Drishti - the vision

Books

2012-01-14T01:40:00.000-08:00

Chemmeen

T.S.Pillai

Available (Members only)

To be returned in 6 days

The Match

Mark Frost

Available (Members only)

To be returned in 2 weeks

Energy, Education & Employment - Lets change India

2011-04-10T05:22:00.000-07:00

For a very long time I used to think that the issue of any country’s development is a matter of time and, like Adam Smith’s invisible hands of supply and demand, is driven by natural forces of societal evolution. An essential feature of this belief was that there is very little that the current generation can influence and all societies must endure their journey through poverty, poor medical facilities and illiteracy until somehow over a long period of time the societal forces would deliver us into a new era.

Over the last few years I have had the opportunity to visit and live in different countries. This has exposed me to the ways of working of different societies. These countries essentially encompass the entire spectrum of economic development between them. There will be little argument about the benefits of visiting developed nations. A visit to these nations helps us in setting goals for our development. We can learn a lot about new technologies, social structures etc and try and replicate them in our own countries. The advantages of visits to poor countries and lesser developed societies are equally large. It makes you aware of the many mistakes that are being made unconsciously. It makes you aware of your strengths. For example in Nigeria I see that simple things such as immigration procedure are all messed up. Now in India I know this works fairly well, I try and compare the processes in two countries and in the end the only reason I can think of for the differences are those people on the ground.

The earnestness with which people on the ground do their job in the end makes all the difference. So that’s it. This is also my solution for the development of India.

It needs a bit of analysis though. Let’s revisit the statement. “The earnestness with which people on the ground do their job in the end makes all the difference”. The key elements here are “people” which we have in plenty, “earnestness” which has to do with character, “on the ground” which alludes to penetration across the whole value chain and “job” which is about opportunity. For a society to progress it all needs to come together.

The next challenge therefore, is to establish how this will come together. Those who believe in my previous theory would say that there is bare little that we can do proactively and therefore we must wait for the invisible hands of social change to do it for us. I, however, am of a different mind now. And this again in part is influenced by my stay in Nigeria. There is so much around here that I believe can be changed by little effort from the people. And extrapolating that thought to India I can think of so much that we can do in India to change it almost overnight. Ambitious – yes, impossible – certainly not.

So my solution is simple. Fix three things: energy supply, education and employment. In fact the three elements (I will refer to them as 3E’s from now on) are already dependent and therefore a little effort on one front will produce results on all 3.

Energy supply is critical. Whether we like it or not without energy we are paralysed. Yes the fossil fuels are running out, yes the CO2 levels are rising to alarming levels, yes the pollution caused by vehicles and industries is reaching fatal levels but still the harsh reality is that we need energy and we need more energy. Can we influence it? Well, yes, but compared to the other two E’s this one can be influenced a lot less by common man. But let’s just say that the government is thinking about it all the time and it is high on the agenda with the new nuclear power plants and distribution networks being set up. Energy will be needed to afford a respectable life to humans. It is that simple.

Education by far is the biggest E. It can make all the difference at all the levels. And it is the responsibility of each one of us. The fact that we are writing or reading on our computers qualifies us to be an agent of change. Education will not only qualify our work force for jobs but good education will address the issue of earnestness identified in my solution above. And that is key. Let us not forget that education in its narrow sense will only get us opportunities but what we make of those opportunities will depend on the education in its broad sense. Sceptics would now say but what about corruption and what about irresponsible civil behaviour. Education in my opinion will address a large part of that. But then there will always be the likes of Lehmann and Maddoff scams which were propounded by well educated people and which can only be managed by managing the consequence with a sound legal framework. Education will enable us to develop such framework. Petty bribes and thefts will see a significant reduction if people are educated and are grounded on strong moral principles.

Even for prestigious higher institutions like IITs and IIMs the advise holds. Most students entering these institutions might have a lot of raw intellect but there is still a long way to go before each one of them can boast of being world class. Access to education has to be a right. And recently government of India has made it one of the fundamental rights.

The last E is employment. In part it is a consequence of the previous two. In part it will have to be consciously cultivated. Government needs to put in frameworks which empowers entrepreneurs and Indian business houses to create more jobs. Mass herd jobs which downgrade individual’s capability by offering mere money should be condemned. Writer’s, authors and public speakers have a role to play. The education system itself should make students aware of the nature of the industry out there and the key elements of the business value chain. Employment by itself is not enough, it should be of the right kind for the right person. On the one hand one should not be ashamed of doing lesser skilled jobs in order to learn and progress but on the other as a country we should be concerned about creating a lost generation.

It is a good time now for the government of India to start regulating our corporate sector. Given our demographics we are certainly in the driving seat and we must take advantage of this situation to clean up the corporate systems in India. Minimum wage for different skill levels should be enforced. Quality of work environment and other work conditions should be effectively monitored.

So thats my simple solution. And as citizens what we can influence is education.

MAGIITIANS can be an important tool for ideas exchange. Some might say we have Facebook etc so why do we need MAGIITIANS. Simply because it is focussed. Simply because here we will not just discuss but also action our ideas.

I am up for an Education Revolution. I am happy to tie up with anyone who has an idea or is already a member of a group.

Lets change India.

Returning from abroad

2011-04-06T03:41:00.001-07:00

Thanks to the over 8 % GDP growth rate of India, many of us are finding jobs in multinational companies. On many occasions these jobs take us abroad. Assignments in US, Europe, Malaysia, Singapore etc are no longer once in a lifetime phenomenon rather they are very much a routine affair.

I am on an assignment in Nigeria these days. Just this morning I met a Nigerian person who has recently come back from an assignment in far east. While talking to this person I could sense a sort of an unusual behavior. It was not rude or impolite but just purely synthetic.

And as usual this led me to think of many similar incidents in the past and ultimately to this blog.

So this blog is about how some of us might be prone to getting contaminated when we return from our foreign trips.

I remember an incident from my college days. Many students in those days were fortunate to find internships abroad (I was not – so this could be inspired by envy)). One such student while making a presentation on his internship project (after his return to India) seemed to magically have adopted a different accent. He just couldn’t speak straight. Annoyed by this the professor asked him why he was talking like that and in the same accent he replied that he has just returned from Germany and cannot help it. The professor asked how many months he was in Germany and he said 3 to which the professor replied - and in India? He of course did not answer as the whole class broke into peels of laughter. The answer of course was 21 years.

The Nigerian person was behaving somewhat in a similar manner. Speaking with an accent, being overtly polite, behaving at least two job levels higher than their current position. We were all trying to be friendly to this person offering our services to make them settle down easily but apparently the self assured individual did not care for any of it or were we no longer in the same league?

This happens a lot and the sad part is that we might indulge in similar behavior without ever realizing it.

Another incident I remember from my college days relates to me. I was short listed for interview by a foreign multinational. The interview lasted for couple of days with more than 5 sittings. And at the end of it when I returned to normal coffee corner chit chats with my colleagues I seemed to have developed an accent. Irritated by this one of my close friends pointed this to me. It was awkward but indeed I realized I was talking like a buffoon.

There are plenty of other examples in my own life. For instance when I returned from Netherlands to take up a position in Bangalore, I have a feeling, I must have behaved like a snob. Trying to be too gentle and polished. Treating everyone around me in a condescending manner.
Accent is not the only outward manifestation of such disorder. Dressing up is another. Suddenly changing food habits is yet another indicator. And obviously there is this whole other category of indicators that have to do with display of money. That one doesn’t necessarily need a trip abroad though.

Not everyone behaves like this. I have seen people who can seamlessly move between their stay in India and abroad. External influences don’t seem to do much damage to them. A part of this could be character but for us the lesser mortals a bit of awareness should be useful.

In my opinion to be on the safer side it is advisable to tone down a wee-bit extra than usual just in case there is a natural (undetectable) instinct trying to contaminate us and pull us in the other direction. Observing one’s behavior and seeking constant feedback could be a good idea. Another good idea could be to dress up in some of your old clothes. An extra effort to fit in may not hurt.

And for god’s sake stop believing that a trip abroad is anymore a status symbol.

Down the memory lane - Tendulkar & Murali

2011-03-31T13:08:00.000-07:00

The biggest attraction of Saturday for me will be the meeting of two greatest players of Cricket. Murali and Tendulkar. I am just wondering how would they approach each other in this Match. Unlike what the media would like us to believe, I don't think they would face each other like arch rivals. There would be no rivalry. No duel to be fought no point to be proven. It will be a meeting like that of two old friends who set out in life almost together and then now meet under the shade of a tree to reflect on the times gone by. Two individuals who have always seen each other in the background not really very friendly or close to each other but sharing a common link of being from the same era. It is a bit like two people in their 90's who feel deeply connected to each other solely because there are not many of their age alive anymore. Only they can understand each others feelings and emotions.

Murali and Tendulkar were around when cricket was just a game. There stardom came fairly early in their cricketing careers and has never really deserted them since. Both have remain grounded, focussed and have shared a deep passion for the game and a desire to excel. Men of few words they both are.

On 2nd of April they will meet each other for the last time. Backed by their countries and teams who are playing hard to give them the best farewell gift ever. But secretly I believe this will be a lose lose for both Sachin and Murali whichever way it goes. Sachin in his moment of jubilation will feel the pain of Murali's loss and likewise behind Murali's ecstacy would be a tinge of sadness for the greatest batsman that ever was or will be. Murali has a World Cup under his belt and therefore may be (just a small may be) Murali's pain of losing the cup would be healed by Sachin's ultimate triumph. But I don't think their professionalism would desert them even for a moment. Sachin will give Murali's every ball the treatment that it deserves and Murali's every ball would be hungry for Sachin's wicket. That is the greatness of these two men.

They both would need to awaken the Arjuna in them who is well guided by Lord Krishna in the battlefield (I hate to use such analogies but let me do it this one time). At the end of it all what would they think of saying to each other. May be Murali would finally hug Sachin out there in the open and say a big thank you for being such a great player and human being who inspired Murali for all these decades. May be Sachin would want to finally give up his stoical demeanour for once and walk up to Murali and say a big thank you for reinforcing his belief in the pursuit of excellence and nothing else while playing cricket.

Or it could be that Sachin would just say "Murali, you have grown a bit fat" or Murali would just say "Hey Sachin your son looks just like you". We wouldn't know. We would never know. What is most likely to happen is that they would just as quietly walk away from the field stealing a glance at each other as they had walked into the field on their maiden encounter.

No matter what happens their presence would comfort each other. They would rest reassured by the fact that there is at least one more person on the field who shares same principles and belief when it comes to cricket. Even in their silence would be a comfort of familiarity. In the middle of all those youngsters they would meet like two old grandpas who can still remember the day Gandhiji called out for the Quit India movement.

For me it will be a great loss. It was a great loss when Ganguly left the field forever but that one was not allowed to settle in because of the circumstances under which it happened. It was a great loss when Kumble bid farewell to the game but Tendulkar out there was a consolation. And now suddenly two of the best the very best would depart leaving a vaccum which the newer generation would never feel and mine would never forget. It is written in the Vedas - Whatever cannot be cured must be endured. Some might wonder if really the loss is so tragic as to warrant the invoking of Vedas. I don't know.

On the 2nd of April when Murali and Tendulkar will meet again nothing about them would be special and yet nothing would be ordinary just like it has never been.

Writer's block

2011-03-26T04:21:00.000-07:00

What do you do when you cannot muster the discipline to align your thoughts and put them down on paper for almost 6 months? A phenomenon which can be described as a writer's block. You probably go looking for all the old stuff that you have ever written on the websites like Orkut and facebook including testimonials or some not so short posts and try to preserve them, hoping against hope that it might inspire you to believe in yourself once again and provide the much needed kick-start and momentum.

I did it this morning. Went scurrying on the orkut website to copy and save all testimonials I had written to my friends almost three years ago and hastily made a word document out of it.

It was a great feeling. Some of these friends I have not spoken to in a long time. And if I do a geographical analysis, between then I can cover almost all the continents. It feels nice sometimes to revisit the past. And the past now (as against in the past) can be revisited readily by clicking on those old photographs on your hard drive or by opening those first few emails which you sent to your friends almost 10 years ago. Most of it is lying there safely on the web world. Testimonials again I thought was the greatest invention of orkut and could have proved to be their USP if they would have played it right. Nothing ever provided such an expressive avenue to articulate one's feelings for friends. It used to be a wonderful feeling to open your orkut page to find that message "so and so has writtten you a testimonial" and in most cases tears almost always welled up in my eyes reading that stuff. May be not all of that was absolutely true but then it felt great. Sometimes it conjured apology towards that friend who I might not have seen in the same light in my life as he did me in his. For that one little invention Orkut spread more love on this planet.

Facebook horribly fails at it. It lets you say so much about yourself (What's on your mind?) but has no place to talk about your friends. You can like dislike etc but that too is a more reactive than proactive expression. Facebook on the other hand seems to inspire more envy than love. There has been research which shows that on an average people feel bad after reading updates on their friend's facebook pages. It has almost become a medium of vindication. People engage in events with the thought of putting it up on facebook. Never thought that orkut ever instilled such emotions.

Anyways, if you have not tried visiting your old emails and orkut site in a long time do it now. Read those messages that you sent long ago and they would reveal a genuine you to yourself. In many cases I realised that I am now not even capable of writing those kind of messages. May be I am not as pure now as I used to be. May be I can still salvage myself may be not but then memories will persist. And certainly this exercise helped me revisit my writing style and how my thought process works, what am I passionate about and what my weaknesses are. All good starting points for waking up the sleeping (hopefully not dead by now) writer in me. A big reason behind this block is what can be called "Resistance". A powerful force that feeds itself on our fears and then works against us. The longer I don't write the more difficult it becomes for me to start again. This "Resistance" somehow makes us acutely aware of all the distractions around us and helps us push in that direction taking us further away from our goals - which for a writer is to write. In my case when I dont write enough my comprehension power of what I read declines too. This only aggravates the matter because the more my comprehension goes down the faster the number of ideas to write about decline. What's the way out? Don't know. May be as I wrote earlier revisiting what we have written before. Putting the ego aside and starting afresh with a willingness to make mistakes again.
There could be more ideas. Hope some of them will strike me. For now I am happy that that's about 600 words written now. Hope this will last and the writer's block will not come back to haunt me again.

Big thanks to Orkut and Yahoo mail too.

Who are we?

2010-09-17T12:25:00.000-07:00

Who are we if not that symbol of excellence fallen from heights?

Who are we if not the seeker of greatness strayed from our paths?

Who are we if not the storm that can move mountains made weak by our own fears?

Who are we if not a noble soul blinded by our own ambition?

Who are we if not a brave warrior bridled by the thought of failure?

Who are we if not a farmer corrupted by the greed of harvest?

Who are we if not the master of our destiny fallen prey to our senses?

Who are we if not the reflection of God muddled by the haze of pleasure?

Are we not that who was destined to do great things?

Are we not that who was created to make the Creator proud?

Aren’t we the music that would flow like the carefree wind?

Are we not just who we were?

Nostalgia...

2010-08-19T11:07:00.000-07:00

Nostalgia has been one of my favourite words of English language. Not just because it contains in itself a powerful emotion which seems to accord the "Past" its rightful importance over the much hyped "Present" and the much feared "Future", but also because of the sheer formation of the word itself. The last syllable is open ended which continues into eternity and rightly so, as someday it would indeed engulf all that is present and will be future.
It did not break into my vocabulary until very recently (may be as recently as 8 years ago) and for some reason Nostalgia always sticks out in my mind with one other word- Nepotism. May be because they are usually in the same section of the vocabulary lists. Whereas Nepotism is overtly negative and may seem to be unrelated to Nostalgia I have always felt the two words to be very closely related. And together they remind me of human weaknesses. No matter how strong someone pretends to be, everyone at some point in time, in moments of great failure and great successes becomes nostalgic. Nostalgic for the past which was so simple, limited, predictable and familiar. Same goes for Nepotism. No matter how much we want to be fair and objective at some point in our life or other we do succumb to the temptation of helping and favouring our near and dear ones. May be one reason why Nostalgia and Nepotism seem related to me is that they both concern family and although they colour our emotions about family in completely contrast shades for me they are the truth of our existence, a reminder of our limitations, of our being human.

A month in Nigeria

2010-07-24T11:56:00.000-07:00

It has been over a month since I came to Nigeria. Life did not give me any hints until last year that Nigeria could be on the list. Coming from where I came from this was not even a remote possibility and no one (Paul the octopus included) could ever have predicted that I would watch the 2010 FIFA world cup in a room on Bonny Island in the middle of the Atlantic. But in the end I did. And I am not complaining, no, actually quite the contrary. I am in fact delighted that i got some new company and a very charged up atmosphere which made the games far more enjoyable than they would have been back home. And then of course Ghana was the icing on the cake.

Nigeria has turned out to be quite an experience (this one I am sure anyone could have predicted). Though it is not the usual experience of being charmed by the great architecture or scenic beauty or daredevil stunts or anything like that which are more characterstic of the West. This is an experience in People. It is about ignorance. About the sheer enormity of the imagination of the human mind and his relentless pursuit of it. For instance the place where I am posting this blog from can only be reached by very few means of transport (read two) under tight security. Every single piece of metal, every single pebble and all the necessities of life have been brought onto this island from outside.

The sheer scale of operations and that of the problems that plague them is astronomical. Any sane man would be intimidated by the prospect of building something like this. But then not all men are sane and thats why the world progresses. Not everyone things about where his next bread will come from but they are more interested in finding the next opportunity which would stretch the mankind to its limits and then a bit more. And in the shadow of such men the mankind takes giant strides.

Back to people and ignorance. Never before have I felt so misled and misguided by the conventional wisdom of my elders. All that they thought they knew or told me about the people in Africa is not only incorrect but so venemously incorrect that those who could be found guilty of propagating such thoughts should be convicted. Here are some of the best people that I have ever met. If you think Indians are hospitable then you need to come down here and meet the Nigerians. In welcoming the guests they are second to none. In their darkest hours they are driven by hope. In a world made by God and so hopelessly biased against them they hail the glory of God. I have met people who in their mid-forties are still nurturing dreams of becoming engineers and putting such hard work into it that sometimes I almost feel ashamed of myself. And all this with a sense of great humility.

As soon as you step into this country there is one phrase which you will hear almost as often as you would see a new face. 'You are welcome'. And over a period of time I have developed my own response to it. 'Well, thank you very much I indeed feel very welcome'. And I do.

Yes there are problems. But they are not the problems because of the people here. They might be the victims but certainly not the perpetuators. I will delve into the economic issues of Nigeria in some other post for now it should suffice to reproduce a line from a Nigerian advert "Good people great nation"

Black and White Photos

2010-05-30T00:30:00.000-07:00

Time to revive my blog. Well why not, in near future this will be one of my few closest links with friends. More on that later.

Today I want to say something about the black and white photos. I was looking at some old family pictures and some of them were black & white. Unfortunately none of them had me in it (blame my DOB). But there were my parents and my relatives. And although I liked the coloured photographs quite a bit the B&W attracted my attention time and again. And I realised thats probably because the B&W pics are special in several ways. Just like our own memory storage system they have the ability to preserve the most essential and let go the rest. They leave something to imagination and they boast proudly of being from a different era.

Whereas a coloured picture brings out even the minutest detail and you might get embroiled in the blues and the yellows, a B&W keeps it simple, well just as its name suggests - Black or White, letting you stare continuously at the faces of people. Thats the other thing (and may be its just my family) but I found very few pics, of buidings or landscapes, which did not have people in them. Could be because cameras were new sensation and in India in those times landscapes were not so rare or fast disappearing and buildings were not so many and fast rising, that more film was spent on capturing people than inanimate objects.

And when you look at them now after so many years they have also begin to fade away. Taking away from us even the last few tinges of memories that remain. But whatever remains is powerful enough to rejuvenate in us the memories of old times and to allow us the luxury of imagination in choosing to colour those pics the way we like.

Same for the B&W movies I guess. Would we not forever after watching Awaara or It's a wonderful Life be busy colouring the characters. Imagining what they would look like in Eastman colour or (whatever is there now) allows us to relish the experience again and again. But do we want them to be coloured ? No, not me. That will be like depriving me of my clay that I use to create and re-create new objects.

Little wonder I choose to switch my camera into B&W mode as often as I can (you cannot always, specially if you are clicking a person and he/she wants all the colourful glory to be captured). Dont know whether this will be able to create the same affect 30 years later but we will see....

…this place

2010-03-04T05:47:00.000-08:00

I wrote this article in my final year at college for a magazine (I am not even sure if this was ever published). I found this accidentally while organiszing my computer data and thought may be it is worth atleast my own blogpost...

The best way to begin this writing would be to quote what one of my seniors’ wrote when I (in my first year then…) asked him to give me an article for the magazine narrating his experiences in the campus over his four years of stay here. He wrote, “It is very difficult even to conceive that one is going to step out of a place which till yesterday seemed eternally yours.”

As I sit down to write this article, where I am supposed to tell my juniors what to expect of this place and how to react to it, the reality of leaving this place, very soon, has begun to sink in. I am not exactly nostalgic because I haven’t yet left my SB-1 but it seems to be eluding me. Am I afraid of leaving this place? May be I am, but the question is why? Did I not have a life before I came here, or have I not been going home all these years on the weekends? Then why should it all seem so difficult now?

No more 2 A.M. visits to Nescafe, but then will I not be able to afford the best menu at Barista at whatever time of day I wish?

No more classes to attend, but then didn’t I always so loudly complain that they shouldn’t be so early in the morning?

No late night walks and no late afternoon lunches, but then will I not be able to see the early morning sun?

What am I cribbing for? Didn’t I always long to get out of this place and quickly reach out for that the love of which had brought me to this place.

In retrospect I am not even in a position to name this place as I can’t find a suitable name to address it with. Geographically it is IIT-Delhi but is that all, certainly not. It is a part and parcel of our lives. Everyone who has been a part of this system has benefited from here in more ways than one. The four years that I have spent here are by no means normal four years of my life, they have not only prepared me for the journey called life but they have made visible to me the vast sea of opportunities that lies ahead. In a few months time (and I hope my BTP does not play a spoilsport here) I will be a part of a legacy and how deserved that partnership would be will depend on how do I utilize the advantage of having lived here for four years.

No matter how much and how desperately I try I can not continue to live in this place forever but I can almost certainly aspire to live this place forever.

I think, having expressed my long contained fear in the initial lines, it would be advisable now to move to issues that any reader, reading a “passing out’s” article, would be looking forward to.

The obvious question to ask me at this point is, “How should one conduct himself during his stay in the campus?” Honestly, I have no single answer to this and this is because of two reasons. Firstly, I can by no means claim to have lived my life in a way which is even remotely close to the best way and secondly, because I have seen people succeeding (or call it, failing) in so many ways. However, there is one suggestion that I would like to make at this point and the source of this suggestion is pure experience. The keywords to living your life in this place are: Not competition but cooperation (this may be contrary to the popular belief that competition is paramount here and that is what separates IITs from most other places on Earth), not grades but insights and knowledge and not awards but interests. This seems like a normal oft repeated success formula, does it not, but that precisely is the point that I am trying to make. A rewarding and fulfilling life here is governed by the same factors as elsewhere but still the fact that this place stands out is only indicative of a diligent effort, by the people who have been here and made it what it is, to instill these factors in their personalities. This place is a wonderful platform where one’s growth is limited only by his imagination.

During one of my conversations with a member of a recruiting team of a very reputed financial firm that came to the campus this year, I came to know that most people whom he has met from Pakistan in US (that’s where he currently lives) hail invariably either from Lahore or Karachi or Islamabad (all these are the metropolitans of Pakistan). However, he said, this is not the case with Indians in America. They are from so many different cities of India but what binds these people is that if working in corporate sectors or academia they are mostly IIT or IIM alumni. This means that IITs act as a talent search engine for our country and as I have already mentioned they provide us with a platform from where we are free to fly as high as our will and desires permit us.

The fairness of its selection procedure and the fierce competition ensures that only the very best gets in. With all due respect to all those who in spite of their brilliant minds and diligent pursuit could not make it to one of these seven campuses, I claim that every student who has been able to make it to this campus is unique in some positive way and all that he should aspire to is to find out what makes him unique.

The key to goal attainment in my opinion is to remain focused and not give up in the face of failure. It is very important to realize that we are here to learn and by no means are we supposed to know everything when we arrive. So it is basically the desire to improve and excel that differentiates the full blooded IITians from just IITians.

The next thing that I wish to take up here is what should be our next step after IIT and what factors generally govern our choices. To answer this I will again steal a little excerpt from my senior’s article (I hope he does not mind little bit of plagiarism). He said,” What you do tomorrow is only half as important as what you do today and how well you do what you do today would determine what you will do tomorrow.” I hope I have successfully preserved the essence of his comment.

Welcome 2010

2009-12-31T20:30:00.000-08:00

2009 will be remembered for all the wrong reasons and may be a few good ones too (the Oscars). It was a year where the humanity as a whole was plunged into darkness. The feel good and India shining and Asia growing sentiments were weighed down by ground realities. Obama took charge and promised a new hope to the World he might not have succeded much but he certainly was a good bet. India found its own Obama in Rahul Gandhi and Manmohan Singh after almost a decade of fractured verdicts proved that single biggest majority party in India is not the stuff of fairy tales.
Impact of financial crisis presented some valuable wisdom to the youth of our country. Saving for the future, not complaining too much about how bad their jobs are and realising that hard work and persistence are timeless values. Copenhagen summit brought the Climate discussion to the forefront and although not many people are giving it a chance, it surely was a significant event for the Planet.
Sachin Tendulkar and Amitabh Bachchan continued to scale new heights and make India proud. Mahendra Singh Dhoni became only the second captain in 132 years of test history to not have lost a single match in his first 10 Tests. Sehwag and Gambhir certainly look more mature and ready to take over from Dravid & (I hate to say this) Tendulkar.

So all in all this was not such a bad year after all. It did crash a lot of hopes but then may be many of them were not realisitic in the first place?
I am sure if you look back you will also find enough reasons to smile and remember 2009 for some good reasons. I certainly will.

2010 is a bit like Obama in our lives. Our only chance and a ray of hope... not because there is anything special about it but mostly because there is not much else to bank on. So lets move ahead in this new year with all our learnings of the past year and a renewed enthusiasm.

I wish you all a very happy new year and success!

I had failed once...

2009-07-22T07:38:00.000-07:00

What can be more misleading than the title of this post? The immodest title implies that I have failed only once in my life so far. Nothing is further from truth but I will stick to this as it allows a punchy opening to this post. So unless you have absolutely zero tolerance for lies and poetic liberty, please bear with me.

I was once appointed (another lie, in fact I was elected through a political process which left much to be desired when it came to fairness but may be more on it someday later) the Secretary for the English Debating and Literary Club at IIT Delhi, quite a coveted position I must say. And for those of you who have been spared the agony of moving through IITs here is a quick description of how these clubs worked. So we had nine of them in areas such as Hindi , Quizzing, English Debating, Dramatics etc and each of them had a secretary who was elected through a free and fair election (now I have really run out of my quota of lies for the next 7 births) and every hostel (again 9 in my time) had one representative in each of these clubs So for my club I was the secretary and had 9 reps.

Now there is this nice spot in IIT Delhi which is called wind tunnel. It is a bit like Zoom TV, when you are running out of all options and have no clue what to do you headed towards it. And so there was no place more befitting than Wind-T for my first club meeting. And the approach to the Wind-T was lined by a 2 brick high wall. So raised just about 15 cms above the ground, this wall was a natural dumping ground for people who would walk about a km from their hostel to get here. When I reached there almost all the reps were nicely seated on this wall.

Just a minor detail which was omitted in the beginning - at the end of the academic year they gave out a best secretary trophy.

So back to my seated reps. The moment I got there I opened this small diary which I had bought the day before and had used to pen down all my ideas about how I wish to run the club and what would I do etc etc. And in less than 5 minutes of my arrival a monologue had started and I kept talking, telling people how I saw this club going forward what I thought should be done. All these reps were only a year junior to me at college and in age some of them were as old as me and may be older. The point here is that I should ideally have had no reason to believe that any of them is any less capable than I am. And since they were 9 of them I should have known that together they can come up with better things. But those were college days and I was in a hurry. So I made this monologue not only in this meeting but also in many meetings later on and came up with many ideas by myself and some of them were good but not all (at last I am capable of speaking truth). So we worked and we did some decent things in that one year and then finally when the Best secretary was announced it was not me. I was upset and like really upset (now dont you start dropping your jaws, it did seem like very important at that time). I looked back at it during the rest of my college days and never really felt great about being the secretary and all that until recently. Now when I work in teams and when I see some leaders too obsessed with themselves I turn back to my college experience and say to myself - I have learnt my lesson. If I were to do it again I would start my first meeting at a coffee corner trying to understand each one of my reps. Trying to figure out what is dear to them. Like I had my aspirations of running the club in a certain way what would be theirs. One key thing which I had missed inadvertently was to show respect to everyone. I dont mean I was rude or anything but there is a certain kind of respect which goes beyond polite words and correct titles. This form of respect inherently believes that anyone's life, dream and journey is as important as our own. It believes that they are as much a super hero in their home and in the eyes of their dear one's as I am in my world. So I had failed once and I might fail several times again in future but I will make sure I will not fail to respect anyone. I will not fail to notice the human being behind the face and not only just the person but also the person in his whole world.

The best dilbert I have read so far

2009-06-26T01:22:00.001-07:00

If the print is too small to read then try the below link:

http://www.prouztech.com/images/dilbert_tech-support.gif

Winning hearts and minds

2009-06-09T23:52:00.000-07:00

Hello (to anyone who has had the patience to hang around for a long long time to wait for this post).

So this one is about winning hearts and minds. Hopefully this post will become progressively clear over the next 300 words or so.
I was just talking to a colleague a few moments ago and suddenly I thought I was acting a bit foolish. Helping her more than she would ever expect or imagine. So essentially foolish by our social standards.
Now I am not sure if I am generalising too much but I have seen that the society in which we live (or at least untill 10 years ago) valued those who would remain reserved and inapproachable, show up late in meetings and crack jokes that would make everyone else laugh and they themselves would never even acknowledge other'e joke by even as much as a smile. And growing up as corner office aspirant's we tend to copy some of those behaviours as well. Now going back to this colleague of mine, my first impulse was "not to help" and quickly become inapproachable so as to reinforce my importance and then only help her a little bit and that too in such a way as to make her realise that I am too busy. I did none of this. Don't know why but I went complete other direction. I made abundantly clear that I am free, offered her help and then when she thought she was done I offered her a few more options and thats when I realised may be I appeared a bit foolish. Now if I think of all the people that I like or admire, most of them have this ability to loook foolish. And they may be able to win our minds by their impeccable intellectual ability but it is their foolishness that makes them win our hearts.
I personally think gone are the days when you could inspire awe by outwitting people in arguments (this works well by the way in college debates but not if you are looking for committment from your employees as leaders) or intellectually dominate them by throwing around facts and figures which would baffle them completely. In order to be successful and particularly as a leader one needs to inspire love and make people believe of his/her innocence. A smart way, contrary to past practices of boasting of strengths and appear super human, is to accept weaknesses and appear as human as others. And then you create that trust that willingness in them to help you regardless of any personal motives.
So take time to not only crack your jokes but also laugh at those of others. Act foolish sometimes. Turn up for meeting a little earlier and behave as if you were the least busy of all other participants. Now I dont understand the exact science as to why this works but from my personal experience I am sure it does.

Ivory tower education vs. Practical wisdom

2009-03-15T23:05:00.000-07:00

This morning when I was coming to the office, a guy jumped out of a running bus and only by a hair's breadth managed to avert falling on my car. This isn't the worst of such actions that I have seen but this reminded me of something similar from the past and then led to a chain of (un) connected thoughts and finally to this blog.
So during my years at college I used to go home on the weekends and generally carried a small hand bag with me. During one such trips in my first year I had done a similar (to the one by the guy above) stunt and jumped off the bus while it was still moving. This was not the gravest of my sins, what I had done potentially fatally wrong was that I was about to jump off the bus in the direction opposite to its motion. One of the guys in the bus (he was probably a labourer or someone) noticed this and shouted "aage ki taraf, aage ki taraf" (face towards the front) - the words hit me like an arrow with a firehead and flamed in me the thoughts - "Oh shit - damn Newton" and I had only enough time to change my direction to make it perpendicular to the bus so that I could still shift my weight in the direction of the bus motion and avoid falling. I was completely shaken by this act of offboarding and thanked the guy in the bus who had by that time left with the bus as the driver never actually stopped it. Moral of the story - This guy in the bus managed to do what none of my physics teachers or H.C.Verma or Irodov or Resnick or Halliday could. He explained to me the practical significance of Newton's laws. I am not suggesting that Irodov or Resnick Halliday did not make a difference but so did this guy.
In Good Will hunting Will (Matt Damon) goes through a similar conversation with Sean (Robin Williams). Sean tells Will that you might know all about the St. Peter Basillica and who was its architect and what all statues adorn the place etc etc but you would never know what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You might know all about war and war strategies and which one was fought when but you would never know what it means to hold your dearest friend in your lap when he is breathing his last in the battlefield. You might know all about woman psychology but you would never know what it means to wake up besides the same woman for 32 years and hold her.
I think it is one of the best dialogues I have ever listened to. This has forever changed the way i will look at textbook education, rhetorical discussions etc.
Another similar conversation I had with one of my collegues who told me that it is one thing to sign off a document to mobilise 2000 people on a construction site and a completely different thing to actually appreciate what a herculean task it is.
Same is true for all these glossy slidepacks that we make day in and day out without ever appreciating what each box on the slide and each arrow connecting two of those symbolise. All this money trading business without ever appreciating what these companies manufacture or how have they evolved over time and what needs they serve is another classic case in point.
No wonder many people are still debating the topic "Whether Elite Institutions Produce Best Leaders". I would say there is no connection between the two. Education is very important no doubt but not sufficient. And so those who manage to couple their education with good understanding of the world do wonders and others dont. Similarly even if one has not had a lot of formal education but all the practical wisdom, one can still be succssful by duly compensating for his/her lack of education by surrounding him/her with the right kind of people.

How many of us (engineers) can take our car's apart and reassemble them or even repair minor problems? This could be a good starting point for getting our hand's dirty may be. It should put us in the right mindset of being able to learn things end to end and then re-apply them to new and more complex challenges. not just peripherally look at things and use the cliched "I dont like to get into details" kind of reasons. This will help us understand the consequences of the decisions, we suggest should be made.

And I think this in the end is what makes all the difference. Many people can write about war but few can fight it. Almost everbody in the current economic crisis is perhaps criticizing their big bosses for rolling out the redundancy programmes but very few can suggest an alternative or can even understand what it means to go to bed when you are sitting on top of a billion dollar conglomerate. Someone told me that the most difficult decision I will ever make in my life would probably be to fire someone and may be someone who would have invited me home for dinner in the past and whose children would not believe that I fired their Dad. And no MBA course will ever provide me with a handbook of "How to best fire people?" or something like that. Only experiences and wounds from the battlefield can make a warrior.

For me from now on and forever afterwards Practical Wisdom and the guy who possesses it will command a lot more respect than any french cuffed, tie adorning Consultant who has seen not much else than the university campus.

So that co-passenger in the bus that day opened my eyes to the importance of practical wisdom and the guy this morning brought it all back to me in the right context and probably during the right time. - Thanks guys!

Ahmedabad - Progress through collaboration

2009-02-28T00:40:00.000-08:00

Ok so here is my promised blog on Ahmedabad trip that I recently made. Most of it will be about Ahmedabad rather than the trip (just a convenient filter for some users who might want to carefully choose what they read). A bit of a history here - I have grown up in Ahmedabad, went to three different schools there and spent almost 8 years in that city. So I used to use IIM Ahmedabad as a landmark to give directions long before my fellow-IITians made it their ambition, goal and all that. Not to say that its value as a landmark is anywhere comparable to its value as India's best B-School but thats just how useful it was to me back then.

Not only had I demeaned the status of IIM Ahmedabad by using it purely for the purpose of giving directions but also I had sinned against other great institutions such as PRL (Physical Researc Laboratory) set up by Vikram Sarabhai, ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) frequented by Abdul Kalam and what must have contributed to the success of Chandrayan mission, Blind Men's Association- a one of its kind institution in the whole of India and visited by Prince Charles during his India trip and a few more. So you see all of these were located within a 5 K.M radius from my house and it was just impossible to resist the tempatation of using them to guide my relatives home. (Now some of you must surely be interested in knowing the property prices near my home - try 40 Lakhs for a modest 2 bedroom appartment).

Enough of history! So I went back to Ahmedabad after a long time (about 3 years) and although I had prepared myself to face many surprises in the city (was lucky to have been forewarned) but none of the preparations came handy when the shocks begun to hit me. Here was a city with all possible signs of good even excellent governance written all over it. Well planned roads, big plush shopping malls, none of the usual urban obscenity hitting you etc. and things had only changed for better.

Everyone seemed happy and very proud of their city. The natives still form a large part of Ahmedabad's population something which is not true for many of our other modern cities. Take for example Bangalore - less than 25% of the population would be localites and this sort of leads to lack of any sense of pride or interest in city's development.

Development has taken place at all levels. So on the one hand there are these nice luxurious malls with best brands and on the other there are these basic "Call an ambulance in 20 minutes" sort of services which are all running great. A largely organic growth has ensured a fine balance between infrastructure supply and demand. And the best of all is the underlying philosophy that guides the whole deveopment process - one of collaboration.

What I was amazed to see was that most of the new shopping complexes, food courts etc were now inhabited by those who used to have road-side lorries or small shops. So the conversations did not go like - "Oh you see that five star restaurant - there used to be a sandwich shop which was bought over and demolished" rather - " You remember that small sandwich shop here, well the man went on to build this nice hotel right there". And there were far too many such examples to be discarded as exceptions. There had to be some mechanism which ensured that the growth was a win/win everytime it occurred. When I first went back to my old neighbourood I was not expecting to see many of the old shops but I did find all the old shopkeepers owning bigger better shops largely in the same business.

As many of you would know Gujarat is a dry state - ok some of you might want to point out that it still has maximum liquor consumption in the country and I would not contest that, but the thing is that by banning it in public the social life is much safer, roads are much safer and still those who drink are made to realise that they have to do it in secret and that it is not the right thing- something they must be ashamed of. Unlike in other cities where drinking is cool and people have even forgotten to be ashamed of it.

Talk of simple things such as eating out in a restaurant. What a pleasant experience it is when you shell out some money and go back home satisfied that you have been delivered the value. A delicious, pleasant meal in Ahmedabad made up for all the futile attempts that I have made in Bangalore over the past year or so to dine in peace.

Turning to those readers who might be interested in real estate. Again a perfect place to invest your money or plan for your settlement home. A genuine market driven pricing ensures that the fundamental laws of real estate are not violated - although you wont find promises of becoming rich overnight but you would also not run the risk of investing in a completely futile venture. As mentioned before personal housing is developing very much in line with the infrastructure. Unlike in Gurgaon and Bangalore where exiting glass palace- like bulidings will lead you into unpaved roads and unmanned crossings.

Also since multinational companies, IT sector etc form a limited share of Ahmedabad's economy it is slightly more immune to the current financial crisis. So loss of a few thousand jobs overnight in the city is unheard of - yet.

Combine this with a strong corporate face of Gujarat and no one will doubt that it is indeed a place to consider when you are deciding on which city to live in.

I am not giving any credit to Modi (which actually might be unfair) and neither am I taking anything away from him. I simply do not have enough information to reach any such conclusion. But if progress is a performance indicator of the government than Modi's government has got it right.

The only thing that worries me is how long can Gujarat sustain this. Some of these brilliant BPO companies etc would soon be thinking of bringing in their large scale, quick money making operations to the city and with it all the associated vices such as large scale immigration, lot of wealth in young hands without enough maturity to spend wisely, an imbalance in supply demand destroying the customer mindset which is Gujarat's greatest strength. But then may be Gujaratis are too smart to be corrupted like this. Otherwise they might have already given in to these things by now.

The same warmth which I felt many years ago still resides in the heart of people there. I am glad I made this trip and am very happy to look for oportunities to go back again.

Well done Ahmedabad!

P.S. - I am not a Gujarati.

My Resume

2009-02-19T00:34:00.000-08:00

Apologies to those for whom it is a repeat telecast...

My Resume

Most prominent was the name on the top,
though little difference did it make.
Even with a Tom Dunst sitting there,
Little notice people would take.

All the time that I have spent on this earth
Sat right there on the corner of the page
With a sense of remorse on the years I had lost
I looked once again at my age

And the days when I had gone to school,
And the days when I had earned some glory.
Were right there in a nice looking table,
Forming the next part of my life’s story.

It was all there sitting one after the other
My talents, my interests, my skills and my knowledge
And placed arrogantly in a league of its own
Was the name of my prestigious college.

The college days asserted their authority
And demanded a line for every year
Courses, politics, posts and grades
Was all spelled out loud and clear

And here it was, a desperate effort
To prove my worth to everyone
A verbose and glossy account
Of all the work that I had ever done

The memories of my golden days
Came rushing back wanting to applaud
As I browsed through the golden words
Describing the grandeur of my every award.

Printed in black and white
It was my life for all to see
It was all that I had ever been
And all that I could ever be

And yet I knew this is not me
I knew I was more than people were seeing
A professional, a student, and a candidate
But above all I was a human being

Where was the cricket in the neighborhood?
And where were the days I had spent in rain?
Where was the love and care of my grandmother?
When I had come back home wailing in pain.

Where were those fights and those torn clothes?
And those smiles of triumph and victory
Where was the gang of old boys?
And the evergreen backyard mango tree

I searched and searched but all in vain
There was no hint of my childhood
No mention of those fairy tales
Nothing about my Robin hood

I held it up once more against my eyes
This was my life for all to see
This is what I have ever been
And all that I could ever be

And there were others sitting nicely in a stack
The paper version of lives in the blue tray
With hopes and prayers and trembling hands
I added to it my Resume

Kunal Chandra
22.07.2008

Feedback

2009-02-16T22:50:00.001-08:00

I have just returned from my trip to Ahmedabad. It was a great experience but more about that in my next blog. This one is about feedback. I am very particular about safety, so much so that it borders on obsession sometimes. This can be partially attributed to the industry I work in (oil) where all the time you are dealing with a potential mass-destructive bomb and partially to the fact that I believe dying on roads is a waste of life.
Anyways, so I took this taxi to the airport the other day. I had ordered a Meru Cab, which is one of the best taxi services available in Bangalore (and also in Mumbai and Delhi I think). They have very high safety standards etc etc (so they claim). But half-way to the airport the driver started to resort to his own ways (which he must have picked up driving call centre cabs - a guess) which included driving at 100 Km/hr without maintaining enough distance from the car ahead and talking on the mobile phone at the same time etc etc. In spite of repeated warnings he stuck to his ways and some how delivered me at the airport in a bit of shaken state. First thing that I did when I got off the car was to call the Meru Cabs and give FEEDBACK. OK my thoughts were exactly same as yours are now - whats the use?. I went ahead with the call anyways. I told them (Meru Cabs operator) look he (the driver) has managed to get away with this sort of driving this time but you cant expect him to be lucky all the time and the greatest danger he poses is to himself because everytime he drives he is a potential victim. I said all this and a bit about the potential damage to their reputation and hung up. Two days later I got a call from Meru. They were grateful for the feedback and wanted to know some more details so that they could take some action, which I happily provided.
Yesterday I took another cab back to home from the airport and made it absolutely clear to the driver and the booking guys at the airport that I won't tolerate any indiscipline in driving. They reassured me that the driver will comply. It was a pleasant ride back home. This time the driver delivered me in a joyous (someone help me with a better adjective) mood. And the first thing that I did when I got off the cab was - you are right - give feedback - certainly a positive one in this case requesting the operator to make sure that this driver is allowed to play a role model in some way to the other staff. I was amazed when the person on the other side of the line ensured twice that it was not a complain but a postive feedback.
So I learnt two things that day, one- give feedback - you never know when it might help some one and two - also give positive feedback - our countrymen have begun to expect it less and less.
I do this to my IT helpdesk. I make sure that the voice on the phone passes over his/her boss's email id to me and then I send a personal email acknowledging their effort. I do this to people who give me ride in their cars and congratulate them on driving safely. I do this to my boss. Ok I agree that could be seriously career limiting sometimes but what stops us from doing that to the others I just mentioned. I am sure you all in your corporate lives (Selva sir I will pass on the feedback models etc to you) have heard about various models of giving feedback BIC and all that. Use them or whatever and try giving feedbacks - it is a very rewarding experience - but like in all acts of life so also in this - let's be genuine.

What gear do you drive in ?

2009-01-25T09:11:00.000-08:00

Those of you who drive will agree with me, that in most uncertain situations 2nd gear is the best to drive your car in. It gives you an opportunity to quickly slow down and if you have the luxury of a few extra unclaimed yards then you can quickly seize those too by accelerating just a little bit more. No real hassles, not much risk involved, a sense of complete control (just a sense) and smooth ride. OK! before a speed lover points out let me accept that indeed the ride is devoid of any thrill. So what? It is much safer, risk-free and with a higher probability of getting to where I am headed to. So unless you put me in a Volvo with at least six air bags, ABS, obstruction sensors and parachutes I will not speed -up on roads. But what about life?
Are we also living our lives in second gear? Trying to exercise that sense of control and making it hassle-free?
Are we forfeiting the right to thrilling successes just because we do not wish to run the risk of painful failures. Are we settling for that little bit of extra unclaimed yards and not speeding up too much? May be the real risk that we are running is to leave unclaimed that, which rightly belongs to us. May be we should judge ourselves not by that which has passed but by that which lies ahead, not by that which we could not achieve but by that which we could, not by our failures but our dreams, not by all that we could not become but by all that we can.
And here it might make more sense to put your life's car in third gear, may be fourth and sometimes even fifth. It will be much more thrilling, yes there will be risks but the ride will probably be worth it. And when we shall arrive we might be bruised even wounded but we would look back at the journey with a smile and say, "Man... that was something".

So accelerate before you run out of fuel or before you reach where you never wanted to but always thought you had to. Release the unleashed potential of your car before it comes to a grinding halt at the will of nature's forces. Turn into those unchartered lanes. Fail we must and we will but let us not give up. Let's stop living our lives like guided tours and for once be our own GPS. We will in the end realise it is much better to have wished and not achieved than to never have wished at all.
And if you are waiting to find that Volvo with six airbags and ABS and parachutes before you accelerate then trust me, in life, it ain't coming.

Do nothing - Perfect strategy for terrorists ?

2009-01-16T07:38:00.000-08:00

I am a strategist. I like to think of interesting strategies. Pulling things together, understanding trends, making predictions, optimizing activities etc. etc. Sometimes I look at different people around me and try to think of what i would do in their positions. For example how would I launch a car in the market or as a doctor how would i maximise benefit for my patients etc.
The most recent role to which I played an imaginary understudy was that of a terrorist.
I sat thinking what should be the best strategy for people who wish to destroy India. After lot of deliberation I reached to a conclusion that inaction is perhaps the best action.

As an Indian, every morning I get up to the threat of meeting with an accident on the road. Even if I manage to reach office safely I am not sure if I can still be sure of a job. Some whimisical investment bankers up there on the East coast of America can create havoc in the lives of me and my friends just because the idiots thought that they can make a lot of money by giving loans to people who will surely default.
If that does not happen at least I am sure to ruin my day by making a purchase at any shop or eating at any restaurant where people are shamelessly conspiring to cheat me. For a change suppose the shopkeeper's decide to be good once in a while one of these policeman by the roadside will surely manage to fleece some money from me for one or the other reason.
If nothing else then huge family pressures to be better than my mausiji's son will surely take its toll on me.
So what do I look forward to as an Indian- a life of avoidance - how to avoid accidents, how to avoid pressure, how to avoid getting fired, how to avoid the corrupt policeman on the road, how to avoid falling into the trap of funny bankers selling funny money in the form of mutual funds and ULIP plans, how to avoid impolite gestures by barbaric motorcycle riders who have absolutely no sense of the magnitude of the risk that they sign for when they negotiate a sharp turn in front of a car without even a helmet. And even if I manage to avoid all this as a young man and reach a humbling middle age then a complete new set of things to avoid emerges - how to avoid my kids from getting into the wrong school where education is no more than a commodity and the school itself is no more than shameless money-making business, how to avoid my kids getting infected by all sorts of mental pollution that is generated by the so called entertainment business, how to avoid getting cheated by a property broker and what not.

If I am personally not affected then at least the likes of Mamata Banerjee and Mayawati and Ramalinga Raju will time and again put me to shame for being an Indian by indulging in reckless acts of self-interest and mass destruction. People like Danny Boyle will make fun of me by showing their Golden Globes which they earned by mocking India with help of India's most celebrated music director and one of the senior-most actors together with a British-Indian who probably had not even seen a photograph of slums before he accepted the role to play an inhabitant of those.

And so even if I look alive, I am in reality a scared, insecure aggregate of bones and flesh who even without the threat of terrorists is living quite an unlivable life.
So then all my terrorist friends, why on this earth do you invest so much to destroy a country, which, if you show some patience, will chalk out a road map to self destruction soon...

Proud to be an Indian - ya right after all I can still buy a two rupee chart titled "Leaders of India" with disfigured images of Nehru, Gandhi and Patel at the local stationery shop and stick it in my room. I can still go about bragging how every piece of science and technology ever invented has a reference in our Vedas without paying much heed to the fact that people in my country still die of common cold. I can talk about how Chanakya and Kautilya knew all that there is about the art of politics hoping against hope that my audience has not seen the shoes flying and nowadays cash as well inside our parliament.
Anyways I am proud to be an Indian and please feel free to forward all those meaningless petitions and "how great India is" sort of emails so that I can play my role as a citizen.

"Yes we can" forward emails and create an illusion about our greatness and sleep peacefully every night.

PS: Sorry for being so negative - just can't help...

Corporate Pendulum

2009-01-07T20:30:00.000-08:00

Everybody likes to be successful. And since most of us do not have the courage to go out there and create something for ourselves we conspire to get successful at somebody else's expense. One of the most frequented paths in this pursuit is the Corporate ladder. Anyways, this blog is not meant to take a critical view of this path. I am more interested in sharing with my readers (I hope there are a few) the dilemma that I face everyday at my office. I call it the Corporate Pendulum.

For those of you who never bothered much about the science of simple harmonic motion (and also for those who never bothered about science itself) during your +2 classes here is the shortest course in Pendulum Physics. A pendulum oscillates around a mean position and it does so because there is some stupid force acting on it all the time trying to settle it at that mean position. Off course the pendulum, everytime it reaches that mean position, has some momentum and instead of settling down it overshoots that position until that stupid force once again brings the pendulum back. So this continues till eternity.

Back to my corporate pendulum. I call the stupid force acting on my corporate pendulum as "Desire to fit in". The force acts most strongly on those who have been in corporate for 0-5 years and since I fit nicely in that bracket I am in a state of eternal oscillation. During my initial days in the corporate, I used to pay a lot of attention to behaving appropriately in meetings and I presume all my colleagues did the same, otherwise why would all of them turn up with fake smiles and politely nod to everything that the boss said in every meeting. We all started to pick up the Corporate jargon faster than we must have learnt to address all our relatives as a baby. In a matter of a few weeks all the fresher's were using such uniform vocabulary that you would believe they have been fitted with digital dictionaries. "Weaknesses" became "opportunities for improvement", "Managing the bad actors" became "Stakeholder Management", "Playing politics" became "soft-skills", "Postponing" became "requires further iteration"etc. etc. Like everybody else, I too had managed to get fitted with a dictionary and so I was smoothly sailing towards the mean position. But once there, I realised that in those weeks not only has my vocabulary not increased by a word but it has actually plummeted to a few tens of those meaningless, politically motivated, overused and sometimes abused corporate terms. So once I had managed to fit in under the influence of "Desire to fit in" force the momentum part, which I call, "Be unique syndrome" set in. This syndrome now pestered me to be myself, voice my opinions just the way I feel about things and in the process dragged me away from the fit-in position. Now off course this has been going on for the past two years and more. And this is not the only case.

There have been other pendulums such as how much to speak in a meeting. So once you are hired with a bunch of other freshers you have this strong urge to differentiate yourself and so you are vocal and outgoing and all that untill you realise that everybody has started to do the same and hence there is perfect chaos without much content in every meeting room. And then your inner self pulls you towards being yourself, which means you might grow quiter and not say much and in the process run the risk of people taking you for either being not so bright or being plain arrogant.

Then there is this whole thing about dressing up. Once we start to make some money the cheapest most expensive things to buy are clothes and mobile phones. So we all rush to these Arrow and Louis Phillippes and Park Avenues followed by purchasng Nokia E61is and Sony Ericsson walkman and Ipods and what not. And all this in a bid to differentiate ourselves with little or no success because the moment you step into your office wearing these you realise that almost everybody else has been to the same shop and the cost of looking same just went up.

As time passes one realises this pendulum tendency sets in most aspects of our work life. In large corporattions there are tons and tons of procedures to do things. You have got a template to write reports, a template for power-points, a template to submit requests, a procedure to design machines etc etc. And your management, once having bombarded you with all these templates and procedures and processes then leaves you with a sweet message something to the tune of, "We value innovation and out of the box thinking and we believe that you will do us proud by coming up with new and better ways of doing things". Off course what they dont say is that please make sure that all your new ideas are presented using those templates and should not challenge or edit any of our existing procedures.

So again the pendulum tendency in us sets in and we start to churn out our first set of 20 reports in exactly that format and template and receive kudos from our boss and we continue to do this until the "Be unique" momentum again tries to pull us away from the mean position. But unlike in the case of clothes or meetings where you may not be severely penalised for drifting a bit too far off from the mean position, in the case of the above you might severely limit your career options if you drift too much from the mean.

Some people can manage to differentiate themselves at the superficial levels. One of the techniques nowadays is to use a cheaper mobile phone or to say that I dont like blackberry or even to wear sport shoes to office and pretend that you are so cool and not afraid of anyone. But most of these individuals scramble to be as close to mean position as possible when it comes to making difficult decisions, or designing stuff or presenting information to the bosses. In these moments all the courage and looking cool talk is quickly out of the window.

So far I have not seen any individual who has genuinely been able to render the "Desire to fit in" force powerless.

And this is what keeps me awake all night, the pursuit of that one person who is truly himself/herself. Someone who is so much under the influence of "Be myself" momentum that the "Desire to fit in" force has no chance. I know such a person lives in all of us but just like most other good things in us this person too is probably fast asleep and in the years to come may even die a silent death. May be I am also mistaken in trying to find such a person in this corporate environment because if you wish not to be a corporate pendulum then you can probably not survive for too long in the Corporate World.

I hope some of you can relate to this Pendulum tendency and have the courage to let the Be myself momentum win over the Desire to fit-in force.

Wish you all a happy new year...

In life, as with Computers, Dare to Restart

2008-12-23T20:28:00.000-08:00

We are all familiar with the not-so-rare situation when our computer goes berserk. Nothing behaves the way it should. All the programs either suddenly freeze in time or manage to shed the chains of slavery that tie them to their algorithms. Our brain generally perceives it with a tag-line: "fir hang ho gaya". And in these moments I profusely thank the person who has put that small button on the machine, the most powerful button in my opinion, even more powerful than the start button - the restart button.

As in computer so also in life, we are bestowed with the ability to restart (and if you wish to thank anyone for that then in this case you are not struggling against anonymity - just thank god). I have a special place in my heart for people who have dared to restart their lives - Amitabh Bachchan, Sourav Ganguly, Abraham Lincoln, Maharana Pratap, Napolean Bonaparte. These are all people who struggled to reach formidable heights in their lives, slipped from the peaks and then managed to start it all over again to reach similar or sometimes even greater heights.

Restarting your life is slightly less convenient than restarting your computer. Although, I should say many of the challenges still remain quite identical. Some challenges include the risk of losing your unsaved data, the risk that the computer may not start next time, the temptation that may be you should give it one more try before you choose to restart, a complete loss of faith in the abilities of the computer etc. etc. Similarly while restarting our life we get stuck on things such as: may be I will never be able to do it again; may be I should keep fighting the same battle before I step back to have a fresh look at it; what will happen to my reputation and image etc. etc.

Many of the opportunities are also quite identical. In most cases of restarting a computer what comes to our rescue is the data that we had managed to save, the data which forms the core of the computer machinery, similarly in life what helps us to restart is that which forms the core of us. If during our good days we are disciplined enough to adopt certain core values and principles that have guided us through our current succes then we have all the necessary tools to restart our lives.

The most important ability for first time strugglers is undoubtedly perseverance. The ability to keep going in the face of most crippling adversities. For restarters it is, what many like to call, resilience, some call it bouncing back. Both are fair descriptions of what it takes to restart our lives but not quite accurate. In addition to bouncing back and being resilient it might take some "gathering yourself". Computers do not live in societies and one computer's restarting is hardly of interest to other computers in the vicinity, humans, however, are bit more unfortunate than that. They have to carry the baggage of their past, of other people's opinions and scrutiny and this, more often than not, is the biggest blocker to restarting our lives.

Unless we are a superhuman we all shall, at one point or the other in our lives, confront a situation where things will not be as they have always been, where success can no longer be taken for granted, where the glorious past will be de-throned by a gloomy present and in this situation the ones who will come out victorious will be those who have the courage, the ability and even the humility to restart.

I have known many people from my schooldays and even college days who delivered the promise of a great future but unfortunately quite a few of them hit the slippery slope a bit too early in their lives and could not manage to start all over again.

The advise is not only for those who have tasted success followed by failure but also an appeal to those who have struggled so long and given up. They too have the ability to restart and they must.

So next time you hit a failure or see your much arduously created success wither away in front of you, let your brain perceive it with no more than a tag-line: "fir hang ho gaya" and hit the restart button.

Management Tools or just common sense

2008-12-21T21:47:00.000-08:00

My current role gives me an opportunity to learn a lot about management tools. Those sophisticated diagrams, matrices, maps, charts and tables that have supposedly been devised over a long period of time after intense and deep research. Many of you must have heard about things like 2 by 2 matrices. These are used by many management professionals, consultants, business leaders to segment markets, characterise products, define customers, assess economies etc. These are very simple to use, we can put any two parameters on the X-axis and any two on the Y-axis and then (as ardent fans of these matrices would want us to believe) we can aspire to fit the entire world in one of those four boxes. Some innovative professionals in their spare time have devised the next generation matrices which also allow for a conitnuous gradation within any particular box or even across the whole matrix.
Then there is Michael Porter's famous five competitive forces analysis. This is a neat tool for industry analysis and business strategy development. It is perhaps one of the most popular tool in the business environment and has been around since the 70's with little change but widespread application. It allows you to think of a particular industry in light of five prominent competitive forces namely: Customer's, New Entrants. Competitors, Suppliers and Substitute Products. I have used it sometimes mostly in training courses while working on syndicate exercises and have found it quite useful.
Then there are many more such as those glossy transformation maps which can be used (again in the opinion of the ardent fans) to even create a map to transform your life with clear actions and timelines for each. It is mostly used when a group of people collectively need to achieve certain goals in a given time frame. Can be quite effective as a guiding document but unless one is careful these might not take into account the influence of external factors and multiple scenarios arising out of those.
Another famous and quite often used, specially when analysing one's own business or that of a competitor's is SWOT analysis. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. Very neat and simple. Often quite high-level but quite effective in terms of understanding the over-all direction.
All these, and I am sure there are many more, are almost used like mouse and keyboards by professionals all around the world to structure their thinking and remain focussed on key issues.
I do not have any problems with these tools but I am not a great fan of any of these or even of the whole concept of having these tools in the first place. For me most of this is common sense and to intelligent managers and natural leaders this will come naturally. All these tools will be of no use to an individual who has clarity of thoughts who knows what he wants, understands the environment around him well and is aware of his own strengths and weaknesses. And so is true for organisations who have a clarity of thought and direction. Most of the times people are so obsessed with wanting to talk hi-fi jargon that tools precede the main objective. It becomes fashionable to throw around a few slides with glossy 2 by 2's and transformation maps whereas in reality the crux of the problem or whatever objective is being pursued is lost.
Off course there are benefits of using these tools and as mentioned before systemic and structured thinking is one of those. But the best value can be derived from these tools only when people begin to appreciate the core themes and concepts that these tools espouse and incorporate them into their thinking styles which should ultimately make the very same tool redundant.
I will continue to use a few of these particularly the Porter's five forces but will try and keep things in perspective by always being aware of the fact that tools by themselves are nothing but tools and only a skilled workman can create something of value by using them.

kunaliit2002@yahoo.co.in - not just an email id but an identity..

2008-12-21T01:41:00.000-08:00

This has been my email adress for a very long time. If I look at it now it comes across as bit of a propaganda, even a bit immature. It has a history. It was created sometime in 2001. I was not in IIT then. I was preparing for JEE. And in those days I used to go about with a different email id: mrfair320@rediffmail.com, even more propaganda and even more immature. I would not go into the history of this last one and my only defence is that I was only 16 years of age when I registered this one. Anyways coming back to kunaliit2002. I registered this while I was still preparing for JEE with a condition that I would use it only if I manage to get through IIT JEE to join the 2002 session. It was quite logical too because under any other scenario this email id would have only been misplaced. And it also explains why it is not kunaliitd2002 for at that time I did not know which of the seven IITs I would end up in.
I used to go to the cyber cafe every so often, check my mrfair id, and take a glance at my empty kunaliit2002 inbox as nobody knew about it. It was sort of an auto suggestion. Similar to what many people achieve by writing on their ceilings in bold letters "I will win the Rajasthan TT championship this year". This way they get to see it as the first thing in morning to remind them of what they should be doing during the rest of the day - working towards that goal. I was a bit more shy than that and hence found my auto-suggestion in this email id hosted somewhere on a far-off US server.
Over time I managed to justify the use of this email id and since then it has become my second identity almost. Also I have managed to retain this id on many servers such as yahoo, google and I guess I had one at indiatimes too. Surprisingly there is little competition for this id, which is good for me .
20 years later it would probably serve as a window to the past reminding me of the year and the college that I went to, just like it served as a window to the future back in 2001 reminding me of the year and the college that I aspired to go to.

Blossoms - The book shop

2008-12-21T00:21:00.000-08:00

Those of you who have lived in Bangalore would know Blossoms. The famous three storeyed bookshop in Churchstreet. I had been there once about three months ago and had failed to discover the 3rd floor (may be I was in hurry or something). I went there again yesterday. In fact it was not a planned visit, it was just that we were looking for a decent place to dine and stumbled at Mainland China (it is a nice chinese restaurant by the way -especially their lunch buffet is value for money) and Blossoms is within a flower throw distance from Mainland China. This time I managed to discover the third floor. Second hand treasure or should I call it Treasure - second hand, anyways I am only referring to a vast collection of second hand books that was buried in this floor. I found a second hand copy of Porter's famous "Competitive Advantage of Nations" - hard bound, in good condition and only 500 rupees - a real bargain I would say. Then I found something interesting on World War-I, World War - II and by now I was really in a mood to stretch this collection. I demanded a copy of "A century in oil". It was published not so long ago but for some reason had been out of stock at all big book stores even in Europe. The salesman only once confirmed the name of the author before producing a copy. I felt cheated.

I had gone looking for this book in every possible high street book shop in Delhi, Amsterdam, Hague, at airports in Hyderabad, Bangalore, at Crosswords and here this man is standing in front of me with a copy of the very same book and that too with such a nonchalant expression as if he is only presenting me with the India Today for this fortnight. I was pleased at having found the book but at the same time was almost shocked at where I found it. The feeling was similar to having found your dream job only to discover that your boss is your biggest competitor from your schooldays.

Blossom had suddenly managed to win a seat at the top of the list of my best shops. Crossword and Sapna book house lost all appeal in that instance. I told the salesman that he has won a customer for life. The salesman either failed to pick up my accent or the purport of the sentence itself and responded with a "any other book sir". "No", I thought but managed to blurt out "The Seven sisters". Now this one was published sometime in the 70's and for sure has been out of stock since I was born (without me having to do anything with the fact off course). This time the answer was more in-line with my expectations and if it would have been anything else I would have hugged the salesman and took him out for coffee. The book was not available. And this is probably the first and last time when I was excited by the non-availability of a book which I have been wanting to read for a long time.

For those who are planning to meet me next Saturday - you know where to find me :-)

A Jonathan Livingston Seagull in all of us.

2008-12-19T00:57:00.000-08:00

I finished reading Jonathan Livingston Seagull (by Richard Bach) only very recently. I had heard a lot about it and so many times that even without actually having read it I had discussed the core theme on many occassions by the coffee corner, only to make a factual error or two in the end which exposed my ignorance.

It talks about a seagull who refuses to accept that seagull's have been bestowed with the ability to fly only to be able to find food and survive. Jonathan Livingston liked to fly and, like every individual who has found his calling, wanted to be a perfectionist in the art of flight. He used to practice for hours. Instead of just flying low enough to manage to scoop a few surface fishes, he practiced diving from 10,000 even 20,000 feet to reach speeds of 200 miles per hour. And one day when he managed to break all speed records and displayed his skiils to his flock, he was convicted with having gone against the traditions of the Seagull community and was outlawed. But Jonathan did not give up, neither did he accept the orthodox rules to continue being a part of the flock. He spread his wings and glided through the blue sky in pursuit of the ultimate in the art of flying.
The writer goes on to suggest that in every human being lives a Jonathan Livingston, a part of us that is eager to spread wings and glide through the blue sky in pursuit of that which is dear to us, in pursuit of that which is the only thing that matters, in pursuit of that which if achieved would make every other achievement or non-achievement meaningless.
But what is that pursuit. It is not a hobby, it is not an interest, not even a temptation. Many people call it "Calling". I was first introduced to this concept by a guest lecturer in one of the philosophy course that I attended during my college days. She described it as a natural inclination towards an activity where you can contribute because you have been bestowed with the natural ability to not only pursue that activity but also re-define it and set new standards.
This is why you were born and if you manage to pursue your calling then it would not matter what else you do in your lifetime.
Those people are fortunate who have managed to find their calling in their lifetime. Many a times it is not the pursuit but the realisation of what your calling is that most people miss in their lives.
And if I look at the truly successful people in the world around us, each one of them has discovered and pursued his/her calling. Try imagining Sachin Tendulkar being in any other profession but cricket. How about Lata Mangeshkar as an actress or Dhirubhai Ambani as an IIT Delhi IIM Ahmedabad Graduate heading Hindustan Lever?
I was told when you find your calling everything around you seems to be just at the right position to help you pursue it. Nothing is out of place anymore.
In Last Samurai Ken Watanbe says to Tom Cruise, "Sight of a perfect blossom is a rare one and if you spend your entire life looking for one without finding it then it will not be a wasted life"

Fortunate are those who have managed to find their calling in life but equally fortunate are those who have had the good reason to be able to recognise that there is a natural calling waiting to be realised by them and a life spent in pursuit of the discovery of that calling is an equally successful life.

How do I know I have found my calling? It will probably be like finding your love. You never know until you find it.

I am gone looking for mine and wish the readers all the success in finding theirs.

Going Green

2008-12-19T00:03:00.001-08:00

Finally I have decided I will write blogs. This decision can partially be attributed to a wealth of spare time that I seem to have inherited almost miraculously in this holiday season (an advantage of working in a Western Headquartered Company) and partially a desire to connect with people.

I work for an Oil company. Oh sorry we now call ourselves an Energy Company and unless you are Saudi Aramco calling yourself an oil company is akin to saying that you are not going to be around in 2108.

Green is the way to go. Future is green; cars, cities, industry everything should adopt one form or the other of green. It is the only way to survive: tactical in the short run but practical in the very long.
Energy demand is soaring and everyone is being urged by governments, green peace, leaders etc. to curb their energy consumption. But I have not even experienced the basic luxuries of life and I am already in the well-to-do class of India. I have not yet bought my first car, not even a motorbike. There are easily about a hundred million Indians like me who will be buying their first cars, A/Cs, flight tickets over the next 5 years. And if the Tata Nano thing is to be believed then that number will become few hundred million.
I read somewhere that still about 60% of Indian population resides in villages and in India there are only about 20 million privately owned vehicles (cars and scooters). In a population of 1 billion only 20 million vehicles which is about 20 vehicles per 1000 people. For Europe that number is about 500 vehicles per 1000 individuals and for US it is about 700.
In future we want to urbanise all of Indian population (heard of Kalam's famous PURA concept?), provide education and a good standard of living, medical care, entertainment and what not. without doing any mathematics one can easliy estimate an order of magnitude growth in the infrastructure requirement, capital investment etc. and to drive it all a huge amount of Energy will be required.
You and I who are privileged enough to post and read blogs have an important role to play. We must conserve so that others might be able to get at least a glimpse of what we take for granted.
If that means that we buy a smaller car and forever shelf our dream of driving around in Gas Guzzlers, then that is the sacrifice we should be prepared to make.

No matter what, we should all go Green and I have already by choosing a green Template to my blog Page.