Thursday, December 09, 2010

My first Business Ethics Case !

This case presents the situations faced by a newly recruited Development Manager Mr. Fani at the Bangalore office of TeenTare, one of the largest technology organizations of the world. He found the real world quite opposite of what he was taught in the Distance Learning Program of a premier Business School of the country. Will he be able to use his business education to sort out the real life problems he is facing at workplace every day? Which side will he fight on - the senior management or his team members? Is he right in taking the decision based on the situation while performing his professional duties?

Bangalore! The Software and IT services industry hub in the state of Karnataka in Southern India has been attracting the software professionals from the all parts of the country for over a decade now. As the Software Industry is growing by leaps and bounds, major multinational companies (MNCs) are setting up their research and development, services and delivery centers in Bangalore. This relatively new industry in a country like India, which has predominantly rural population, whose primary professions are agriculture and related occupations, has given rise to unforeseen and complex managerial problems for the young as well as the older generation executives working in these newly set up MNC offices.

Mr. Fani had joined the organization TeenTare as a development manager in August 2007 after 7 years of work experience in some of the big names of telecom software development industry. He had been given a small team of 12 engineers, who all are recruited in the past two months, some with 2-3 years of work experience while others are recent graduates from the best engineering colleges of the country. While giving charge of the team, Mr. Morde, senior Development manager and reporting manager to 5 other Development Managers like Mr. Fani, has instructed him to build the capabilities of his team members such that they can tackle any problem given to them. Mr. Fani has planned and discussed the training program he is coordinating for his team with Mr. Morde as well as his team members. After two weeks of intensive training by experts from American office, the team is ready to take the charge of mobile phone application development.

However, after receiving the first project assignment, Mr. Fani discovers that the work is nothing like his team is trained for. The project schedule is very tight and even minor mistakes are not tolerated. There are many processes which he and his team members need to follow which are new to whole team. As there is no one to take care of these small but bureaucratic procedures, his team is busy in sorting these out half of the office time. Mr. Morde in presence of Mr. Fani instructed the team members to follow all procedures as the company’s policy requires all of its employees to do so. In one process Mr. Fani is requested by an engineer Ms. Deepa to review a document which she has prepared to send to an offshore client. Due to lack of time and excess work load Mr. Fani is not able to review the document and asks Ms. Deepa to take care of it herself and sent it directly to the client. The client however finds some mistakes in the document and pulls up Mr. Morde who then asks Ms. Deepa to explain the mistakes. Next time when Ms. Deepa requests her boss Mr. Fani to review the documents, he again asks her to send it directly to the client. Because of the rebuke received from Mr. Morde, Ms. Deepa informs him that her boss Mr. Fani is not available to review the documents prepared by her. Mr. Fani, after getting full dressing down from his boss Mr. Morde, calls Ms. Deepa to the meeting room immediately and asks her to explain why she bypassed him and directly complained to his boss. He threatens her with severe consequences in her performance appraisal. Now he assigns very hard and laborious work to Ms. Deepa requiring her to finish it all in very short duration. She is much tensed about the situation.

Ms. Deepa, being a talkative and much liked young lady spreads the talk about these incidents to all of her team members. As the other team members come to know about this, they also complain to Mr. Morde about the review and monitoring work being sidelined by Mr. Fani, while blaming the team members for the mistakes found in the documents by clients thereafter. These complaints create lot of trouble to Mr. Fani as he had to explain the whole situation to Mr. Morde and his superiors. Instead of setting his house in order as per the learning of his management courses, he determines to teach a lesson to Ms. Deepa and other team members who complained about him. He extends the probation period of Ms. Deepa and one other team member.
Moreover, on the insistence of his senior management to achieve the development targets, He has to make his team members set their yearly targets to very high level, which were very vague and almost impossible to achieve. With ever increasing work pressure and stagnant salaries because of bad appraisal by Mr. Fani, Ms. Deepa and one more engineer resign from the organization while other two apply to change their team citing lack of interesting work and uncomfortable work conditions under Mr. Fani. In her exit interview, Ms. Deepa criticizes Mr. Fani for his lack of leadership skills and technical expertise. However because of the political intervention by other development managers and with the support of Mr. Morde, who is from the hometown of Mr. Fani, Mr. Fani survives the inquiry conducted by Vice President of the Division. He closed the report on Mr. Fani leaving him with just a warning.

The support of Mr. Morde made Mr. Fani even more aggressive towards his team members. Now He sets even stringent targets and makes his team mates come to office on weekends citing work pressure from the client side. While achieving the targets on time and getting praise from the client side as well as from his Boss, he becomes the devil for his team members; they are not motivated at all as they see the work as routine and never ending. They start looking for better opportunities outside the team, and subsequently some engineers quit while others change their teams and projects. In the vacant positions, Mr. Fani hires new engineers, which work whole heartedly till they realize the true nature of Mr. Fani and his superiors. As one of engineer, while leaving the organization remarked, “I came to work for TeenTare, but ended up working for Mr. Fani and his Superiors!”

After some time while reflecting back, Mr. Fani realized that he was able to achieve the targets set for his team by his boss Mr. Morde and clients, but at the cost of his team members and their good feelings towards him. He wanted to change his image among his team members and other development mangers. But he is in ethical dilemma. Should he continue the way his organization wants him and his team to work or take a hard look on the situation and side with his team mates to enrich their work experience at TeenTare with more enjoyment and satisfaction. Given the appraisal policies and nature of work being received and done, he is not sure whether he will be able to side with his team mates while working with TeenTare. He wants to set preference between his professional obligations and his personal values of helpfulness and caring. After a stint of four years he is even considering quitting the organization so that he can be seen as more humane and understanding manager. How can he change his work environment and become a good manager loved by his subordinates?

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Language is not a barrier to a Good Friendship

Just few more days here in Office, and I'm already missing the people here...
a Korean engineer I met during my trip to Dubai and Istanbul in May 08...Used to tell me eat CATS for stamina....then you can work all night....so i did eat CAT finally :)

We had a conversation today....I'm touched really ... a part of it....

Me: hi
YH: Hi
How are you?
Long time no see~
Me: I am very good...how are you ?
I will be leaving SISO this friday. Going for MBA
YH: Opp~~~~~s
really?
I didn't study english anymore
정말 정말 축하합니다
[ I really must congratulate ]
in Korean, 항상 행복하고 뜻을 이루길 빕니다
[ Will always be happy and wish to come true ]
Good saying.
Me: I will translate by Google
thanks
very much
YH: Where do you go for MBA?
Me: its one of the best colleges of India "Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode"
YH: marriage?
Me: haha after 2 year ...after MBA ...i'm only 25
YH: How did you decide MBA?
Me: How is your work now....is it tough like before ?
YH: Nope easy easy very easy
But i have to finish whole work by 8 PM.
Opps
I have a log of conversation for you~
But I can't tell you in english~
Oh my god~~~
Me: send me in korean
YH: 그날 이후로 참 많이 보고 싶었는데
내 업무가 많이 변하게 되었다
그래서 너한테 직접적으로 연락하지 못하게 된게
많이 아쉬웠는데 이렇게 먼저 연락을 해주어서 너무 고맙다
그런데 기쁨도 잠시고
갑자기 MBA로 간다는게 ..
미안하기도하고 다시 만나지 못할까봐 아쉽기도 하고 그러네
Did you get it?
[ Since that day I've missed a lot
My work has changed a lot
So you were somehow prevented direct contact
And had the first contact but it has given me so thank you so
But joy jamsigo
We're going to suddenly do MBA ..
Sorry, sometimes lots of delicious food, and would never meet again, right?
Did you get it?
]
Me: yes I translated by google.

YH: 정말 너 때문이라도 영어공부 다시 해야겠다
[ You should do it again, because even learn English ]
Translation by google is not perfect
Anyway I will be in touch with you on your blog~

Me: yes we shall
tell me when you come to India
we'll meet

YH: I'll~
Good Luck
완전 성공하길~

Its not easy to move away from old friends but internet can keep us in touch ...:)

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

wanna fall in Love

As I am planning to go back to college next month. I have been thinking about it for quite few days now. What is it for? I'm not much of a studious. Neither I am much concerned about the job offers I may get after my education there. So there should be a better purpose to go back to classroom. Really!

So, How about finding my love? I think it is good idea. You never know ki aapko kya pasand aata hai. After all I'm still not sure about one thing for which I may be ready to sacrifice my sleep. Some thing which I can hold onto for more than a couple of months. A course which I can attend and enjoy irrespective of how boring or fulfulling it might be. Something which can be done without regretting doing it.

As they say Do what you love, or Love what you do. So there is the NEED to find that Love !!!

I'm gonna fall asleep listining a song on FM...

beautiful girls all over the world
i could be chasing but my time would be wasted, they got nothin' on you baby.....

Good Night.

Monday, May 10, 2010

First lesson of Management !!!

One of the most hated things I have at work place is the constant stream of E-mails in outlook from colleagues, managers, juniors. Asking hundreds of silly questions. Some are like... I lost my ID card, Lost my goggles, keys, earphones, and God knows what not!. Then there are birthdays, marriage invitations, Thirupati Prasadam, sweet at my desk, Outing planning messages, which in return create a torrents of messages from half of the recipients replying to all in the chain instead of first confused person only.

Now on the same lines, there is one more group I've joined recently for IIM Kozhikode Batch 2010-2012. In the last 4 days only, I've got 750+ mails in my Inbox....Ha! Man!! people are really excited :)

I believe most of the people are of 20+ age in this group, but the questions being asked may put a 7 something kid on back foot. The essence of all queries is almost same..."Guys! Tell me I'll be fine. Someone give it in Writing!" Its as if people are coming into this World for the first time.

As most of the people, who are working, have or are planning to resign from their present jobs, and are simply too excited to go back to college life. Others, who are still in colleges, just want to finish with their exams and wanna ride on the bandwagon as soon as possible.

I can see my first lesson in all this hoopla of emails, doubts, replies...and simple pink noise....Baby! get ready for the mails and replies if you wanna be a good manager....better buy a BlackBerry!!!

Sunday, May 02, 2010

MDI Gurgaon Interview experience (PGPM- 2010)

These are the Questions I remember, which were asked during those 28 minutes. I'm reproducing only some of the answers, rest were just informative ....:)

Prof1: What do you feel about your Group Discussion Performance?
Was it better than other group discussions of yours?

Again another prof2: Vikam, what do you feel about your group performance?
Was it better than other group discussions of yours?

Do you have any other call?
What is your percentile?
What were your sectional scores?
Are you not good in quant section?
to CAT walon ki kuch galti rahi?

Samsung main aap kabse kaam kar rahe hain?
What applications have you developed?
Tell us some Ayats of Quran.
What is the Market share of Samsung and Nokia Mobile in India?

Your hobby is Blogging?
Can anybody blog on that?
How did you create the blog?

Which area of Rajasthan you come from?

You have done your graduation from IIT kharagpur, how was the experience, was it a dual degree program?

What do you want to do in next five years?

How can I make a blog?
Can anybody read your blog?
How many people read your blog?

What is the normal rate for AdSense advertisements?
After retirement, we can blog too...hehehehe.

Only those who know English can read blog?
Can we write in Hindi as well?
How do you write in Hindi?
Write down the URL where we can transliterate.

Do Profs from IITs also blog?
What is the address of your blog?...writes down.
Fine, thank you for all that information.

Prof: Right now you are in Technical and you are longing for managerial job. Now these two are different. Right! You are good at technical job, that doesn’t mean you will be good at managerial job, and most of the good managers are not good at technical job.

ME: In my case, I want my development manager to be good in technical field as well ....laughter. so that when I propose a solution, he should understand the complexities involved.

Prof: That’s why technical people make good managers in most of the cases...
So what is the specific management skill, we should think, you have which will make you a good manager.


Me: Right now, the most important thing I find in myself is that I gel with people very easily. There are some guys which are silent most of the time, while there are some who are very much talkative. What I ensure is that I fall in their comfort zone. Like, I can go out for lunch with them. I want that every manger whether at lower level or at top level should give time to their employees so that he can feel their requirements. And what is the perspective of the employee, it’s more important to know that. And one such example I find is Vineet Nayar of HCL infotech, because his policy is Employee first, consumer second. He has made HCL as one of the best places to work. So first, management should make sure that employees are giving their best and continue to do that. I think consumers can be disloyal, they will find another good product any dump you in a month. They won’t even care whether you existed or not. (Prof: Why one month they can do that in a moment!! ME: everyone takes time to decide.) on the other hand employees will work to come up with the new products.
Apart from that I’m very particular about my performance and when I report to my manager I report in proper way and if I have any issue I directly talk to my manager so that I don’t give any opportunity to him to complain about me. These are some of the aspects which I’ve learned at the Job, actually!!!

Prof: Very good! Vikram, do you have sense of humour? Hahahaha....
Me: Blah blah...

Prof: Give us an example of your sense of humour. Apne shahar ke latife sunayiye....
Me:Ok. One example I can give you is about a marriage I attended recently. Where my friends asked me to do some kind of Engineering Dance!....

Prof: If I may ask you, what is your caste !!
Me: Jat

Prof: To unke kuch example dijiye humko...heehhehe...
Me: Jats are like Just Avoid Them...heheheh

Prof: Accha yah bataiye...what is the difference between Product design and Service design?

Prof: Now, what is the common thing in these?
Me: Consumer !

Prof: Very good !! do you want to ask us anything ?
Me: No sir. I had very good experience with you. I’m very happy with that. Thanks.

Do you have any other call?
How serious are about MBA?
Me: I am very interested in this sir, infact I've been saving my salery for fee for some time.

Prof: How much have you saved?
Me: around X lakhs

Prof1: But that will not be sufficient....
Prof2: Admission ho jayega. Loan wagarah le lena.
Yes, First year I”ll cover with my savings, and for second year I’ll arrange for a loan :)
Prof1: Haan, humara jo banker hai he can arrange ....money is not a problem.
Bahut accha, best of luck. Good Luck. So we should remember that JAT means Just Avoid Them !!..hahaha
Me: No sir, It was just a joke. If you see, even my blog address is JustAnyTime, which also stands for JAT...hehehe...or it depends on the people what they make of it.
It’s like I’m available any time for my friends and collegues.

Prof1: Come back, baithiye. There is one social concern issue. Abhi aapne Khaap ke bare main suna hoga. Kya jante ho uske bare main aur uske bare main aapke views kya hain.
My view is that society should change with time. The reasons for Caste and Gotras were different, but now we are living in globalised world and we should adapt to that instead of being left alone..
And some bakar for next 2-3 mins.....

Verdict: Converted :)

We were 10 ppl for that panel. 2 girls and 8 boys. I found that I am the only boy selected while both girls have made it in final list.

Leave your comments...:)

Monday, April 05, 2010

शिक्षा अनिवार्य क्यों है?

Written with the help of http://www.google.com/transliterate/
बहुत दिनों से हिंदी मैं कुछ लिखा नहीं है | मोबाइल और इन्टरनेट ने पत्र लिखना भी बंद करवा दिया है | करीब चार साल पहले छटवे सेमेस्टर मैं हिंदी साहित्य के परीक्षा के बाद आज अचानक मन हुआ है हिंदी मैं कुछ लिखने का |
कुछ दिन पहले "बच्चों के मुफ्त और अनिवार्य शिक्षा का अधिकार अधिनियम" लागू हुआ है | बाकी सब तो समझ मैं आता है लेकिन अनिवार्य शब्द का क्या मतलब है? अगर किसी बच्चे का पढाई में मन नहीं लगता है तो क्या उसे जबरदस्ती करके पढाया जायेगा? यह विचार अचानक ही नहीं आया है मेरे दिमाग में, बल्कि मेरे साथ पढने वाले कई ऐसे छात्र थे विद्यालय में जिनका बिलकुल भी पढने का मन नहीं करता था | एक बार मैंने भी अपने पिताजी से कहा की मुझे नहीं पढना, तो मेरा शंशय तो एक चपत में ठीक कर दिया गया | लेकिन और लड़कों को कितनी भी चपत लगाओ उनका फिर भी मन नहीं लगता था, कुछ तो कहते थे की कुछ भी कर लेंगे लेकिन पढ़ नहीं पाएंगे | उनके तर्क भी काफी समझ के होते थे | स्कूल में ५ साल संस्कृत पढने का क्या फायदा, शायद ही कभी काम आये | वही हाल कई और विषयों का था | अब लगता है बिना काम के ही पढाई गयी थी |

हाँ, एक फायदा तो होता है पढाई का, ज्ञान काम आये या न आये, रोजगार मिलने में सहूलियत तो हो जाती है | यह बात अलग है की काम में भी पढाई ज्यादा काम नहीं आती और ज्यादातर नए सिरे से ही पढना होता है, लेकिन फिर भी पता नहीं न जाने क्यों उपाधि धारकों को काम पे लिया जाता है | क्यों न सीधा जो काम करना हो उसी की प्रशिक्षा दी जाये | लेकिन इस में भी समस्या है, कभी व्यक्ति का मन अभियांत्रिकी का करता है तो कभी प्रबंधन का, और उसके बाद समाजसेवा और राजनीति का, मकसद बदलते रहते हैं | इसलिए काफी हद तक जैसा चल रहा है वैसा ही चलता रहता है क्योंकि लोगों को पता ही नहीं होता की उनका उद्देश्य क्या है और किस चीज की पढाई की जाये |

एक और बात, आखिर बच्चों की पढाई का दायित्व किसका है ? सरकार, परिवार, शिक्षकों का या फिर बच्चे का ? सरकार तो साल - साल में बदलती रहती है, बच्चे पढ़े या न पढ़े, बड़े होकर वोट तो देंगे ही ! परिवार वाले भी बस सुविधाएँ उपलब्ध करा सकते है, बच्चे की जगह पर पढ़ तो नहीं सकते ! और शिक्षकों की तरफ से तो बच्चे पढ़े या न पढ़े उनका वेतन तो पक्का है | तो फिर आखिरी जिम्मेदारी रह जाती है स्वंय छात्रों की, अब पढाई अच्छी लगे या न लगे, पढना तो पड़ेगा, जब तक अपने आप से कुछ करने और दूसरों को भी रोजगार देने की छमता न हो और अगर भविष्य में नौकरी चाहिए तो !!

" पढ़ लो बच्चों! आजकल तो अनपढ़ों की शादी भी बड़ी मुश्किल से होती है !"----रामभरोसी मास्टरजी .

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Reservation and Situation of Women

“Aisi ladkiyan ayengi...udyogpatiyon ki, bade bade sarakari afsaron ki...sansad mein...aisi ladkiyon ko dekh kar ladke citi bajayenge pichhe se...haan...aap dekhlijiyega," this is what Mr. Mulayam Singh has proposed as one of his logic for his opposition to Women reservation in the parliament. Now most of the feminist and people with self claimed common sense are deriding him for his cheap mentality and sexism.

But why do we forget that this is not only Mulayam Singh, who thinks in this way, but there are millions of Mr. Kathor, who have elected such leaders, are also having the same opinion. It is true to some extent that females are teased, stared at, and commented upon, and even harassed by few sick men, who probably think that this is the only way, by which they can prove their manliness. Now the most problematic part is not that women have to face such obnoxious elements but the acceptance of the parents of the girls and society in general, that only way to avoid these situations is to keep their Bahu-Betis locked into their houses, instead of fighting for their rightful space in the world. It is not only parents and elders who try to restrict the women, but the females themselves do not come forward and become the party in their own oppression.

There are many such incidents which I’ve seen and felt myself. First is education. Why do we need separated educational institutes for women? Why don’t we encourage them to study in the co-ed school and colleges, where they can grow on par with men? Yes, as I said earlier, there are many problem related to unruly psychos and accommodation in cities. But the main problem is that parents don’t have trust on their own blood. Some of them think if they send their girls to co-ed institutions, they may get involved with boys of different castes and social status. This will tarnish their reputation in the society. They don’t say it to their daughters clearly but they understand it quite well and convince themselves that they are supposed to be like that only.

Next problem is that for some unknown reason females try to hide themselves behind veil instead of coming in public and face the world as it is. I’ve seen most of the women in my village, including in my own family, covering their faces in front of males. When I ask them why it is so, the only answer that comes is that they are supposed to be like that for cultural reasons. Its not only limited to uneducated and village women. We see on the social networking websites that most of the female profiles have hidden their faces in the garb of some different pictures then their own. Why is it so? Yes, I understand that there is a continuous nuisance of hundreds of freiendophiles, who are not on friendly terms with their own female family members but want the unknown females to be their friends without even knowing. There may be chances of misusing the photos by some maniacs. But this doesn’t mean that females should just loose their identities and hide themselves behind the flowers and animations. There is a real need on their part to come forward and fight the world.

Now the solutions, as I can see, lie not in reservations in education institutes, jobs, transportation, or even in legislative assemblies or in the parliament, but in the equal encouragement and opportunity given to females at home, to begin with. In making the girls believe that they can be as good as boys and in raising the girls as tough as boys, instead of asking for reservations for them. By encouraging them for higher education rather than marrying them to suitable boys at young age.

But the irony is that I don't see it happening very soon. It is going to take time. We cant go back and change what has happened till now, but we can surely change our attitude towards women and make the difference in the times to come :)

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Garlands !!!

News Bees have settled down now in their new hives after buzzing for a couple of days over Maya madam's head. It was an ingenuous marketing lesson that should have been taken by aspiring managers. How effectively had Behanji used her garlands made of currency notes to garner lots of airtime and space across media, worth crores.

However the matter of my curiosity is neither Mayaji nor the Currency notes. Its about the Malas(Chains) made of different materials. Why we, in India, are so much infatuated with these garlands? Since the child is born to the time (s)he remains only in pictures and statues. It is tied with garlands. How do people feel when they are garlanded or they garland someone? Really, I mean, does it give some pleasure which I'm depriving myself till now.

If you have had any opportunity ....you may share your experience :)

Monday, March 15, 2010

What exactly are we looking for?

This is not the first time I’ve been asked or I’ve asked this question myself. Ever since I’m conscious of myself, I’ve no idea what I’ve been looking for exactly. Many times, it has been like reaching the goal and then turning back and saying to myself, hey is it something you wanted?. Or in easy terms it’s like a dog chasing a car only to come back where he started from.

The reason of behaving this way may be curiosity, distraction, shifting goal posts or simply lack of self confidence. Another reason for this may be starting on the task without having clear understanding of the results, or doing something just because others are doing it. One more reason that is more important is that you don’t know how to say NO to your very own people, whom you don’t want to hurt, have asked you to take on the task without considering your interests and you start on it because you, yourself don’t know what is to be done.

Oops lets me close this post here.....I don’t know why I’m writing this ....and even you! why are you reading this...if you have the reason write down in the comments below.

Thursday, March 04, 2010

Writing as a Hobby

You know what; writing is my hobby, that’s what I say when someone asks me about it. But I’m not sincere about it at all. Though there are couple of incidences about my writings which I remember fondly and am going to share now.

First Diary: When I was around 10. I saw two diaries in my father’s suitcase. Let me say one big one (A) and another smaller one (B). I used to wonder what did he write in them? Why kept in locked almirah? So one day I discovered where he kept the key. Next day, I got my hand on the key when he left for school (He is a teacher), opened the almirah carefully such that no one in the home could see me, and then took out the diaries. I don’t remember exactly what was written in B, it was almost blank, but A had something interesting. In the front pages there were some tables full of numbers, probably about his salary, expenses, month wise for past 5-6 years running thorough many pages. And then as I turned pages from the end side. There were around 10 pages full of Hindi songs’ lyrics of Manoj Kumar type movies, written immaculately. It was totally unexpected, as I never heard him singing or even humming. All he used to do was listening to News on Radio. So I just put back the diaries and closed the almirah and took the key with me completely forgetting that I’d to put it back. In the evening he might have searched for the key. He looked around and then noticed something in my shirt’s pocket. Here it is! "Why did you take it? Did you steal something from there", He asked. “I wanted to see the diaries”, I said. “I want the smaller one, its empty!” I continued with the demand till he got me a diary. For that he just cut few A4 size papers in 4 pieces each, pinned them together. Then gave me, my first little Diary, saying, "Get yourself a Big one when you go to college". After some time he wanted to see what I’d written in that? It was full of details about the songs, like title, singer, Music Director, Movie Name, which I used to listen on the radio or watch in Chitrahar and Rangoli on DD-1. All he gave in return was a Smile!....as I had a totally unheard of hobby....collecting song details.

First Letter: Letter writing was taught in primary school and then repeatedly in every Hindi and English class before exams. But It was around 4 years later than the unique hobby, at the dawn of adolescence. The letter was to be written to impress the recipient. To tell her that how much I admired her smile and what did she mean to me. It took 2 days of calligraphy to write those 3 pages, and one more day to draw the symbol of heart pierced by an arrow. On Jan 14th, I thought,” Today is the Valentine day celebration as we celebrate Makar-Sankaranti”. I handed over it to her in front of whole class. Most of the female classmates got their hearts broken as they saw a drawing on the last page. For next few weeks quite of a hailstorm was raised by my schoolmates whom I used to consider my best friends. Letters continued till I got my mobile, but recipients kept changing.

First Essay: Just like letters, Essays too used to come in exams, but this time it was different. It was an Essay writing competition. We, the class 11-12th students, were given few topics. I chose to write on “India’s Population problem and possible solution”. It was to be written in about 1000 words. But what I submitted was a total mess. It ran through at least 15 pages, I wrote whatever I could think of, examples of families I which had abnormal sizes with dozens of children. Examples how a limited family can have batter share of available resources...etc. After a week the evaluator came with the result. I obviously didn’t win the prize. But he asked in the class,”Who has written this drama?”

First Novel: This is something still to be finished; Last year He got the idea to begin on this. He found the topic, even the characters were decided. Story was progressing well, Characters behaved as they should have naturally. Their conversations were recorded. However in the end one of the characters requested another, “Please do whatever in your life but don’t become a writer”. He still doesn’t understand what arose this plea. And He said “Don’t worry I won’t”. Ever! So probably this dream will be unfulfilled unless new characters are found.

PS: Report the mistakes in the comments below, I've got 99.18 percentile in verbal section in CAT-09. but you understand well that exams can never check a person's mistakes...they are bound to be there.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

A Bugs Life

You are travelling in a Car, which is caught in traffic for last 15 min, calming yourself by reading live commentary of India-SA match on you smart phone. Now how will you feel if Sachin is at 199* and your smarty Hangs itself? That means its Screen freezes like windows PC does sometimes, and all you can do is take out the battery, put it back and restart the mobile to find that the inning is over and you are deprived of live text at MobiCast.

For a moment you might feel like throwing away the dumb thing, and curse its manufacturer and promise yourself to never buy any product of this company. This kind of problem is called BUG in geeky parlance. And as you can understand, when the product doesn’t respond in the expected way, it is going to hit the brand reputation, which in turn is going to bite into the revenue, profit, market share etc of the company.

To avoid such unwanted situations, the product development process has rigorous quality assessment tests. The process starts with an initial design, requirements and expected results. But as you move ahead with the development you come to know that there are many scenarios which were not considered in the beginning, and may result in unwanted leaks. These leaks are found either by developers themselves or by dedicated test engineers, they are like sniffer dogs, or like doubt masters, who always think like “What if” to avoid the “WTFs” in future.

After the testers give a list full of these glitches, the product is again on the drawing table, this is when you start with stitching holes, adding new requirements, putting new conditions and bundling up the whole thing to send it back for next round of testing. The process continues till the deadlines can’t be extended any further.

Germs always remain as they do in Colgate toothpaste advertisements and so do the jobs of thousands of development and test Engineers.

Sunday, January 31, 2010

Tum

तुम










दूर होकर पास हो तुम
रेशमी अहसास हो तुम
प्यासी रेगिस्तान की मैं
तृप्ति का आभास हो तुम

अंग लगते छंद जैसे
गीत का विन्यास हो तुम
कुछ न कुछ तो बात है जो
खास में भी खास हो तुम
जेठ की हूँ दोपहरी मैं
और श्रवण मास हो तुम

साधना होगी सफल ही
एक ऐसी आस हो तुम
फूलघाटी मधुवनो की
वास का आवास हो तुम

मौन प्रतिमा सी लगी हो
यूँ मुखर बिंदास हो तुम
क्या भला अस्ततित्व तुम बिन
क्योंकि मेरी सांस हो तुम

--V-S--

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Learning to Lie.....making up stories.

"Jhooth Bolna seekho, Gaaon main nahi ho!"--R.G.
"aisa SOP to koyi bhi likh dega, Create some story"--T.A.

So guys I think, enough of personal stories, I've got to start creative writing, which means that I need to learn, how to lie, how to make stories, after all I want to get an MBA degree atleast....I think even my dad wants it for me to some extent.

So here it goes....
"Specific example of technological change faced by your organization."

Technology is something which is changing the world like never before. What is routine today may be out of sync tomorrow. To stay in the line of current of new technologies and to use these for the benefit of the organization is the duty of every alert manager. Keeping all these points in mind, I, as the chief executive officer of MySun Pvt Ltd, a company with 1436 employees on the roll, decided to introduce the electronic attendance system in my company.

The purpose was to keep track of the efforts put by the employees, Leave requests approvals, holidays etc, and to do away with the burdensome paperwork. We outsourced the required infrastructure related work such as swipe-in gates, Database support, central server maintenances, and individual electronic ID cards, to OnTime services ltd. An electronic ID card, is just the size of a Bank Debit card, has a tiny chip with necessary employee information such as unique identification number, photo, home address and a colour photo on top. It can easily put around one’s neck with a strip, such that it’s visible.

Most of the employees were happy with this move, as they no longer have to pick out a pen and sign in the register. It was easy for our clerks also, as they no longer have to dig through the attendance registers to count the work hours put by thousands of employees. For the first week, things were not as easy as expected, server broke down in the morning as hundreds of people queue up to mark their attendance at the office time of 9:00 AM, and there was a huge rush at the gate. Earlier they used to sign in the registers even after being late for more than an hour. In the heat of the moment, some hot tempered guys broke the swipe in gates, as they worried they might be marked late. We had to ask the OnTime to replace the broken items by 4:00 PM so that it is not the same mess again in the evening. From the next week onwards we increased the entry points to 4 from 2. And things returned to normal.

This system did not make to the older generation initially. They thought all this tantrum was useless, and was put in place to create a show. They wanted to go back to register attendance system. But from my point of view it turned out to be very good thing as I planned. Hundreds of folks, which were late most of the time, could be identified and given notice in written. There was no need for employees to rush to their supervisor with leave applications. At any given time we could see, how many people are inside the premises. We could see how many people did not turn up any given day just by a click of mouse, instead of manual roll call, as we used to do earlier.

This system didn’t come up at huge cost either. The overall system was set up in just Rs 8 lakhs rupees, which is equivalent to salaries of 4 clerks for a year. It did away with manual mistakes, which used to creep in while calculating total working hours and remuneration calculations. All 4 clerks were moved to more satisfying work positions, and they were happy as they no longer needed to do the boring sums and divisions.

In 2 months time I was able to see a significant positive change in employees’ attitude. Now, they were on time most of the time. We could easily calculate the overtime hours and pay accordingly. This resulted in 18% increase in the total product output for same number of working hands.

When I reported the results of the next quarter to our management board, they were all happy and appreciated me for the initiative. Now the next move is going to automate the lunch and snacks delivery in office. Employees will be encouraged to help themselves. This will save time as well as resources. Way to go!

First attempt...You can help me improve....put all your comments for sure.