Why Do Elephants Have Big Ears ? - Unlock your potential !

Elephant thinking–Something to overcome to unlock your potential

2012-02-11T11:45:00.001-05:00

If you have read my book, “Why Do Elephant's Have Big Ears”, you would know that I use two elephant stories to help you understand how we limit ourselves and fail to realize our full potential.

Over the weekend, I had been to the library (In spite of the fact that I had TWO kindles !! sometimes going to the library and reading a non digital book has its own charm!)and picked up a few books to read. I was very surprised to read a similar story in the book “Self Leadership and the One Minute Manager.

Here is the extract –“When they begin to train an elephant for the circus, they chain the baby elephants‘s leg to a pole in the ground. The baby elephants wants to get away. He pulls and tugs. but he can’t escape – the chain is too big and the pole too deep in the ground. So he stops trying. As he grows up, he just assumes he can’t get away. Today he’s a six ton elephant.he could sneeze and pull that chain – but he doesn't even try. Circus trainers say that they can put a piece of sting around the six – ton elephants' leg and he won’t break away”

Coming from a traditional Indian background, the Indian society is more interested in telling you what you CANNOT do rather than inspire you to try out new things. I call it the the “society's train track”. They create one for you, lay it and expect you to follow it !

Coming to the USA has been an eye opener. No constraints and the fact that you could work hard in whatever you want to do and make money/be happy or just live. It is very liberating !
So friend, whether you have Elephant thinking or Large Elephant ears, it is time you unlock your potential !

Raghavan (Raj) Rajendran

Teaching people to fish around the world !

2012-02-05T09:23:00.001-05:00

One of my favorite motivational concept is to not give people fish, but teach them to fish (The proverb “"Give a man a fish and he won't starve for a day. Teach a man how to fish and he won't starve for his entire life." has been attributed to everybody from Chinese proverbs to Confucius and Jesus Christ !). So I spent a lot of time teaching my team members the actual understanding of the concepts to get things done rather than give them a list of instructions to follow. This has been very useful for me during my years working with teams of all shapes and sizes.

I wanted to have a similar concept for my charity too. It was then I found Kiva.org. They allow individuals to a lend a little as $25 to help people around the world. They difference is that you can choose the projects and these projects are folks trying to better themselves by building a business or doing something for the society. As a trial I decided to help a gentleman Mr. Joseph in Uganda put structures on his farm and to buy fertilizers to support new live stock. It was a pleasure to see that the loan was repaid and his farm prospered. This was followed by supporting the Amistad Group in Guatemala. All with micro loans of less than $50. That too was successfully paid back

This is a great way to help people not just by donating money to an large trust and hope that they spend it wisely. But actually get involved in the process of selecting how the money gets spent. Also, 100% of the money you lend goes to the person needing help (Kiva is funded by other sources and contributions)
The only limitation I can think of it that some countries like India are not represented here !

Do check it out today ! Join me in doing good.,.

Raghavan (Raj) Rajendran

Good is the new average !

2012-01-19T18:41:00.000-05:00

There is an interesting article in Business Insider which is based on Seth Godin's view "If You're An Average Worker, You're going straight to the bottom". Interesting read. This one of the lessons I have learnt during my years of working and one I keep preaching to my team members all the time

Right from the school days, I always put in the extra effort to differentiate myself from rest of the students. While working, I spent a lot of time creating my own brand - Hard Work, Good Grasp of the problem, Structured thought process, Innovative solutions and successful delivery. In fact, in my first start up I worked in, I was the Mr. Fix It. If there is problem, they would call me to fix.

So the two takeaways I try to give my team is

Good is the new Average
Being average is no longer an option. You have to be good. You need to put in the extra effort to make sure you exceed expectations and deliver. Working out the details, Making sure the documents are formatted properly (I hate it when people are too lazy to do a spell check- Takes two minutes !), preparing for the presentations more thoroughly. Small things, which add to separating you from the rest of the team members and helps you leave a very positive impression in the minds of your stakeholders. Try it and see the difference !

Create your own brand
In my view, we sell all the time. Whether it is in our personal life or in the professional work environment. So why not sell ourselves so that our talents are properly understood by the others. If you set you standards higher, you have won half the battle. But if you can "market" your Unique Selling Proposition (USP) - create you own personal brand - you have the magic mix to make sure you are recognized and rewarded for what you do. More on this in a later post...

Read the article and start your journey to being Great. Average is for losers !

Raghavan (Raj) Rajendran

Being Indian is now a badge of Honor?

2012-01-01T15:21:00.001-05:00

I have been fooling around with a Proud To Be Indian web site for quite some years without much traction, In its current incarnation, it can be seen at www.P2BI.com.

So it was with great pleasure I started reading the book by Ramith Sethi (I Will teach you to be rich Blog fame). His blogs are fantastic. His writing style is very different. You see his interviews, you can see his passion just burst out ! Overall, his blog is something I would strongly recommend to everybody. Even though he pushes his ware very strongly, his interest in helping others shines through. And who can blame him for charging for the value he delivers. Not me !
What was interesting was the fact that he was using his “Indianness” as a badge of honor. He talks about his parents (Who migrated from India) who spend 5 days negotiating for a car and then walk out of it because the dealer refused to add a Floor mat to the deal. He also coined the interesting acronym – WWAID (What would an Indian Do?).

When I came to US (about 15 years ago) most of us felt the need to blend in. As the IT boom took over the country and the Outsourcing became the name of the game, we felt guilty for causing disruption in the life's of the locals here
Finally I think we have moved on to a state where being Indian, and bringing in the values of our culture is considered to be good. People recognize us not just for the nerds who are the “Computer Whisperers “ but actually folks with an idea to present and the presence to make an impression !

Go for it. Love this. In fact, as part of this discovery, I am starting a career focused blog (Take off on my book Why Do Elephants Have Big Ears) to share the lessons learnt over my 25 year career with folks who can use them.

The blog should be ready in the next few weeks, But you can go over and register so that you can be notified when it goes live….

Your thoughts?

Raghavan (Raj) Rajendran

Spiritual Gravity will bring down Apple in 2012

2011-12-31T09:41:00.001-05:00

Most of my friends know that I am a die hard Microsoft fan. I have been working with their products for most of my career. I have watched Apple rise from the ashes and head to the stratosphere with envy. So please take my predictions with a pinch of salt !
My prediction is that Apple will peak out in 2012 and start their descent back to earth. Here is why …

Apple has to be right all the time. Competition has to be right only once for Apple to fall off its “Number 1 “ pedestal and the competition is getting very much close to being right !
Apple products are not being designed and built by Aliens.Other humans will find way to break it and make something better
IT Corporations find it difficult to manage their own much smaller IT application portfolios. Managing over 350K apps will soon break and rogue applications will slip in to destroy customer confidence
Apple products are on the verge of becoming commodities. They will soon drop in the “Cool” factor bringing them down to earth with other products
Without Steve Jobs, Apple will fall back into a “Microsoft under Steve Ballmer” paradigm. Still a great company making money. But not THE company !
What goes up must come down and what goes up faster must come down faster !! The law of Averages will catch up with Apple soon
Mobile virus will become more lucrative considering the exploding population of Apple IOS and we can see a swarm of them hit the ecosystem

Revisit next year same time. Let us see if I got it right !
What are your thoughts?

Raj Rajendran

When the Idea creator's credibility is challenged, should the ideas credibility be questioned?

2011-12-29T17:57:00.000-05:00

Most of my friends know that I am a big fan of Robert Kiyosaki and his books based on Rich Dad Poor Dad paradigm. I like his concepts of residual income, the quadrant approach to money making etc. In fact I had recommended his book Cashflow Quadrant to my friends

So it was a shock when I read about John T. Read's write up about Kiyosaki. John is a very influential person with strong beliefs and ideas. He is very successful and his ideas on making money are very interesting (More on that in a later post)

He really goes to the town about the Rich Dad Poor Dad's "factual errors" and numerous "Extremely unlikely accounts of the events that supposedly happened" . It was an interesting read and John has spend quite some time to research his target.

Whether we agree with John or not, the point which I was concerned about was the impact on the ideas and concepts Kiyosaki had put on the table. Since Kiyosaki's book's content has been questioned, does it mean that his ideas were also wrong? Was I just drinking Koolaid and not looking at the facts clearly? Should our impression of the ideas be influenced by the negative information on the author?

In my opinion, the baby should not be thrown out with the bath water.. Even after understanding all the accusations, the fact that there might not be a real "Rich Dad", I believe the central themes with Kiyosaki put forward are still valid. The fact that ideas may not be used by all of us talks more to the our limitations rather than the viability of the idea.

I still continue to believe in the concepts of Rich Dad Poor Dad. I think ideas should be judged purely based on its merits and the idea creator shenanigans should not impact its credibility .

What do you think?

Raghavan (Raj) Rajendran

Students and LinkedIn- Essential or Waste of time

2011-12-29T00:08:00.000-05:00

Should Students Use Linked In?

I have been a LinkedIn member for quite some time (See my profile here). So when my college going son asked me whether he should create his own Linked In Profile, I paused and then thought - What the heck - there is no harm in creating a profile.

More I thought about it, more I started feeling that all student SHOULD have a LinkedIn profile. Here is why:

As they more towards professional life at the end of the college years, a better understanding of the networking tools will be a value add
It gives him an opportunity to connect with his teacher and mentors. Getting their feedback (which is hopefully positive !) will help him as he starts applying for Internships
It also gives the prospective companies, a place to find more about him and helps him differentiate from the other applicants who might not have a smart Dad like me :-)
Finally, it allows him to show case the voluntary work he has done and other achievements

Overall, I think it should be become mandatory for students to start creating their LinkedIn Profiles (Everybody seems to have a Facebook Profile). What do you think?

Raghavan (Raj) Rajendran