A clear verdict

...is not clear until it is delivered ! Its always 20/20 in postmortem !

It gives enough scope to nay-sayers, when goes negative. Enough scope to the "I told you so" types.

And enough to the perpetual optimists, who followed their own decision.

Choose to follow the right leader !

.. not the mightiest army !

This is a story from Mahabharat. The battle was about the start.

Both Pandava's and Kaurava's were collaborating with kings around Krukshetra to be their allies.

In the process of building the winner team both Arjun and Duryodhan show up in Lord Krishna's house.

Lord was resting. Arjun sat near his feet and Duryodhan near his head. Waiting for him to get up !

When Krishna woke up, he saw Arjun first and asked him to ask for what he wants !

Arjun said, he needs his support for the battle.

Then he asked Duryodhan, what he wanted. Duryodhan was building an army to win. So he asked for Krishna's army, which was huge and unbeatable.

So Krishna with Arjun - pandavas ! And rest of his army with Duryodhan.

We all know what happened to the result of the greatest war ever fought on the face of earth.

Bataal thinks - its applicable even now ! In modern day team building to win business wars ! If one goes with the proven leader, the team will be built right !

Freedom of speech !

What are bloggers' supposed to do ?

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/Bloggers-can-be-nailed-for-views/articleshow/4178823.cms

Collaboration - A True Success Story !

Today One of the early entrepreneurs of Orissa came home.

Orissa is a state, where people do prefer a job first. Very less people get in to doing their own business for living. Very risk averse people, in general. And being poorest state in India, you can not blame the people not to take risk also.. which end the society in the vicious cycle that is far away from generating wealth.

More so earlier during 60s and 70s than now.

In any case, this person, after finishing his engineering from IIT Mumbai, in 70s, he did not settle for a comfortable job or even buy a ticket to go US like every other IITan that time.

He went back to Orissa, and wanted to do something on his own. As there was no market for hig end services, he settled for something very simple and basic product.

The iron hinges for wodden doors.

Minimal investment, in lathe machine that can process 20 tons of iron hinges a month. But, early on what he could end up selling was max 5ton a month. There used to be one auto rick that would distribute these hinges to shops in nearby cities. More could not be afforded.

But he knew, there is more market for these hinges, as Monday if the auto went to city X, it used to get chance to go back there on say next Monday and the shop keeper would say, the stock has been over from Friday. Simple supply chain stuff. And he had to get this gap filled without going through additional procurement of Auto Rick.

Then he noticed, few other auto ricks going around the same shops distributing nails and other hardware stuff (these were again some small scale industries in Orissa but mainly by marwadis and punjabis).

So, he went with proposal to all the owners to start shating the autos and the destination is still the hardware stores.

That clicked.. .and the collaboration could put his production to 20tons a month and with the optimum scale profitability came in.

The group became so well knitted that whenever they planned to lunch a new hardware product, they would see among all the companies, who should do it and who is best suited for it.

Govt. officiers in charge of industrial development, noticed this and provided central land. Then all is hostory !

He is now, one of the first families of Orissa in businees that has spread across nails to ship building.

News of same color .. come together !

I sometimes wonder, how the events are batched in people lives.

When someone goes through a bad time, all bad news comes in together. One after the other, until it moves the subject to a brink of insanity.

Same with good news. When it starts coming, it starts pouring.

Then there is the third kind - period of uncertainty. Don't know good or bad, but when uncertainty creeps in, it comes with its all siblings !

In December, there was a bad period. All sort of unrelated quarters of my life started sending bad news to me.

Jan till now, it was period of uncertainty.

Y'day evening, I got a call from a close friend, who was laid off from her job in Dec, saying she got a job after 2 months of struggle within Bangalore. My 6th sense classified it as Good News, and I was confident that the period of uncertainty would go now.

Then came few mails in the evening, breakthrough stuff ! Ended with a video conference, which kind of took much uncertainty away. Rest of the night, on phone calls .. by morning, all the uncertainty gone !

I sometimes strongly believe in influence of stars :) The timing really puzzles me.

Games corporates play ..

I work for a company, which is big, no #1 in the respective industry and most importantly in the so called recession has 25B USD in liquid money (cash and short term investment) that can live through the bad times.

All sounds good ? Not so soon ..

I was surprised last week, when this company went with a debt instrument to raise 4B USD to wall street.

Why would someone who has 25B in bank, go for a 4B loan for "normal corporate" governance ?

Daal mein kala hai ..

I went in to a formal channel of investigation and the explanation I got was - even though the co. has 25B, it is kept outside of USA. And bringing in this money would cost TAX dollars.

Do you buy that ?

Home Coming - both ways :)

There is always a certain level of excitement to go back home ! From wherever one has been.

However, in the saying "home coming" the definition of Home is kind of subjective.

I ve been away from my home (so to speak) and been to my home in my home town. Confusing ? Basically, a place where I grew up, with people who brought me up, but not the place I ve been living in now !

So I was excited to get there. That was home coming for me. I am now, excited to be back in my own home. Dual Home coming :)

Novel ways of cheating people ..

The more conveniences human being creates, the more the abusers become creative.

The latest in small time fraud stories from a banker - When someone deposits a foreign currency check in Indian account, the bank tells them that the amount will reflect in their account after 21 days, converted on that days exchange rate. Fair enough !

This is where bank makes money (legally) - Interest for 21 days, and speculation on currency value in 21 days.

However, the abusers, the greedy bankers do worse ! They want another 3 days extra holding on the money - so they go and tell the DHL (Courier) person to send the notice 3 days later.

Courier was invented to beat the snail mail - and it is instructed to be snail mail, for 3 days extra time !

Thank God ! The internet has changed it all.

A lot of a "good" thing ..

.. is not so "good". After all !

The craze over last 15 weeks of getting in to shape, hours of stretching the body's ability, minds ability, the frenzy - has been granted forced rest, by nature !

The hardship became an addiction. And looks like even addiction needs rest !

Take a break :)