Towards a professional govt

It is an endless debate in this context in the corporate world as to where lies the dividing line between the different stakeholders, more precisely in context of shareholders activism in executive realm in majority of the corporate. Yet, the pundits pronounce that the board of directors is where the supervision of the shareholders ends. Different mechanisms of the quarterly reviews and sub-committees such as the famous audit committee affording a closer look at executive functioning is where corporate governance draws the line between the shareholders and management.

An 8216;Alliance Coordination Council8217; is perhaps comparable to the shareholders supervisory board of directors, formalising an interface between the chairman, often the shareholder or his representative and the managing director, a chosen professional and other key functionaries like finance and marketing directors.

The advent of Dr Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister pursuant to Sonia Gandhi8217;s renunciation, gives rise to this grand opportunity. It throws up an interesting possibility in the context of coalition politics separating the role of shareholder here let us take Sonia Gandhi as representing Congress from that of a professional management, represented by the Prime Minister and his team.

What therefore follows from this is that the bosses of other coalition parties, be it DMK, SP, RJD or Left need to play similar roles; in that their top leaders, who are all seasoned politicians, have both age and experience on their side, should follow suit. The top functionary of each party should eschew any aspirations of being in the Government; play the same role as the Congress president. This simply means that they remain an active member of the Coordination Council. This council should really work to set, monitor, review and revise a concrete agenda 8212; the Common Minimum Programmed in this case.

Fortunately, the choice of the PM has fallen on a reluctant politician and a committed and proven professional; there cannot be a better time as even the President of the country himself has a similar background, minimising the areas of conflict, one really being the CEO and other being the constitutional head, working more like a visionary.

This also implies that the game of the formation of Cabinet should be like our selection of an executive team in a corporate; the shareholders should really handover a list of probables, with indications of who has liking for what and the formula of proportionate representation and balance should really be left to the captain. We do know that even in business joint ventures, much similar to coalitions, key positions like in finance, marketing, technology and marketing are preallotted and accordingly shared. The coordination committee should really have an intense review with the captain and his team on fixed-term basis; more like a bi-monthly programme. The coordination committee should be honest enough to record the points of view and differences and try to iron them out and indeed have among them leaders like Harkishen Singh Surjit who can act as arbitrators.

There can be no difficulty incharting out what the coordination council needs to look after and what is the agenda for the Government.

If this course is run properly, there are more chances of its succeeding than failing due the current scenario in state politics. By and large, the partners also have good and respectful say in most of the states 8212; they have dominant numbers or, should we say, they are aspiring to acquire in due course. Experience has shown that if a party actually delivers in a state, by and large, the voters reward and return it to power. Therefore dominance in state of the coalition partners should be seen as inbuilt cushion for any undue shocks that Centre politics can create and should be used very effectively.

Second, the important aspect in governance is the youth versus the old. And the issue of grooming the youngsters for leadership and succession. We are moving towards a scenario where the below-forty population is the going to be in majority. We have generation-next duly represented in the new Parliament, represented by educated, suave and smart youngsters. A dilemma many nations face and indeed, we also have in the past, of a leadership vaccum, of not having sufficient choices.

The seniors need to address this at two levels; the generation next should be deployed first at the party8217;s grassroots levels, to enthuse new thinking and methods, professionalise the political party8217;s organisation. Herein particular challenge is to those who have arisen due to their family. We have seen how failures decimate political organisations and how nothing succeeds like success. But both scenarios only highlight the fallibility of an organisation if it doesn8217;t have an institutionalised format. Although our parties are far away from these realities of need to professionalise, they all now have the taste of success and failures. There cannot be a better time to begin. A political party is serious and expensive business more than ever before and any party without a sustained programme will not be able to swing the voter.

The next area for the youth is to be the understudy in the government itself. We should ensure that design of government formation should allow for the experience and expertise to rub off on the youngsters. Capability, rather than lineage, should be encouraged; the Government system provides for the Minister of State or deputy ministers; those who prove to be performers should be encouraged with independent charge.

The current post-poll setting is the most ideal one to usher in a new era for governance. In 1975, we by default embraced a new but costly phenomenon of populism in politics. The current scenario promises to be a harbinger of plurality in levels of governance to strengthen our body polity. Be it the Congress, BJP or any of their allies, we do hope our leaders will not deny us the great opportunity.

Windlass is a leading technology and management professional and is currently chairman of MGRM Net Limited