I have been toying with the concept of Value Cells, talking to my friends, in partcular Saroja of IIM Ahmedabad, and co founder of www.naukri.com. It is indeed very difficult to start a new concept, until it has been pre validated by a biggie. The recent article by Mckinsey, "Organising for value"

and an email from Joseph Sexsmith, author of Marketing Mash Ups - I at http://actinomics.wordpress.com/ has provided the much needed trigger for writing in the public domain.

While I use a borrowed term "Value Cell", I feel the term VALUE, which is central to the term Value Cell, needs to be better understood. I shall try to explain it in the near future.

Those interested in the topic are welcome to give their comments.

This blog should interest, among others, the following:

Thought Leaders in Management Strategy
Management Consultants
Thought Leaders in Philosophy of Management,
Economists
Environmentalists
Mathematicians, in particular those in the field of Discreet Mathematics
Physicists
Chemists
Technologists
Mathematical Biologists
Cyberneticians
Software specialists

Why such a motley crowd?

Economic Value is a term that goes beyond economics. While all players above would be intereested in developing the concept, the software guy will come, package a solution, and market it. Lesser economists will say he "created" value. Let it be so.

Understanding Value

Wikipedia defines value in eleven contexts --economic, philosophical, et al. Can we reduce the number of contexts? Is it possible to have ONE definition and ONE way of understanding it -- atleast in its generic form? With all other forms being special cases of the general? We try to do so in this blog.

A Starter

LAW1

Value of the Universe remains constant…. It is not mass, energy or entropy but VALUE that remains constant.

Please do not think about it. Meditate on the Law.

Does it not take you closer to holistic economics? Holistic Management? A better world view? Do we really create value or simply integrate it--- unto ourselves or our system. Does it not reduce one's arrogance? Collective arrogance? And thus assign a proper value to mankind? Help you assign a more balanced value to your surroundings? Colleagues? Stakeholders?

Implications of this statement are far reaching, but in our opinion, intransitory. Call it a hypothesis or postulate if you want to. After all, Euclid's Geometry, based upon postulates like "shortest distance betwen two points is a straight line" survived for more than 2000 years, much more than any economic or management theory.

Sources Of Inspiration

The Turning Point
The Tao Of Physics
A Brief History Of Time
Organising For value