tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42016000481104429592024-03-07T01:30:17.365+05:30iThinkIdeas, Opinions, Observations and Startup Lessons.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.comBlogger53125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-56546115429915438492014-10-13T17:42:00.001+05:302015-07-20T17:41:57.826+05:30how NOT to hire for startup in India?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2WThQNxtpUoIKLT3tVmBh5pVlvzRHPIy9PwLCnQVSsOmbHvg7i5AKpYxI9BJgr_xuBgZXvfS2y6BbdNYzRtHD_Ok73hTvl24wHH-z8KcvOVrgbzrktplV0sJJ0xd7wRhcTbFAqG1nq0cs/s1600/how-to-hire-for-indian-startups.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="359" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2WThQNxtpUoIKLT3tVmBh5pVlvzRHPIy9PwLCnQVSsOmbHvg7i5AKpYxI9BJgr_xuBgZXvfS2y6BbdNYzRtHD_Ok73hTvl24wHH-z8KcvOVrgbzrktplV0sJJ0xd7wRhcTbFAqG1nq0cs/s1600/how-to-hire-for-indian-startups.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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I've been trying to hire programmers for my startup for past 8 weeks and have learnt a few important lessons. I hope some of these lessons will help few people.<br />
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<b>Which is the best job site in India for startup hiring?</b> I've tried nearly all the job sites. Yeah, you heard it right: All. Indian job sites as well as Indian editions of global websites. Paid sites as well as free sites. All these websites claim to have thousands of actively-looking-for-job candidates who are eager to grab your job offer so you'll start with very positive note. Here is my first-hand analysis of few major websites:<br />
<ul>
<li><b>Naukri.com</b> is the biggest job site brand in India. It's just because of their brand influence that I paid them <i>twice</i>. First time for posting a job vacancy (they call that as 'hot vacancy') and the second time for their resume database access (their jazzy name for this is Resdex). Both these attempts proved to be a futile exercise. When you search as an employer on Naukri.com, it will show 2k-3k active candidates for your job criteria but that's just a mirage. </li>
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<li>For my Job posting, I got 42 candidates' responses. Many of the responses were from freshers (even though I clearly mentioned that I am looking for 2-5 years experience candidates). Most of the remaining candidates who fulfilled my job criteria had a very below average coding experience. They have mostly worked on small Wordpress/Drupal/Magento websites. None of them has worked on high traffic high performance websites. 3-4 folks had good website portfolio in their CV, but none of them could even qualify first basic screening round. </li>
<li>In the second attempt, I took resume database access with Naukri.com. Why did I try Naukri second time when they failed abysmally the first time? When I tried Naukri.com second time, by then I've been trying to hire for 5 weeks and exhausted all other options so I <i>had</i> to try this jazzy like database access as well. Database access feature allows you to mail suitable candidates in just 1 click. I mailed 1850 candidates (yeah, that's toooo many but I guess 5 weeks hunt and having tried all other possible options made me desperate). Plus I thought let people at least apply first, then later I can very well filter them. 40 of them showed interest, 10 of them were re-applicants from first posting, rest of them had so routine-nothing-to-brag-about portfolio that I didn't even call anyone for screening round.</li>
</ul>
<li><b>indeed.co.in</b> is not so popular in India, but I anyways gave it a try. The majority of the candidates were outstation candidates (even though I had clearly mentioned that only Delhi candidates need to apply). No solid candidate applied hence nothing productive out of this website.</li>
<li><b>Linkedin India</b>. I always had this firm belief that Linked is hoax (more on this some other time in some other post) but I had to give them a try as everyone I know is on Linkedin so I thought suitable candidates must also be on Linkedin. My belief tested positive and Linkedin didn't deliver. Stats: Got 40+ responses but none had good enough work experience.</li>
<li><b>AngelList</b> (angel.co) proclaim itself as exclusively for startups. Most of the folks who applied here were freshers. I even tried to proactively approach many of the promising candidates, but no one seems to be interested in joining an unknown startup.</li>
<li>Third party recruiter/consultants: These guys claim to provide candidates' CVs and guarantee you job hire in 15 days. I didn't try them and neither should you. If you yourself wholeheartedly can't find suitable candidates even after scouring all possible job sites then how can these guys? They don't have any secret candidates who are waiting only for your job offer.</li>
<li>You may ask: did you try hasjobs.co or hirist.com or .....? yeah, tried them all.</li>
</ul>
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Some of the above websites might work really well for big companies while others might work really well for well-known-established startups, but they are not meant for newbie startups. You might be willing to pay good salary or you might also have decent office in decent locality, but nothing works :)</div>
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<b>The quality of candidates applying to startups:</b> Most of the folks I got as candidates were from second rung engineering/MCA colleges with very poor work portfolios. Most of the developers have worked on basic websites for small businesses. None of the candidates I got had experience on high traffic decently successful product/website. Most of them didn't have working knowledge of git, unit testing or database/server performance measures. Most of these developers are employed with thousands of small (5-20 people) website-making companies that mostly get their business either from freelancing websites or from local businesses. These folks are not interested in startup idea or power/capability of the idea, they are just interested in their salary.<br />
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<b>Does that mean India doesn't have rockstar developers?</b> There <i>might</i> be small fraction of good developers in India but all of them are already working with big giants like Microsoft, Amazon etc who can pay them highest possible salary, provide them plush offices and best peers to work with in India. These coders are looking at startup only from a single angle: as a future founder/cofounder. I know most of them will not be able to leave their cushy well-paying job but still there is nothing wrong in dreaming about being a founder one...fine...day... These guys won't even apply to your startup.<br />
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<b>Let's find CTO first</b>: I've seen many companies who, once they fail in hiring good developers, start to look for CTO. They think that once you've a good CTO then it will be easier to build the technical team. Plus CTO will start working on the product from day 1 so at least some progress is visible. Tell me one thing: If you are not able to hire a good developer, will you succeed in hiring CTO. The answer is NO. I've seen few companies trying this in vain so I didn't even try this.<br />
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<b>Remote team:</b> When I didn't find any good programmer in Delhi NCR, I thought let's find good developer wherever they are in India (I can't afford European/US developers) and work remotely with them. I tried this and burnt my hands. Working in remote team require highly disciplined self-driven folks (in addition to other technical skills) which is again a tough task to find. More on this later in some other post but for the sake of brevity let's say that remote working is not conducive for Indian startups.</div>
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<b>Dude, Stop complaining. What's the solution?</b> To be very frank, I've not found a solution yet. I think that having solid technical cofounder/s is the best bet. Cofounders together can design and code to launch MVP, gain some traction to make a name in the market and then start hiring. I would like to believe that better candidates will approach more established startup (I would write about that someday once I verify this:) ).<br />
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'Startup' is a glorified term that's mostly associated with glorious entrepreneurs, m/billions of dollars, innovation, brilliant people to work with, solving global problems etc etc but at first startup is just an idea. Everyone has hordes of million dollar ideas so no one cares about your idea. Cofounders are the only ones who will go through this unknown, not-glorious journey without plush office.</div>
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PS: Advice to Indian developers: I know Indian education system doesn't give you any practical training or right exposure but today they are so many open online courses from where you can learn everything from designing good UI to making large scalable websites. If you are not learning awesome stuff then you are just <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.com/2011/03/its-just-excuse.html" target="_blank">making excuses</a>.<br />
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Edit: Do you have the technical capability and grit to change the world? If yes, I am looking for Technical Cofounder: <a href="https://angel.co/lenro/jobs/77320-technical-cofounder">https://angel.co/lenro/jobs/77320-technical-cofounder</a></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-38687184089378625632014-02-22T19:30:00.001+05:302014-02-23T10:13:03.526+05:30Doing startup in parallel with your job<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Are you thinking of working on your startup in parallel to your job? Here is the news: It won’t happen.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Startup is tough. Startup is demanding. Startup is a roller coaster. You can’t do it while doing something else. You might be able to (very convincingly) fool yourself that you are doing your best while doing it in parallel but startup is 24*7 deal, you can’t do it part time. You'll work (it'll be more of trying-to-work) late nights or on weekends and feel good about yourself that you are working hard on your way to startup but feeling good is not same as delivering the product.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why doing startup in parallel is a bad idea?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>You won’t have sufficient time</b>: If you wish to extract a few hours everyday for your idea execution then it won't be easy. Your job will keep you occupied. Your work will have phony deadlines, meetings for the sake of meeting, you'll have to deliver something howsoever useless that stuff is, your office water cooler gang will keep you busy, may be your have hordes of time in office but you need to pretend to onlookers that you’re very busy, may be you’ve to mandatorily spend 9 hours in office due to some shit office rule. Something or other will keep you away from your startup work in office. And if you manage to find some time to work on your stuff then: What if someone will look, what if someone will find out, what if your friend will ask you what are you doing, what if, what if and what if…… You’ll spend more time finding answers to what ifs than doing something constructive. Few days you might be able to devote more than 10 hours/day for your startup but otherwise it will be weeks when you’ll average less than 2-3 hours a days for your real work. Who has more success probability? The one who is </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">focused and </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">continuously slogging for 12 hours a day, day-after-day or the one who is somehow managing 2-3 hours a day that too with dissipated focus and energy?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Incremental Progress</b>: If you are doing startup in parallel then because of smaller number of invested hours into startup you will not see incremental progress every day, every week. If you get stuck on some problem (and you’ll face a lot of them) then if you are working solely on startup then you’ve entire day, day-after-day, to solve the problem. But if you are solving something part time then you’ll take a few hours to get back to the problem, few hours to get into the groove and by then that day’s quota of limited hours would have been over. We work harder and with more passion when we see things are taking shape, when we see can see fruits of our hard work. If things are not taking shape or if they are not getting solved at expected pace then we lose heart, howsoever small dismay that may be. Incremental progress is the fuel to your dreams.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>You will give up</b>: Startup has lots of dark phases. There will be time - many a times - when nothing will seem to work and no solution seems to be in sight. Then you think of leaving. At the very least, you start to explore other options. When you have things going in parallel then you will have plenty of things to care for and plenty of second choices, so you unwillingly unknowingly give up during dark phases and move on to try other options. You might peace yourself with, “ I have given my best”. But with startup as the only option, you don’t have any other choice, you don’t have any other option. Either you fail or you succeed. So you will have to find some solution, some workaround to the problem. And there is always a solution a problem if you stay with it long enough and not give up. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b>Reasons you are running things in parallel:</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b>You are not convinced</b>: If you are not doing startup full time then in simple terms you are not convinced. Either not convinced about your idea or not convinced of your capability. Both the cases are fatal. Stop wasting your time and go figure why you are not convinced.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />If you are worried about your idea, then stop worrying. There is never a good idea. All ideas initially seem small, may-not-work-types. If you’ve done your homework and your gut tells that it’s kinda ok idea then get going. <br />If you are worried about your capabilities then give me one example when Superman founded a great company? None. People doing a startup do something because they really <i>want</i> to solve a problem, not because they <i>can</i> solve a problem. If you <i>want</i> then you’ll find ways to how you <i>can</i>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b>I can’t start because of xyz reason excuse</b>: Don’t have enough money to support yourself or your family? Need some backup money before you take the plunge? You want to gain some more experience in this field before you are ready? You are too young to start a startup or too old? You intend to start after 2 years? <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.com/2012/09/you-wont-start-startup.html" target="_blank">These are just excuses</a>. There is never a founder who has enough money or enough experience or insanely great team before starting up. Everything gets done on the way, on the job. Trust your gut and startup.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b>You want to save your face</b>: Startups fail. Oh yeah, majority of startups fail. If you are working on something in parallel then you have lots of excuses if your startup won’t succeed. “I didn’t have time”, “I was working on that other higher priority thing”, “this wasn’t a full time project it was just on trial basis”, “come on at least I tried” etc etc. But when you are working on startup full time then either you succeed or you fail. Nothing in between. No excuses.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b>Courage</b>: You don’t have courage. Courage to think big, courage to take the leap, courage to execute, courage to stop giving excuses and stop fooling yourself, courage to stand up to your near and dear ones, courage to start. Finally it all boils down to courage. To start a startup you need courage, nothing else. Not money, Not being highly technically competent, not great team, no support of family or friends but ….Courage. Startup is so stacked up against odds that without courage you can’t beat the odds. By various means (education, reasoning, technology), you may be able to silence a few doubts, you may be able to sideline few obstacles, you may to able to beat few odds but to start despite ALL the odds needs Courage. If you don’t have courage to wholeheartedly dedicate yourself on the altar of startup then there is not much hope.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Job is a quagmire, especially if you don’t love it. Sometime you’ll cling to job for some promotion, sometime for next salary because you need that money for some important event, sometime you can’t leave because what will you tell your girlfriend, sometime you won’t leave because you’ll prove yourself irresponsible once again in your parents’ eye, sometime you need to get married so you can’t leave job, then you can’t leave because you’re married and need to run house, then who will have to pay fees of your kid and then….In short, You are screwed. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Everyone wants to do a startup but how many of us finds time and dedicate that time for startup? T</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">he-job-you-don't-love kills your passion to conquer the world and s.l.o.w.l.y makes you from Alexander the great to yet another average guy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Stop wasting time fooling yourself. Find courage to pursue your dream. That’s real you.</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-82257212722552091362013-09-27T17:34:00.002+05:302013-09-27T23:35:42.577+05:30Confusing symbols for Shift, Control and Option keyboard keys<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you use MacBook you might have seen utterly confusing shortcuts like:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img alt="confusing shortcuts on MacBook" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK5EdCe2Qj1J-1opefgllq1C1lc_FYk4LblZVBq1weFDGvK3A9v7N5bMNVlK7Fm_pgdiO1e7rvIXV7EVXZWedwDa7MA8QTzECw8yTRNld3-NYhiyYtVIDdHYJ-mr02mvtYdBeQlOS-Yz_A/s320/confusing+shortcuts+on+MacBook.png" title="confusing shortcuts on MacBook" width="290" /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you are recent convert to MacBook, just like me, then you will go crazy remembering these shortcuts. You don't see </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 19.1875px;">⌥, ^ or </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 19.1875px;">⇧ keys anywhere but still they are so prominent in each and every shortcut. You don't see them, so you can't relate to them hence they are so difficult to remember.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 19.1875px;">I did some googling around and found out that old keyboards used to have these symbols (icons or figures) on keyboards:</span></span></div>
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<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/26/Apple_Modifier_Keys.jpg/800px-Apple_Modifier_Keys.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/26/Apple_Modifier_Keys.jpg/800px-Apple_Modifier_Keys.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now world, even Apple, has moved on but shortcuts are still veteran ones. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">@</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Apple: You are amongst the most user friendly company on this planet and if you ignore dust like this in some of your alcoves then it's not good. Let's find user friendly and easy to remember shortcuts, Please.</span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-7792532136080754362013-01-24T21:31:00.000+05:302013-01-24T21:36:30.727+05:30Deciding factor<span id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; white-space: pre-wrap;">Life is full of choices and we have to decide. Yes, there are choices even when you fool yourself into believing that you don't have any choice. Sometimes choices are for trivial stuff, other times decisions of life.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; white-space: pre-wrap;">Shall I do what is norm or do what I think is right?</span></span><br />
<span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; white-space: pre-wrap;">Shall I bide time (and count miserable days) with people I don't like or go searching for something better?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Shall I say it or swallow it?</span></b></span><br />
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Shall I start my company or keep this well-paying job?</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">... and so on, questions never stop. </span></b></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; white-space: pre-wrap;">So how do you decide?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It's very simple, Choose the path that makes you happy.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If people around you have accepted rat race quagmire life and are carrying on the way it is then decide whether that is making you happy or not. If not, people’s opinion is waste.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">If people around you are succeeding by being servile or by falling in line but if that doesn't sound like you. Then decide what makes you happy.</span></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">World will push you to some mould and expects you to fit in there. Do you fit in or are you discontent there, decide based on your happiness. But even after spending years inside the mould if you feel you don’t really belong there then it is the time to search for happiness.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sometime people says that its just short term pain but I’ll happy one day. That one day is today. Tomorrow never comes.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="http://bhorowitz.com/2012/06/15/the-struggle/" target="_blank">Struggle</a></span><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> doesn't means unhappiness. Struggle can be road to freedom, path to happiness. If you've chosen your struggle and it's not enforced on you, then you'll feel happiness even in struggle.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Expectations from family, society, job, friends is just mirage. Once you've decided something then people and environment will mould themselves accordingly. </span></span></span><b id="internal-source-marker_0.7007715366780758"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Whatever you decide, you may wonder if that is right and wrong; there is <a href="http://www.gapingvoid.com/old_images//ws0904%20jpeg.jpg" target="_blank">no right or wrong</a>. </span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Will you do <i>it</i> if money is not a criterion or if you don’t have to please anyone? </span></span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Any money, place, person that makes you miserable is Not worth it. </span></b><br />
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Choose Happiness.</span></b><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></b>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-71706021666417409802013-01-13T18:59:00.000+05:302013-01-13T18:59:04.782+05:30Why not?<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Do I need to change my job? Shall I wait for another 3 months?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Do i need to start a startup?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why should I be the one who stand up for <i>this </i>cause?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every question you ask yourself you are putting yourself in defense. Reasoning with self is good but asking "do I need to stand up for this?" at the start of reasoning means that s</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ubconsciously we've already told our mind that we should not do it. We are reinforcing fear and dissuading</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="https://plus.google.com/102657398996895315995/posts/RExxt8biYsD" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank">courage</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Metaphorically this is like you telling yourself that you can’t even run 1 km and then try to persuade yourself to run a Marathon.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why not put ourselves in doer’s shoes and start reasoning/introspection by asking ourselves 'why not?' There are chances that you’ll think from totally different angle. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why not change the company?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why not start a startup?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why not I stand up for this?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why, how, are the words for people finding excuses. 'Why not' is for doers. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why not frees you from shackles of doubt. Doubt is always there, even Mark Zuckerberg was skeptical of Facebook as a company when he started it. In fact every entrepreneur has been. But why not startup? Let’s start up.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When you need to ask yourself any question start with: Why not?</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-11029860323001819662012-12-28T21:45:00.002+05:302013-09-27T23:38:19.220+05:30Design considerations for Codecademy<a href="http://codecademy.com/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank">Codecademy</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> is a great website for learning programming. It is helping thousands (may be millions) of people learn how to code. Content wise Codecademy rocks however there are few design areas where Codecademy can improve on. Before I want to start on I want to state it categorically that am not a professional designer. I am just a grateful user who wants to give my feedback to a very useful website that is giving so much to users. Here I go:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(Note: please click on blog images for bigger, better and clear images)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Codecademy header needs to be visible. Always.</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW932-57_zQBz5MuoxFPcAidmIrfltdvx6zHMvZga-pA9OYpofBhm0refJyouYMpprxLDpeIAzWyPKJakKeSQycsvpcHhyphenhyphenPzEABjnZwpTGlwHxBBPh0IROpSZeAIfdDUvXtWzWI2xTTF3D/s1600/Codecademy+header.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Codecademy header" border="0" height="33" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW932-57_zQBz5MuoxFPcAidmIrfltdvx6zHMvZga-pA9OYpofBhm0refJyouYMpprxLDpeIAzWyPKJakKeSQycsvpcHhyphenhyphenPzEABjnZwpTGlwHxBBPh0IROpSZeAIfdDUvXtWzWI2xTTF3D/s640/Codecademy+header.png" title="Codecademy header" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Header contains a company’s brand identity (logo) and the most important links. Moving header outside visible page (like in image below) when user scrolls down is not a good option. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Always flaunt who you are.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTUc_mzXi4_6Dw-qGrhszgp02ycoTsyGTtQquB86RGUm1V8PqNK1MoH2zq_r2GD3gPzbxHdUzUPBrh_JMwzx0oAtK8jm_PZ4SgZOJXNvVTPgjxYLkVFDlAviWx5BeYGjjg-Z56yfWJH4wb/s1600/Codecademy+header+not+visible.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Codecademy header not visible" border="0" height="99" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTUc_mzXi4_6Dw-qGrhszgp02ycoTsyGTtQquB86RGUm1V8PqNK1MoH2zq_r2GD3gPzbxHdUzUPBrh_JMwzx0oAtK8jm_PZ4SgZOJXNvVTPgjxYLkVFDlAviWx5BeYGjjg-Z56yfWJH4wb/s640/Codecademy+header+not+visible.png" title="Codecademy header not visible" width="640" /></a></div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Other moving and fixed parts:</b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Editor area and Result area should always remain fixed on web page independent of scroll (unless when user scrolls to the bottom of the page for footer). Even now Editor and Result areas are somewhat fixed but slightly moves up and down as user scrolls up or down. There is no need for them to move. While writing a line of code user is generally focused on a particular line in editor area and simultaneously going through lesson's instructions. When user scrolls up/down the lesson instruction pane, Editor area also wavers up/down because of which user need to refocus/find her line of code again. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lessons' instructions should move up and down independent of right hand side Editor and Result area. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Run, Reset and Save options:</b></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-feLhW4EIfeuh7BPEulrTvW_ViPX1ogX3SsdlXIpkHMbsUVxlZ-y1qAQGIZ7UKJMiEfPTppuuoDJXGBZVUNAHdEcfHATliH8ZBn0dhj2zyk_gI-HYL10gj8OSXJbAJW-W7oTdKFX2PsI2/s1600/Codecademy+Run+Save+and+Reset+options.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="276" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-feLhW4EIfeuh7BPEulrTvW_ViPX1ogX3SsdlXIpkHMbsUVxlZ-y1qAQGIZ7UKJMiEfPTppuuoDJXGBZVUNAHdEcfHATliH8ZBn0dhj2zyk_gI-HYL10gj8OSXJbAJW-W7oTdKFX2PsI2/s640/Codecademy+Run+Save+and+Reset+options.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Run, Reset and Save buttons/info is getting duplicated on screen hence eating a lot of precious web space. Info from both the highlighted areas (in image above) can be clubbed in a single horizontal row. Something like: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Green Run button (Ctrl+enter) then </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Red Reset button (Alt+R)<span style="white-space: pre;"> then G</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">rey Save button (Ctrl+S).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This will also free up some space for increasing height of result area so that users can see more lines of result in result area. Exercises where result is displayed in various lines will be better and fully displayed in that case.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Movement from one section to other:</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When one section is finished in a course then link to next section is shown in result area. If we click on that link then next section instruction set appears but it is never completely visible on web page. Some part of the lesson is always hidden at the top. A user has to scroll up the instruction panel to see start of new section’s instruction set.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Wrapping text in Editor as well as Result area:</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcDZe80xeD5oXIAsvahThg3ae6n9fT_j89TmErkM9JHoGsYaa7L26bZl9WlXUCDwtQTw11Ip_B3u7R62X514vLhKfh-ZsvxTKvPKMlqY1TX7tECPws7nlIVZ02JbtTpLE2m2h4qO-_DFLo/s1600/Codecademy+error+message+overflows+console+area.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="100" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcDZe80xeD5oXIAsvahThg3ae6n9fT_j89TmErkM9JHoGsYaa7L26bZl9WlXUCDwtQTw11Ip_B3u7R62X514vLhKfh-ZsvxTKvPKMlqY1TX7tECPws7nlIVZ02JbtTpLE2m2h4qO-_DFLo/s640/Codecademy+error+message+overflows+console+area.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If some error message is longer than width of the result area then result area doesn't auto-wrap the message. It just goes beyond the console area and is not visible.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Codecademy track>>course>>section alignment:</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiqDSYvocCuiiGi8ndG4-0HD4GxZwBcqXyZNxrQzEJO77H6yIIcUZL6ZxZG2XfMp-WtcJDMc3gaTDA80Dgx5jJFZDKLAUbZ6WhKUZx_qamvPojmKFZz-H_AKrIImXBE51vABayq-rT8Qlq/s1600/Codecademy+track+course+section+alignment.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="129" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiqDSYvocCuiiGi8ndG4-0HD4GxZwBcqXyZNxrQzEJO77H6yIIcUZL6ZxZG2XfMp-WtcJDMc3gaTDA80Dgx5jJFZDKLAUbZ6WhKUZx_qamvPojmKFZz-H_AKrIImXBE51vABayq-rT8Qlq/s640/Codecademy+track+course+section+alignment.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Course hierarchy seems to be displayed in disorderly fashion on web page. Track>>Course (for ex JavaScript>>Getting Started with Programming?) is on right hand side while section name (“Why learn programming” in this case) is on left hand side. If all three of them can come neatly on left hand side (may be like: JavaScript>>Getting Started with Programming>>Why learn programming?) then hierarchy will be more clear and some precious web space can be spared for Editor/Result area.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-70657958644921216372012-12-20T08:41:00.000+05:302012-12-20T08:41:11.561+05:30Would I love to work this on my deathbed?<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This might seem a bit extreme criteria to evaluate what you <i>really </i>want to work on but answer to this will tell you whether the job that you are doing now is meant for you or not. Whatever you would love to work on your deathbed you should be doing that <i>now</i>. Earning livelihood by doing <i>some </i>job will make you like so many people who want to just do their job, earn, retire early so that they can enjoy their life -- metaphorically it's like saving up sex for old age. Why would you want to retire if you love what you are doing? If you don’t love your work then nothing great will ever be created by you.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are hordes of stories of people working unbelievable number of hours everyday, people working very hard despite very unfavorable conditions. You can't make those people work like that just for livelihood, they work for their love. People working on <i>job </i>wait for 5 pm.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mathematician <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonhard_Euler" target="_blank">Euler</a> lost one of his eyes in his twenties but that didn't handicap his love for math. In fact he went on to say that "I’ll have less of distraction". He kept working and lost vision in his second eye at age of 70. Even complete blindness couldn't stop him working on solving mathematical problems. He proved to be even more productive in his blindness and worked for 17 years in total blindness.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is not madness for mathematics. This is epitome of love for the job/love.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc" target="_blank">Find your love.</a> If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-54067857445562500732012-10-10T08:56:00.001+05:302012-10-10T09:11:15.613+05:30Give me the estimate<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you are managing people who are doing work that has not been your forte then estimation can be deluding process for you. You can't estimate yourself in this case so first you ask for estimates and then try to validate them. The moment you ask for estimate from a person you are asking for his commitment, asking for his word. No one in this world wants to be proven wrong, even to himself. No one wants to go back on their words. So the moment estimate is asked that person start to estimate by including all risks, all possible disasters that may happen, all possible subjective worries. When estimate is done after factoring in all these fears no doubt estimate will be inflated. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You can get estimates reviewed by peers or specialist within/outside team but most probably you won't find any deviation. People within an organization have a healthy fear or healthy respect or social/professional dependency with each other so until something is not glaringly wrong it won’t be pointed out.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Validating estimate by established estimation standards never work. Standards are too general whereas estimate has to be specific. So standards can act as guideline but they can never validate estimate.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Getting estimate from a person and then boss him to cut it down 20% and then continuously sit on the top of his head to finish it even faster never helps.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So how work can be get done in more efficient manner?
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By placing your faith in the person. Tell him not to worry about missing deadlines, not to worry about repercussions, not to worry at all. Request him to work, just work and give his best. By faith all the buffer estimates (read fears) evaporates. Once the assurance is given to the person, keep faith in him. Don’t start moaning the moment something goes out of the line. Keeping faith doesn't mean that you forget about him. Do keep track of the progress at mutually comfortable level. Keep judging the person. If at any point you feel your faith is being misused, act.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are circumstances when estimation will be mandatorily required so only faith won't serve the need. But whenever possible give faith a chance.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Faith will give you positive surprises. In today’s world people are not treated with faith and that’s why world is so cynical, cautious and inefficient. You give a person your faith and there will be occasions when you will be pleasantly surprised. There will be times when you’ll find gem of a person.
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-15427128986933188152012-09-17T09:18:00.001+05:302012-09-17T09:25:01.045+05:30You won’t start a startup<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you feel that you’ll earn enough in 2 years and then you’ll start a startup, that’s not gonna happen. You’ll never earn enough (it’s human psyche; ask Warren Buffet if he has earned enough). For you to start working on your dream project - passion, food and shelter is all you need.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you feel that you’ll settle down first and then you’ll start a startup, that’s not gonna happen. Life doesn’t give you time to settle down, there is always more life. You settle down when you are dead. Startup is a roller coaster experience so better start a startup when you are not settled.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you feel that you want to give yourself some time so that you can learn enough and read enough for a startup then keep learning and reading, startup not gonna happen</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #999999;">[<a href="#f1n"><span style="color: #999999;">1</span></a>]</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. You can never learn enough for a startup unless you are working on your startup. Reading books/ blogs/articles/essays for 1 year is equivalent to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-C0wApn1vI" target="_blank">working in your startup for 1 day</a>. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you think you will think of an Awesome Idea first then you'll startup, that's not gonna happen. There are no awesome ideas. All ideas for startup look small, niche, not-great at first. They shape up to be a great idea on the way. So if you’re not already on the way, then it's not gonna happen.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you're working for some giant company that pays you enough but you dream that you'll get out one day then that's not gonna happen. Decent pay in Giant organization will make you comfortable, lazy and coward. Forget that startup; keep pleasing people for your next promotion/salary-hike. Or be courageous and give shape to your idea.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When you start making how-to-climb-the-ladder plans in your current organization but you feel that you'll think about, or focus on, startup in parallel, that's not gonna happen. You don't do startup in parallel. Either you do startup or you don’t but never ‘in parallel’. It’s full time job. It's 24*7. May be not 24*7 work but 24*7 focus and dedication for sure.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When time flies you'll not see it fleeting. When it’ll be 2 years and then 5 and then 10 years you'll not even realise. Time flies. It’s going on now. It’s now or never.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If startup is your want and not your need, you won’t start one.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">[<a name="f1n"><span style="color: black;">1</span></a>] Reading, after a certain age, diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking. – Albert Einstein</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-84462757602453608932012-08-08T19:25:00.000+05:302012-08-08T19:25:36.193+05:30Worst thing about<b id="internal-source-marker_0.03386740409769118" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s the worst thing about your product/service?</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s the worst thing about your website?</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s the worst thing about your team?</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When you seek feedback from people in superlative term, it works. People answer more openly. If you ask “Name two things that can be improved in our product?”, it gives the impression that you are trying to be defensive or you created this questionnaire just because your manager asked you to.</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Create a contest amongst your customer support executives on what’s the worst thing about your product/service. Results will surprise you.</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Create a contest amongst your Beta testers on what’s the worst thing about your mobile app.</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Create a contest amongst your newly hires on what’s the worst thing in hiring and onboarding process.</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Create a contest amongst your employees on what’s the worst thing about your company's intranet portal.</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Contests are better than surveys. People willing to give <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.com/2010/05/feedback.html" target="_blank">feedback</a> will answer in both the cases but certain set of people tend to act when there is a carrot on the other side.</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When you start finding worst thing en route you’ll find nearly all the flaws.</span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Creating great stuff means you need to go to great lengths. </span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span><br /><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s the worst thing about this blog?</span></span></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></b>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-83103286964031598582012-07-13T11:18:00.001+05:302012-07-13T11:18:26.172+05:30What can i do?<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZDd7Xhgvge_06l2h_wcy0i72OTHJap-WqLaz8ENVdZy8RvL1HWh2TwWNeD3YHi6IFS_Ib4c3iZqg5updHafH0v3-rU4inxBqKSG6eKSvIO9A1vhaDCawXRFsEB7C9R4S78-EEeG-Lu59J/s1600/IMAG0322.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="237" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZDd7Xhgvge_06l2h_wcy0i72OTHJap-WqLaz8ENVdZy8RvL1HWh2TwWNeD3YHi6IFS_Ib4c3iZqg5updHafH0v3-rU4inxBqKSG6eKSvIO9A1vhaDCawXRFsEB7C9R4S78-EEeG-Lu59J/s400/IMAG0322.jpg" width="400" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I generally go to this sports complex for jogging. There is a mini football field where 20-25 kids play football regularly. Today, due to Monsoon rain, football field was filled with water. Few of the kids were bantering in a group at a distance whereas few others were standing dejected near the football field. While passing by I told them to ‘do something’ about the field. One of the kids said, in a very sad tone, “What can I do?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Adversities are always there, small or big. Either we decide to solve problem or <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.in/2011/03/its-just-excuse.html" target="_blank">excuse</a> ourselves into ‘what can I do’ mode. By passing the buck to <i>the system</i> or to someone else we just try to fool ourselves. Many a time we shirk by saying I can’t do anything substantial. Until we do something how can we decide that it won't be substantial? Substantial is secondary, doing something is primary. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The kids instead of dropping the ball could have done a lot.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Form a Facebook group and mobilize like minded people to act. <i>System </i>tend to listen to passionate group.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Question right authorities on the <a href="http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2012/07/10/the-council-that-kicked-the-hornets-nest-a-rare-call-to-action/" target="_blank">right forums</a>. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Request people to help you and someone will.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Start a <a href="http://www.indiaagainstcorruption.org/" target="_blank">revolution</a>. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Start conversation. You might find one of your football buddy’s parent worthy of helping you.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If no one comes then <a href="http://littleenginehomecare.com/the-star-fish-story/" target="_blank">do your part</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you're <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.in/2012/04/if-youre-in-doubt-do-it.html" target="_blank">not sure what to do</a>, do something.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You can always do something. Always.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-47051695565043651222012-07-11T13:58:00.000+05:302012-07-11T13:58:38.037+05:30Great Thoughts Time<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When did you last dedicated time for conscious proactive thinking?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Thinking </i>(more of mind wondering aimlessly) while you are waiting for something (your flight is delayed, etc) is different.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Planning </i>in reaction to something (launched product turned out a dud; missed promotion) is different. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When you think in reaction to something, there is a worry part attached to it and that inhibits your free thinking. You will not be able to enter into great thoughts territory with worry as your baggage.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">‘Great thoughts time’ means you dedicate certain time, may be 1 hour every week, to consciously think Great thoughts. Think which way your industry, in which you are working, is heading? Think what product can you launch that will solve a problem. Think what can be the next app that will make something easier. Think how you can make your current startup into a great company. What’s good, what’s bad and what can be made better. Think how, why, when and what of things.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Great Thoughts Time will take your thinking level to new horizon. It will help you focus on great, bigger problems. It will help you to figure out where the world is heading so that you can go there and solve better problems.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">‘Good/better’ can be achieved by planning or run-time thinking but ‘great’ will incubate only in Great thoughts time.<span style="background-color: white;"> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Find your Great Thoughts time. And Think. Solve bigger problems.<span style="background-color: white;"> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Richard Hamming talked about great thought time in one of his talks. I would <a href="http://www.paulgraham.com/hamming.html" target="_blank">highly recommend this essay</a>.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-71757929363719407972012-06-16T08:19:00.000+05:302012-06-16T08:19:36.412+05:30I’ve done all that I can do<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you say this? Or you feel a tinge of remorse and recall the things that you could have done but didn’t?<br />I was reading biography of Steve Jobs when this line hit me like a thunderbolt. I am not going to write anything about biography now as that might be topic for other time. Jobs said this on the day he relinquished his CEO post from Apple. That evening author (Walter Issaacson) of his biography came to meet him. By this time Jobs have already been suffering from bouts of cancer for several years and he was well aware that he was about to die.<br />I am very certain that there must miniscule percentage of people who could say this at the dusk of their life or at the end of any day. We all run in life after immediate short term goals like a headless chicken. Can you say this today? If not, then this is the time to do whatsoever you think you can. I wish, I could have, I should have, <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.in/2010/04/given-chance.html" target="_blank">given a chance</a>, are all <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.in/2011/03/its-just-excuse.html" target="_blank">excuses</a>. Stop living the life of someone else’s image of you. Stop living by other people’s advice, recommendation or lessons. Go live your Dream. Do whatsoever you think you can do. Forget social assumptions and norms. Drop people’s expectations. They are all bullshit. You know what you can do and you are right.<br />Live to say: I’ve done all that I can do.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />PS: There are several times when something (statement, action, thought etc.) hit me like thunderbolt. That makes me stop; Stop whatsoever I am doing and think; Think about that thing. I call them Wisdom thunderbolt or wisbolt. I’ll be sharing those in future with ‘thunderbolt’ tag. Thanks.</span><br />
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<br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-66436285956036184032012-04-19T14:44:00.001+05:302012-04-19T14:44:42.862+05:30If you’re in doubt, do it.<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our ecosystem – education, family or society – is hell bent on creating intellectual midgets. We are taught to be Always Right. We are taught, “If you’re in doubt, Don’t”. We are taught not to make a fool of ourselves by doing anything anti-majority. We are taught to avoid people's mockery. We are taught to avoid confrontation. We are taught to feign omniscience and not ask question even if we don’t know something. We are taught not to tell people that they are wrong, even if they are wrong. We are taught to avoid and ignore things/people. We are taught not to question authorities, rules, traditions, processes, and so called intelligentsia. We are taught directly, indirectly, surreptitiously to be a midget. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You need to fight everyone, even yourself, to avoid this midget trap.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Try things.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Imagine.</span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Explore.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Make mistakes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Learn. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Question.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Do it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even lovable Steve Jobs preached ‘<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc" target="_blank">Stay hungry, Stay Foolish</a>’. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you are in doubt, Do it.</span><br />
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-39842933399258262692012-03-22T11:16:00.001+05:302012-03-22T11:16:59.667+05:30Just one concern<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At times, you get some concern from just one team member, from just one client or from just one customer. Your first thought will be ‘exceptions are always there. Ignore it’ or ‘this guy is finicky’.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nope.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In this diplomatic world of ours not everyone complains. Not everyone is courageous enough to raise a concern. The concern from that one person can be concern of many more but others just prefer to ignore it. Most people, even if they encounter some problem/hassle don’t report it. That doesn't mean that concern went unnoticed. The feeling of discontent might simmer in people or remain in their subconscious for long. These people will give wrong feedback to others in their area of influence or at worst they might ditch your product/services.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Discontent leads to bad vibes and people with bad vibes spread cooked up information which leads to rumors. And Rumors are failure of leadership.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Concern from one person might also be a premonition. That person might be the first one to experience it and reporting it proactively. If you listen to the first one promptly then you can avoid big time issues/discomfort.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Understand concern from every single source, especially exceptions, and address it. And then broadcast that message to bigger audience who, you feel, might have been impacted. Address the concern. Broadcast it categorically. This will kills rumors and give people a sense of importance that their concern gets addressed. This is a small gesture but this can have huge impact.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Exceptions are not meant to be ignored.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-82664444860352926402012-02-29T11:23:00.000+05:302012-02-29T11:23:06.216+05:30You compromise only once<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are times when we are running into deadlines and we have to deliver with some compromise on quality.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are times when your client is a very demanding person, but with no additional budget.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are times when your software developer will feel (or he may shout aloud) that you are becoming too finicky about small quality control details.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are times when your friends will feel that you are being too rigid. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are times when you feel that this is wrong and I should stop it. But then your <a href="http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/01/quieting-the-lizard-brain.html" target="_blank">Lizard brain</a> asks you to just avoid it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are times when you feel you will start exercising; from tomorrow.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That is the time when you stand up and act.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Because you compromise only once, thereafter it will be a habit.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Be a yardstick of quality. Don’t be flexible in your expectations.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tell that client that any new changes will be billed afresh. She might feel offended but if you deliver great quality she will understand.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tell your friends that I can’t be flexible on this. This might feel anti majority but <i>this is what I feel</i>. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tell your developer one more time that god lies in details and quality is the most important.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Compromise is Sin.</span><br />
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<br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-66708087847214920952012-02-25T12:06:00.000+05:302012-02-25T12:06:54.804+05:30If it’s difficult, you still didn’t get it.<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Everything is simple. Yes, Everything.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If something is complex, it means you didn’t spend the right amount of time on it, with requisite Focus.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There must be times when you solved something and felt, “ohh that was Simple”. It was not simple. You worked on it to make it simple. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If something still perplex you. You still didn’t get the right angle or right context.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Steve Jobs said “That’s been one of my mantras – focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex. You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What about legal document, terms and conditions, insurance docs, red herring etc? They are not simple. That’s why Nobody reads them. I am sure you don’t want your service/product to be of that class. How can you incorporate this in your company culture? Include “Make it Simpler” in your company philosophy. Whenever you are about to deliver something, Ask yourself “How can I make it simpler”.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Whatsoever is your field, things should be simple to you. Simplify. And then Simplify some more.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It’s elementary Mr. Watson.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-11090173212675088642012-02-22T11:25:00.000+05:302012-02-22T14:31:12.834+05:30Plans, Will Fail.<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Your plans are your faith in yourself. You plan something and you believe that it will succeed. Belief is never totally rational. There is always a pinch (sometimes tons) of emotions in a Plan. Plans always succeed in Mind. Plans are always million dollar idea. Plan always brings you fame, in plans.When you plan a startup, you believe in that idea. You do try to be logical and rational but faith is always there. You might have junked tens of plans before starting ‘the one’.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Plans are based on your past experiences and your learning from various sources. Tell you, past experiences don’t exactly repeat in future and learning is way different from ground, dirty, reality. Infrastructure, Hiring, Budget, client payments and processes, they are all plans. And they will all go haywire.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You planned to hire; you planned to create, you planned to deliver. That's ideal plan stuff, but things are totally different on ground zero. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That’s the thrill. Entrepreneurs dare. Plans will fail. And only then some plan will click. They are not failing, they are teaching you. Your faith in yourself will finally work. Your plan # xyz will surely work. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is the time to plan and today is the time to <a href="http://gapingvoid.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/babson-ps-005j.jpg" target="_blank">execute</a>.</span><br />
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-46693385330472347932012-02-21T15:26:00.000+05:302012-02-21T15:26:26.421+05:30Your carrot is not my carrot<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You might be encouraging your team to work harder by promising them higher salary, provided they show results. Some managers promise better growth while others promise lesser work pressure in future. But when a manager offers something, he is showing the carrot which is a carrot to the manager.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You promise promotion, your team might be looking for frequent appreciations.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You are offering better hike but team members might be seeking better work culture.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You are offering stability however a team member might be seeking new challenges outside current domain.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You might be offering daily challenges but team might want to specialize in one particular focus area.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">People promise for things that they like. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This carrot approach is botched up in nearly all the appraisals system in nearly all the companies. Companies define a framework for its people and decide what the carrot is. Appraisal frameworks generalize the things but carrot is highly specific to an individual.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Same applies to products and services you are offering.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Your product is class apart functionally but your customers might be more inclined towards its exterior looks. Your product is good for showoff but your customers might love a more economical product. You give some service economically but you customers might be more interested in easy availability.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Find carrot of the person you are talking to and then talk in terms of that carrot.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-19794311545207263932012-02-19T16:12:00.000+05:302012-02-19T16:12:00.052+05:30Boredom is good<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you are not content with the status quo you feel bored. Playing-meeting-after-meeting job is status quo; am-looking-for-a-good-idea inertia is status quo; am-waiting-for-my-chance <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.in/2011/03/its-just-excuse.html" target="_blank">excuse </a>is status quo. Status quo doesn't help anything. Status quo is just inertia.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By boredom, your <a href="http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/01/quieting-the-lizard-brain.html" target="_blank">lizard brain</a> has signaled you that it’s time to create something; it’s time to try something new. Boredom doesn’t depict lethargy; it depicts your discontent with status quo. Boredom tells that you want to change the current situation. Your mind somehow knows that you can ignite a revolution and that’s why it’s signaling you to start something. Doing mundane job without even realizing that you’ve become mechanical is bad, not boredom. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Boredom is good.</span><br />
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<br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-9852772387749742882012-02-15T12:10:00.000+05:302012-02-15T12:10:42.701+05:30Startup block<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Good talkers never get talker block and intelligent writers never get <a href="http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2011/09/talkers-block.html" target="_blank">writer’s block</a>. Gist is that when you talk, talk, and talk more, you produce golden words during that journey. Same applies to writing. It might seem that few people produce excellent speech or excellent writing every single time they deliver. That’s an illusion. Because behind that great quality published work there lie tons of unpublished work. It’s rightly said that it takes 20 year to become overnight success.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There is no startup block. If you keep looking for that perfect idea, perfect execution plan, perfect team or perfect infrastructure, it will never work. Sorry if that seems offhand but that’s truth. Ideate, execute and repeat this till you hit the bull’s eye. There is no right team, no right plan or no right time. You have to get your hands dirty and try several things because it’s only in that journey that you’ll bump into the right thing. Get out of that starter block of yours and start playing the game. It will work. For sure.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-27806769652874613822011-06-15T10:04:00.002+05:302011-06-17T09:50:50.061+05:30Where is your Quarterly result?<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I am always surprised by the quarterly result of successful companies. A lot of successful companies relentlessly grow q</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">uarter on quarter</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. They strive for <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Hairy_Audacious_Goal">some targets</a>, achieve them and then move on to higher, loftier targets. They don’t halt to take rest, they don’t brag too much, they don’t get tired, they don’t give excuses. They do their best, and better that best very next quarter. Companies seem indefatigable whereas we human beings are so complacent, so very complacent.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We, human beings, look for growth in long term. And many a times we just lose track of time. Time just fly by us and then we wonder -- ohh the year is gone, ohh I’ve been thinking on this for past 6 years, ohh 4 years of graduation are gone, blah blah.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why don’t we start declaring our quarterly results?</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Quarterly/ bi-quarterly appraisals at work can serve the same purpose as quarterly result but in appraisals you tend to bloat your achievement in hunt of higher salary increment. So to avoid fudging data declare your quarterly result to yourself.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We make so many promises to ourselves, or give so much hope to ourselves, but things fade into oblivion during course of time as we remain engulfed in our mundane routine. And even if promises/hopes ricochet, we are so good at deluding ourselves. We have <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.com/2011/03/its-just-excuse.html">excuses</a> ready for our every failure, every lapse.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Treat yourself as a listed company. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You, owner of company, should be answerable to you, the stakeholder.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When you are in stakeholder's shoes question ruthlessly why you, the owner, are not performing well. Wash down all your excuses and stop building castles in the air. Start declaring your quarterly results. In your quarterly result:</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Give next year’s forecast: Write down what you want to achieve in next one year.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Give your quarterly profit/loss: Write down your successes and failures. Write down whether you are on right track to achieve your annual forecast or whether you need to alter the forecast.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Give your exceptional expenditure: Write down unforeseen blocker that caused dent to your milestones/achievements.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You can jot down a few lines at the end of every week to build a repository of your activities that you can refer and analyze later for declaring your quarterly result.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Am starting off with my quarterly result. Are you?</span><br />
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</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-160224220250471992011-05-10T12:40:00.000+05:302011-05-10T12:40:05.691+05:30Presentation mirage<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">People claim highest, portray best and promise maximum in presentations. Is your management team claiming a lot in presentations? ‘Accrued saving of $50,000’, ‘possible saving of $225,000’ blah blah. Does this sound familiar? Why all the presentations make things look good, rosy and optimistic?</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">People claim tall in presentations because:</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- Presentations are not connected with any statistical database so fabricated claims can’t be impromptu cross verified</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- Presentations are never stored in any centralised repository. So whatever claims made last quarter are already forgotten so you can make fresh big delusive claims, yet again, and earn accolades.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- Presentations are short, one side communication meetings. People don’t ask right questions because of ever pervasive ‘time shortage’. When few people do ask some probing questions, they are replied with mundane gibberish jargon for every question. No more cross questions asked as that might seem argument and people shy away from arguments in meetings. Am good to you, you all remain good to me doesn’t solve anything.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Don’t fall prey to delusional claims. </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Make sure all claims are verified, tracked and monitored against centralised statistics repository. </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Don’t allow people give you some general jargoned nice circuitous answer to your question. Ask right question and expect right direct answer. Anything less is blasphemy.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Don’t feel guilty that you might put people in a fix in the meeting. Don’t give people leeway on their non-performance. </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Be the yardstick of quality, to yourself, to others, always.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-51621379768751724602011-04-06T23:31:00.001+05:302011-04-07T09:04:11.918+05:30Don’t push me to the brink<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- Mobile number portability got introduced in India some days back. When unhappy customer tried moving to other telecom operator she is given cheaper monthly rental and very attractive call rates plan.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- An employee stays with a company for years but when desired growth doesn’t happen she finally resigns, disgruntled. Then same company offers her a good salary hike plus other perks.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- A service offered is not up to the mark. Customer requests, grovel, cries; in vain. She threatens to sue the company in consumer court. Service is provided and some placatory compensation is doled out by company.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why companies push people the brink and when customer is about to cut loose then same company try to retain them. It doesn’t work. Once human loyalty is hijacked, you won’t be able to rekindle same faith in customer. You might be able to retain customer but she won’t act as your <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.com/2010/06/create-advocates.html">advocate</a>. She will be there with you just for the time being and something better will lure her away. Broken trust is nearly impossible to repair. And in this lightening paced world people don’t have time to trust you for the second time.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dear corporation, don’t push me to the brink.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dear Executive, Are you reading the stats on how many people were pushed to the brink in your company, how many of them stayed back, stayed for how long, anything you could have done to not to push them to the brink?</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4201600048110442959.post-66287943301506449912011-04-06T16:50:00.000+05:302011-04-06T16:50:53.917+05:30Write to me<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Managers/Leaders/Executives often ask themselves: How do I build trust with my team. How to open floodgates of communications? How to tell team members to open up so as to seek real feedback? How to create an environment of openness?</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Writing, p</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ersonally,</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> to your team once a week (or once in 2 weeks) is the mantra that can make things happen. It can be sort of blog but you send that in a mail to your team, directly to their inbox. When Leader writes to me directly apprising me of the plans, happenings, learning, successes, failures, i feel special. I feel being valued. I feel that am worthy in hierarchy and not just a cog. I will appreciate that you took time to write to me.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Make this writing subtle professional with a touch of team warmth. Write some informal stuff at the end to give it a personal touch and not just any newsletter.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Benefits to this practice:</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- It kills rumors. I strongly feels that ‘Rumors are failure of leadership’. People usually get information through various informal channels but when a leader substantiates/discard/reason the rumours/happenings then it breeds faith and kill future gossips.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- It gives a sense of <a href="http://hoodasaurabh.blogspot.com/2011/03/reassure.html">reassurance</a> to people at ground level, at all levels, to your team.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- It creates openness. People will write more to you giving you right ideas/feedback/opinions.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- It gives people a chance to confide in you. It open direct channel, kills hierarchy.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">- It pushes your middle management layer to be more open, deliver more and keep promises. </span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Whether you are doing good, or its just business as usual or you are in some unruly crisis, write to me.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">PS: While i was working for British Telecom, <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/mark-williamson/7/72/b32">Mark</a> use to write to entire team every week and i just loved the concept. Thanks Mark.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05619107196476010602noreply@blogger.com0