Sunday School!

The most mundane events can rapidly bring one back to earth. This morning, while on my way back home I stopped over at a shop selling plastic stuff. The intention was to buy plastic pot holders for pots on my balcony.
In the shop was a gent, looking happily uninterested. In my best 'angrazi', I asked the gent if the shop was open, to which he said no. I was surprised and asked him again, to which he again said no. Disappointed & annoyed I trudged off, to a neighbouring electrical shop. Post my purchase, I enquired with the incumbent if there was a plastic shop around, in the immediate neighbourhood. The guy goggled at me and said there was one next door, hadn't I seen it? I said it was not open.....................when the chappie was even more surprised.
To cut to the chase, both of us went next door, to meet our uninterested gent. After a rapid exchange in what sounded like a dialect from Rajasthan, it transpired that the shop was indeed open...............!
The, whole thing was mind boggling & made my head spin. On further enquiry, it transpired that the plastic shop guy thought I was asking for a ' bottle opener', when I asked him if the shop was open! What a mess.
The point is who created the mess. I must take the blame, of trying to be very smart and high context and over communicating, where a simple sentence would have sufficed, in probably Kannada or Hindi.What was I trying to do, communicating to the chap in English? Not only was I overcommunicating but doing so in a not so appropriate language!
Having made my purchase after some spirited haggling, this time alternating between Kannada and Hindi, I departed, not without thinking how stupid I was.This after I teach communication! As a parting shot the shop fellow asked me, why I spoke English, when I could have talked to him in Kannada!!!!
You learn all the time don't you.........................

There are no stupid questions!

As I lecture, to young sparks, in moments of lull, my mind drifts to how safe it is to lecture in a class as against my previous avatar as a sea farer. The reason I make this statement is because the number of seafarers in captivity and held for ransom by Somalian Pirates has crossed the figure of five hundred and has gone largely un-noticed, even as many of us go about our daily business of trying to figure out which restaurant we would like to visit at the weekend or which politician is going to give it to us in the neck, next.

Even as I write this piece, hundreds of seafarers are risking their freedom every day to allow ships to move through the busy international marine corridor linking West with East, called the Gulf of Aden, thereby ensuring that oil, chemicals and gas, food, raw materials and finished products all reach their destinations unhindered. Interestingly it is said that almost everything that floats today has an Indian on board.

But think for a moment of how these seafarers feel as they prepare for a transit of the Gulf of Aden ( How do their families feel? ), studying Best Management Practice specific to their situation, erecting defences such as razor wire and water cannon, practising protective procedures and manoeuvres. Practicing time and again for that one emergency that may surface at short notice.

Over 90% of global trade, including crude oil, goes by sea.Now think for a moment how every one of us would be affected if our seafarers said enough is enough and cargoes were delayed as they were re-routed round South Africa’s Cape of Good Hope or Sea farers demanded increased remuneration as risk and hardship allowance.

A while ago a young gun asked me if pirates really looked like Capt Jack Sparrow, in Pirates of the Caribbean. I said, yes, except that, they had eye patches covering both eyes, instead of one.I did not add that, today, pirates are armed with shoulder fired missiles as against the cutlass that Sparrow, wielded! I was joking, but the sad part is that many of us are operating with blinkers, cloistered in an unreal world, and the description would well suit many who live in a safety that is taken for granted.

Another enterprising youngster asked me, if it was true that a naval man had a wife in every port? While I'm a firm beliver in the dictum, that there are no stupid questions, this one took my breath away and, that is a story that will be reserved for another time...................

3 L's and a career!

As many of my students leave us for industry, a few stop by and ask, what would contribute to a successful career.

While there are many things that lead to success. I think from my experience that the following play an important role:

#1. Language: Who ever said that you could get by without decent language skills was giving you a load of BS.While it is important to have good language skills it is very important to be vigilant enough to detect BS. For example, have you heard somebody say ' Your presentation was wonderful, but..................... . Well everything before the 'but' is BS and can be safely ignored. Other words that should get your sensors up are words like 'only', 'just' and so on. 'There is only a small mistake'. Sit up and take notice, immediately.There is trouble in the offing.

Then there are the power players who use power words like urgent, strategy, important,paradigm to hide real facts and their ignorance. Another trick is to serially drop names of people who are in power and are fairly sure you will not cross check.

At a critical moment in your discussion you will hear the sentence, ' In my last meeting with the General Manager, she said that.....................'. The tactic is meant to strike fear in your heart and get you to shut up, pronto.

#2. Lies: It is a fairly well known fact that folk pad up their resume. What is not very well known is that about 5-10 % are pathological liers and worse are very skilled at the game. The general trick here is not to lie because most lies are not sustainable and you will eventually be found out and more importantly guard against liers by not being overly trusting. Most of us trust and then weep, when we are suckered.

#3. Luck: You bet your last paisa that without this you are doomed. However, you can improve your luck quotient my investing in the following:

a. Practice: Look at Sachin Tendulkar.
b. Persevere: Infosys Narayanamurthy.
c. Prepare: Look to the future and keep the big picture in mind. Don't get lost in small details.
d. Promises: Keep them. That's how you build credibility and folk trust you.You build a network that will cushion you in bad time, and trust me they do come.

Most of all to be really successful, you've got to enjoy the voyage, rough sea's and storms, as well, and watch out for the bullshitter's!Treat them like bubonic plague!

Namma Bengaluru!

It is fairly routine these days to hear of people stamping Bengaluru as the next 'innovation' hub of the world.No less. I first heard it from my friend Bob Hoekstra, erstwhile chief of Philips in India and an avid admirer of the city.So much so, Bob has gone the extra mile in setting up an innovation centre in India and lives a good part of his life in Bengaluru.I was initially surprised, but see the sense in it now.
Every once in a lifetime there comes a time when things fall into place and as Malcolm Gladwell would say, we are at the 'Tipping Point'. Bengaluru's tipping point has arrived and is well recognized.
One of the contributors to its status as the next Silicon Valley, is its highly educated immigrant population and here it has echoed California's Silicon Valley. What drove innovation in the valley? The immigrants of course!Many Indian!
One could argue that Mumbai has just as many immigrants or more. Maybe true, but the qualitative difference is in the education levels of immigrants in Bengaluru. Few other cities come even within sniffing distance.Innovation needs education of the qualitative kind.
The immigrant is an interesting animal. He does not fear failure because he/she is fairly anonymous in a city which is not theirs. This fosters risk taking which is a vital ingredient for innovation and entrepreneurship. Indians fear failure and a person who fails is anathema to our society. An alien city provides the cover of a protective cloak to try, fail and rise again.
Are there challenges? Sure there are........corruption, resistance from earlier settlers to a changing way of life and so on and the former will have to be tackled and the latter respected.
Bengaluru is a melting pot of success and if you are not here you might just be missing history in the making!

Limelight!

A couple of days ago a young man at ABS said that he did not want to choose Human Resources Management as a career because HR's according to his point of view were generally not in the 'limelight'.
Now I do not want to debate the accuracy of this opinion, but rather the idea of being in the limelight...........Is it very important to be the prima donna of a scene or always have the slice of the action? Can we derive satisfaction from the mundane?
In this context I remember a rather interesting story of a lady who worked in a Warsaw ghetto, during the run up to World War 2. The lady knowing the fate of the Jews, went about smuggling Jew babies out of the Ghetto at great personal risk. She spirited 250 infants out......
A couple of years ago she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.............but guess who won, Al Gore, the former American VP, for presenting a 'wonderful piece' on global warming. The lady has since passed on, to hopefully a better world, a fairer world, where being in the limelight is not the sole criterion for living a decent life.
It is this constant requirement to be in the limelight that gets us to miss many of the smaller pleasures of life, after all being in the limelight can be blinding.
Are HR's not in the limelight? The question ruffled a few feathers, in the gathering.
On my way back home, instead os zipping at my 150 KMPH on the NICE road, I made a more sedate 80...............and caught the most amazing sunset, as the setting suns rays bounced off freshly quarried rock. Something I had missed over seven months.

As Audrey Hepburn said..............

There are certain shades of limelight that can wreck a girl's complexion!

Power..........

It is a generally accepted fact that the former American President Bill Clinton, would have gone down as one of the top presidents of all time if only Monica Lewinsky hadn't appeared on the horizon as the fly in the ointment. Now every time Clinton is in the news, you can bet your last cent, that Lewinsky is around the bend & is going to be mentioned.
Now take the case of my other favourite, the great Tiger Woods, who is better remembered for his peccadilloes between the sheets rather than exploits on the green, today.
I'm not delving into the moral side of the story here. Morality is boring, who needs it? My interest is- why did Hilary Clinton soft pedal her husbands indiscretions and fargive her man while in the case of the Woods, the wife got an annulment of their marriage and has since disappeared into the mist of Sweden.
Why?
The reason is probably, not hard to see. Mrs.Clinton, was eyeing the top political spot in the US and looked to be the first woman president.She definitely did not want to get on the wrong side of the electorate and place her chances to be president in jeopardy, with a messy divorce trailing her
Mrs.Woods..............she was happy to take the moolah, and retire!To hell with Tiger.
Two well read women, in a first world country, exercised different options......which was the right way? Who the hell knows?
However it brings to mind the words of Lord Action- Power Corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.Holds true in this sordid drama as well.As for Bill & Tiger, scumbags, who did not hesitate to misuse the power that they had!

Breaking news is that Lord Swaraj Paul, has quit his post and tendered his resignation to the House of Lords, on being suspended for skulduggery..........

The other day I was reading a piece on Theodore 'Ted' Roosevelt, the American President, preceding World War 1. Roosevelt donned various hats, one being that of a ranch owner.Out on a spin, one day, he and a cowboy,noticed an unmarked calf. The next logical step was to brand the bull. The thumb rule was that, the calf belonged to the person or ranch owner, on whose territory the bull was found.

Roosevelt, was surprised to see his cowboy branding the calf with his sign, even though the land belonged to some other rancher and protested as such. The cowboy ignored his boss. After all he was doing him a favour.

The pair rode home quietly, post which, Roosevelt called the cowboy over, paid him his dues, and asked him to leave the ranch. He was fired, with a terse message, 'A person who steals for me, will steal from me'.How true. A simple homily most corporates do not seem to get.

That unfortunately is the unqualified truth. Dishonest people remain dishonest.It is probably the reason, why Tiger Wood's wife gave him the boot..........she understood Tiger better than most.

Strangely, Theodore Roosevelt, is best remembered,for the Teddy Bear, which was named after him!For me.......he was not a hypocrite, because as they say "When a guest starts talking about ethics and morality, its time to hide the good silverware."

Ted walked his talk.

Kenneth Lay, the cowboy, from Enron, is a good example!