Disasters, mostly man made appears to have clouded Hyderabad since the last few months. I have been living in Hyderabad since 1983, more than 24 years but I have never seen such incidents happening in such a short interval.
Many people comment that these kind of incidents are very rare in TDP regime and more common during congress regime. Most people seem to agree on this part but I don't have any statistics to conduct a t-test and see if this claim is statistically significant or not. On the other hand congress man claim that these things are not related to the regime and no one could have avoided them. Is this claim true? This claim definitely appears not to be true. What happened yesterday could have been easily avoided.
I had worked in a manufacturing form that used lot of flammable raw material. I have even done some work for a gas bottling plant too. At both these places safety is given highest proiority and despite that accidents do happen but the human casualty part is very very low. I had seen few accidents and in all these incidents human casualties are zero when sufficient awareness and supervision was employed to ensure safety was done. But in cases where safety practices were namesake and were done just for compliance there definitely were casualties. This clearly indicates a linkage between the attitude and results.
One thing is very clear, congress party and slack come together. Even during the last regime of congress there were so many unwanted incidents.
Another aspect that needs examination is the unpreparedness of the administrative machinery to address such incidents and their inability to handle media properly. Throughout the night news channels were claiming that there were more than 20 dead but after removing all the collapsed parts it was realized that there were only two who died. Media feeds on sensalisation and tries to push news in a way that allows them to gain maximum mileage. Almost all the channels now claim that they are fighting against corruption and keep uncovering incidents. On one hand this appears to be something good for people but on the other hand there is no attempt from media to do any root cause analysis. Why should they do it? They have no incentive to do that.
It is important that media be held responsible for their less responsible broadcasts and be fined for spreading rumors. There was another incident of firing yesterday. This happened at the residence of a congress leader's son. The person who got shot died at Apollo. Media for the want of sensation interview the deceased spoused and tried to put words in her mouth and then after that started repeatedly broadcasting the exact sentence that they would have wanted her to say.
It is important that media acts responsibly and play a neutral party and shouldn't take sides. In fact the politician is the PCC chief but still media shouldn't try to combine two uncorrelated events and blame one source for it. Any father in that situation would try to defend his son at the first instance and then later as a matured guy would state that law should take its own course. When we watch a movie, we would be more than ready to support a hero who murders the villain and expect that he gets released quickly so that he can get married to the heroine and when the villain is caught we almost always want him to be hanged. But in life one never knows who is the hero and who is the villain and sometimes a onetime hero would turn into a current villain. Move is only for two/three hours but life is forever.
Let me conclude this post by saying that one of the most important steps government must take is regulating who can be appointed as a reporter. Looks or voice should not be the deciding criteria but more important factors like maturity, sensibility, thorough knowledge about the domain and even law should be considered. Some kind of neutral certification is necessary if media has to be managed without clipping their wings or restricting their freedom of expression.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Friday, September 7, 2007
Flood of events @ ISB
Though we are only a week into Term 4, the placement fever is slowly catching up. September also appears to be the month of action. Everything seems to be happening in Spetember - ELP meetings, conferences, workshops, some international pre-placement talks, admission guidance requests, resume workshops, Independent studies, B-school competitions and what not.
At ISB the work intensity also goes northward. They prepare you for all this right from the preterms. By now most of the students have figured out if they are a grades person or an extra-curricular person. There are few who already have the requisite spikes and don't bother others.
It is very easy to deal with the grades guy. They approach you either when marks are uploaded on blackborad or when grades are uploaded on atrium. Otherwise they are busy in doing CP or assignments or reading books.
The more difficult to deal with crowd is the extra-curricular type. These guys have so many ideas and have so much of energy except that they have given up on grades. These are the ones who regularly keep saying that grades don't matter. They pursue a wide variety of activities and keep sending you calendar invites.
One thing I can definitely say is that at ISB you will get much more than what you pay for every second you spend here.
At ISB the work intensity also goes northward. They prepare you for all this right from the preterms. By now most of the students have figured out if they are a grades person or an extra-curricular person. There are few who already have the requisite spikes and don't bother others.
It is very easy to deal with the grades guy. They approach you either when marks are uploaded on blackborad or when grades are uploaded on atrium. Otherwise they are busy in doing CP or assignments or reading books.
The more difficult to deal with crowd is the extra-curricular type. These guys have so many ideas and have so much of energy except that they have given up on grades. These are the ones who regularly keep saying that grades don't matter. They pursue a wide variety of activities and keep sending you calendar invites.
One thing I can definitely say is that at ISB you will get much more than what you pay for every second you spend here.
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Term 4 begins
Finally Term 4 begins. For the first time we have a subject on OB and most of the Engineers feel it is faff and keep displaying their disinterest quite openly. Some of them don't realize the importance of this particular area in Business.
But according to me, this is one of the most important subjects. As we move more and more towards a service economy, managing Human Resources becomes more and more important and a good understanding of OB becomes more and more critical for a good manager.
We have another very complex course - Government, Society and Business, which is a combination of Micro and Macro Economics.
ELP, which appeared to be no-so-attractive at the beginning, has caught the fancy of many students and there is sudden spurt of mails seeking team members.
People have started winning B-school competitions. From the mails that I could locate, ISB teams have won the following competitions:
1. IMI HR and Fin paper presentation,
2. XIMB's Ashwamedh paper presentation
3. SPJMR's case analysis
There are multiple teams planning to participate in the Innovation Challenge. I'm sure we will see many more such winning teams from ISB.
But according to me, this is one of the most important subjects. As we move more and more towards a service economy, managing Human Resources becomes more and more important and a good understanding of OB becomes more and more critical for a good manager.
We have another very complex course - Government, Society and Business, which is a combination of Micro and Macro Economics.
ELP, which appeared to be no-so-attractive at the beginning, has caught the fancy of many students and there is sudden spurt of mails seeking team members.
People have started winning B-school competitions. From the mails that I could locate, ISB teams have won the following competitions:
1. IMI HR and Fin paper presentation,
2. XIMB's Ashwamedh paper presentation
3. SPJMR's case analysis
There are multiple teams planning to participate in the Innovation Challenge. I'm sure we will see many more such winning teams from ISB.
Monday, September 3, 2007
Why did I meet Mr. Naidu?
Mr. Chandrababu Naidu has lot of firsts to his credit. He was the first Chief Minister who tried to run government and bureaucrats with a business like focus. He was the first to hire strategic consultants to advise him. He was the first to adopt IT in a big way, not only providing land to IT companies but expanding IT based services in the government domain.
In the last three years, though the congress government was busy in figuring out which of their promises have to be fulfilled and which ones to be sidelined, development continued to happen as lot of things that were in pipeline during Naidu's term started producing results. This is not to takeaway anything from the current CM. In fact he should greatly appreciated for putting away his anti-IT stand that he displayed during the first few months.
Coming to the actual subject of this post, my objective in meeting Mr. Naidu is multifold.
First, it is due to his efforts that I'm at a place like ISB. Otherwise I would have not been able to think of anything like this. I wanted to tell him that what he did made a difference to lots of people and may be by doing that motivate him to do more.
Second, I have always wanted to do something that would benefit everyone around. There is nothing unique about this as I believe that everyone who is doing well and is happy would like to do that. But many times I wondered what is that I could do at this minute and this led me to the thought of meeting Mr. Naidu. I thought my circle of influence is small, I can influence only those who know me or those whom I know and the impact of this certainly small. But a person like Mr. Naidu can impact society in a big big way. So I thought if I can plant a seed in his mind, may be if it can impact such person, even in a very very minute way, it can produce big big results. By doing such thing I thought I can benefit many more like me. I know for sure that Mr. Naidu knows about all this but I thought I will do my part. You never know what a small event can trigger.
Lastly, till now I have been immersed in the business world and never thought about other aspects of life. But after I met Mr. Parakala Prabhar, a Phd in Economics from LSB, at Sierra, when he gave a talk to Sierra Leaders, I realized that there are many more dimensions that I have not been exposed. The first three terms have definitely affected my thought process and I said if I believe in something I must do it.
There was no specific personal agenda or anything related to ISB, though I urged Mr. Naidu to visit ISB and interact with the student body.
Finally I would like to highlight that if intentions are good, once will get support from different source and things would fall into place automatically. There seems to be an order to all the random events, after all.
In the last three years, though the congress government was busy in figuring out which of their promises have to be fulfilled and which ones to be sidelined, development continued to happen as lot of things that were in pipeline during Naidu's term started producing results. This is not to takeaway anything from the current CM. In fact he should greatly appreciated for putting away his anti-IT stand that he displayed during the first few months.
Coming to the actual subject of this post, my objective in meeting Mr. Naidu is multifold.
First, it is due to his efforts that I'm at a place like ISB. Otherwise I would have not been able to think of anything like this. I wanted to tell him that what he did made a difference to lots of people and may be by doing that motivate him to do more.
Second, I have always wanted to do something that would benefit everyone around. There is nothing unique about this as I believe that everyone who is doing well and is happy would like to do that. But many times I wondered what is that I could do at this minute and this led me to the thought of meeting Mr. Naidu. I thought my circle of influence is small, I can influence only those who know me or those whom I know and the impact of this certainly small. But a person like Mr. Naidu can impact society in a big big way. So I thought if I can plant a seed in his mind, may be if it can impact such person, even in a very very minute way, it can produce big big results. By doing such thing I thought I can benefit many more like me. I know for sure that Mr. Naidu knows about all this but I thought I will do my part. You never know what a small event can trigger.
Lastly, till now I have been immersed in the business world and never thought about other aspects of life. But after I met Mr. Parakala Prabhar, a Phd in Economics from LSB, at Sierra, when he gave a talk to Sierra Leaders, I realized that there are many more dimensions that I have not been exposed. The first three terms have definitely affected my thought process and I said if I believe in something I must do it.
There was no specific personal agenda or anything related to ISB, though I urged Mr. Naidu to visit ISB and interact with the student body.
Finally I would like to highlight that if intentions are good, once will get support from different source and things would fall into place automatically. There seems to be an order to all the random events, after all.
Saturday, September 1, 2007
Some funda
I have come across Jim Collins - Good to Great way back in 2003. Since then I had been looking for indicators to identify great organizations.
As a training consultant I had an excellent opportunity to visit more than 100 diverse organizations located in different cities of India. During this time I compared and contrasted different companies and tried to see if there are significant differences.
One clear cut differentiator was - people. At great companies, people were sincere, committed, confident and had a sense of urgency. But there is definitely a causal ambiguity. Did people with above characteristics make the firm great or the firm made the people confident. I tried to relate it to my own experience.
I realized that there were times when I behaved like an average demotivated employee and times when I was radiating confidence and could make significant contributions. When I look back I realized that it was the firm that existed before I entered made an impact on me and my behavior after I joined the firm impacted others.
There are always bright people and then there are always difficult times. Bright people who are not interested in the big picture get quickly demotivated if things are not happening for them. But then 1 in 1000 there would be bright visionary and he is the one who can trigger a reversal in the atmosphere.
I have just finished reading a Mckinsey article titled - The link between profits and organizational performance, and the article also highlights simlar findings. One clear reinforcement this article helped make is that, the firm is a bigger stakeholder and needs to take proactive action.
But in reality I have observed that Managers including HR Managers expect that the employee should take initiative and try to make a contribution. I always argued that the organization should make a stronger effort and should have clear processes to get an employee in to a high performance mode.
I truly believe that every Manager should take responsibility not only to recruit good people but also to see that they move into the high performance mode quickly
As a training consultant I had an excellent opportunity to visit more than 100 diverse organizations located in different cities of India. During this time I compared and contrasted different companies and tried to see if there are significant differences.
One clear cut differentiator was - people. At great companies, people were sincere, committed, confident and had a sense of urgency. But there is definitely a causal ambiguity. Did people with above characteristics make the firm great or the firm made the people confident. I tried to relate it to my own experience.
I realized that there were times when I behaved like an average demotivated employee and times when I was radiating confidence and could make significant contributions. When I look back I realized that it was the firm that existed before I entered made an impact on me and my behavior after I joined the firm impacted others.
There are always bright people and then there are always difficult times. Bright people who are not interested in the big picture get quickly demotivated if things are not happening for them. But then 1 in 1000 there would be bright visionary and he is the one who can trigger a reversal in the atmosphere.
I have just finished reading a Mckinsey article titled - The link between profits and organizational performance, and the article also highlights simlar findings. One clear reinforcement this article helped make is that, the firm is a bigger stakeholder and needs to take proactive action.
But in reality I have observed that Managers including HR Managers expect that the employee should take initiative and try to make a contribution. I always argued that the organization should make a stronger effort and should have clear processes to get an employee in to a high performance mode.
I truly believe that every Manager should take responsibility not only to recruit good people but also to see that they move into the high performance mode quickly
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