The Market Play

Few days back I was reading Mr. N. R. Narayana Murthy, it is really amazing to read his writings. Though every word of his writings give you a kind of dimension about his life, his work, his ethics but I was more curious to know about the pre economic reforms and post economic reforms journey of an Indian entrepreneur.

It was truly thrilling to know when a man had to apply for an application to import 150MB hard disk and wait for another six months to get application sanctioned. His writing gave me an idea how IT sector went viral after those economic reforms and how ventures got benefited from it like never before.Being an entrepreneur Mr. Murthy's every word was thanking that visionary thinking of India's former Prime Minister Mr. P.V. Narasimha Rao, which changed the structure of the country 360 degrees.

In a huge market like India, things go viral overnight. Sometimes even producer of the product can't believe that the product he made thriving the country. There are lots of instances where we can see how trivial things went viral and sore the sky and swept the market all together.

Those are the days I was even not born when India won its first ever cricket world cup in 1987, till then cricket became the undisputed religion of a secular country and with no doubt cricketers the God. It went viral then and there is no hope it will stop ever (at least in India). Those are the days back in my childhood, I can vaguely remind around 1997s when a weekly soap on television went viral. India's very first super hero Shaktiman. Kind of Superman fictional character, cashing ever high TRP for Indian government TV channel Doordarshan. I remember those days when our lives were completely guided by this character. Market in every sector also enjoyed it's share of pie. It was a time when garment manufactures were highly banking on the costumes of the Indian hero. For every kid the these costumes were the highly aspiring thing of his life and always remained at the top of his wishlist unlike Steve Jobs bitten apple now.

It was the time when a sweet chewing gum Boomer went viral. Many others eloquently followed this trend. This gum hardly had gone that viral after people knowing they were chewing sweet latex and it's harmful for their health if the company had not conceptualized free tattoos and stickers for kids. Those were the days when the meaning of  the word tattoo was that flexible body character, who can save your friends from any misshapen. Kids used to feel proud of having the bright and shining collection of those tattoos. Probably I feel those marbles were almost replaced by these tattoos and bets went more sophisticate. Really kids have been the unbeatable market strategy and panacea.

All these things are relatively viral till time but the only difference is the meanings has changed. Taste has changed so as those fictional characters. Lots of things went crazy in market whether it's small or large in this time period. Last year a real man, a singer, a composer, a so called viral marketing teacher Mr. Dhanush went viral on internet. The list is not exhaustive at all. It's said 'only thing which is constant in life is change', Indian market has been always an eyewitness of this. It was a time when mouse, cat, dogs used to rule the animation world but  now all these are replaced with human caricatures and are equally famous too. I have heard people commenting "why are there two nostrils in one nose ?" but being frugal is not always the right way to do business in India. People here need full value of their money, otherwise they will not embrace you very long.

cheers !

What's the secret ingredient ?

How much time it takes us to make things easy, from crappy, hazy idea to transform it into worthy information or does it really worth to consider about it ? There are lots of such questions often comes into one's mind. But condition applies, only when it's given a thought prior to move on. The Indian education system has evolved a lot from earlier time as I am being told by my father. But somewhere down the line we remained unable to erase the foot prints. So we can say we have improve our walking style but we still like to follow the engraved foot prints.

Someone has nicely said, "for gazelle every morning starts with a thought how much it should run fast so that it can save itself from the fastest of the fast lion and for a lion the same morning starts with a thought how to prey on the slowest of the slow gazelle so that it doesn't sleep hungry." Things are subjective indeed.

It's really important to express what we feel, but what is more important is that we have a healthy discussion over it. Conversation often makes things easy. What we can say about it is, it's a free service what can give you a lot. This time I am going to share similar sort of conversation with an army person who was also a victim of day to day increasing inflation like other common men and is ready to discuss about his air tight budget planning anytime with those whom he feels can understand what budget means. Though it was nothing related to family budget since he was a retired army person and I am a college student. According to him it's hard to understand the meaning of monthly budget for me.

I met the army person at a salon where he came to get his not so lengthy hair get trimmed. It was an interesting discussion going on between the person and the barber that in this inflation it's really hard to survive. According to him he can get 19-20k per month and in this salary he has to survive with his wife and children. He said for the people like him, not to talk about hotel food where it's hard to arrange pulses. It remind me the recent planning commission's report where it suggested Rs.32 per day earner is not a BPL !

His talk about hotel remind me a post I read sometime back where he says people come in restaurants because it's an occasion for them, he goes there because it's a requirement. Nice observation indeed ! But this time situation was different. For the army person it's neither requirement nor occasion but still he wants to visit hotels and restaurants. I find nothing wrong in this. Why would anyone find it wrong ? Don't we visit our neighbors without any reason ? Don't we go to amusement parks, movies without any reason ? He wants to go but can't because according to him it's the thing that only rich person afford not a common man. I was shocked it's the condition when we say in India we are enjoying ever high per capita income of around 60K !  Certainly we don't have equal distribution of money around. well...

We generally prefer home food than hotel or restaurant food for various reasons. Affordability is one of the reasons. But in India food is not the thing which can be taken for granted anytime. People have their own tastes, flavors and colors. It's not necessary that all these qualities can only be found in a restaurant food. How can we forget about Indian street food. These street vendors serve the same taste and flavor but yeah hygiene remains an issue most of the time. Here money comes into action. These street vendors have to arrange things in limited funds where they have to trade off between taste and ambiance. They choose ambiance most of the time.

I have no idea what a student is being taught in a hotel management institute. If they are feed with conventional knowledge or taught about above it, because we are always not sure about what we are taught in a B-school. Why can't we get a place where a person thinks first about what should he eat than to how much should be in his wallet to eat that ? After all we like pay for what we eat not like to eat what we can pay for. It's worth thinking about what can be the secret ingredient that can make one's food available for everyone prior to noticeable barriers.

Cheers !!

The Maths Notebook

We are all set to curtain off the turbulent 2011 with a new zeal and hope for a soothing year ahead, but amidst all these turbulence we forget the small nitty gritty things about our life which sometimes we get to know from our youngers. It's new year eve, where I am sitting thinking to write something to welcome 2012, in my balcony. Children playing in the street and their noise on one hand disturbing me to think something potential, on the other hand amusing me to see how energetic and hopeful about the day ahead. Probably they don't know the harsh reality of the world or I am highly pessimist about tomorrow. whatever...

Rinku my neighbor's son is also there enjoying his winter vacation full on now a days. This boy suddenly remind me a small happening when I visited his home for some work. That day in morning his mother was bargaining with scrap collector on the price for old books and newspapers. I had some work with Rinku's father. I completed that and was coming out when I noticed Rinku arranging his notebooks in two piles. I just tempted to ask him why we was doing so, because all those books were to be given to scrap collector finally. When I asked him he told me in one pile there were his previous year math notebooks and in other pile the scrap books to be given to scrap collector.

Meanwhile his mother came in and told me Rinku never let his old math notebooks sell. It was a different experience for me to see a child loves his maths notebooks so much. I asked him to let me see his previous years notebooks. He brought all which had collected till then. I saw that dog-eared notebooks with pale yellowish pages, embellished with pencil, somewhere with pen too. I asked him why we collect those old notebooks, what could those be use of ? He told me that those notebooks comprises the maths formulae which his teachers made him write down, which is useful for him in new classes too. He doesn't need to rewrite all those again. I pass him a smile and return back to my home.

That day I learnt a very beautiful lesson about life. Over the years we have learnt lessons from our teachers, our elders, our colleagues but it's really amazing to learn from a child. A child with all his thoughts are so contagious. We elders reside more towards probability and predictability unlike a child who never believes in all these things. Rinku never thought about the number of formulae, would be useful to him in future, which would decide whether that notebook being sold or not. He just put it aside because in his sense it's useful and that's enough.

We like the fresh smell of new book, but we should always remember the dog-eared pages comprises the real stuff. In the end I would like to wish you all a very Happy New Year. May we have a prosperous and cheerful 2012.

Cheers !! 

At Another End

It's around 1 Am when I am in some fix. I think approx 90% of the population is in their bed at another end of their own world. This figure 90% is not a kind of hypothetical figure but it's from my observation to my surrounding. From where I am sitting right now I can see around 15-16 building around me and around 13-14 are in dark, some 2-3 buildings are in light at this time. So I assume this figure as a global. But it's not that rigid though if you don't like my concept you can forget about it and can enjoy the rest post.

Things are always best when they are at their extremes. I don't know who was the guy whether, a genius reader or a writer who said "Books are the best friends of human being" It's like whether there was an egg first or a hen. But it's for sure that he/she was a tremendous thinker. Thinking is a kind of process which starts churning out thoughts without any pre alert. We are taken to some new world where only we and our thoughts rule. I can say it a sandbox where we are testing our thoughts. Most of the time we think because we are bound to and sometime we think because we want to bind ourselves. I am not a consultant or any carrier counselor but I realized this talking to some guys in general who were in sort of dilemma about the next.

I remember, when I had to select a stream after passing matriculation for my future. At this time I had to thought because I want to bind myself with something essential for me. Now when I am full grown up and can feel the heat of future responsibility, I am thinking because I am bound to. It's a kind of sensational thinking process when you at one end and thinking about the weather at another end.

So till now what I wrote is something general I realized but what's the fix I talked about in first line. Well it's that what feels a person happy when he/she is reading anything. Whether it's the writing skill of a writer who wrote it so beautifully that the person just can't stop himself reading it or the reading ability of a reader that sensed the real essence of the testimony and stamped it as a worth reading text. I know most of us would be agree on the fact that it's a group task, accomplished simultaneously. But here I think when you are be a reader or be a writer, you are the only player in the field, this time what feels you justifying your work. I am till in fix. The answer is supposed somewhere from first generation reader/writer who setup some guidelines to which we are following till now. There is an analogy to this as we know in business the first success principle is "make it in cheeper place and sell in costlier" we can generally read at first page of any business book but the person who had said this first had certainly not read it in any book but he/she earned it from his/her experience. We are at another end and I want it to get fixed.

For the time I get my all fixes fixed, think mill is on and workers are at work.

Cheers !!

The last few things

"The last few things, things forever"

I don't know who said these words or had said ever but these words just popped up into my mind when I was thinking about the post. These are the days or I should say last few days of my graduation life. Everyone around me is as crazy as I am. Some composing friendship songs for his/her friend. Some just stumbling upon facebook and twitter to show their sentiments and some who has nothing to do (like me) is just scratching his head over these last few things. We are partying, we are hanging out with friends, we are nostalgic but this is all about life.

Most of the time I realize the curiousness about the last few moment in our life is more than than about the first few. Children curious about the last day of their school more than the first day. People like to see the last sight of the sun (sunset) more than the first (dawn). We are more curious about the final results than the initial preparation. It's human tendency that we want to live our future and we get to know that there is an end in near future we want to make that moment immortal. But these last days are more scarier than the first day.

Last moments are never easy to handle. Sometimes it's like an unknown feeling that makes us more confuse about our plans. We don't know whether we are happy or sad, exited or nervous, clear or vague about things. A very simple example, I often see my youngsters even experienced the condition, when we are in examination hall. We know it as exam phobia. These are the last few moments we are thinking about future, how my performance would be. It's really never easy.

Through out our college life we spend some quality time with our friends but last moment is like we were living in a house as a paying guest, we used things, some of them became a part of our life and finally we have to move to another city and leaving those things for others. But we enjoy these moments. This enjoyment is amorphous but relations are not. We not only spend few moments together, we actually share few moments of our life with some special people and perhaps this is the reason why we love these last few things so much. :-)

Cheers !!

Authenticity is directly proportional to Goodwill

It's going to be a very quick post because of some time constraints. Actually it was going to be a tweet before but hard luck twitter, you just allow me to sum this up in 140 letters, but it's not that quick too.

From my childhood, we are being taught about authenticity and goodwill in concern of a person, in concern of an organisation. At that time it seemed to be little impractical. We hardly notice these notions more than just another english words, but now it feels immense sense in these words. Your authenticity in work pays you in form of your nice goodwill in market, your trust in your customers and life long credibility. We can say the more you are authentic, the higher is your goodwill bar. Authenticity never comes in a day. It depends on your work. One day when I was talking to my friend searching for some fund raising for his work, I feel that it's true.

Actually this post is about another experience of my life related to local news channels. Being an MBA aspirant I often discuss with my friends about the Indian news channels' way of working, the kind of news telecast but today this was the day I felt this.

This was an another morning and at breakfast table as usual I switched on my T.V. It was a local news channel there telecasting the news about the death of Osama. I stopped there a while and listen to them what they were actually saying. It was really unbelievable news for me. Last night when I was on internet till 12 AM, there was no signs of this kind of news in air, what happened in few hours. I moved to BBC channel for the confirmation of news. The same telecast was going there too. At that point of time I found confirmed with the fact that 'Osama is really dead'.

Actually it was not my fault. Perhaps I am not the first person who has doubt over the credibility of local news channels' news. For the sake of TRP, for the sake of audience ENJOYMENT if you are compromising with your work, I would not allow it to my life and perhaps that's why I had to switch over to some really authenticated news channels for the confirmation of the news.

Cheers !!

Information and Affection, The Dangerous Duo

The greatest differentiator of humans and our triumph as the alpha species on the planet has been our increasing ability to record and share our collective knowledge and information. We are living in a kind of universe where information is begin to be counted into the list of the fundamental requirements of a human being. Sometimes the situation seems me as we are dipped into a pool of information at our throat. When I saw the daily startups growing in the different corner of the world, I found one thing common to all, that's most of the startups tend to process this information and present as a beautiful gift to their customers rather than a raw. From wikipedia to wikileaks everybody is ready to do the job for you. You just need to know the exact URL and that's it, rest is on them.

I came to know facebook is using users' private information , wikileaks is continuously threatening world and lots more, but what scares me a lot about information is it's non static nature. Information has no boundaries at all so as the form. We sleep in a kind of world and wake up in an another kind of world. You never know how many new apps have been created mean while. For the code you were searching a night before, has been baked till morning. Apple launching a new i-product daily may seem to be cool but it's not that cool, atleast for persons like me who have to think twice to change their two year old cellphone just because the newer version is little slim :-) . Thanks to these information vending machines, who process all the raw material so nicely that we even can't say how far we have traveled in time. Was this the Time-travelling concept ?

Now when I say the rapid changing form of information, I would like to say the rapid change of information riding on the shoulders of those before to reach further. This is still interesting. No doubt generation is thriving information rapidly, but how much information has reinvented their own wheel, that's important and this scares me too because today we are doing better and faster but ultimately where we have reached it's difficult to say. It is said that globalization in India is one of the main reasons why there is irregularities in money distribution to different class of people. Some how I find the same situation with information across the globe and it scares me about the future.

There is an another thing which seems me as a better half of information, that is affection. I realized how even affection can be dangerous to us, while I was watching the movie Kung Fu Panda. Conditions are not much different in our surroundings The affection of parents towards their children, sometimes make them no more than a dump. It's been such a long time experiencing this so called 'affection', specially in India you will never feel recess about this. This really scares me when I relate this to information because information has a pace and affection as a speed breaker, either slow down your car or be ready for accidents. Affection can be related to anyone. The affection of a father towards his daughter, the affection of a girl towards her boyfriend or of boy towards his girlfriend, a nostalgic affection for youth, affection to money and even someone says an intensive affection towards your startup is equally dangerous.

At the end of this post I would like to say Information and Affection, these are the two most dangerous vital things we'll need to survive in future, only a better rhythmic and balanced ride can get us reach to the ultimate destination.

Cheers !!