Saturday, September 27, 2008

Some random thoughts

My friend from my dorm today sent me a message saying "hey missing u yaar...BTW we r goin to mount Abu on a bike trip tomorrow...u will be missed " ... aisa laga ki life main aur kya chahiye ... somebody thinking of you and feeling that it wud have been good if u had been there

-------------------------

There is a tendency which I have and I think many would have of associating songs with particular times / locations / feelings etc. So, when a particular song gets played on T.V. or somewhere else, you remind of that time / place etc. I have this habit of hearing a song again and again (in a loop) till I get bored of it ... some of my friends know of it and many a times get frustrated with this. My idea is that till the time a song has any juice left, it is ok to hear it again and again. One other side effect of this is that I somehow remember the lyrics of many of these songs ... and not just the start but the whole lyrics.
One of my friends (who was in my hostel during undergrad) wrote sometime back that he heard a song (which almost everyone hated and I listened to it in a loop, as usual, while in hostel) and he remembered me ...

-------------------------

The Indian government is fooling everyone – it keeps revising past weeks’ inflation numbers up. So, when all eyes are on the inflation number for some particular week, I believe that it gets under-reported and then in subsequent weeks when more attention is towards the inflation number for the latest week, those of previous weeks are comfortably raised / revised to their actual values

-------------------------

When I travelled outside the country for the first time ... the airplane entertainment system showed a map of the route etc. the thing that striked me was that the physical map showed only India in green (depicting the fertility, vegetation) and the surrounding areas were desert like or not that green ... just showed the unique fertility of the soil in this area

-------------------------

I have always thought ki there is a difference in the way people talk about distances in Mumbai and Delhi. If you ask someone about distance between two places, in Delhi the reply would come in the form of the approx kms between the two points ... while in Mumbai it would be the approx. time it wud take. Generally, the distance thing might like a better measure ... but not sure what the time thing implies. Even in NY the distance is spoken of in the more traditional way ... but in miles

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Ideal job

My idea of an ideal job / company / workplace / colleagues is one where on a Friday I would feel sorry that for the next two days, I won't come to office and work. Don't get me wrong. I like holidays and am fine with having weekends but it should not be the case that from Monday morning onwards, you start waiting for the next Friday. It should not be the case that on Sunday evening you starting feeling sad that the next morning you have to go to work; that on Monday morning you have to push yourself really hard just to get to work. Sunday evening should be such that you become over enthusiastic with the fact that the next day is a working day.

Again, don't get me wrong. I like to spend time with family. But you should also like to spend time with your colleagues in the office. I remember a Career Launcher executive once said that the workplace and your colleagues should be such that every morning when you reach office, you would want to hug your fellow employees. Just think about the amount of time you actually spend with them at the office and may be outside.

When I look at the profiles of the seniors from my institute on a social networking site, typically I don't find even a single photograph of their office, the office building or anything related to the company they are working for. Some of it may be due to security reasons where the company does not allow photographs within the building. But I refuse to believe that even one photograph is not possible which somehow is related to the company. I don't know what to make out of this.

One area which all my Professors emphasize on is to think of a real career and not go to investment banks, consulting companies etc (or the current usual destinations of grads in my institute). They say that you should look at other companies, other industries and that the jobs which have become typical these days are more of a waste of time. They say that you do not require to pass from this institute to these jobs and that you are too dispensable while working at these firms. Anybody above a basic level of education and understanding can do these jobs.

I sometimes think that there would be some truth in these statements. The Professors have no selfish motive when they say that a particular career path is better for me than the other. They are not expecting anything from me for themselves after I graduate. How would they be affected if I did one thing or the other? I guess it is their desire to see me happy and satisfied with my career and job that is at work here. They want me to pursue a path wherein it should not happen that later on I start wondering if I had taken the right decision. Then it might be too late to shift gears.

Two career alternatives after graduation

An interesting interview appeared in the WSJ a few days back. Mr. David Wei, CEO of Alibaba.com was interviewed and he made two interesting comments / observations which I am sharing.

- What was your first job and what was the biggest lesson you learned from it?
Mr. Wei: My first job was the starting point for the balance in my career. I had a very legendary boss. His name is Mr. Guan [Jinsheng], the founder and CEO of Shanghai International Securities. I started my career as his secretary and then went on to become his assistant and executive assistant. I think that experience made my life so different than if I had joined as a junior clerk in any of the departments of a business. You start to get the vision, the entrepreneurship, the strategic thinking from the first boss. I think his success and failure gave me lessons, good and bad, respectively.[In 1997, a Shanghai court found Mr. Guan guilty on corruption charges and sentenced him to a 17-year prison term.]

- Who gave you the best business advice and what was it?
Mr. Wei: Our customers. That''s the lesson I learned from the first partner I worked with in PricewaterhouseCoopers. Although we were in an advisory business, your customer always knows more than you.

I had taken a course last term called LEM (Laboratory in Entrepreneurial Motivation). I guess I haven't mentioned that upto now. But that was by the best course that I have done during my graduation. The best thing about the course is the Prof. (Prof. SH). As he himself says in the first class, since there are no control measures in the course (attendance, exams etc.), he has to make every session such that people are kept interested and they keep coming. Though I cant say this about every session, but classes are in general interesting.

The Prof. is a very good speaker and also gives general life fundas (which I liked). One kind of develops large amount of respect for the Prof. and people remain in touch with him even many years after graduation (something which is very uncommon).

I guess you will hear a lot about the course and the Prof. henceforth. But the reason I brought this up here is that the first of the above two points is what he used to tell us. That instead of taking a normal finance / consulting etc. job which the grads tends to do in my institute, one has two other options which are far superior and which would allow you to see your full potential and put them to proper use. These two options are

1. Becoming the assistant of a senior executive (like the CEO etc.) of a firm. You being the assistant would be exposed to everything that the CEO does. The CEO does much more than just finance or marketing or HR. It is in some sense the most comprehensive of jobs and you would get a first hand experience of everything.

2. Getting yourself involved in a new project / division / department / business which some company is looking to build. Again, building something from scratch would give very good exposure and a great chance of learning.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Flexibility within a company

This is what they say about the time period to change various things in a company. Taken from the book "Managing the small to midsized company".

The question is: what should change, and what should be held tight? The answer lies partially in the hierarchy from values to tactics:

  • Core values Change seldom, if ever.
  • Purpose Should last for 100 years.
  • Mission Changes whenever one mission is completed and a new one need be set (usually every five to 15 years).
  • Strategy Revised annually, then totally recast with each new mission.
  • Tactics In constant flux, to adjust to changing conditions.

Monday, September 08, 2008

A letter to Air India

Subject: Non-operational in-flight entertainment system

Hi,

I travelled to the US in your AI ... flight on the .... It was a direct 15-hr flight. For no part of the journey, the in-flight system worked. This problem was also faced by most of the passengers.

The crew could not do much for they only knew that it should start on restarting the entertainment system. When it did not they said they were helpless.

You would understand that this was quite painful. Such a long journey without any in-flight entertainment.

I hope something is done about this so that it is ensured that such a thing is not repeated.

Thanks.