Be a Workaholic

There is an element of pride attached to the word - Workaholic. There are some who claim to be one and proudly so. There are bragging rights earned when you burn the midnight oil, live out of a bag, sit in the corner office structuring plans, consume umpteen cups of coffee, equal number of re-invigorating breaks and have a line up of meetings. They have several missed calls and messages on their phones and some consider themselves fortunate if such people actually answer their call. 

I was one too - have burnt the midnight oil several times over. Have had many people ask me if i have stayed up all night...it felt good. Lived out of a bag for several years and earned an astronomical quantity of miles with a passenger privilege status that one can only dream about. Felt guilty leaving office early lest i be seen as the one without much work. 

In hindsight - It wasn't worth it.

While i rose in ranks, position and responsibility i lost a number of softer aspects. From being one of the fittest guy, i became sloppy. Lost out on several family occasions that would have been delightful, didn't understand a vacation as i was anyway in a new city / country each month and travelling for rest made me cringe. Made me restless when i was not around my computer and very often woke up at unearthly hours to send mails....let me tell you, zombies don't look smart.

I still advise, be a workaholic but, change the mix. There is no correlation or a study that i have come across that states that a company of workaholics rose much faster than those who worked within sane hours. I believe that if you have planned your work right and have a structured approach to problem solving within a good organisation structure, nine hours is more than sufficient to work productively and efficiently. 

Take an interest in fitness - there are couple of benefits

• Your ability to be self motivated increases as the limits that you can reach are set by you. 
• Results are never instantaneous so unless you follow the rigor regularly, results never come through. It teaches you to be patient
• The variations are so many and the right mix of work outs is essential to tone yourself....it teaches you that no one method fetches results, it is a calculated and intelligent combination that works.

Be a kid in some measure -  Either you can be a kid to be with a kid or just have a curiosity of a kid to experiment new things, learn a few things from scratch without worrying about your age or what others will say. Many intellectuals have said this....it is never too late to learn anything. 

Enjoy the flavour of what you eat - i am still not good at it, but the few times i have followed, it leads to earnest fact finding about cooking (which i believe is a good therapy) which is a conversation that is interesting and leads to many interesting joinder. 

Read something interesting - Good GK leads to conversations and such people make good company. 

It is ok to share a laugh - it is the best de-stresser i have found. You don't have to be utterly silly to do this but observations, instances that have a fun element may help.

Pick some of the above, or all of them or add something of your own but draw a boundary to work. Be a workaholic but make sure to change the mix. 

The Essence of Time

We all have read innumerable articles on time management; been advised, sermonised, lectured, admonished into thinking about managing time and how critical it is to plan by the minute if not seconds.

Our exposure to time management starts at the very moment we enter a play school as tiny tots and we live by a routine / time table through our journey to college - 20 long years i must say. Isn't it good enough to inculcate a habit which determines the following,

1. You can't be late even by a minute as that would get you a remark or may be a sit out in college?
2. A day is divided into multiple periods which expose you to different facets of a discipline and you could gain significant if not incremental all round knowledge in a single day.
3. You plan your week / day based on what you would be learning / doing in a particular time period and you are asked to align yourself to an expectation of what you can derive and what you can contribute.

Elementary stuff...right? we would vehemently agree that it is so well engrained in our mind and blood that we don't need to be told again. We will cringe and possibly feel insulted if we are told that we have not adhered to timelines.

Yet, on a person level, i have experienced (quite frequently) the following,

1. I found 80% parents coming late (by 15 to 45 minutes) to a parents-teacher meeting to decide if their kid could be tutotored to be the next mathematical genius.
2. I have people telling me that it is ok to be a couple of minutes (couple could even meet half an hour) to meetings and the client wouldn't mind as they have a personal equation
3. Meetings that have been set up a week or more in advance with an agenda have last minute preparations and postponements as there were other pressing engagements.
4. Young blood...at the beginning of their career....coming 20 minutes late for interviews quoting reasons which could be termed as irrational or unfathomable or plain bizzare.

Just a few examples to cite but takes me back to the basic premise i started with, where do we go wrong after having been through precision driven time table for two decades?

Hard to comprehend but it is what differentiates a leader from the rest. The most difficult task to accomplish and to maintain is to stick to a schedule. While we will quote a thousand external reasons for messing up schedules.....it has actually happened as a cascading effect of someone who started the mess....we end up aligning ourselves to fall in line with the mess rather than correcting it. The only small point we should understand is that being on time has a cascading effect too...it is just a matter of falling into a different trend...a trend seemingly militarian in approach but far reaching benefits....possible? My personal experience definitely makes me think it is.

The Brighter Side

Blame it on the optimist in me or the constant urge to see the brighter side; thought i will pen down the many positives i have seen from the time i have had the ability to be sensible and appreciate those that are sensible around me.

Was brought up in Kolkata; while the city may not be hailed as being among the progressive lot, there is an underlying truth that i learnt early on that none in the city go hungry, every nook and corner has an eatery which serves (ghugni) a delicacy made from chick peas and bread - very affordable and can satisfy the most discerning taste buds.

My father served the railways for 36 years and from the many marvels of the railways he has narrated to me, it is true that there isn't a corner of this country that you cannot reach at a reasonable cost.

There isn't a class that i have been through that did not have people from all religion in it. Might have eaten from many tiffin boxes but not sure i realized or there was a way of finding out if it belonged to a particular caste or religion. The food was delicious and the wait for the next session always appeared too long.

There are many exotic destinations in India....pure, far away from the blemishes of a city, with a sense of calm and from what i realized over the years....one lifetime is a little too short to cover all of them.

Been through two premier institutions in the country which have stood for excellence but have given every ordinary citizen a chance to become extraordinary. The selection is through merit, the journey through the course is arduous but provides the respectability in the end that few will question.

The city where i live today - Mumbai, welcomes all. There is a job for the one who is sincere and wants to work hard. While the infrastructure seems woefully inadequate....it is not rare to find a local train for 8.23 coming in at 8.23. Whether in Mumbai or elsewhere in India....you do tend to be chaueffer driven (hand pulled rickshaw, auto rickshaw....and the list goes on) even with a meagre budget.

While the word entrepreneur sounds elitist, India has them in large numbers....check every street, every vendor, every store and every business stream.....there are loads of them who have started with less than Rs.100 in their pocket but have earned a respectable living for themselves and their families.

While there is a flip side to all of the above....it is a belief that one who is positive finds a way to live with a smile. From what i have witnessed across many many countries / cities i have been to....what i have narrated above seems to happen ONLY IN INDIA. Jai Hind!! (for our 65th independence day)

When Designations Become a Commodity

What can best signal a complete breakdown of an HR process? Well...while the points laid out could possibly run into pages....the easy indicator is when you find a clone of an HR manager / head in every department and at every level. It is often misconstrued that this function / department has a bunch of educated typists who are necessarily paid to follow orders that are seeminly rudimentary to the elite few based on impulsive judgements or compulsive requests that are hard to turn down.....for fear of repurcussions that have otherwise not been evaluated for their genuinity.

It is seeminly an intentional act by the select few -who look at the excruciating process of conforming to an heirarchical order with an ardous method of sustaining it - with complete apathy. One may wonder what is it that compels such a behavior. The answer though may appear simple has risen from deep rooted flaws that have multiplied over time to protect a self nurtured fiefdom...which brings with it the power to grant, the power to approve, the power to give a word....which if not followed amounts to sacrilege.

It is but human for individuals to approach such centers of power to get the seemingly impossible approved.....the result without doubt is anarchy. While this has often resulted in jubiliation for some, with a false sense of pride and achivement....it has often hampered growth with many rising to levels of incompetence. This gives little room to the structured few who have queued up through methodical and result oriented hard work to see any hope.

The resultant is that the levels of thinking, strategic orientation, future vision and cataclysmic growth just becomes a pipe dream. The energy and passion in an organisation comes with a structured approach to nurture and recognise experience with brown matter, which if followed gives away the average joe.

While many would point out to countless organisations who have thrived and grown.....the resilience to extreme external factors have only protected those those that have followed an order...no wonder it is tough to replicate an Infosys or a Wipro easily today.

"3 Idiots" and the other side of the coin

3 Idiots the movie has been termed an all time hit and its content has raised many a debate about the Indian education system. There is a soft sermon to parents too to provide the requisite freedom to their kids to choose the path that they are passionate about. Nothing wrong about the subject in general and it is indeed a trigger to many of us - parents to not be narrow in determining the choice our kids should make. There is a life and career beyond an engineering, medical or MBA degrees.

Having said the above, i believe it is human nature to make safe bets and as a parent (and a professionally educated one at that) it is an impulsive inclination to think about safe paths which have a proven history of employ ability. It is also not easy to determine a cut-off point when we feel our kids have the capability and sensibility to make the right career moves. There are times when we are pleasantly surprised by the depth to which our children can articulate what he or she wants but in the absence of it, it is but natural to choose a path for them and in all probability a safe one. A desire to be at one of the ivy league institutes is common thinking and it does have a visible guarantee to success.

I will not claim that i knew i wanted to be an Engineer and MBA from top notch colleges at the age of 14 (when i passed my tenth grade); to be honest, i don't think i had the maturity to think beyond for a radically different career path. In hind sight i feel i could have been a good musician or may be a good cook even but i have no regrets today with where i am and what i have accomplished (i am at the moment trying to give wings to some of my cherished dreams though).

Compared to a decade+ ago, the options available today are many. The proliferation of content / information in all shapes and sizes does make a child mature faster and gives him / her certain ideas on what he / she wants. They may be able to articulate better but yet, i will advise caution to evaluate any decision and check genuine interest or indicators before a go ahead is given.

While it is good to start early in a particular direction, it is never too late actually to start after securing a good employable / professional degree. Chetan Bhagat an IIT and IIM started writing much later in life and as on date has moved on from being an investment banker to a full fledged writer / columnist.....i know of a singer too who completed her professional degrees and later took to being a playback singer and i should add ...a successful one too.

Allow your children to follow their dreams....it is critical.......but understand there is nothing wrong in the common way of thinking that provides the children and the parents with a sense of security.

Relevance of content in B2B publications

"B2B publications.....well no one reads them" is an often heard statement.....more so from many of my colleagues who have worked with me through my 11 year stint in the B2B media industry. While B2B media commands only a fraction of the advertising pie in the industry in India, the cost economics works well in its favor to give a much lower break even point and higher margins compared to any B2C publication - primarily because one can do with a smaller team and lower circulation (as most of it is controlled). Most of the publications survive by re-hashing press releases some even creating lengthy stories (albeit boring and wholesomely irrelevant at times) just to catch a client's attention.....hoping he would see it as a favor to place advertisements in the publications. Many go to lengths to offer a red carpet to the client - you order and we can help you with it - interviews, company profiles, custom case studies and very often glorifying duds as well, all in the hope of making that extra buck. Very often, some clients with deep pockets wriggle out what they want - typical mafiadom as they wield great powers to influence their peers in the industry as well. The reason for their behavior is simple....they view publications more as an advertising catalogue that a reader would flip through in five minutes rather than making time to read through what is written. Ask yourself, would you spend time on anything that does not add value to your life or business?

While this route helps get in all the numbers without an iota of remorse - i still continue to question the very basis of these thoughts; more so as i am on the other side of the table today and have been scurrying to find good genuine data pertaining to the industry i am in. Here is my wish list that can actually help me in what i am doing and possibly make me a fan of any publication who can cater to my needs....

• In a cost intensive industry such as ours, every bit of analysis to reduce costs will buy my attention
• Sectoral research - done methodically and with rigor to provide me with key analysis, inference and a path forward will force me to spend time or even quote it in all my meetings to make my planning simpler
• Intensive study of changes in technology and its implication there of can help me gain a competitive advantage by being an early adoptor
• Analysing a particular issue by quoting from say ten case studies and studying the pattern in detail to draw conclusions

These are just a few to quote. The age old formula of stickiness of content is easily forgotten as it is the hard path to stand tall and be on your own. It takes immense effort to reach a pinnacle but alas only few follow the path to the top.

I wish to quote what many gurus in marketing have repeated a zillion times over.....it is important to create entry barriers by doing something that will take a competitor ages to catch up.

The Indian Cricket Captain - Punching Bag For A Billion Indians

When do a billion people trun critics, bowling experts, batting order analysers, field placement supervisors, pitch report scrutinizers .....all in one go? No one can answer this question better than the past and present captains of the Indian cricket team.

One can say that this is just a game and you can't win everyday and i believe every one in the crowd will admit to this but we are a nation which hasn't excelled in any other sport consistently other than cricket...at least in the recent past.

Every child born in India especially if he is a boy is gifted a bat and ball the day the he is able to grasp any object around him. He is constantly told tales of Sachin Tendulkar more than Birbal, Lord Ram or Tenali Raman. He is shown the nearby playing ground on a bright sunday morning with more people playing on the field than the cumulative grass visible there. It is definitely a good exercise ...which may take hours mind you.....to figure out who is bowling to whom and fielding for whom.

It is a factor of loads of hard work with an even higher degree of luck to make it to the cricket camp. The odds are such that it may seem easier or rather cake walk to win a lottery ticket with odds of 1:1.5 lac than to get a place in the team.

If you are one among the coveted team members....well...you better perform. You can't be popping out of news papers, television sets, internet and every bill board in sight constantly tell us to buy a certain brand of carbonated drink, shirt, fan, phone, bike, car and the works and come back to tell us that they forgot to polish themselves against short balls before the game.....this unfortunately is the most common perception among all of us.

It is also true that the Indian team has found one of the best strike combination that we have seen in a long time. There are days when the combination comes short of striking it well but it can happen any where and in any game. My faith in the team is immense and the day is not far when the same combination will be paraded in open top busses through the city after a spectacular win.