9 Life's Mantras we learnt from our Father

Yesterday was my late father’s 70th birth anniversary. I was recalling my childhood. Our family was like any family in upper middle class India during the 80’s where mothers played a day to day role in bringing up children and teaching them all there is to know. It was only when my brother and I grew older we realised the role our father had in embedding values in us by just observing him.

Here , I will share with you 9 mantras for life which my brother and I imbibed from him.

1. Treat People with Dignity : Be it the plumber , his boss , team members , distributors , colleagues , relatives , LIC agent , you name it ; every one was treated as an individual first before his or her profession or social standing. And the best part was that it was done effortlessly.
2. Practice Integrity even when no one cares : I remember our father (a General Manager in a PSU ) poring over the telephone bill marking all the personal calls made from the company provided telephone, despite the overall bill being well within his entitlement. I was old enough to ask him on why he did that. He smiled and said that it just made him feel and sleep better.
3. Prioritise and then take One thing at a Time : This was before the era of Multitasking. Our Father’s pithy oft repeated statement in Bengali ‘Ek Ek kore shob hobe’ (which means that everything can be dealt with one at a time) is more hardwired in our mind than Dan Goleman’s ‘Focus’ which essentially boils down to this.
4. Have a sense of Humour : Our fathers sense of humour was contagious. It helped defuse many a tense situation at home or office. His colleagues , team members relatives found his ‘joie de vivre’ infectious . We saw this humour at display even when he was undergoing cancer therapy which did wonders for our morale. Yes , I truly believe that the family / team which laughs together stays together.
5. Focus on Doing one’s Best rather than worrying about the results : While like any parent it would please him when we did well , his standard question after we took any exam was ‘Could you do your best?’ . This is something which I could put to good use in my professional career where I found that focusing on effort and process excellence would automatically give results rather than agonising over what the outcome would be.
6. Manage your team / work first before managing your boss : Our father worked in an era where the subordinate boss relationship was quite different from today. At a time when most industries were operating in a sellers market , one did not have to work too hard in delivering results. My father was never the ‘schmoozing the boss’ type of person , which did adversely impact his career as he moved up the corporate ladder. But yes , this is what we learnt and is the ethos of my consulting business even today. While we respect prospects and clients, I don't ‘schmooze with prospective clients’ and say yes to anything which is not in the client’s best interest, just to acquire or keep the client.
7. Start your Day Early : Our Father was always an early riser to accommodate his routine of morning walk , making the morning tea for family , newspaper and a hearty breakfast before leaving for work in order to reach half an hour before the office began. He used to say that that half an hour would help him plan his day and ensure he was up and running when the office started.My brother and I maintain this habit till date.
8. Give more than what you receive : I don't mean this only in the financial way. I have seen our Father be the first one to be there in time of need. Be it picking up a friend’s elderly parents from the railway station or doing the waiting duty in a hospital for an ailing relative , our father was the first to volunteer and then do it with a smile. At that impressionable age I used to think that there was never any reciprocation for his efforts and that every one would take advantage of his goodness but later I realised that life does have a way of reciprocating in its own way and at its own time.
9. Focus on What Matters : As I alluded to in point 6 , in the 70’s and 80’s era , if you worked in a blue chip company operating in a sellers market , career management actually boiled down to boss management which entailed having a social life linked to your superiors where the executive and his wife are in high visibility. Our Father never took that route. He chose to spend time with his family and yes it did affect his career. The meteoric rise from a Tyre Service Engineer to the youngest Category Head in Dunlop India came to a stop when the company changed hands. The culture changed from meritocracy to…. ummm.... ‘not meritocracy’. I wonder what he felt when he saw his juniors get ahead of him for factors apart from ability. But I guess he knew the choices and he made his choice. For him family mattered more.

I have not written this piece to eulogise our father . He was an ordinary human being having no special claim to fame . And don't we all learn from our parents . The reason I wrote this is ,though it has been > 6 years since he has passed away after fighting a losing battle with cancer , we still miss him . By writing this down , I am actually reinforcing what our father taught us and ensure my brother and I keep applying the same in our lives.

And the reason why I am sharing this on Linkedin is that in these VUCA times the need for some of these values is paramount. There are people who are more self aware and might find these values of some use in initiating some transformation in their life

Therefore , please feel free to share this with anyone you know who might benefit from this.

Thank you.

Photograph Credit goes too :AfricanSafaris.com

Is this how the new recruit treating your company?

I find the waiting area of an airport terminal fascinating. The diversity of passengers is a treat to watch. A cursory glance shows a gamut of activities by which the passengers engage themselves. Be it catching a quick meal at the food court , reading , talking to an irate customer , or simply playing candy crush in their smart phones ; they all have a common gesture. Frequently their eyes dart to the departure board to see whether boarding has been announced.

Waiting for my flight at a busy terminal one Friday evening, a question came to my mind?

Do the talent we recruit treat our companies like airport waiting areas?

I reflected on the recruitments I had made in the past for my team in the companies I had worked for before becoming an entrepreneur. While there were excellent recruitments , I burned my fingers on a few. And this was not about talent but talent which could not be put to use. Why? Because the talent recruited with such fanfare decided to switch jobs in less than 2 years for no apparent reason.

Is there some way we could have foreseen this?

There can be 2 warning signals in the resume itself :

1.Has the candidate jumped companies every 2 years or less?

2.Has the candidate got even a single a promotion in the same company? (or all the promotions have come from changing companies? )

The above points are obvious yet this kind of recruitment is more common than we think. I cannot cite figures but scroll down on some of the profiles on linked in itself and you will see for yourself.

Just like us in the waiting area, these candidates join our company with the exit date planned. In the short time he /she is with us there are very few tangible contributions made despite the high visibility. The first 6 months go in settling in and the last 6 months in scouting and negotiating for a better job. The remaining time in between sometimes can be measured in months.

Thus with little or no contribution the employee exits your waiting area to catch a flight to another destination. Another waiting area where he is upgraded to a better lounge and facilities. He is happy but only for a short time. He is planning his exit and is confident of his future because he knows that there are enough recruiters like us out there.

The intent of the candidate gets reflected in the resume and yet we make this mistake. Is it our ignorance in identifying these candidates or is it that we choose to ignore? Maybe there is a deadline for recruitment which makes us desperate ? Or maybe it is our ego that makes us feel that we will be able to retain this person by offering a lucrative pay or assignment or our exceptional organisation culture? Maybe something else?

And as the result shows ; We are proved wrong

My purpose for writing this is to sensitise potential recruiters from being ‘used’ by these rolling stones. Your comments are most welcome.

Why the Frog in the Well is not to be blamed

We all know the story of the Frog in the Well. Nearly all the versions of the story deride the frog's ignorance and his narrow minded view of the world. Yet not a singlet version which goes beyond this.

Why did the frog stay in the deep well? Was it actually because of his narrow minded view (won't do) or his lack of capability to climb the steep walls of the well (can't do)?

I believe it would be rather impossible for a frog to climb the steep walls of a a narrow well. Thus his view of the world stems from his lack of capability rather than his will.

I have seen so many instances where we define our world or vision based on our current capability. And worse, we start justifying it and limit our actions to our current existence. 

People talk about ambition . Let us bring ambition to our frog story. Do you think ambition would have helped the frog come out? Maybe it could but it would have been a abnormally high amount of self drive. Majority of us do not have this burning ambition and hence we could use some help in building our capabilities. This is what good leaders do. They first diagnose the lack of an action as either 'Can't Do?' or 'Won't Do'?.

Then , based on this diagnosis they intervene. 

Be it the Brand Manager who cannot think of ideas or the Sales Manager who cannot drive execution in his team ; both , because of their lack of capability will behave in accordance to their limitations. The Brand Manager will down play the use of creativity in communication and will burden the listener with boring long logical communication which gets ignored. The Sales Manager due to his lack of capability will go on a blame game with other stake holders and also develop an abrasive behaviour with not only the other stakeholder but also his / her own team members.

Strengthening their capabilities however will help them transform their approach and contribution to work. Increased capabilities therefore leads to increased engagement thereby creating a win win situation for both the individual and the organization.

In the story , the turtle comes to the top of the well and paints a vision about the sea. But the vision though compelling doesn't enable the frog to move. In corporates , the Turtle can be equated to the CEO who paints a compelling vision for the employees but then gets disappointed when the employees don't act towards the vision. Very often they don't ask the question whether their team has the capabilities to move towards that vision? They spend a whole lot of time / resources in off sites and consultants to forge a compelling vision statement but they are unwilling to invest in capability building. As a result the high challenge of the vision without capability creates organizational stress leading to attrition and hurting the image of the company..

Therefore our story probably would have a different ending if the turtle would have helped the frog by discussing ways to come out of the well and then working with him to ensure that the frog moves towards coming out of the well.

What could be the possible steps? Ah Well , that is another story...

6 Leadership Lessons which Corporate India Should Not Ignore

Water boils at 100 ° C. It may be very hot at 99 ° C, but the whole surface of the water changes just 1 ° C later. The ghastly gang rape might be just that 1 ° C which has brought India to boil. It is impossible to remain detached from the happenings which are unfolding every day. While the entire nation is rightly focused on making India safer for women and children, on this New Year Eve I will be sharing my thoughts on 6 lessons which Corporate India Leadership should take from this ghastly incident apart from women safety.

1.      Make Frequent Deep Dive into the Trenches: ‘Too little & Too late’ was the phrase which described the Government of India’s (GoI) reaction to the national sentiment. It is clear that the politicians lead highly insulated lives making them incapable of keeping an ear to the ground. In the corporate world, the higher we go we tend to become insulated from our ground; our frontline employees, our customers, our vendors etc. The voice of the ground takes the form of reports and data. While , I understand the pressure of time , I believe that a day spent by a CEO in a month speaking to a consumer with a complaint , or working with the salesman on his two wheeler can only add to the value of the reports which flow in the CEO’s  inbox. Hence, mark a day in the calendar every month to meet a customer / company junior salesman / factory worker on his / her turf. You just may be surprised at the insights gained.

2.      Strengthen your organization where it really matters: Every policeman guarding a politician means one pair of feet less to guard the citizens. Many organizations over a period of time acquire ‘white elephants’. These are senior managerial staff posts created generally with a nebulous purpose of accommodating people who have outlived their usefulness to the organization. The math is simple. A Director Special Projects may be drawing a package which can be equivalent of the compensation of an entire Regional Sales Team covering 1 state. The simple question CEO’s should ask themselves “Would I have paid this package to this person had I been the owner of the company?” The answer will be clear.

3.      Beware of ‘Kiss up & Kick Down’ Leaders: You will agree that the face of the police which the politicians in power see is vastly different from the face seen by the common citizens whom the same police are there to serve. A leader’s job is also to serve. Thus, do give a thought to that department head, which is constantly at your side, replying to your mails, flattering you in ceremonious corporate functions and hanging to your every word. If he is at your side every time giving you attention, what attention will he be giving his team? As per the legendary Jack Welch, these leaders are the most dangerous in an organization that need to be smoked out and taken care of relentlessly. This has to be a continual endeavour because the corporate climate is conducive to creating these types of leaders.

4.      Keep the focus clear on the issue and action: Yesterday one of the reputed news channels in a panel discussion was lambasting the GoI on the insensitivity shown last week and then veered as to why the secrecy was maintained during the cremation. To me this is not the central issue. The discussion should be on what the GoI be acting on now ; namely a calling a special additional session in parliament to strengthen molestation and rape laws and secondly fast tracking in bringing the criminals of this case to justice.  Similarly , most of us in corporate would have experienced attending meetings which degenerate into fault finding without a concrete action being recommended and reviewed periodically to check its implementation. Therefore as a leader, be the voice of reason which is like a rudder to keep the key issues in line as your organization or department aligns itself to act on it.

5.      Do not overlook small disciplinary issues : A lewd comment overlooked may give rise to a grope, which in turn to molestation and then to a rape. I am referring to the ‘Broken Windows’ phenomenon here, where people simply breaking windows of public property if unchecked graduates them to major crimes.  Human beings are very susceptible to gradual decay of values and discipline. Do you have senior people in your organizations that arrive late to work every day and no one tells them anything as they are ‘performers’? Are there people who accept small favours during Diwali from vendors? Are there managers who frequently plan tours in their home town? There are numerous signals of a company’s discipline breaking down. It is imperative that the senior leadership does not overlook these as they weaken an organization and its competitiveness over a period of time.

6.  Be the change you want to see: This is an oft repeated statement but this is the cornerstone on which all the above rest. You will agree that to bring change the GoI has to act and demonstrate the change .As a senior leader you are the voice and the culture of the organization.  You are the custodian of the values of the organization. What you set by example is what will be followed down the line, good or bad. Thus, you have to live and demonstrate those values every single moment.

These are a few thoughts that I wanted to share with every senior leader of Corporate India on New Year’s Eve. Do go over these points once more. Try to see to what degree it applies to your organization. Go over your leadership team with a fine toothcomb and take action wherever necessary. Your organization will thank you for it.

Size of the Windscreen

Ever wonder why the size of the car screen is much larger than the size of the rear view mirror? Imagine if the sizes of both would be interchanged.

Driving would be....a problem.

Yet this is what we do in business. We spend a disproportionate amount of time analysing historical data and extrapolating the future from it. This is like constantly looking in the rear view mirror and not seeing the heavy tanker rushing on in front of us.

Change in the environment is dynamic and while we should look at the historical data, it should not be at the cost of keeping one’s eyes open and gathering insights from the market place.

That is the wind screen. Keep your eyes there and flick them over the rear view mirror occasionally and not Vice Versa.

Drive Safely

Letter from a First Line Manager to his Boss

Dear Sir,

I am writing this mail to you to share with you my honest thoughts on the roll out of the Corporate   SFE program. The chances are that after I pen down my thoughts , I may not have the courage to send you this mail. But any way let me cross the bridge when I come to it.

Sir , I want to ask you 3  questions.

My first question : Why is it that not a single Corporate SFE Team Member is a field sales manager. Sir , I do not appreciate people coming and telling me what to do when they have no idea about  the realities we face in the field. The group yesterday comprised a senior HO manager who has last worked the field 15 years back. Does he know that in the last 15 years , there has been a sea change in the kind of talent attracted by the Industry. The industry is not a preferred employer today and today I have to recruit whoever I find.  Do you expect miracles to come from this kind of talent? Even if I try to mould and develop , the new MSR takes it as harassment and he resigns before he is confirmed.  Does anyone of the Corporate Team members has any idea about the kind of talent  we are dealing with? I do not think so.

You might tell me to focus the roll out on my experienced team members. Let us take, Vikas. He has been  in my team for the last 3 years. A good performer , but egoistic. You know he delivers results but he has his ways. My second question , If you were in my place , how would you roll out this program to Vikas? The moment I start questioning his doctor list , he will get offended and may even go to the extent of pulling his performance down to show his displeasure. At the end of the month , I am caught between the devil and the deep sea. Do I focus on SFE or do I meet my end of the month commitment. Will you as my boss accept reasons like this for not delivering my numbers?  I know you will not. I cannot take this kind of risk with my performance.

My third question , Sir, Are you convinced that this SFE Roll out will help our territory performance. During the entire meeting I could see you were saying the right things in front of HO. Things they like to hear. But I know your body language lacked conviction. I have been working with you for the last 5 years and know when you are convinced and when you are not. You do not know that also overheard you speaking to your colleague in the washroom during the tea break. You said that this initiative is needless and leading to unrealistic expectations from the corporate. If you as my leader is not convinced how do you expect me to be convinced?.

Sir , I am feeling better , writing this down but I have decided I will not mail this to you. My job is important and I do not want to jeopardise my career by speaking out my concerns. Rather , I too will make all the right noises which HO wants to hear while I continue to guide my team the way I have been doing so as to maintain the current levels of performance.

Please forgive me.

Warm Regards,

Vikram

Inflation ; Cause and Control from a rank Amateur

I am not a statistician. Nor am I an economist or even an Industry top honcho. Nor am I anyone backed by reams of data on economic growth, consumer purchasing pattern etc. I am an ordinary upper middle class person staying in India’s most expensive city: Gurgaon.

To me Gurgaon used to represent the shining beacon of New India’s global ambition. Its cosmopolitan culture inspired me for most of the seven years which I have spent here. So much so was I blinded by Gurgaon that when my company decided to relocate to Mumbai , I chose to resign from my high paying job to set up my own consultancy practice here.

I do not regret the decision of not moving to Mumbai. Yet in the last one and a half years the rose colour of my glasses seems to have faded somewhat. Off late I am noticing the cracks behind the spectacular growth story of this millennium city. This disturbs me as I see this impacting India’s future in the long run.

In the new India’s coming of age which I see through Gurgaon, I draw a parallel to America’s evolution. America, the erstwhile land of opportunity where hardy pioneers braved unknown dangers and an extremely hostile environment to give birth to a new nation. America also has a tumultuous history , the Civil War ,  the great depression , World War 2  , the Vietnam war , the political assassinations to name a few. Yet it was this pioneer stock which set the foundation for America’s leadership in innovations. Be it the car, telephones, railroad, heavy engineering, space exploration, office machines, Entertainment, Computers it was America which set the trend. I think all this innovation was fuelled by need. Need of a country, need of an individual. A nation had to be built from scratch and somewhere the building process brought out the best in its citizens.  Today when we think of America, these images may not come to our mind. Today when we think of US we may think of the recession; a fall out of the subprime crisis. It brought to light the extent of the rot which had seeped into corporate America. A nation which a few decades back had led the world in manufacturing innovations today manufactures the highest number of Lawyers and MBAs.

There may be many reasons for this erosion. I think this simply happened because Need was substituted by Greed.

Greed is dangerous. It is a cancer which kills its own host. Greed is fuelled by instant gratification. And it is this evidence of moving towards instant gratification which I see happening in front of my eyes.  I see it invading our society and eroding our robust value systems inherited from our parents.

We blame inflation and corruption as some of the biggest banes in our lives.  Both are driven by greed. ”Corruption, Yes…but inflation? No, not possible. That is the Government’s fault. I am a victim of inflation” ,we exclaim.

Let me explain. I understand inflation as a mismatch between supply and demand.  Too much money chasing too few things.

Let us look at demand factors with 4 examples which I have observed in Gurgaon.

1^st example : Over the last 1 year I have noticed that the number of cars in my block seem to have doubled. Yet more than 50% of the cars remain in their parking bays every working day. It seems we are purchasing more cars but not using them.

2^nd example:At a hypermarket in my locality I see shoppers piling the shopping carts with big bottles of soft drinks , chips , snacks amongst other things and then queuing up to pay with a credit card and that too on the last days of the month.

3^rd example: While taking a morning walk at 7 .00 a.m.   I routinely see some parents sitting with their children waiting for their school buses with the car engine idling and the ACs running.  I was of the opinion that the petrol prices affected everyone.

4^th example: I see young couples purchasing 3-4 bedroom flats in Gurgaon for Rs.1 Crore and above without batting an eyelid on a combined annual income of Rs.20-30 L.

In all the 4 examples I see Greed as more of a driving force than Need. This has me worried. We are consuming more to fulfil our greed. Some of you might say so what? The disposable incomes have gone up so why should an individual not have the right to enjoy life in his or her way?

My question is that are we capable of handling this high income? I think the answer is no.

I recall in the 1980s when the Maruti 800 hit the Indian Roads, there was a steep increase in the number of road accidents in Delhi. Indians brought up on a diet of the leisurely moving Fiats and Ambassadors, found the rapid acceleration power under their feet exhilarating and they just could not control it.  It was then; speed limits were imposed on the Delhi Roads. An external measure to impose control on human behaviour.

In inflation too, the government is trying to impose external speed limits in terms of hiking interest rates, but the main control for inflation is in our hands.  We can choose to live our lives with things to fulfil our needs. Spend on what fulfils our need and not what fans our greed.  Conservative living does not mean Spartan living. It just means living happily well within our means. It means buying 1 television set which the family can share. It means showering our families with love and time instead  of gadgets and gizmos. It means being a parent and passing the same core values which were passed us on to us by our parents.  I think if each of us takes even 1 small step in this we will see the impact if not in terms of increased savings then definitely in terms of increased happiness.

I think conservative living will also impact the supply to some extent. At least voracious real estate companies will think twice before acquiring agricultural land at dirt cheap prices to build high end residential complexes which we rush to buy and pay with our souls to keep the EMIs from piling up.

Let us not become another America.

It is up to us actually.