FACILITATING EXCELLENCE

“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

The week gone by I met one of my friends who’s a software programmer. The trivial talk over cups of coffee and accompaniments seemed to race past the memory lanes. One discussion after another with little connect between the topics and then suddenly it veered to our careers. Without delving into what we discussed about his choice of occupation field, the discussion on a typical life of a sales person seemed to involve both of us. One thing which came to the forefront during that discussion was that the life of a salesperson was denominated by a constant fight within and a struggle outside. End of the day, the performance of a salesperson is measured in numbers delivered. The quantity is the currency of measurement of one’s acumen and caliber. Did we achieve the set number or not; the quality of work behind achieving that number another bullet point in the official discussion but the bullet point would often appear as a footnote. If the number was achieved, the quality of work wa