Its the "change" and not the "net" value ...

Everyday we walk in to our work place with huge digital displays showing company's stock price.

That's one of the ultimate metrics of effectiveness of our work - agreed ! And lot of us who have this stock in our portfolio through ESOP/ESPP or RSU do pay enough attention to this one.

One thing interesting I noticed today though ! When the ticker is in RED we get that feeling, "MAN something went wrong". Even the very next day if it is green we feel happy. Even if the net value on the green day is less than that of the red day. See the pictures. Cropped to hide identity of blogger's employer.

Mobile - Ain't we ?

We all love to move.. and to work ! PDAs have proven it by their popularity. We work, play, network on the go !!


So when one sees this futuristic bus with video-con, high speed comm links, office equipments etc. in built - it feels like "WOW" !!

Want to brainstorm next sales strategy ? Get in the bus ! Hit the road. Go to nearest hill station, and finish up the work while on road. Sounds cool.. until you see the fat cable below the bus physically connected to a building power source ;)

Don't we love technology ?

Certainly yes ! It makes our life easy. Helps us achieve monumental tasks with much less effort.

Now see this following product / solution announcement touted to be next frontier of technology ..

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Controls for lights & Aircon will be enabled tthrough Phones of Individual Room Users, please note that there are NO physical switches available to control Lights.

Phone features for Cabin users:

· Lights Turn ON/OFF (No brightness control available)
· AIRCON ON/OFF
· Aircon Room Temperature settings


The above services will be automatically enabled for Calendar Bookings. If the conference room is not booked through outlook, then you can turn ON Lights & Aircon by using the IP Phone. These services will be enabled for 30 Minutes only, after which the controls go back to energy savings mode. Please book the room using outlook to avoid this.
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Turning ON a light bulb - Monumental Task !!
Using phone menu (which is in the room you want to lit) to light up the room - much less effort !!

Really !!! ???

The more one gives the more one gets !

Ever wondered how monkeys evolved in to human beings, with the most distinctive physical change of having no tail ???

If we look at Darwin's theory in a very simplistic manner, it just says - "If you wont use it, you wont have it - over a period of time".

So, monkey's must not have used their tails for any real use ! Hence that part evolved "out" !

Well ! Now switching from Darwin to friend's grand-maa ! She is this woman who has seen close to a century. Wise to the E. One of her stories goes like this.

"One village had a big well. 100s of years old. It had crystal clear water and plenty of it to quench the thirst of entire village and anyone passed by. Everyone in that mountainous village thought it was a divine well, as the water was so refreshing. And it was always present. All other wells of that area, lasted about 25 yrs before going dry. It was a natures gift.

Then a king built a temple near that village which became one of the most beautiful temples of that area and popular pilgrimage ! He then ordered, no one can use the water from that well. The only usage of the water is going to be for God's special bathing ceremony that happens every year on a particular auspicious day.

The well that used to provide water to 100s of people now was only God's.

After a few years the well went dry !"

Grand-maa takes a pause and says, if you don't take out the water from the well regularly, it would go dry. As nature thinks, there is no use proving water to this outlet any more.
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Vicky had an ideating technical architect in his team. He would come up with lots of
good ideas. In good times, all of them were being considered and tried out. Some succeeded and did not. But he kept ideating.

At the dawn of recent recession, vicky got tired of this ideating head and thought of asking him to just come stop ideating as the business is not ready for ideas now.

And before being that stern, he went to betaal. Betaal just told the above story that he heard from the old lady !

Optimism

Whenever I am at my native place, an used to be sleepy town, that is joining the race of "India Shining" growth lately, I meet one of my old friends, without fail.

This person was my classmate during IIT days, went just like all of us to work in US for several years. During the wave of reverse brain drain, when a lot of came back to settle in Bangalore, the IT capital of India, this friend came back to this small town. And more importantly to start IT business.

He has seen his highs and lows just like any other entrepreneur.

This time when I met him, he was going through a low. The projects pipeline has reduced. He company has reduced to only himself and a young trusted programmer. He is able to make enough to run his family. But thats about it as it seemed.

So, during the talk I just brought up the topic of joining a normal job like one of us and was aback by his response and the optimism in that response.

He said - "There are 365 days in a year. And I just need 3 good days out of the 365. Which is less than 1%. 2 days to come across 2 good employable young people and 1 day to land a good project and I am back on saddle".

Nice way to look at it. No matter how unlucky you currently are, 1% of time one will have his luck ! Now, are we looking for that 1% time so that we catch them before the dawn on us ??

Most inexepensive and effective way of making someone's "day" !!

After almost 17yrs, completely out of the blue, I get one e-mail from a classmate on Facebook in-box !

And it was not on any of the present day occasions like - Friend's day, Friends' Friend's day etc too...

It goes like this...

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"hi ______ !
guys like you needs to be respected & adored more than being just being a friend!!

Although we were not exaclty friends in college but i had opportunities to interact with you ocassionaly coz we had a common friend called Mukesh (met him this july in kolkata).

I am sure, wherever you are, your contributions must be recognised on daily basis.

Love you !!!

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It really made me feel good ! Even if it may mean nothing ... today !

It would be my new year resolution to reach out to some long lost contacts or even people I meet daily and taken for granted, to say something sweet about them. I ll even keep a time slot every week in my calendar to do this !

Jugalbandi ..

No matter how much a corporation wants to propagate the culture of "collaboration", the personal silos stand tall.

The ego, the urge to go ahead and look better than others, the rush to get to the top, the desire to control and impose ideologies end up winning ! If not, end of being serious nuisance for the culture of collaboration.

What does one do as a manager in that case ?

Watch music reality shows on the theme of "jugalbandi". Where two competing aspirants sing together - and each of their goal is to make the song as beautiful as possible.

They get along ! They pay attention. They pick up where the partner / opponent fumbles.

Such a learning ! As a manager, I would go back and pair up competing people to common goals. I would make one be measured by the others success.

Sounds like something to try out for sure ;)