How decision making happens?
Jan 22, 2026
I write today to express the broad set of ways decision making happens at the global stage and discuss the Indian scenario as well.
A company observes the world and maintains great relationships with govt, academia and other businesses. It defines what is required for them to 10x their revenue with a particular product or service (which it first thinks or ideates). But, it is pretty new for everyone to even think about it. They simply prepare the skeleton of some idea and write about it. This helps clarify the outline of the idea, initially it could be vague however, clarity comes with writing about it more. As the person thinks of this idea and goes deeper, he understands he cannot do it alone. He asks a VC to tag along to put some funds, then the news is published in producthunt or some newspaper within the country as well as on LinkedIn (the connects already exist). People still are not interested, since they don’t know what it is about exactly. Then, a web of studies are funded to show that something is ‘backed by science’ or get some external validation, irrespective of whether something works or not. The NGOs get involved with their marketing efforts since, some ‘noble sounding cause’ is attached to it which in reality is vague but sounds good, for eg, sustainability or climate change or something of this sort. Once, this is done and adequate amount of PR is done then narrative has to be set countrywide and globally. So, a Musk might say ‘we will live in the age of abundance’, ‘we don’t need people, AI will do all’ and so on. For the purpose of mindcapture and taking mindspace for people to seriously start thinking about this, multiple rounds of interviews are done for a particular idea with Bloomberg, Reuters, CNN, CNBC, BBC and so on. These interviews get global viewership and the people are looking at this, thinking about a million thoughts related to this. Conferences such as World Economic Forum are organised to promote the same idea and build a story around it. Political leaders have their own incentives to look cool amongst their population and meet with investors and entrepreneurs in order to get them to their country as well as utter some buzzwords so that population back home feels pride in the language irrespective of the outcomes. Cultural underpinnings are provided by making memes, songs, videos, ads and dances around the same idea or product or service. Eventually, it is considered as an exportable model to the world with ultimate goal of creating money for oneself and having mind space of a major chunk of the planet. Kids start emulating the person, they start singing songs and dancing to the tunes of the key entrepreneur or thinker because of the whole persona/ personality, not because of the product (but because of how it made him feel). For eg, people idealising Musk or someone. These people always include some factor of relatability with the masses and make it sound like they’re one of them, it’s part of the mind space tactic. They may also invoke some spiritual values or some typical sentences for the relatability factor as well as ensuring their influence over the masses remains,. Eventually, they always write a book (or get it written via ghostwriter) to communicate their worldview as well as to sound like they knew something that others did not plus sounding smart; the intended objective is always to not loose mindspace of the masses.
Overall, it takes a combination of legacy media, social media, VCs, NGOs, researchers, artists, cultural stars, book writers, spiritual folks and political leaders to make billions. They keep telling stories for multiple items, play with the listeners are readers psychologically and touch multiple cords and make them believe that the story is fascinating and wants them coming for more, always. No wonder MICE (meetings, interviews, conferences and events) has a market in billions of dollars.
The key takeaways are that they always have some nexus to collaborate with, for eg, folks in WEF from different fields assembled at one place and how they keep telling stories and playing with the minds of the masses, without people even realising it.
In the Indian context, it boils down to an array of influencers who gather at Mukesh Ambani’s son’s wedding- business leaders including global billionaires such as Larry Fink, Zuck, Pichai, G. Adani, artists like Rihana, Khans (plus the whole Bollywood gang), spiritual influencers like Sadhguru, Baba Ramdev, social media influencers, legacy media figures, political figures such as PM of India, current and previous CMs of states, etc. and all the known figures from different arenas such as sports, stock market etc. who have accomplished unique things in their fields or are key people in the circles. Now, there is an attempt to mainstream indology and craft the India story with media, research and academia, rankings, indices and so on playing a key role in shaping the narrative; building the story internally and globally so as to create one’s own ecosystem of voices that can represent the worldview as well as help sell products and services abroad. The game eventually is in the minds of the people of the globe; China maybe a great manufacturer but in the minds of the people, it will be a totalitarian state with high set of freedom restrictions; even if one may go to visit one won’t decide to live there (at least that is the common perception). A very high degree of collaboration amongst people of different domains with unique set of persona can produce marvellous products that siloed approaches cannot produce; that’s a very important takeaway.
The ultimate battleground is in the product/service to be sold and the minds of the people (which is the battle of the narratives). Cultural power cannot be asserted if no one views your channel or buys your books or someway there is a cashflow involved along with number of recipients of your ideas. Who knew the battle of what one emotes when one hears your name is the ultimate arena where one fights on the global stage and storytelling (audio/written/video or other formats) is how one permeates the minds and hearts of billions (apart from everything else that is required).