Dominating colleague

Many a times it happens when you work too hard, do all the dirty work and when it comes to reaping the benefits, someone else, junior or at par to you, will come and start throwing his clout.

This is what happening with me at the moment. I am working on a project and there is an account manager for this project. Ofcourse, he is an important person as he brought this account and he knows the key decision makers for a longer time than I do. There are commercial decisions he can take, which I cannot take. But, that doesn't mean I have to be sidelined. I go to customer site every day driving 200 kms one way, sit with customer project team and ensure the vendor team is working. In between this gentleman will jump in, at his own will and start showing as if he is running the show. I cannot take it for too long. But at the same time, I want to handle it in a professional way.

I have two objectives. 

1. Finish the project successfully and on time
2. Don't let anyone overshadow my work

To meet the first objective, I would do following - 

1. Keep adequate pressure on the vendor and make sure he finishes the work on time and with quality
2. Make sure all the issues are discussed regularly

Well, I have been doing it so far and I will continue to do it in future.

For the second objective, I would do following - 

1. I will reveal bare minimum information with this gentleman. As he is using my information and showing it as his own information. Or at times, he finds what is missing in my information builds his case to take all the credit
2. All my communication will be in written so that everyone knows the source of it.

Is there any better way to do it? Advise.

Crazy things

I was thinking, what crazy things I did in past, which when I recall bring smile on my face? If I have to name few of them, then what will be those?

1. Driving my saloon car off road and then sending message to Mohammed Al Falasi, my deputy CEO to pull it out of sand (happened some 2 weaks back). Thank god he was around in town and saw my call and sms.
2. Walking with Rashi (my wife) in red light district of Amsterdam and ogling at those scantily clad females who were standing behind the glass panes.
3. Smoking weed in a coffee shop in Amsterdam. However, it didnt excite me much. Being a non smoker and I couldnt inhale the smoke properly and ended up coughing.
4.  Running from Karama to Dubai Marina (approx 35 km) early in the morning on a Friday. Waking up Bhaskar (my friend) who was sleeping after a late night booze party, to cook large breakfast for me and take me back to Karama.
5. When  I was nearly 8 year old, I sneaked from the toilet into our house, to get my cricket equipment as my father was in his office and my mom had gone to temple. My father was very angry on me later on.
6.  Around the sametime, I along with my elder sister Meeta were going to school (Children's corner), when we saw a helicopter flying overhead. I don't know why I felt that it was a toy and I can grab it. I stood on the boundry wall of Upper Club (people who lived in Mukteshwar might know this place) for more than 20 minutes to catch it. Eventually we were late to school and Singh Aunty (head mistress) gave me sound beating.

Sometime, it is good to do crazy things without any fear of what people will think and for no logical reason.

The Hindu : Today's Paper / BUSINESS : Smart sourcing is the new game

The Hindu : Today's Paper / BUSINESS : Smart sourcing is the new game

Indian Rupee Symbol

It was a very pleasant feeling for me as this was the first time I saw Rupee Symbol being used while business discussion and with great ease as if it had always existed.

This happened when I was in Dhaka, Bangladesh, two weeks back. I was sitting in the office of our business contact Mr Matin, who has several business interests the country. While I was waiting for him to drive me to a meeting with the government officials, there was another person in his office visiting him from India for another line of business. Though, due to basic mannerism, I do not like to overhear a business conversation, which doesnt involve me, the discussion was very conspicuous for me to over look. The Indian visitor was quoting some prices by writing them down in a piece of paper to a manager from Mr Matin's office. While doing so, this visitor was writing the Rupee Symbol against the price quoted, which really impressed me, what impressed me more, the way his Bangladeshi counter part accepted the usage of the symbol without a question.

This was my first encounter of seeing Indian Rupee Symbol going global. 

Lets Dream

After a long gap, more than a year, I decided to give my speech in the toastmasters. It is not that I didn't attempt giving the speech and writing good script. However, every time I sat to write the speech  thoughts were not flowing and I used to leave the draft in the midway, till I committed to deliver the speech on 6th Sep to give the speech on 8th Sep. I sat down on 6th and 7th to write the speech.

The objective of Project 6 is to use vocal variety to make a point. Besides this my personal objective was to make the speech sound natural, conversational and deliver it without memorizing it. Therefore, instead of writing the complete draft I chose to write the speech in power point and with bullet points.

I won the best speaker award. Please find the speech below.

Why the heads are rolling from all sides?

Organizations face tough time in lifespan of their business. These days it doesn't even surprise anyone hearing story of such an organization. Every second organization, irrespective of its nature of business, is facing tight business scenario at the moment. Our organization is no different. 

Irrespective differences in nature of business, the approach to deal with tough time is usually common across all the businesses. The first thing that happens is downsizing of resources.  In our organization as well at the moment, heads are rolling, most of them involuntarily and some voluntarily foreseeing the uncertain future that lies ahead.

In my perspective, downsizing portrays the weakness of the organizational leadership, in more than one ways. It is an impulsive decision making rather than thoughtful cognitive decision making.

Nearsighted management - When the organization starts retrenching its staff abruptly, without any prior warning or giving out signs of its inclination to do so, that means management was sitting like a lame duck, unaware of what is happening around, waiting for disaster to happen and then take firefighting measures which in this case means ruthlessly sacking of resources. 

Hoarding extra mass - Is there a need for management to retrench resources in first place? If there is, it means organization was always in trouble. It had always been carrying financial burden of these extra resources all this long, making them part of disaster the organization is struck with.

When we club above two points, we draw following conclusion - 

1. Knowledgeable and foresighted management always knows the importance of lean organization. It maintains right resource balance in the organization.

2. It doesn't allow unwanted and extra resources in the organization, which it would end up sacking. 

Cost cutting versus Cost reduction

To me cost cutting is the last resort for an organization to consider. 

In many organizations, specially from service industry, resource costs, which means the salaries, are the highest organization spending. When a services organization faces adversities, in most cases, it targets to reduce its expense in salaries given out. 

Where as the facts may be contrary to it. For an example, it is possible that the salaries they are paying may not be burdening the organization. It may be the cost of stationary that organization is consuming is very much high. If organization switches to paperless office it might reduce the cost drastically. 

I advocate that the cost reduction should always be a high priority of the organization. Management should periodically be asking  - where the organization is spending. Is there an alternative to it? 

If an organization is operating in low cost environment, it will always be in a healthy state when other businesses are beleaguered with adverse environmental factors. Besides that it will make the organization more agile to adapt itself to market situation.

Toastmaster

It started nearly 2 decades back, I was studying in class 7th of Beersheba Senior Secondary School, Haldwani, India, when I decided to come out of shadow of my very gifted and admired sister Meeta. She was melody queen of the school, loved by all the teachers and students for her academic, drama and singing skills. 

On the contrary, I was an unknown or occasionally known as timid and sulking Meeta's brother with no identity of my own. 

But, then in my little mind I had decided I will sing a song in front of school assembly during the celebration of Independence Day, 15th August. I was discouraged and laughed at about the though of the idea itself. Only my mother encouraged me. She heard my repeated rehearsals while my sister was coached by school's music teacher.

I sang in front of 1500 students, with my leg shivering and my voice quivering, the complete song. Heads were moving around and no one focusing on me and my song. Musicians couldn't cope up with my rhythm so stopped playing along. At the end I got the customary applause. 

While boarding the bus back home, my class teacher Ms Vandana Pandey said - "Hemanshu, you sang very well". That made my day. Today I am glad I did something that which only few out of 1500 students could do. I decided to be different.

Thereafter nothing significant happened till, 31/07/2004. It was the farewell of Ms Samar D. Hatoum, our project manager. An outstanding person and manager, I had a chance to work with. Our CEO asked me to speak few words about her before all. I fumbled few words and that is it. It was embarrassing. I didn't like my performance.

Around that time, I met Mano Ramanathan. A wonderful person, full of knowledge and guidance. We used travel together on the bus to work, discussing history, world news and international politics.  In one of these journeys he told me about Toastmasters Club. Infact, later during the day he got me the URL of the Toastmasters Website. With in couple of weeks I joined Emirates Toastmasters Club and I am still associated with it.

As my toastmaster journey started, I was giving motivational speech to the Employees of GIT Sudan. Giving presentation to team of government officials at Dubai Land Department were never that complicated. I gave presentations for the group work in my college while doing MBA. Trained the treasurers of Division B. It was so simple.

I am still enthralled about are the two presentations I recently gave in Bangladesh. One was to the Secretary of Communication and other very senior government officials from various ministries, who applauded me for the delivery and content of my presentation.

Second presentation I gave to a Brigadier General of an Military run organization and his team of army officials who were highly impressed with the presentation.

We speak all the time but making presentations or speaking with confidence in front of large audience, that too in a manner in which your audience can relate themselves to what you are speaking is an art. You do not get it in one day but over a period of time when you speak and experiment with your speech. Toastmasters is a platform for people like me.

This is the incentive of being a Toastmaster, you learn and polish what you have with in you naturally.