The Marketplace Literacy Project Team
| Madhu Viswanathan is Professor of Business Administration at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where he has been on the faculty since 1990. He earned a B. Tech in Mechanical Engineering (Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, India, 1985), and a PhD in Marketing (University of Minnesota, 1990). His research programs are in two areas; measurement and research methodology, and literacy, poverty, and subsistence marketplace behaviors. He has authored books in both areas: Measurement Error and Research Design (Sage, 2005), and Enabling Consumer and Entrepreneurial Literacy in Subsistence Marketplaces(Springer, 2008, in alliance with UNESCO). His research on subsistence marketplaces takes a micro-level approach to gain bottom-up understanding of life circumstances and buyer, seller, and marketplace behaviors. This approach should be distinguished from macro-level economic approaches, and mid-level business strategy approaches such as base of the pyramid (BOP) research This perspective aims to enable subsistence marketplaces to move toward being ecologically, economically, and socially sustainable marketplaces. He directs the Subsistence Marketplaces Initiative (www.business.illinois.edu/subsistence) and has created unique synergies between research, teaching, and social initiatives. All three arenas involve engagement of large and small businesses and social enterprises, as well as a diverse set of students and faculty across different disciplines. He has organized conferences in the area of subsistence marketplaces bringing together researchers and practitioners and edited publications of nascent research in this area.
He teaches courses on research methods and on subsistence and sustainability. A yearlong, one-of-a-kind inter-disciplinary graduate-level course with students from engineering, business and other areas focuses on sustainable product and market development for subsistence marketplaces and involves an international immersion experience. Other teaching initiatives include a module for all (approximately 600) incoming undergraduate business majors on developing sustainable businesses for subsistence marketplaces, and graduate and undergraduate level courses on sustainable business enterprises. These teaching innovations aim to challenge students to appreciate diverse perspectives across the globe and imagine circumstances beyond one’s immediate experience, while working toward a better world. |
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Our Team in India - S. Gajendiran & R. Venkatesan
Gajendiran and Venkatesan of the Marketplace Literacy Project combine several decades of developmental work for NGOs in Tamil Nadu, India, as well as grass roots experience in subsistence marketplaces. During the course of the last eight years, they have conducted qualitative and quantitative research in subsistence marketplaces with Madhu Viswanathan. They are the lead instructors of a consumer and entrepreneurial training program for low-literate, low-income individuals and central contributors to the design of this program. They are coauthors of the book "Enabling Consumer and Entrepreneurial Literacy in Subsistence Marketplace," based on this work. They are part of the team teaching the course on Product and Market Development for Subsistence Marketplaces, enabling interactions and market research with subsistence families in India and creating video-based learning material.
S. Gajendiran holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Bharathidasan University, a post graduate diploma in co-operative management from Annamalai University, a Masters degree in Public Administration from Madras University, and Bachelor of Law degree from Dr.Ambethkar Law University. He was the secretary of the Youth Association in the village of Neivasal, Tanjore from 1982-86. He was the Vice President of TJR.56 Milk Producers’ Cooperative Society in Tanjore from 1986 to 1989. He served as Supervisor, Adult Education Department, Tamil University, Tanjore and coordinated Adult education centers in villages from 1987 to 1988. He was a social worker at the Guild of Service SSBH/Plan International project for the urban slums of Chennai to carryout its child family community development works from 1988 to 1992. He was the Training and Evaluation Coordinator in the same endeavor from 1992 to 1998. He coordinated vocational skill training program at the Seva Samajam Vocational Training Center, in the process of enrollment, retention, completion and placement of adolescents and women and facilitated to those, who were interested to become an Entrepreneur through linkages with financial institutions, Govt. departments and other agencies. He was the Assistant Project Officer from 1998 to 2003 and in charge of roll out of “Corporate Planning Monitoring and Evaluation” in the Chennai field office. He conducted and coordinated summative and formative evaluation on projects and programs. He trained the representatives of 200 Self Help Groups on principles, practices, formation and strengthening. He participated as resource person/trainer for community participation in World Bank aided water and sanitation project by the Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board and Functional Literacy Program staff of Chennai City Corporation.
R. Venkatesan completed his higher secondary education in economics and commerce. He worked as Community Organizer with Guild of Service –SSBH/Plan international from 1992 to 2003. He supervised community development in 10 low-income neighborhoods in Chennai, comprising of more than 2500 low-literate and low-income families. His responsibilities included counseling families and enabling them to develop family development action plans. He worked with NGOs, Government and other agencies to provide benefits to communities in the areas of health, education both adult and formal, habitat and livelihood. He supervised the development of Community based organizations (CBOs) and Self-help groups in different low-income neighborhoods. He was involved in the process of identifying and assisting potential entrepreneurs under the Entrepreneur Development Program of the Project, Tamilnadu Slum Clearance Board and Tamilnadu Corporation for Development of Women. In this capacity, he established linkages with training centers and Small Industries Service Institutes (SISI) and enabled youths and women to pursue marketable skill trainings that enable self-employment or other employment.