BRAToSPHERE

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  • Time flies..

    It just feels like yesterday when I was in Bangalore, sipping my hot Café Latte in my favourite café in the world. That was New Year ’s Eve. And here we are, with one month of the year already complete.

    Have we suddenly shifted to some other galaxy? Has time started moving fast? The time here seems to be moving really fast and it always feels like a race against time on a daily basis, at every moment.

    Is there something called a leisurely life? At this age, I am afraid, but I believe the answer is No. I remember reading this a long time back –

    When you are young, you have energy and Time, but no Money.

    In adulthood, you have money and energy, but no time

    In old Age, time and Money are in plentiful (hopefully J ), but no energy.

    Such is life. There are always so many things that can be done, but just not enough time to accomplish them all. What does one do then? Just accept that there is never going to be enough time and go on with life?

    A life filled with regret that everything we wish is not getting done? An incomplete life yearning for more all the time?

    Maybe.

    Or maybe not. Maybe we could do with some prioritization and chuck the lesser important things out of our lives. Scheduling and being disciplined helps.

    Like we allocate money for various spends, I believe our TIME is more expensive and we should start rationing how we spend our time. Money once spent can be earned back, but well you ain’t getting any younger!

    One other major discipline to be inculcated is the art of saying NO. No to things, activities, no to people. Like someone had said, it is equally important to know what NOT to do, than what needs to be done.

    I am not suggesting that we all become machines and chuck leisure out of our lives. I totally believe it is important to let loose and chill sometimes, but it is equally important that we chalk out what really helps us wind and commit time accordingly rather than binge watch TV all weekend and then feel guilty of it on Sunday evening.

    Time is the biggest lever we all have in more or less equal proportions and it is up to us what we make of it.

    “Time and Tide wait for none!”

    So, here it is to a productive 2016. Er! The remaining eleven months of 2016 I mean!

  • Happy New Year 2016

    One more year done, and the other is here. Thinking about it, 17 days, or about 5 percent, of 2016 is already complete!

    Every year brings with it a hope. A hope of it being new (no wonder it is called a new year). A promise of brining in new experiences and some wonderful moments. No wonder again, New Year resolutions are so prominent across the world. Probably, New Year resolutions is the only ritual present across the world, amongst all the different countries, cultures and religions.

    If New Year is so sacred, I have always wondered why people drown themselves in liquor to bring the year. Are the party revelers so scared of the New Year, that they prefer ringing it in an intoxicated frame of mind?

    I am not judging here (in fact, I was one of those many drowning bottle over bottle, just a couple of years back), and neither am I passing any moral diktats of what is right and what is wrong? I am just perplexed at this behavior and trying to imagine the reason for this behavior.

    Is it the work of some marketing genius from some alcohol company? Maybe yes. In promoting this culture, but this ritual has been ages old. If I am not mistaken, there are stories of ancient land, where celebrations (including ringing in New Year’s Eve) is froth with a lot of liquid. Sparkling green liquid of intoxication.

    I am probably just over intellectualizing it. This probably is just one more day (rather holiday) for the party revelers to party. Just another occasion to throat down a peg too many. And, as long it is harmless, a drink or two never harmed anyone. Did it? (Notwithstanding the fact, that the UK authorities have recently declared that even a single drink a day is harmful and could be eventually carcinogenic). Again, should be left to the individual to decide, in legal standings.

    A small google search throws many more strange ways of celebrating the New Year’s Eve. Like in Estonia, People eat seven times on the New Year’s Day to ensure abundance in the next year. This is besides the fact, that there are many people I know of who do this on everyday basis. Probably to ensure abundance on a daily basis!

    For more such acts of strangeness, please be directed here.

    A very very Happy New year 2016. May this year be filled with joy, health and Abundance!

    Smirk!

  • Design to Grow – Book Review

    With Coca-Cola in the title of the book itself, this book got into my must read section. That the book is on the design process within the company and outside raised my curiosity and I immediately started reading this book on my pad.

    The world is no more as we knew it, so would say the old timers. For a 125 year old company like Coca-Cola many things have changed and evolved, except maybe for one thing – the uniquely great taste of Coca-Cola. Not many people know the complexity behind the powerfully innocent fizzy drink. There is obviously more to the world’s largest beverage company than the fizzy drink that bears its name.

    The book is not about design, as the conventional design that we know of. It details the concept that design thinking is not for the specialists alone! It is something that can, and should, be applied by anyone in the organization to get through almost any challenge. It is not a cosmetic change applied, but a methodology of integrating different disparage items into a well-oiled orchestra, to produce a symphony. Design is about bringing in cohesiveness amidst the entire chaos.

    The book is filled with anecdotes of how little changes done at the elementary background level made huge impact. Among many examples, my favourite is the one on “Design Machine”. As a regular user of the tool, it intrigues me that why could someone not think of this earlier. As a matter of fact, it is still not implemented at most of the major MNC’s I know of. Such simplicity with such wide scale system wide impact, removing layers of redundancy and saving on costs, bringing in agility in the execution.

    Agility. A key trait of a startup and a desired quality by every organization worth its salt. The author suggests planning backward for agility. Instead of the normal process of planning and then measuring its results, start with results and then form your plans around it.

    The design with purpose process can create real substantial value only when scale and agility are combined, and this achieved with the power of Design.

    A good book for anyone interested to know the workings of a company and a must read for startups.

  • Flight to Catch

    I just spoke about  Business travel and here I have an episode to narrate of just missing a potential stranded situation.

    After many days, and many a cancellations, I was bound to travel to a southern city earlier this week. The plan was simple. I fly out through a Jettly charter in the evening, spend the night in a hotel and return the next evening after completing my business in the city. A short sweet business trip, like the countless many I have had.

    This trip seemed to have been jinxed right from the word go!

    The trip planning begins about a month back. I was to visit three cities in a span of 10 days, and i book my tickets for some time in mid-November after confirmation to the stakeholders and aligning everyone. For once, I had made all the bookings well in advance.

    I had scheduled an action packed week.

    Alas! Like most of the planning, this was not to be and the trip had to be postponed due to some circumstances. All three trips had to be cancelled. While cancellation I was made to realize by the travel agent that the flight tickets to this south Indian city are not refundable and I could rather reschedule the trip for no penalty. Nice! I would hate wasting the company resources, and once again after aligning the requisite stakeholders I reschedule my trip to the first week of December.

    I again start planning.

    One night before the travel day, I happened to meet a friend who was visiting from the same South Indian city. We had dinner together and caught up with each other’s lives and work. It was a wonderful evening and the background thought all the time was – I am to visit his city the next day. What a coincidence!

    On the day of travel, I pack my bags in the morning ensuring I have all the essentials to cover myself from both the sultry hot south Indian weather and winter wearing for my return to Delhi back, the next night. I was all prepared.

    I had booked a cab for myself a good two and a half hours before the take-off time. The last meeting gets extended and give an internal signal to myself. Half an hour more and I leave, even if the meeting is not done. Two hours before the take-off time is good to reach the airport and complete all the check-in formalities.
    The meeting is done right in time, and I pack my laptop and head off to the airport. Here I get a mail from my colleague announcing that the business in the city has been postponed and I could cancel my ticket. What? Not again! I decide to go on and finish the other part of the business and push for this first meeting to be scheduled the next day. I sure could postpone my trip by a day. I so did not want to postpone this already delayed trip. The traffic on the way to the airport is bad even during this time of the day. Pity people who ply on this road everyday especially during the peak hours, I think to myself.

    The phone rings, and a quick chat later I realize the reason for the postponing of my scheduled meeting. I was now unnerved. Is it really that bad? I call up my colleague and check the situation. She gives no hope! I am still on the way to the airport.

    Now, with potentially all my meetings getting cancelled there is no reason I need to go to Chennai. But would I get a refund on my air tickets and the hotel? I have already web checked in to my flight. But what do I do after getting there? Battling these thoughts in my mind, i am suddenly shaken by the jerk of the car. He has taken the turn to the airport. I have less than 5 minutes to be deciding.

    I call up the hotel and check if I could cancel my booking. I would not want to waste so much money – flight and the hotel! After a brief wait, they confirm that the room would be cancelled without any penalty. Awesome! I ask them to hold on.

    Now it is the flight cancellation. I call up the travel agent incessantly but to no avail. What do I do?

    The cab enters the departure terminal at the airport and halts. The driver looks at me, and in a moment I signal him to go on. He looks at me in a confused manner and I speak, “Wapas office le chaliye” (take me back to office). He is still confused and gives me a puzzled look. He turns to look in the front and drives out of the terminal.

    The travel agent is still not reachable. The decision has been made. I tell the reason to the driver on why we are returning. He now seems convinced. I make calls and announce my return. Still not sure if I have made the right decision. Should I have carried on and pushed my way through the meetings? Maybe. Or maybe not! It probably would not have been worth it. Nevertheless, no point thinking now. The decision has been made.

    I return back to office and walk to my Manager’s cabin – “I returned back from the airport”, I exclaim, telling him my reasons.

    I then head straight to the travel desk.

    “Where are you guys?”

    “Why are you not answering my calls?”

    The guys give me a puzzled look.

    “Can you please off board me and cancel my flight ticket to Chennai?”

    The next day morning I get a news alert on my iphone – “Chennai Airport shut for the day due to rains”.

    Pictures start flowing all day of the inundated city with water logging everywhere. The news alert in the evening – “Chennai airport to remain shut till Sunday”.

    #PrayforChennai

  • Marissa Mayer.. – Book Review

    Marissa Mayer – the charismatic CEO of Yahoo. The once upon a time star of Google, and now a stylish CEO of a faltering company. This is how most people know her. (Other than the fact that she has a penchant for delivering babies without taking a break from work!)

    Yahoo – the once gateway to the web, and now a non-descript provider of weather data to iPhones. This is how most people know the company.

    Mix them both (Are they unseparable?) and you have an interesting concoction of a story. Full of Drama and Action.

    This book is not Marissa’s biography. It is more a chronicle of Yahoo, covering Yahoo’s history and the succession of management there from its beginning, which is both fascinating and intriguing. This leads us to the question – Why does Yahoo exist anymore? And what purpose does it serve?

    More importantly, this book throws a dim light on the situations that got Yahoo in the position that it is in presently.

    The author takes the reader through Marissa’s personal background (right from her child prodigy days to her dating Larry Page), her beginning days at Yahoo where employees pinned up posters of her face with the word “HOPE” to the end of that honeymoon period and the beginning of her real struggle to keep Yahoo alive after Alibaba’s IPO (the Asian investments). It is all covered.

    This book also throws interesting insights on Marissa’s working style and the various policies that she has brought in an effort to build a culture of innovation at Yahoo. She did try.

    I did not find this book flattering towards Marissa, nor was it biased against her. It did seem like a balanced view of her and the company. So much, that the book feels like a bunch of business articles joined together to tell a story.

    Nevertheless, anyone with a slight interest in the working of these internet companies and the background of the rise of the silicon tech behemoths should read this book. It has quite many interesting snippets and is an overall easy read.

    Psst. Did you know, yahoo let go of an opportunity to buy Google in its initial days?