Life or something like that !!

Today was a long day !!

2011-08-06T01:36:00.003+05:30

Half awake and sleepily, I look at my mobile, oh boy couple of missed calls and message from my wife. How long did I sleep? What's the time? 8:45 in the night. So I slept only for 45 mins. Time now for quick chat with wifey and then quick dinner.

At 10 pm back at room with couple of articles, one text book chapter to be read before I could try my hands on the case to be read for tomorrow's strategy management class.

Flashback to 7:30 am the same day. Grudgingly I am getting out of my bed. Its time to get ready fast, have a quick bite at the mess and run for the class. Professor is already in the class and next hour and a half is about how to manage a world class operations. After assimilating concepts of operations research in the previous term we are learning operations management this term. Though explained in manufacturing terms, fundas are on managing supply chain.

Next two class, for full three hours, are on corporate finance management. Again we have had our finance base created with managerial and financial accounting in earlier term. So how would you raise capital for your venture? Shall you go for debt or for raising money through equity? Should you consider approaching a venture capitalist or go for private placement?

At 1:30 in the afternoon, its time for a quick lunch. And by 2:15 we are back again, just in time, for economics class. So is trade between two countries good? What if one of the country is small in GDP? What is absolute advantage and how it is different vis-a-vis comparative advantage? Why import tariff? Why quota? Ohhh, enough for today man!

But no. There are another two classes lined up for today. Change is only constant, they said. So there it is, gyan on how to lead and manage change. Using case professor is explaining the nuances of change management. 4 teams have come prepared with their analysis of cases and making presentation. Once teams are done with their presentation professor takes over and summarizes the learning from the case.

7:30 PM - Finally we are through with a long and grinding day.

Back to current time. It is already 1:00 am and I have just finished two articles to be read before I start with the case. Thankfully tomorrow ( today?) classes starts at 10 so I can still stretch some more. 2:30 - done with the case. Time to hit the bed !!

It Depends !!

2011-06-20T01:10:00.000+05:30

It has been exactly a couple of months since I came to Joka Management,
as IIM C , situated at Joka in Kolkata, is known among the taxi walas. And it has been nothing less than a roller coaster ride beginning day zero. Sometimes these two months seems like two years and at other not more than two weeks.

There is no single way of doing things, no right solution. The very first lesson we had on day zero when we were introduced to the nuances of case methodologies. With each passing days there were some aha moments and also challenges to our structured, rational and straight jacketed thought process, mainly shaped by our background in science, technology and engineering. But unlike technology life is not predicable and so does the business, and people who are at either side of the business. As they say at times one has to unlearn to learn. Now I can vouch for it. When at the end of case analysis you find all 44 people have come up with different solution for the business issues presented in the case and prof says that there is no right or wrong solution and all these solutions can be correct then the engineer brain becomes very uncomfortable. Every technical problem has a single solution after all, even though ways to getting to the solution can be different and every way of solving the problem can be logical justified. But business is not technology. In these two months my brain , which tried to rebel initially, has understood and accepted the fact that management is fluid. Technology is not the indicator of life, business and management surely is.

Among all procedural pre-readings, lectures, quizzes, assignments, exams, projects there have been quite a many aha moments. You start to understand and appreciate the reasons behinds seemingly incongruous things. Like, why cokes and pepsis of the world spend fortune on their advertisement.

By the way do you have any idea that the cost of your Dell laptop can depend on who uses, workers or managers, the staff canteen at assembly plant at Dell? Things in business are not as straight forward and simple as it is in engineering. For quite a few questions the answer is "It Depends!!". And as you'd realize in business and management things really depends on many factors.

Even though BCG and HBR attribute Honda's success in US in 1960s to Honda's well crafted strategies when in fact it was by fluke Honda tasted initial success, and answer for quite a few things is "It Depends" I am loving it !!

Que Sera, Sera !!

2011-03-23T23:57:00.002+05:30

Life is difficult.

This is a great truth, one of the greatest truth. It is a great truth because once we know that life is difficult - once we truly understand and accept it - then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters. -- M. Scott Peck in The Road Less Traveled.

There are only so much one can influence when it comes to things that affects one's life and its future course of action. Some one rightly said that there is future of desire and then there is future of fate. To some extent life is sum of the choices one makes, but even then not every thing can be planned and turned out to be as much as planned. But one thing among all this, that is very important is ability and strength to accept the current situation.

Sure plan ahead and take steps to make planning a reality but then be aware that things may not turn out the way you have planned. Have strength to accept the outcome. Be happy if it turns out to the way you had planned and if that is not the case, collect the broken pieces and move on. Why me and other such questions can only aggravate the suffering and delay healing. If you can do something to get the favourable outcome , do it or else just accept.

In the future when you look back at the turns of the events and try to connect dots, every thing will fall into places, everything will make sense. For events which are not making sense, wait some more :). In the end, everything will be fine, if it is not fine, picture abhi baaki hai mere dost!!

Whate will be, will be!

So Why Raavan Was Flop!!

2011-02-07T14:19:00.001+05:30

"Amit?" called out professor one, P1. "That's me" I replied. "Lets go".

And I followed P1 to the interview room, where another professor, P2, was going through my profile file. After exchanging pleasantries P1 asked about my job profile and responsibilities. I told them that I take care of all aspect of project management.

P1 - "How would you explain project management to a lay man?"
I started to explain taking example of going to a movie and building a building. While doing so I must have used couple of project management jargon. P2 interrupted and asked if I am a PMP? I answered in affirmative. He went on to ask couple of questions from project management , like that of Gantt chart, PERT etc.. He then asked me to draw a network diagram. I managed to answer them satisfactorily. P2 then said he was done and asked if P1 had any question.

P1 - "In your essays you have mentioned that you read books. Which book have you read recently?"
Me - "Simply Fly".
P1 - "But that's a management book. What other books have you read?"
I mentioned books of other genre which I had read. One of them being Harry Potter.

P1 - "So you follow Harry Potter. What is the name of the sport he plays?"

P1 - "And how it is played?"
I explained based on what ever little I remembered about the sport.

P1 - "You have written that you are a movie buff. Which is the movie you have seen?"
I told him whatever the movie was and went on to explain the storyline of the movie. P2, who was just observing me all this while, asked if I have seen Raavan? I said yes. "So what do you think why was Raavan flop?" his next question. "Ouch, let me think" I thought. Then I went on to explain what I thought could be the reason of that movie being a flop.

After that they said that they were done and asked if I had any question. I asked them something, wondering if that was all. There wasn't any regular interview question like why MBA? why now? short term , long term goal, no quants questions. They didn't even check my certificates as is norm with IIM C. Yeah, they did ask if offered an admission what kind of accommodation I'd prefer, another norm in IIM C interview.

And so I came out of the interview not knowing what to expect. Because of my fickle mindedness by the time I started application for IIM C I had only 3 weeks left before the deadline. I wrote the essays thinking these essays could be used as working draft for other IIMs and ISB application. But even then I wrote with full conviction and being true to myself.

Only with the final admission offer I understood that it indeed is one's overall profile , consisting academic performance, GMAT score, professional career, leadership potential, essays & recommendations and interview, which gets you in.

Now I am looking forward for one great year ahead.

The impatient generation!!

2011-02-03T16:50:00.001+05:30

We? Nah. In face we are the transition generation. As teenagers we stood in the queues to pay electricity bill, to get cash from the bank, to get reservation in the train, to buy ticket for movie and what not. By the way in those days not many houses used to have a telephone connection.

At the turn of new century things changed drastically for us. As adults, with the advents of credit cards and internet, we hardly needed to stand in queues for things, especially things mentioned as above. Along with these there have been influx of quite a many private service providers for things affecting our daily lives. You just give a call to customer care and someone comes down to collect cheque for the payment. Businesses now have facility to remind consumer of their due payments or car servicing and things like that.

So far so good. We are now used to fast and efficient services and rightly so. But looks like things need further improvement if I go by my experience today.

With financial year closing there are quite a few investment policies for which due date is nearing and I thought of paying dues for all of them today. I chose to go offline mode for this.

I started with Bajaj Allianz. To pay the premium all I had to do was to give the cashier my policy no. and then make payment by the credit card. The whole process took not more than 10 min. including waiting time. In fact I always have same good experience with them.

Next in line was Kotak Mahindra Old Mutual. With places directory app on my android phone I searched for nearest centre of Kotak. Though the listing has a phone no. also , phone was constantly busy. Anyway, based on the addressed I got in the places directory I reached the centre in no time. Shock no. one, they don't issue receipt the same day if the payment is made by cheque or dd (I wonder who makes dd for this purpose) and the bigger shock, they dont accept payment by card. What the hell? A bank as big as Kotak Mahindra does not accept credit card because they don't have the machine. I thought of paying by cash, but there system was down. OMG. #fail. By the way I tried to pay online also, but their system says no due.

Next was ICICI Pru. All these years I have been handing over the cheque for premium to the agent and he has been very good in his services. This year has been different. Again the places directory came handy in finding the office location of ICICI Pru. Once there they asked me to fill a form for making payment by credit card. There way is little different. Even they don't have credit card swiping machine but they can facilitate offline. After taking necessary details they gave me the acknowledgement.

So if big banks like Kotak and icici still don't accept payment by credit card I don't have patience to go and withdraw money from bank and make payment. I am better off using on line mode of payment. I just did for LIC :)

Dream dreams, no one else can see !!

2011-01-28T17:05:00.003+05:30

Sometimes you wanna run away,

But you never know what might be coming round your way,

'coz on a day like today, the whole world could change....

There are dreams. And then there are childhood (teenage?) dreams. I have been pretty good at studies and like many other capable students in India I wanted to be the part of selected few at Indian Institute of Technology for my graduation. By the time I reached into class 11th, my goals were clear. First, get into IIT and then go for management studies from Indian Institute of Management. In India for an intelligent science student the combination of IIT-IIM education is zenith of academic qualification. And that became my dream.

Slogging 10-12 hours daily during 11th & 12th and then for another year after that, I could not made it to IIT and settled for second best in line for technical education in India, REC. At that point of time there is only so much one can do and instead of further (especially in Bihar and UP guys keep trying to get into IIT for 2-3 years after there intermediate!!) continuing my pursuit for IIT I joined REC. And never regretted that. A significant part of me is ME because of my association with the college.

After I was done with my graduation I started my professional career. The task in front of me was pretty cut out. Work for couple of years, write CAT and get into IIM. I was little cocky of my abilities and used to be damn sure of getting a call for GD-PI post CAT. Nevertheless, I never compromised with my preparation for CAT and once again slogging started. I used to devote 4-5 hours a day, apart from office, for my studies. Being from Hindi medium background (yes, I did my complete schooling in Hindi!) English used to be my Achille's heels. Hence most of my time went into improving my English language skills. I was quite comfortable with my quants. But the result, mere 92 percentile in CAT. I fell flat in my first attempt.

Subsequent attempts resulted 92(again),94 and 96 percentiles. After 4 attempts, sincere attempts I ended with no call and a broken dream. It was not about studying for MBA, it was about studying for MBA at IIMs. By the time I stopped my attempt for CAT (My work experience was going towards higher side for 2 yr MBA from IIMs), couple of IIMs have started 1 yr MBA for experienced professionals.

I waited for a few years before taking GMAT, first step towards these executive MBA. And another year for having leadership experience. Meanwhile I was married and professionally doing reasonably good. IIM remained my unfulfilled dream, but routine life started taking toll towards that. I wasn't sure if I'd apply for MBA.

But then "When you know what you want the whole world conspires you to achieve it". It was around July last year, by then the application process for admission into IIMs were already started but I was still in two minds. Due to changed circumstances at my present organization I decided to give it a last shot. I had decided if I don't make it to IIM this time then that'd be it.

But that was not to be. I am indeed going to IIM for my MBA this year. I am part of class of 2012 of PGPEX at IIM Calcutta. But surely miles to go before I sleep :)

Somewhere there's a place for you,
I know you believe it too
Sometimes if you wanna get away
all ya gotta know is what we got is here to stay, all the way!!!

Lyrics (c) Bryan Adams.

We are like that only!!

2011-01-27T13:44:00.002+05:30

February-March is the time when almost all salaried person makes last minute hurry to plan for tax savings. Various investment options are explored and invested in, so one can have tax saving. So far so good.

"Hey, do you know some travel agent? And medical shop?" Another usual conversation around this time. Remember, usually this is the time when you have to claim leave travel allowance and medical allowance. Which is reimbursed on actuals. Well, how many of us need to utilise entire amount of medical allowance and lta? Not many. But hey, both are part of my salary, my hard earned salary. Why should I give tax to govt. on these. So, I'll find a travel agent and medical shop , who can give me bills for the entire amount which I am entitled to in return to a few percentage of the amount. That way I retain the tax money which was in fact suppose to go to the govt. Its my money after all.

But when Mr. A. Raja and Mr. Suresh Kalmadi does the same, then it is corruption !!!

Are we not like that only.

Cinderella's Shoes !!

2011-01-20T13:32:00.005+05:30

Year was 2001-02 and time was not really good for we guys in the final year of engineering. Recession had hit the usual buoyant mood in the campus. There were few and far between companies coming for the campus recruitment. One such company was X, which came calling for us. They conducted a written test, mostly on business awareness, as part of their recruitment process. Those days I used to regularly follow a business magazine, BW, and this magazine used to have a regular quiz on business awareness. After the written test of X, I was totally confident of getting through to next round as this test had almost all the question referred from the magazine BW. But to my utter surprise I was not called for the interview, the next round.

A test which was to test you on business awareness and where you have answered almost all the questions correctly was not enough to get you the interview call. I was shocked. But that was it.

Later I mailed the guy, who came to our college for recruitment on behalf of X, explaining my stand. I wasn't expecting a reply to this mail, sent by a disgruntled student. But a few days later there was a reply from this gentleman. While explaining his company's recruitment policies he asked me to recall the story of Cinderella. He asked me "Amit do you remember Cinderella's shoes? Its about the right fit of the shoes and the feet.And it does not really judges the size of the feet." Something similar goes on with the selection process, he said closing his mail wishing me luck.

And the lesson stuck with me. I went on to finish my academics and went back home without a job. Around a month later we received a mail from college's TnP about a company, perhaps last visiting our college for our batch, coming for recruitment. I was again back to college. This time I was through to second round after aptitude test. My first round of interview was OK except that I told the interviewer that I wanted to work of couple of years after which I'd like to go for MBA. As opposite to other guys I wasn't called for second round of interview. But to my astonishment I was one of the selected student.

And thus I started my professional journey 8 years 7 months and 10 days back. After exactly 3 months from now I am going back to academics with the hope of another level of transformation. First level came with the association with REC Warangal. Which taught me to believe in my capabilities; be myself and true to myself; aim high and perseverance and not to miss out Cinderella's shoes :)

Are we to blame!!

2010-03-20T20:50:00.003+05:30

It was a summer evening when my little bro came home after his play hours. And along he brought a little , bruised and almost dying , sparrow. He had found it near his play ground and out of child like curiosity he got it home to see if we can save , at least try to save, its life. There wasn't much chances of survival of the sparrow, which had not even properly grown wings and looked like attacked by some animal, but being children for us nothing was not possible unless tried. So we started operation save the sparrow.

We put dettol on the bruises and applied ointments. With cotton we poured drops of milk to its mouth. Which the sparrow seemed to be taking in. Then we let it rest. We had a discarded mechanical mouse catcher , which was made as its nest.

The sparrow started responding to the care taken by us and gradually its bruises started healing. In an week or so it had fully recovered and in the process all of my family members developed a liking, an attachment towards it. We continued feeding milk to her and it continued growing.

It seems that the sparrow also started recognizing and associating with us. In the day time it used to fly here and there in the house and as soon as we used to come back from school or papa from work it used to come to us. flying from me to my brother to my sis. It used to sit on the shoulder of my dad. That was very unusual for a house sparrow , or we never heard of any. Strangely it never flown out of the home and remained within it. Playing around with us all and then sleeping in cosy bed , prepared especially for it in the mouse catcher. We were getting used to its presence in the house.

One morning when got up and were expecting to see the sparrow , it wasn't around. First we thought that perhaps it has flown away but when we saw its nest it was still there but in the pool of blood , dead!! Previous night we missed to close the gate of mouse catcher and perhaps a mouse killed the sparrow.
Boy , were we sad. It was like loosing some near one. We buried the bird near our house. That was a short but intense relationship between humans and a bird.

This happened some 16-18 years back. Now I have been living in Hyderabad for last 8 years and I don't think that here I ever saw any sparrow. Once ubiquitous house sparrows are not around. Who is responsible!!

On World House Sparrow Day!!

Phatela jeb sil jaayega!!

2010-01-02T11:02:00.005+05:30

jo chaahega mil jaayega

Tere bhi din aayenge chhote,

achcha khaasa hil jaanyega

And so goes lyrics of one popular Hindi number, which Ganja and I used to sing along around 8 years back. Year was late 2001 and we were in final year of engineering at REC Warangal. IT slump of 2001-02 saw fewer and fewer companies visiting us for campus recruitment and most of my batch mate, including me, were left high and dry. Cut to 2009, things have changed for all of us, settling in life now.

Christmas holiday of this year resulted in a long weekend and gave me an opportunity to have a short trip to my alma-matter, now NIT Warangal. Early morning on Christmas day I, along with my wife and a close friend, started for Warangal. Once we reached there and were inside the campus I was like wow, all old memories of college days became live in front of my eyes. I felt like I am reading stories from an old book. College was being given a face lift after becoming NIT 7 years back, but the underlying essence remained the same. All the places in the campus had some or other memories associated with it. We roamed around entire campus, I reliving those good old days.

First year classroom reminded me that I used to sit on the first bench, without fail. One day I was little late to class and Kiran had occupied that place and I was like how dare he. Being holiday classrooms were closed but I could open windows. Opening each window and peeping inside the classroom brought some memories or other from that room. Second year’s room reminded me of Robot, who used to teach, no rather read out from the book in very robotic manner, and hence the nick name. By the time we were in third year my regular sitting place has almost reached to the last bench (one of the reason, among others, was my tallness :-O). A chalk fight in classroom on back of IAKR, third year. And HOD asking me to leave the class for not attending his previous lecture, final year. Krishnanand caughting Jhakki in his attempt of proxy, drawing class. Mistaking a professor for support staff, design class. We standing outside the examination hall and many of us still trying to cram, before commencement of exam, civil department, usual venue of our exams.

Entrance of our department, where we posed for photograph during last few days in college. The graveyard abutting the boundary wall of college , where we ventured late night about 1 am when we were returning after watching a night show of some movie. The audi , in front of which Chaudhary and I sat and discussed our future. SAC, spring spree of 2002. Main entrance to the college , we were stopped from entering as it was way beyond permissible time of 11pm. NCH and NSH , attending PPT from companies. Boy , there are quite a lot of memories from those days. I would not go on recollecting memories from our hostel area , essentially most eventful of all places.

By 3 in the afternoon we were through with campus. Then we ventured into the town. There was this Kalinga dhaba where we dined for 50 bucks (those days we hardly had money). Public garden , the usual venue for intro after ragging. Amrutha hall, where we used to watch movies in just 16-18 bucks in the comfort of AC.

After reliving all these and many more memories from college days for an entire day we came back to Hyderabad in the night.

Attending this college has influenced me in many ways.All the four years attended here were enriching. I was getting prepared for the real world. My thought processes were refined here, my world view changed, interacting with people from all parts of India helped me broaden my horizon. Few of my beliefs got strengthen, others got shattered.A significant part of me is only because I attended this college. Getting a degree and helping me start my career were just bonus.

Going forward, Rukne ka nahin, thakne ka nahin, life mein chalte rehne ka

So Where Are You From? !!

2009-12-19T14:53:00.006+05:30

The other day I was at the eye clinic , waiting for my turn to see the doctor. There was this old lady sitting beside me and we striked converstaion. She asked where am I from? Ummmm , lets see.

I was born in Gaya , brought up in Motihari (Both in Bihar). Then in Narsinghragh , a remote village in south Jharkhand. Then next 8 years I was in Jamshedpur , where currently my parents are settled. Then I moved out to Warangal, in Andhra Pradesh , for my graduation. After which I have been working in Hyderabad close to 8 years now.

So where do I belong to? Bihar . where I was born. Or Jharakhand , where I was brought up. Or Andhra Pradesh , where I studied and then currently working?

Am I a Jamshedpurian , where my parents are settled now and where I frequently visit. Or am I a Hyderabadi , where I stay to earn my living?

Or am I an Indian?

Anything That Can Go Wrong Will Go Wrong !!

2009-11-23T12:02:00.000+05:30

Who is the Murphy anyway?

Who ever he is, he makes his presence felt when you are least likely expecting him. Sometime he acts as spanner in the wheel and other just a deflated tyre. But for sure you , me and others are affected by him day-in , day-out. Him affecting us can be minimized but the thought of altogether removing his presence would be a foolhardy one.

However we can be better prepared to tackle anything and everything which may, potentially, go wrong.

By paying attention to detail. Even before you start executing, a well thought out plan should be in place. This is the "well thought out" part of the planning I am stressing at. Proper care should be taken in initial planning so as to capture all necessary activities needed to complete the task. While listing down activities you would know what could possibly go wrong while executing the task. And that's where you need to have your contingency management in place. Which can be arrived at by "what if" analysis. What if one of your key people falls sick !! What if your development system crashes!! This analysis will help you identify possible areas where things related to your project can go wrong. You can anticipate them and can avoid them by taking proper care during execution or you can be well prepared in case the event occurs.

Even after paying proper attention to detail at various stages in the project things can go wrong. Now use those learning as your experience but make sure that next project onwards these learnings are put in to practice. Or still better learn from others mistake.Please remember that everybody needs help sometime. It is good to learn from one's mistake but it is still wiser to learn from others mistake. Perhaps at organization/team level a document capturing what went wrong in a particular project and what was the learning, can be maintained and shared. Just to ensure that same mistake is not repeated / similar situation dont repeat.

Sooner or later, something fundamental in your business world/ the factors contributing the the success of the project will change. As Andy Grove said "Only the Paranoid Survive". Being paranoid helps you to analyse ,to be better prepared. Be paranoid , but be sure that you act as well. Otherwise being paranoid is sure sign of failure. Dont overdo.

But one thing is for sure that in spite of one's best effort shit happens and then you dont have any other option than to accept it. Dont fret , take lesson and move on. You'd be better prepared for future.

I want my money back!!

2009-11-14T11:28:00.002+05:30

When was the last time you saw a movie almost entirely shoot on sets? And foreign locations for songs? That is very 80s man. Add to that childish situational comedy and sub standard acting by the male protagonist. You have Gazab Kahani of Ajab Prem. How many Indian Christian you know who speaks Hindi with forced English accent, the female protagonist and her family does so in the movie.And oh, add to that Atif Asalam’s voice for Ranbir Kapoor.A full two and half hours of atyachar.

Not even a month back RK gave appreciable performance in Wake Up Sid and in APGK he was almost pathetic. A director’s actor?

So you can’t speak Bihari!!

2009-11-08T16:35:00.001+05:30

No, I can’t. And wait a minute there is no language as Bihari. It is the way we speak Hindi out there sounds like altogether different language, aka Bihari or perhaps a new dialect. Well it is not a dialect either. It is Hindi with regional flavor and some accent to it.

You find many dialects of Hindi being spoken in Bihar, one such dialect Magahi (Magahi paan, beetle, is famous all over India) is what my folks speak. And I don’t know Magahi as well. In fact hardly many in my generation speak Magahi. That is sad. Essentially languages are very integral part of any culture and with most of us confining ourselves to English lately its matter of merely a decade when not many languages would be around. In face I read somewhere that every year 400 languages are getting extinct every year (?). Can something be done about it?

Technology, Entertainment, Design!!

2009-11-08T16:29:00.003+05:30

So TED was here, here in India for three days. TED talks going for three whole days in Mysore. But I could not attend those sessions. Reason: money honey!! It was too costly for me to attend. Well never mind, there is always next time. But there is addition to the To Do list and someday I don’t only want to be in the audience at one of those TED sessions but I want to speak at one. Hopefully on the topic related to technology and design.

I can motivate people !!

2009-10-31T13:32:00.001+05:30

Not really -- they have to motivate themselves. You can't motivate people anymore than you can empower them. Employees have to motivate and empower themselves.I can motivate only myself. If I have to motivate my people to deliver result then perhaps they are in wrong job.

Having said that, an environment, however, can be set up where they best motivate and empower themselves. The key is knowing how to set up the environment for your people. Essentially you can be enablers for others to be motivated[self].

I am exploring the ways to do so for my team. Obviously organizational level parameters like money, career growth and skill development , recognition etc are already in place. What I am looking for is team level local enablers.

The Strange Relation !!

2009-10-27T17:43:00.002+05:30

We had recently joined the college and were under the process of “getting introduced to seniors”. For R Basu, my classmate who was from West Bengal, the usual question asked was if he and Jyoti Basu, the then chief minister of West Bengal, were related in some way? Obviously that was not the case. And that’s what R Basu used to tell. But you know seniors; they were never giving up on the question. Fed up one day R Basu said yes there was a very strange relationship between him and Jyoti Basu. Strange relationship? As in? He replied “ We are strangers!!”

Eats, Shoots and Leaves !!

2009-10-25T11:24:00.001+05:30

That's about the red Panda you find in the Himalayan mountains. And sure enough they don't go around shooting as the title suggests. Its about red Panda's food habit and I intend to say that they eats shoots (mostly bamboo) and tree leaves. An unintended comma distorts whole intended meaning of the sentence. Which could have been avoided had attention to detail been paid.

Paying attention to detail does help. Be it professional front or personal life. You put clothes in the washing machine , put required detergent , let in the water and switch on the machine. But did you put the water outlet at proper place? Missing to pay attention to detail on the process of getting your cloths clean using washing machine can flood your entire house. I did that twice :-O.

Shipping application/delivering product/concluding project on the deadline promised looks to be a wishful thinking. But I know this is very much possible had attention to detail is paid at various stages of development cycle. To begin with, estimation goes wrong and this has cascading effect on the project time line. Lets take example of software development. One thing is for sure that developers are a helluva optimistic lot of people. The time estimation is usually based on gut feeling and experience. And that is certainly not a scientific way of estimation. Experience could be one parameter but coming out with the estimation solely based on it will not give you justifiable estimation.

Striving to do the task right first time should be the approach taken. Once a task is assigned it is very important to understand ,before you begin with implementation , what needs to be done. Then comes how it would be done. Essentially what all activities or sub tasks would lead you to completion of the task. So understand and analyse the task and break it down to several sub tasks. Once this is done , write down all the sub tasks. Review the list for some missing steps/detail. Refine the list based on self review.

Now get the list of sub tasks peer reviewed. Iterate through above two if needed. Then consolidate the list of sub tasks. Essentially now you know all the steps leading towards completion of task. This list help you in having control of what needs to be done and will help you arrive fairly accurate estimation of time. At any point of time during the development you can correctly measure the progress and rightly adjust the time line, if needed.

I categorise the whole process : paying attention to detail. Though this is against the normal instinct , inertia acts against this once included as part of regular process will significantly help one to be in total control of development process.

वसुधैव कुटुम्बकम !!

2009-01-21T15:56:00.000+05:30

Watch Kenya sing for India :)

I Am Too Busy !!

2009-01-03T23:48:00.005+05:30

....to attend this meeting!!

Well one of the most common trait of being Indian in India is not being punctual (Incidentally same Indian when in other countries on business becomes very punctual, huh!!). We, at office, have this daily status update meeting. And sure enough apart from usual issues like not sticking to the agenda of the meeting, late start and hence later finish of the meeting was norm . We tried many things (like some games, yes games!! and monetary fines etc.) but in vain.

Then some time back we hit upon this idea of a ball with " I am too busy too attend this meeting" written on it. And anybody coming late will be made to hold this ball for entire duration of the meeting. And guess what? It worked. Now within the grace period of two minutes everybody is in :).

Not a nice way to make respect time but effective nevertheless!!

Go Beyond Lighting A Candle!!

2008-12-28T00:05:00.003+05:30

A candlelight vigil , as described by Wikipedia, is an outdoor assembly of people carrying candles, held after sunlight. And this is in vogue.

There was this unfortunate terror attack in Mumbai and we all saw public outcry and their angst against political establishment. Every citizen of this country started wanting to do something for his country. But what can an individual do? Oh wait; there is this novel idea of a candlelight vigil. A symbolic solidarity for victims - of Mumbai terror attack or Jessica Lal. So we lit a candle, join people in-mass and that’s it. Our part is done. We feel content. At least we joined the peace march. We did our bit. Then we, The people of India, go to hibernation till something else happens.

All this is good. At least we still have some feelings left of our country and countrymen. But this is not it. We need to go beyond just lighting a candle. Otherwise that is just hypocrisy.

Or what else you say when you see people not bothering to even stop when there is some accident. It personally happened with me. I was pillion rider with a friend. He somehow lost the balanced, bike skidded and both of us fell down. By the time we got up at least 5-6 people on their bike crossed the site but none of them stopped to help us. And no, there were not aam junta. This happened very near to my office and all of them must be working one or other IT company in the IT Park nearby. I am not denying that in general people don’t help but there have been many cases when they pretend not to see anything. God forbid, but had there been any casualty these very people would have participated in a candlelight vigil shouting slogan against govt's negligence to maintain proper road. Hypocrisy, I say.

Or what else you say when you see people not following a queue. And then complaining about slow working of government officials? The other day I asked this lady if she mind coming in the queue. Instead doing so we snapped on me saying that that is how she get canteen coupon daily and no body objected. And mind it this happened again in the canteen of the IT park. Hypocrisy, I say.

Or what else do you say when people refuse to follow traffic signals and lane rules . I was waiting at a red signal and this gentleman behind me was honking continuously for I refused to give way to him to cross the red signal. Hypocrisy, I say.

Or what else do you say when people, including me (I even don’t have a voter Id card and I am past ten years the voting age. Shame on me.) don’t exercise their franchise but keep cribbing about the govt and its policies. Hypocrisy, I say.

Armchair intellectualism is good for discussions but that does no good. Now is the time to stop talking and start doing. Lets go beyond just lighting a candle. Lets be change at root level and the bigger changes would follow suit.

And We Stand United !!

2008-11-29T22:57:00.004+05:30

In paying tribute to those who sacrificed their lives in fighting the Mumbai terror. We all deeply mourn the loss their families we as nation have suffered. This is heartening though to know there are still few who don't care for their lives even when they are at the line of fire when they are doing their duty. The India salutes you all. May your soul rest in peace.
Amen!!

What Next !!

2008-11-29T12:20:00.006+05:30

Lets face it, our current government has been a complete failure in tackling the securities issues. And intelligence department,, huh,, is complete farce. I know a person working with IB , claiming that the department runs on paper clippings, news articles and its source of information are media coverages. Even if you take that with a pinch of a salt, that is like WTF?.We need complete revamp of intelligence system.Not to forget about change in help at home department. Some news paper rightly commented that Shivraj Patil is the most incompetent home minister ever. Home , foreign , defence and finance ministry all need some dynamic and aggressive leaders. Not to miss the prime minister. All these guys needs balls to take some decision above from party politics. Do they have in them to take some decision and stand by it , similar to testing nuke??

Thats for government , lets look inward at ourselves, we the people of India. Proud to be an Indian?? For what ?? The poverty , the backwardness, the petty politics, the vulnerable security. Huh!! We are no where near even China. The all this talk of being superpower is just bullshit. To be a superpower , a developed nation we have to rise above just armchair intelectualism . Now is the time to stop talking and start doing.Most importantly change in attitude of each and every citizen of India is required. Boss it is not somebody else problem. For God's sake ye nahi chalta hai. Change starts from within. Lets be the change neccessary to make India the superpower. Enough is enough.

I Am Scared !!

2008-11-28T22:21:00.006+05:30

Yes,I am scared about safety,my safety,safety of my family,safety of my neighbor.Who is responsible for our safety? I don't want to be another victim of a blast or a bullet. Who will ensure safety of each and every citizen of this country?

Its gross , its outrageous. Whatever happened in the Mumbai.

An event can change the whole course of life for somebody. Now is that time for India. Life will not be same again for us, Indians. We have to stop being indifferent, we were not being tolerant. We were indifferent. There is no Mumbai spirit. People were just indifferent. It didnt happen to me, thank God. Next day everything is normal. God damn it!! How can one ignore what happened in trains, and continue with one's daily life as if nothing had happened. That is not tolerance for God's sake. That is indifference to reality. As long as I am not directly affected that is fine. I dont care what happened yesterday and carry on with my own life. That is escapism. Turn back face the reality. If this time we dont do that , we , as nation, can never rise up. Enough is enough.

And That Aint You !!

2008-10-03T21:44:00.007+05:30

The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It is a very mean and nasty place and it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain't how hard you hit; it's about how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forward. How much you can take, and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done. Now, if you know what you're worth, then go out and get what you're worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hit, and not pointing fingers saying you ain't where you are because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain't you. You're better than that!

Stumbled upon this quote from Rocky Balboa.