Category: Work

Passion and intent

Prasad Ajinkya1 Comment

Bill Watterson to in the commencement speech to his alma matter (Kenyon College), came out with several gems. I wonder how many of them will be retained by the original audience.

An excerpt –

Like many people, I found that what I was chasing wasn’t what I caught. I’ve wanted to be a cartoonist since I was old enough to read cartoons, and I never really thought about cartoons as being a business. It never occurred to me that a comic strip I created would be at the mercy of a bloodsucking corporate parasite called a syndicate, and that I’d be faced with countless ethical decisions masquerading as simple business decisions.

Bill talks about his passion, and how it manifested in different forms during his college years. How the passion overtook him, and then how the business overtook his passion. Without keeping your mind fresh, if you engage with passion, then even you might go through the same experience. The key to it is to play and keep an open mind for different ideas and experiences. So what new did you learn today?

Reply-All

Prasad AjinkyaLeave a comment

When you see a mail lying in your inbox having multiple people in the CC and in the To, the first urge is to hit the Reply-All button. Make your presence felt in the email conversation. The urge increases exponentially with power distance (also see Geert Hofstede) in that organization. The minions have to prove to their bosses that they exist, and they can contribute for the bosses benefit.

You will see this become excruciatingly apparent on public holidays, company-wide announcements, successful projects, etc. The reason I am posting this today is because I know that my inbox is going to get inundated with Happy Independence Days tomorrow. Despite repeated requests, this does not change, so I say, let the spam spew forth.

Succession Planning

Prasad AjinkyaLeave a comment

I am now in the process of making a succession plan … for myself!

Why do I want that … to ensure that the organization is not people centric, even if it were myself, I dont want the firm to be dependent on me. What are your experiences in charting out a succession plan for the management of the firm?

As far as I know, it should ensure that the next one who takes up can hit the ground running without any suffrage to the firm.

Hyderabad

Prasad Ajinkya4 Comments

Only in a city like Hyderabad do you see such idiosyncrasies. Our office timings were 9am to 6.30pm, which worked out for everyone (although I found them a tad too early!!). But ever since I have started waking up at 6.30, it has become much easier.

Nonetheless, today when I walked into office … I found that the AC was not working; which was very fortunate considering the fever I was running. After half an hour or so, the enter lights, connectivity, etc went. zook, kaput, gone … silence. The office does come to a stand still, especially the tech department. The newly installed UPS took the brunt of all the machines and the servers … phew!

Upon further questioning, we found that this is now going to be a daily occurence with the AP electricity board. The area is going to face extensive power shedding and daily from 8am to 11am, the lights will be cut. Great!!! Awesome!! As a joke, I asked our admin that maybe we should reschedule our office timings to suit the AP board.

11am, the management decides to reschedule the office timings … 10.30am to office it is!! What am I going to do in the mornings now?!?

Biryani at Bawarchi’s

Prasad Ajinkya2 Comments

Our intern at eYantra, Mitesh(IIM-Indore Batch of 2009) is having his last days here, he has had a blast till now (or so I would like myself to believe). Today he gave us all a treat at Bawarchi’s, for lunch. Having never been there, I obviously was excited to go there for lunch. Taking 2 bikes, the party of four left for the place … sadly, the place was closed. All the great plans were dashed … why was it closed?? Because of some strike against the hike in petrol prices!!

Fortunately the indominatable Indian spirit came to the rescue; We noticed a man standing besides an alley infront of the popular restaurant. He was gesturing towards us to follow him. He led us through a back door, into the kitchen of the restaurant and finally into the restaurant itself!! The place had so high an opportunity cost of being closed, that they were opening it despite the strike. How awesome is that.

The Bawarchi biryani is really famous for its taste and the clean, soft chicken. The portions are aplenty, and it takes a huge stomach and a healthy apetite to finish off an entire plate. Burrpp!!

Afterthought – We need to have more interns like Mitesh here!!

PS – 100th post!!