Hate and Courage-the two opposite twins born to Fear

"Courage is not the absence of fear", someone has said. Fear however is the root of all problems. Fear has two reactions- one a short term knee-jerk reaction and another a long term reaction. Like most short term things, the instant reaction is short and non-sustainable. The long term (re)action on the other hand takes a longer time to start and give results. Hate is the short-term reaction and difficult to sustain which is why most terrorists at some point surrender or become mercenaries- no longer driven by hate but by habit and lack of options.

The long term answer is true courage-a positive emotion and one that is not really a reaction but more a state of being. "A courageous person does not need a terrorist to be courageous however a terrorist essentially breeds only in a pool of fear and terror" This reminds me of that incident about Abraham Lincoln. When he went to meet wounded soldiers from the confederate army in the hospital, a lady chided him saying that they were enemies who should be destroyed. To this, Lincoln's reply- an illustration of courage was: "Lady, do I not destroy them when I make them my friends?"

Courage however is difficult. It requires all those virtues that our parents tried to instill in us. It requires patience, perseverance and even a lot of forgiving. To quote Kipling from his poem 'If':

"If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating...."

I think that is what courage is about. Its about thinking things through, analysing the siutation without bias and then deciding on a course of action. Its about not letting others manipulate you into action often hasty and counter productive but working out a course of action which not only solves the problem but makes you stronger as a result!

Thus courage is not terror attacks by Hindus but a strengthening of our faith, beliefs and our ability to grow.

And most importantly it is most definitely NOT business as usual. In fact it is a systematic change not just in business but in lifestyle and principles.

Enough of the Mumbai Spirit!

Yah, enough of it cause Mumbai's indomitable spirit has been used and abused too many times now. Our ability to get back up on our feet and carry on has carrried on enough. Now I would like the politicians of this country (who somehow never figure in terror casualties.. even in the Parliament attack they were ironically spared) to take responsibility. Make every corporator, MLA, MP and minister accountable for the terror attacks that happen in their areas. Let's have a law which says that all the ruling politicians who have even a single terror attack in their constituency, automatically cannot stand for elections next time from anywhere! Impractical? Overreactive? Unfair. I don't care. Life hasn't been fair to Mumbaikars has it? Nor has it been fair to the understaffed, underpaid, under-equipped and overworked policeforce. Let these netas feel the heat for a change. Let's all question, not just the intelligence networks but the leaders we elect. Each and every one of them should be taken to task- made responsible. Lets terrorise the netas so that they do their job to serve and protect us
And let's not, at least this time make it business as usual!

What was HE thinking?

"The greatest irony of nature and the greatest tragedy of earth is that the only being capable of appreciating its beauty to the fullest is the only one with an unbelievable propensity to destroy it!"
That is an original quote and one that is really straight from my heart. Think about it, can any other being apart from man appreciate the beauty of a mighty mountain range nestled in clouds or wonder at the depths of the blue ocean as he sits on its shore? Can any animal spend hours on the banks of a river doing nothing and then come back feeling rejuvenated?
And yet it is this same organism that seeks to destroy this beauty. What could be the cause of this aberration?
Is it God's aberration? I know that a lot of scriptures talk about how the world and its bounty is God's gift to us. But does that mean we finish off the gift by consuming it or treasure it the way we would a flower or a card from a loved one? So this makes me think, was the creation of Man God's endgame or is it our colossal mistake (to think that way)?
I think with the pollution and the global warming increasing by the day, we might just find the answer to this sooner than we want!

Brand and the buying decision

These days I have been quite interested in the branding aspect of marketing. I guess the fact that my job is related to brands and retail does also help.
The other day when I was making a sort of buy-list or rather a wish-list I realised that as I was putting a number in front of my objects of desire, I found out just how branding works, at least for me. Let me explain..
I have always been attracted to watches. I have found that there was a gap between the amount I wanted spend and the maximum cap that I wanted to put on it. This grey area is where brands came into play because as I started naming each brand the cap for each changed and for one particular brand I couldnt even put a number (if only that was possible in buying the watch too!). But then I realised what my professor had taught me about brand valuation in monetary terms. Thus if i was ready to pay x rs. more for brand B over brand A wasnt that what brand power is?
Thus brand power lies in that grey range and it is every individual brand that then turns this into a particular value (hopefully positive) for a particular individual.
I know I am probably not telling anything new however the reason I am writing this is because I actually experienced it in the most exact terms and after having read a lot about commoditisation of products this was a powerful reminder of how much the 'brand tag' still adds to each of our lives.
Thus as someone has said, "Brands announce something about ourselves to the world"

Diminishing utility of Intelligence

The complaint of most of my colleagues, friends and classmates who are at work today is that they seem to be not doing enough 'value-add'. Most of us (including me of course) think that we can contribute much more. The overriding emotion is that if we could probably earn much more if only we were able to really contribute with our intelligence and learning. But then why does it not happen?
Well the answer, boys and girls is Diminishing utility of intelligence. That is as every executive contributes with his intelligence, the utility of that intelligence to the organization is quite high initially and hence the employee is recognized and promoted however as he contributes more and more the utility to the organization of that is isnt quite so much.
Think about it, could there be an explanation for this? A low level employee is usually one among many since they form the majority of the strength of the company. However as he is promoted and he rises above, the number among which he is competing becomes progressively smaller. In fact as he reaches the middle or higher management, he is among the top 1 to 5 % in any company. Now even if he contributes through his knowledge or value-add, it wont have that much impact. Why?
One explanation is that an organization can pursue only so many new ideas or policies. As a result some executives will not really be doing intelligent work but in fact will merely be implementing those ideas decided by others in the top echelons.
Another explanation is that as part of the top brass, their value add though significant is hard to measure and compare against those of their peers just as someone with $200 mill is just marginally better off from someone with $100 mill.
Thus maybe the utility of intelligence and indeed the compensation ;-) associated with it diminishes as it progressively increases per employee. I wonder if that's why they say, 'the meek shall inherit the earth'?
P.S. Special mention of RM, AK, DC and ND-M for having had contributed to this blog through your insightful comments. {This is not simply a means to flatter you but I guess it wouldn't hurt ;-) }

Confident or just too sure?

Confidence and sureness (if that is a word) are two different things. Sureness or cockiness if you will-is being certain or opinionated about everything. It often shows not maturity but rather a certain narrowness of perspective or even just good ol’ bliss blooming out of ignorance.
Specimens that exhibit such characteristics do not acknowledge an alternate perspective for as long as possible and then when confronted by overwhelming evidence simply find themselves completely lost!
Confidence or true self-belief on the other hand is an approach which accepts the ambiguity and risk present in every situation and tries to continuously adjust and modify thoughts and actions.
This is probably quite closely related to cognitive dissonance and I think a truly confident individual is one who is completely cognizant of his cognitive dissonance ( too heavy maybe) and is constantly trying to get a better understanding of his self and his environment.
Thus the quote for today: Confidence is the cognizance of uncertainty and cockiness is the absence of cognizance. (quite good if i say so myself!)
Or to borrow from the quote of a well-known politician: “I wish I was as sure of something as he seems to be of everything”

Post ISB post

ISB is over and reality is setting in and fast! Having met my ISB classmates and potential ISB students in the last few days, I am missing ISB like nobody's business. It has been by far the most amazing, unique and memorable year of my life and it is very difficult to describe ISB without using superlatives (and lots of them).
However as I mentioned, the reality of the economy, of the job and of getting back to work has now kicked in (and hard).
I guess change is good but too much change does take some getting used to. -Not a bad random quote considering I am out of practice these days. I promise to write more and regularly (i.e. if someone is still reading this stuff)
-Abhishek, Co2008, Indian School of Business!!!!

Quoted with Truth!

"If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;.."
-Lines from Rudyard Kipling's poem If.
Its only under high pressure situations that you really know if you have got what it takes and the placement week was certainly a good test. A lot of unlikely candidates crumpled under the pressure and a lot of others showed just what they are made of.
Personally I think the week was a great leveller and the spirit shown by nearly the entire batch was phenomenal. It was also a unique experience for me since it was the first time I was in the job market.
To end this post a rather random quote from a Hindi movie: "Its so simple to be happy but it is so difficult to be simple." (Can you make a connection to the topic)

A new experience..a new phase

I am employed.
That is all I should say about my company since this is not meant to be a blog about my career. However, I want to share that experience of going through this whole placement process (which was a first for me.) It was a gruelling, hectic and for some people quite a tense time as they probably lost perspective. That made me realise that "its worthless to think you are worth less since often what you get is what you think you ought to get!"
If you think the role is good and you will love doing it, assume the best outcome and ask for an aggressive salary. It shows the employer that you are confident and capable of performing.
I guess the last week was a great experience and over the next few blogs I hope to share it with you but for now this quote (not an original), about life:
"Everyone dies but not everyone lives!"
Another very good one by the little master Sachin about his cricket (but I think very applicable to life):
"I know that no matter how I play (live) I won't be able to satify everyone so I just try to satisfy myself".

"ISB-T 20 champions"

I could write about how great it felt and what an amazing feat it is for a school which is only 6 years old but that would hardly be characteristic of 'random quotes'. So here are my random thoughts on this whole issue.
We are proud to be in a school which is highly regarded and this was a good vindication of what we have believed in but then came the numerous articles and comments about how IIM's didn't make it and how wrong the ranking was etc. and I thought that maybe its the price of fame.

Personally, 3 schools which had rejected my application for MBA are now ranked below ISB. Such is life ppl, the only thing permanent is change and that brings me to a quote my friend V's philosophy on life:
I am just an instrument who does what needs to be done without pride or guilt though once the task is done, there is a feeling of happiness.
Food for thought? For all of us students and ISB since all of us need to keep going- all the way to the top!

ISB- place to be

This is my first post about ISB and I am really trying to think about a quote which will epitomise this place. Should it be 'survival of the fittest' or the 'ultimate Business school'?
Its seems to be a great place with probably the finest professors and peer group that you could find.
But then sometimes you can overdo it. Sometimes you do get the feeling that ISB is really just a subset of the 'big bad corporate' world and maybe as an academic institution it should be more than that.
You see an academic institution even one that teaches Business needs to be more than just a glorified recruitment exchange. I feel that we as a batch are capable of much more if only we realise what we can do we probably can. So here's my quote for this post, from the poem by Robert Frost,
"I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."