bring you a LOT of ideas keeping in mind the selfish nature of human beings. When you are done with your idea and have finalized it, its time to elaborate each part of the plan in the initial report so as to make a clean first impression. The last stage is presenting the idea. It has to be presented in such a way that the audience may feel acquainted with the idea before the presentation is over.

In a business case, much time and effort is often spent on designing a sustainable business model. From my experience, the most crucial catch in a case competition is the value of return on capital. This figure is there for you to know the level of competition that you’re up against. Generally there is an easy solution for all cases like this, called the “linkage” model. It states that ideas in case competitions are more effective if you link them between various projects in a single case. Quite simply put, different entrepreneurial projects in a case may be started by using the profits from a single venture simultaneously e.g. a chain of small restaurants which only require capital from the revenue generated by the first restaurant. This practice entails a prosperous trade environment as there is never a shortage for capital or investment for the projects.

I hope these tips help you to ace case competitions as they have helped me.

Feb 16, 2011

From Zero to Six figures in 2 years ...

Hey friends,


Here's an interesting entrepreneurial story.Its a story of Nirav Mehta, founder of AppsMagnet, a Mumbai based startup. Nirav has been through a typical ups and down of entrepreneurial life – he was asked to resign from a company he started 11 years ago, scratched his own itch, launched couple of products, a lot of them failed and here he is – a six figure $$ revenue in 2 years. Here his success story through his own lips...

Happy watching !
Cheers !





Feb 9, 2011

The Mystery Of Pricing ...


* This article was taken from pluggd.in
What is Price? How is it determined?
Solve the mystery if you can, with the following clues:

P = Perception

When the ‘Zodiac Grill’ – a very sophisticated restaurant launched at the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai, the menu did not have prices. Guests were free to order what they wanted, and then leave behind a price for the meal as they deemed fit. There were no eyebrows raised if guests left behind $1 as long as they thought that was the value of the meal they had enjoyed.
As it turned out, The Zodiac Grill received more revenue for meals served than they had estimated. Guests had enjoyed the ambience, the food and the service and had rewarded the restaurant with a price based on their ‘perception’ rather than what would have been printed on the menu.
The Zodiac Grill today has a fully priced menu and the launch experiment helped the hotel management tremendously to ‘price’ the service appropriately.
I see an interesting pricing model being followed by the digital enthusiasts who make free ‘plug-ins’ for large publishing platforms like WordPress.org. Subscribers of the wordpress.org platform are free to download all these fantastic plug-ins and then are prompted to ‘donate’ a few dollars to the developers if they feel like it. I am sure that the sum of donations received, generates more money for the developers than they would have earned if they were to price each plug in.
If you are a new start up or a business entrepreneur, try and gauge the prices of your product and services based on what your customers perceive it to be worth. It may be the best way to discover your true value.

R – Revenue Build

Many businesses I know have certain revenue targets in their business plans. They aspire to be say a $10 million Topline Company by the 3rd year of starting up. Pricing then begins to work backwards and they price their products and services accordingly.
Is this the way to build and price your services? I have a contrarian point of view. This approach may damage the value creation.
For the sake of giving an example, let’s assume that you have a Magical Goose that will start laying eggs very soon.
  • If you decide to sell the eggs even before they are laid to discover later that your Goose is slower than normal in laying eggs, you may land up killing the Goose while trying to force it to lay eggs. To illustrate, MySpace was spoilt early on by Google when they received guaranteed revenue commitments from Google who exclusively took over selling ads on MySpace. Past the first year, Google figured that this was a loss making deal for them (they made less revenue from MySpace ads than what they had guaranteed to pay MySpace) and did not renew their agreement. But by then, MySpace had got addicted to ‘revenue’ toplines and went ahead and ruined their site by spraying ugly ads all over the site and aggressively selling them. MySpace, as I remember looked like a website that had only ugly ad hoardings all over and this quickly drove away lots of their users. The lure of only generating revenue ruined MySpace forever.
  • On the other hand, if you determine the price of eggs before they are laid, you may land up selling ‘golden’ eggs at the price of ‘normal’ eggs. Facebook managed this beautifully – they took their own sweet time to just to understand their ‘Magical Goose’ and what it was really going to be valuable for. It’s amazing to see how slowly and elegantly they have sold ads (so they priced their golden eggs appropriately) and more so, introduced non obtrusive revenue streams like ‘facebook credits’ – a la creating value from the feathers of the Magical goose in addition to the eggs it lays!
Revenues are important but should not become the death noose of your business as it begins to rev up.

I – Insights

What do people pay for? If you can really examine the finer detail of what consumers really want to reward you for, then pricing can really be made to work for you in a far more profitable way than you could imagine.
Examples are aplenty. It’s well known that kids buy McDonalds ‘happy’ meals for the toys, and more often then not, their parents then eat the ‘happy’ meals. In India, brands splurge on MTV just for the association with an iconic youth channel more than the actual media reach it delivers. Chinese customers are happy to pay much more for a Gucci bag made in Italy than an identical Gucci bag made in Korea. So, in the case of McDonalds, MTV & Gucci, beyond their core offering, it’s intangible value drivers based on their consumer insights that is also being aggressively priced.
When we sell ‘Advergames’ (branded games), we calculate the time spent by consumers playing the game and hence interacting with the brand. So assume that 200,000 unique players play a brand game for 3 minutes, we have delivered 600,000 minutes of engagement to the brand. Next, we compare how expensive buying 600,000 advertising minutes would be on television and then price our offering very competitively. In this case we have an insight about how our customers (brand owners) VALUE media – not by impressions but by engagement.
Insight – ‘Advergames’ deliver engagement not impressions
When I made socks in my father’s Company, I began walking around in European Clothing stores to discover what kind of socks I should be selling to them. During this process, I stumbled upon an amazing insight – the price of Baby Socks for new borns (as young as 3 months) were the same as the price of Men’s socks as large as shoe size 12! When I dived deeper, I realized that it was mothers who buy socks and they were equally attached emotionally to their newborn child as they were to their husbands and hence didn’t differentiate the price of baby socks vs. men’s socks. Now, baby socks weigh 10% of Men’s socks and hence are 90% more profitable to make. We started our export business making Baby Socks!
Try and go beyond the obvious reasons why consumers are buying your products and services. The real price you can charge them may be hidden in that insight.

C – Costs

You cannot escape measuring costs and then making sure that it’s more than covered for when you start pricing your goods and services. But wouldn’t that make a business just another usual small time business?
If Zynga – the Company behind Cityville and Farmville would have added its costs of servers and salaries and then divided it by the number of players it served, it would have logically priced the game service as a monthly subscription. Instead, they offered all their games as free to play and sold only in-game virtual items. In the a few months, millions of gamers bought virtual gifts for their friends (beer on Poker tables) and pink tractors for their farms! They compensated Zynga multiple times over to what they could have otherwise paid for as a monthly service.
To drive home this point – when you buy seeds in Farmville, you pay for a virtual item that is nothing but an image on your screen. You pay for the electricity to fire up that image on your screen and even for your Internet broadband connection to play Farmville. For Zynga, the money of the Pink Tractor has almost no cost and is an almost hundred percent profit!
So understand costs, but don’t adopt ‘only’ the costs plus formulae to make money. You may well be missing the Pink Tractor hidden in the mud.

E – Endearment

I think this is the most amazing dimension of Pricing. Apple for instance has mastered ‘endearment’ pricing. Consumers like me just have to buy Apple products the moment they become available because I simply LOVE Apple. When my Macbook costs 100% more than a similar laptop, I don’t even think twice before buying it. If an iPad costs $499, it costs $499. I don’t go out and look for comparisons and then decide to buy it or not. The same applies to Fashion brands and the likes. For example, why do you pay $1499 for a black Armani Jacket when you could buy a very similar looking Jacket from Gap at $199?
I don’t think consumers compare prices of brands they are attached to and just pay what they are asked to. As we all know, when you are in love, ‘price’ comes second.
If you can make your consumers fall head over heels and blindly in love with you then you can charge them anything. That’s the ultimate nirvana of Pricing.

Feb 8, 2011

A puzzle to give you a heads up!


There is a table on which a number of coins are placed. You also know that there are as many coins with Head up as many coins with Tail up. Now you have to divide the coins (number of coins is even) into two equal piles such that number of coins with Heads up and Tails up in either piles be the same. The catch is you are blind folded and you cannot determine the sides (for sure) if you are blinded.

Feb 5, 2011

Blue Eyed Boys



The Problem Statement for the Blue Eyed Boys Problem goes as follows :

There are 1000 people on an island. They have either a pair of blue eyes or black eyes. There is atleast one blue eyed and one black eyed person on the island. They have no way of seeing their own eyes, but can see everyone else’s eyes. No one can communicate with anyone else. Anyone who comes to know that they have blue eyes commits suicide.
One day a blue-eyed stranger comes to the island and unknowingly says that “ I’m glad that atleast someone else has blue eyes “. After some days, all the blue eyed persons commit suicide (not necessarily together). Can you explain how ???


Mail your solutions to : harshgupta1987@gmail.com
Please do not post solutions on the blog as comments. Allow the others to try as well.

Happy solving !
Cheers !

Feb 2, 2011

Bitzua and Chutzpah

Wonder what the weird title of this post is about? Is it some kind of Hebrew stuff no one is supposed to have a clue about?

Well it is Hebrew. LITERALLY. I found these words when one of my friends shared this Economic Times article by R. Gopalakrishnan at our GDS Group. I was too "busy" to read the article the first time I came across it.(I did read it later on.) But I liked the way the words looked or rather sounded. After searching on the net I found out 'Chutzpah' is pronounced like "Hootzpah". And I hope "bitzua" should be pronounced somewhat like "bitzooah". I would like to pronounce it that way because I like the sound of it. I have this romance with the way some words sound to my ears. But that is not the only reason I am writing this post. These words are nowhere near romanticism.

I went out to look for their meanings. When I looked for "Chutzpah" I found something like "gall, brazen nerve, effrontery, incredible 'guts,'......" in some source. But I found this example on the right which really made the meaning crystal clear to me. Imagine some man killing his parents and demanding mercy from the court because he is an orphan! This word is used both positively and negatively. But more importantly somebody with chutzpah is a person who does not give a damn about existing norms and takes up challenges however darn difficult they possibly might be. Somebody who can go against the tide and have the audacity to challenge a GOLIATH. Israelis have this habit of praising daring people because I believe such arrogance, aggression and daring attitude has helped the country survive amidst hostile neighbors. Words conveying the same sense in other languages are difficult to find.

Bitzua is a much simpler yet a very important word. It signifies implementation or putting into effect. I was reading this book by Barry J. Moltz "You need to be a little crazy", which talks about implementation in the light of starting and growing a business. He calls people who start businesses crazy because they have a statistically very low probability of surviving. I definitely think it requires chutzpah to survive the debacles a business throws at you. Starting a business can be very different from ensuring its survival and implementing all its plans. That might require the CEO of the company to clean his own toilets or carry his own mail sometimes. And sometimes businesses fail because of trivial defects in implementation. The cashflow in your business might dry up just because your customers are taking more time to pay you!! Or what if you do not have any customers who trust you? Would any amount of strategic thinking or path breaking ideas help? Barry emphasizes on bringing the right people inside your business, which is far more important than the idea that started the business. Because they are the people who can implement your ideas and strategies and mold them according to the scenarios your business is exposed to. "Bitzua" sounded like "business" to me even before I came to know about its meaning. Now I am not surprised.

GDS is organizing a workshop at V4, Vikramshila, IIT Kharagpur for enthusiasts in finance, game theory, business strategies and consulting on 4th February,2011 at 6 pm. Hope we come across more people who have the bitzua and chutzpah to help GDS grow, challenge existing notions and deliver a strong impact. People who are not afraid to ask questions and look at threats as opportunities. We would love to bring them within the folds of our organization.

Jan 21, 2011

Business Strategies



Business strategy describes how a particular business intends to succeed in a chosen market place against its competitor. Intelligent business strategies are the cornerstone of successful business venture. It can be reason for small players in the market giving bigger players a run for their money. It represents the best attempt that the management can make at defining and securing the future of that business.
Business strategies are broadly classifier under three categories – Prospector Strategy, Defender Strategy and Analyser Strategy. Each strategy, if implemented effectively, making use of all favourable external factors, can make for an industry leader company. Additionally, each business strategy focuses in on a select segment of the market; therefore it is possible for two competitors in the same industry to be equally successful if they are using different business strategies to target different segments of the market.
Prospector strategy
This is the most aggressive of all strategies. It involves active programs to expand into new markets and stimulate new opportunities. New product development is vigorously pursued and attacks on competitors are a common way of obtaining additional market share. They respond quickly to any signs of market opportunity, and do so with little research or analysis. A large proportion of their revenue comes from new products or new markets. They are often highly leveraged, sometimes with a substantial equity position held by venture capitalists. The risk of product failure or market rejection is equally high. Their market domain is constantly in flux as new opportunities arise and past product offerings atrophy. They value being the first in an industry, as that their “first mover advantage” will provide them with premium pricing opportunities and high margins. Price skimming is a common way of recapturing the cost of development. They can be opportunistic in headhunting key employees, both technical and managerial. Advertising, sales promotion, and personal selling costs are a high percentage of sales. Typically the firm will be structured with each strategic business unit having considerable autonomy. The industry that they operate in tends to be in the introduction or growth stage of its life cycle with few competitors and evolving technology
Defender strategy
This strategy entails a decision not to aggressively pursue markets. As a result, they tend to do none of the things prospectors do. A defender strategy entails finding, and maintaining a secure and relatively stable market. Rather than being on the cutting edge of technological innovation, product development, and market dynamics, a defender tries to insulate themselves from changes wherever possible. In their attempt to secure this stable market they either keep prices low, keep advertising and other promotional costs low, engage in vertical integration, offer a limited range of products or offer better quality or service. They tend to be slower in making decisions and will only commit to a change after extensive research and analysis. Their goals tend to be efficiency oriented rather than effectiveness oriented. The industry tends to be mature with well-defined technology, products, and market segments. Most sales tend to be repeat or replacement purchases. Individual strategic business units typically have moderate to low levels of autonomy.
Analyser strategy
The analyser is in between the defender and prospector. They take less risk and make fewer mistakes than a prospector, but are less committed to stability than defenders. Most firms are analysers. They are seldom a first mover in an industry but are often second or third place entrants. They tend to expand into areas close to their existing core competency. Rather than develop wholly new products, they make incremental improvements in existing products. Rather than expand into wholly new markets, they gradually expand existing markets. They try to maintain a balanced portfolio of products with some stable income generators and some potential winners. They watch closely the developments in their industry but don’t act until they are sure that the time is right.
In my next post on Business Strategies, I will be writing over how some companies leverage with their unique position to create market niche around themselves.

WHO MOVED MY CHEESE???




The story of Who Moved My Cheese? was created by Dr. Spencer Johnson to help him deal with difficult change in his life. It showed him how to take his changing situation seriously but not take himself so seriously. This is a story about change that takes place in a maze where four amusing characters look for cheese. Cheese being a metaphor for what you want in life. Each of us has our own idea of cheese and we pursue it because we believe it makes us happy. The maze in the story represents where you spend time looking for what you want.

Characters:
Sniff (mouse): Who sniffs out change early.
Scurry (mouse): Who scurries into action.
Hem (little person): Who denies and resists change as he believes it will lead to something worse.
Haw (little person): Who learns to adapt in time when he sees change can lead to something better.

Living in constant white water with changes occurring all the time at work or in life can be stressful, unless people have a way of looking at change that helps them understand it .In the story we see two mice do better when they are faced with change, while the two littlepeople’s complex brains and human emotions complicate things. It is not that mice are smarter. We all know people are more intelligent than mice. Everyone knows that not all change is good or even necessary. But in a world that is constantly changing, it is to our advantage to learn how to change and enjoy something better. Move with the cheese!

Once long ago in a land far away, there were four little characters who ran through a maze looking for cheese to nourish them and make them happy. As different as mice and little people were they shared one thing in common: every morning they put on their jogging suits, running shoes, left their little homes and raced out into the maze looking for their favourite cheese. The maze was a labyrinth of corridors and chambers, some containing delicious cheese. But there were also dark corners and blind alleys leading nowhere. It was an easy place for anyone to get lost. However, for those who found their way the maze held secrets that let them enjoy a better life.

The mice Sniff and Scurry used the simple trial and error method of finding the cheese. They often got lost and bumped into walls. But after a while, they found their way. For Hem and Haw their powerful human beliefs and emotions took over and clouded the way they looked at things. It made life in the maze much more complicated and challenging. One day all four of them discovered in their own way, what they were looking for, at the end of one of the corridors in cheese station C.
Every morning the four of them raced to the cheese station and enjoyed the cheese. Sniff and Scurry woke up early every morning and when they reached their destination, they took off their running shoes and hung them around their neck-so they could get them quickly when they needed them again. The little people woke up a little later each day to go to the cheese station. After all they knew where the cheese was and how to get there. They wrote on the wall: Having cheese makes you happy!

After a while the little people’s confidence grew into arrogance of success. Soon they became so comfortable that they didn’t even notice what was happening. But Sniff and Scurry continued their routine and inspected the area every day to see if there were any changes. One morning they noticed that the cheese was missing. But the mice were not surprised as they noticed that the cheese had been getting smaller each day. They knew exactly what to do. They put on their running shoes that hung conveniently around their necks and were quicly off in search of new cheese. They didn’t over analyse things. The situation in cheese station C has changed so they decided to change. Later the same day the little people found the cheese missing. They were unprepared for what they saw. Hem screamed at the top his voice that it was not fair. They didn’t want to deal with what they were facing. Their behaviour was not attractive or productive but it is understandable. Getting cheese wasn’t easy. It meant a great deal to the little people. It was their way of getting what they thought would make them happy.

That night before going home hungry and discouraged Haw wrote on the wall: The more important your cheese is to you the more you want to hold on to it!
Next day Hem and Haw returned to Cheese Station C and found no cheese. Haw shut his eyes tightly and didn’t want to know that the cheese disappeared gradually. He wanted to believe that it disappeared all of a sudden. He wondered where Sniff and Scurry were. But Hem believed that they were smarter than the mice and that they should be able to figure this out. While they were still trying to decide what to do Sniff and Scurry went farther down the maze looking for cheese in every station they found. They didn’t think of anything else but finding cheese. They didn’t find anything for sometime until they finally went into an area of the maze they had never been before: Cheese Station N. They could hardly believe their eyes. It was the largest store of cheese they had ever seen.

While Hem and Haw were becoming frustrated and angry and were blaming each other for the situation they were in. They continued to go to the same cheese station. They tried to deny what was happening, but found it harder to get to sleep, had less energy each day and were becoming irritable. Hem suggested that if they worked harder they will find that nothing has actually changed and that they might find the cheese somewhere nearby. Next day with a chisel and a hammer they made holes in the wall of the station and peered inside but found nothing. Haw was beginning to understand the difference between activity and productivity. But Hem believed that sooner or later the cheese will be back. Haw realised they were losing their edge. He started laughing at himself for doing the same thing every day and expecting different results. It took him a long time to find his running shoes as they put everything away on finding cheese station C as they thought they would never need them again. Haw tried to convince Hem that it was time they move on and change themselves. But Hem didn’t agree. Haw prepared to leave and announced “It’s Maze time!” Hem didn’t laugh or respond. Haw wrote on the wall: If you don’t change, you can become extinct.

Haw thought about he’d gotten himself into this cheeseless situation. He knew Hem was wondering, “Who moved my cheese?” but Haw was wondering, “Why didn’t I get up and move with the Cheese, sooner?” Haw became more anxious and wondered if he really wanted to go out into the Maze. He wrote on the wall: What Would You Do If You Weren’t Afraid?

Sometimes some fear can be good. But it is not good when you are so afraid that it keeps you from doing anything. He looked to his right, to the part of the Maze where he had never been, and felt the fear. He hadn’t had any Cheese for so long that he was now weak. It took him longer and it was more painful than usual to get through the Maze.

He decided that if he ever got the chance again, he would get out of his comfort zone and adapt to change sooner. It would make things easier.
Then, Haw smiled a weak smile as he thought, “Better late than never.”
During the next several days, Haw found a little Cheese here and there, but nothing that lasted very long. Things seemed to have changed since the last time he was out here. But he was taking control, rather than simply letting things happen to him. Later, as Haw looked back on things, he realized that the Cheese at Cheese Station C had not just disappeared overnight, as he had once believed. He had to admit however, that it he had wanted to, he probably could have seen what was coming. But he didn’t. He decided he would stay more alert from now on. He would expect change to happen and look for it. He would trust his basic instincts to sense when change was going to occur and be ready to adapt to it. He wrote on the wall: Smell The Cheese Often So You Know When It Is Getting Old.

Haw finally came across a huge Cheese Station, which looked promising. But he was disappointed to discover that it was empty. “This empty feeling has happened to me too often,” he thought. He felt like giving up.But he wrote on the wall: Movement In A New Direction Helps You Find New Cheese and moved on. It was a marking for his friend Hem, hopefully, to follow.

Haw looked down the dark passageway and was aware of his fear. Then he laughed at himself. He was letting go and trusting what lay ahead for him, even though he did not know exactly what it was. To his surprise, Haw started to enjoy himself more and more. “Why do I feel so good?” he wondered. “I don’t have any cheese and I don’t know where I am going.”He stooped and wrote on the wall: When you stop being afraid you feel good.

He to make things even better he saw himself in great realistic detail, sitting in the middle of a pile of all his favourite cheeses. The more clearly he saw the image of himself enjoying New Cheese, the more real and believable it became. He could sense that he was going to find it. He wrote: Imagining Yourself Enjoying Your New Cheese Leads You To It.

Haw kept thinking about what he could gain instead of what he was losing. He realized that change could head to something better. Then he raced through the Maze with greater strength and agility. Before long he spotted a Cheese Station and became excited as he noticed little pieces of New Cheese near the entrance. He realized that if he had moved sooner, he would very likely have found a good deal of New Cheese here. He wrote: The Quicker You Let Go Of Old Cheese, The Sooner You Find New Cheese.
Haw made his way back to Cheese Station C and found Hem. He offered Hem bits of New Cheese, but was turned down. Haw just shook his head in disappointment and reluctantly went back out on his own. He was happy when he wasn’t being run by his fear. He liked what he was doing now. Now he felt that it was just a question of time before he found what he needed. He realized: It Is Safer To Search In The Maze, Than Remain In a Cheeseless Situation. The fear you let build up in your mind is worse than the situation that actually exists. Now he realized it was natural for change to continually occur, whether you expect it or not. Change could surprise you only if you didn’t expect it and weren’t looking for it. He wrote: Old Beliefs Do Not Lead You To New Cheese. He was behaving differently than when he kept returning to the same cheeseless station. He knew that when you change what you believe, you change what you do. He wrote: When You See That You Can Find And Enjoy New Cheese, You Change Course.

He also wrote: Noticing Small Changes Early Helps You Adapt To Bigger Changes That Are To Come. When it seemed like he had been in the maze forever, his journey- at least this part of his journey-end quickly and happily. Haw proceeded along a corridor that was new to him, rounded a corner, and found new cheese station N. Piled high everywhere was the greatest supply of cheese he had ever seen. He realized that fastest way to change is to laugh at your folly-then you can let go and quickly move on. Haw had also used his wonderful brain to do what Littlepeople do better than mice. He envisioned himself – in realistic detail finding something better – much better. He reflected on the mistakes he had made in the past and used them to plan for his future. He knew that you could learn to deal with change. He realized that there is always New Cheese out there whether you recognize it at the time, or not. And that you are rewarded with it when you go past your fear and enjoy the adventure. But Hem still had to see the advantage of changing himself.


Haw went over and wrote down a summary of what he had learned on the largest wall of Cheese Station N.
Change Happens
They Keep Moving The Cheese
Anticipate Change
Get Ready For The Cheese To Move
Monitor Change
Smell The Cheese Often So You Know When It Is Getting Old
Adapt To Change Quickly
The Quicker You Let Go Of Old Cheese, The Sooner You Can Enjoy New Cheese
Change
Move With The Cheese
Enjoy Change!
Savor The Adventure And Enjoy The Taste Of New Cheese!
Be Ready To Change Quickly And Enjoy It Again & Again
They Keep Moving The Cheese

While Haw still had a great supply of Cheese, he often went out into the Maze and explored new areas to stay in touch with what was happening around him. He knew it was safer to be aware of his real choices than to isolate himself in his comfort zone. He hoped and said a little prayer wishing his friend Hem might finally realize the importance of change.

Move With The Cheese And Enjoy It!
The end.......
Or is it a new beginning???