O’ Five….

Year O’ Five has been eventful, remarkable, wonderful and very special in my life. It definitely needs a recap of why this year has been so special.

• Bought my first car in India and christened it "Jenny"...
• Tried GMAT for 2nd time and realized that it was not my cup of tea...
• Got engaged...
• Got Married...yippie...that a reason to call it a spl year...
• Started Blogging...
• Quit my old job, which I loved for 6 years...
• Joined my current job, which I am loving now...
• Migrated to a new city for job & to set up family...
• Read a lot of books than ever, in a wide variety of genres (20 plus)...
• Interviewed people for job recruitments for first time...(both at old & current jobs)
• Went to UK on business - my shortest overseas trip ever (2 days/3 nights)..
• Air Travelled 16 times (11 - personal & 5 - business) (this is my highest ever in a single year)...
• Visited the following places...

Thirunelveli
Thiruchendur
Delhi
Agra
Kullu-Manali
Vellore
Ooty
Edinburgh - Scotland

Hope to have an eventful O'Six.

Making of a Bibliophile

Did a recap of the books that I read in the recent past (last 2 to 3 months). That, quite a list....

Books that I read in the recent past:
The Rage of Angels (translated to tamil)
Snapshots From hell
Bel Canto
One Night at the Call Center
The Alchemist
The Detective

Books that I am reading now:
The World is Flat
Freakonomics

Books in pipeline for immediate read:
Management 21C
In Search of Excellence
The Airport

The thing with Renee and Period films

What is the matter with Renee Zellweger and period films? In the recent past most of the movies which Renee portrayed were period movies.
On a Cold Mountain in Chicago Renee was Down with Love with a Cinderella Man.

Bolded green are period films, which casted Renee.

Competency

Recently I came across with different kinds of competencies, which was very interesting. Thought of sharing 'em...

They are,
Unconscious Incompetency
Conscious Incompetency
Conscious Competency
Unconscious Competency

(It's like 4 quadrants)

Desired state of competency in anything for anyone is Unconscious Competency.

May be an analogy will help to comprehend these easily.

A person who does not have driving skills. Rather he does not require at the place he is living currently. (say in India, not everyone is expected to have driving skills).
This is Unconscious Incompetency.

That person goes to America. First thing he learns is that he requires Driving skills to be independent.
This is Conscious Incompetency.

He learns driving and starts driving around. A burgeoning driver...
This is Conscious Competency.

Eventullay he becomes a veteran and expert in driving since he's been driving a while.
This is Unconcious Compentency.

Interesting...eh?

In search of words...

Today I received a call in my cell phone from someone asking what was my name. (There wasn't even a courtesy hello). I was so furious and shouted back who was that and what he wanted. He said that he was security at gate# 5 and I had a package arrived that I had ordered. Curltly I said wrong number and was about to hang up on him. He wanted me to wait up and handed the phone over to someone else. That 'someone else' said that I had a bouquet waiting for me. I was perplexed. I said that there must be something wrong and it was not possible. 'someone else' told from whom it was from. Immediately I got his whereabouts and ran to collect the bouquet. While running I woke up all my cells in the brain to find out the 'reason' or 'occasion' for the bouquet. My brain cells proved that they were not very useful. I called up that person blushing out, supplied the backgrounds and asked what was the 'reason' or 'occasion'. That person asked me to wait until I saw the bouquet to find out. I waited and I saw. Then I knew the occasion. Unfortunately I had forgotten the occasion. I felt a sudden urge of tear in my eyes. I had to control my emotions considering the environment. Called back that person and thanked. There are times when you think that there are no right words to express your feelings. This was one of those times. Thanks is a tiny word to confine what I wanted to express. Bottom line is I felt happy. Very very happy.

The person was my wife.
The occassion was 100th day of my wedding.

'The Manager'

An essential characteristic of the superhero mythology is, there's the superhero, and there's the alter ego. Batman is actually Bruce Wayne, Spider-Man is actually Peter Parker. When he wakes up in the morning, he's Peter Parker. He has to put on a costume to become Spider-Man. And it is in that characteristic that Superman stands alone. Superman did not become Superman, Superman was born Superman. When Superman wakes up in the morning, he's Superman. His alter ego is Clark Kent. His outfit with the big red "S", that's the blanket he was wrapped in as a baby when the Kents found him. Those are his clothes. What Kent wears, the glasses, the business suit, that's the costume. That's the costume Superman wears to blend in with us.

Lately I have been having this feeling that wherever I am & whoever I am with, I am 'the Manager'. Like the Superman, I felt like I was born Manager. I kinda looked strange too. One day I was in my kitchen, enlightening my wife with 'short stories' from my life. I observed her way of cooking for a while and 'the manager' started to appraise the way she was cooking. I passed my wisdom on how important it is for her to improve her productivity and time management.

Result? Well, I had to take over the rest of the cooking and later I had to dramatically fall on my knees to apologize in style to set everything right.

Lesson? Wife is the Chairman, MD and CEO of the house. What can a poor manager do about it?

I felt like I woke up from dream of being 'the manager'. Ofcourse, now-a-days I am 'the manager' only at my work and not everywhere and not with everyone.

Note: First para, the comparison of superheros, is from the movie Kill Bill Vol.2 by Quentin Tarantino.

30 days & 3 books

Been pre-occupied with my new job & new environment for a long time. Too busy to find time to read and write now-a-days.Between my busy schedules and lot of commuting between home & work, I managed to squeeze my time to read three novels. (took a lot of time to complete though).

All three were written by first time authors. Their work were too good for the first-timers.

Both Five Point Someone & Mediocre But Arrogant were written by MBAs. That's the first inclination that I had to buy these books. Both the books deal with a student's life from start to end of his college-hood.

Five Point Someone has a unique style. Language of the book was pretty good and the standard is international. Reason for talking about the language here is that I usually think twice before buying English novels written by Indian authors. This novel took me to my good old college days. Anyone who stayed in hostel during college life would immediately fall in love with this book. It's very funny. And yeah, this book is being made into a movie in Bollywood.

Mediocre But Arrogant, shortly MBA, was not very enjoyable to me. But heard people saying that this is a very good read. Reason why it was not very enjoyable was that I read this book immediately after reading Five Point Someone. Both the plots were very similar. Both dealt with a guy's college life - joining till leaving. A few characters in the movie remainded me few of my friends. That made me to get closer with the novel.

Kite Runner is setup in Afghanistan. I have never read much about Afghan. From this book I learnt a good amount about Afghan and her trouble. This book is a New York Times Bestseller. This book is one of the very good books that I have read ever. This books deals with human relationships in a very fantastic manner. Author has succeeded in delivering very complex inner feelings of individuals without distorting them. 'Guilt' is worst of all feelings. 'Guilt' is the main drive in the story. I do not want to give out spoilers here. This is a "must read".

Lost in Transition

I am back after almost a month's time.

I was in a transition phase with the new job, new city & new environment. Now I feel like I have got acquainted with all these "new"s.

Still I have a lot of things to catch up.

Nostalgia

I cried; I cried happily on the day I got my first job 7 years ago (I think it was June 1998, approximately).

Now after 6 wonderful years I am leaving my first job on 29th July. It's pretty hard to say adios.

A wise man told not to get attached with the organization but with the work. I didn't know how to do that. I will have to practice that at my new organization.

Main thing that I feel bad about is loosing the network that I have built in last 6 years at my current organization. Network of people at many levels. I have to build a similar network at my new job pretty fast to compensate this.

First job, first salary, first flight trip, first recognition as a great performer (I was an average performer since school), first role as project leader...so many "first" memories were at my current organization.

I want to keep all that nostalgic stupidity aside and be practical asap.

Biggest challenge that I foresee at my new job is in 'blending in' with that organization's culture. Sooner I do better I would be.

unclassical CLASSICs

Hithhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Catch-22
Gone With the Wind
David Copperfield
Midnight's Children

Above is a list of classic books, which made it to the top 100 great books in English. I bought these books with a curiosity to enjoy the literary values of these classics and to have a satisfactory feeling of classical readings. But my tiny brain is not yet tuned to enjoy the literary values or the classical contents of these books.

Review said H2G2 (Hithhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) as the funniest novel of the century. I read that book, it was funny, a non-sensical funny. I was not able to enjoy the non-sensical funny. It's true that I laughed out loud many times while reading. And the story was very creative too.
But I wouldn't put it at 4th place among top 100. Recently Hollywood made a movie based on this book, with same title. I think the movie did not go well in box office.

'Catch-22' is at 11th position in top 100. This is also one of the "funniest" novel of the century, as per the reviews. I am half way through reading this book. I am reading this book just because I started reading. I have to admit that this book has a unique way of story telling. Again my tiny brain is too tiny to appreciate and enjoy that style.
(Story runs during the Second World War time, and it goes to Bologna, Italy.....hmm?).

Remaining three books are at the 21,34 & 100th positions respectively. I have read at least 2 chapters from these three books and kept aside before continuing further. It was too difficult to toil over the pages. But still I have not given in yet. Waiting for a good moment to go back and enjoy the 'literary values' of these books.

Recently I saw a classic film 'Taxi Driver' (1976) directed by the great Martin Scorsese and acted (lead role) by Robert De Niro. I did not have patience to watch the movie without Fast FWDing it. Same with another classic 'Ben Hur' (1950's), which won 11 academy awards.

What is a classic? Generally anything's very old seems to be called as Classics. Books & movies, which were made long long ago were made for the target audiences of that period. Over the period definitely the taste have changed a lot. That is the reason why it was so difficult for me to read/watch those classics. I was wondering whether was it only me or other people also have the same kinda difficulties. I checked with two of my friends who, unlike me, are voracious readers. They also have similar opinion as me.

Let me wait till my tiny brain grows up some what big enough to enjoy those classics and come back again.

The 'thing' with Italy and the 'thing' with 3 major American Cities

I am reading 'The Broker' by John Grisham, got that from my friend's collection. I am glad that I did not buy. The novel is not so great to talk about.
Subject matter is the place where the major part of the story is running. It is Bologna, Italy. When the main character of the story lands in Italy, my eyebrows raised automatically.

In my recent reads 'The Da Vinci Code' and 'The Angels & Demons' of Dan Brown, the characters go to Italy at least for sometime. I remember vaguely that small part of the storyline of Sidney Sheldon's 'The Sands of Time' runs in Sicily, Italy.

What's the 'thing' with American authors and Italy?

Similary Hollywood movies, most of them have a thing for Los Angeles. If not Los Angeles it would be New York. If the story is a family drama, plot moves to San Fransisco at the maximum.
Poor Los Angeles; when aliens attack, they attack Los Angeles first, during natural calamity Los Angeles becomes an island ("Escape from L.A" - the stupidest movie I have ever seen).
Most of the movies have their plot only in these cities. If you have not observed this before start observing now, your eyebrows will also raise when you watch movies.

When America is so big with lot of big and interesting cities, what's the 'thing' with Hollywood movies and these cities?

Great Depression

As promised I am posting this blog about America's Great Depression. In the short (just 513 years) history of America, there are only two incidents that I am most interested in. One is Great Depression and the other is Civil war. (When you deal with American Customers, if you talk about America's history they would be much impressed. I have used it during the casual conversartion and it worked just fine. Try it out).

The Great Depression was an economic slump in North America, Europe, and other industrialized areas of the world that began in 1929 and lasted until about 1939. It was the longest and most severe depression ever experienced by the industrialized Western world.
Here is the link to learn more about Great Depression:
http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/depression/depression.htm

SOX - in a nut shell

What is the Sarbox Act or Sarbanes-Oxley Act or SOX?

• Sarbanes-Oxley is a US law passed in 2002 to strengthen Corporate governance and restore investor confidence. Act was sponsored by US Senator Paul Sarbanes and US Representative Michael Oxley.
  
• Sarbanes-Oxley law passed in response to a number of major corporate and accounting scandals involving prominent companies in the United States. These scandals resulted in a loss of public trust in accounting and reporting practices.
  
• Legislation is wide ranging and establishes new or enhanced standards for all US public company Boards, Management, and public accounting firms.
  
• Sarbanes-Oxley law contains 11 titles, or sections, ranging from additional Corporate Board responsibilities to criminal penalties. Requires Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) to implement rulings on requirements to comply with the new law.

What does Sarbanes Oxley Address?

• Establishes new standards for Corporate Boards and Audit Committees
  
• Establishes new accountability standards and criminal penalties for Corporate Management
  
• Establishes new independence standards for External Auditors
  
• Establishes a Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) under the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) to oversee public accounting firms and issue accounting standards

Courtesy: Some site in Internet

Corporate Governance (U.S & India)

A News excerpt: Bernard J. Ebbers, the former chairman of WorldCom, was sentenced to 25 years in prison for orchestrating a record $11 billion fraud that toppled the telecommunications company he founded.

25 years imprisonment for a 64 years old may seem a little too much. But considering the magnitude of the fraud and considering the responsible position Ebbers held while he was cheating, this verdict is justifiable.

U.S is very strict on Corporate frauds and the punishment is real heavy. This is to demotivate (rather, threaten?) the other Corporates from involving in frauds and cheating the poor investors.

In addition to heavy punishments, U.S lawmakers have come up with a strict law called Sarbanes-Oxley Act, SOX shortly. This law is said to be "the most far-reaching change in American securities laws since depression". (I will write about SOX and Great Depression separately). With this law in place, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of U.S will have a closer look at the corporates and tight control on the corporates from cheating the investors and SEC.

Worldcom & Enron are hard lessons for SEC. Hopefully, the Corporate frauds will be eliminated or reduced with this law in practice.

While talking about these frauds, I couldn't resist thinking about 'the Big Bull' of India. I googled and found that Harshad Mehta (the Big Bull) is long dead. He died of heart attack on 31-Dec-2001. He was 47 when died. He used the Indian stock market during 1991-92 as his play ground and played hard ball on millions of poor investors' money. Sensex reached (or crossed) new highs during this period. SEBI (Securities and Exchange Board of India) woke up and arrested him in April 1992. Unfortunately, almost 28 cases registered against him were still in trial stage at the time of his death. I am not sure whether the cases have come to an end now. Couldn't find it in net.

While B.Ebbers case took just 3 years for verdict in U.S, the biggest fraud case in Indian Stock Market history is (was) open without judgement for more than a decade.
If this is the case, how would the other market frauds like Harshad Mehta will get scared?
Like SOX, does SEBI have anything real tight on Indian public companies for Corporate Governance? Or are we going to learn a hard lesson like U.S?
Recent rallies in SENSEX (crossed 7340 already) of Indian Market is scary. Are the companies really performing good or there is someone like 'Big Bull' is making it go up?
Is SEBI keeping an eye on the corporates showing great results?

Is our money safe?

Interesting Phrase...

An interesting phrase from the novel 'The Evening News' of Arthur Hailey...
...he is affected by nostalgic constipation, he needs a mental enema....

Interactive Advertisements...

This past weekend, while I was watching TV an observation struck me hard. That whenever commercial breaks come up I tend to change the channels. I believe this holds good for many people. Ad agencies spend lotsa money in making the ad and getting a suitable slot in TV to telecast. But what is the point if the viewers just switch the channels during commercial breaks...?

There are a few exceptional advertisements, which people patiently watch and then switch the channels. They are,
a) Ones with actor/actress/sports person who are in lime light (people stop to watch these ads for sometime but not regularly...after a while...they start searching for the remote)
b) Ones that attract kids
c) Ones that are brilliant
I find harldy a few advertisements that make me stop before switching channels.

All that cost & effort in making the ad are helluva great waste. I thought that the advertisements (telecasted in TV) are not serving their purposes.
Will ad agencies take a survey on that and make a good decision on what to do?

Obviously we can not pass a bill to legally enforce that the viewers must watch those advertisements. That will become a matter to laugh.

Using the technological advancements, advertisements can be made as interactive. Interactive?
Yes, interactive. Advertisements should be made to get inputs from the viewer (via Remote Control). Based on the input the advertisements should react differently. With the current TV sets it is not possible, that's obvious. TV manuafacturers and Ad Agencies can go for a tie-up to achieve this. A separate microprocessor chip to process 'interactive advertisements' may require to be implanted in the TV set. Microprocessor can be programmed to process the input from Remote Control during the particular commercials and react based on the inputs. Even with no input from Remote Control also the microprocessor should perform the commercial with default input...otherwise waiting for viewer's input indefinitely will be a huge loss to the TV channels.

'Interactive Advertisements' are not the only solution to make people watch the commercials without switching channels. This could be just one of the ways. A detailed study & survery needs to be done on this matter to come to a solid conclusion. Otherwise there is no point in Organizations/Ad agencies spending a lotsa money in TV Ads.

War of the Worlds

I am a big fan of Spielberg and Tom Cruise. I was waiting eagerly for this movie to hit theaters and rushed to watch the movie on the opening day. Was it worth eagerly waiting for? No.
In a way this Movie was a big disappointment to me.

Idea of making an alien movie from the novel written (by H.G.Wells) almost a century ago itself wasn't appealing to me. But this movie isn't about Aliens. Then? This movie is about the feelings of a father (mainly) to guard his Child(ren). Tom Cruise is playing an ordinary man role, he is not a 'larger than life' in this movie. (hmmm....first disappointment. "Why Cruise? Why not some ordinary star"). Not that Tom Cruise did not suit the role. His performance was good in the movie. But the girl played as his daughter (Dankota Fanning) was stunning, her's was brilliant performance). Good thing about this movie is that Spielberg did not picturize as if the aliens destroy historical monuments and important places on earth (like Eiffel Tower, Taj Mahal etc).
Another good thing is that the movie jumps in to the main story line so fast. I sat straight and thought "okay that's it, it's gonna be a movie with lots of interesting stuffs". pooofff...!!!
Who the hell are those aliens, where did they come from, why are they destroying us? Is it only me that couldn't understand the movie or the movie itself was made like that? Steve, please help me.
I agree that for the opening scenes it was great and scary when the aliens came in all of a sudden and started destroying the earth. But I sure wanted to know a little more about their origin (is it Mars?) and purpose at least just before the movie ended. oh gosh, probably Steve would have thought that there were already a humpty number of alien subjects, which all had almost similar purpose to visit planet earth, so why to bother fans by telling the same old stuff again.
If the emphasis were more on the feelings of the father & daughter relationship, I would have accepted not showing the backgrounds of the aliens. But with the help of CGI aliens have occupied a considerable portion of the movie. It was kinda mixed.
hmmm....ending of the movie is another tragedy. Aliends start dying all of a sudden....oh come on gimme a break...!!!

Obsession....

"Biblioorphans" - a word invented by my friend to refer to the books sitting idle on the shelf, left unread.

I have a plethora of biblioorphans at home.

Yesterday, I went out with my wife for shopping dresses. My wife purchased a few dresses. I also had a plan to buy a cargo pant. But on a street with lots of clothing shops only an old book shop attracted me. I stopped at book shop...I badly wanted to buy books. I had decided to put a 'stop sign' myself for buying new books. I had decided to give a life to the '(biblio)orphans' sleeping at my house only then to buy new books to read.

I am becoming more and more obsessed with Books & Movies. Good or Bad?

Had a feeling that my writing skills are poor and have a lot of room for improvement.
Result: A New Beginning.

End of Days...

I put down my papers at my current job to take up a better job (better pay & better position). Now I am counting my last days at the current job. Coming to work, I feel like fish out of water everyday. I do not have any work to do; I do not have any role & responsibilities. It's completely like my employer is paying me unnecessarily. But still my manager wants me around until this monthend. (some stupid 'client billing' issues).

The other day I was talking to one of my colleagues who has also put down his papers. He told that he is enjoying his "end of days" (!) doing nothing at work and getting his usual handsome pay. I really don't understand why am I not able to enjoy this situation as that guy does? Does that mean I am loyal? Does that mean that I have the thing they call it as integrity?

mmm.....?

Wonderful Beginning...

I have just started a wonderful life with my beautiful wife, Devi. She is pretty, funny, kind and lovable. What else would a guy look for....?
I am not a great believer of God, but still I want to thank God for everything that he has given in my life...so far so good.