Indra Nooyi Speech at Columbia Enrages Some

[Fitz]

Indra Nooyi is the CFO of Pepsico and she was the guest speaker at Columbia Business School last week for their MBA graduates. She made some controversial remarks about the United States, comparing them to the middle finger. You will have to read it for yourself to see what you think. She earns about 7.5 million per year as the CFO. I wonder how grateful she is to work at this American Company? Many are outraged and think the blunder was definite and deliberate. Many feel that Pepsi will be boycotted and hurt very much by her insensitive comments. The MSM is not covering it yet that I have heard, but they may be by Monday.

208.158.244.116/Speech-ColumbiaBusinessSchool.pdf

 

[David_Paul]

PowerLine has accounts of her speech here.

Ms Nooyi says her remarks have been “misconstrued” here:

pepsico.com/msgfromindra.shtml

 

[Fitz]

David_Paul:

PowerLine has accounts of her speech here.

Ms Nooyi says her remarks have been “misconstrued” here:

pepsico.com/msgfromindra.shtml

Yeah, and do you think her remarks are misconstrued? I don’t.

 

[David_Paul]

Don’t believe they were.

This is weird however. Corp execs at that level in her type of business are usually above this stuff. Politics, politicians, political parties and even countries are just speed bumps.

She sounds more like Eason Jordan of CNN than someone who produces a real product.

 

[Lisa_N]

This was on another thread and I stand by my recommendation that Ms. Nooyi return to her native land where women are so well treated. She might find sitting suttee less appealing than her current hot seat.

Lisa N

 

[Fitz]

Lisa N:

This was on another thread and I stand by my recommendation that Ms. Nooyi return to her native land where women are so well treated. She might find sitting suttee less appealing than her current hot seat.

Lisa N

Lisa, I looked and did not find the thread. I am sorry that I missed it. I guess you miss a few days on CA formus and you miss a lot!

 

[mjdonnelly]

I read through her speech, it was a pretty good one.

I have a degree in Human Resources, with alot of classes in international business.

You need to read all the paragraphs in her analogy to understand what she was saying. She is right on target. The world revolves around the business and industry of the US. Other countries start teaching english in elementary school, to make themselves bi-lingual in order to more easily do business with us. We have more economic superpowers than the rest of the world combined. The result is that we are always in the spotlight. When the US speaks, people listen. They may not agree, but they always listen.

Now, issues have come up with US companies sending jobs overseas to help with profits due to lower cost of living, etc. In Asian countries, many textile industries have sent jobs there. They end up employing children. The same children who would have been on the streets if not for the job, their families starving, and no school because it isn’t available. What some people call a sweatshop. But where would those children be without that job?

Some companies have changed their practices due to the bad publicity. After all, it looks as if the US is taking advantage of foreign workers. Company sponsored schools have been set up where the children go to school for half the day, then can work the other half, but still get paid for the whole day. I believe Levis Strauss did this.

I last looked into it was in 1996, so my info on that particular company is a little out of date, but that is what she is referring to. Don’t be so caught up in profits, think about the people.

 

[Elizabeth_B]

mjdonnelly:

I read through her speech, it was a pretty good one.

I have a degree in Human Resources, with alot of classes in international business.

You need to read all the paragraphs in her analogy to understand what she was saying. She is right on target. The world revolves around the business and industry of the US. Other countries start teaching english in elementary school, to make themselves bi-lingual in order to more easily do business with us. We have more economic superpowers than the rest of the world combined. The result is that we are always in the spotlight. When the US speaks, people listen. They may not agree, but they always listen.

Now, issues have come up with US companies sending jobs overseas to help with profits due to lower cost of living, etc. In Asian countries, many textile industries have sent jobs there. They end up employing children. The same children who would have been on the streets if not for the job, their families starving, and no school because it isn’t available. What some people call a sweatshop. But where would those children be without that job?

Some companies have changed their practices due to the bad publicity. After all, it looks as if the US is taking advantage of foreign workers. Company sponsored schools have been set up where the children go to school for half the day, then can work the other half, but still get paid for the whole day. I believe Levis Strauss did this.

I last looked into it was in 1996, so my info on that particular company is a little out of date, but that is what she is referring to. Don’t be so caught up in profits, think about the people.

Up until six years ago, I was in executive management in an international business. I also have a degree in education and I am the mother of teenagers. In my opinion, Indra Nooyi’s use of a vulgar analogy obscures any invalidates the other points she hoped to make and sends a strong message to the graduates that the preferred way to express disagreement is by resorting to adolescent behavior.

Having read all of her comments and the follow-on claim that they were miscontstrued, I fully understand the valid points she included in her speech. Unfortunately, she chose to discount the valid points with her descent into vulgarity that contributes to the coarsening of our graduates. Furthermore she implies by ommission that she did not try to make this point.

Commencement speeches are meant to inspire the graduates, not to encourage them to wallow in the crude mud. The average 22-year-old does not need approval in order to be vulgar. They are already immersed in a culture where crude insults are highly prized.

She may think she was being clever, but in reality she is showing her own coarseness and lack of integrity.

 

[Fitz]

Elizabeth B.:

She may think she was being clever, but in reality she is showing her own coarseness and lack of integrity.

Timing is everything. This comes on the heels of Newsweeks mistaken info also. I think that it is anti American and she knew her audience and played to it. Liberal New York College.

 

[Lisa_N]

Elizabeth B.:

Up until six years ago, I was in executive management in an international business. I also have a degree in education and I am the mother of teenagers. In my opinion, Indra Nooyi’s use of a vulgar analogy obscures any invalidates the other points she hoped to make and sends a strong message to the graduates that the preferred way to express disagreement is by resorting to adolescent behavior.

Having read all of her comments and the follow-on claim that they were miscontstrued, I fully understand the valid points she included in her speech. Unfortunately, she chose to discount the valid points with her descent into vulgarity that contributes to the coarsening of our graduates. Furthermore she implies by ommission that she did not try to make this point.

Commencement speeches are meant to inspire the graduates, not to encourage them to wallow in the crude mud. The average 22-year-old does not need approval in order to be vulgar. They are already immersed in a culture where crude insults are highly prized.

She may think she was being clever, but in reality she is showing her own coarseness and lack of integrity.

Great post and that IS the point. The speech descended into Michael Moore-ish or Whoopie Goldeberg-ish juvenile vulgarity. I am sure Ms Nooryi thought she was just being funny, catching on the winds of the kind of anti American rhetoric that always plays well to the press. So maybe it played well to a group of liberal dewy eyed college students but it was tacky and offensive IMO.

Indeed as mjdonnelly pointed out, there were some good points made in the speech but they were lost in the pathetic attempt at humor by demeaning a country that has allowed this woman to become successful beyond anything she could have achieved in India.

Lisa N

 

[Richardols]

Lisa N:

a country that has allowed this woman to become successful beyond anything she could have achieved in India.

Do you measure success only in terms of financial success, Lisa?

I suggest that the fact that an Indian woman has been Prime Minister of that country is a success beyond anything an American woman could have achieved here, where a woman has never had a chance at become President (and probably will not, for decades.)

 

[tcay584]

I just read the whole speech, and I guess you can find an insult if you are looking for it. Personally, I thought it was a good analogy of how a country that is as powerful as the US can “stand out” in a way not intended.

 

[mjdonnelly]

Lisa N:

Great post and that IS the point. The speech descended into Michael Moore-ish or Whoopie Goldeberg-ish juvenile vulgarity. I am sure Ms Nooryi thought she was just being funny, catching on the winds of the kind of anti American rhetoric that always plays well to the press. So maybe it played well to a group of liberal dewy eyed college students but it was tacky and offensive IMO.

Indeed as mjdonnelly pointed out, there were some good points made in the speech but they were lost in the pathetic attempt at humor by demeaning a country that has allowed this woman to become successful beyond anything she could have achieved in India.

Lisa N

I agree that Elizabeth’s post was very good. But Lisa, I don’t think Ms Nooryi was demeaning our country. Being critical of past practices, yes. We Americans sometimes have trouble accepting criticism, be it pride or whatever. The speech was to address early twenty somethings, in that context is is probably appropriate. Those speeches are usually dry and hardly inspiring, a little humor could go a long way.

 

[Lisa_N]

Richardols:

Do you measure success only in terms of financial success, Lisa?.)

Yes of course, I am a greedy capitalist by nature…Geez Richardols you are if nothing else COMPLETELY predictable. I have worked with a number of Indians over the years. Their culture holds back women and is EXTREMELY patriarchal. Ms Nooyi would not have had the same opportunities in India that she had here with respect to education and employment.

Richardols:

I suggest that the fact that an Indian woman has been Prime Minister of that country is a success beyond anything an American woman could have achieved here, where a woman has never had a chance at become President (and probably will not, for decades.)

Right and her name, Ghandi had absolutely nothing to do with her rising to power as Prime Minister? Kinda like Hillary hopes to leverage off her husband’s name.

But I disagree with your comment that in this country a woman could not be president. Why not? Just because many of us reject Hillary has more to do with her politics than her sex.

Lisa N

 

[DaveBj]

Lisa N:

Right and her name, Ghandi had absolutely nothing to do with her rising to power as Prime Minister? Kinda like Hillary hopes to leverage off her husband’s name.

But I disagree with your comment that in this country a woman could not be president. Why not? Just because many of us reject Hillary has more to do with her politics than her sex.

Lisa N

For the record, the Ghandi she married was no relation to the Ghandi who led the fight for Indian independence.

Of more importance was her maiden name–Nehru. She was the daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister.

DaveBj

 

[Wolseley]

I drink Coke almost exclusively anyway.

If I need a change of pace, I drink RC.

 

[Lisa_N]

DaveBj:

For the record, the Ghandi she married was no relation to the Ghandi who led the fight for Indian independence.

Of more importance was her maiden name–Nehru. She was the daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister.

DaveBj

Yes I knew that. I was referring to her election being more of her relationships and name familiarity than her merits as Richardols indicated. IOW if she had been Indira Ravichandran, the daughter of a small shopkeeper do you think she would have been Prime Minister? I don’t.

The US is FAR more of a meritocracy and allows women greater opportunities than India where the caste system still exists and women deliberately abort female babies. Again the point being that Ms Nooyi would not have had the freedom to utilize her talents and education in India. So she comes to the US, works her way up the ladder to a position at the helm of a huge conglomorate and she calls her adopted country the “middle finger?” Sorry but I think it was rather lacking in class and graciousness. IMO she made the reference because she thought it would play well to the crowd.

Lisa N

 

[mjdonnelly]

Lisa N:

So she comes to the US, works her way up the ladder to a position at the helm of a huge conglomorate and she calls her adopted country the “middle finger?” Sorry but I think it was rather lacking in class and graciousness. IMO she made the reference because she thought it would play well to the crowd.

Lisa N

Again, you have to take all of it in context.

What would you call it when a company exploits people from another country because of their poverty?

Check here:
sanluisobispo.com/mld/sanluisobispo/business/11633421.htm

They went on strike for a 10% increase in pay (1.6 US cents), overtime pay (they were forced to work 14 to 16 hrs per day), Sundays off, and being able to take more than 2 restroom breaks during their workday without their pay being docked.

There is more info on the site, that was just a portion of what happened.

That is an example of a major corporation being irresponsible. I’m sure there is some great excuse, but how does it look?

It looked as if those workers were being flipped ‘the bird’ prior to their going on strike.

 

[David_Paul]

mjdonnelly:

Again, you have to take all of it in context.

With all due respect, I am so sick of that DODGE, if I were Elvis in Las Vegas I would pick up a hand…well never mind.

No…I don’t need to know no stinking “context”

I’m not a freaking idiot. I know what she said and what she meant and how low class and thoughtless it was.

I could do the same as she. Give me a faith. Give me a country. Give me an ethnic group. Catholic, Prot, Jewish, Irish, Navajo, Chinese, German, Zuni, Russian, Mongolian, I don’t care. I can give a speech at Columbia U or anywhere else and I can be as low class about them and have an audience of kids cheering me on as she did.

And guess what?

I can do that without lying.

 

[mjdonnelly]

David_Paul:

I’m not a freaking idiot. I know what she said and what she meant and how low class and thoughtless it was.

I could do the same as she. Give me a faith. Give me a country. Give me an ethnic group. Catholic, Prot, Jewish, Irish, Navajo, Chinese, German, Zuni, Russian, Mongolian, I don’t care. I can give a speech at Columbia U or anywhere else and I can be as low class about them and have an audience of kids cheering me on as she did.

I never said anyone was an idiot.

Of those groups you mentioned, which one is as powerful, economically, as the US?

And, you don’t need context? Fine, the Bible says: “there is no God”

How is your “context” now.