Jugaadis increasingly accepted as a management technique[2][3] and is recognized all over the world as a form of frugal engineering.[4] Companies in Southeast Asia are adopting jugaad as a practice to reduce research and development costs.[5] Jugaad also applies to any kind of creative and out-of-the-box thinking or life hacks that maximize resources for a company and its stakeholders.
According to author and professor Jaideep Prabhu, jugaad is an "important way out of the current economic crisis in developed economies and also holds important lessons for emerging economies".[6]
It is pronounced as jugaad or jugaadh in Hindi, while in Punjabi and Urdu it is pronounced as jugaar, with a hard "R" sound that can be misunderstood by non-native speakers as jugaad.
One type of jugaad is a quadricycle, a vehicle made of wooden planks and old SUV parts, variously known as kuddukka and peter rehra in North India. However, jugaad could be used as a term for any low cost vehicle which typically costs around Rs. 50,000 (about US$800).[8] Jugaads are powered by diesel engines originally intended to power agricultural irrigation pumps. They are known for poor brakes, and cannot go faster than about 60 km/h (37 mph). The vehicle often carries more than 20 people at a time in remote locations and poor road conditions.
Though no statistical data is available, it is reported that there are a number of instances of failing brakes, requiring a passenger to jump off and manually apply a wooden block as a brake. As part of research for his 2013 book, Innovation and a Global Knowledge Economy in India, Thomas Birtchnell, a lecturer of Sustainable Communities at University of Wollongong, Australia, found that of 2,139 cases of road traffic casualties in 72 hours at J N Medical College hospital in Aligarh, 13.88% of pedestrian casualties were due to jugaad. It was stated by Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways Pon Radhakrishnan that jugaads do not conform to the specifications of a Motor Vehicle under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988.[9] These vehicles hence do not have any vehicle registration plate and they are not registered with the Regional Transport Office (RTO). Hence, no road tax is paid on them, neither there exists any official count of such vehicles.
Jugaads are not officially recognized as road-worthy, and despite a few proposals to regulate them, vote-bank politics have trumped safety concerns. The improvised vehicles have now become rather popular as a means to transport all manner of burdens, from lumber to steel rods to school children.[10] For safety reasons the Government of India has officially banned jugaad vehicles.[11]
Another type of jugaad called bike-rehra or motorcycle-rehri, a motorcycle, moped or scooter modified into motorized trikes are used in the Punjab province of India and its neighboring states.[12][13]
Another type of jugaad called phat-phatri rickshaw or phatphatiya rickshaw, WWII-era Harley Davidson motorcycles modified into motorized trikes which were earlier used in New Delhi.[14]
The variant of jugaad in Pakistan is a motorcycle made into a motorized trike called chand-gari meaning "moon vehicle" or chingchee after the Chinese company Jinan Qingqi Co. LTD who first introduced these to the market.[19]
Jugaad is a Hindi word meaning an innovative fix or an improvised solution born from ingenuity. Jugaad is the gutsy art of spotting opportunities in the most adverse circumstances and resourcefully improvising solutions using simple means. Jugaad is about seeing the glass always half-full. Almost all Indians practice jugaad to make the most of what they have.
All the jugaad innovators we studied in India and other emerging markets not only demonstrate great resilience, but also excel at building and nurturing partner ecosystems. They actively engage partners to co-create greater value for society. Specifically, jugaad innovators leverage partner networks to:
In a business context, jugaad is a "frugal, flexible, and inclusive approach to problem solving and innovation." So says Professor Jaideep Prabhu, author of Jugaad Innovation: Think Frugal, Be Flexible, Generate Breakthrough Growth.
In the West, with the global economy set for a long period of austerity, jugaad is a welcome item on boardroom agendas. "Jugaad is a clever, unconventional, quick way to solve a problem," says Wido Menhardt, CEO of the Philips Innovation Center in Bangalore. "It is always out-of-the-box, and it is typically very focused. These are exactly the kinds of innovations Philips needs to develop products for emerging markets, but ultimately also for increasingly competitive developed markets."
So how is Philips using jugaad? "We challenge ourselves with seemingly unattainable goals in cost, delivery time, or function, and as we focus intensely on that goal, it forces us to come up with unconventional solutions," explains Menhardt. "Often, these seem impossible or unrealistic at first, but they can lead to incredible and disruptive solutions."
But isn't jugaad just another iteration of the various agile methodologies already doing the rounds? No, says Menhardt: "Agile or lean are process frameworks, whereas jugaad is void of process," he argues. "Jugaad is a culture, an attitude, an outcome of circumstance, but definitely not something planned. The challenge is to tap into it and channel it."
"The formalization and industrialization of R&D created a split between technologists and marketers," Prabhu says. "But if jugaad tells us anything, it is the centrality of understanding consumer needs and then working back - even if that's as simple as deciding the price that people can afford. The consumer is front and center here, and marketers are central to driving the jugaad innovation process in the organization."
"You can't import jugaad into your organization and then just carry on as if it's business as usual," says Prabhu. "It's about employing people who have a jugaad mindset, then increasing the empowerment of small teams at every level of the organization, consistent with bottom-up innovation. There has to be a certain element of craziness, uncertainty, and space for serendipitous learning. Too much process will kill that creative spark." Or, as Intel founder Andy Groves once put it: "Let chaos reign, then rein in chaos."
The Mitticool, an idea born out of adverse circumstances, shows howa resilient mindset can transform scarcity into opportunity. Combininglimited resources and a never-say-die attitude, Prajapati tapped into hisempathy and passion for his fellow community members to conjure upan ingenious solution that improved lives in Gujarat and beyond. Notonly did he produce a cheap and effective cooling device, but he alsocreated jobs for dozens of undereducated women. In doing so, Prajapatiis both driving environmental and socioeconomic sustainability in hiscommunity and ensuring the financial sustainability of his own business.Prajapati embodies the true spirit of jugaad.
In this book, we delve into the frugal and flexible mindset ofthousands of ingenious entrepreneurs and enterprises practicing jugaadto creatively address critical socioeconomic issues in their communities.Jugaad innovators like Mansukh Prajapati view severe constraints,such as a lack of electricity, not as a debilitating challenge but as anopportunity to innovate and overcome these very constraints.
The extreme conditions that make jugaad innovation worthwhile have typically been more prevalent in emerging markets such as India, China, and Brazil than in the United States or Europe. But in recent years, developed economies have begun to exhibit many of the same aspects of scarcity, diversity, unpredictability, and interconnectivity, making these principles relevant to companies around the world.
Jugaad is a concept that taps into current trends around crafting and thrifting in everyday life. But as the Indian economy grows with an emphasis on innovation, there has been a resurgence of interest in the idea of jugaad. Rina Arya (University of Huddersfield) argues why a broader view of the concept can help illuminate its renewed interest.
It is a necessity for many Indians at the Bottom of the Pyramid to use a term from economics, for whom access to resources is problematic, and whose socio-economic status makes opportunities for social progression more difficult. For wealthier socio-economic groups, jugaad is employed to reduce expense and economise labour costs (Rai, 2019). But arguably scarcity continues to be prevalent across India and for that reason underpins the approach to jugaad.
The contrast of perspective, the whole arena of difference that discussion of this compact and complex concept invites necessitates further research, which has all but been outlined here. Jugaad is a concept that taps into current trends around crafting, thrifting. And the growth of the Indian economy, with its emphasis on innovation, and in a high-risk society, summons the need for a resurgence of interest in jugaad.
Rina Arya is a Professor of Visual Culture and Theory at the University of Huddersfield. She is currently writing a book about jugaad and also another study about the cultural appropriation of Hindu symbols.
Critical Jugaad is jugaad done as an act of everyday resistance and survival. Critical Jugaad is a term I have coined that is based on an inquiry that explains how people use ingenious making practices like jugaad as a tool for resistance, subversion and criticality against colonial powers of oppression. Jugaad is a Hindi term which means making do with what you have at hand. Jugaad-like practices form cultural binders and empower people to find a collective force to fight oppression while practicing creative self-expression.
It would be antithetical to the spirit and essence of jugaad if I pointed to design or art groups that represent Critical Jugaad. It is found in acts of everyday resistance and not in studios or galleries. The work that inspires me comes from normal people doing normal things in an extraordinary way. However, there are a few practices and artists / activists that do stand out to me and are inspiring. Afrofuturist eyewear by Kenyan artist Cyrus Kabiru is extraordinary in terms of its use of found objects art to create a futurist materiality and visions which are otherwise missing in our Western mainstream futures discourse.
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