A dialogue I want to preserve for life.....

The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's a very mean and nasty place and I don't care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain't about how hard ya hit. It's about how hard you can get it and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done! Now if you know what you're worth then go out and get what you're worth. But ya gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain't where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody! Cowards do that and that ain't you! You're better than that!----------------Rocky Balboa

Leadership: My perspective

I want to discuss about the most debated topic in corporate life and MBA schools: Leadership. I have been reading thesis and sheaves of paper full of complicated principles. I hold a very simplistic view on this. I feel Leadership is nothing but "Being Human". Yes, this phrase has been copied from a popular charity organization but I think this is precisely as simple as this. Imagine a situation: leading a business with a hierarchy in place. Now, the business cannot run until the team works together. It will be fraught with internal politics and sensitivities. It, thus, becomes imperative for a leader to think as a human, as a person in his colleague's shoes. It is important to think that way as the person may need a neutral person to be driven out of dilemnas. It is this human side which can make a difference to the business as well as individual team members.

Just a wild thought!!! Test it and let me know the results...

Devzz

Weakness

Hey all

This is another of a post that I feel inclined to write. Unfortunately, while many people do praise me about my strengths, few know about my weakness. Today, I disclose it hoping that this public disclosure would actually help me solving it. I think my biggest weakness is my reactive nature. I react too fast. It can be a boon but I have observed many a times it is a bane. Not only can it spoil work, it can spoil relations as well- a thing I have witnessed time and again. I am trying to get over it, music being the obvious option cause it pulls me back.

Through this post I wish to apologize to all those friends who witnessed this side of mine. I can assure you I am trying to control it and putting my efforts. I , however, need you all by my side to achieve it.

The devil

A Quest for takeoff

The bird looks around, flaps its wings
She is excited, because she'll flow with the wind.
She looks around and sees her friends take off,
She sees them flapping, the wings up and down
She is aware that she'll be joining while they are around

She opens up her wings, beautiful as they look
In the sunshine, they look bright and gay
She flaps hard, excited about her flight
She knows that this is the beginning of a new life

She goes up slowly, closing slowly as they say
Chirps happily, flapping away
Suddenly she stops, her wings still flapping up and down
She looks all around,confused look and a frown
Not knowing what has gone wrong.

She realizes a chain on her leg
A weight tied around, pulling her down
She struggles, she screams for someone to unlock the chain
She finds no one , no one to free her again

She looks to the sky, sees her friends moving afar
She watches them go, tears flooding her eyes.
She tries to call, her voice gives away
She knows its futile, no one to share her pain anyway

Alone she stands, alone she waits
She thinks how to get past this situation ............



* not feeling motivated to complete it today guys, sometime later

Office Story!!!

My life is a presentation,
Each day is just another slide.
My wallet is like a financial statement
It's NPV is always in red

I live like a Project Manager,
WHo struggles to keep his OPEX down.
I feel the same as an accountant
who hates financial closing especially when IT is full on

I, however, dream like an architect
who magically creates a vision
I spend like a billionaire
even though the feeling lasts just 2 days
Reluctantly I turn to my screen
" Regional Airports: Catalyzing Growth" it annoyingly says

Google Talk

Tribute to the best team!!! MANCHESTER UNITED

Arsenal 's future team!!!!!

A long due post……..

Hi all……

My post was long due….

The budget was a crucial event this year as key decisions had to be taken with regards to the fiscal stimulus and inflation without compromising on growth.

The fiscal deficit target for this year was pegged at 5.5 % which was disappointing as such a target would be largely achieved by disinvestment and auction of 3G spectrum. In order to achieve a good quality fiscal deficit, non planned expenditure needs to be reduced. Hence, a target of 5% would have displayed the FM’s resolve of reducing the non planned expenditure. Another key concern is that the FM should not compromise on CAPEX in a bid to reduce the fiscal deficit as CAPEX investments give returns in the long run.

My concern was partially alleviated with the amount of Infrastructure spending announced by the Finance Minister. This would encourage the infrastructure companies to increase their volumes. Moreover, increasing the refinancing limit of IIFCL would increase the availability of cheap funds. However, certain aspects were disappointing. The increase in MAT by 300 basis points would not only result in lowering of book profits, but an increase in cement and steel prices as well which would affect the profitability of this sector. I also have doubts on the success of infrastructure bonds as money would be locked for 5-10 years for a measly rate of 5-6% making them less attractive investment options.

The Finance Minister raised a lot of smiles by raising the IT slab. This seems an illusion to me as the income that an individual would save through direct taxes would be consumed by indirect taxes due to the increase in excise duties. The hike in food prices would create additional burden on the consumers.

The increased focus on clean energy impressed me the most. With the introduction of clean energy cess and the creation of a National Clean Energy Fund, the finance minister has not only paved way for the emergence of a new sector but has also sent a strong message to the international community about India’s commitment to solve the Climate change issues. The government’s intention of transitioning to GST in 2011 is another positive step as a simplified taxation system leads to increased revenues.

 After the recession, it was imperative to reflect optimism in the budget. Although, the budget did manage to setup certain trends, it reflected a certain degree of over cautiousness too.

Something on realty!!

Well, I apologize to my readers about the delay in the budget post. I am still in the process of analyzing it and expect my first part of analysis to be out within the next 3 days. However, I read something interesting on real estate which I intend to share.

There was an interesting article on foreign debt or ECBs into the sector. Now, real estate sector is not allowed to use ECBs by the Indian government. When I tried analyzing the reason, I observed that this happened in 2007 when the economy started overheating. It was felt that if ECBs are allowed a real estate bubble could open up. Now, a burst could cause the economy to come down. Hence, a timely intervention was done to avoid this burst. I intend to discuss the real estate burst phenomenon in one of the later posts.

But interestingly, ECBs are still flowing into the sector. The mechanism is an interesting one. The Real estate company issues the bonds which are bought by NBFCs. These bonds are then listed in the stock exchange. Hence, the local finance firms act like a storage place to such bonds, and when they get the right price, they sell it to a foreign fund. All transactions done and quite legally too.

Now, in my opinion, this becomes a cause of worry. Already, the FM has realized the overheating of the economy due to which the CRR rate has been hiked and fiscal stimulus being withdrawn. With such funds being infused, we run the risk of inflation and excess liquidity. Hence, the government needs to step in and plug this loophole. One possible way could be to prevent the listing of such bonds. FIIs can only invest as long as the bonds are listed in Stock Exchanges. If we could prevent them from being listed, we could actually control the ECBs into the sector.

Goodbyes hurt the most, when you don’t get to say them!!!!!

Before I start my entry, I must thank one of my closest friends, SJ, to reignite the pensieve as I had slowly started turning into an impulsive writer. Now, to my entry:

Today, I went to watch “Karthik calling Karthik” which, of course was a brilliant movie. However, one line struck me the most, the line I write in the title above. It put my deepest thoughts in plain words, something that I had failed to express all this time.

This has happened with me not once but twice. And each time, I felt deeply impacted. Luckily for me, the first one did not actually end in a goodbye and as fate would have had it, I once again came in touch and the camaraderie was again at the same levels.

It is the second one which has always pricked me like a thorn. This person became a great friend, a person I chilled out with and suddenly the communication channels got lost. I tried contacting the person, sent emails but to no avail.

The day I was disembarking for a new phase in my life, I wanted to say a final goodbye to this person. I wanted to ask what had gone wrong, I was ready to shed my ego, just to relive those fun moments that I had with the person one last time. I wanted to say that I might have been a bit ridiculous, stupid at times, but all this was just to lighten things up. I wanted to say that I always considered the person to be a part of my special group of friends for whom I was willing to go out of the way. I wanted to say all this and much more……. But I could not.

Recently, I got a linkedin invitation. I thought that probably the temper had died down. But, as things later turned out , I was wrong.

I know that my entry may never reach the person eyes, but I’d like to say that I did whatever I could with utmost sincerity and honesty. I had made numerous attempts and had compromised with my ego to the limit. However, I was made to swallow this bitter pill. And the bitterness now stays……………

On a lighter note, I also visited Archie’s where I saw this interesting board which said “ Women are more talented than men….While men succeed after numerous attempts, they require a single attempt” I leave the interpretations open….

My next entry: II’ll analyze the budget 2010-2011.

Till then, cheerio

devzz

The land of dhoklas,khandwis and of course dandia

As I started off from Delhi, I felt strangely excited and sad. Sad because I would be leaving my family and it almost broke my heart bidding them goodbye. Excited because I was going to a place which is the least known amongst Punjabis.

My knowledge about Gujarat, I must confess is frightfully limited. For me, it meant a state where there is a lot of sweet food, lot of dhoklas and dandia with colourful clothes. Hence, I was strangely curious about this state.

As I landed, I was surprised to see such a silent airport. Being a Delhiite , this was a strange contrast. As I moved towards my destination, I was equally astonished to see the advancement that Gujarat has made. Compare this with a state such as UP, this state is progressing by leaps and bounds.

My entry won’t be complete without a mention on Gujarati folks. In the northern side, one is more used to language that may be a bid strong at time. But the folks, their hospitality and politeness has left me impressed.

I’ll close my entry here. I’ll write about my visit to Sabarmati Ashram in the next post. Till then cya…

devzz

Virtualization

I explored this concept recently. The term virtualization was coined in 1960s and this refers to a virtual machine. Recently, you will more often see it being referred as platform virtualization.
In this particular thing, the host operating system shares its physical resources such as RAM, HDD with its guest operating system. The environment that is then created appears as if the guest operating system is independent of the host system.Thus, what you get in the end are two personal computers sharing common physical resources but very different from one another.
You may be wondering why I brought this topic up. It has been a common concern these days about the compatibility of vista with several programmes. To get rid of these problems, one can either use the compatibility wizard which may not have 100% success rate or reinstall xp. Reinstalling xp can be a bit of a problem as certain systems may not have the drivers readily available. Besides, even if the drivers are available, it would take ages to reinstall and often result in unforeseen issues. Virtualization is thus the answer.

The image that you see above shows you the real life implementation of virtualization. I had vista installed and using a virtual machine I could install xp without disturbing my vista. More importantly, I did not have to reinstall any of the drivers or fiddle with any bios settings. Sony Vaios could be a bit of doubt here as they do not have virtualization settings available.
This aspect is very useful for developers or students who face compatibility issues and don’t wish to do anything extreme to run their legacy applications.

Recommended software for windows: Microsoft Windows Virtual PC
Recommended software in general : VMWare, VMBox etc

Love AajKal and other things

Well, this movie seems to have been a lot in the news. I recently had a chance to see it and much to the annoyance of others, I would give it a 2. Well, the movie started off at a lovely note, such as a break up party, which triggered off expectations. But, as it unfolded it had a sense of deja vu as it summarized old and new love stories. I feel lucky in a way. I saved 200+ bucks on a movie that I was about to spend on.

My Advice: Guys watch Luck instead. That is an underhyped movie butt deserves more respect, atleast more than love aajkal. Girls plz have a second thought. There is nothing in the movie to die for (quoting one of my friends).

Some new music has come up: For headbangers like me, there is this : Dhan Te Nan from the movie Kaminey. The wordings are something like this

Aaja Aaja dil nichode

raat ki matki tode

Koi good luck nikaale

Aaj Gullack tode……

Dhan Te Nan Te Nan

The music rocks

 

Being a Salman Khan Fan , I would also advice listening to this song : Love Me Love Me from the film Wanted

The IT worker

Disclaimer: The following post is based on real life experiences of male IT developers. It is aimed at all the managers and female coworkers who often show disrespect to their feelings. Any coincidence with any of the Program Managers of female developers is not at all regretted. You are also expected to forward this post to as many program managers and female coworkers as you can.

Just in case, you have wanted to know how the IT worker works, here is an insight:

7:00 am: Gets up rather grudgingly

7:30 am:Dresses up , sprays deo all over to impress females inspite of knowing that there are none too worthy of the expense so incurred

7:45 am Gets onto the bus or cab depending upon how miser the company is. Tries to get in some conversation with some girls especially some HR girls, realizes that there is no chance as most of them are committed or married. Ends up sleeping the rest of the time

8:30 am: The villainous building comes in sight. Oh yet another mountain. Yet another day to tackle. Swipes his card and enters

9:00 am: After the toilet breaks, coffee breaks he finally opens his system. Greets his fellow workers rather disinterestedly , managers er no comments

9:30 am: Starts checking his outlook mails. Spends greater time forwarding the good morning messages rather than the official ones

10:00 am: The first interaction with the managers, monsters inc. Time to make big promises and convey er not so big deeds. Get some worthless advice from the program manager who starts outsourcing his work to developers.

10:30 am: First chance on your female co workers. Invite them for coffee. Invitation politely declined due to some PERSONAL REASONS. Gather some male colleagues preferably your manager to fund your coffee

11:00 am: Finally the work commences. Ah 10 minutes of outlook checking first.Then stare blankly at the piece of code in front of you which stares back in an annoying manner. You start execution and out pops a black screen full of errors. Stare at them for 30 minutes and then outsource the work to your TL.

1:30 pm: Lunch time folks. Second chance on your female co workers. Invitation politely declined as they need to go with their friends. Depressed, you go to cafeteria alone or sit in front of your system eating and dreaming. If you are a composed person, male friends still available

3:00 pm: Time to dream. Well, status update time in front of the managers. Try to make a mountain of a small issue. The more complexity described, the better. Show him great dreams great things.

5:30 pm: Time to get ready to leave inspite of being fully aware that someone would stop you. If you are lucky, you may miss the eyes of ppl or convince them, If you are unlucky, well then the temperature starts rising

7:00 pm: Last chance on your female colleagues: INVITATION ACCEPTED!!! You realize your importance there, that of a coffee financer. But wait, what’s this? You are joined by your male colleagues and other ready made guests. WELCOME TO THE PARTY

:(

8:30 pm: Time for managers to get their personal calls and prepare departure. Time to flee to the loo, to avoid outsourcing

9:00 pm: Managers DEPART!!!!Good riddance!!! Start packing hurriedly. Call the cabbie frantically hoping he would stop and wait

9:10 pm: Flee to the cab. End of another eventful day!!

Windows live writer

This is the first time I am using the live writer. My motivation: A friend’s blog. But, I must admit, I am liking the experience as I type my current entry. Good Work Microsoft!! For a change, you have been a little less greedy and a little more innovative.

 

On my personal front, I am about to finish my internship. I really enjoyed my experience, although it was an unpaid one. Researching deeply into renewables, I for the first time felt how blessed my country is as compared to other nations. There is a lot to realize and still we are scratching the surface. I hope I can make a significant difference on this front.

 

I had a great time making pizzas this weekend. Well, it is a great achievement for me. Something to fluff up my resume when I go matrimonial hunting isn’t it. Based on my cousins’ experience, you are more likely to find a better spouse if you know cooking. Long way to go devzz.

 

Till next time goodbye.

My sensational soccer gaming skills

A sensational steal!!!




A kool corner

The Great Train Robbery and the IPL

The Great Train Robbery!! What a great piece of work to overcome the short sabbatical I had taken from reading. I believe it is one of the finest novels started by crichton. The story no prizes for guessing is of a train robbery organized by a certain guy called Pierce a k a John Simms right from the preparation stage to its execution and a mindblowing climax. Crichton has efectively conveyed the meticulous preparations and there is a lot of realism attached to this audacious act. More importantly, this Pierce guy effectively uses the Victorian society's weaknesses to achieve his ends. All these weaknesses have been elaborately potrayed.

Rating 5/5 Must read

The IPL is the other great thing that is happening in my life other that EPL. Although, I am torn between Sachin and Sehwag, I still have a weak spot for Delhi Daredevils. The start has been fantastic. The CSK vs DD was a match went down to the wire and Delhi eventually emerged victorious. Lets hope the daredevils lift the title this time...

Networking: A thought

Gosh!! This is one word that I have been coming across lately. A lot of people especially friends from business schools have stressed on the essence of this skill. Lot of social networking sites have also come up. Although people have claimed high rates of success, I still feel that this is one skill where Indians mastered once upon a time and the Indian way of networking had higher success rates any day.

The networking system that I am talking about is the family system. I feel that this system actually produced the best results because of greater involvement , accountability as well better expression to one's career goals in addition to career related advice. I believe that what was termed सिफारिश which was looked down upon by quite a few people has taken a more polished form called referrals. In fact some organization only accept referrals.

I strongly feel that the Indian way of networking is something that should be renewed and built upon. It is easier to connect blood relations rather than build new ones.

Oye!! It's me

I started writing a blog!! Just Imagine!!

Many people would scratch their heads or find the above start absurd. But, then they are my actual thoughts as I write my first post. I have been debating for a while about the worthwhileness of a blog over a diary. And for a change technology won. The reason being: If you feel your life worthwhile, a person has the responsibility of sharing it with the rest who have made it happen.

The pensieve would thus comprise of my fond memories and my thoughts associated, of course, in a brutally random fashion.

And so it begins.......