unJustly... maybe

I Have Moved!

2006-01-30T13:30:00.000Z

You can now read me at http://unjustly.wordpress.com Have replicated all my previous posts on wordpress. However, you can still read them all here, although some of them lost formatting, in the process of importing them. Thanks for reading. See you around!

Thoughts on Christmas - III

2005-12-25T02:43:00.000Z

I’m sure you are all flooded with great Holiday advice. However, Barbara’s list takes the cake as far as I’m concerned!

Mend a quarrel. Seek out a forgotten friend. Dismiss suspicion, and replace it with trust. Write a love letter. Share some treasure. Give a soft answer. Encourage youth. Manifest your loyalty in word and deed. Keep a promise. Find the time. Forego a grudge. Forgive an enemy. Listen. Apologize if you were wrong. Try to understand. Flout envy. Examine your demands on others. Think first of someone else. Appreciate. Be kind. Be gentle. Laugh a little. Laugh a little more. Deserve confidence. Take up arms against malice. Decry complacency. Express your gratitude. Welcome a stranger. Gladden the heart of a child. Take pleasure in the beauty and wonder of the earth.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Thoughts on Christmas - II

2005-12-25T02:41:00.000Z

If you’re planning to party this Christmas, may I suggest reading Alf’s Safety advice for when you are out this Christmas beforehand! I really loved the section on Personal Property:

- Keep valuables such as mobile phones and laptops safely hidden whilst out. We suggest you carry a safe with you at all times. - If you're going out for the night, take enough cash with you for the evening. And also for a plane ticket out of the European city you'll end up in once someone's drugged you and removed one of your kidneys.

Thoughts on Christmas - I

2005-12-25T02:40:00.000Z

And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.

- Dr. Seuss (How the Grinch Stole Christmas)

Job Satisfaction: Subroto Bagchi

2005-12-23T12:44:00.000Z

In his latest “Times of Mind” article, Subroto Bagchi takes a (by-now-expected) unusual take on the entire concept of Job Satisfaction. He asks whether jobs are living things that can ever ‘satisfy’ us. As he says,

“Jobs are not meant to satisfy us. Jobs are not animate things that have knowledge of who we are, what we are seeking and what our special needs could be”

And…

“Few of us ever ask the boss to be rewarded with a tough and dirty job. We only look for the ‘plum’ ones. Yet, there are people, who given a tough and dirty job, make it strategic: they transform the job in unbelievable ways. In a typical career span, there must be at least four such solid stints in one’s life to make the person a solid professional. All the great people I know have been in the trenches for much of their lives, and their inventory of bruises outnumber(s) the commendations they have received. The occasional commendations stay on the wall. It is the bruises that these people carry with pride.”

When I started my career, and for years afterwards, I was in continual, never-ending search for job satisfaction. Over time, as I matured (?), it was replaced with the realization that every “first day at work” was exciting, every “first year” satisfying, but then it sort of tapered off every single time. If it happens once, fate! Twice, coincidence! But more than that and it must be something internal, something to do with me, rather than with the job/company! I also realized that the times when I felt “fulfilled” weren’t necessarily the times that were the happiest, or the times when my bosses, colleagues, family or the company were catering to my every need. They were usually the times I was contributing the most, the times I was in “flow”, the times I was “satisfying the job”. You can read the full article here.

Wishes

2005-12-23T10:27:00.000Z

Saw this...and loving it... Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2006, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures. And without regard to the race, creed , color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee. By accepting these greetings you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for herself or himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.

Christmas Story

2005-12-23T10:21:00.000Z

Little Bobby came into the kitchen where his mother was making dinner. His birthday was coming up and he thought this was a good time to tell his mother what he wanted. "Mom, I want a bike for my birthday." Little Bobby was a bit of a troublemaker. He had gotten into trouble at school and at home. Bobby's mother asked him if he thought he deserved to get a bike for his birthday. Little Bobby, of course, thought he did. Bobby's mother wanted Bobby to reflect on his behavior over the last year. She said, "Go to your room, Bobby, and think about how you have behaved this year. Then write a letter to God and tell him why you deserve a bike for your birthday." Little Bobby stomped up the steps to his room and sat down to write God a letter. Letter 1 Dear God, I have been a very good boy this year and I would like a bike for my birthday. I want a red one. Your friend, Bobby Bobby knew that this wasn't true. He had not been a very good boy this year, so he tore up the letter and started over. Letter 2 Dear God, This is your friend Bobby. I have been a good boy this year and I would like a red bike for my birthday. Thank you. Your friend Bobby Bobby knew that this wasn't true either. So, he tore up the letter and started again. Letter 3 Dear God, I have been an "OK "boy this year. I still would really like a bike for my birthday. Bobby Bobby knew he could not send this letter to God either. So, Bobby wrote a fourth letter. Letter 4 God, I know I haven't been a good boy this year. I am very sorry. I will be a good boy if you just send me a bike for my birthday. Please! Thank you, Bobby Bobby knew, even if it was true, this letter was not going to get him a bike. Now, Bobby was very upset. He went downstairs and told his mom that he wanted to go to church. Bobby's mother thought her plan had worked, as Bobby looked very sad. "Just be home in time for dinner," she told him. Bobby walked down the street to the church on the corner. Little Bobby went into the church and up to the altar. He looked around to see if anyone was there. Bobby bent down and picked up a statue of the Mary. He slipped the statue under his shirt and ran out of the church, down the street, into the house, and up to his room. He shut the door to his room and sat down with a piece of paper and a pen. Bobby began to write his letter to God. Letter 5 God, I'VE KIDNAPPED YOUR MAMA. IF YOU WANT TO SEE HER AGAIN, SEND THE BIKE!!!

Intellectual Property, DRM & Customers

2005-12-20T11:52:00.000Z

I know this controversy is now about a zillion years old. But it illustrates some of my thoughts about companies’ values & principles only too well! I was going to write a long article about this, but then I came across Carla Schroder's article The RIAA - Hollywood - DRM - Linux Suicide Pact on LXer, where she writes:

“I had already come to the conclusion that the fine folks behind the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, Digital Rights Management, and the Business Software Alliance are either nuts, corrupt, or both. These are all things that Real People (like you and me) don't need and don't want. The DMCA is on shaky ground Constitutionally, but until we get a Constitutional amendment that requires new laws to pass Constitutional muster before they can be enforced, we will spend our lives enduring barrages of similar madnesses… …I find myself wondering what sort of mindset would prefer to perpetuate an inferior product line and ignore what customers are willing to pay for, and instead devote considerable energies and money to fighting with their customers, and treating them like criminals, and purchasing punitive unenforceable laws, and sue tens of thousands of people, and plant destructive software into peer-to-peer networks and on customer's computers, for which they should go to jail, but nooo, that won't happen, instead of devoting those resources to improving their products, and delivering what customers want to pay for? …Like Richard Stallman, I detest the sloppy, inaccurate, propagandistic term "intellectual property." It deliberately implies that ideas and concepts can be owned. Well, they can't. What we are talking about are copyrights, trademarks, and patents, or very specific implementations of ideas and concepts. In this discussion, we're talking about copyrights and fair use. As an author, I have a fair bit of self-interest in copyrights. I don't care to see my works copied and sold by someone else. By dang, if there is money to be made from my labors, I want it. …I admit I am nervous about the concept of delivering a book entirely in digital format. I need to earn at least $40,000 from a book to make it worthwhile for me financially. Will digital delivery cut into my income? Or will it expand my readership by making the book available at a lower cost? I believe the latter. Sure, there are always freeloaders who are ingenious at getting things for free. But most folks are honest, and all they want is fair value. If I write sucky books that no one wants, like the way that the music industry releases crappy CDs, and Hollywood makes dopey movies that no one wants, I won't sell more books by criminalizing customers and instituting lame copy-protection schemes. …So here we have an entire industry exerting considerable effort to exclude a whole class of customers, because we use a computing platform that they cannot control. Sure, Microsoft will be happy to screw over its end users by including all manner of DRM nastiness. But in the end it won't matter anyway- customers who choose to view their legally-purchased DVDs on Linux will easily, if illegally, find a way. What sort of madness is this? Despite the attempts of the software and entertainment industries to convince us that we only license their products, not own them, most folks view items that they purchase as owned, and theirs to do with as they jolly well feel like. That's the reality, and fighting that is futile. Their attempts to "protect" their "property" are laughable in any case. Professional pirates, the ones who copy and print off thousands of discs, aren't even slowed down by their silly lawsuits and copy-protection schemes. The only ones who get hurt are their own customers- the very ones who pay actual money for their products. The way to attract customers is to offer attractive products at a fair price, and be nice to them. Not strongarm them. You know that, I know that. Why don't these bigshot corporations know that?”

For more on the Sony DRM Controversy, visit the following: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/11/sonys_drm_rootk.html http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2005_11.php#004192 http://businessweek.com/technology/content/nov2005/tc20051122_343542.htm http://www.boycottsony.us/ http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/2005/10/sony-rootkits-and-digital-rights.html Get your free pdf copy of Freedom of Expression®: Overzealous Copyright Bozos and Other Enemies of Creativity here

The Rantings Of A Technology Lover

2005-12-20T11:47:00.000Z

I love technology. I love my iPod. I love my digital camera and the pictures it creates on my computer. I love the Powerbook G4 I’m using to write this post. I even once loved my Treo 600 though that infatuation is fading as its email program capabilities have unexpectedly deteriorated. But I still love the idea of being able to get my email whenever and wherever I want. I love the antibiotic that cured my wife’s pneumonia last winter. I love blogging. I love the special features on the DVD. I love that Dr. Jonas can save this boy’s life (rr). I love the idea of Skype. If I could find a decent USB headset and mic that worked as it should on a Mac I'd love Skype itself. I love podcasting. If I watched TV, I'd love Tivo.

Same here...heh!

Poem by Robert Frost

2005-12-20T11:43:00.000Z

Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what I’ve tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To know that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice

Don't ask me why I'm reading this stuff!

Change Management

2005-12-16T12:04:00.000Z

Here I go again…butting in things that are none of my business, instead of concentrating on things I’m supposed to be doing. Problem is I think too much, especially about things I care about. Mushy disclaimer done, let’s move on to the reason for this post. Organisational change needs 3 things to succeed:

Intent
Precision and
Speed

However, most Change management exercises fail precisely because the Change Agents fail to get one of the above right. Either the effort is a half-hearted one (Lack of Intent), or it is done with too narrow or too wide a focus (Lack of Precision), or it seems to go on forever (Lack of Speed), leading to demotivation & loss of energy. Lack of Intent: Usually occurs because the Change Agents do not have a clear vision (sorry to use that term) of where they want to go. This might be partly due to the ever-changing nature of the environment around them, or lack of direction from Senior Management, but usually it is because the reasons for undertaking the Change program are not clearly articulated. Quite often the programs are undertaken because of ego-clashes, fad-hunting or because the Change Agent is just plain bored or frustrated with the status quo. Articulating the reasons for the change program, and the benefits that are sought to be achieved, is the first step towards getting it right. Spending more time & thought at the pre-planning stage would make the execution usually better. Lack of Precision: Usually occurs because in their haste to change, Agents attack the problem piecemeal, rather than taking a holistic view. Or they may desire to change everything of the past (remember the Re-engineering fad?). While tools like OD, Scenario Planning et al might help, probably the best approach would be to run a pilot program in a smaller part of the organization as an experiment to learn from, gain political currency, and leverage. Do keep in mind though, that at times, this might not be possible, or indeed desirable. This would be particularly true in cases of downsizing, strategic purchase/sale of business, or while entering a new market/geography/product line or repositioning an existing product line. In such cases, probably the best approach is to move with large steps at a rapid pace. Which brings us to… Lack of Speed: This is where (my uneducated & totally biased guess) 90% of change management programs fail. Most programs proceed at too slow a pace, meandering & floundering on the way, not because of lack of intent or precision, but because the time taken to implement the program is so long as to render the original premise & plan meaningless. This is usually because even when people are convinced of the “intellectual need” for a change program, they have not bought into it “emotionally”. This is because such programs frequently challenge our pre-conceived notions of how things ought to be done, or force us to step out of our comfort zones. Surprisingly, it is as true of the Change Agents themselves, as of the other people effected by or involved with the program. Acknowledging the emotional impact of the Change Programs goes a long way towards ensuring speed. Have you seen any Change Programs suffer? If so, do you agree with the above, or can you think of other reasons why Change Programs flounder?

Carers Wish List

2005-12-16T00:06:00.000Z

I wish:

I could watch a television programme all the way through I could go to bed when I want to and sleep through the night I could get up when I want to I could do something on the spur of the moment I didn’t have to watch the clock for tablets and toileting I didn’t have to worry all the time about the person I care for I wish things could be as they were.

Thanks to Chris Young, caring for her husband (& to Trevor for sharing this). Trevor Gay defines a carer as “family members (or friends) who provide care to someone suffering from an illness or disability. They are unpaid. Carers do this from a sense of duty and obligation but more importantly from a sense of love for the person they look after.” India has always had a rich tradition of carering (is there such a word?) It is not only common for people to take care of their parents/in-laws, it is almost an expected part of one’s duty to them. Almost all of us grew up watching our parents care for one or more of their parents, and we are the richer for the experience. Sadly enough this tradition seems to be waning with the advent of nuclear families & apartment-living of today. However, it is interesting to note that a western country like UK still seems to have a thriving culture of carering! As Carers UK point out “the care they provide is worth £57 billion per year - the equivalent of running a second NHS. People from all walks of life and backgrounds can become carers - over 3 in 5 people in the UK will become carers at some time in their lives.” (emphasis mine) So, this holiday season, I request you to please visit the Carers UK Web Site and spend a little time reading some of the information.

Quality of Leadership

2005-12-15T11:08:00.000Z

Adrian Savage has this to say on judging the quality of leadership of an organization:

Always remember this. How your staff behave is telling the rest of the world — very clearly and loudly — how good you are as a leader. When I see poor staff, I know the leadership is crap. And don't give me all that rubbish about blaming the quality of the people available. There are thousands of talented folk out there looking for work. If you employ poor people, you're either getting what you deserve (the good ones wouldn't be seen dead working in your organization); you're too mean to pay a decent wage; or you can't tell the difference between good people and those who should be politely sent on their way — or, worst of all, you don't care. However you slice it, you're to blame. There are no excuses.

Hmmm, something for all of us to ponder upon…

Two Stories of Management Styles

2005-12-15T11:03:00.000Z

Recently, came across a really old article by Joel Spolsky regarding contrasting management styles. What caught my eye was this phrase:

(At Juno)… it was the idea that no matter how hard you work, no matter how smart you are, no matter whether you are 'in charge' of something or not, you have no authority whatsoever for even the tiniest thing. None. Take your damn ideas, training, brains, and intelligence, all the things we're paying you for, and shove it. And at Juno, there were plenty of managers, something like 1/4 of all the employees, and so they had plenty of times to stick their fingers into every single decision and make sure that they were in control. The contrast with Microsoft, where VP's descended from Building 9 to make it clear that you have the authority to get things done, was stark.

Read the two stories contrasting the management styles at http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/TwoStories.html, and then think about which story would be true for your company!

Wildly Important Goals

2005-12-14T13:42:00.000Z

In the audiobook, “The Four Disciplines of Execution”, Stephen Covey and Jennifer Colosimo say that the first discipline is to focus on wildly important goals. To do this, they state that people can only accomplish two or three goals at once with excellence and insist that we must narrow our focus in order to achieve such WIGs. An excerpt:

One of the most fundamental principles of organizational activity is that human beings are genetically hard-wired to do one thing at a time with excellence. And there's no better place to illustrate how this principle is honored than at the airport. Because right now there could be more than 100 airplanes either approaching, landing, taking off or moving around. And all of them are very, very important - especially if you happen to be in one of them. For an air traffic control specialist only one aircraft is wildly important right now. That's Flight 457. The controller is aware of all of the other planes on her radar. She is keeping track of them, but all her talent and expertise is solely focused on Flight 457. If she doesn't get Flight 457 on the ground safely, if she doesn't do that with total excellence, nothing else she might achieve is really going to matter much. Wildly important goals are like that. They always share one unique characteristic. They are the goals we must achieve with total excellence. Any other goal we might achieve really won't matter much. This is what we suggest you must do in your work. You must make the hard choices and separate what is wildly important to you and your organization from all of the other merely important goals that may be on your radar. Then you must approach that wildly important goal with focus and diligence until it is delivered as promised with excellence.

The other three disciplines as per Covey & Colosimo are:

Create a Compelling Scoreboard
Translate Lofty Goals into Specific Actions
Hold Each Other Accountable -- All of the Time

Gaiman on Parenting

2005-12-14T13:28:00.000Z

Was reading an article by Dina Rabinovitch on Neil Gaiman, when I came across this…

As with all tales of children in peril, the parents in Gaiman's books are deeply detached. "I suspect the parents in Coraline, and all the books, are much more me, parodying me - my nose in a book, my head somewhere else. It's more me taking all the worst bits of me, than it is my parents," he says.

I’m sure this sounds extremely familiar to my wife…describes someone she knows well! ;-)) For those of you who have no clue about who Neil Gaiman is, or what he does, I’d suggest typing “Neil” in google, and following the first link you come to.

Does this happen to you?

2005-12-14T13:25:00.000Z

If you own an iPod (or for that matter, any other techno-gadget), and have had a harrowing experience lately, check out an experience Brad Feld had... http://www.feld.com/blog/archives/2005/11/it_ought_to_be.html You may also like to read Jeremy Zawodny’s “Steve Jobs Ruined My Thanksgiving”

Can't Believe I Took These Tests

2005-12-12T17:15:00.000Z

Your Blogging Type is Pensive and Philosophical

You blog like no one else is reading... You tend to use your blog to explore ideas - often in long winded prose. Easy going and flexible, you tend to befriend other bloggers easily. But if they disagree with once too much, you'll pull them from your blogroll!

What's Your Blogging Personality?

Your Outrageous Name is:

Hugh Mungous

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Your Hidden Talent

You have the power to persuade and influence others. You're the type of person who can turn a whole room around. The potential for great leadership is there, as long as you don't abuse it. Always remember, you have a lot more power over people than you might think!

What's Your Hidden Talent?

Your Personality Profile

You are dependable, popular, and observant. Deep and thoughtful, you are prone to moodiness. In fact, your emotions tend to influence everything you do. You are unique, creative, and expressive. You don't mind waving your freak flag every once and a while. And lucky for you, most people find your weird ways charming!

The World's Shortest Personality Test

You Passed 8th Grade Math

Congratulations, you got 10/10 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Math?

Doing Business in India – Part 2

2005-12-09T13:58:00.000Z

In the previous post, I had summarized a recent McKinsey Quarterly Report on the future of India's Outsourcing, which had emphasized the urgency of educational & infrastructural reform in India. Time after time, report after report in one journal after another seems to focus on our poor infrastructure, not just physical but social & educational as well. And yet it seems, as though the policy makers are just not bothered. While previously we seemed content to deplore the decadent West, while touting our own so-called cultural superiority, today we seem to be taken in by our own hype of having conquered the West just because of our IT & BPO prowess. One software center opens in Bangalore, hiring 5000 people, and the media make it appear as though we’re now the software capital of the world. Add to it the numerous articles in the Indian media about the number of Indians in high positions in various American firms. We seem to forget (blinded & deafened by our own hype) that our software exports are barely 1.5% of the total software industry. If we add the BPO stuff, we’ve probably captured 2-2.5% of the market. For each company coming to India (or choosing to work with Indian firms), we probably have three choosing not to. The reasons given by these companies range from poor roads to Indian accents to cultural issues. While we can decry this as racist or un-informed, the fact of the matter is that a company choosing to set up base in India does it with a lot of trepidation, and it devolves upon us to make it easy for them to do business with us. However, we seem to go out of our way to increase the post-decision dissonance. Our labour laws & unions make hiring & firing way too cumbersome. Our government bureaucracy ensures that instead of spending their time producing & marketing, the companies spend it in queues in government office. (Please do not talk to me about having dismantled license raj; I’ve dealt personally with the customs & excise departments, as well as with RBI & Department of Company Affairs, and I could tell you a story or two that would make your jaded selves shiver) Our roads are not worth discussing, while the electricity supply is good enough for all the software campuses to have large generators. The telecom infrastructure is painful, and if you use the internet at home (rather than the company DSL) then you would know what “pathetically slow” means. Meanwhile we go about, smug in the belief that “the logic for offshoring is inescapable”, that “to survive in tomorrow’s world, every company will have to do business with India/China”. I’m sorry, but that’s bullcrap! Companies will do business if the value they get out of it is more than the cost of doing business. With our creaking infrastructure, poor administration of laws, convoluted bureaucratic procedures & abysmal educational standards, we really are in no position to Rule the World.

Doing Business in India – Part 1

2005-12-09T13:49:00.000Z

A recent McKinsey Quarterly report on Offshoring says that India's lead in offshoring stems from its pool of well-trained, low-cost engineers for IT services, but this pool is smaller than it appears, and there's a risk that it may run dry in the most popular offshoring locations. It says that the leading issues (opportunities?) facing Indian offshoring industry (IT & BPO) are:

Variability of educational standards across institutions
Poor English
High rates of emigration among graduates of the top schools
Low number of engineering graduates, especially when compared to the foreseen demand
Scarcity of middle managers and…(get this…)
Poor quality infrastructure

The solutions suggested are:

Raise the quality of university education – defining curriculums that reflect current and future demand in employment; developing better certification procedures and promoting higher standards of quality for colleges; support the expansion of top-quality private schools; Offering grants to study the coveted disciplines (like engineering); standardization; focus on English; opening IITs in each state
Move beyond offshoring hot spots – into Tier 2 & tier 3 cities; provide incentives & marketing support to companies willing to do so
Improve the infrastructure – airports, communications networks, utilities (roads, housing, sanitation, electricity & water)
Move beyond IT and software – into industrial R&D and medical research and back-office functions

The report goes on to say:

“Thanks to the dynamism of India's IT services, the country is the world's preeminent offshoring destination. But other low-wage nations are now broadcasting their potential as offshore locations, and demand will quickly exceed India's supply of talent suitable for international companies. To stay on top, India must not only produce more top-quality engineers but also improve the suitability of other graduates. Finally, it has to show companies the depth and quality of its talent in areas other than IT—especially R&D and back-office work in industries such as finance and accounting.”

Read the full report online (free subscription required) at http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/article_abstract.aspx?ar=1660&L2=1&L3=106&srid=17&gp=0

Wish List - Books

2005-12-08T16:59:00.000Z

Remember wish lists? As kids we filled our lists with stuff we hoped to receive and stuff no one would ever buy us. Well, I've started my own Wish List on the Amazon.co.uk website. Check it out then create one for yourself if you haven't already! http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/registry/3U24CEWIVBBLQ

Quotes - by Milton Friedman

2005-12-08T16:49:00.000Z

There's no such thing as a free lunch.
I am in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it's possible.
A major source of objection to a free economy is precisely that it gives people what they want instead of what a particular group thinks they ought to want. Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.
The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem.
We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes nonwork.
We don't have a desperate need to grow. We have a desperate desire to grow.
With respect to teachers' salaries - Poor teachers are grossly overpaid and good teachers grossly underpaid. Salary schedules tend to be uniform and determined far more by seniority.
If an exchange between two parties is voluntary, it will not take place unless both believe they will benefit from it. Most economic fallacies derive from the neglect of this simple insight, from the tendency to assume that there is a fixed pie, that one party can only gain at the expense of another.
History suggests that capitalism is a necessary condition for political freedom. Clearly it is not a sufficient condition.
Many people want the government to protect the consumer. A much more urgent problem is to protect the consumer from the government.
Only government can take perfectly good paper, cover it with perfectly good ink and make the combination worthless.
There are four ways in which you can spend money. You can spend your own money on yourself. When you do that, why then you really watch out what you’re doing, and you try to get the most for your money. Then you can spend your own money on somebody else. For example, I buy a birthday present for someone. Well, then I’m not so careful about the content of the present, but I’m very careful about the cost. Then, I can spend somebody else’s money on myself. And if I spend somebody else’s money on myself, then I’m sure going to have a good lunch! Finally, I can spend somebody else’s money on somebody else. And if I spend somebody else’s money on somebody else, I’m not concerned about how much it is, and I’m not concerned about what I get. And that’s government. And that’s close to 40% of our national income. – Fox News interview 2004

Who will play your music?

2005-12-07T07:28:00.000Z

John Stanko re-tells this story of how Michael Jones went from being a consultant to a famous pianist.

“One day someone heard Mr. Jones playing the piano in a Toronto hotel lobby, something he did as a hobby while he traveled. The man approached him and asked Mr. Jones an important question: The man asked, "Do you work at the hotel?" I said, "Oh, no, no, no. I'm a consultant. I'm busy trying to change the world." To my disappointment, he didn't seem at all impressed by that. Then he asked, "How many other people do this kind of consulting work that you do?" I said, "Well, probably 20 or 30, I would guess, in the Toronto area." And then he looked at me, and at that moment what I most recall about the meeting was how clear and sober his eyes appeared, from how he seemed a few minutes before. He said, "Who's going to play that music if you don't play it yourself?" I felt that question drop in a way that I had not heard a question drop inside of me before. I realized it was a question for which I had no answer. . . Then he stood up, a little uneasy, and steadied himself by putting his hand on my shoulder, and said, "This is your gift -- don't waste it." Meanwhile I sat on the piano bench, stunned by the question and the sense that it had just changed my life. Who will play my music? I asked myself.”

Stanko asks: "Who will play your "music" if you don't? Who will write the book, build the business empire, take the missions trip, compose the play or fulfill your destiny if you don't? Are there others who can do what you are doing now, while something only you can do remains undone?" Postscript: Michael Jones concluded that no one would play his music if he didn't. He overcame his fear of going broke, being ignored or failing and went on to sell two million copies of his piano recordings.

What's wrong with our reform process?

2005-12-07T07:23:00.000Z

Ravikiran Rao explains that not only does it not go far enough, but that it's not likely to go much further, in his post Why we reformed what we did." An excerpt:

The gradual, step-by-step opening was supposed to be a good thing from the point of view of eminent caution. It was supposed to be a continual experiment, the results of which would help us to take further steps. If this experiment succeeded, the argument went, we would feel more confident, and it would be politically more acceptable to take those steps. As an experiment it has succeeded spectacularly. Where we reformed, we did well. We reformed the stock market, and the stock market is doing well. We allowed foreign investment and foreign investment flowed in. We liberalized the telecoms sector and now the poor have mobile phones. Where we did not reform, we are doing badly. We did not liberalize the labour market and so organized sector unemployment is still high. We did not dereserve the small-scale sector and we are still lagging in manufacturing. We haven’t touched agriculture and farmers are still committing suicides. This is as perfect a controlled experiment as you can ever get in the social sciences. If you want to test out the efficacy of a drug, you split a population into two, give one of them the drug and the other a placebo. If the group that receives the drug improves and the control group that received the placebo does not improve, we know that the drug makes a difference. You cannot take the drug’s lack of effect on the control group to claim that it isn’t effective, can you? But that is exactly what I’ve been hearing for the past ten years that I’ve been following this debate. It is bad enough that we are conducting this cruel experiment - where the rich and the middle-class are administered the medication while the poor are given the placebo.

Imagination, Business Trends & Doing What it Takes

2005-12-06T17:12:00.000Z

A few interesting top ten lists from Dave Pollard's How to Save the World. Ten rules for being more imaginative: 1. Pay attention 2. Spend time with children 3. Remember your dreams 4. Change your point of view 5. Collaborate 6. Transport yourself 7. Improvise 8. Break the rules 9. Believe, and make believe 10. Get away from the media The ten most important trends in business: 1. Open-Source Business 2. Disruptive Innovation 3. Complexity 4. Corporate Reform 5. Innovation Incubation 6. Social Networking and Personal Productivity Improvement 7. Wisdom of Crowds 8. Channel Customization 9. Customer Relationship Management 10. Execution The nine reasons we don't do what we should: 1. Fear 2. Lack of Self-Confidence 3. Lack of Knowledge 4. Trying to Do Too Much Alone 5. Trying to Do Too Much 6. Loss of Self 7. Lack of Energy 8. Lack of Reward 9. It Can't Be Done

For NRI’s …from another

2005-12-06T17:09:00.000Z

An NRI blogs about going back… http://parthp.blogspot.com/2005/11/kya-ab-laut-chalen.html TTG’s answers to some of the above issues… http://25worldcountry.blogspot.com/2005/11/laut-sakte-ho-somewhat.html And… Jabberwock in an unusually political post talks about the hypocritical NRI’s

Perils of a Tech-driven Life?!

2005-12-06T16:36:00.000Z

Instead of expecting to finish that long tech to-do list, maybe we should find the Zen in the art of computer maintenance, or so says Brad Stone in "Our So-Called Digital Life".

“Finally. I am about to stop building and start living my digital life. In just a few more days, the computers, accessories and software tools that I use at home and work will be fully upgraded, optimized and fine-tuned for maximum efficiency.”

The column focuses, only half in jest, on the perils of today’s tech-driven world. You must patch the OS, update security settings, defrag hard drive and download a new anti-spyware tool; you need to subscribe to Skype, Del.icio.us, Flickr and satellite radio, PayPal, Paltalk, Grokster and Friendster… archive old e-mail and preserve the addresses of the good contacts, pick through the spam filter and separate family messages from the e-mails of all those desperate Nigerians… You need to backup the hard drive, connect TiVo to the home network and widescreen TV to stereo system, sync the digital camera to the PC, and thereafter transfer the photos to the Web, ordered, tagged, captioned, etc. etc. You need to create a new playlists in iTunes, start a blog, begin a daily podcast, and perhaps a video blog as well. You also need to research new cell phones, change the settings on the current one…ad infinitum… …And to add to all of it, you need to read this stupid blog, making fun of all the people like me & you, and the lives we lead… Having read the column, one is more sympathetic of Brad when he says (emphasis mine!),

“Then, after I have checked off all the items on my technology to-do list, the tools that I need to live a fulfilled digital life will finally be fully assembled. Unless true fulfillment is forever elusive. Maybe the intensive, time-consuming effort needed to manage my digital life is itself my digital life.”

Here’s to digital enlightenment!

Nine Business Insights from Time CEO Ann Moore

2005-12-06T06:42:00.000Z

…From an interview in Knowledge at Wharton One: Never turn down the chance to vote. Two: The only difficult assignment in business is finding good people and putting them in the right job. Three: You will never have more control over your professional life than you do when you start out. Enjoy control and time while you still have it. Four: Forget the clock. Get a compass instead. Where you are headed is more important than how fast you are going. Five: Power accrues to those who produce results. Profits matter. Six: Power isn't everything. Power means incredible sacrifice and constant trade-offs between work, spouse and family. Seven: Recognize that there are fundamental differences between men and women. Eight: All behavior emanates from the top and reverberates down the organization to the lowest level. Nine: Making money is easy. Making a difference is hard.

Who killed Manjunath?

2005-12-05T20:46:00.000Z

Ila Patnaik in a very perceptive essay writes:

“Parts of the oil economy are criminalised because fuel prices are not market-determined. The profits make murder an acceptable risk for entreprenurial thugs…”

Read the full story here.

For Friends Only - Poem by WH Auden

2005-12-05T08:00:00.000Z

Ours yet not ours, being set apart As a shrine to friendship, Empty and silent most of the year, This room awaits from you What you alone, as visitor, can bring, A weekend of personal life. In a house backed by orderly woods, Facing a tractored sugar-beet country, Your working hosts engaged to their stint, You are unlike to encounter Dragons or romance: were drama a craving, You would not have come. Books we do have for almost any Literate mood, and notepaper, envelopes, For a writing one (to "borrow" stamps Is the mark of ill-breeding): Between lunch and tea, perhaps a drive; After dinner, music or gossip. Should you have troubles (pets will die Lovers are always behaving badly) And confession helps, we will hear it, Examine and give our counsel: If to mention them hurts too much, We shall not be nosey. Easy at first, the language of friendship Is, as we soon discover, Very difficult to speak well, a tongue With no cognates, no resemblance To the galimatias of nursery and bedroom, Court rhyme or shepherd's prose, And, unless spoken often, soon goes rusty. Distance and duties divide us, But absence will not seem an evil If it make our re-meeting A real occasion. Come when you can: Your room will be ready. In Tum-Tum's reign a tin of biscuits On the bedside table provided For nocturnal munching. Now weapons have changed, And the fashion of appetites: There, for sunbathers who count their calories, A bottle of mineral water. Felicissima notte! May you fall at once Into a cordial dream, assured That whoever slept in this bed before Was also someone we like, That within the circle of our affection Also you have no double.

A Giant Mosaic

2005-12-02T02:25:00.000Z

This mosaic image, one of the largest ever taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope of the Crab Nebula, is a six-light-year-wide expanding remnant of a star's supernova explosion. Japanese and Chinese astronomers witnessed this violent event nearly 1,000 years ago in 1054, as did, almost certainly, Native Americans. The orange filaments are the tattered remains of the star and consist mostly of hydrogen. The rapidly spinning neutron star embedded in the center of the nebula is the dynamo powering the nebula's eerie interior bluish glow. The blue light comes from electrons whirling at nearly the speed of light around magnetic field lines from the neutron star. The neutron star, the crushed ultra-dense core of the exploded star, like a lighthouse, ejects twin beams of radiation that appear to pulse 30 times a second due to the neutron star's rotation. The colors in the image indicate the different elements that were expelled during the explosion. Blue in the filaments in the outer part of the nebula represents neutral oxygen, green is singly-ionized sulfur, and red indicates doubly-ionized oxygen. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, J. Hester (Arizona State University)

The Bridge Builder

2005-11-28T17:00:00.000Z

An old man, going a lone highway, Came at the evening cold and gray, To a chasm, vast and deep and wide, Through which was flowing a sullen tide. The old man crossed in the twilight dim, That sullen stream had no fears for him; But he turned, when he reached the other side, And built a bridge to span the tide. “Old man”, said a fellow pilgrim near, “You are wasting your time building here. Your journey will end with the ending day; You never again must pass this way. You have crossed the chasm, deep and wide, Why do you build a bridge at eventide?” The builder lifted his grey old head. “Good friend, in the path I have come”, he said, “There follows after me today, A youth whose feet must pass this way. This chasm that has been naught to me, To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be. He, too, must cross in the twilight dim; Good friend, I am building the bridge for him.” - Poem By Will Allen Dromgoole With loads of thanks to Bud Bilanich

On The Loss of A Young Life

2005-11-25T16:35:00.000Z

In the memory of Manjunath Shanmugam, who gave up his life in line of duty… We need to ensure that the sacrifice doesn’t go waste. We need to ensure that his name is never forgotten. We need to ensure that the perpetrators of this heinous crime are brought to justice. We need to ensure that incidents like this are never repeated. So I request all my readers to visit the site set up in memory of the hero by his friends (http://manjunathshanmugam.blogspot.com/) I also request all of you to please sign the Petition to the Prime Minister at http://www.petitiononline.com/manju005/. It may/may not result in anything, but the effort is still important. If nothing else, it will help bring some pressure on the government, and focus media attention on the politician-criminal nexus! Join the good fight! Gaurav Sabnis has a moving eulogy here & here For the full story, please visit Rashmi Bansal Other blog posts on Manju’s murder: Animesh Pathak Amit Varma Sharad Dhammo Indian Express articles: IOC official seals petrol pump, is killed Cops hunting for accused in IOC sales manager’s murder Father of IIM graduate killed for shutting down petrol pump says he knew of danger

Thanksgiving Proclamation

2005-11-24T16:49:00.000Z

Here is the original Thanksgiving Proclamation: "Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor; and Whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint committee, requested me to recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness: Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enable to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, in general, for all the great and various favors which He has been pleased to confer upon us. And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions; to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually; to render our National Government a blessing to all the people by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed; to protect and guide all sovereigns and nations (especially such as have shown kindness to us), and to bless them with good governments, peace, and concord; to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us; and, generally to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as He alone knows to be best. Given under my hand, at the city of New York, the 3rd day of October, A.D. 1789." George Washington

Being Thankful

2005-11-24T10:13:00.000Z

Since today is Thanksgiving, all my posts today will have something to do with gratitude, love, joy & hope. Scott Adams has a fantastic piece out today. Extracts below, but please read the complete piece. I promise, it’ll be worth your time… I’m thankful for the invention of the television remote control, without which life itself would be impossible. I’m thankful that my cat can purr but not laugh, because a laughing cat would be creepy. I’m sure there are a more things I should be thankful for, but I take all of those things for granted. And the privilege of doing so is perhaps the thing I am most thankful for. As for me, I’m thankful to Scott for having brought me so much joy. I know a lot of people think Dilbert’s a cynic, but I think we all need someone to point out to us (business-folk) our warts. Someone needs to say that the emperor’s naked. And Scott does it in such a fun way too! Dilbert strips have always made me smile. And most of them have made me think… Thank you Scott! And Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

With Gratitude on Thanksgiving Day

2005-11-24T06:36:00.000Z

Today is Thanksgiving Day in the USA. What a beautiful concept! Thanksgiving is a holiday unencumbered by gift-giving, unlike birthdays or Christmas or the like. At Thanksgiving, all you give is… Thanks! Adrian Savage writing in/as The Coyote Within says “Holidays used to be times for slowing down and remembering. They should be again.” Check out the full article on Participation at his site. (He writes it so much better than I ever could, so instead of trying to publish extracts, have just given the link) Please also check out the guest article by Patricia Ryan Madson on Slow Leadership. She talks about Gratitude… “Looking at life with a grateful eye is a habit, and can be cultivated.” Thank you Adrian, Patricia & Slow Leadership for reminding us of the truly important things in life!

Celebrate Failure

2005-11-23T15:03:00.000Z

So says Richard Watson in this FastCompany column. An extremely interesting observation is regarding people’s response to failure. Most people will deny it, or attribute it to causes outside themselves! This is because as Watson says “Most people believe that success breeds success and they believe that the converse is true too, that failure breeds failure”. Another interesting viewpoint in the essay is regarding the oft-repeated “tenacity advice”. Most motivational speakers urge people not to give up. They say that if you just keep on trying, you will eventually succeed. And if you don’t, it must have something to do with your not trying hard enough. Watson believes this to be false. He advises us to learn from failure and try again differently. As Henry Moore said: "The secret of life is to have a task, something you bring everything to, every minute of the day for your whole life. And the most important thing is: It must be something you cannot possibly do.” Watson’s top five tips for failing with greater frequency and style: 1. Try to fail as often as possible but never make the same mistake twice. 2. Set a failure target as part of each employee's annual review. 3. If projects are a failure, kill them quickly and move on. 4. Create a failure database as part of knowledge management. 5. Set up annual failure awards. If this gets too successful, stop it. What do you think?

Primer on Bloglines

2005-11-23T11:09:00.000Z

A fair number of people have come back asking about Bloglines… I thought it was better to put a primer on setting up & managing a Bloglines account here, rather than mailing it to everyone one by one… Please do keep in mind though, that this section will seem fairly simplistic to the techies out there…this is a tech-phobe writing for other tech-phobes…suggestions for improvement invited! Getting Started Go to http://www.bloglines.com/; create an account...then set up feeds as follows: You'll see something like "Subscribe with one click from your browser toolbar". This should allow you to add a shortcut called "Sub with Bloglines" to your favorites folder. Then go to the website you want to set up a feed from, and click on "Sub with Bloglines". It'll show you all the feeds from the website, select the latest one (I found atom feeds to be better than RSS feeds, but you might like to play around a bit) & click OK. ALTERNATIVELY: Look around on the chosen website for a link saying RSS or XML. Usually this is an orange box. Their also might be a link saying "subscribe to feed", etc. Right click on this link, copy shortcut, go to your Bloglines account, click "Add", paste the link in the box & click OK. ALTERNATIVELY: On some websites, e.g. New York Times, etc. you can also get their OPML file, save it to your desktop; then just add it to your “Add” box in Bloglines, then click OK. You'll see the feed links; delete the ones you don't want. You can also move them to other folders, etc, by using the “edit subscriptions” tab on the top right, or by using the “Edit” button (top left, next to “Add”) You might have to play around a bit on Bloglines before you are fully comfortable, but it does ease the problem of visiting all your favourite websites one by one. To Start With: You can view my subscriptions on http://www.bloglines.com/public/indianinuk. You'll see a tab at the very bottom, saying "export subscriptions", on clicking which you can view the OPML file, save it... then just add it to your “Add” box in Bloglines, and click OK. Once you've exported my OPML file to your Bloglines account, you might want to delete/modify/reorganise quite a few feeds. But it should help you get started. Further: You can set up your options, so that it only shows you the updated feeds...makes it a whole lot easier to manage... you can always view all your feeds by either clicking on “Show All” or using the “Edit” button. Plus, if you choose the option to make your blog public on this one, then you could send me the link to your subscriptions later on...will help me add feeds...(I know, I know…shameless, aren’t I?) One more thing: If you want to share your subscriptions with others, please keep them "Public"; else others will not be able to view it... (hmmm… good idea to click off "Public", if you have subscriptions to "naughty" feeds...;-)) Hope this helps. Do comment on whether this was useful, and also as to how this article could be improved upon. Happy feed-gathering!

Teacher Man by Frank McCourt out now!

2005-11-23T01:45:00.000Z

Frank McCourt was born in America to Irish parents who brought him up (so to speak) in Ireland. At the age of 19, he made his way back to America, where he worked in a variety of low-paying jobs while earning a college degree, after which he taught in New York schools. His book on growing up in Ireland Angela’s Ashes won the Pulitzer Prize. A moving story of pain, loss, deprivation & hope, it’s quite simply the best memoir I’ve read till date! This was followed by ‘Tis, based on his later life in New York. However, the 30-year period during which he taught in schools, was largely given the short shrift in this book. With Teacher Man, McCourt makes amends, and gives us a bit more insight into this part of his life. The book (or at least the parts I’ve read) is vintage McCourt, with his unique brand of low-key humour shining through the most painful of experiences. Also, like the earlier two, it is the story of a young person discovering life… excerpts below (from http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,,1648343,00.html ): “Mea culpa. Instead of teaching, I told stories. Anything to keep them quiet and in their seats. They thought I was teaching. I thought I was teaching. I was learning. And you called yourself a teacher? I didn't call myself anything. I was more than a teacher. And less. In the high school classroom you are a drill sergeant, a rabbi, a shoulder to cry on, a disciplinarian, a singer, a low-level scholar, a clerk, a referee, a clown, a counsellor, a dress-code enforcer, a conductor, an apologist, a philosopher, a collaborator, a tap dancer, a politician, a therapist, a fool, a traffic cop, a priest, a mother-father-brother-sister-uncle-aunt, a bookkeeper, a critic, a psychologist, the last straw.” …AND “The big puzzle at the end of the term is how does the teacher arrive at a grade? I'll tell you how I arrive at a grade. First, how was your attendance? Even if you sat quietly in the back and thought about the discussions and the readings, you surely learned something. Second, did you participate? Did you get up there and read on Fridays? Anything. Stories, essays, poetry, plays. Third, did you comment on the work of your classmates? Fourth, and this is up to you, can you reflect on this experience and ask yourself what you learned? Fifth, did you just sit there and dream? If you did, give yourself credit. This is where teacher turns serious and asks the Big Question: What is education, anyway? What are we doing in this school? You can say you are trying to graduate so that you can go to college and prepare for a career. But, fellow students, it's more than that. I've had to ask myself what the hell I'm doing in the classroom. I've worked out an equation for myself. On the left side of the blackboard I print a capital F, on the right side another capital F. I draw an arrow from left to right, from Fear to Freedom. I don't think anyone achieves complete freedom, but what I am trying to do with you is drive fear into a corner.”

Kindness to Strangers

2005-11-23T01:44:00.000Z

Don Blohowiak talks about “small acts of kindness” in Leadership. Now. He passes along the advise of Michael Mercer to Do Unnecessary Acts of Kindness. Mike tells this story about an interesting experience he had once when reaching out to help: One day, while driving, I saw a frail, elderly lady at a busy street corner looking at cars zooming by. I figured she was having trouble crossing the street. So, parked my car, walked to her, and let her hold my arm as I stopped traffic and helped her slowly cross the street. When we got to the other side, I asked if she needed any more help. She sweetly smiled, and said to me, "Actually, I didn't want to cross the street." So, I asked her, "For what reason did you let me help you cross the street?" Tears welled up in her eyes as she explained, "The fact that you went out of your way to help me was the nicest thing anyone has done for me in a long time. And I didn't want to detract from your goodness." Mike makes a point of noting that he did help her back across the street! Michael Mercer recommends that we all do one or more totally "unnecessary acts of kindness" daily. As Don says, wouldn't that be something for which we could all give thanks?! Have you done an unnecessary act of kindness today?

Web 2.0 Experience Continuum

2005-11-22T15:27:00.000Z

Read this lovely article by Dan Saffer in Adaptive Path, where he quotes William Gibson "The future is here. It's just unevenly distributed.” He says: “Over the next ten years, we’ll see a wide range of experiences online, from highly structured to nearly formless… So what will the next ten years feel like? Disorienting at first, but normal eventually. It will take time for users to acclimate to the semi-structured experiences available on the Web, and even longer to accept the unstructured experiences. We’ll shed some of the metaphors — sites, bookmarks, pages, and so on — that we’ve used to orient ourselves on the Web, in the same way that cars stopped having running boards and television has stopped broadcasting stage plays.” Talking of the Web 2.0 Experience Continuum, he notes: “On the conservative side of this experience continuum, we’ll still have familiar Websites, like blogs, homepages, marketing and communication sites, the big content providers (in one form or another), search engines, and so on. These are structured experiences. Their form and content are determined mainly by their designers and creators. In the middle of the continuum, we’ll have rich, desktop-like applications that have migrated to the Web…These will be traditional desktop applications like word processing, spreadsheets, and email. But the more interesting will be Internet-native, those built to take advantage of the strengths of the Internet: collective actions and data (e.g. Amazon’s “People who bought this also bought…”), social communities across wide distances (Yahoo Groups), aggregation of many sources of data, near real-time access to timely data (stock quotes, news), and easy publishing of content from one to many (blogs, Flickr). The experiences here in the middle of the continuum are semi-structured in that they specify the types of experiences you can have with them, but users supply the content (such as it is). On the far side of the continuum are the unstructured experiences: a glut of new services, many of which won’t have Websites to visit at all. We’ll see loose collections of application parts, content, and data that don’t exist anywhere really, yet can be located, used, reused, fixed, and remixed. The content you’ll search for and use might reside on an individual computer, a mobile phone, even traffic sensors along a remote highway. But you probably won’t need to know where these loose bits live; your tools will know. These unstructured bits won’t be useful without the tools and the knowledge necessary to make sense of them, sort of how an HTML file doesn’t make much sense without a browser to view it. Indeed, many of them will be inaccessible or hidden if you don’t have the right tools.”

Quotes from Peter Drucker

2005-11-22T15:22:00.000Z

1. Help is defined by the recipient 2. The critical question is not "How can I achieve?" but "What can I contribute?" 3. There is only one valid definition of business purpose: to create a customer. He alone gives employment. 4. It is easier to raise the performance of one leader than it is to raise the performance of a whole mass. 5. An executive should be a realist; and no one is less realistic than the cynic. 6. You cannot prevent a major catastrophe, but you can build an organization that is battle-ready, where people trust one another. In military training, the first rule is to instill soldiers with trust in their officers -- because without trust, they won't fight. 7. Listening (the first competence of leadership) is not a skill, it is a discipline. All you have to do is keep your mouth shut. 8. It is easy to look good in a boom. 9. Luck never built a business. Prosperity and growth come only to the business that systematically finds and exploits its potential. 10. The one person to distrust is the one who never makes a mistake. Either he is a phony, or he stays with the safe, the tried, and the trivial. 11. There are keys to success in managing bosses. First, put down on a piece of paper a "boss list," everyone to whom you are accountable. Next, go to each person on the list and ask, "What do I do and what do my people do that helps you do your job?" And, "What do we do that makes your life more difficult?" 12. Workmanship is essential: In fact, an organization demoralizes itself if it does not demand of its members the highest workmanship. 13. A decision is a commitment to action. No decision has, in fact, been made until carrying it out has become somebody's responsibility. 14. It's much easier to sell the Brooklyn Bridge than to give it away. Nobody trusts you if you offer something for free. 15. The ultimate test of an information system is that there are no surprises. 16. Until a business returns a profit that is greater than its cost of capital, it does not create wealth -- it destroys it. 17. The question has to be asked -- and asked seriously -- "If we did not do this already, would we go into it now?" If the answer is no, the reaction must be "What do we do now?" Very often, the right answer is abandonment. 18. Freedom is not fun. It is a responsible choice. 19. One can't manage change. One can only be ahead of it. 20. Just go out and make yourself useful. 21. Conventional wisdom is often long on convention and short on wisdom. 22. Businessmen owe it to themselves and owe it to society to hammer home that there is no such thing as "profit." There are only "costs": costs of doing business and costs of staying in business; costs of labor and raw materials, and costs of capital; costs of today's jobs and costs of tomorrow's jobs and tomorrow's pensions. There is no conflict between "profit" and "social responsibility." To earn enough to cover the genuine costs, which only the so-called "profit" can cover, is economic and social responsibility -- indeed, it is the specific social and economic responsibility of business. It is not the business that earns a profit adequate to its genuine costs of capital, to the risks of tomorrow and to the needs of tomorrow's worker and pensioner that "rips off" society. It is the business that fails to do so. 23. I would hope that American managers -- indeed managers worldwide -- continue to appreciate what I have been saying since day one: Management is so much more than exercising rank and privilege, it's so much more than 'making deals.' Management affects people and their lives, both in business and many other aspects as well. The practice of management deserves our utmost attention; it deserves to be studied. 24. Management by objectives works if you first think through your objectives. Ninety percent of the time you haven't. 25. Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately generate into hard work. 26. So much of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to work. 27. What everyone knows is usually wrong. 28. Popularity is not leadership. Results are. Leadership is not rank, privileges, titles, or money. It is responsibility. There may be 'born leaders,' but there surely are too few to depend on them. 29. Leadership is not magnetic personality - that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not 'making friends and influencing people' - that is flattery. Leadership is lifting a person's vision to higher sights, the raising of a person's performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations. 30. Leadership is the lifting of a man's vision to higher sights, the raising of a man's performance to a higher standard and the building of a man's personality beyond its normal limitations. 31. Of all the decisions an executive makes, none is as important as the decisions about people, because they determine the performance capacity of the organization. 32. In today's marketplace, productivity is the true competitive advantage. 33. The effectiveness of an organization depends on work being done at the lowest possible organization level. 34. The one truly effective way to cut costs is to cut out an activity altogether. There is little point in trying to do cheaply what should not be done at all. 35. The best way to predict the future is to create it.

Swanson's Unwritten Rules of Management

2005-11-22T15:09:00.000Z

Received my copy of Swanson's unwritten rules of management... with delight... last weekend! This pocket-sized volume is available free from http://wwwxt.raytheon.com/communications/whs_rules/ William Swanson is the Chairman & CEO of Raytheon, the fourth largest defense contractor in the world. As a young executive, he noted down these "rules" on scraps of paper...on becoming CEO, he presented them to young Raytheon executives...last year the 76-page book started making the rounds of the management underground in the US. Eventually, Warren Buffett received a copy -- and liked it so much that he asked for dozens more to give to his CEOs, friends, and family. Bill Swanson's '25 Unwritten Rules of Management' 1. Learn to say, "I don't know." If used when appropriate, it will be often. 2. It is easier to get into something than it is to get out of it. 3. If you are not criticized, you may not be doing much. 4. Look for what is missing. Many know how to improve what's there, but few can see what isn't there. 5. Viewgraph rule: When something appears on a viewgraph (an overhead transparency), assume the world knows about it, and deal with it accordingly. 6. Work for a boss with whom you are comfortable telling it like it is. Remember that you can't pick your relatives, but you can pick your boss. 7. Constantly review developments to make sure that the actual benefits are what they are supposed to be. Avoid Newton's Law. 8. However menial and trivial your early assignments may appear, give them your best efforts. 9. Persistence or tenacity is the disposition to persevere in spite of difficulties, discouragement, or indifference. Don't be known as a good starter but a poor finisher. 10. In completing a project, don't wait for others; go after them, and make sure it gets done. 11. Confirm your instructions and the commitments of others in writing. Don't assume it will get done! 12. Don't be timid; speak up. Express yourself, and promote your ideas. 13. Practice shows that those who speak the most knowingly and confidently often end up with the assignment to get it done. 14. Strive for brevity and clarity in oral and written reports. 15. Be extremely careful of the accuracy of your statements. 16. Don't overlook the fact that you are working for a boss. * Keep him or her informed. Avoid surprises! * Whatever the boss wants takes top priority. 17. Promises, schedules, and estimates are important instruments in a well-ordered business. * You must make promises. Don't lean on the often-used phrase, "I can't estimate it because it depends upon many uncertain factors." 18. Never direct a complaint to the top. A serious offense is to "cc" a person's boss. 19. When dealing with outsiders, remember that you represent the company. Be careful of your commitments. 20. Cultivate the habit of "boiling matters down" to the simplest terms. An elevator speech is the best way. 21. Don't get excited in engineering emergencies. Keep your feet on the ground. 22. Cultivate the habit of making quick, clean-cut decisions. 23. When making decisions, the pros are much easier to deal with than the cons. Your boss wants to see the cons also. 24. Don't ever lose your sense of humor. 25. Have fun at what you do. It will reflect in your work. No one likes a grump except another grump. To read more about what this wonderful book please visit: http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1069237,00.html http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1071479,00.html http://www.dancentury.com/home/archives/2005/08/23/bill-swansons-unwritten-rules-of-management/ http://spaces.msn.com/members/chiefskipper/Blog/cns!1pcQyny3goTsBSdT3kgCqCvQ!328.entry http://800ceoread.com/blog/archives/005816.html P.S. – Business 2.0 also had an article called Books That Matter http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,516019,00.html

Akanksha Musical

2005-11-22T14:59:00.000Z

Akanksha children bring to the city of Mumbai another Broadway-adapted musical, ‘Kabir and the Rangeen Kurta’. With a 150 less privileged children participating and many more working on its production, this musical sends out another simple message… the power of dreams and the courage it takes to make them come true… Directed by Kruttika Desai, choreographed by Shiamak Davar, sets by Fali Unwala, music by Roger Drego & lights by Michael Nazreth... Last year’s event 'Once Upon a Time in Shantipur' (which I attended) was an absolute delight. You would have forgiven me for thinking these kids were professional actors with years of stage experience! Every nuance measured, every dialogue delivered with panache, each of the 100-odd kids breathed confidence, elegance & passion. Surely, someone lied when they told us these were less-privileged kids who’d never seen a theatre in their lives, forget about acting in one! For had they not told us, we wouldn’t have known…not in a million years… As I wrote to a K Sriram of Akanksha after the event: “The play was wonderful, stupendous, amazing! Thank you, Akanksha & the kids for giving us an opportunity to experience pure joy! Can I book tickets for next year now?” Alas, I shall not be able to attend this year’s show (another reason I hate being away from India), but my best wishes to the Akanksha kids. For those of you who are in Mumbai, this is probably an opportunity of a lifetime. Do yourself a favour: Go & See It! Details: Venue: St. Andrew’s Auditorium, Bandra, Mumbai December 2005: 2nd & 3rd at 7pm; 4th at 12 noon January 2006: 6th & 7th at 7pm; 8th at 12 noon Ticket Prices: Rs 1000, Rs 500, Rs 300, Rs 200 Contact Manoj at the Akanksha office on 23700253/23729880 More details at: www.akanksha.org/events/musicallanding.htm

My Life as a Knowledge Worker - By Peter Drucker

2005-11-22T14:50:00.000Z

Just read this absolutely brilliant article by Professor Drucker in Inc Magazine, in which he writes about the seven experiences that shaped his attitude to life and work. Thank you Gautam Ghosh for leading me to it, and for the excerpt… “I had no idea what I would become, except that I knew by that time that I was unlikely to be a success exporting cotton textiles. But I resolved that whatever my life's work would be, Verdi's words would be my lodestar. I resolved that if I ever reached an advanced age, I would not give up but would keep on. In the meantime I would strive for perfection, even though, as I well knew, it would surely always elude me. I have done many things that I hope the gods will not notice, but I have always known that one has to strive for perfection even if only the gods notice. Gradually, I developed a system. I still adhere to it. Every three or four years I pick a new subject. It may be Japanese art; it may be economics. Three years of study are by no means enough to master a subject, but they are enough to understand it. So for more than 60 years I have kept on studying one subject at a time. That not only has given me a substantial fund of knowledge. It has also forced me to be open to new disciplines and new approaches and new methods--for every one of the subjects I have studied makes different assumptions and employs a different methodology. I have set aside two weeks every summer in which to review my work during the preceding year, beginning with the things I did well but could or should have done better, down to the things I did poorly and the things I should have done but did not do. I decide what my priorities should be in my consulting work, in my writing, and in my teaching. I have never once truly lived up to the plan I make each August, but it has forced me to live up to Verdi's injunction to strive for perfection, even though "it has always eluded me" and still does. Since then, when I have a new assignment, I ask myself the question, "What do I need to do, now that I have a new assignment, to be effective?" Every time, it is something different. Discovering what it is requires concentration on the things that are crucial to the new challenge, the new job, the new task. To know one's strengths, to know how to improve them, and to know what one cannot do--they are the keys to continuous learning. First, one has to ask oneself what one wants to be remembered for. Second, that should change. It should change both with one's own maturity and with changes in the world. Finally, one thing worth being remembered for is the difference one makes in the lives of people.”

Farewell Professor Drucker (1909-2005)

2005-11-22T12:03:00.000Z

When its time for you to go, as that time will most certainly come, Ultimately what matters is not your success, but your significance… Peter Drucker was undoubtedly the most significant management philosopher of all time. His writing spanned well over half a century, a period during which technologies, markets and organizations changed dramatically, yet his insights were always fresh and pertinent. Professor Drucker had the ability to cut through what seemed to many to be highly complex organizational and managerial issues and identify the basics. A humble man, he said “I'm totally uninteresting. I'm a writer, and writers don't have interesting lives. My books, my work, yes. That's different." No one who knew him agreed with the first part; even those (like me) who dipped into his enormous body of work agree with the second. The body is gone; the spirit lives on… in the heart of the countless millions who find business an exciting, enticing, passionate adventure… Thank you, Peter Drucker! ======================================================================== Eulogies Jim Collins wrote in his foreword to The Daily Drucker: “Drucker’s primary contribution is not a single idea, but rather an entire body of work that has one gigantic advantage: nearly all of it is essentially right. Drucker has an uncanny ability to develop insights about the workings of the social world, and to later be proved right by history.” Tom Peters wrote: “…Peter Drucker didn't "invent" management. The Chinese probably did thousands of years ago—among other things, Sun Tzu's roughly 2,500-year-old The Art of War is a full-blown "management" text. So, too, Machiavelli's The Prince. And Frederick Taylor's century-old The Principles of Scientific Management. But Peter Drucker did arguably (1) "invent" modern management as we now think of it; (2) give the study and craft of management-as-profession credibility and visibility, even though biz schools like Harvard had been around for a long time; and (3) provide a (the first?) comprehensive toolkit-framework for addressing and even mastering the problems of emergent enterprise complexity. And he did something else incredibly important: He popularized the study of-appreciation of modern management. Drucker’s historical significance will rest on works such as The Concept of the Corporation (1946), The Practice of Management (1954) and The Effective Executive (1967), which are the tracts that launched the "practice of management" as we know it to this day—and probably as we will know it for decades to come.” Knowledge@Wharton said: “Drucker studied management -- in fact, he discovered it and taught how it can make a difference to society. In doing so, he has left our world the richer for the knowledge he created and shared.” Dan Pink writes: “But Drucker's greatest legacy is not so much what he said. It's how he lived. Forget the brilliance of his thought. Look at the texture of his life. The man was a glorious role model. Three examples: · He worked his butt off and never became complacent. With all his accomplishments, Drucker could have started phoning it in 30 years ago. He didn't. He pushed and pushed and pushed. He wrote more than a dozen books after he turned 65! Amazing. · He was a non-stop learner. Drucker said that every few years he liked to master a new subject. That's why this Austrian guy with a law degree and penchant for economics decided to study . . . Japanese art. He became an expert, of course. But more important than this particular expertise was the broader lesson: There's always more to learn and the most valuable learning often exists outside the cramped cabin of "management." Drucker's long life proved the principle: Being curious is the only way to be fully alive. · He devoted himself to a higher cause. The essence of Drucker's philosophy was that, at its best, business could be about something noble. Business (in contrast to centralized government, which he once called "obese, muscle-bound, and senile") offered a powerful way to liberate human potential and elevate our lives. He counseled companies not only to perform better, but also to be better. And he pressed himself to be better as well. He devoted much of his later life to advising non-profit groups (though he often made them write a check he never cashed so they knew the full value of his advice.) Drucker lived modestly, but his reason for living wasn't modest at all: He wanted to change the world.” Business Pundit says: “He asked questions to which the answers seemed obvious, but upon closer examination we realized they weren't what we thought.” Evolving Excellence said: “Most of all, he spent his career tirelessly pushing American management to think ahead and to improve. Most likely he is already staring to delve into the organizational structure and strategy deployment process in heaven, with plans to give the Creator a few tips on how to be best prepared for the next wave of immigrants.” Economist said: “He changed the course of thousands of businesses. He spawned two huge revolutions at General Electric—first when GE followed the radical decentralisation he preached in the 1950s, and again in the 1980s when Jack Welch rebuilt the company around Mr Drucker's belief that it should be first or second in a line of business, or else get out. Yet Mr Drucker is also cited as a muse by both the Salvation Army and the modern mega-church movement. Wherever people grapple with tricky management problems, from big organisations to small ones, from the public sector to the private, and increasingly in the voluntary sector, you can find Mr Drucker's fingerprints… … These days management theory is increasingly dominated by academic clones who produce papers on minute subjects in unreadable prose. That certainly does not apply to a man who claimed that the academic course that most influenced him was on, of all things, admiralty law… … Management theory has not evolved into the world's most rigorous or enticing intellectual discipline. But in Peter Drucker it at least found a champion whom every educated person should take the trouble to read.” BusinessWeek called him The Man Who Invented Management, noting that: “-- It was Drucker who introduced the idea of decentralization -- in the 1940s -- which became a bedrock principle for virtually every large organization in the world. -- He was the first to assert -- in the 1950s -- that workers should be treated as assets, not as liabilities to be eliminated. -- He originated the view of the corporation as a human community -- again, in the 1950s -- built on trust and respect for the worker and not just a profit-making machine, a perspective that won Drucker an almost godlike reverence among the Japanese. -- He first made clear -- still the '50s -- that there is "no business without a customer," a simple notion that ushered in a new marketing mind-set. -- He argued in the 1960s -- long before others -- for the importance of substance over style, for institutionalized practices over charismatic, cult leaders. -- And it was Drucker again who wrote about the contribution of knowledge workers -- in the 1970s -- long before anyone knew or understood how knowledge would trump raw material as the essential capital of the New Economy.” Wall Street Journal has a great section devoted to his opinion pieces at http://online.wsj.com/public/page/2_1194.html In 1999, the WSJ published the following on the occasion of his 90th birthday: "Drucker is famous for a series of questions: What is our business? Who is the customer? What does the customer value? The answers to those questions, asked by generations of managers around the globe, became known as "the theory of the business." ... The most distinctive hallmark of the managerial mindset is that it operates from that theory. Major decisions and initiatives all become tests of the theory. Profits are important in part because they tell you whether your theory is working. If you fail to achieve the results you expected, you re-examine your model. It is the managerial equivalent of the scientific method, starting with hypotheses which are then tested in action, and revised when necessary.” Please Also see: Claremont University: The Legacy of Peter Drucker Fortune: Peter Drucker – An Appreciation Business Library: Obituaries For some more insight into the man & his works, refer Drucker Archives at http://www.druckerarchives.net/

2005-11-14T12:27:00.000Z

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