And the award goes to...?

Guess what…Bangladesh Corporate

Blog is proud to announce the annual Bangladesh Corporate Blog Award starting from December 2008. There will be a lavish program arranged at either Radisson Water Garden Hotel or BCFCC, there will be a host of business heavy-weights, celebrities and the award ceremony will be followed by electrifying cultural program, mouth-watering dinner and fashion show. We are already looking for sponsors for different items of the ceremony. Ki bujlen?

Whatever you might be thinking, let me apologize for this non-sense joke. I just wrote it to feel how it feels, it doesn’t feel bad though. But there are a few issues. I don’t know if you have recently noticed or not this latest trend in the corporate arena of Bangladesh, the culture of arranging award ceremonies.

This trend was perhaps set in by DHL and The Daily Star, whereby something called DHL-Daily Star Business Awards are given to various businesses and business personalities under different categories. More details are found here. Although the question always remained as to what makes DHL the best company to give such an award, it was also not clear who the panelists were and what were the selection criteria they were using to select the awardees. However DHL took heed of our previous post and changed their website accordingly (although they never said than k you). Nevertheless, I must wholeheartedly recognize the fact that the initiative is well appreciated and the intention is good. It just lacked some transparency in terms of processes. I also have another query trying to find out how many years of publication made the entertainment magazine Filmfare India worthy and eligible to be able to arrange Filmfare awards in India? One week, one month, one year, ten years…after how many years they thought that it’s a good time to start giving awards to people related to Bollywood? I don’t know.

But we notice that a few new entrants in the business literature industry of Bangladesh have already started arranging award ceremonies to honor the best brands, businesses, etc. even though it has not yet been even a year that the business magazine had hit the newsstands. So we wonder, as we do it best and ponder, what makes a company or a business magazine buckle up and start giving awards and why do they do so? Is it a marketing trick or stunt? Trying to appear as a think-tank and boddha in that field? A first mover advantage to silence other lips who might argue about the elite judge panel and their knowledge depth? There must be a reason…and as of now, the reason seems pretty unclear. Again a lot can be said about the super objective and the broad mission, but what else....when will the cat be out of the bag?

Following this suit, DCCI also decided to arrange another award ceremony. But still, it makes a bit more sense that a BMO like DCCI is arranging something like this, they are the apex body, they have been there for a good number of time (50 years as they claim) and the people they have on board know the rule of the game pretty well, no matter how they have actually played it.

So some joke time again, you know what, we are sad (sigh and yawn) that we are never invited to all these award ceremonies et al, incase we burp while eating...or make sounds with our cutleries..or don't dress well...or ogle at women around...or cheer loudly the band on stage or crack jokes at elderly successful businessmen....hehehe....or lest we corporate bloggers spot something bloggable and since unlike business journos, we don’t report news, we blog…and that makes certain people really unhappy and uncomfortable. Nevertheless, we set a vision to be able to arrange our own gala extravagant award ceremony in 2011 and honor our business stars and villains for their performances. And aboveall, we will make the process transparent, collaborative where consumers will be able to vote through SMS, call their preferred business-personalities and brands. The choice will be left to ordinary consumers like you and me, bidding au revoir to blue-blooded panelists and think-tanks. We don't need no education, we don't need no thought control...how about that?