Also during our B-School, someone wrote the yearly punch line as “It feels good to be good”. Many did not like the punch line at all. I personally did not like it at that time but later it was one of my best punch lines ever. “It really feels good to be good”.

Always wish to do good.

• People were not as fortunate as you to be there where you are, so don’t shout at them, help them
• When someone misbehave, it hardly impacts you physically, only it impacts you if you take it negatively. If you ignore that as a immature act, you will feel even better.

Many occasions where I wish good and good happened:

• There was a person who wanted help with http and https duplicate content removal in Search Engine, I did not wanted to take money (as I was against freelancing), I helped him fix it not expecting anything. Later he sent me PPTs, PDFs, books etc that he collected from so many conferences (exclusive and expensive stuff). It was a WOW experience.
• There was a person who came for interview, he was messed up, he got rejected, before leaving he asked me the answers and went into detailing, I spent almost an hour with him explaining it. After 5 years, when we started the company, he called me to pitch for his business school. He also explained me, how that interview helped him. He helped me with the complete pitching.
• So many instances like that.

If you look at religious books:

• Bible says: Throw your bread into running waters and it shall come back to you after many days http://bible.cc/ecclesiastes/11-1.htm
• Karmanye Vadhikaraste, Ma phaleshou kada chana, Ma Karma Phala Hetur Bhurmatey Sangostva Akarmani
  ???? ???? ?? ???????? ?????? ??, ????? ???? ?? ?? ??? ????| ???? ?? ?? ?? ????? ?? ??? ?? ???, ??? ???? ???? ?? ???? ??? ?? ??? ?????? ? ??|

One of the best quotes I recently read was something like this (I am unable to recall it as it was) “When you don’t focus on your returns, when you focus on doing really well for someone, you can expect amazing innovation”.

Live every day doing good, trust in God, God will help you trust in yourself, people will trust you, good things will happen to you.

“You are not pro-active enough?” Did you say/hear this sentence? Does it help at all?

Recently we attended 7 Habits of effective people training session. Even after the session, many of us were still not clear about the new definition of “Be Proactive”, as we always used dictionary to define the word “Proactive”. Dictionary says, “Proactive is creating or controlling a situation by causing something to happen rather than responding to it after”. So we feel Proactive is about creating something or preparing ourselves in such a way that we can avoid situations which can hurt us. There is nothing wrong with the definition, in fact thats the best definition to Proactiveness but in real life, you need more than perfect definition. I always believed that none of us can be 100% perfect. We can be prepared for most of things but still there are exceptional situtation (every now and then) and how we react to these exceptions help us lead a better life.

Step #1: Understanding what’s a real loss, very inspiring video

(Whats a real loss & Whats a challenge, great video to watch)

Old way we looked at Proactiveness

1. Be prepared for exams beforehand than worrying about it during the last week – This is proactiveness
2. Have a spare football for the football match, in case one goes off, you still have another one. This is proactiveness
3. Having an assistant project manager as backup, so when a project manager is sick, project can run smooth – Best example of proactiveness (the plan B)

I see that the word “be proactive” is being used and abused in the corporate world. Every manager asks their teams to be proactive. When something goes wrong, we keep blaming someone (or ourselves) for not being proactive.

Let’s flush the old idea of Proactive, Please 

Why -

• As the definition is not helping you at all.
• We all want to prepare for better things but can’t be perfect 100% times. Everyone wants to be proactive but the reality is none of us can be 100% proactive.
• Also it creates a guilt and hurts your confidence. Also it hurts your team as you start thinking others are not proactive enough.

New way of looking at “be Proactive”

This video will clear a lot of things, here is another video that can help you understand another viewpoint.

The new way of looking at “be proactive” is “Let not your reaction kill you”, here are some of my old posts

1. http://aji.techshu.com/my-death-wolf/ (How you are killing yourself while being a victim to your circumstance”
2. I wrote about 90 10 principle, you can search for it on web. Its about 10% problems you can’t control but rest 90% problems are due to our wrong reactions.

Mindset Change

The most important thing here is to own your circumstance and understand you are here because of choices not because of others. Often we push everything to others.

When I worked at Grmtech, our boss Vikas will always tell me, “Either you can fall victim to your valid circumstances or win over it”, the victim vs victor attitude. This is step #1 to proactiveness.

• Step #1, it was your choice, you made the choices, you end up here, now how will you react is proactiveness. Will you react looking forward or will you react looking backward? Thats the main difference between reactive reaction or proactive reaction.
• Step #1.1: Oh, never regret for your choices as that was the best you could do at that time. Regretting and worrying will only change anything. Bible quote (Matt 6:27) “And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?“
• Step #2: Train yourself to reach pro-actively.
  • Proactive language: http://blog.theresabeeckman.com/2010/11/14/taking-responsibility-reactive-vs-proactive-language.aspx  This still needs more understanding, http://mushpanjwani.com/2012/11/03/whats-your-story/ .. I shall write about it again. Be careful about what you feel and utter.
  • Act based on principle than based on your emotions, anger etc. (Example: A client sends a mail, “Stop our work, won’t pay for this month”. How will you react? Will you react based on your disappointment or based on a principle?”.

• (Best, be prepared) Know that such situation will happen in any business and you can prepare with a process to ensure you react based on the process/principle defined.
• (Second best, react right when not prepared) When you don’t have above solution ready, how will you react to it. Here are the steps:
  • Take a pause and see why it went wrong.
  • See if there is anyway we can help the client succeed.
  • If there is no way to save the project, how to make a graceful exit.
  • There are underlying principles that will help you react better like “Client’s business is more important than your account. See if it is hurting in anyway?”, “No disrespect for anyone”, “Relationship is more important than an account or money”, “Accept fault when it happens” etc. Now these principles needs to be written everyday and your brains should be trained for it. Having these principles ingrained in each one of your team member will help in reacting better, reacting pro-actively.
  • Also watch for language, don’t say, “You never co-operated with us, we asked you to do this, do that”, say “There were issues which together we could not fix on time. We own the problem, wish we could do better, still there are 10 to 15 things left to be implemented. Can you please get it implemented, we will help you get it implemented and then we will support you for next 3 months for free with reports and things undone.

Is it that easy?

No not all, thats why great companies are rare to find, they train their teams, themselves, the whole organization again and again to win over these difficult challenges. I was listening to Rata Tata Sir, when asked about values for an organization and how to enforce it at all levels, he said (in my own words and understanding) “You can’t take responsibility for behaviour of 400,000 employees but when someone does wrong/right, how you react to it will define your value”. WOW! it was a great learning.

What’s your definition to “being proactive” and what’s your take from this post

I am as free as watching Mamta ji’s recent CNN video. Here is my take on the subject from my personal experience.

I had no idea, what I needed to do, where I will get job – during grads College

I was as ignorant as any other student when I was in Xaveirs. … Thats how we are … our education has no interface with reality. Whom to blame?
My take: College should have more interface with reality, industrial fairs, making it compulsory (we were training that way), http://aji.techshu.com/indians-fear-failure/ . In our colleges we only have one type of judging … Grades (as per theory) … Its damn boring and it ignores many other dimensions … many who are not good in sitting and studying loses their confidence. That’s ok, no country is perfect, world isn’t either.

Ok, now professional course – MCA … MBA

MBA students had knowledge what companies will ask and what is needed (better than MCA & probably engineering). In MCA, we will have 2 type of students, one who were planning for Infosys and one who hardly bothered about job but will keep reading magazines, web, papers and will end up scoring very low (I think 5 point something out of 9). Some people like me, would shuffle between here and there. Both are successful in their own terms. Some got jobs from college and some got from off campus. Some worked in small companies then joined bigger ones. Some worked in startups and now own companies. Different people, different path to JOB and success.

While passing out of professional college? Most of us had no idea about what we gonna do, whats good for us. We just did the way others did. The fact is we did.

Whom to blame? Certainly not college, our college did put a lot of interface with real problems … I also made many cool application for our professors .. students? I never understood that I guess the way I should have … I was very interested in  computers, so I could spend a lot of time in computer labs. Job? May be not, as the selection is very different.

<h3>My job interview at Alumnus, must read</h3>
I was asked about MMS, I never heard that word by then. Then they asked many more things, I had no idea. They failed us. I requested for one more chance. I prepared better, then they asked about Linux and Windows security stuffs, I had no idea again … again I was failed, I asked for one more chance … I think the fifth time, I called them at night, asked “who will take the interview and whats his strength, what questions I can expect” … I learned those and cleared the interview for “A CHANCE”. On job, I got trained for php, mysql etc … all Google learned, people hardly taught anything … We did good, so next opportunity came … Grmtech …. joined there for a mobile ….. http://aji.techshu.com/three-years/ ..Job trained me, shaped me, gave me a direction on what to do in life …..

<h2>My final take – Don’t define job, do job properly and it will help you find the path</h2>
Understand, you are different from me, your opportunities are different from mine, so is mine with someone else. We all are different. Take it step by step. Don’t fall victim, just fight it out. Get a desktop, get an internet connection, study it again, enter somewhere where you can be mentored and given chance. Offer your laptop or desktop, work from home, keep working, keep learning. You can’t change your past, you can’t change your country or culture that easily (I fought with many companies in Salt Lake when I was student, asking to give MCAs a chance to sit with Engineers, they said no, I argued but they did not listen to me).

1. Hey’s it ok if you are not good but you need to understand you are not good and improve from there.
2. Grab opportunities, work hard, work smart, learn as much as possible. My professors told me “What you learn here in 3 years, your company will teach you in 3 months”.
3. Show positive attitude, work day and night when you can, party day and night (the things you enjoy) whenever you can. During my first job at Grmtech, I will work for 3 to 4 days, 16 hours or so and from Friday to Sunday I will go back to hostel to enjoy with friends.
4. Gain confidence in yourself.
5. Meet mentors (in office and outside), Meet good guys/girls (and get positive energy from there), go for events, network …
6. Don’t try to learn, just be listeners, just be there, and learn in bits and pieces … it will make sense at a later stage, just be there, collect nodes/dots to be connected later  http://news.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html
7. Enjoy, take pride in whatever you do.
8. Nobody needs that much money, it will come, just take care of your basic needs and don’t put yourself in demands which can lead you to depressions and wrong directions.
9. It’s ok to be human, we all do wrong, we all fail, we all get rejection but we all can fight back ….
10. Never compare, its never between you and them http://aji.techshu.com/never-between-you-them/

Hope it helps atleast one person in next 10 years, then my 30 mins goes worth.

3G & Touch, defining moving Internet !

There were days when people will go on vacation on a sea beach and will wish for a café with Internet. We improved from there and had basic connectivity on laptop (wifi), then again we wished for better. Then came basic internet on mobile, we wished for speed and better mobiles. Then came better touch & keypad mobiles & pads with 3G connectivity. Now it’s a new era, almost!

Internet is more fun now! “Porn to Poke”

The other change was, “what we did with Internet?” Web has transformed from information to entertainment in last few years. From “Porn to Poke” was a major shift, now people are connected on social media and want to see what’s happening with their friends and want to update what’s happening with them.

Bulk updates from static internet is boring, its about runtime moving internet

Bulk updates are boring, where you visit the Himalayas and then update it once you are back. It is fun when you can update from Himalayas and people can comment back and you can interact with them time to time. This is a new world of communication.

(This is my best friend from Himalayas updating his status. Commenting on this photo was way different, I felt really good) Imagine the situation when you are frustrated or extremely happy, there is no fun in holding it (and infact you want to share it right then).

“Happiness only real when shared” – http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0758758/quotes (From one of the best movies of all time). I can rephrase it to “Happiness only real when shared real time“). Remember the ad, Maja aya? Asli mazaa SAB ke saath aata hai (The real happiness is when shared with all).

My fun experience while on Vodafone 3G in Mumbai

I was in Mumbai for business trip and had to travel all around. IPAD & 3G was my guide, I could instruct the auto drivers, “oh not that route, go this route!”. I could just surf for Mallu restaurant while traveling and demand amazing food. In between, I could stop and do a conference call. I had conference calls with UK team standing in the Andheri Ticket counter. It was really fun to have amazing connectivity and I am sure it is to go better and better from there. Other fun on Vodafone 3G and ipad:

• Siting in a cafe and taking web interviews by playing games (The boring puzzles are over)
• Wifey doesn’t have issues going on vacation anywhere as she can still watch TV on move on youtube.
• WOW! Now you carry a powerful informational and entertainment tool along with you. The only space between your problem/query and the solution is asking it to your connected mobile device (and Google or Facebook).
• Attending webinars is no more an issue, I can attend it from car now
• Amazing possibility and much more fun

Orkut vs Chirkut and now “3G vs Uncle”

I remember the days when orkut came to picture in India, there were 2 communities, orkut or Chirkut http://aji.techshu.com/orkut/, soon I can see other 2 communities “3G vs Uncles”. Anyone not having a connectivity on mobile will be called uncle.

 ”Have fun! I use vodafone internet and its fun!”

1. Ask if the owners/founders/management the bottleneck? Are you micro managing? Are you pissing off good people? Are you thinking small? Are you unable to pass on the vision? Are you not able to motivate your team to live the vision together? Are you the bottleneck?
2. Are you in the right market with the right offering? This is important to ask, sometimes we might go wrong, its good to go back and start it again. http://community.tiekolkata.com/profiles/blogs/sabeer-bhatia-3-questions-to-ask-for-any-product
3. Is your company’s vision (Direction follows vision) well defined? Is your company a company that is focusing on improving some part of the society? Are you passionate about improving your customer’s lifestyle by solving the problem to best level? (This is so so important: Whenever I hear, “How client doesn’t understand”, “Client can’t freeze the requirement” … I will repeat .. “Thats the problem, we are trying to solve, lets solve it better next time” … Focus is not on shouting at people and client but to solve the problem every day. Making life better.
4. Is your company a company where people want to excel? Or Is your company a company where its only about revenue and work? Excellence brings revenue. Excellence attracts good people and clients/customers.
5. Is your company focusing on developing people? (Even if they leave your company, they will stay the ambassadors to your company, “Give when you can  & Ask when you need it”)
6. Is your company a company where good people want to join? How are you selling your company to new prospect recruits? Are they buying your work culture, your business model, your challenges? (Grrr … Most good people don’t want to join government jobs …)
7. Is the company focusing on financial management? (Visibility is important, focusing on building the finance is important but it comes secondary to me, it is needed but a good combination of PEOPLE, RIGHT MARKET, RIGHT OFFERING should bring in money, why shouldn’t it? Many disagree here but I still believe, money follows)
8. Who all are thinking about?

1. Innovation
2. Value addition
3. New opportunities
4. Team members life improvements (This is major) Point #10 http://aji.techshu.com/11lessons-entrepreneurs/
5. Customer/Client relationships
6. Process
7. Cost cutting
8. Revenue improvements

As mentioned here http://www.slideshare.net/ajinimc/iimc-talk-on-digital-marketing-by-aji-issac-ceo-techshucom My first venture was my Church’s youth camp and it was a major success (From one stage where noone believed we could participate to winning it with small margins to winning it for years). From 2002, I am thinking like an Entrepreneur, had my own ups and downs but great leanings. Here are few cents from my experience

1. Every Entrepreneur is different, so your growth and sustainability principles will be different. Example: I am a domain expert (Digital Marketing), my way to go ahead is to improve Digital Marketing experience (The market is big, I can solve it, now I need to add resources (Finance, Processes, HR etc) to scale up, thats my growth & Sustainability. For an Entrepreneur who is more into networking will like to network around to make the best partners to make things happen. So it will be different for you. You are the company when you start and everything is build on top of you (most of the time, later it will change). Google was made on an algorithm by Larry page, Facebook was made by Mark’s need and so on and on (but later it is all different). I have also seen companies where there is hardly any independence but the work is fixed and defined. They too are successful but are limited by many ways.
2. Myths about Focus, keep your eyes open, focus is still not defined: In every article you will see focus, focus and focus .. my experience is (and as discussed at SSKolkata, many others experience is) … It is not easy to focus initially, you need to do everything possible to survive and work towards one expertise … Focus will come, keep observing and keep moving. If you have enough money, time .. you are already surviving … you can focus now .. If you are all alone, you are surviving, you can focus now.
3. Believe that you will be APPLE and GOOGLE - Everybody likes to hear the story of Facebook, Google and Apple. They will say “You know they started in a garage, how fun” but when it comes to really working in garage, its a tough call. So is when you need to expand. You are going good with 10 people, now you need to go for 30, you will have invest, you will have to take risk … its a tough call again as the risk is bigger …. You got to be your own motivator – Growth is uncomfortable at times, its like a child growing, the bigger the child grows, bigger are the responsibility and that is sometimes uncomfortable. You got to motivate yourself and enter change of orbit carefully and with believe.
4. You got to work with smarter people, smarter than you … This is one of major problem I have seen with people … They are not able to work with people smarter than them .. Also I have seen Entrepreneurs always going for better and better people. It is said A hires A, B hires C, http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/01/the_art_of_recr.html#axzz1ielqY0ni … Search for A hires A, B hires C articles on Google.
5. Flexibility & Skills: At different stage of your business you need different type of thinking http://ecorner.stanford.edu/authorMaterialInfo.html?mid=1796 .. We (as owners of the initiative) need to see if we are the bottleneck at any stage of our business or not. Some of us are not good as managers, some of us are good as inventors. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Google (Google had to hire Eric as CEO and founders focused on innovations and product)
6. Broader thinking – What is this all about? What is big thinking after all …. My company will be 1000 members and 100 crores, is it big thinking? Big thinking is when you act according to your big thinking. If you know and believe your company is going to become big, you for that reason you can think of hiring someone whom you can’t afford now (even as a partner, or promise). I know that the company will be really big, I need to prepare myself, so attending and meeting other greater minds is important. “It’s ok to lose few thousands of Rs to create success stories” .. Think longer version in mind … Getting the wider picture. It’s not easy to explain this thought. Thinking small is a common problem I have seen.
7. There are many more points that are needed to fine tune an initiative for growth and sustainability. I will write another post.

Some Practical points that helped me:

1. Thinking alike to reduce learning curve – SVN and folder structure, now dropbox and structure. (Knowledge structuring) … For all our clients we have a folder structure where we have named it alike. So every person knows where to find a file, everyone ones what to do for a client etc. Thats to SVN and dropbox, our monthly cost for all these management was less than $5.
2. Thinking together – Process incubation folder & Dropbox (Knowledge management & Knowledge sharing) .. People keep adding documents to this folder, I keep organizing it (Later R&D team will do it, this quarter we have initiated the R&D team)… “I was promised an increment but nobody looked into it” … I will ask the HR to add a document for recruitment and thereafter .. we will keep working till we know we get a clear picture of how the process works and there is visibility and follow up. (Not easy but a process incubation folder helps us to start the process)
3. Dashboard – FengOffice + customization (I had to own the dashboard code) … Now we know where we invest our time, where are we losing money and where are we earning … who is working good and who is not.  This was one of most important thing for scaling, without this … measurement of various activities in the company is crucial.
4. Going fearless to make company better – Making team members public and bold http://www.techshu.com/bloggers/ … They need to own the company, it can only happen if we are fearless of losing them.
5. Hire them when they are available not when you need them: When you are small, small people don’t apply. Nobody wants to join a small company but there are some great people who come forward, don’t lose them. When we started the company, we had given open offers to many of the people whom we knew, they join at different stage of your company, whenever they say “YES”, we make space for them. Good people are very very important.
6. When a good person leaves, do given them open offer to come back: There are people who will leave because of different reasons (Grass is greener on other side), they might come back. We have a Facebook group which is always open for all ex, interns and current team members.
7. Anything that is repeative and non-intellectual should be automated. - http://www.techshu.com/faqs/ (Techshu leaks & Process excel sheet)
8. Programming is extension of your mind – SEOAPPY.com … automated a hell lot of things for our team.
9. You need to own the industry in longer term .. Jeetbo.com (for HR issues), digitalsoch.com (for corporate training) … anhour.in (for client education) etc to name a few.
10. Invest in good seeds – Always hired people with good background for top layer work .. One who can’t think of getting 2 lacs a month as a salary can never make your company going to 200 crorers. … http://www.seoforclients.com/about-us (Read the Jack Welch’s quote)
11. Work towards relationships – We have incurred heavy losses, still paying the debts … we worked for people for free, we did not collect the money when we could not deliver, we switched off few months payment to compensate … reason 2 relationships 1) With the client 2) With the ROI focused.
12. Define every word correctly … Our company is defined as “ROI focused End to End Digital Marketing Mix partner” (Every word is well defined and that is what stays with people”
13. Keep training people … They reject your wordings but sooner or later they will realize the need. Sweat in training to avoid blood in war… http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=155229661206652
14. Keep exploring new options … Keep thinking and keep documenting …. the documents allows me to see the complete picture, playing with your thoughts inside your mind is difficult but arranging it on a doc and rearraging it on a doc is easier. I had documents which were confusing for 2 weeks but it came out to be the best after 2 weeks.
15. Focus on Logic – Anything that is not logical is not supported .. Why should I ask my team members to come on time (when we are only 4), Why should I have a leave policy when we are only 10, why should I focus on accounting when my revenue is only 100,000.

• Crime #1: You are not into social Media (Thanks to all the events that happened in the last few weeks, I have given over 3 speeches on Social Media  )
• Crime #2: If you are not a blogger (These images will explain my point FB Image Link)

I am not criminal

I am social and I do blog, just to prove my point, here are some of the blog posts that fetched me some good traffic for being an HR blogger http://www.google.co.in/#q=hr+blog+india, even my blog was selected as one of the best HR blogs from India (that was long time back). Now I am into marketing, that means I am going to hell (as all marketers are liars and all liars go to hell, rest is maths I guess).

Here is my proof:

1. http://aji.techshu.com/my-death-wolf/
2. http://aji.techshu.com/you-a-failure/
3. http://aji.techshu.com/stories-that-inspired-me-part-iii-a-simple-world/
4. http://aji.techshu.com/stories-which-inspired-me-parti-the-law-of-the-seed/
5. http://aji.techshu.com/stories-that-inspired-me-parti-iparable-of-the-two-draft-horses/
6. http://aji.techshu.com/doto-others-as/
7. http://aji.techshu.com/simplify-problems/
8. http://aji.techshu.com/manager-leader/
9. http://aji.techshu.com/basic-needs/
10. http://aji.techshu.com/people-company/
11. http://aji.techshu.com/azim-lessons/
12. http://aji.techshu.com/aji-hot/

(There is more at http://aji.techshu.com/archives/, thanks!)

Pass the verdict, am I a criminal? Comment please

Will love to have your verdict.

I can take an example from my traveling. There is a bus stop where we can good trees, shadow and protection from rain. We can stand there and take the next shuttle that comes in. If I go at 12 noon, I stand there and get a shuttle easily, I can pick one of my choice but in the morning, there are less shuttles and more people. So people walk 100 meters in scorching sun or rain as they want to reach office faster, look at them some more people cover 200 meters to get a car faster than these 100 meters and this race continues, we keep walking and walking. In case if I still stand under the tree, I am sure that I will not get anything for next 2 hours, so I am forced to join the walking race. Where do I draw the line? Wherever I draw it, I see others coming and drawing the next line? Is there an end to this? No, unless you say so.

What are alternatives:
- You change your routine, you adjust and start early
- You sacrifice the saving, hire a regular cab
- You find a job near by which may pay you less but you can avoid this race
- Or learn the art of getting the shuttle before others in some way or the other
- Or enjoy the race, keep running to be the first
- and so on ….

This competition is there to stay, the work is going to increase. I think we will have to define it some day or the other. Very good read by Gautam Ghosh,

Now are MBAs good or not? My take on it is, depends on whom you are hiring and for what you are hiring. MBA degree alone is neither good or bad, it is about people. Any HR is a raw material and one need to see the ROI out of it. Some of them can make them profitable and some can’t. The most offensive video about MBA

If you remember my old post “mba waste of money” (which does bring me some good visitors every month as it ranks for MBA waste of money and surprisingly many are searching for this keyword). Let’s see a video before going further:

Confidence: What I like about MBA culture from AIMK is “Nothing is impossible wala confidence!”. They will like to make things happen in any time. Be it a presentation or a program, they will not complain that “only 5 mins for it”, they will jump in and make it. I remember the days when we had to finish few of the programs and then few presentations along with other parties. We made the presentations in less than 1 hour and were on stage. This confidence always helped me. I have made presentations during my travel to client and was never low in confidence. This confidence matters a lot in every field. But was it about MBA, no, not at all. Though a good MBA institute will give you enough challenges that you will feel confidence in almost everything. Some of our papers by Arnad Laha Sir, http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/faculty/profile.php?id=224were 100% open book, open discussion, open internet and had to answer 1 question out of 10 to get 100% marks Recently when I was interacting with 2 interns from IIMs and 2 interns from 2 other MBA interns from different Schools, I could see the difference. After every class the other MBA interns will come and complain with low confidence whereas IIM guys made an amazing (very useful) Internship study. I must also accept that sometimes they fail to show this confidence	Less prepared for failures: As the above video was explaining us about failures. Fresh MBAs have always seen the big dreams but when reality hits them, some of them do lose their confidence but many do jump back. But they have big things to lose when compared to others. A person coming out of a normal college can risk a Rs 20k job per month but when a top insti MBA has to risk Rs 100k job per month, it hits them bad. I was talking to a fresh MBA passout who is doing a different job (which is considered low grade job) but the industry is so unorganized that a person who organizes it can mint money. but then this guy is teased few times more than others for being a loser. If he can come out of it, better things for company and him.
“I know things, I have learned it”, marketing is P for … P for …. P for … Copying something from FB “gujarati friend told me MBA means Mane (I) Badhu (everything) Aaavde (know) !! seen people with less ideas and more actions in their life get more successful!”	Learning is good but remember those are just alphabets the company is going to form some new sentences, so be open to learn more. Teachers are gonna be different here.
Talented: Most of them are extremely talented. I have worked with many of them from our college, they are so wonderful, I will say the around 30% of them are amazingly good (I don’t know their grades, certainly they are not always the top 30% as per grades)	Sometimes the theoretical talent is different from practical talent: But when these talented people enters the world where things are less theoretical, they find it difficult. What I like about AIMK was that most of them were from Army culture who have visited many cultures and knows why people are different from others. Most importantly why they are different from you .
MBAs are Good at analysis. From SWOT analysis to BCG matrix to maslow’s hierarchy of needs, they know almost all analysis methods. It is good. It does allow you to keep things under control and make logical decisions.	But business is sometimes illogical too. Just copying something from Facebook again where the discussion is about a Jargon “‘give peanuts and u will get monkeys’…sure…Ram got across to Lanka thanks to only monkeys. If he had hired MBA’s, they would still be presenting him a 60 slide plan in a PPT…and charging him for it in advance… “ When Ram asked his MBA manager -what are my chances of getng sita back Hey Ram, its only 20% or less …-Why Because u don’t have enuf resources, the market cap and valuation of Ravan is tooo high, so don’t even think abt it -What if we hire monkeys? Don’t even think abt it as you don’t have budgets! And Ram never got sita back thanks to his mba manager (Sometimes it is so true, this happens when your analysis becomes paralysis )
MBA gets you opportunity:	May be too early sometimes: Sometimes people are not prepared for some of the realities.
Perfection is defined in MBA, everything taught there is perfect	Perfections needs to be redefined with speed and reality.
MBA gives you tool and its manual, you have more tools	Real experience teaches you on what tools can be used
MBA gives you many more options and tools	Don’t forget the paradoxes of choices and the factors associated with it
MBA gives you wider examples, wider views and generalized methods. Remember how Google was created, remember the Microsoft policy & the Apple disasters … etc	Sometimes it is important to know in and out of business at minute level: I remember working with a top Guy from one of the top 3 institutes of the world. He has designed the interface for one of the Linux flavour. He is great guy, great talent. He came in and without even studying the business he started making changes, some of it were good but I knew it is not going in right direction as he missed the strength of our business. In 2 months time we let him go.
MBA sometimes makes you follow things, which are good as you are safe	In current world the biggest risk is to be safe
Most of the MBAs from good schools have good communication skills and varied knowledge, so they can be trained for better sales representation.	Sorry if you have hired them to become Evangelists for your product. Converting sales team to Sales team to Evangelists is company’s job.
Last point: MBA is about knowledge and tools	Real world is about wisdom and execution.
MBAs charge more as they understand business better. I liked this sentence from the conversation “Ram Got Sita, what did Monkey got?” … it is important to share good % of revenue with the team.	The other aspect is that sharing is good but what if Ram does not get Sita but still he had to pay money in advance, may be sometimes that is too heavy for startups or SMEs, even for clients. I agree with the fact that if you don’t demand the money you don’t get it easily. You be good (which MBAs have proved so far by being in the top lists), charge good and continuing doing better to charge even more. Nothing wrong in it. A person should be paid really high if the person is creating high value for the company.

Last point

MBA is about knowledge, efficiency and tools, Real world is about wisdom, effectiveness and execution. Now its your take, does more knowledge, efficiency and tools make you wiser, more effective and profitable? We have recruited many MBAs as we want them to be the pillars of the company in long run. They have the tools and the knowledge, its our time to help them use it wisely and effectively.

It is difficult to teach about forgiveness in corporate life. Somebody cheated me, why should I forgive him? That guy, he did that purposefully, why I should I forgive him? Remember, he shouted at me, it was so humiliating, I will never forgive him. All of it is true, there is no true visible benefits of forgiveness. I like the sentence which says

Cast your bread upon the waters, for after many days you will find it again.

- http://bible.cc/ecclesiastes/11-1.htm, I think this is one of the greatest messages from my religion to me. The long term benefits of forgiveness. Even when you and I can’t see the short terms benefits, there are many long term benefits.

Ephesians 4:26 (NKJV) says “Be angry but do not sin”: do not let the sun go down on your wrath,

This is so powerful message. When we see wrong, we do go angry and it is very nature of US and IT is OK TO BE A NORMAL PERSON. The catch here is not to carry the anger for more than a day, forgive and move on. Sometimes forgiving is like putting water on a spark, the spark which if neglected can burn your house. In my personal life, it has helped me a lot:

• Forgiving helped me discover better part of others.
• Forgiving helped me focus on better things than wasting my time and life on something that is bad for both the parties.
• Forgiving helped me feel good esp when you see others are happy because of it.
• Forgiving helped me make my world better. Generally your world is much smaller than you think. It consists of people whom you meet almost every day or now n then. If we keep hating some of these people then we are making our world a little bad to life in.
• It helps me in innovation as I can focus on things I love than things I hate, a big thing for me.

(Chulbul Pandey Vs Makhi Pandey, the Dabang fans know it )

So go ahead, forgive, move on in life.
“bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” as said in http://bible.cc/luke/6-28.htm.

Happy Forgiveness day!

Also read:
1) http://www.seoforclients.com/hr/never-between-you-them/
2) http://www.seoforclients.com/hr/hindu-muslim-christian-terrors/

(I too bought few ferraris and learned big lessons here)

We generally have a perception that devils have little horns and angels have white feathered wings. I am also trying to get the same answers here.

I generally give this example to our sales team, account managers, project managers.

Real Story: It happened some 2 months back. I was traveling from our office to our client’s office in Salt Lake where we do SEO consultancy for large clients (Search Engine Optimization for better ranking). It is generally a 20 mins drive through Rajarhat road which is connected to the Airport. You generally get shuttles (people who are willing to give you a lift for a minimum amount). The rates in these routes are almost fixed. It generally costs me Rs xxx (I will reveal the exact amount after some time as the story is all about the exact amount).

I entered the taxi and was about to reach my destination, just before 2 stops, one fellow passenger asked the cabby to stop.

• There the main character gets down.
• He took a Rs 10 note and offered it to the cabby. Cabby said to the guy, kya yeha thak ka Rs 10 hai kya (Is the charge to this place Rs 10)?
• Since I was the only guy there and the question was not directed to me, I did not say anything (as I am fed up playing the good guy role for last few months, nobody wants a good guy).
• Cabby took 10 Rs, the guy goes and cabby starts again. 2 stops to my destination? Only I and Driver was left.
• Will I be called an angel or devil? It will all depend on the next two stops.

Devil: If the driver stops in between and asks anyone about the right price, he will come to know that it is Rs 15, not Rs 10. He will call me devil as I did not raise my voice for right (and also he is not aware that I am not going to cheat as I would be paying Rs 15 anyway). Even if I would have given Rs 15, he will always assume that I was to cheat but he caught me and thus I am paying Rs 15. I will remain a devil for him throughout.

Angel: Now if he doesn’t stop in between and when I get down, I hand over Rs 15 and tell him that the charge is Rs 15 not Rs 10, “Sir, please do charge Rs 15 now onwards”. He may consider me an angel as I did not cheat when I could have easily and also helped him learn from his mistakes.

Another scenario: Now if I would have raised the voice and said that the cost is Rs 15 at that time (when the other passenger was giving Rs 10), it would have created a tussle between me, cabby and the guy. It is cabby’s responsibility to know the right price (business rules: Know or learn from your mistakes) not my responsibility to correct the society.

Now my question is? Did I do anything right or wrong? I was silent till the last moment but still I could have been labeled a devil and an angel in one taxi. Whereas I travel daily as pure human being by paying the same amount.

I learned that being perceived right or wrong is also about timing. I work very honestly but if my boss only comes to my desk twice a day and finds me on my facebook, he is going to get me devil wrong. My dad visited our hotel only 5 time in 3 years span and surprisingly all five times all our roomies were sleeping including me (he came at different times too). He always feel that our friends don’t study they sleep throughout the day. He told many people . Coming back to the point. Was I devil or angel?

Let’s take business communication. We have a client, Pune based, we worked really hard for him, we prepared a lot of documents for him and asked our team to arrange a meeting to discuss things. Since the project needs a push, client is also worried about our initiatives. Now if we mail the client first about the meeting, our efforts will be considered angel good but if he mails us first then all our efforts will be labeled “Worked under pressure”. The timing in communication does play a very important role. As in the same taxi, I was consider a devil and an angel based on 2 stops, similarly I will be considered an angel or a devil with this client based on who mails first.

There are perceptions and other things that contributes to a good vote or a bad vote but timing is also very crucial. As I mentioned in my facebook status that there is no good or bad life, only there are good and bad moments.

Moral of the story:

You can control a lot of develic and angelic work by playing right. Only God can judge people right without any additional information but people make judgment based on the information they collect (things they saw, heard, felt etc). A good person also needs to learn the art of sending right signals. You can watch all the daily Soaps that my wifey watches where a good person is always taken wrong based on what others saw (where as she was to do good). A good example that I remember, this soap star goes to prostitute hub to save her family and her fiance sees her and refuses to marry her considering her character to bad. Soaps will ultimately respect the good fellow but real life can be really painful. So better learn some art of sending right signals for good.

Spam part

Please do join linenclub’s campaign this August at http://www.facebook.com/linenclub (Take your pic in linen and win amazing prizes).

My purpose for this post is basically an open question to everyone. I
would like to know some of your thoughts/criticism/experiences/doubts/
questions/etc on the following question. There is an internship fair
to be held shortly in Mumbai, Pune, Kolkata, Ahmadabad and Bengaluru,
for which we need some inputs from you to make this a successful
event.

Q: As we all know there are many internship positions available in
various companies around the country, also that most of the intern
positions are filled by references or some connections.

– So what is that you as an individual, an employer or an employee
would want to change in the internship industry?
– What would according to you be the best way to hire worthy
candidates?
– What is that extra punch, that you would personally want to see
in \’Intern hiring\’?
– On what basis (parameters) should a candidate be alloted an
intern position?
– Do you think the companies should directly receive candidate\’s
application form, or should there be a filter who would vet the
candidates and match them to specific opening as per their abilities?

I request you to please share as much information as possible. it
would be really helpful for us really understand the missing links and
requirements of the internship industry. Once again, thank you very
much in advance for all the great responses you would send in.

Personally, I will like to have interaction with the candidate atleast 6 month before the internship or Ideally I will like an agency to contact us, understand our requirements, interview candidates, select candidates, we do the final round (atleast 6 months before the internship), then the agency should provide the materials to study for the internship and connect with us so that we can clear any doubts. After 6 months, the intern should enter with a purpose and gel with the team to do something that can benefit the company and himself/herself.

Our (AIMK MCA) internship was the best, we had internship in 3rd year (final year) first and second trimester, then one trimester was study and another trimester was off for either internal or external project. In this way a person who is interested to work with the company can even continue working for the whole last year without effective much of his study. I started like that, I left college after 2 years of MCA, I worked at Alumnus and then joined another company where I did my final project + final job. It was beneficial for all.

>> Do you think the companies should directly receive candidate\’s application form, or should there be a filter who would vet the candidates and match them to specific opening as per their abilities?
This completely depends of the company and the cost involved, since interns are not for long term, as a company we don\’t want to invest anything to get good interns … we just want to take few, try one stuff …. but in case if there is any intern that is interested for a long term with us, things can be completely different, we will like to have different layers of filters before they enter in ..

>> What is that extra punch, that you would personally want to see in \’Intern hiring\’?
We just worked with the IIM interns, they had their mentors (professors) guiding them, this is very much needed, we need mentors at both end, in company and in college.

>> – On what basis (parameters) should a candidate be alloted an intern position?
One interview + The CV (it shall go easy on them as the risk is less here for the companies)

>> – What would according to you be the best way to hire worthy candidates?
There is no best, there is one that suits us and there is another that suits others but in all cases we want good people to be in. I recently spent by 2 days with an intern, I got so upset as his basics were so poor (we did a bad hiring here), I think I shouted a little too much, he ran away, never came back again … this time we were more careful, we hired amazingly good interns and they are doing really cool. Loved working with them so far. They have already worked on FB apps, Joomla, wordpress and few more architectures ….

Hope it answers to some extend. Thanks.

Best Regards,
Aji Issac

PLEASE GO THROUGH THIS

I agree with you that swine flu awareness is needed, but there is no need to be panicky and join the publicity propaganda carried out by media and others which acts as a vehicle to spread misconception than
to spread scientific information. These are few facts about swine flu when discussed with the leading
epidemiologists.

1. Swine flu, that is H1N1 flu is not new, first detected in 1987
2. Infective stage of flu is 5 days, 1 day before and 4 days after onset of symptoms
3. The best way to prevent it spreading is asking patients having symptoms of flu like fever, cough and running nose to take rest at home for 4 days so he does not transmit it
4. Masks are of limited value if any, in this disease, it can spread through droplets on your skin, through contact etc, and I have seen that the masks in Pune are worn as fashion statement, while walking on road today morning I saw people wearing masks coming out for a morning walk with their dogs!, many wearing masks around their necks, and so on, in fact these masks shall act as the vehicles to carry the virus, instead, avoiding crowded places or cinema halls or malls where air conditioners are on, is advisable, because you get recalculated air, where the virus density multiplies
5. Death after H1N1 flu is not common, in fact infections like measles is taking toll of thousands more every year, and we are oblivious of the facts. Swine flu is being blown out of proportion by media trying to create hysteria among lay people.
6. Fever accompanied by respiratory distress, should be immediately notified which is likely to be a complication of H1N1 flu
7. The mortality is less than .01 percent of those affected, that means may be one in 10,000 affected is likely to suffer the life loss.
8. If you remember, 2 years ago SARS was blown out of proportion, what happened? Humans develop immunity to the virus, the same is going to happen, we develop immunity in due course of time, the virus is in the air, you can not stop it, our body is already developing the immunity so nothing to panic.

We need to take care of children and elderly who have less immunity and do not let them go to crowded places that are all.

WE MUST START THIS CAMPAIGN OF NOT TO BE AFRAID OF THIS FLU AND LET YOUR DAILY WORK CONTINUE AS NORMAL, NO MASKS FOR ORDINARY CITIZENS, HEALTH CARE WORKERS OR SPECIFIC EXPOSED TO LOT OF CROWDED ENVIRONMENTS MAY BE BENEFITTED, NOT PROVEN.

I am amazed to hear that people are selling masks of RS 20 each which are available to less than Rupee 1 in the market. See who is getting benefitted?

Please spread the scientific info, do not join the band wagon and stick to science, that should be the order of the day.

People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.
What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.
Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.
In the final analysis, it is between you and the global CEO. It was never between you and them anyway.

May God bless all of us to do Good. Life is not about what you get but about what you enjoy.

my first boss, less of a boss and more of a mentor. We had different viewpoints at various points. Even we departed arguing , looks like yesterday and brings the smile

11 lessons I learned from Vikas Kedia

1. About dreams & stars: “You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But he dreamed things that never were; and He said, ‘Why not?’” …. His dreams were so big and so strong that his team could see it real all the time. He always talked big. He talked about Nasdaq when the bathrooms were smelling. You might find it crazy but his dreams always pushed him and his team for the extra mile. I used to dream about visiting NASDAQ too, I think it was too contagious and too fun. Dreams are like stars…you may never touch them, but if you follow them they will lead you to your destiny. If InterNext Technologies Inc is something today then a lot of credit goes to his dreams (and I am sure he will take it to NASDAQ one day). He always said “You dream big and the rest of things will be added to you”. Even InterNext Technologies Inc’s website will reflect an image about dreams. I hope the new building will also have the boy looking up towards the star. DREAMS.
2. Hard work has no substitute: There are so many people to criticize your hard working abilities, some will call you workaholics but I wish there was a substitute for this hard work for an Entrepreneur. He will work day and night to make a thing work. He will be on a call while traveling, he will be on call while shopping and almost all the time he will be available for work. We all are born with various limits but there are few who believes that “Life has no limitations, except the ones you make” and Vikas is one of them. His CV would reflect all the non-technical educational achievements but his technical knowledge and expertize is much above a professional techy. I often asked him, “Vikas, how did you expertize so many technical things”. He will always answer, “I tried, I failed, I retried till I understood”. His hard work made him a TRUE LEADER, whom people respect from their heart. I always respected him for all his hard work. I always prayer for his success as if anyone who deserves success then it is him as he has worked so hard for it. I met so many ex-colleagues, we all had our own complains but almost all admired Vikas for who he is and his hard work. I think a great achievement for anyone. HARD WORK!
3. Impatient Early releases: He always pushed us for an early release. I was not a very big fan of releasing something too early (I still struggle with it but to lesser extent, we released our new design without even completing it). It certainly helps to release a bit early with some bugs. IMPATIENT.
4. Best Infrastructure: He will change the computers, will have all of us use the dual monitors, will have the best infrastructure. Being a programmer, all I cared about was a pujama and computer (may be thats why people still call me pujama programmer) but he taught us how good infrastructure influences the company. You will always find InterNext Technologies Inc to be full of Gizmos, latest network cables, advance networking, best phones and so on. INFRASTRUCTURE CRAZY.
5. Programming standards: I remember the days when I and Vikas were the only two programmers in the company, we will change the file and keep a copy of it with a note about the changes. Our codes will have all the includes. With Vikas, we have come a long long way with proper coding standards, version controlling with SVN, inline documentation (I LOVED IT THE MOST, I STILL FOLLOW). Our function names will be like FnGetSomeSleepAjiAsYouNeedToGetUpEarly($ArrayInputs). Alpha, beta, productio and multi layer backups. IP KVMS, over 50 servers and much to add to it. Architectures and a lot to write about it. He is great programmer too. He is really TECHY.
6. Documentation: Documentation is like sex: when it is good, it is very, very good; and when it is bad, it is worse than nothing. He will create great documentations. All the technical team used his documentations to solve many FOP (frequently occurred problems). It helps to have something immediately accessible, … Getting documentation immediately available online is very appealing to a lot of people. At InterNext Technologies Inc we learned the art of documentation using Google docs. The credit goes to Vikas for pushing us towards Google docs. Documentation.
7. Failure is OK: One of the biggest lessons we learned in InterNext Technologies Inc, Failure is ok. Infact we had plans to launch a campaigns for Indian B-Schools, where we wanted to teach about failure. “An inventor fails 999 times, and if he succeeds once, he’s in. He treats his failures simply as practice shots.” This is so true for an Inventor like Vikas. He tries too many things, he fails more often than anyone. I remember how he shifted the task system from gforge to google docs, then to google calenders, then to emails, then to …. He tried, he failed but he always knew the importance of these failures. Failure is OK, Inventor.
8. Create products like Gods: He was a strong believer of products over services. He always wanted to create products that providing services to other companies. InterNext Technologies Inc would have been 5 times richer financially than today if Vikas had taken service path but his decision to stick to products helped us experience the magic of brands and products. I will always remember InterNext Technologies Inc for the innovations we did for our own products. Products.
9. Converting quality to numbers: Our new company SEOforClients is fully running on it. We have implemented all over. Even the stock options are about converting work output in numbers to your stocks (may be a good HR innovation). Vikas was always in favor of putting quality and work into numbers. He always said, “If something is not Measurable then it is not manageable”. Measure-ability is manageability (and manageability is scalability and scalability is GOOD for business).
10. Let the problem come, we will see it: Another great lesson for life. We used to worry a lot about future problems, the problem that don’t exist. The problems that will be encountered only if the products becomes successful. He always used to say, “Let the problem. These are welcome problems that comes with success”. Now I focus on the core product, launch it and when we hit the success we have enough resources to fix a lot of possible future problems.
11. Learn it yourself, no spoon feeding There are occasions when you love spoon feeding. I remember an instance where I was asked to password protect a folder. It was late at night and I was about to leave. I had never done something like that before, so I asked Vikas. He asked me to Google and get the solution. I was disappointed but it made a rule to try yourself to the possible levels. Also in the process of password protecting a file, I learned a lot more about .htaccess. GOOD Mentor.

I guess I can write many more lessons that I have learned from Vikas. He once said, “Call someone sir only when they deserve it not because they are your seniors or your boss”.

Vikas Kedia in 11 words

DREAMS, HARD WORK, IMPATIENT, INFRASTRUCTURE CRAZY, TECHY, Documentation, Failure is OK (Inventor), Products, Measure-ability, Let the problem come, GOOD Mentor. (and a good human being, may God bless him with all success)

Summarizing Vikasism: Don’t listen to those who say, you taking too big a chance. Michelangelo would have painted the Sistine floor, and it would surely be rubbed out by today. Most important, don’t listen when the little voice of fear inside you rears its ugly head and says. they all smarter than you out there. They’re more talented, they’re taller, blonder, prettier, luckier, and they have connections. I firmly believe that if you follow a path that interests you, not to the exclusion of love, sensitivity, and cooperation with others, but with the strength of conviction that you can move others by your own efforts, and do not make success or failure the criteria by which you live, the chances are you’ll be a person worthy of your own respects (and others). Thank you Vikas SIR!

External links that talks about Vikas Kedia

Rest at Wikipedia page on Vikas.

I had been a librarian, a volunteer teacher (taught every sunday for almost 2 years), secretaries, programmer, researcher, team leader, marketing head, leader and a lot more full time jobs …. what I have seen is:

1. I see that every sector offers space for innovation and improvements.
2. I see that every sector offers great satisfaction of achievement when we achieve some targets and standards. In library, it was about how to make more and more people read books, in programming it was about the final display with no errors.
3. and more …..

Now I am on discussion point on whether the job satisfaction is about job or person or both? I will say both, everyone will say both? But how much person and how much job then ?

I get dissatisfied with my job when

1. I don’t see money coming my way
2. I see my boss is screwing himself and his company AND ME
3. I see mistakes, I suggest improvements but still the politics hardly allows the change
4. I see a mismatch with my expertise for long run (This is just not that very important), I am still open to become a travel guide and I will fit in my expertise there, or a cook … But when I have spent years into a line, i will like to milk it.
5. The company is selling my blood for money … Some people are never happy with the quantity of work .. they demand more … I will SAY NOOOOOOOOOO to them right then … run company where we all earn our breads and the owner his cake.

I am in hurry so stopping here, whats your take on it?

Since I am on a very strict budget (I even forgot my atm card number time as taking money out of ATM is a rare occasion these days), I ended up buying one book (Old habits don’t die easily), book on insurance (I bought it as it was written by someone whom I trust).

So issues, I will be buying her book soon . For the time being one should not miss this page http://www.sramanamitra.com/entrepreneurship-case-studies/. Thanks for all your hard work in providing so much information for all of us. Thanks again.

Firing employees is not easy

For any sane minded company (you should work with sane minded company only) firing is one of the most difficult part. I had interacted with some of the people for whom firing is just a way to improve his business. If somebody is not performing ask him to leave, thats all. Some people are good at firing, I am not. I have always struggled with firing employees and I have learned my lessons too. Firing is awful for the person doing the casting out and, surely, for the person being fired. Still it is important to let people go at times. I was a part of many discussions where we were passing the ball to each other for the firing announcement. I was also a part of the team that got fired. So I have been on both the sides of firing table and felt the heat exact same on both sides.

Why employees get fired

Just 4 reasons:

1. For breaking laws.
2. Non performance
3. Economical problems
4. Strategy changes by the company

Employees getting fired for breaking laws:

Now even this can be further divided into 2:

• Being unethical: This is when people steal or cheat or sell off some proprietary things. This is highly unaccepted. In this case one doesn’t need to think twice. Hear the person, give a good and fast trial and call the fire alarm. In such firings it is important to announce the reason for firing really loudly. I remember a case with a very high profile US based company that started its operation in India. A senior person, very high performing person, was fired from the company for bribing the government officials for a contract. Company did get the contract. In any other company the person might have got appreciated with incentives as bribing is taken as a accepted practice in some part of the world. BUT this company wanted to make sure that its people understand the value behind its integrity, so fired the person loudly. Every person in the company got a mail with the reasons and was asked not to take this route ever. So in such cases do shout loud enough after firing. This will also settle the dust of confusion among the employees. Leave no place for gossips or misinterpretation after firing.
• Breaking of other company rules: There can be other breaking of rules like coming late, or being arrogant to the seniors etc. In such cases I haven’t seen much of firing as most of the firing had non-performance as the real reason and breaking of company rules only as the surface reasons. In such cases before firing the person you need to give the person atleast 3 to 4 chances. Provide training to the person, assign a mentor and delegate the firing process to the mentor. After 3 to 4 chances do let go the person with proper explanations. Also it is advisable to clear this process with other employees. I will also suggest to drop a common mail to the company explaining the reasons and the process for such firing.

Firing employees for non performance

This is a much debatable topic when it comes to firing because of non performance. I have only seen few occasions when the person has accepted that he/she wasn’t performing. In most of the cases both the parties will disagree on the non-performance status. I recently interacted with a person who got fired from one of my known companies. I know their management really well. So he asked me, “Why did so and so fired me, I was one of the most performing person in the team and they fired me for non-performing”. I inquired and found many more reasons behind his firing including some level of politics (You know what I mean). But overall this guy wasn’t clear on “WHY I WAS FIRED FOR NON-PERFORMANCE”. There were instances were people were getting fired for non-performance and I advocated and mentored them. To the surprise of many they became the pillars to the company. Also there were instances when non-performers did not improve and did cost to the company because of my intervention.

With non-performance based firing one need to be very careful and make sure that their is no foul play involved. As in one of my previous post it mentioned that “People leave company because of their manager“, so can be the case with firing. There are many cases where the firing happened because the manager was not happy with certain thing (which can not be counted as non-performance at all), or the manager was feeling threatened because of the junis talent and so on. So in case of non-performance, let the HR department define the non-performance clearly. THE KEY IS CANDID. You need to be open to the employees as in what you mean by non-performance since performance is estimated based on results and results are depended on team work. At many times the job profile may not be well defined leading to non performance. Different people have different attitude towards work, some are task oriented or well-defined job description oriented, so you need to define their roles very preciously to avoid non-performance. A scrutiny of non-performance may also lead to improvement in work and work-flow processes.

In case of non-performance firing make sure that it doesn’t come to the person as a surprise. Let there be a complete open and candid process for such firing. (Also take it as lesson for your hiring, generally a lot of initial stage non-performance firing happens because of bad hiring)

Mass Employee firing due to economical problems

This can be really sad when all of a sudden the client flow dies off and the company find itself in a financial crisis. Company does try to fight back but at times nothing work out. In such cases, it is very important to involve the whole of the company to understand the problem and fight back. Recently I visited a CEO of a growing company, he explained me how his company went through financial crisis and how his employees helped him come out of it. In that conversation he did mention that he was very open to the employees about the financial crisis faced by the company. He attended few meetings with the whole team and explained them the issues faced by the company. Then everybody worked extra, analyzed the problems and brought the company out of financial crisis. In all possible cases one need to be very candid with the people in concern.

Even when the CEO explains the issues to the next level it sometimes doesn’t flow down to the core people group. CEO of the company need to ensure that the next level is passing on the information with the same intensity. I have access to some of the top companies in India and I have seen how their CEO sends regular group emails, be it a happy moment or a sad one (but most of these companies are tech companies and every employee has access to emails).

Point of the matter is that employer needs to involve the employee in these situations. Such layoffs should not come as a surprise to anyone.

Employee firing due to strategy changes by the company

This was another reason that I have personally witnessed where the company decided to stop a particular department as they felt it is not the right direction for the company. Such decisions can come out of management meetings and can hit the team as a surprise. But even in these cases company need to discuss with the team about such a move. After all success is all about fine tuning. It is easy to destroy but very difficult to create one. When the company shares its observations with the team then there can be a mutual discussion and sometimes it can come bring huge profit out of such departments and products. Even when the company need to take such decisions, it needs to make sure that the team members are given enough time to explore new opportunities in life.

Do not just delegate firing to the HR department

At many layouts and firing the top management is not at all seen, it is taken care by the HR department. Delegating layoffs or firing to the HR department is not very much advisable. I used to get involved in firing representing the management. Also CEOs and other senior members do jump in at serious firing cases. It is very important to involve the immediate managers and team members in the firing process. In some cases i will also advice the involvement of management including the CEO.

Overall summary on How to fire employees

1. Make sure employees know the exact reason why they are getting fired.
2. Make sure it doesn’t come to them as a surprise.
3. Make sure you hear different version of the story before taking a decision. Allow fair trail.
4. Make sure you don’t delegate firing to HR department alone.

I poop therefore, I am

It is so important to give away for free. Many of us are too busy in “creating things like God” and “working like slaves” or even “demanding like Kings” but hardly have time to Poop (sharing it away for free).

I remember a Bible quotes (Ecc 11:1-3),

“Cast thy bread upon the running waters: for after a long time thou shalt find it again. Give a portion to seven, and also to eight: for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth. If the clouds be full, they will pour out rain upon the earth. If the tree fall to the south, or to the north, in what place soever it shall fall, there shall it be.”

How true it is! People are not interested in free giving aways but are very interested in getting free give aways. Before giving we calculate the return whereas when we do what is needed the return does come. From my personal experience, Pooping is very useful for your career too (Long term).

Reasons why Pooping (Sharing for free) is useful

1. Whom you know is more important than what you know: Pooping allowed me connect to a lot of like minded friends. Pooping allowed me to chat with industry experts. I got in touch with them when I pooped (sometimes free blog advices, sometimes free work etc) and we are still in touch.
2. Pooping reflects what I ate: Only when I poop people will come to know what I am eating (or what I ate).
3. It does bring gift too: Because of the free help that I provided I have got many many gifts. I got free memberships worth $150 per quarter, ppts of the latest seminars in US, great information and access to tools.
4. It builds trust and customer: I got my first customer through a friend of mine who used to ask me questions on a web forum with different name. Because of your writing people can know more about you and trust you and your work.
5. It makes you better: Only when you speak and share you are criticized and improved. There were many occasions when people have corrected my concepts. Even one of my earlier SEO mentor came in my life because of Pooping.
6. Written pooping allows you to focus on new things: Blogs have saved me so much time. I write it once and then I forward the links for similar queries or trainings.
7. Written pooping allows others to recommend you: A good blog of yourself do encourage others to recommend you to others.
8. I poop there, I am: I pooped in an interview, took around 30 mins class so that the person can understand some important concepts. After few years the same person has brought me clients. He accompanies the person to our home.

So do poop freely and enjoy the best gift called LIFE.