Embracing Change: Exploring Perspectives on Transition for Bhutan

I find no apt thought quote when reflecting on change management in Bhutan than Professor Megginson’s where he states (inspired by Charles Darwin) “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It is the one most adaptable to change”. This is very important, especially for everyone charged with ensuring the relevance and resilience of organizations in this age of relentless change. This must be a manifesto for all leaders of change—the innovators, trailblazers, change-makers—those people entrusted with transformation, modernization, and evolution who have been building better organizations and helping others on their journey to do the same.

For Bhutan and for any other country, change is more than necessary to survive and thrive through this rapidly transforming era. In other words, there must be a change in order to embrace the changes taking place around us. The future for Bhutan looks daunting as it traverses through its metamorphosis stage—albeit very exciting with endless potential and possibilities in what we can do. 

While Dubai and Singapore rose to prominence through their monumental developments from a place less of an oasis through tourism, investments, and highly progressive policies, Bhutan made very slow and careful progress embracing the middle path of development. In doing so, Bhutan still remains at its infant stage of development while the world has moved fast in leaps and bounds. What are we waiting for? What have we achieved from careful transitions and what is the goal of these cautious transitions?

From my perspective, the slow and careful transitions are right in their own places. While this gave us enough time to observe the happenings beyond our boundaries, it also kept us stagnant for a long time. It was by choice and by circumstances we had this course when it comes to development. It was because of indecisions, seemingly poor and bureaucratic systems, and a lack of human and capital resources that it took a long time to move fast. We can’t blame the past entirely (there is no use doing so either) because the initiatives within the last three decades were the compelling propelling forces in what we are today. If we want to take slow and careful transitions for the same purpose of benefiting its citizens, can't we take avenues (developments that are at par with highly developed states) that can best serve the needs of the people at this stage? I say this because we can’t afford to remain the same, and remain using neolithic tools and ways of doing things. In the past, it may be true that slow and steady wins the race but now, fast and precision win the race. Again, what are we racing for? The race here means the benefits we can derive from the developments taking place around us.

That is what His Majesty the King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck envisions. He said hereafter whatever Bhutan does, it must be done by design and not by default. We have been doing everything so far by default. Poorly planned towns taking their natural courses of development (see Thimphu), infrastructure buildings in Bhutan inspired through “Least Cost Selection” bids, and irrecoverable hangover on traditional and time-consuming ways of doing things to name a few. 

While Bhutan can never be Dubai or Singapore–they are not a testament to perfection and a utopian blueprint because show me a place that is without a problem. There are certain aspects in which some countries are far ahead and some are inundated with issues. Bhutan can do so much when it comes to development because we are in the holy grail of starting things. There is so much to do and there are things happening under the sleeve. 

These countries might have an entirely different history and unfair advantages or even future visions than ours. But we can always have places to look at, draw inspiration from and bring back to our country because they have excellence in some aspects. Contextualize and adopt the principles that are universally applicable! 

The solution is to cut the ancient craps that are no more useful and bring change. A change must come from the realization of inadequacy or a lack thereof in the existing way of doing things. And for the change to happen, there must be a change in the system. A changed system brings changes in human capital and the ways of doing things. The changes that recognize themselves as state of the art because the highly developed cities that cater to every need and want of people like Dubai and Singapore are not a creation of perfection. Bhutan recognizes a balanced development—that is not only striving to embrace consumerism practices— perfection for Bhutan too is far off the edge but what Bhutan can do is strive for excellence. And that too by design. 

Come up with policies that show the potential and not limitations.

For the change, I firmly believe the path forward for Bhutan is clarity. The clarity in our developmental goals and clarity in what we want to leverage to make the best use of developments taking place in the world. One aspect of developments Bhutan can eye on is the use of modern technology to bring developments in the country. On a granular level, one laptop, WiFi, one dream and necessary skills are all it takes to leverage modern technology. As we have learned in the “Design Thinking’ workshop, in order to run, and sustain any business or institution, we need to envision a clear picture of what it looks like in the first instance itself. For a business, we need to design the organization in such a way that it is primarily created to achieve its specific goals and objectives. For the business to be successful, we need effective business strategies and in order to employ that strategy, we need to follow working processes. The same applies to governance–build the foundations, and structures but not cast on stones. Shed the cultures that are no more useful because if humans are after reason, why must we cling to abstracts and futile?

I have observed and noticed that in Bhutan, people and the government hardly make disruptive changes because our old way of doing things is deeply entrenched in the system. The change can be achieved only through actions. One can leverage technology by creating a native business ecosystem by testing, contextualizing, and emulating best business practices from the outside states. A skilled programmer who is also an entrepreneur can create “Software as a Service'' (SaaS) business models natively and empower all the businesses in the country. The businesses can bring in another business through incentives provided by the SaaS owners. Thereby, creating a self-sustaining business ecosystem. Alas, we keep on posting labelless pictures of the products on social media.

There is no innovation in the way we do things. Just to give random examples, there are multiple general legal firms in the capital and if you just search “Find lawyers in Bhutan”, only the international websites appear on the search. There is no web presence of legal firms in the country. There are legal firms but they try to extend their hand in every issue that you can hardly find specialized firms that can fully cater to your specific (for example, business) needs.

From my experience, Bhutan is at what Albert Camus describes in his speech “Human Crisis” where he says “This crisis is also about replacing real things with printed matter, that is to say, the growth of bureaucracy. Contemporary man tends more and more to put between himself and nature an abstract and complex machinery that casts him into solitude. Only when there is no more bread do bread coupons appear”. 

If you look at Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) in the country, most of them are exiting from doing business. There are very few FDI's coming to Bhutan. Even if you want to set up an FDI, it takes more than a year to do so. Why can’t we cut the crap and set up robust processes that can help set up FDI within one month! When I write this, I don’t mean we should allow every FDI. There must be robust impact assessment mechanisms to accept and reject the types of FDIs.

For a change to happen, I also think that we must be very progressive and at the same time be thoughtful of what we really want. In order to bring change, everyone must be abreast of the best practices and developments taking place in highly developed countries, then everyone must learn, and get skilled to take action. 

Despite all these lackings, are we trying? Yes, we are but…it is time to reign the swing in a way we have never done before!

I feel so excited to see the endless potential in what we can do. Everything is moving fast. We must keep up with the sole purpose of benefiting the people and bringing changes accordingly. Hence, for Bhutan, more than change management, Bhutan must first create a change. 

What changes would you bring? 

Will you start from scratch?