THE RAT RACE

No More Posts ON THIS BLOG

2007-10-02T11:59:00.001+05:30

No More Posts ON THIS BLOG.

I have stopped posting here.. From now on all my posts will be at one site only at http://indiathroughmyphotoblog.blogspot.com/

I think that will save my time and also yours if you are reading my blogs...

Moreover I have started thinking..why share my thoughts with the world? My thoughts should be mine only... let me spend more time offline.. there is so much to do before I die... LOL

Organisational Terrorism

2007-03-03T14:09:00.000+05:30

That day I was hearing a FM jockey say that explosions happen, people die and yet nothing changes. No steps are taken to prevent such recurrences. After the Mumbai Train Explosions RPF strength was found to be miserably low and so it was decided to be strengthened with additional manpower and it was expected that it would be done on top priority. But nothing happened and then Samjhauta Explosion happened. So people of India must learn to get habituated with all such explosions and acts of Terrorism around us. “Adat Dalna Parega”. Whatever wrong happens around us from acts of Terrorism to rape and murder to anti-social activities, nothing will ever improve, nobody will do anything about them; so people of India better learn to live with these and make it a habit so that these acts do not surprise them anymore. Once we are habituated with all such negativism around us we will be happy and will not ask for change and improvement. Once Terrorism around us becomes a habit we will just keep on walking past the dying around us who are victims of such acts till we either die or be lucky enough not to. Habit makes us accept the situation as the situation itself is now a habit for us.

We all have heard of International Terrorism. The phrase evolved after Regional or Domestic Terrorism crosses national or regional boundaries by joining hands with each other in different countries, Funds flowing across national borders through backdoors, and with the acts of Terrorism being perpetrated in countries other than where the planners are. We all know what this word means. We think we know what this word means. After all we read about Terrorism nearly every day in newspapers.

We all know that Terrorists thrive on muscle power, want to remain in power, perennially seeks to achieve power and benefits for self and therefore terrorises the people around them to achieve all this. It is a habit for them to do so. The Terrorist does not love anybody else or any entity but himself or herself even though they may be under the misapprehension that they do so; they may think they love their families or their country of choice or the cause they say they stand for. Actually they love only themselves and that is why they can perform the acts of Terrorism in which they can easily kill and maim thousands without batting an eyelid. If we study their past and present we can easily see that they are full of arrogance, egotism, ruthlessness, greed for power and disdain for others who dare to stand up against them. They also live in a world of their own created by their “strength” where they think they are king and therefore right and all the others are wrong.

Having dissected the anatomy of a Terrorist, I have now come to the conclusion that Terrorism exists around us all the time in different forms and strength. Terrorism exists in the form of the school bully. We must all have either gone through this ourselves or seen others going through this depending on how strong or how weak we have been and how lucky we have been or not to meet a bully in our own lives. The Bully was the Terrorist when we were in schools.

Then there are Terrorists in families. The father or the husband can be a terror if he is rude, a drunkard, always beating up his children and wife and terrifying them all the time. There are people like this too around us. He is nothing but a bully who has to prove his power over his family through his acts of terror. And so he is a Terrorist too for his family.

The distinguishing characteristic of a Terrorist is that he will be perceived as being strong vis-à-vis those whom he terrorizes. He thrives on creating such an appearance for himself. He will go all out to create such an impression of his strength and power in the mind of his potential victims by using everything in his means so that the others show obeisance to him.

Thus a terrorist may be physically strong as in the case of the school bully who will use this physical strength on others to assert his superiority or he may be strong by position of power as in the case of the Father or Husband on whom the family depends and so have to submit to his Terrorism. Each Terrorist will thus have some source of power which he will use to Terrorise.

In the case of the Political Terrorist his power is derived from his weapons and his being untraceable/ hidden. Secrecy & his weapons give power and makes him strong. The day the Terrorist is caught with his pants down (without weapons and outside his hiding he is powerless and subdued immediately by the other side. You take away his power source and he ceases to remain a Terrorist. This is the secret of fighting a Terrorist. So when a father becomes old and weak he ceases to be a Terrorist because now he has to depend on his wife and children who are stronger.

Thus we see the bully on the road. This Terrorist on the Road can be anybody with a vehicle- need not be a car or Blueline Bus driver as we see on the Roads of Delhi, it can be a 2–wheeler driver too. Yes sometimes a 2-wheeler driver also terrorises a 4-wheeler driver by the knowledge that in the event of an accident the 4-wheeler will be held more guilty since his was a bigger vehicle in a court of law and also sometimes the knowledge that a 4-wheeler driver will be from a respectable background and may not have the will and desire to fight with a 2-wheeler driver who may be a person of the streets. Thus here we see two types of Terrorist on the road. In the case of a 4-wheeler driver his source of power is his bigger vehicle; in case of the 2-wheeler driver the source is derived from his position (his having a smaller vehicle gives him a stronger Position in Law) or his position in society (he being a street man compared to the educated man in the car who cannot physically fight with him).

If you apply my definition and logic of what a Terrorist is you will find them all around us in different guises and in different areas. I think Terrorists exist everywhere around us and yes certainly in organisations too. The bully who is your boss is also a Terrorist. A management Person can also be a Terrorist. The person who is in Management is in a position of power and so his seat is the source of his power. Anybody misusing his seat of power is also a Terrorist. I call him an Organisational Terrorist.

I think there are examples of them in any organisation and if we look deeply we may find some around us too. Those who think they have the right to threaten people because they are under them & powerless because of their positions, bully them by shouting at them because the other cannot shout back, by giving them low ratings even after they have worked hard all year long because the other cannot rate him back, using harsh words when they do not really deserve it because the other is polite enough not to retort and prevented by disciplinary rules if he wants to, threatening them with dire action and sometimes even taking these actions on his victim are all Terrorists of the Corporate world. The Corporate or Organisational Terrorist’s gun is his seat.

Yes I have come to conclude that there are Terrorists all around us from Kashmir to inside our houses to the roads to our own organisations. I thank the Radio Jockey for her innocuous comment which I heard that day while driving to office and which started me on my thinking which I am sharing with you all here.

The silver lining in this is as I stated above. You take away the source of power that a Terrorist has which he uses against others and he or she becomes zero. The only way to fight a Terrorist as I said is by isolating them &.taking away their sources of power. Whether this happens by force or by natural process of ageing, death or retirement is another story. But when it happens as it always happen, then they are nothing but zero just like the old husband who after a lifelong beating of his wife becomes an arthritis bound pound of pitiful flesh deserving and getting nothing but pity from his wife on whom he now has to depend upon; or the Political Terrorist who has to rot in jail or the Retired management Person whose seat is no longer there to give him his perceived power and who then becomes just like any other person among the teeming millions on the roads who will have to depend on nothing but courtesy and politeness to get work out of others so that he can survive the remaining period of his ordinary life.

Why Argue?

2006-06-09T23:30:00.000+05:30

There is a Bengali Saying whose English Translation is exactly casting pearls before the swine. Whom do I argue with? On what subjects do I argue? I argue with people whom I want to improve, and so I argue with those I love and therefore I want to improve. I argue on subjects that I think can be improved, By this very reasoning I will also argue with my bosses and my management for improvement of the organisation I work for. The day I do not do that is the day I have made up my mind not to work for it anymore or care for it anymore. So I think a person who argues with his loved ones will also argue with his bosses because he will love his organization too….. A person cannot be different if he is a real person.

ACCOUNTABILITY and why it does not happen in a PSU? Do we need Unions?

2006-06-07T22:53:00.000+05:30

We hear a lot about the Marxists Party CPI (M) and other union activities in areas untouched by unions so long. Like the recent HERO HONDA disturbance in Gurgaon. What are unions required for really? When so long these places have enjoyed without unions, why is it that they are finding gates open for them to enter?

We hear about PSUs not performing efficiently whereas organizations like Infosys, Wipro, IBM, Reliance seem to attract people and retain them too. & they are even becoming Global Companies!! Why is it so?

All this has to do with the ownership of an organization as well as the role of unions and collectives!!

Do we need collectives?

Let us analyse.

Are PSUs efficient?
We hear that Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) are inefficient. Management of these organisations will deny such allegations. I work in one. It is highly profitable and has a Private Sector like culture to some extent - the exposure and openness to new ideas, T&D, and so on. But still I beg to differ. I say PSUs are inefficient. They are mostly mediocre companies for mediocre people. And because I am mediocre I am here.

Why is it so?

The cause lies in the difference between a Govt Organisation and a Private One.

What is that really?

So I started analyzing and here are my conclusions… ,& here are my own answers to my own questions - though the pattern of questions are defintely a mixed one and touches everything at the same time, I am sure my thoughts are clearly coming out.

Let us analyse logically step by step

1. Why do we need collectives at all?
Ans: --- to look after the people working in the organizations.

Who runs an organization?

ANS: Management.

2. What makes a person part of management? What is management?

ANS: Those entrusted with the responsibility to run the organisation, implement and carry out the fiat of the owners -"the Govt of India" in the case of a PSU. In other words they are the owners' representatives in this organisation. So anybody entrusted to do this job is part of Management. So by this logic the Board of Directors and Chairman are management, because they interact with the GOI. The HR dept is management because HR implements Policies and pay and deals with anything that affects the employees. Going by the same logic, anybody in this organisation when he has to carry out the instructions flowing down to him/ her w.r.t. organisational aspects- through the Delegation of Authority is also part of management. We are all part of management in some role or other. Hence the higher we rise by virtue of increased powers we become more of a management person and less of an ordinary employee.

3. Why do we need to have two groups: one named management and one named collectives?

Ans:- Because it is perceived that if there is only management they will only think of the owners & the employees will suffer and if there are only collectives, then they will only think of the employees and the owners will suffer. So someone some day way back in History found the need to create a Union (because of owners suppressing their employees in some company in some foreign land -- not India, probably Australia or UK I forget now) and so arrived the second group- "The Collectives" in organisations. So that there is a balance. That is what was supposed to be as History teaches us. It is another matter, however, that somewhere down the line the collectives forgot their own people in many organizations.

4. Why cannot we perform dual roles? Why cannnot a "management person" be a "collective" and why cannot a collective be part of management? –

Ans: Because the catch is in the word "suffer" in my earlier reply. Because as an individual progresses up the ladder of the Organisation and metamorphosises from an ordinary ugly caterpillar called "Employee" to that wonderful beautiful creature called "Management Person" we transition ourselves from a demanding person into a denying person. From one who always felt he should get this and he should get that and this is not right and that is not right he becomes a person who thinks he should not allow this to happen and he should not allow that to happen, he should not give this and he should not give that. So he has now FINALLY ARRIVED - as the last Avataar of his life in this Organisation -- in which role he weilds power. AND what fun is there in power if we do not deny? What power is there in strength if we do not subdue the opposition? What fun is there in being management if we do not think we own the company and not just representatives of the owners?

And so we forget that the ultimate aim of the owners is NOT "no sufferance" BUT profits and growth of the company. And so we forget that to get profits and growth of the company, so that the owners become richer, it is absolutely necessary that we take care of the ordinary caterpillars too, and not just because they too will one day become "butterflies" like most but because a happy employee is a happy organisation- "happy" meaning successful.

I said "we transition" implying that this attitudinal change is self inflicted to a great extent. [To a lesser extent it is forced upon us by our helplessness too.] We may hide behind the excuse that "we have to be like this because we are management", "because the owner wants us to behave like this", but it is not so really!! Because had it not been self inflicted than we would not have seen many great management people in History like Russi Modi (of TATA Steel) and and owners themselves like for eg Narayana Murthy and Charles Branson, who have thought of their people. How could they do it? Because they did not think THAT as "Management People" (in fact they were the OWNERS and higher than “management people”) their role was to deny all the time. Rather they proactively thought of improving the lot of their employees and did it. I feel it is wrong notion that there cannot be a dual role. I think a dual role is better as then one need not have collectives at all, If the management start thinking of the employees. What I have just said may seem like a paradox. I am saying that the same person can be a collective and also a management and yet I am saying that then there will be no need for collective. THINK PLEASE.

I say it is self inflicted because every individual likes to be that management person one day and remain so till he dies. I say it is self inflicted because we love to be in power. And what is the outcome of this desire? Those who cannot be "the management person" soon enough seeks to attain power by becoming the office bearer of the collectives. What is the effect of this? I have said it below.

5. Why do the "management"people always think the "collectives" must first ask for something and then only they can consider giving it?

Ans: Many progressive Companies do not have collectives at all. People work and get well paid/ taken care of for their hard work.

6. IS THAT possible in a PSU?

Ans: -- No perhaps, because more than 50% [My own guess estimate and not a quoted figure] of people in a PSU do not have that private company mindset of working hard and getting paid well for that. At the same time because the individuals who are in power do not want to relinquish that power and want to enjoy it forever they do what their roles demands them to do so that they remain in power:-

A.) Since the owner of a PSU is Govt Of India who is not willing to give like Charles Branson or Narayana Murthy or TATA, the "Management People" deny everything mostly, are not proactive in employee care, do not want to give anything without somebody demanding anything, do not want to incur the wrath of the owners, lest they be removed from their posts.

B.) So too the office bearers of collectives want to remain in power forever and to do that they have to listen to the majority of the 50% of people here and so will take forward only those demands to the Management which if all are met will not help the owner to become rich.

And so both these groups of people do not do what actually should be done to create a WIN-WIN situation for everybody- the owners and the employees. They will rather WIN THEMSELVES.

[The danger is when these two groups join hands for creating a win situation for ONLY themselves]

7. But the paradox of this situation here is explained in the question who is the owner?" A bunch of secretaries in DPE, The ministers who come and go? Who is Govt that owns this company? Who are the people who are in Govt? What is their stake?

[Who are the owners?

Those who own the company and stands to benefit from the gains by the Company. After all if it is your company you would like to earn something from that will you not?]

Is it really not the country that owns this company? And will not the country gain if the PSUs flourish? But who is "Country" Nobody. The country is not a person. So in actuality the so-called owners- the GOI are not the actual owners. And so what interest can they have in the good of this company? When there is no REAL INDIVIDUAL WHO OWNS THIS COMPANY like we have in Private Concerns, how can we expect good to happen for the company through good to the employees or HOW CAN WE HAVE ACCOUNTABILITY? Everybody is thinking of themselves here. Even the pseudo owners themselves!!

And so when there is no ACCOUNTABILITY in a PSU how can employees who want to be accountable and deliver by making an effect through their ideas can work and excel in a PSU?

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm……….. Look at the latest example of Sri Subir Raha of ONGC who dared to confront his masters (in Govt)

Inefficient Us

2006-05-29T18:03:00.000+05:30

Busy? No I do not think so!! It is just that we are inefficient.. Inefficient as in:-

1. Doing things inefficiently.
2. Doing things we need not do.
3. Doing too manyn things ourselves when they can be delegated.
4. Not taking time out to plan the work first and in that plan first schedule what should be done after what. and then how.
5. Getting distracted.
6. Spending time on telephone too much..

Ohhh what a long list I can weave!! but i have no time.. and this is enough for today therefore... ~~I do not want to be inefficient.. when I have to do so much in so short a time-- my life time!!

I wish I lived longer.. and I wish my useful life was longer!!!
I wish the day was longer..
I wish I could do everything together!!

Attitude

2006-01-11T16:31:00.000+05:30

IMPORTANCE OF ATTITUDE

BUILDING A POSITIVE ATTITUDE

STORY:

There was a man who made a living selling balloons at a fair. He had all colors of balloons, including red, yellow, blue, and green. Whenever business was slow, he would release a helium-filled balloon into the air and when the children saw it go up, they all wanted to buy one. They would come up to him, buy a balloon, and his sales would go up again. He continued this process all day. One day, he felt someone tugging at his jacket. He turned around and saw a little boy who asked, “if you release a black balloon, would also fly ?” Moved by the boy’s concern, the man replied with empathy, “Son, it is not the color of the balloon, it is what is inside that makes it go up”.

The thing inside of us that makes us go up is our attitude.

The success of an individual, organisation or country depends on the quality of their people.

William James of Harvard University said, “The greatest discovery of my generation is that human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind”.

If people had better attitudes, they’d be better teamplayers, and it’d cut down waste, improve loyalty and, in general, make their company a great place to work.

THINK

“If you had a magic wand and there was one thing you would want changed, that would give you a cutting edge in the marketplace resulting in increased productivity and profits, what would that be?”
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Moral of this Blog?

You think I have a positive attitude? Nopes not at all!!
I liked the articles and so hosted it here. Am STILL TRYING TO FUGURE OUT WHAT THE HELL A POSITIVE ATTITUDE IS AND HOW TO KEEP IT FLYING HIGH WITH ALL THE BLOCKS AGAINST ME AND AROUND ME !!!

And I am losing.

Can we stop to Ponder?

2005-12-26T19:36:00.000+05:30

We are so busy in the Rat Race that we rarely have the time to do anything else. Can we stop to ponder the value of small things lin life?

To realize
The value of a sister
Ask someone
Who doesn't have one.

To realize
The value of ten years:
Ask a newly
Divorced couple.

To realize
The value of four years:
Ask a graduate.

To realize
The value of one year:
Ask a student who
Has failed a final exam.

To realize
The value of nine months:
Ask a mother who gave birth to a still born.

To realize
The value of one month:
Ask a mother
who has given birth to
A premature baby.

To realize
The value of one week:
Ask an editor of a weekly newspaper.

To realize
The value of one hour:
Ask the lovers who are waiting to Meet.

To realize
The value of one minute:
Ask a person
Who has missed the train, bus or plane.

To realize
The value of one-second:
Ask a person
Who has survived an accident...

To realize
The value of one millisecond:
Ask the person who has won a silver medal in the Olympics

Time waits for no one.
Treasure every moment you have.
You will treasure it even more when you can share it with someone special.

To realize the value of a friend:
Lose one.

I have NO TIME

2005-12-19T13:55:00.000+05:30

This one is about Attitude.

If one feels he or she does not have time it is only inside his or her mind it is so.

(1.)Do you work all the time from 9 to 5 whatever the timing may be?
(2.) Do you spend time on tea breaks?
(3.) Do you spend time with your friends during lunch time at their table or the canteen or outside for a smoke or for a sunshine warmth?
(4.)Do you find time to gossip about your colleagues?
(5.)Do you talk on phone and how long do you talk?
(6.) Do you have hobbies at home and spend time by yourself to garden or read a book or watch a movie when the family is taken care of?
(6.) Do you go out and drink and get drunk?
(7.) Should I ask more? I think you get the point by now.

If you want something strongly you strive for that.
If you want the good for your child you work hard for that.
So it is all about wanting to do something. If you want to do it you find time or else you do not!

It is all about adjusting time and work.

Weak Bosses

2005-12-19T11:43:00.000+05:30

People who are unsure about themselves or want to suck up to his or her bosses are the worst bosses themselves. I find many around our work places who use loud voices to put their point through as if loud voices lend more weightage to their logic (actually it is not so, but because logic is missing they will use loud voices to subdue the weaker voice of the junior). Then I find themselves being careless in their own work and landing into problems but when it comes to handling their own juniors, these chaps will act as if he never makes mistakes!! Then I have also seen another category of people (not necessary that all these characteristics cannot be in the same person- and more often it is so) that they will discuss many issues - again in aloud voice-- pretending they know everything when they do not even have the inclination or time to make their own research to see what is what. It is very easy for them to pass judgement on everything that comes to their notice sply during tea time and act as if he or she was the last word in the matter. What stops us to do our own research and then make comments? What is the need to make comments on matters which we do not know? Is it absolutely necessary to prove that we know everything since we are bosses?

The GOOD, the BAD and the UGLY !!

2005-12-10T16:01:00.000+05:30

Once upon a time there was a wonderful western movie made by the name of “the Good, the Bad and the Ugly”. It is very easy to understand what is “good”, but the difference between “bad” and “ugly” when used in reference to a type of human being becomes difficult to understand. But the meanings of these words were wonderfully portrayed by the three characters in the film so much so that anyone who saw the movie came out with a clear understanding of the definitions of these three words.

Here I am not talking of that film but of three types of bosses in any organisation, the “Good, the Bad and the Indifferent”. Here too unless someone experiences these bosses in his or her career it would be very difficult for him or her to understand these types as there are no fixed characteristics to describe them. The meanings of these words to different people would be different depending on their own experiences. To some the meanings of these words may even be seen as a relative term and they may feel that it all depends on how good or bad or indifferent a subordinate is to his superior or that a boss may be good to one junior but bad to another and yet indifferent to another still and therefore these terms have no fixedness as qualifiers of persons working as bosses. In fact I strongly suspect that most successful people would probably say that all bosses are good, proving a hypothesis of mine that a truly successful person is one who can make his boss become a good one for him. In effect it means it is all within us to create what we want in life and that includes a good boss.

I share my ideas here of what a good, bad or an indifferent boss is. I will restrict myself to defining these words only and not lose myself in the quagmire of relativity as mentioned above. I will only try to give absolute definitions of these words as per my own understanding and welcome others to comment and share their ideas. Also let me make it clear beforehand that what a person is as a human being has no relevance to his role as a boss. A perfectly good, gentleman maybe a very bad boss, and so also a very nasty, bad person may prove to be a very good boss when it comes to work and work life. My definitions are in paragraphs as it is not easy to describe the meanings in one word but at the same time I will only highlight a few characteristics only and leave the ground open for discussions and comments, if any, from the visitors to the site.

The GOOD boss doesn’t think of himself as a boss, he leads, he guides, and he works with his subordinate as a team member and takes care of him like a parent. The person under a good boss learns from the qualities of his senior and develops into an able worker himself. It is always an exhilarating experience to work under such a boss, even if he may demand his pound of flesh in terms of hard work and loyalty. A GOOD boss would also care for his people and work caringly for their well-being. A GOOD boss would be one with whom one can share thoughts, argue without fear, exchange views, be sincere and not just be seen sincere. A junior would always look up towards the good boss and love him. The junior would always want to work under this boss but at the same time would grow out of the protective shade of this boss as this boss would develop him to take higher responsibilities. Unfortunately a GOOD boss may not be one who shines in his own life, for we do not have grace marks for being a GOOD boss.

The BAD boss is one who does not teach and yet wants results, who does not care for his subordinate and yet demands attention himself. He is one whose aim is to control his subordinate and forgets that he should rather concentrate on the work done by the subordinate and the results, he asks for filing of tour reports but not take actions on them, whose idea of team work is an evening out with his subordinate and not a day in with the team. He does not believe in freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom from bondage. His idea of a good subordinate is one who always says, “Yes”. He looks at work and work place like a personal fiefdom and is interested only about himself, does not know how to delegate and train and guide, does not have the capability to lead. A bad boss forgets that his subordinate is not a fool. A BAD boss is one whom one should pity for he is not worth any respect. Unfortunately it does not mean a BAD boss cannot rise in his own career, for going to the top doesn’t need pass marks in leadership.

But nothing beats an INDIFFERENT boss. A bad boss will be bad to you and so you know where you stand, but an INDIFFERENT boss will be unpredictable, you will always be in suspense. They are the majority in an organisation and are the greatest de-motivating influences, because they don’t do anything at all for a subordinate and his work. Though a bad boss may harm you more, you can still keep quiet, do what he wants and be controlled by him, don’t argue with him and pray that you get a good report but how do you tackle an INDIFFERENT boss? An INDIFFERENT boss is one who is not bothered about subordinates at all. An INDIFFERENT boss will not harm his junior nor will do any good for him, will not scold him nor appreciate him, not guide him nor ask his opinion. Even with a bad boss you can learn the job, but, yes, you have to do the work in his way. But under an INDIFFERENT boss, you will not be able to learn anything; he will be one who will only give lip service and always quote rules when it comes to doing something good for the junior. The INDIFFERENT boss will not want to make the work place a better place to work in, he will not know how to deliver group objectives. One should fear INDIFFERENT bosses more, I think, as they are more in numbers and affect the growth of persons in an organisation as they leave their juniors in a limbo.

We have all had our share of bosses, but have we thought of what type of bosses we are? In fact why do we want to be a boss at all and not be just a team member, with perhaps a little more knowledge than the junior, a will to help others and a desire to lead?

Leadership Quotes

2005-12-05T01:38:00.000+05:30

Harold S. Geneen
Leadership is practiced not so much in words as in attitude and in actions.

Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf
Leadership is a combination of strategy and character. If you must be without one, be without the strategy.

Blaine Lee
The great leaders are like the best conductors - they reach beyond the notes to reach the magic in the players.(Do we extract the magic in our players?)

Arnold Glasgow
One of the tests of leadership is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency.

John C. Maxwell
A big man is one who makes us feel bigger when we are with him.

Peter Drucker
No executive has ever suffered because his subordinates were strong and effective.

Henry Kissinger
Leaders must invoke an alchemy of great vision

Donald H. McGannon
Leadership is action, not position

Max Lucado
A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd.

Dwight D. Eisenhower
Pull the string, and it will follow wherever you wish. Push it, and it will go nowhere at all.

Henry Ford
I am looking for a lot of men who have an infinite capacity to not know what cant be done

Lao Tzu
To lead the people, walk behind them

William James
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices. Jim RohnLeadership is the challenge to be something more than average.

Leadership

2005-12-05T01:30:00.000+05:30

Lets talk about leadership !!

I read a wonderful article in Times of India, wonderful because it is so right and it matches my thoughts about what is needed around us today. So, I thought I should share this (copy+paste/ Plagiarise) it here. It is very relevant for us and we should introspect and find out what we as leaders have or what is missing in us.

Quote:"Ten Commandments to make a successful leader"

Leading a big public company is one of the world’s most important jobs. It is already fiendishly difficult, and seems to be getting harder all the time. Those who make it to the top frequently fail: they stay for shorter and shorter periods.

And there is more competition than there used to be for the talents of top bosses because private equity now offers another option. To judge by the huge pay packets offered to the few deemed capable of doing such jobs, there is a dire shortage of people thought to have what it takes. Here is a ten-point checklist of the necessary qualities.

A sound ethical compass. If the boss’s values are undemanding, the company’s will also be wobbly. That may not put it out of business, but it means the company will have to pay a premium for talent. Good people do not like working for organisations whose values they mistrust.
The ability to take unpleasant decisions. Many judgments must be made on the basis of ambiguous information. Leaders often have to deal swiftly with conflicting demands without being sure of their facts. That calls for a strong stomach.
Clarity and focus are essential requirements for making those awkward judgments. Leading a large company, and dealing at speed with a host of complicated and many-sided issues, is an immense intellectual challenge. In order to survive the clamour for time and attention, a leader must also be able to screen out unnecessary noise and to focus on what really matters.
Ambition. The best leaders are empire-builders who want to create something that outlasts them. That is different from ego-boosting personal ambition.
Effective communications skills are a relatively new requirement, the result of the increasing intrusion of the outside world. A good corporate leader should talk convincingly, which is not always the same thing as telling the whole truth.
The ability to judge people is an essential pre-requisite, given the importance of human capital. Judging who will work best in which slot is one of the key tasks of leadership. Like so many aspects of the top job, it requires intuition as well as experience.
A knack for developing talent is needed to build a stock of future leaders. People learn far more about the art of leading from a good mentor than from a great book.
Emotional self-confidence. Accumulating a pool of talent requires an ability to work with people who may be better at their job than you are at yours, and to guide and motivate them. Leaders who are jealous of their followers do not inspire loyalty. Self-confidence also allows people to admit to weakness and ask for help without feeling defensive or inadequate. Successful leaders need to be able to say, I don’t know what to do next, without losing the respect of their colleagues.
Adaptability will prove invaluable when things go wrong. Surviving a reverse calls for resilience and flexibility. The key is an ability to reframe: to reshape a problem so that from some angles it can look like a success.
Charm is not a quality taught on MBA courses, but few get to the top without it. A bit of luck helps too, though that may prove hard to arrange.

Many of these qualities are useful for leading any enterprise, but especially a publicly-traded corporation. In turn, the way companies are led determines the prosperity of nations and the happiness of their workforce and their customers.

In response to the scandals and collapses of the past two years, governments have rushed in to tighten the rules of corporate governance. That is no bad thing: good governance may not guarantee good performance, but at least it provides tools to tackle bad management.

And it is right to give boards a sense of responsibility and the means to exercise it. All this helps to rebuild trust.

And if all else fails...Talk to the chief executive of a public corporation about a job in private equity and the first question is, When can I start?’

Running a business for a private-equity firm means not only shelter from the limelight: no small shareholders turn up at your annual meeting to moan about your pay, and the media and non-governmental groups are much less intrusive.

In addition, there is a refreshing lack of ambiguity about what you are expected to achieve.
The timeframe is manageable. The investor is rational and interested. The rewards for success are huge. And nobody asks awkward public questions about your pay package.

The Economist

Unquote

Relationships: Friendship Among Colleagues

2005-11-30T15:30:00.000+05:30

Relationships: Friendship Among Colleagues

The "I" in me

2005-11-26T20:13:00.000+05:30

I guess I can create my first two posts here with something which I had written long ago. So it is easry for me just to copy paste here.

Can we remove the “I” in ourselves when dealing with other people? I wonder! We have grown to accept, some of us, consciously and some of us unconsciously, that this “I” is an inherent part of our selves. The conscious ones think that without this “I” in their conscious state of mind, they are naught, that all normal self respecting human beings should have this “I” prominent and visible in all their dealings as this is what separates them from other human beings. The unconscious ones don’t even know that this “I” exist in their behaviour as it has got embedded so deeply over the years by letting it take control of them, that it has become hidden from their knowledge.

This is a very great malady affecting a majority of people around us and specially in organisations where we work. This is a malady, which knows no class difference and affects all of us equally, be it an ED/ V.P. or be it a representative in the collectives. That is why you will find that such people resent the people below them or people who ask questions or who share information as the latter are looked at as intruders in the former’s glass palaces, which they have carefully built and nurtured to protect their fragile existence, that even a hint of askance towards these people tend to shatter the glass façade. Questions asked seem to challenge their authority. Information shared seems to reduce their right to be privy to such information.

There are exceptions, I agree, but any organisation would have been a better place to work in if all of us forgot this “I” inside us for the time we are here and remember that we are all working for the same goal and nobody is superior to anybody except in knowledge, maybe, and age and that’s all about it I guess. If we can remember that then we can probably keep the ego inside us in the background and never forget that one day when the chair is not there, it is the human being that we will all be remembered for, barring of course, for the eccentricities and harm or good that we do here as long as we are in service.

It is due to these misplaced egos of these people that cases like somebody feeling that his authority has been demeaned in some work when a junior takes some initiative or someone feels that he should have some peon to bring his water to his table or someone feels that he has the right to walk through some room just because he is senior even though a meeting is going on there. I say to this type of people that please pause for a moment and think. Think whether what your egos make you do are justified? Do you feel angry to find a locked door because your ego is hurt seeing that you don’t have access to something which your bloated ego makes you feel you should have or do you really think you should walk through that door? Do you feel that when a junior has taken the initiative he has done to make you appear silly or whether by rebuking him for some good job done will make you appear sillier? Please ask yourself when a junior comes with a suggestion is he trying to tell you that you are a fool because you couldn’t think of it or is he just trying to do his duty and help you do yours? Well this is just an example of hundreds of such cases, which may be happening to most of us here. If only this ego did not blind us, maybe we could have all been better people to work with.

Today I offered my seat to someone who wanted to use the mail. It surprised the person. And it surprised me in turn. It never occurred to me that if I offer my seat to someone I am losing any authority or I will not remain who I am. It is true that sitting in someone’s seat/ chair can be taken to extremes and office decorum has to be there. After all I am not supposed to sit in a senior person’s chair just like that. But I am sure you all understand what I mean. I am confident that what I am I will always remain even if I offer my chair to someone because what I am is within me and nothing can take it away from me.

But then, all said and done, who knows? Even I may be having this “I” in me when I feel proud to say that I don’t have it, and feel proud to say that I can offer my chair to anyone without any fear. This seems to show that it is me taking pride in myself and hence probably propagating the inherent “I” that is inside in all of us to the forefront of my sub-consciousness and then consciousness. Maybe we all will continue to live with this “I” inside us and it will forever be a battle to keep it under control. The better human is one that can win all the battles.

The "I" that is in us are of two forms, one is the "I" as we are, as individuals, and the other is the "I" which comes to us from our positions. It is the "I" which comes to people by their positions that create zeros out of them. It happens because they are actually without the other "I" -- their own "I"s (The first one) and so hide behind the "I" that they think comes from their positions and when they lose their positions they are totally lost because without their positions they are Zeros!! Unfortunately such people are around us all the time. In any organisation of the world, anywhere in the world.