Children are born a blank slate. As they grow up, the environment and people shape their behaviour and character traits. And these characters keep on changing as they grow up and interact with different people. Its so amazing to see that how people react differently to the same situation.
When an apple fell from the tree on Newton's head, it forced him to think about the reason for apple falling down and not going up. This thought led to formulation of the theory of "universal gravitation". For any another common man, the falling of apple would have been a non-event. If I would have been at Newton's place I would have eaten the apple and never bothered to invent any such theory. Somebody else might have just cursed the apple and thrown it way.
Even I was born 26 years back in Kolkata in a middle-class family. I was admitted to school when I was less than 3 years old.
My first day in school: My brother's class and mine were close (rather attached) to each other and there was a window in between through which I can peep into my brother's class. During the brief first day at school, I stood at that window throughout and kept on crying and saying "bhaiya, bhaiya". Teachers were so pareshan that they decided to send me back home and told my parents that I am too young to join the school. I still remember this day, but don't remember what happened next. My mom tells me that the next day, I cried again and this time because I wanted to go to school. I promised not to cry in the school and after lot of persuasion (children know only one language of persuasion - crying and crying louder). I was sent back to school and since then I never cried at school (I never cried, but there were some events that did bring tear to my eyes). I will come back to them later.
I liked my thumb a lot: Thats why in my early childhood, my thumb used to be inside my mouth. My parents were pareshan with this habit of mine and tried very hard to make me get rid of this habit. They used to apply chilli on my thumb, but I was smart I used to wash my hands and take the thumb back into my mouth. They made me wear gloves throughout the day, but I beat them again, and used to take the gloves out and take the thumb back. Finally, after 6-7 years, I was able to get rid of this habit. I don't know how it happened - may be because I no longer liked the taste of my thumb.
Stammer, stammer, stammer: During my childhood, I used to stammer a lot. I always used to pronounce "lala" as "yaya", so I ensured that I avoid using words with "l" in it. My parents tried their best to help me get rid of my stammering, but with little success. As I grew older, I started speaking better, though there are still some words I can't pronounce properly. I can't pronounce words with "sh" side by side. My friends will vouch for my hilarious pronunciation of "sh". "Shady" (dorm name of one of my friends at IIMA) - are you reading it?
Learning to ride a bicycle: This is one of those events that had the greatest impact on my life. When we (my elder brother and I) were young, my dad gifted us a bicycle. The bicycle had side-wheels to ensure that at the initial stages we don't need to bother about balancing while riding the bicycle. My elder brother was a fast learner and it took him just 2 weeks and he was able to ride bicycle without side-wheels. He got the side-wheels removed. I was (and am) a slow learner. I requested my brother to help me learn bicycling, but he instead used to tease me because I haven't learnt bicycling yet. "Mein bhi ek ziddi ladka hoon" - if I decide to do something, I will achieve it. So I decided that I will learn bicycling on my own. We had a big hall in our apartment. I used to place the bicycle near a pillar, push the pillar hard and this ensured that the bicycle moved on its own and I concentrated on balancing it. After every 1 circular round, the bicycle used to stop moving and both the bicycle and me would be on the ground. I used to try this for an hour everyday and slowly but steadily, I started falling fewer times. And one day ... I did not fall down. It was a moment of triumph for me as I had finally conquered bicycling. It took me more than two months to reach this moment of triumph.
Enough of childhood stories for now. I will continue the other anecdotes in the later parts of this post.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Back to childhood days
Being a younger child at home and that too when the elder brother is a prodigy has certain side-effects associated with it. Knowingly or unknowingly people end up comparing the two.
The worst yet unavoidable characteristic of human nature is their tendency to compare people. Why can't we realise each person is a different personality with his own positives and negatives?Why can't we accept people as they are, rather than comparing them with others? Why do we keep on focussing on the negatives in the character of a person and ignoring the positives? Why don't we realise that nobody is perfect?
I am younger of the two brothers and so we were always compared with each other. And honestly speaking, during our childhood my elder brother,Amit and I were polls apart from each other. While my brother was a prodigy, I was (I still am) a person with less intellect. While my elder brother was a lazy soul, I was hardworking and disciplined (this is only positive quality in me, so let me boast about it).
My parents liked (and still like) me a lot because of some of my good qualities (at least they perceive that I have some good qualities). However, when it came to achieving something big in life, I think that they had far lower expectations from me.
My childhood was spent under the shadow of my elder brother's performance. My elder brother always stood 1st in the class since class VI. I tried very hard to match his performance, but always failed miserably. In the school, nobody knew me by my name, rather I was known as Amit's brother. Even outside school, I was never able to command the same respect among our common friends than my brother did. Reason - I was short-tempered, always ready to pick up fight, while my elder brother had an amazing skill to calm things down. Thats why, I always used to pick up fight with my elder brother to make myself heard and because I wanted to prove that "main bhi kisi se kam nahin".
Thankfully, we took up different streams of education after secondary education. My elder brother chose science, while I preferred commerce. I had realized that I would be a disaster in science because of low intellect (or rather lack of it) but might do well in commerce stream.
Time passed and my elder brother did very well for himself. Even I didn't do too badly for myself. But with the passage of time, I gained more clarity on what I want to do in life and as a first step towards this, I decided to do MBA (I had made up my mind that I would do MBA only from IIM-A or IIM-B and not from any other institute).
Honestly speaking, my parents never believed that I would suceed in CAT examinations. So my parents tried hard to convince me that there is no point in trying it. My elder brother came to my rescue and convinced my parents to let me give it a try.
By fluke, I did well in CAT and landed in IIM-A. Post IIM-A, I have secured a decent job for myself. Now I can proudly say that even I have done well for myself. My parents also now realise that both their sons have very different personalities and both have succeeded in their respective fields.
I have learnt one lesson from this - every person is different, we need to acknowledge it and respect people for what they are. We should never try to change their personality. Nobody is perfect and so we should get rid of the notion of a "perfect man" (man here includes woman also, no gender bias).
The worst yet unavoidable characteristic of human nature is their tendency to compare people. Why can't we realise each person is a different personality with his own positives and negatives?Why can't we accept people as they are, rather than comparing them with others? Why do we keep on focussing on the negatives in the character of a person and ignoring the positives? Why don't we realise that nobody is perfect?
I am younger of the two brothers and so we were always compared with each other. And honestly speaking, during our childhood my elder brother,Amit and I were polls apart from each other. While my brother was a prodigy, I was (I still am) a person with less intellect. While my elder brother was a lazy soul, I was hardworking and disciplined (this is only positive quality in me, so let me boast about it).
My parents liked (and still like) me a lot because of some of my good qualities (at least they perceive that I have some good qualities). However, when it came to achieving something big in life, I think that they had far lower expectations from me.
My childhood was spent under the shadow of my elder brother's performance. My elder brother always stood 1st in the class since class VI. I tried very hard to match his performance, but always failed miserably. In the school, nobody knew me by my name, rather I was known as Amit's brother. Even outside school, I was never able to command the same respect among our common friends than my brother did. Reason - I was short-tempered, always ready to pick up fight, while my elder brother had an amazing skill to calm things down. Thats why, I always used to pick up fight with my elder brother to make myself heard and because I wanted to prove that "main bhi kisi se kam nahin".
Thankfully, we took up different streams of education after secondary education. My elder brother chose science, while I preferred commerce. I had realized that I would be a disaster in science because of low intellect (or rather lack of it) but might do well in commerce stream.
Time passed and my elder brother did very well for himself. Even I didn't do too badly for myself. But with the passage of time, I gained more clarity on what I want to do in life and as a first step towards this, I decided to do MBA (I had made up my mind that I would do MBA only from IIM-A or IIM-B and not from any other institute).
Honestly speaking, my parents never believed that I would suceed in CAT examinations. So my parents tried hard to convince me that there is no point in trying it. My elder brother came to my rescue and convinced my parents to let me give it a try.
By fluke, I did well in CAT and landed in IIM-A. Post IIM-A, I have secured a decent job for myself. Now I can proudly say that even I have done well for myself. My parents also now realise that both their sons have very different personalities and both have succeeded in their respective fields.
I have learnt one lesson from this - every person is different, we need to acknowledge it and respect people for what they are. We should never try to change their personality. Nobody is perfect and so we should get rid of the notion of a "perfect man" (man here includes woman also, no gender bias).
Sunday, June 22, 2008
My experience at current job and collegues
I have completed almost nine months into my current job role. During these nine months, I have moved from the lowest points of my career to one of the highest points of my career. Such a sea change goes to show how important people around are for career development and job satisfaction. So I would like to share my first nine months experience in the current job.
When I was hired, the job profile was explained to me as that of a sales role involving some elements of pricing etc. But when I was hired, the job was vastly different from what was sold to me. I was disappointed but never let it affect my performance. I tried hard to understand my job responsibilities and contribute positively to the desk, but met with little success. Reason - a) my boss himself was not clear of what my job responsibility should be; b) my boss though a good person was unable to manage my expectations from the job. Result - I was unable to do justice to my role, and proved to be a total disaster. Whenever a new employee joins, it is important that he is inducted properly to his role and the people he would work with. But it never happened. People always are reluctant to hand over a part of their responsibilities to others, because they fear that it will reduce their importance. This happened with me as well. Result - I never knew what I was supposed to do and many a times held responsible for mistakes I never committed.Everybody have a "never say die" attitude in them and so have I. I could not let the situation go out of hand so easily. So I kept on trying hard. But all my efforts were in vain. Slowly I started panicking and started giving up. The final nail in the coffin was the informal review process, where I heard so many negatives about me that I was left shocked. The purpose of any review process is to provide an honest feedback and so properly communicating it is important. I was deeply hurt that I got to know all the negatives in the review from the HR and my boss never cared to speak to me on it. I decided to speak to my boss but it was not very helpful.I was fighting at two levels - a) trying to convince my boss that I was a good employee, b) trying to convince that I am capable to do justice to the role I have been hired for. But I failed at both fronts. I was finding it diffifuclt to convince myself that I was doing justice to my role and so I made up my mind to quit.
But then...something happened that changed my life at the job.
My boss quit and I had a new boss. I knew the new boss, though not very well and somehow I felt that she did not like me at all. I was in a dilemna - the resignation of my old boss means lots of responsibilities for me, but at the same time I have continue my two level fight - convince my new boss that I am worthy of the job and that I am a good human being. I decided to continue into my current job and give it a chance.I wanted to start my relationship with the new boss in a clean slate and so decided to be honest with her about my experience with my old boss. So I asked her if she is happy to have me in the current role and that if she can clearly define my roles and responsibilities. She clearly laid down my roles and responsibilities and at the same time told me that she was happy with me in the current role. I was not sure if those words came from her heart or was it just an attempt by her to give me a second chance despite her disliking for me.
It has been three months since, and I am happy to say that I have won the fight on one front - my boss and my collegues are now convinced that I am a good human being. And I must admit that all credit goes to my team who made every efforts to make me an invaluable part of the team. They were honest in their feedback and so if I committed anything wrong, I knew about it immediately and they made every effort to ensure that I don't commit the same mistake again. I have learnt and am still learning a lot from my team.
However, I still need to win the fight at the second level - prove that I can do justice to my current role. Somehow, I feel that my performance in my current role has been far below my own expectations. This is partially due to the fact that I have been left to go along alone in my job role and also partially because of resource constraints. However, I would never let external factors divert and influence my career path. So I am leaving no stones unturned to achieve the tasks that I am supposed to complete. And I believe that with the support of my team I will be able to achieve it. I am one of the lucky few to be a part of such a great team and it will definitely go a long way in shaping my future career path.
When I was hired, the job profile was explained to me as that of a sales role involving some elements of pricing etc. But when I was hired, the job was vastly different from what was sold to me. I was disappointed but never let it affect my performance. I tried hard to understand my job responsibilities and contribute positively to the desk, but met with little success. Reason - a) my boss himself was not clear of what my job responsibility should be; b) my boss though a good person was unable to manage my expectations from the job. Result - I was unable to do justice to my role, and proved to be a total disaster. Whenever a new employee joins, it is important that he is inducted properly to his role and the people he would work with. But it never happened. People always are reluctant to hand over a part of their responsibilities to others, because they fear that it will reduce their importance. This happened with me as well. Result - I never knew what I was supposed to do and many a times held responsible for mistakes I never committed.Everybody have a "never say die" attitude in them and so have I. I could not let the situation go out of hand so easily. So I kept on trying hard. But all my efforts were in vain. Slowly I started panicking and started giving up. The final nail in the coffin was the informal review process, where I heard so many negatives about me that I was left shocked. The purpose of any review process is to provide an honest feedback and so properly communicating it is important. I was deeply hurt that I got to know all the negatives in the review from the HR and my boss never cared to speak to me on it. I decided to speak to my boss but it was not very helpful.I was fighting at two levels - a) trying to convince my boss that I was a good employee, b) trying to convince that I am capable to do justice to the role I have been hired for. But I failed at both fronts. I was finding it diffifuclt to convince myself that I was doing justice to my role and so I made up my mind to quit.
But then...something happened that changed my life at the job.
My boss quit and I had a new boss. I knew the new boss, though not very well and somehow I felt that she did not like me at all. I was in a dilemna - the resignation of my old boss means lots of responsibilities for me, but at the same time I have continue my two level fight - convince my new boss that I am worthy of the job and that I am a good human being. I decided to continue into my current job and give it a chance.I wanted to start my relationship with the new boss in a clean slate and so decided to be honest with her about my experience with my old boss. So I asked her if she is happy to have me in the current role and that if she can clearly define my roles and responsibilities. She clearly laid down my roles and responsibilities and at the same time told me that she was happy with me in the current role. I was not sure if those words came from her heart or was it just an attempt by her to give me a second chance despite her disliking for me.
It has been three months since, and I am happy to say that I have won the fight on one front - my boss and my collegues are now convinced that I am a good human being. And I must admit that all credit goes to my team who made every efforts to make me an invaluable part of the team. They were honest in their feedback and so if I committed anything wrong, I knew about it immediately and they made every effort to ensure that I don't commit the same mistake again. I have learnt and am still learning a lot from my team.
However, I still need to win the fight at the second level - prove that I can do justice to my current role. Somehow, I feel that my performance in my current role has been far below my own expectations. This is partially due to the fact that I have been left to go along alone in my job role and also partially because of resource constraints. However, I would never let external factors divert and influence my career path. So I am leaving no stones unturned to achieve the tasks that I am supposed to complete. And I believe that with the support of my team I will be able to achieve it. I am one of the lucky few to be a part of such a great team and it will definitely go a long way in shaping my future career path.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Cricket Match - My company vs XYZ Country Club
After getting a thappad from one of my dear friends I decided to finally write a post on this blog.
Today we (a team comprising employees from my company) played a cricket match agaisnt one of the cricket clubs (I forgot the club's name) in London (obviously not the county club. We are too good to play against them)
It was a good fun event, though we ended up on the losing side.
The opponents batted first and scored 132 in their 20 overs. My contribution - I bowled 19th over and gave only 2 runs (Don't get an impression that I am a good bowler). I was fielding close to the pitch to save singles, and in my efforts to put extra efforts, I gave away some runs on overthrow.
Chasing a target of 133 runs, I was sent as an opener. I put my pads and gloves on (this is the first time in my life I was playing with pads and gloves on. I am a street side cricketer and it felt good wearing them and going to bat). I lasted only for 4 balls and scored 2 runs. After facing the first two balls, I decided to take off the gloves as they were way too big for me. People warned me that it might be way too dangerous, but I decided to continue to bat without the gloves. I last for only 2 more balls and was clean bowled by the opponent's best bowler.
We managed to score 73 runs and lost the match by 59 runs. After the match, we had a couple of rounds of beer and requested to have another match in near future. Hopefully, I will be better in the next match.
Today we (a team comprising employees from my company) played a cricket match agaisnt one of the cricket clubs (I forgot the club's name) in London (obviously not the county club. We are too good to play against them)
It was a good fun event, though we ended up on the losing side.
The opponents batted first and scored 132 in their 20 overs. My contribution - I bowled 19th over and gave only 2 runs (Don't get an impression that I am a good bowler). I was fielding close to the pitch to save singles, and in my efforts to put extra efforts, I gave away some runs on overthrow.
Chasing a target of 133 runs, I was sent as an opener. I put my pads and gloves on (this is the first time in my life I was playing with pads and gloves on. I am a street side cricketer and it felt good wearing them and going to bat). I lasted only for 4 balls and scored 2 runs. After facing the first two balls, I decided to take off the gloves as they were way too big for me. People warned me that it might be way too dangerous, but I decided to continue to bat without the gloves. I last for only 2 more balls and was clean bowled by the opponent's best bowler.
We managed to score 73 runs and lost the match by 59 runs. After the match, we had a couple of rounds of beer and requested to have another match in near future. Hopefully, I will be better in the next match.
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
My first job - a mix of interesting experiences
I have worked for 3 years across 3 different organizations, each with a different work culture and people. It has been an enriching experience for me and so I thought I should share my experience.
I took my first job immediately after my commerce graduation, while simultaneously pursuing my Chartered Accountancy. I did have CA articleship experience, but the set up was different. We were treated as students rather than employees and so it was a different sort of experience. I would say that my first job was my plunge into the corporate world.
My first job was in a 70 year old service organization that was trying for an image makeover through recruiting young talents.
During the first month in the job, we had to undergo training. During the training, we had senior people coming in to reiterate their committment to young talent and I started feeling that we would an integral part in the company's attempt for image makeover. I used to take training seriously for which my friends used to tease me a lot. I have the bad habit of taking everything very seriously.
So the first month training come to an end and then awards were announced for the best performing trainee. Surprisingly, I was adjudged as the best performing trainee. I was very happy and excited. It strengthened my belief in hardwork and that everywhere - be it an educational institution or a corporate world - hardwork is always rewarded. But my happiness disappeared when the locations and departments were announced for the batch. Being a reasonable performer, I would have expected to be posted in a department that suited well with my skills and capabilities. Instead, I was posted in a small village of Karnataka, where people hardly understood Hindi and English. I was expected to perform a client facing role in a place where most people spoke only Kannada.
My first realization - do not expect that everything would fall in place as we want. We might believe that we deserved something better, but life at different stages keep on throwing challenges for us. Its the way that we handle the challenges which defines our character.
Time had come to take a decision. Should I quit the company and rather focus on my studies? Or should I take the plunge, accept the challenge thrown by life and move ahead. I decided to choose the later.
I worked in that small village in Karnataka for a year. It was a mix of varied experiences. I had a good time trying to learn basic Kannada words so that I communicate to people. As people say in Hindi "Haalat aadmi ko sab kuch sikha deti hain". However, I did feel that the recruitment of young talent was creating a feeling of insecurity among the experienced people in the organization - people who have dedicated 15-20 years of their life working for the organization. This sense of insecurity was always reflected in their behaviour and to sum it, most of them treated us an outsider.
After a year, I decided to switch my role. I believed that my skills were better suited for other roles. To move to a new role, I communicated my intentions to a very senior person in the management. This was in a clear violation to the organizational hierrachy. It did create a lot of anguish among my immediate superiors. I don't think it was a right step to take but I felt that given the top management committment to recruitment of young talent, it was also important for them to understand the ground reality. The toughest part for an old organization is to retain young talent and make them alongside with the people with experience. There is always an internal conflict between the desire of young people to implement changes and the atempt by experienced people to maintain status quo.
My request for a role change was accepted and I was transferred to a new role at a ne location. I was excited about my new role and I believed that my experience in the first role will help me better manage the relationship with experienced people. In my new role, I thoroughly enjoyed my job. I felt that the skill sets needed for the job perfectly suited my abilities. However, I got a chance to have a closer look at another critical aspect of corporate culture - internal politics. I will not delve into greater details, but I learnt that just like in the society, even in corporate world politics plays an important role. There is a contnuous power struggle going on within the organization and the success of the organization depends critically on the way organization handles this power struggle.
I was unable to cope with the power struggle and internal politics within my department and so I decided to call it a day.
My first job which lasted for a period of 18 months was full of rich experiences for me and it helped me gain greater understanding of the corporate culture. I feel that I took a lot of decisions that were uncalled for and succumbed to the corporate culture pressure. But it did enrich me with diverse experience which have helped me in subsequent career decisions. First time, I realized that in any job the people we work with is more important than the role itself.
I took my first job immediately after my commerce graduation, while simultaneously pursuing my Chartered Accountancy. I did have CA articleship experience, but the set up was different. We were treated as students rather than employees and so it was a different sort of experience. I would say that my first job was my plunge into the corporate world.
My first job was in a 70 year old service organization that was trying for an image makeover through recruiting young talents.
During the first month in the job, we had to undergo training. During the training, we had senior people coming in to reiterate their committment to young talent and I started feeling that we would an integral part in the company's attempt for image makeover. I used to take training seriously for which my friends used to tease me a lot. I have the bad habit of taking everything very seriously.
So the first month training come to an end and then awards were announced for the best performing trainee. Surprisingly, I was adjudged as the best performing trainee. I was very happy and excited. It strengthened my belief in hardwork and that everywhere - be it an educational institution or a corporate world - hardwork is always rewarded. But my happiness disappeared when the locations and departments were announced for the batch. Being a reasonable performer, I would have expected to be posted in a department that suited well with my skills and capabilities. Instead, I was posted in a small village of Karnataka, where people hardly understood Hindi and English. I was expected to perform a client facing role in a place where most people spoke only Kannada.
My first realization - do not expect that everything would fall in place as we want. We might believe that we deserved something better, but life at different stages keep on throwing challenges for us. Its the way that we handle the challenges which defines our character.
Time had come to take a decision. Should I quit the company and rather focus on my studies? Or should I take the plunge, accept the challenge thrown by life and move ahead. I decided to choose the later.
I worked in that small village in Karnataka for a year. It was a mix of varied experiences. I had a good time trying to learn basic Kannada words so that I communicate to people. As people say in Hindi "Haalat aadmi ko sab kuch sikha deti hain". However, I did feel that the recruitment of young talent was creating a feeling of insecurity among the experienced people in the organization - people who have dedicated 15-20 years of their life working for the organization. This sense of insecurity was always reflected in their behaviour and to sum it, most of them treated us an outsider.
After a year, I decided to switch my role. I believed that my skills were better suited for other roles. To move to a new role, I communicated my intentions to a very senior person in the management. This was in a clear violation to the organizational hierrachy. It did create a lot of anguish among my immediate superiors. I don't think it was a right step to take but I felt that given the top management committment to recruitment of young talent, it was also important for them to understand the ground reality. The toughest part for an old organization is to retain young talent and make them alongside with the people with experience. There is always an internal conflict between the desire of young people to implement changes and the atempt by experienced people to maintain status quo.
My request for a role change was accepted and I was transferred to a new role at a ne location. I was excited about my new role and I believed that my experience in the first role will help me better manage the relationship with experienced people. In my new role, I thoroughly enjoyed my job. I felt that the skill sets needed for the job perfectly suited my abilities. However, I got a chance to have a closer look at another critical aspect of corporate culture - internal politics. I will not delve into greater details, but I learnt that just like in the society, even in corporate world politics plays an important role. There is a contnuous power struggle going on within the organization and the success of the organization depends critically on the way organization handles this power struggle.
I was unable to cope with the power struggle and internal politics within my department and so I decided to call it a day.
My first job which lasted for a period of 18 months was full of rich experiences for me and it helped me gain greater understanding of the corporate culture. I feel that I took a lot of decisions that were uncalled for and succumbed to the corporate culture pressure. But it did enrich me with diverse experience which have helped me in subsequent career decisions. First time, I realized that in any job the people we work with is more important than the role itself.
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