The Rich Labourer

by Parthajeet Sarma, Sibani Sarma

Everyone wants to be innovative. People do. Organisations do. So do governments. Being innovative is necessary for survival today. Everyone's understanding of the path to innovation is different. Whether it is the government initiating a public directive like the demonetisation of high value currency notes or a private organisation launching a new product, it is critical is to be human centric. Real value is co-created with the end-user. In a first of its kind, this book uses a fictional story in the backdrop to demonstrate a 3-step structured approach towards innovation. The Probe-Ponder-Prove method or the 3P Method. This first version of the book is like a prototype and is an experiment in itself. Prototypes are made to secure feedback and use such feedback to improve any product or service. Readers are requested to leave their comments and suggestions, to enable an enhanced second version. Feedback link: www.Parthajeet.com/TheRichLabourer/

Genres: Nonfiction

146 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2017

About the author

I have two folders in my hard-disk; one is labelled HASSLED and the other labelled RELAXED. Under RELAXED I have my writings, mostly blog posts and book manuscripts. Rest are family pics.

Under HASSLED is stored work related files. My bread and butter in this folder comes from my management consultancy work around Workplace Transformation. I am a Workplace Experience Designer, an Entrepreneur and a Chevening scholar (Oxford University)

Reviews

[Kalyan Panja · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book has something concrete that companies can do to recover the competitiveness gap that separates them more and more from the rest of the industrialized world. The book does not talk, but as we see is full of fictional examples. Particularly interesting is the attention given to people in a field where others often focuses exclusively on the technical aspects.

[Sankalpita (bookGeeks India) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unlike many other authors in the business and management genre, the authors in this book have adopted a unique writing style. They have supported the concepts explained with the help of a fictional backdrop..

Read the full review on my website - http://www.bookgeeks.in/the-rich-labo...

[Karthik H · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting concept. A breezy read despite being a non-fiction. The theories are being explained with practical implementation examples that really helps. The 3-Step path seems to be quite addictive and you may find yourself opting for the 3P method in approaching every problem and this definitely helps. The 3P method is an interesting management technique that focuses on solving problems with a structured approach . The Probe Ponder Prove method can be used in any setting, as an individual, or as a corporate or even for a society. The book uses fictional examples in real life scenarios to explain how to implement this approach and get mass savings in terms of effort, money and time. The author has kept it short and straight to the point and this makes it a more welcome approach (I usually dread those large management / self help books), but this book was quite a relief in that way
Here's a detailed review of the same in my blog
http://www.muralikarthik.in/2017/03/R...
Dont miss this one :)

[Shashank Jain · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simplistic explanation of the core fundamentals of problem solving!! Amazed to read it and find it appealing. Thought provoking elaboration of management concepts with good examples.

[Vishal Kale · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book proposes a very interesting, thought provoking concept; if I may summarise in a few words – look, and look hard, before you leap; think it through. That is the entire book from start to finish. To those who may find this surprising, Corporate India is littered with examples of people who didn’t do just that; look before leaping. I personally call it my 360-Degree style of analysis, which I visited for the first time in my first article, which was on Tablet Devices, as also in my interactions during my Advertising and Brand Management Visiting Faculty experience

The Book calls it the 3Ps approach – Probe, Ponder and Prove. The best as well as the worst part of the book is identical : it is a short, rapid and fast read, written in easy prose, simple to assimilate, understand and absorb. There is no beating around the bush here. Curiously, for serious readers like self, this is also the biggest issue : you are left wanting for more, deeper analysis, contents and a far deeper development of the concept. To be fair, this one in my hand is a prototype; it will be expanded in the coming versions of the book…

[Aryan Sarath · Rating 5 out of 5]

Have you ever wondered whether you could teach management through a present day story? I have not read one until recently and never thought that it would be possible until I stumbled upon The Rich Labourer.

The book revolves around few characters like Ravi,Riya, Vinod, Jagdish,Nikita, Seema,Rohit,Ramesh, Saee and had beautifully placed forth in front of us as to how project idea can be conceived and implemented. The team decides to venture into a project of creating a self-sustained housing model which they code name it as "Powerhouse"

Whether they managed to successfully built one is the story.

I can say this is something similar to a management book which implies the importance of a unique concept called The 3P Method where

P - Probe, Ponder and Prove

What has to be done during these stages has been well explained via a story involving the characters mentioned above. The authors had mentioned that this is the first version of the book and have invited suggestions too but I honestly feel, if we go with the concept as such, the book is perfectly worded and would not require any further additions unless a new concept needs to be imbibed into it.

The concept mentioned in the book can be applied in real life in most of the aspects. When there was a mention of how the cost can be saved in BPO, I could easily connect myself with the scenario as I had worked myself in a BPO for close to 8 years and had seen in person as to how changing the cubicle structure, flooring, colour scheme and replacing old monitors with swanky new ones had a drastic effect in the performance of the employees. I am sure, as a reader, you too would surely be able to make the connect with your life scenarios too.

[Aditi Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book Cover Art: I liked the cover. Even though the writer has used fiction as a backdrop, he has made the cover a formal one. The message thus that the cover conveys is that it is a “business book” . This goes well with the tagline of the book.

How’s the Title: It is only towards the very end of the book that the initial characters are brought back by saying that the parents, despite poverty, managed to give the children a great education and a good life. However, the rest of the book is not about them. It is about innovative thinking, the want to do something and the gutsy approach to make it happen and finally getting the dream achieved. With this premise in mind, the title seems a little misleading. The book is not about the “The Rich Labourer” but about “Structured Innovation” (non fiction skewed title) or “Riya’s Project” (fiction skewed title)

Is The Blurb Catchy: The first paragraph of the blurb, I felt, was trying to hard, to get the reader’s attention. Instead, here is how the blurb should have looked: what the book addresses-how does the reader benefit. Since there are books dealing with similar concepts by the dozen, it should harp more on what the USP of this book is.

Read the full review here: https://lovewordie.wordpress.com/2017...

[Ila Garg · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Rich Labourer is a novel by Parthajeet Sarma and co-authored by Sibani Sarma. It is published by iDream. The cover shows the legs of a man walking up the stairs of "success". The tag line: "A 3-Step Path to Finding Solutions: For People, Organisations and for Society" is explicit in itself and therefore, readers can easily guess what to expect inside this book.
Read the complete review here: www.ilagarg.com/2017/01/the-rich-labo.... html

[Jasleen Kaur · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best part about the book was that the author didn’t try to showcase his intelligence over the topic. His attempt of teaching a concept to all groups of people was indeed a win-win. The examples used, the stories incorporated, the characters brought up in between, made a non-fiction book as interesting as a fantasy book.

Talking about the writing won’t be helpful because a non-fiction book is full of technicalities and one can’t judge technical aspects. What can be judged is how well the author delivered his concepts; and that was done extremely well.

What I thought was missing was a strong ending. There were some loose ends here and there but not major ones. Also over the end, the author became very descriptive and there were a lot of things which were hard to understand. If the same thing he could have blended in between somehow, while narrating the whole chapter of “Powerhouse”, then maybe I could have grasped those paragraphs well too.

You can read the complete review here:
https://thesubtlebraiding.blogspot.in...

[Anupama K. Mazumder · Rating 4 out of 5]

What I loved about the book is how it drives across its point in the form of a tale. The storyline revolves around the 3P method: Probe, Ponder and Prove. Sounds like a MBA book? Well, this book is actually written by two architects turned MBAs, and reflections of both professions can be found in it. When addressing any problem, in the Probe stage, one is encouraged to understand the problem in hand and the needs of the end user. The data collected needs to be analysed in the next stage and the results to be incorporated in the final solution. Because it is set in the current context of demonetization and issues of modern life, everyone would be able to identify with the book.

I personally thought the end of the book was too fast forwarded, as if one had rationed the number of pages that could go in the book.

That not withstanding, you would definitely like the book.