Not just Human Resources...

On an especially mind-numbing day at work… I found my new muse. I came across a training company’s website that offered a variety of programs that were ‘going to change your life’, ‘help you realize your dreams’, ‘give you the edge that would leapfrog your career’… on the whole.. almost everything, short of rewriting your DNA! They were going to achieve all this and more by showing you some videos of famous people and getting you to fill out a workbook! Wow! The interesting thing of course is that these terms are so overused – if only I had a penny for everytime I heard them, I’d be really rich by now! Everywhere you look there is rhetoric, and then there is branding – it has become difficult these days to figure out where one stops and the other begins. The reason why we want to believe in the rhetoric, apart from the fact that it sounds nice is that we believe that there must be a system in synergy, that is putting its might behind realizing the potential of the rhetoric. Bu...

Thank God the coin has 2 sides. There is some divine logic and poetic justice in this fact. It gives the impression that somewhere in universe there is a delicate balance – there is multi-dimensionality, as against polarity. That alone is enough to make me happy… confused… but happy. I like the fact that there are multiple explanations and alternatives for everything. Human beings have too much ego to believe in simplicity I think, and am no exception. A while back now, I was completely taken up with Gladwell’s ‘Tipping point’ and particularly enamoured by the Broken-window theory. Its such a cool concept and has such instant and universal appeal. Here’s an excerpt from Gladwell’s book ‘Tipping Point’ (since there is no way that anyone else’s words can do justice to the brilliance of the author): In 1992, there were 2154 murders in New York City and 626,182 serious crimes, with the weight of those crimes falling hardest in places like Brownsville and East New York. But then something...

Recently I had a very interesting and rather amusing encounter that was so moving that I just had to write about it! Like normal people I tend to enjoy my Sundays and guard them rather zealously against invasion by the ‘weekend warriors’. Recently I was approached by a couple of HR professionals who wanted some very simple info from me regarding the business unit I work with. The info required was as simple as simple gets – no of people in the organization, some policies etc. – basic stuff you know… This info was required for a proposal they were working on for a client. So they call me on a Sunday when I am at dinner with some guests in the midst of an interesting conversation… no apologies for the disturbance or anything, they launch into a detailed account of what they need despite my feeble attempts at requesting a discussion later in the night… but of course… I want to be helpful since it is an ‘emergency’. Well… as I later found out they had not gone through the info ev...

Imagine this: The venue : Acclaimed painter, MF Husain’s, bungalow in Bangalore, India. A beautiful large space with an inbuilt stage and surrounded by works of art that transform the space from the ordinary to the magical. The actors : The Tangents – the only all-women Playback theatre group in India The audience : 40 women from different walks of life – professionals toiling in the corporate world, doctors, engineers, race car drivers, artists, home makers, mothers and mothers-to-be, wives, sisters, teachers, friends… The subject of the play : Audience life stories – celebrating women The performance : The performance takes place in 3 segments. Fluids, stories and conflicts. Fluids are basically a dynamic tableau of audience responses enacted by the actors. Let me give you an example: The conductor (who is effectively a ‘sutradhar’) leads the audience to the theme of say – being a woman in the corporate environment and what the frustrations they feel at times. Wo...

My brush with ‘the power of ambition’ – a personal experience This is a story of how ‘ambition’ transformed an ordinary business unit, stuck in the rut of its own limitations and its industry’s limitations into a powerhouse of achievement. Well.. let me start at the beginning. This particular business unit is the parent division of a large IT company, but it operates in the FMCG space. The FMCG market, especially personal care products, has been increasingly tough in the last few years. This unit was facing considerable de-growth and coping with low morale of its employees. Historically, things, for some reason tend to get worse, before they start to get better… and this division was probably at one of the lowest points in its existence. A leadership change brought in a fresh perspective, new dreams, and a big dose of ambition. Ambition and passion go hand-in-hand and are both equally contagious. The leadership team became the real pillars of change. I remember meeting this team ...