FACILITATING EXCELLENCE

In a casual conversation with one of my friends, a passing comment stuck in my head. We were discussing about how people get noticed and acknowledged in organizations eventually leading to opening of the doors of career growth. And then I heard an almost emphatic feedback “Profiling matters a lot…how you portray yourself…how you talk, whom you talk to…etc…” Well the conversation ended but the thought stuck in my head. Let me admit that I have myself been at the receiving end of this “Profiling” and have believed that it matters in your professional growth. There have been instances where I have felt that “Substance” has often fallen prey to “Profiling”. While I continue to use the word “Profiling” I think my interpretation of the same before I move ahead is warranted at this stage. For me “Profiling is an act of projecting oneself as being capable of handling the circumstances / situation at hand while in full knowledge of the intellectual ability of self – the act often an atte

I love this quote by Peter Drucker and as a strategy graduate and HR Practioner I haven't found a statement so true and yet so ironical. Amidst the heated debate for strategy I am well aware that if the environment of an organization does not give it the due space to implement; strategy dies a very painful death. So what are the cues that allow us to identify the possibility during its planning stages 1. Strategy is not driven by the top- What does it mean; This categorically means that despite the conviction or the thought of conviction at all levels in the organization; there is no one person driving it. It is a collective responsibility and yet nobody is accountable. Please do not confuse my statement as against team spirit but I genuinely believe leadership has to be a one person agenda. 2. Cynicism- Now it is simply impossible to get rid of cynics or answer all or even pacify all doubts during the planning sessions. To quote Alan Lakein," Planning means to bring th

I am a trainer and I love to train.. I am a supervisor and I love to supervise... I am a counselor and I love to counsel...... I am a teacher and I love to teach....... I am a mentor and I love to guide... I am experienced.. I love to share.... We often come across situations where we realise that we insist on sharing our knowledge. 'Gyan' as I call it. Our years of experience give us an edge over others or that is what we would like to believe, especially in a position where we manage people. I have been lucky. Whenever I am in a talking mood, there is someone who is in listening mood or so I presume. But more often than not, that might not always be the case. Just yesterday I was sitting with someone to share some of my experiences in order to help him deal with a situation. By virtue of being head of HR and his senior, he had no option but to listen to me as I advised him on how he needs to handle the situation, how he need to be the bigger person, etc. However the en

“… Tadpole management is very time consuming. The tadpoles are total carnivorous, and can be raised on live tubifex worms. They will also readily eat each other, and there are two ways of dealing with this. The first is to place each tadpole into its own small jar, and the other is to place all the tadpoles into a large tank of water that is filled with masses of floating plants (real or plastic). Food can then be placed on the floor of the tank and the tadpoles will swim down, feed, and then swim back up to hide in the plants. Both methods require labor. The first involves changing dozens of individual jars to keep the water clean, and the other involves morning and evening siphoning of the large tadpole tank…” ( Source: http://www.anapsid.org/ornatabreeding.html ) And what about humans with traits of Tadpoles – I don’t think we can deny their existence around us. We come across people who love to pull the person down intending to rise to the occasion. They are happy creatin

The art of sorting out the chaos or better still not creating one evades me at this point of time. Quite recently I was managing a project  which ended up with in  nothing less than chaos. I am not sure if what I started with will be able to deliver results. and i have been  introspecting. what went wrong, what could have gone better. I have a list of problems but when someone today asked 5 main reasons for not being able to achieve the target, I was vague. I did not like my lack of preparation to deal with the question and hence I wanted to use the Chaos Theory.  Chaos Theory basically tells you that very simple things can cause immensely complex things.  And I believe that was what went wrong with the project, the art of detailing, the lack of one common link, the mismatch in expectation, one oversight eventually led to the gap in delivery of the  entire project.  Chaos theory helps to see things in perspective and explain why of a situation as in this case. However when it

Many of us, in our lifetimes, have faced dilemmas whose resolution has the potential of changing the course of our lives - one where we are at crossroads and task of picking the best amongst the alternatives in front of us has not been easy. I am no stranger to this, having faced dilemma on a couple of occasions and the task of making the pick from amongst the alternatives has not been easy. Some typical examples are college vs. course; to marry or not and if yes, with whom; business or service (job) etc… People are today taking decisions and picking alternatives which by conventional wisdom would qualify for outright rejection. Some typical examples are joining a startup vs. a well established company; picking an alternative career path rather than a well defined time tested path etc… So is the thought process changing? Are people giving weightage to substance and not just the quantity? I recently took one such decision when I made a career switch from a well known and re

We meet a customer…he starts talking…slowly probing…gradually engages us in a dialogue which gives him some insight into our working…some talk on our competitors interspersed with some industry talk…and we feel we have a customer who has given us an ear…then we try talking business…he starts by saying tough market…budgetary cuts…tightrope walk…but since we have ongoing relations, I’ll give you business… he lays out his ‘shopping list’…I will buy some of this and some of that…and may be consider the other things too…but you know I have very less money…it’s only because of you that I am spending…(wow! I must be a magician casting spells on people – I mean they spend just because they met me!)…and guess what, he also puts a price tag to my inventory…and the result…Eureka, I have a customer on hand…I run around pillar to post in the company selling what my customer sold to me about my product/service …and fighting for the price he decided to buy at… Let me just paraphrase…

My morning today started with a discussion on the lack of commitment of employees in an organization, went on with cases of disloyal and dishonest employees; turned into an afternoon of good team discussions and winded up with an evening of distrust and discrimination. So there was cynicism, laughter and frustrations all in a day. Cynicism because in today's world you essentially are programmed to be doubtful about everything, laughter because even in between doubts you can relax and let yourself loose and really learn and grow and frustration because despite the knowledge that there are two sides of the coin, sometimes even the experienced ends up focusing on one. My biggest concern as an HR professional is how to let optimism prevail and the cynicism coexist.  So my solution to that as I perceive it would be to accept. Accept that there are different kinds of people working in the organization. Accept that different people will behave differently and for that matte

I loved to write and then I stopped. I loved to talk and then I stopped. Well its not that I don't write. I do and I talk as well but only to the extent of what I need to and now what I want to. Thinking of why I stopped? Why I gave myself the excuse of time, is, I am afraid. I am afraid that what I write is not good enough, what I talk is not worthy of being heard. I have an opinion, always did. It took me a while to be able to get that confidence to say it out loud. I have friends, and colleagues who might have a different say than I do and they might be louder than I am. and now I stopped. So am I doing anyone a favor? Does this post sound angry to anyone? Can it not be termed as a professional post? Do I have to be very careful of where the grammar goes? May be yes and may be no. But right now what is more important to me, is, I bring my voice back. I don't know why I stopped. But I know for sure that I do not have to continue with this break. I can simply spring back

I faced a very interesting and intriguing question last week during my meeting with the top management of a closely held business house. The business, is profitable, on an expansive mode and holds good promise for the future. The business house, a leading player in its industry, is engaged in the services sector. Being a leading player in the industry, it is looked upon by other players in terms of its business moves – I mean who would want to reinvent the wheel when it already exists. During my meeting with them, I was posed a question – I am the leading player in this industry…prospects know…competitors follow my strategy closely and try and copy…I drive a lot of industry business… then why should I advertise? The question seems very logical considering that The prospects and customers know about you The market is expanding for your business You are a leading and a respected player in your industry. The business is profitable. Your brand

“Don’t use your brain – if it existed, you would have found a way to achieve the target.”…sounds familiar…have heard it somewhere… Most of us must have been subjected to this statement…wait a minute…subjected…I mean, we usually use these words when we talk of a sort of treatment being meted out to us. Well this statement seems almost tyrannical in thought…, no if’s no but’s, only acceptance and following of the so called directive. So what drives this sort of remark…really haven’t been able to figure out for sure despite having the fortune of being both at the receiving end and charitable. We exhort the virtues of open environment and feedback but get riled by the simplistic of statements which ask us to explain the reasons behind our stands. The very virtues we once rattled off in the HR round of interview – patient, flexible, adaptive, good listener – all seem to be good to be confined to the textbooks. Admittedly, it takes a lot of conviction and courage to