Random Blog

I can’t think of anything subjective and there are a lot of little events and incidents that i have an opinion about (not all good and not all sayable either). So here goes on whatever is commentable.

Last weekend, my activities would befit the job description of a secret service agent – staying under cover and hot! Unfortunately both were literal given i was bedridden (not exactly) with a temperature that borders on crazy. Thanks to a few caring souls around, I am back on my feet. But the interesting fact that mine was not a one off case and there are atleast a dozen ppl who’ve fallen for this seasonal change kind of makes it a challenge. Let me tell you – misery does not always love company!

Then there’s the Kopda cup. The IIMS take on IPL is much more appealing than the original given the participation and the cheer. The class girls were divided into groups of 3 and they became the team management who with the help of the ‘free’ captain would buy the players for their team. The concept was wonderful, not because it was borrowed, but the enthusiasm it generated. You should have seen our CEO’s and CFO’s running around with laptops before auction and then in the auction second guessing, strategising and running proxy price wars to weaken competition! Phew.

The week before we had a visiting lecturer teach us on sustainability. Wow! The way of teaching, the energy levels and not to forget, the concept itself was so different from what we are used to. Somewhere down the line was born the sense of belonging. It asked of me a lot of questions, and I can’t help think it is yet another way for mankind to drive his selfish needs. A desperate attempt to cling on to his un mending ways. In addition the teaching just went on to prove that anyone who is so passionate about the subject can bring out the best from the participants. We need more such Indian faculty.

The regular term began this week and seriously Its like antennas class all over again. I can’t think of the last time i had to prepare before going to a class and even that seems to help little. My gchat status msgs have already exhibited my most relevant questions i’ve come across like how can you take a subject seriously which is abbreviated as BS? (I might fall in love with this subject if i get to study) If macro study is an extrapolation of micro study, then can u study the textile industry by studying micro mini skirts?

Other than that, been suiting up to pose for pics which seem to come out comical than professional. Though kind of liking the suited up feeling especially without a tie and a jeans pant below. Too bad style ain’t an option :P Spoke to an couple of normal people (not in B-school yet) and realized the ‘opportunity cost’ was not a big deal given its still bright and happy :)

As i cough like Devdas with a spoilt larynx i sense, not all good opinions are appreciated nor are all bad opinions unwelcome. But I still am in no mood to entertain people’s wrath. Let me get back to the Price Elasticity of demand that i need to prepare for tomo. Oh wait, today. Damn the biological clock!

Crisis finally!

Crisis is in everyone’s dictionary these days and each in a totally different meaning! A lot of people know i’ve been talking about writing on Crisis ever since i read the Andromeda strain by which i mean i’m going to copy paste the excerpt and take credit for bringing it to notice :D As a severe case of Baddder Meinhoff syndrome (google it), ever since i came to IIM Shillong, everywhere I hear someone or the other using the word.

Dean – “Crisis is the mother of innovation” (Catch phrase here)
Visiting faculty – “Our resources drain is gonna lead to a huge crisis soon”
Senior - “You’ll hear a lot about this @$#%^ Crisis a lot”
Overheard – “Shit,Personal Crisis time! I’ve run out of clean ‘things’ to wear” :P

But on a more serious note I suggest you read the following excerpt and appreciate the relevance to anything and everything u see around.

According to Lewis Bornheim, a crisis is a situation in which a previously tolerable set of circumstances is suddenly, by the addition of another factor, rendered wholly intolerable. Whether the additional factor is political, economic, or scientific hardly matters: the death of a national hero, the instability of prices, or a technological discovery can all set events in motion.

The noted scholar Alfred Pockrun, in his study of crises (Culture, Crisis and Change), has made several interesting points. First, he observes that every crisis has its beginnings long before the actual onset. Thus Einstein published his theories of relativity in 1905-15, forty years before his work culminated in the end of a war, the start of an age, and the beginnings of a crisis.

Similarly, in the early twentieth century, American, German, and Russian scientists
were all interested in space travel, but only the Germans recognized the military potential of rockets. And after the war, when the German rocket installation at Peenernfinde was cannibalized by the Soviets and Americans, it was only the Russians who made immediate, vigorous moves toward developing space capabilities. The Americans were content to tinker playfully with rockets and ten years later, this resulted in an American scientific crisis involving Sputnik, American education, the ICBM, and the missile gap.

Pockran also observes that a crisis is compounded of individuals and personalities,
which are unique:
“It is as difficult to imagine Alexander at the Rubicon, and Eisenhower at Waterloo, as it is difficult to imagine Darwin writing to Roosevelt about the potential for an atomic bomb. A crisis is made by men, who enter into the crisis with their own prejudices,propensities, and predispositions. A crisis is the sum of intuition and blind spots, a blend of facts noted and facts ignored.
Yet underlying the uniqueness of each crisis is a disturbing sameness. A characteristic of all crises is their predictability, in retrospect. They seem to have a certain inevitability,they seem predestined. This is not true of all crises, but it is true of sufficiently many tomake the most hardened historian cynical and misanthropic.”

MC
The Andromeda Strain

Beautifully put. Our actions without thought, bear the burden of sowing the seeds for things you do not anticipate. Yes, Man is intelligent enough to come out of it, be it the current global meltdown or the energy crisis. But aren’t we always thinking in retrospect? True, one cannot predict whats going to happen, but you can adjudge what your present action might lead to. The entire concept of causality is not a retrospective study.

I’m not sure, if this is true of every person, but whenever i try to do an impact analysis (a term from office), i end up over-thinking. There was a brief coverage on Game theory for decision making, but what we don’t realize is how do you account for variable change when there is a sense of foreboding and inevitability! (see movie 21 :) )

I sensed i’m going too technical (or just terms dropping), but something we need to think about before we term the situation as crisis. Problem, scenario, difficulty, hurdle are more apt words than a crisis for most of our day to day life. But our decisions taken to handle the scenarios are to be rational and with a bit of forethought.

As i typed this, i kind of remembered that our batch music band is also called Crisis! They were awesome in the cult comm fest yesterday, and i need to make a special mention of the pianist and singer, a certain Rukma Jayaram (here). She’s got 3/4th of the batch having the gchat status messages praising her voice and more so in awe after reading this article. The humbleness of someone like her and the fact that she’s one among a very promising set of future managers, makes me really proud to be part of this batch :)

From Byes that weren’t extras to Skip distance strategy

When you have a screwed up pun in the title, the chances are you are on a roll! Being on a roll is a bad news if you are a chicken I guess (buwahaha).

I half expected to see myself getting the business focus, the professionalism and a small amount of cut down on my PJs since I’m now a part of the IM Shillong family. What i didn’t take into account was the fact that I’m back to a college and hostel life! :D

When I quit my job and moved from Bangalore, amidst sad faces (who were secretly exchanging hi-fives whenever my back was turned) there were 3 things that I realized.

a) I’m going to be missing a few people whom I’m really glad I met and Sincerely hope to be in touch with for the rest of my life (a very tough promise)

b) Now that i won’t have a pay-check, I’m actually dependent again and can’t spend big!

c) You cannot carry 5 bags of luggage on your own and cross the railway over-bridge without looking stupid

The week I spent in Chennai after that I kind of realized being literally jobless, I was working more than i ever did in office! Of course a whole lot of running around in the hot sun, eating home food and pampering my dog left me with one day to pack all my stuff for probably a really long stay away from home. (2 years in Bangalore or 4 years in VIT, i ended up coming home atleast once a month). So while all the batch mates I met at the airport were paying extra luggage I was the only one who had less than the limit allowed!! Kind of explained the borrowing I’ve been doing here in the name of "inclusive development" :)

Shillong – Love at first sight! Though it took my maiden flight, bad airline sandwich, a 3.5 hour drive that was dangerously probing the anti gravity attributes of the bad sandwich, the thing that remains in memory of the 1^st of July was my “Shit! This place is Awesome!!” Lush greenery everywhere, warm people, beautiful landscapes, cool weather (I’ve been wearing a jerkin all the while) and above all the excitement at pursuing my dream! I’m gonna be writing a lot more on this place in the next 2 years. ( i left out - the chance to flaunt my hindi :D)

The rigour of work interlaced with ice breaker sessions topped off with awesome partying last -weekend. I got back into the groove of exam-eve-night at VIT (here an everyday affair), long useless conversations (never lost touch) and terms dropping (now all management terms like sustainability and crises) totally out of context (all this before the term even began). Just took a break and came after an hour of absolutely crappy conversation (taking cases and my own case taken) laughing my ass off . Aah, college :D A lot of time to talk about it.

An electronics engineer might know what a skip distance might mean. It is more so relevant in a class room where there’s a terrible generalization that first benchers are sincere ;) On one day when i sat there, a blog entry got written on a fellow students page on how first benchers are sincerely taking notes. Those drawings in the margin and the philo flowing plus the sleep u can manage without getting caught aren’t something that is apparent. Doesn’t hurt in this concept called class participation either :D

I hope to be a bit more regular in this new avatar of dumping business jargons to trivial issues to take off the steam of serious assignments :D Next, i hope to write on crises, long pending after Crichton’s Andromeda Strain :) Adios till then.

Sincerely

Now, not that I had written my earlier blogs under the veils of deceit, scheming for world domination, but I thought this one should be straight from the heart with no bad puns or extremely clever word usage (cough).

I got admission into the Indian Institute of Management Shillong for the batch of 2009-2011. I can’t say how glad I’m.

There are a few people I need to acknowledge. Doing it in person seemed a bit awkward and invariably ended in grins/laughs. This is no particular order.

My TL, Amar, who has been extremely supportive right from the start. Being my mentor, he genuinely seems to takes pride in my achievements and I couldn’t have asked for a better person to guide me in this corporate world. He gave a glowing referral for my IIM B and also very valuable inputs all thru my 2.5 years at Honeywell for my all round growth and development.

Pokey, who has been extremely frank in his opinions and that’s probably the kind of person you need as your friend. Not the one to just agree with whatever u say, this is the kind of guy who gives honest opinion and not so sweetened Judgments that might at times be a bitter pill to swallow. I’m still working on a couple of his inputs and he’s off to IIM Lucknow.

Ninja, who probably should have been dead had I ever managed to catch him in college. The last one year of my CAT prep couldn’t have happened with the same vigor had it not been for him. Every test and every mock I took, I had someone to set targets with, someone to keep me pushing for more. Unlucky to have missed out this year, but mach, greatness shall be yours.

My roomies, Sheela and Sriram have been one major factor. I mean when the last thing you see before u sleep and the first thing u see when u wake up is your roomies preparing, keeps you pushing. For their hard work, I’m sure this year is gonna pay off big dividends. Vikrant, who is now in US for his MS, also was instrumental in convincing me to quit contemplating and start preparing for this CAT.

Joe, whose corporate wisdom and truckloads of sense, have guided me thru times when my confidence levels were down. She doesn’t sugar coat inputs, but probably the best person to help you out if you ever need. Between driving her crazy and finding innovative ways to get on her nerves, I can never say a sincere thanks without her interrupting with “Thappad khaana hai? Koi kaam nahi hai? :D “

Poornima, arguably the best thing to happen to me post college. Between monosyllable replies and long monologues, she is one person headed for greatness in anything she chooses to pursue. Getting her to pursue anything is a tough ask, so she lets a lot of things pursue her ;) [Sorry, I couldn’t resist]

And again a lot of well wishers, Sk, Rini, Shabu,Paddu to name a few.

By God, I know I can’t thank anyone more than my family for their support. But thanks is just too lame.

I’ve been lucky. In a lot of ways. A lot of people have told me this. The kind of ppl i've come across, the way things have worked out. Despite this, I don’t have to justify to anyone I wanted this so sincerely.

God bless us all. Looking forward to an awesome 2 years :)

PS: This is the first time I’m mentioning names in my blog. Mostly cos I’ve never had a lot of good things to say about ppl and saying the crazy stuff with names might have put my life at risk ;)

@ the rate of Thought

Calvin: Sometimes when I’m talking my words can’t keep pace with my thought. I wonder why we think faster than we can speak!
Hobbes: Probably so we can think twice.

A Bill Waterson gem! :)

Not so much the philosophy, but at least the first part is intriguing. This is a situation almost everybody find themselves in. A minute of silence is all is needed to have thousand conversations with self. Most of which is crazy I must say. I tried to capture my line of thinking and found them pretty crazy.

Situ 1: Attended a marriage of a friend. Not many mutual friends, so..

God, I hate weddings..They should ban weddings.. Why would so many ppl sit around looking at each other.. I wonder what they are all thinking.. Hmmm, that box looks big, wonder whats in it.. What if they open to find the box empty.. grin.. must try it out once in some party.. Hey where have I seen that girl!.. can’t be company, not so many pretty girls.. of course there is [beep] but again too few.. I haven’t seen [beep] in some time now.. aah..[beep] .. real pretty.. wait, this girl, where have I seen.. must be one of those dejavu moments.. dejavu.. he he.. dejavu dejavu.. scrubs.. I hope the food is good.. heard gujju food is generally good.. what was that dish – Kadhi? Hope they give that.. It was delicious.. Hey where did that pretty girl go!!

All this while waiting in line to go wish the couple :)

Situ 2: Riding the bike after some heavy philosophical discussion on future

I wonder how it would turn out.. I wonder what future holds for me.. interesting image, a blind beggar with a board around his neck that reads future.. holds out to everyone the bowl for charity, but ppl are just too busy to notice! Wow.. what a philo.. hey, wait! Isn’t phile means love? So whats the root word of philosophy? Wonder if it’s the same phile. whats sophy.. definitely not that MTV female.. yew, irritating! Sophie loving ppl need to be termed classphobes or something.. ah, future - everything happens for a reason.. mostly good.. what all have reinstated my beleief? Why go so long ago, today morning coffee was delayed thanks to %^&%. But see what happened! Bumped into [beep].. aah..[beep] .. grin.. this should irritate someone.. he he.. wonder why I love irritating a few select ppl..

A 2 min drive from shop to office.

Situ 3: Weekly tracking meeting

What a boring meeting.. I hope they don’t ask me anything.. I hate explaining what I did.. I should have been an executioner! Very easy to explain the job.. wonder if executioners are given monthly targets.. damn, I’d hate to be around an executioner just before his appraisal discussion.. why is everyone laughing? God, I missed the joke.. who cares, just laugh.. I wonder if just nodding at the right times is sufficient.. no, too risky.. the direction of nod could commit you to something you don’t want.. hey look, a bunch of network cables.. Looks like they plan to use multiple laptops at a same time.. hey wait, if I could hold them together and take a photo I can email it saying “A communication engineer’s valentine gift”.. he he.. wait for the meeting to end to take the photo.. will come in handy later.. I must wipe that grin off my face.. focus.. Is someone calling my name?
“Ya, I was just trying to recollect the Par classification..”

nice save! must stop watching Scrubs!!

Situ 4: One of the most crucial 15 mins where I was required to think

…



[Sigh]