My “Firsts” for the second time

“Health is Wealth” - I realised so much in the last eight weeks when I underwent spine surgery to deal with the sudden pain in my left leg due to nerve compression and developed a “foot drop” condition in a very short period.   I am on a good recovery path with support from doctors and therapists, and loads of love from family, colleagues, friends, and my company.

I developed this condition all of sudden, even a week before I did my 10K run in the Chennai marathon, two weeks before I had my annual health check and all “GREEN”

When I rewind my recovery path, I experienced many “firsts” for the second time in my life and I received so much encouragement from people around me.

      When I made my first baby steps after surgery, my parents were in so much joy as they were when I was a toddler.   This time my children witnessed my first baby steps and encouraged me.

-          When I went to the washroom on my own for the first time

-          When I did 1000 steps at a stretch for the first time

-          When I sat for 30 minutes at a stretch for the first time

-          When I climbed a flight of ten stairs for the first time

-          When I wore socks on my own for the first time

-          When I went to a nearby store to buy and carry a loaf of bread for the first time

I don’t remember any of these “firsts” when it happened for the first time, these “firsts” for the second time will be in my memory forever.      Some more firsts are to come in the next few weeks/months, such as bending to pick up things, bi-cycle rides, driving, and running.    

The support I had from my company, Shell is enormous (#shellcares); my colleagues are awesome, they did regular check-ins, sent flowers, and visited me.  My friends, my relatives the unconditional love from my immediate family, my parents, my brother, my wife and my three gems (children) are good complements to medicines.     I cannot miss mentioning my other companions during my recovery, books, music, and prime videos.

I am looking forward to my full recovery and being part of the 2025 Chennai Marathon 10K run!

Health is wealth, including mental health. 

 

 

 

 

 

BEWARE OF ENEMIES!

BEWARE OF ENEMIES!

 Have you attained “success” or know of organisation / people attained “success”?    Of course, yes.

“Success” here means what organisation / people set for themselves and achieved, it could mean clearing an exam, Job/promotion, retirement, winning / participating in sports, awards, election win, movie box office, high valuation of start-up, profits, share price,  invention, etc

When you achieve “success”, you have potential of two enemies popping up, namely “Complacence” and “Arrogance” and may overpower you.    Have you noticed these on organisations / people who have attained success?   I have seen these in some; cab aggregators, airlines, hotels, restaurants, political parties, individual stars, hospitals, and so on.   Now visualize those organisation / people who have exhibited these behaviors and recollect the experience; did you?

On the other hand, before attaining “success” or during “failures” you have few companions like; “Humbleness”, “Willingness to learn”, “Respect”,  “Connection or Relationship” and so on.  Let us call them “friends”.

In my view, when you have attained “success” you need to have the above “friends” continue to accompany you and not the “enemies” overpower your “friends”.   Now visualize those organisations / people who continue to have these “friends” after they attained “success”; I am sure you have got few in front of your eyes.

In my opinion, when you attain “success” it is important to have these “friends” continue to travel with you, then it is “REAL SUCCESS”.

Looking forward for your views and comments.

 

Do the “OPPOSITE”

Do the “OPPOSITE”

Do the “Opposite”,  you may have a better chances for effective results !   sounds strange?   Let me attempt with some examples,

-          

- Have you noticed for any long truck to take a right turn, the driver steers the truck towards left and take right turn.  Imagine the truck sticks to the lane and take right turn; for sure the driver had to do few reverses and forwards, may hold the traffic or create an accident.

-        - If you have to be awake through the night out for some critical work (say flying a plane, surgery on patients,…), will you not be sleeping during the day to be awake and  energetic during night?

-         - An arrow must be pulled backwards before it is shot forward.  Try by just pushing it forward?

Now, do you agree “doing the opposite” helps in some situations.

However, in my work environment (IT services), quite often I find we do spend energy in same direction and not attempt think about “doing the opposite”, whenever we have project / client situation, the most common response is to throw more people at the problem, does it always work?  Is it because don’t plan enough, pause, think about doing the opposite (like steer left and then take right in the truck example)?

What do you think about “doing the opposite” ?   Can you share your views and some examples (good and bad) from your experience?

“MIND THE GAP”

“MIND THE GAP”

It is hard to miss the announcement “MIND THE GAP” when you travel in London underground trains.  This is the caution for the travelers to mind the gap between the edge of train and platform and not get hurt by slipping in between.

This “MIND THE GAP”  was echoing in my mind, these echoes were telling me that we may need to “mind the gap” across relationships;  in business between Customers and Suppliers; at work between colleagues, at home between parents and children, between spouse, between teacher and student and so on.

I work in the services industry,  at times during the life of the service contract, I hear comments like – “you don’t understand my business”, “what is your value add”,  “SLAs are green, but unhappy Customer” , etc;  do you hear comments like these?

I think the fundamental reason is we don’t “mind the gap”  or probably don’t even realize that there is a gap.  If we analyse a bit, Customers ask what they ‘want’, not what they ‘need’ leading to a gap between want and need;  Suppliers sells what they ‘have’ (or may have in future) and not what Customer ‘want’ (which in itself a gap);  result is a big gap between the need and what Customers got.   Shouldn’t we “mind the gap” and reduce the gap?  I have attempted to make a pictorial view of gaps at every stage !

I have a very similar conversation with my children when they ask for something.   I normally say to my children,  “you are asking what you want,  it is not always true your wants and needs  matches,  I will only get you what you need” .    Did I “mind the gap” or just believed that I know their need?

If we analyse problems in any relationship – “teacher and student”, “husband and wife” ,  “colleagues at workplace”the dissatisfaction arises when we miss to  “MIND THE GAP”.

How about your encounters and experience in “MIND THE GAP” and any lessons learnt?

(DON’T) COMPARE APPLES TO ORANGES

DON’T COMPARE APPLES TO ORANGES

This is a common idiom used, when apparent differences between items which are thought to be incomparable such as apples and oranges.  I have come across this many times at work and home, when questioned about performance, compared regions, products, etc.  I have used it many times on to establish why my area of work is different to others, why the performance / results cannot be compared.

I am thinking, why we shouldn’t compare Apples to Oranges; aren’t “disruptive” ideas born when we start comparing unrelated things to achieve more?  I feel it is okay to (or should) compare “Apples to Oranges” to experiment on new things and possibly excel.   Some of the organisations come to my mind who have compared themselves to unrelated things and possibly be in the path of success.

• Amazon from booking selling online store to an IT service provider
• Google from search engine to possibly big player in automobile industry
• People like Neroli Fairhall paralysed from her waist down, Oscar Pistorius with both legs amputated participating in Olympic games (not only Paralympic games)
• Some of the inventions like airplane, nuclear power, our emails, etc

d

On the contrary, few organisations who ignored to compare Apples to Oranges; like the ones below;

•          Kodak once pioneer in the industry failed to transform in digital revolution
•      Blackberry who had huge market share on smart handled, led way to Apple and Android
•          Sony Walkman  (don’t think the younger generation even remember)
•        Many individuals surpassed you and me (for sure me) and we have decided not the compare and “stay put” .

l   I recollect an old Tamil  movie lyrics by writer Kannadasan, which reads as “paravayai kandaan vimanam padaithan, Ediroli keettan vaanoli padaithan”    (translated in English – Scientist compared the birds and invented airplane,  listened to echo and invented radio) which sounds like people dared to compare Apples to Oranges.
   
     In summary, what I want to convey is let us not excuse ourselves saying, “ I am different”,  “that is different” at the first instance.

   Do you think it is important to compare "Apples to Oranges" at individual level and at organisations level?  I am looking forward for your comments and examples for YES and NO for comparisons.

MY PERSONAL MAINTENANCE - 4 day in AOL Bangalore Ashram

MY PERSONAL MAINTENANCE  - 4 day in AOL Bangalore Ashram

Last week, I have chosen to spend four days in a residential course at Art of Living ashram in Bangalore.  It was a different and refreshing experience;  I have learnt some new things and also it made me to experience the past.   Let me narrate my experience.

COURSE:   The course were a combination of Yoga, breathing exercise, stretching and meditation.  The class starts at 6am in the morning and ends at about 830pm in the night, with two long breaks (breakfast and lunch) and couple of small bio breaks. This 14-15 hours day was long, but not tiring.  If similar meeting was to happen in office for four days, there will be numerous breaks for refresh, may this course itself is meant for refresh, so why refresh breaks?.  “If we do our work with love and energy,  we can work long with less breaks” 

Most of the courses were done with eyes closed,  it means we don’t have to worry about how others are performing and no inhibition on how others perceive our performance.  The  learning I take here is “ have less of distractions for effective performance” 

The toughest part (at least for me) of the program is “SILENCE” – yes, we were not expected to speak for 3 full days.  When my children ask, what I do at work,  my response used to be “I keep speaking and get paid for it” ,  from there to “no talk” for 3 days was difficult and I could managed with some exceptions (one  call made).   “Dare to do something different”

Among many types of programs, we were also asked to do some creative drawing in about 10 minutes.  It was amazing to see many creative work,  this is mine !  “I think everyone can be creative, age no bar.”

ACCOMMODATION:  The room was not equipped with 9” mattress, foam pillows, shower with luxury toiletries, climate control, flat screen with WIFI, etc.  The room is small non AC, 4 people shareable, hard single beds with thin mattresses with shower facilities.  I used to stay in similar type rooms when I started my career, it was nice to go back to that experience.  The rooms are clean and fit for purpose.   “Luxury does not guarantee satisfaction, but fit for purpose and basic expectations will” 

FOOD: The food served were not 45 items, 5 course meals;  it was good, hygienic, single course meal (like rice, sambar, vegetable), thrice a day.   There were no coffee, snacks in between.  I was bit surprised on how I managed without caffeine for four days.  “Light on stomach is heavy on energy” .

SEVA (SERVICE):  The course also included doing Seva for about an hour a day.  I did spend time in kitchen (vegetable cutting), garden and model village.  It is very different experience to do work in mass kitchen (believe they do 10,000 meals a day).   “It is good to do some work on the ground once in a while as a service (I am not talking about as a service in IT)”

I really felt it was a good maintenance (like car) for me, both mind and body.  I think it will help for individuals and corporate go for maintenance once in a while.  

“Soap bubble” - Transition to a new role

In the corporate environment, change of job either by joining a new organization or job rotations is important and inevitable.  These changes (new person in a new role) helps the individual to learn / contribute in the organization and also gives a fresh perspective to the function.

My questions to the hiring manger are, when we get a new person to the new role (internal or external hire),

-          - are we expecting the person jump start and produce results ?

-          - are we giving her enough time to settle down ?

-          - are we allocating resources in educating about the org / role ?

-          - do we have sufficient self-learning material?

I    I feel as a hiring manager we need to spend quality time with the “new hire” on induction, not just for the job role, also about the group, organization, people, culture, processes, decisions, goals, etc.   I often see Managers are in a rush to deploy the person into the role (billable project or otherwise) and expect the person to produce value (results) quickly and allow a natural path of long learning cycle about the rest of the organization.

I am sharing my experience when I joined this organization little more than three years ago.   I was joining this company after a long stint of 22 years in my previous organization;  I had some butterflies in my stomach.   I also knew in the new role, I will be inducting lot of leaders and hence decided to watch my transition bit more granular for the first 90 days.

First, I said to myself ; in my first 90 days, I will take over from the incumbent like a “soap bubble” and I will ensure “the bubble” does not break.  I also said, I will neither attempt to re-size nor reshape the bubble.  The meaning here is, will understand the details on its own merits; however set aside the changes / recommendations post 90 days.

Second, I did jot down all my interactions with the colleagues and categorized them as “value consumed” or “value delivered”.    If I had learnt / understood something from someone, I have categorized those interactions as “value consumed” and given a numerical value of “minus 1” and if have I have contributed something significant in the conversation, solutions, etc, categorized those as “value delivered” and given a numerical value of “plus 1”.   At the end of each day, computed the cumulative net value delivered to the organization and plotted a graph.   As expected the net value was –ve initially and more –ve later, less –ve over a period of time, break-even and grew +ve thereafter.    Interestingly,  it took about seven weeks for a break-even in my case.

Third, I have broken down the net value further by functions (ex: Delivery, pre-sales, Talent acquisition, etc).  The observation here is, some of the function had a more +ve net value and some of had more –ve net value at the end of 90 days.  I am not advocating more positive is good or more negative is bad.    The point, I am driving is depends on the role we are hiring the person, if we can steer the induction we may get better results.  

Fourth, I have also recorded the people who have spent time with me in my transition and group them as top management, Sr management (mostly peers in my case), team, self-reading, etc.  In my first 90 days, about 137 hours are spent on me in various forms of interactions.  Interestingly, self-reading was on the lower side.  The learning I had on this is, when we hire new people, it is important to spend time with in educating about the organization (beyond the job role)  and these interactions are not one way, it has to be on push-pull mode, meaning the new employee has to pull people into the conversations. 

Fifth, I had jotted down my recommendations on what we need to do better; more from an “outside-in” perspective and did present this to my mangers after about 120 days of joining the organization. My managers not only appreciated those views, also given me green signal to implement some of those and I am glad to say more the three-fourths of these ideas are implemented.

My transition has given me learning on hiring and inducting people in new roles, the key ones are

1      1) Allow new hire to understand the organization beyond the job role (don’t break the soap bubble).

2      2) Focus the transition on the key areas beyond the job role as well.

3      3) Allocate time and resources for transition (including the hiring manger’s time).

4     4) Motivate the person to get fresh perspective (outside-in) in the early days, before s/he get used the organization.    Recognize good ideas and explore implementation.

5     5) Create self-reading material.

Thank you for reading this, looking forward for your comments.

Smiles on many faces during my children birthday anniversary this week

This week we had series of birthday anniversaries at our home; my elder daugther's birthday on 23rd May,  my son's on 24th May and my wife's on 26th May.

My children celebrated their brithday anniversaries little differently,  thanks to their mother for the idea and the efforts.

On my daughter's birthday;  she went and distrubuted food, water and sweets to needy / beggars in the area we live in; we drove around the localilty and distributed fresh home cooked food for about 15 people.

On my son's birthday;  he went around the area and distributed new clothes  to about 10 needy and beggars.   I think those people would have got an opportunity to wear new clothes may be first time in their life.

Both my son and daugther have felt really satisfied they way they celebrated their birthday anniversaries.

In normal course it would have been some cake, gifts and party; and smiles only on the children;  this celeberation has created smiles on others.

 

Results by motivation – “I am an Energy Star”

Results by motivation –

“I am an Energy Star”

Show me Results!  --  this is something we want anywhere;  at home, work, utility services; government, students, schools, movies, sports…

How do get the desired results – carrot or stick? Both? Neither?  Luck?

Let me narrate one motivation strategy I used at my home.

We have three children at home; one of the constant dialogue I hear at home is “hey, whoever has switched on the light/fan;  switch it off”   -- the response from children is generally; “it’s not me” .     I have heard these noises many many times.  I was telling my children and wife;  “who” is not very important;  anyone can put off lights / fans / TV when not in use;  these lectures did not work.

I have put a simple motivation strategy;  devised a scoring card called “I am an Energy Star”.  This is pasted in the living room, side of the refrigerator;  the rule is anyone who switches off any energy device which is ON unnecessarily; will get one star.   More the stars, more the points and children would get a gift.  Believe me, it clicked instantly, and there is a competition to switch  OFF devices to gain stars  -- sometimes it works too much; even the necessary lights are put OFF.   

Let us switch to organization scenario,  as Leaders how are we working with our team to achieve results – by motivation techniques?  Or stick (if you don’t do this, then… ) approach.  Recollect few instances of the approaches you have practice recently with your colleagues and analyze which has given sustained results. It will be great if you can share your views and some examples of this.

Btw, I was sharing this “I am an Energy Star” example with two of my colleagues recently;  they implemented at home and it worked for them!

Won Silver or Lost Gold?

Won Silver or Lost Gold?

London 2012 Olympics is just round the corner and London and rest of the world is so excited about this and looking forward for this event. One thing which comes to mind on the sports event is prizes and medals.

Olympics are bundled with lots of sports like athletics, football, swimming, etc. At the end of every event three prizes are given, it is mostly GOLD, SILVER and BRONZE.

What do you think is going on in the mind of an athlete who has got Silver medal, is she happy about the prize? I can hear you saying – “of course, she is”. I heard some of you saying, “No, she is upset”. If we analyse it, she might have both the feelings; happy for winning Silver and upset for losing Gold. So what do we call this as Won Silver? Or Lost Gold?

I see this kind of feeling happens in our workplace as well, one of the situations I can think of is performance appraisal. If one gets “Exceeds Expectations”, does she feels happy about it or upset for not reaching “Outstanding”. In my opinion one should have both the feelings, “Won Silver” feeling should give confidence on oneself and a great motivation to keep going and at the same time “Lost Gold” feeling should help to reset the goal, identify gaps and striver harder to reach gold (goal?).

What is your view about this? What is your feeling in similar situations? What do you think is a good approach?

At that moment, I knew what love is - Happy International Women day

Happy International Women’s Day.

 

First, let me introduce myself;  I am a father of two; one smart boy and a sweet little  girl.   This article is based on what I have experienced in life.

Let me start with my son, who was born ten years ago, on a Wednesday evening in the millennium year 2000.   I got a phone call that day morning to let me know that my wife was admitted in  hospital for delivery, and was advised not to worry.  Tension mounted to this first time father - I flew from Bangalore to Chennai with lot of anxiety about the new born, will my wife be safe, will the baby he healthy, is it going to be boy or girl, will the baby  look like me, etc, etc.   When my son was born I was flying very high (quite literally, at 30000 feet above ground).    It was so timed, when I reached the hospital the nurse was getting the baby out and I was the first person to take the baby on hand.  When the nurse put the infant on my arms, I just frozen for a second and thrilled with the sudden promotion as a father.  I heard many times, you don’t have to teach fish to swim,  I think the same is true for the infants to smile, I got mesmerized by the smile of the 30 minutes old infant.   It was an wonderful experience of a first time father, a little smile from the baby made my life -  at the moment, I knew what love is as a father.

My son grew up and at every stage, I had a lot of learning.  During he early stages, learnt to sleep (and not sleep)  in haphazard timings; learnt tiny bit of work (large portion was done by my wife!!) on diaper change, feeding and so on.   During his toddler stage, I learnt quite of rhymes and stories to get occupied with  him, particularly on bed time.    When the little boy grew up,  I learnt things from him, one such example -  me and my son were try to quench our thirst with tender coconut,  took the straw out with hand closed on one side and let the coconut water on the ground. I asked him, “Karthik, why are you wasting the water?”, his response was “I am cleaning the straw, though the coconut water may be good, with dirt in the straw it will make it bad”. I learnt this simple technique from my son – at the moment, more than love I was pride to learn from us son.

Seven years later, my daughter was born.   This time I was with my wife through the pregnancy, as were living in England did not have extended family support during the first nine months of her pregnancy.  I want to tell you one thing during my wife’s pregnancy, my nature of job warrants a lot of long phone conversations, my wife used to tell me that, “your daughter when born will recognize you only by voice”,  when I joked that time, but I realized that was true later.   I could still remember inch by inch when my wife went through the labor, I was with her during that time.   While on one hand we were eagerly waiting for the  baby to arrive, on the other hand I was very tensed, looking at the pains what my wife was go through, after a long labor the sweet little girl was out to the world.    My wife was still suffering with pains and discomfort post labor.  However when the pink beauty was placed on the arms of my wife, I saw a brightness (can’t be measured by watts) on her face – at the moment, I knew what love is as a mother.

Me, my wife and my son were experiencing the little one grew up day by day.  I still recollect my son counted the number times her sister “turned around” when she was about 3 months old.  Our daughter also have gave us lot of learning in the early stages, this time managing two children who are six years apart, balancing the love and managing possessiveness of both children.

When my daughter was around two years old she started speaking few words,  any parent would want their child to say Amma (Mom in tamil) as the first word, but I did not want my child to say Amma (as my wife passed away when my daughter was 8 months old).   After my wife passed away, I doubled my role as father and mother for my children with support from my other family members.   Days, weeks and months passed by, my daugther was making few words and sentences and very playful.   One day she said “Amma” and it was me (her father) whom she called as “Amma”,  it was a very mixed feeling, very happy when my daughter called me (she still does) as Mother and very sad that she did not have actual mother.   This is really rare recognition to a father I am will remember this for my life.  I must tell you, at the moment, as a man I knew myself what a love is as a mother, great experience, truly women are gifted. 

Happy International Womens day – out of numerous roles what a woman plays in life MOTHER is the greatest role.