From fundi to jugaad: Indian innovation

Working in Kenya last year, I became aware of the significant role of the fundi in African engineering. Rather like Scotty on the Enterprise, the fundi's role is to improvise and to squeeze performance from materials or mechanical processes whose original function may be long past, yet with imagination, skill and dexterity can be modified for current needs.

A Swahili word, it is also used in South Africa to mean an expert, umfindisi in Nguni and meaning a teacher.

So I was interested to read in Business Week http://bit.ly/6qEw1M of an Indian concept of inexpensive invention that is finding favour in American boardrooms. Navi Radjou from Cambridge University's Centre for India & Global Business, uses a Hindi slang word, jugaad (pronounced "joo-gaardh"), to describe "an improvisational style of innovation that's driven by scarce resources and attention to a customer's immediate needs, not their lifestyle wants."

Held up as a new management fad that resonates with our times, jugaad nevertheless has potential pitfalls if quality and durability are sacrificed in pursuit of a quick fix - particularly in the context of the built environment. The process of innovation need not be complex, but for real value to be added it must generate products that are robust and enduring to be truly sustainable.

"More speed Scotty", but less haste...