Minimum Viable Digitisation

In MSMEs, digitisation fails when it asks for faith. Start where it offers relief. This is the point where many leaders make the costliest mistake: They treat digitisation like a “big bang”. ERP rollout. Full automation. Everything at once. And then they act surprised when the company rejects it. Let me say it plainly: Most MSMEs don’t fail at digitization because of technology. They fail because of adoption. Which Seat? Inherited seat: you’re under pressure to “make it modern” fast. That...

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In MSMEs, digitisation fails when it asks for faith. Start where it offers relief. This is the point where many leaders make the costliest mistake: They treat digitisation like a “big bang”. ERP rollout. Full automation. Everything at once. And then they act surprised when the company rejects it. Let me say it plainly: Most MSMEs don’t fail at digitization because of technology. They fail because of adoption. Which Seat? Inherited seat: you’re under pressure to “make it modern” fast. That pressure pushes you into big moves. Hired seat: you want to justify your hiring with visible transformation. That pushes you into big moves. Promoted seat: you want to prove you can lead beyond operations. That pushes you into big moves. Different seats. Same trap: overreach. UPI vs core banking Think about how India adopted UPI. Most people didn’t wake up one day and say, “I want to digitize my financial life”. They adopted UPI because it was easier than what they were doing. It reduced pain: no change needed, no long forms, no bank visits, no waiting, instant confirmation. If you compare that to “core banking software”, you’ll see the difference. Core banking is heavy. UPI is light. Core banking asks for trust and patience. UPI offers relief on day one. That’s your lesson for MSMEs: Digitisation should feel like relief, not religion. Right Target Incoming leaders often say: “We need data.” “We need transparency.” “We need ERP.” All of that may be true. But it’s not the starting point. The starting point is: interfaces. Interfaces are the places where work crosses a boundary and things get messy. In MSMEs, disputes usually begin at interfaces: purchase request → approval → PO production completion → dispatch → delivery invoice → follow-up → collection customer promise → production plan → commitment These are the places where: money moves, blame travels, delays hide, exceptions grow WhatsApp becomes the system. So don’t digitise “everything.” Digitise one interface where money moves and disputes begin. Why Interface-First Two well-known ideas explain adoption clearly. Everett Rogers wrote about how innovations spread: people adopt when they see advantage, low risk, and others like them succeeding. They don’t adopt because you announced it. The Technology Acceptance Model (Davis) is even simpler: adoption happens when people feel the tool is useful and easy. In MSME terms: “Will this make my life easier?” “Will this create trouble for me?” “Will I get blamed if it fails?” “Will it slow me down?” If you can answer these questions well, adoption happens. If you can’t, people will smile and bypass. Viable digitisation Minimum viable digitisation means: small scope, clear benefit, low risk, quick proof, easy rollback. It’s not “small thinking”. It’s smart sequencing. The goal of the first digitization is not perfection. The goal is trust. Once the system sees that digitization reduces pain without creating danger, the next step becomes easier. What to digitise If you want a safe starting point, pick one of these interfaces: PO approvals Why it works: delays, confusion, and “who approved what” disputes are common. A simple approval queue reduces follow-ups fast. Dispatch confirmation Why it works: dispatch is where customers start shouting. A simple dispatch status board reduces panic. Collections follow-up Why it works: cash flow stress is universal. A simple overdue list with follow-up notes reduces chaos. Notice these are not “ERP modules”. They are pain points that people already feel. The one thing you must add: rollback safety This is important: in MSMEs, people avoid new systems because they fear getting trapped. So your pilot must include a rollback rule. Not as a threat. As reassurance. Example: “We will run this for 2 weeks. If it increases cycle time, we will roll back.” “We will keep a backup format for emergencies only.” “We will not punish anyone for mistakes during the pilot.” This reduces fear and increases honest participation. (The author is Co-founder at PPS Consulting and a business operations advisor. She helps businesses across sectors and geographies improve execution through global best practices. She could be reached at rashmi@ppsconsulting.biz)

The Mignonette’s Dark Legacy: Murder, Survival and the Shaping of Legal Doctrine

Laurence Westwood
Dec 4, 2024
3 min read

A case of life and death in the South Atlantic redefined the boundaries of necessity and continues to intrigue lawyers and writers alike.

On May 19, 1884, a nineteen-ton private yacht Mignonette set sail from Southampton, England, bound for Sydney, Australia. Aboard were four men: Captain Thomas Dudley, mate Edward Stephens, seaman Edmond Brooks, and cabin-boy Richard Parker. Some 1,600 miles off the coast of Africa in the South Atlantic, the yacht was overwhelmed by violent seas and sank within minutes. The crew managed to escape to a small, thirteen-foot lifeboat, armed only with two one-pound cans of turnips to sustain them. What unfolded subsequently became then a cause célèbre, and a defining legal case still taught to students of the English Common Law to this very day.

The four men in the lifeboat rigged a makeshift sail and set off in the direction of Rio de Janeiro. On the third day they opened the cans of turnips. On the fourth day they caught a small turtle. On the sixteenth day, the cabin boy Richard Parker, only seventeen years of age, became very ill from drinking seawater. The idea was then broached that the life of one of the four should be sacrificed to save the lives of the others. Brooks dissented, not wanting to kill anyone. On the nineteenth day Dudley and Stephens agreed to kill Parker if there was no rescue by morning. And so, early the next day, Dudley cut Parker’s throat with a penknife. The three remaining men fed upon his body for four days, when they were rescued by the German barque Montezuma on July 29.

Dudley, Stephens, and Brooks were not shy about saying what had happened. When the Montezuma returned them to Falmouth, England, on September 6, 1884, they repeated their story to customs officials, only to find themselves charged with murder.

However, public opinion was with the three men, including the brother of Richard Parker, also a sailor, who knew as well as any that the sea was a very harsh mistress. There were also legal issues to consider, notably that then under the common law the ‘privilege against self-incrimination’ was absolute. Moreover, some legal commentators considered homicide to be always justifiable if necessary to preserve oneself.

The authorities felt they had no option but to prosecute, not least to set a precedent that limited the defence of necessity, committing both Dudley and Stephens to trial, and dropping the charges against Brooks so his account of what happened in the lifeboat could be used against the others. And yet it was always understood by both the judiciary and the public that any precedent set would not be used against Dudley and Stephens, that they would be treated leniently.

The trial began on November 3, 1884 before judge Baron Huddleston, who was already intent on reaching a guilty verdict, and who more than any saw the need for a precedent to be set on the law of necessity once and for all. The jury was made to understand that they had a choice: find Dudley and Stephens guilty, or opt for a special verdict (as Baron Huddleston wished) where a panel of judges would then decide on the facts of the case and the guilt or innocence of Dudley and Stephens, and, most importantly, set the legal precedent. It should be noted that Baron Huddleston deliberately referred during the trial to the ‘clemency of the Crown’, thereby assuring Dudley and Stephens that they would be reprieved. The jury opted for the special verdict.

In December 1884, the Queen’s Bench Division, under Lord Chief Justice Coleridge, ruled that the defence of necessity could not justify murder, a decision that has endured in legal history. Dudley and Stephens were sentenced to death, but with a recommendation for mercy. While Queen Victoria was expected to pardon them, Home Secretary William Harcourt opted for a six-month prison sentence instead. The men were released on May 20, 1885.

Beyond the legal textbooks, Regina v Dudley and Stephens continues to echo in literary circles. Joseph Conrad’s Lord Jim, though primarily inspired by the real-life ‘non-sinking’ of the pilgrim ship Jeddah, drew heavily on the case’s themes of necessity and survival. Yann Martel, in his 2001 novel Life of Pi, wove in a literary nod by naming the potentially man-eating tiger Richard Parker—an unmistakable allusion to the ill-fated cabin boy. More recently, mystery novelist Elizabeth C. Bunce drew on the Mignonette tragedy in her 2022 children’s book In Myrtle Peril. Edgar Allan Poe, too, had explored the grim dynamics of sacrifice and survival in his only novel, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, where a sailor named Richard Parker offers himself up to be consumed by his fellow crew members. Interestingly, Poe’s tale, published in 1838, predates the real Richard Parker’s tragic fate by nearly half a century.

(The author is a novelist, retired investigator with an abiding passion for Chinese history)