All the random thoughts

‘Happy New Year to you’ That is a statement fit only for a CEO to blurt out in one of those strategy meetings. ‘Let’s target to be the number one provider of Dog food by so and so year’, the CEO says leaving the rest of the team to wonder how in the hell they are going to meet that objective. How do we go about being number one in the market? What does it mean at a ground level? The CEO can never bother about that and that’s the reason the rest of us have our jobs. We need to work out the details ourselves. We need to constantly remind ourselves that the target is to be number one and therefore that mindset needs to reflect in all of our thoughts, behaviors, discussions, decisions and actions. The CEO visualizes and depends on the rest of the team to actualize the vision. There are posters pasted all around the office proclaiming the vision and serving us the reminder day in and day out. We see that every day and we are expected to work accordingly. At the end of the period for which t...

I was busy the past few weeks with home work, 'class' work and of course watching live telecast of the 'terror' serial on various news channels. It was kind of dejavu for me as I was reminded of the early days of Iraq war of 2003 and watching the live coverage of the war on the various news channels in America. The difference though was, in 2003 the perpetrators of war were broadcasting and in Mumbai 2008 it was the victims of the war who were the broadcasters. As for similarities, there were many. The same underlying insensitivity to the happenings on ground, the shameless passion for sensationalism, 'creation' of news when there was not much to report and so on. Now, if I were watching all that was being telecast, then what moral right do I have to complain? But it is always interesting to comment on 'isolated incidents'. For example, I realized that my passion for news during the period of terror was similar to my wife's passion for some TV serial...

Too much is made out of negative thinking in our society. "Be positive" is the mantra for meeting the requirements of the definition of success. If someone is worried about the outcome of any event, others in the team are quick to soften them up by asking them not to be negative. Depending upon their age, negative thinkers are also termed as 'Devil's advocates' in some groups. Alexander has not become 'the great' by thinking negative. According to Management Historians or Historical Managers, he was either not thinking or was thinking positive. Now what has positivity got to do with anything? It's a good question to ask but I doubt if we will ever get an honest answer from many of these management gurus. Not because there is no answer but it is probably an incovenient truth. Let me take an example. The closest to positive and negative that we can come across is the flow of current. It flows from the negative terminal to the positive terminal. It's ...

Mamu was an underworld Don. Rather, Mamu wanted to be known as an underworld Don. He had a booming voice and an imposing personality, or so he thought. He was about five feet six inches but he always believed that tallness is a state of mind. No one knew his real age, no one dared to ask, or so he thought. Mamu lived in a two bedroom house in a street that had small houses lined up on both sides. The people in rest of the houses were mostly middle class families of Government employees. Mamu was the only exception. No one knew how he made his money or why there were always tens of people in his home. Actually, there were never more than ten people though Mamu always preferred to use the term 'tens'. No one knew why those people came back to Mamu day after day. When Mamu stepped out of his home, Den in his terms, he was surrounded by those people, much taller than him in reality though shorter in their minds. They hardly allowed Mamu any view of the road or the street. Mamu w...

"We live in Rhymeless times", a friend quipped the other day. He must have been referring to the film songs because, Nursery Rhymes are timeless for sure. May be not because of their quality but because of the customer base which changes year on year. These must be the only products that are timeless more because they remain the same while their customer changes. Is this a lesson in marketing? Change the customer while keeping the product constant? With all the emphasis on packaging, may be that is what is happening anyways. Anyways, even if the times are rhymeless and rhymes are timeless, I have some time to rhyme. Someone should make effort to add/upgrade to the current set because, if we have evolved as people, it should reflect in our stable of Nursery Rhymes too. So, here goes attempt number one - One, two, three I am free Four, five, six I have tricks Seven, eight, nine The world is mine. My daughter loved it. That should be reason enough to qualify this as something...

Of late, when I go to my daughter's school for whatever reason, I keep coming across the physical education teacher of the school. He must be much younger than me but sports a much sterner look. And slowly, over the last few months, I started developing some kind of respect/fear for the guy. Nothing to do with his capabilities but simply out of fear I used to have for our own drill sir all those years ago. I guess that position or role has a fear inducing capability. But what's the deal with these PE teachers anyways? Why do they believe they were supposed to be in some military but landed up in a primary school ? Why are they so strict? For some one who is supposed to be playing most of the time with kids for a job, should they not be much more happy looking people? Why do they seem to carry most of the weight of the world's future and wear a frown that could compete with that of some true blue strategist or military boss? After some brainless storming, I have come up with...

Being a bachelor must be a really lonely affair, people say it so often that one tends to believe it. May be because one says and does things which have 'lonely' written all over them. 'I had dinner at Macdees last night' - I & Macdee are the key words here; carrying much heavier meaning than what their lean structures indicate. 'Why was he alone last night? Why did he eat at Macdees?' people immeditaely start analyzing. Mainly because no sane person who is not alone should be eating at Macdees, according to those who crossed that bridge (Of eating alone at Macdees). The perspective changes if the 'I' becomes the 'We'. 'They were having a fun night out' is the immediate conclusion. At the risk of annoying my wife, I will have to say that the 'I' is always hidden in the 'We'. 'We' is just a mask, a pass to enter the club of social acceptance. As bachelors, people are interpreted in ways that make them look like ...