Management conundrum of IT Startup’

 Published in ‘Corporate Citizen’ magazine (April’25 issue) - 

https://corporatecitizen.in/v10-Issue11/corporate-insight-management-conundrum-of-it-startups.html

Think like a CEO

..So you have been working for more than 4-5 years in the corporate world; some of you have been working in the middle management rung, but the common refrain is, feeling stagnated, you feel that there is no action happening, getting bored (or frustrated) of mundane things you have been doing, more are less are de-motivated (& if things don’t change for better, you could be de-moralized too!)

Right??

If that is the case, the good part is, you are not alone. There are millions of professionals feeling the similar pangs, though the remedy is not that difficult!

Allow me to explain.

In the current work, do you ever get the feeling of ownership? Did you, on your own / proactively (without anybody else asking) work late to complete some urgent task / proposal / program or worked for few hours on weekend from home? (and I’m talking of pre-lockdown era! 😊) Do you feel attached to the work? Do you take pride in whatever little team you’re leading?

Mostly, the answers will be in negative. If that is the case, you need to reorient yourself.

Yes, you need to start thinking like a CEO!  (& No, but don’t rush to HR to ask for corner office and or executive assistant! 😊) .

When I say, think like a CEO, try to take a bird’s eye view of your work / your organization from 10,000 ft above the ground. Try to make sense of all the business units/departments. Try to see the big picture. Don’t think of yourself as a mere spoke of a big wheel. Instead of moaning say, ‘what-I-am-doing-in-this-migration-project’, find out how it is important for the customer & for your organization (like in the given example, you’re enabling  customer not only saving money in capital investment of hardware by moving onto Cloud but also in taking advantage of scalability of Cloud) & you will understand the importance of your contribution). Find out how the organization makes money (Order to cash process), see who the vendors are, find out the employee count.  Find out what metrics/KPIs your organization uses. There will be some key words / terms specific to every organization. Find out what those are, find out their meanings & you start getting a new perspective.  (Listed organization do publish financial statements on internet, find out & try to read the balance sheet, P&L statement. It is not that difficult. Even if you find out the operating revenue & operating expenses & the line items underneath, it is a great beginning!).  Observe CEO (or rather, CXOs/Sr. leadership), how they communicate, their body language, the confidence they exude, the energy, positivity they radiate.  (And I’m not asking to follow them blindly or to idolize them but to get inspired, get charged)

Once you start taking above steps, you’re getting into the groove; you are molding yourself to think like a CEO.  Supplementary reading (Eco Times / CNBC etc.) would provide you a lot more info about the verticals, how a particular industry is performing, what are the common pain points of a particular industry & how the industry champions are facing it etc.  You need not understand full 100%; even if you understand 10% of it, it would still help in changing the perspective, changing the thinking.

If you’re working in IT industry, are you aware that labor cost is its biggest cost component? But that is not the case for say, automobile company where material cost is the biggest cost component.  If you’re working in hotel or hospitals, occupancy is the key metrics.  Again, if you’re an IT professional, find out the gross yield per employee (simple formula – Revenue divided by Total No. of employees). Then you will also realize why IT companies want to move away from the linear model.

Once this thinking starts developing, you are bound to work differently, however small your team could be.  You would be more energetic, would be liking to go to office, to accomplish things (& not for the sake of your home loan EMI!) You would be taking genuine interests in your team associates, would be taking the end-to-end ownership of the project/s, talking to client/client’s project manager more frequently,  hearing the feedback/complaints, trying to do the course-correction,  would have a better pulse on the billing / collection, sniffing escalations & mitigating them in the bud!

And believe me, if you start doing above things, within a few months (or maximum, a couple of quarters), you could be the top performer in your team/BU/organization.

Continue delivering a spirited performance for a few years and you are bound to think one day, “Hey, why should I do all this for someone else and that too for so many years? Let me be the boss of my own little organization!”

And voila… an entrepreneur is born!!

Management lessons from Marathon running

I remember, it was one of those annual check-ups that had shown my cholesterol level pretty high. Doctor advised me to walk at least 30 minutes a day, besides suitable changes in diet. After some inertia, I started for morning walk. I was working out of Chennai those days.  30 min. walk in the perennially humid weather was soon viewed as a boring exercise. As a short-cut (rather, to finish the ordeal fast), I thought why not to run for 10 min. instead of 30 min. walk? And I decided for running. On day one, I could have run for hardly 2 minutes before panting profusely. But soon, I could increase running for 10 min. at a stretch. I also realised that I enjoy running.

Around same time, I’d seen a couple of friends’ posts on social media about 10K running.

I googled, found out some information, spoke to a couple of friends, spoke to doctor, got some good suggestions , got the essential running accessories (including Asics shoes and Fitbit watch) and I started running for 15 minutes on every weekday & 20-25 minutes on weekends, in early mornings. Began waking up with 6 am alarm, completing the run much before traffic started and reaching office well in time.

One day I heard the ad. of Chennai marathon on FM radio, googled to find out more details & registered for my maiden 10K run. That time, my objective was simple, I just wanted to complete 10K run (& not retire mid-way).  Started running for longer durations on weekends. I’d made a resolve not to back out and run full 10 km. come what may. Besides the usual running, I also had a couple of long runs (6 km, 8 km) just to see whether I had the stamina for 10K run.

To my surprise, I found myself completing my first 10K run in Wipro-Chennai marathon successfully. (Can’t forget  the cheering from complete strangers and more so from fellow-runners urging not to give up or not to rest for long, asking to get up and continue running, especially in the last leg!)

Years passed on, I persisted with the newly acquired good habit of running and saw myself completing seven 10K races in last 5+ years.

One needs to do quite some spadework (besides building the physical stamina) for running a marathon (42K) or even for that matter a 10K race. ‘Run-walk-run’ helps in lowering the heart rate, sprint run (for 3-4 minutes) helps in increasing overall speed, running against a gradient helps in increasing stamina for long run. The other details include planning for the logistics of reaching the venue/start point of the race and coming home after the end of race. Mostly marathons start pretty early in the morning at 5 pm or 6 pm latest), accordingly you need to get up at 4 am or even earlier.  You should have eaten light dinner (but rich in carbohydrate) on previous night. You need to run light.  I don’t carry water bottle (I drink at water stations arranged by race organizers) or even a wallet.  The only exception is mobile phone and some hard cash. If the end point is different than start point (I have witnessed it in some marathons), you need to plan for call taxi. Race organizers/ city officials close most of the leading roads/arteries to marathon venue for almost half-day, so getting a cab/rikshaw also becomes a challenge and bigger so when you’re exhausted running 10K!  

I see quite some parallels between this preparation, marathon running, having an eye for the minute detail and the art and science of Management!

Here are some observations, rather management lessons one can learn from marathon running.

·         I had scripted my message (of what I would post on social media 😊 immediately after I’d registered myself for the marathon (10k). Only time (taken to finish the race) was kept blank. This writing down in advance was a very powerful stimulant. You have committed to yourself and now don’t want to let yourself down, come what may! I began waking up early in the mornings (4 am) for practice runs of various kinds; started giving more attention to diet, intake of more fluid, fruits etc.  Increased protein intake in the diet (more egg-whites, pulses, sprouts), increased water intake to 3 liters a day.  Citrus fruits not only increase fluid level in the body but also Vit. C enhancing immunity.

 

 

*Begin with end in the mind. Visualize the end result. Write down the goals*

·        I remember Chennai marathon more because of humid weather and steep gradient in the route. Even though the race was flagged off at 5.30 am, the humid weather kicked in within no time making running on the steep flyover (near Adyar, Chennai) quite some task. I had to drink water at least twice in every 10 minutes, sat for a minute or two due to cramp and again got up, determined to run.  Last Pune marathon had some absolute dirt track immediately within 200 meters of start. It was pitch dark at 6 am (no streetlights) and you had to run on uneven ground (ensuring you’re not slipping/spraining ankle). There was also the menace of street dogs for a few kilometers. Somewhere in Balewadi Highstreet I slipped off the road while avoiding street dogs chasing each other. One of the kind-hearted fellow-runners stopped , gave me a helping hand, made me sit at the curb side, offered me water. My ankle was sprained, had a minor bruise but luckily it was minor. I did some stretches and joined runners again (to the surprise of many younger runners!) 

 

*Every year is unique, every quarter is unique with its own challenges, new variables. Be flexible to accept/accommodate/adapt the change*

 

·         For a marathon, every kilometer counts, every lap counts, every step counts. Your consistency, average speed matters. Like a test cricketer paces his innings while scoring a century, you need to pace your run!

 

*You don’t build a great organization overnight. You do it year by year; quarter by quarter, week by week, every day* 

 

·         Yes, just when you are in the last leg of your race for the stupendous finish, you feel those cramps in legs, you feel totally tired, totally exhausted. For a split second you think like ‘why-am-I-doing-this-at-this-age?’. You feel like stopping, rather giving it up! But then you exhort yourself to buck up, to get that last gasp, grit, determination, will-power all put together and you raise your steps again and  ...you touch the finishing line...to glory!!!

 

*You need to conquer the proverbial last mile challenge ensuring thinking of and execution of every little detail tirelessly, giving your 120%*

 

I could be biased here but I think running is one of the best exercises. It is wholesome, the good effects are seen in almost every cell of your body. It is the best cardiovascular exercise for your heart. The profuse sweating you experience after running outdoors could be the best catharsis one can have! You just shed the negative vibes like sweat! When you’re running, you’re brimming with confidence! The perseverance of running the grueling 10K rubs on and you handle challenges in work life with more confidence, more positivity!

The prevalent sedentary and irregular lifestyle of NextGen (which includes binge-watching OTT for whole nights) is inviting troubles pretty early in life. Professionals in 30’s are seen complaining of burnout, are not able to handle even minor bumps in corporate life succumbing to depression. Running could be the best exercise in helping them finding their mojo back!

 

Nevertheless, do consult your doctor/physiotherapist before you start running no matter what your age is. If for any reasons, running is not recommended, find out whether you can walk. Brisk walk could be the right exercise for you.

 

Couldn't resist sharing a quote here. While the figurative meaning is awesome, sharing it here more for its literal meaning.

 

“If you can't run, walk. If you can't walk, crawl, but by all means, keep moving” –

Martin Luther King Jr.”  

 

 

 

-Prashant Pimpalekar

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(Published in the business magazine ‘Corporate Citizen’ in its April 16 to 30, 2022 issue)

Management Bytes (2)

I distinctly remember the incidence. I was talking to my senior colleague (say John, to avoid any guesswork) who seemed to be quite agitated. When I asked him the reason, he told me, “Prashant, I’m quite fed up with this ever-ringing mobile phone.  Last Sunday evening, I was about to start my dinner with family & the damn phone rang. It was someone from our office..!”

Being a close friend, I took the liberty to tell him, “But John, look at the positive side.  Someone is having some serious issue at work/project, s/he sincerely believes that you can solve the problem and or guide properly & so is calling you even after office-hours. You're so much needed! Doesn’t this make you feel good instead of thinking it as a nuisance?” John didn’t respond but I could be see he was thinking in a new light.

Yes, most of us with 20+ years of real work (read, grind!) become go-to persons / trouble-shooters / problem-solvers in organizations.  And yes, we do get occasional phone calls after office-hours, on weekends/holidays and even when we’re on vacation.  Right?

But if you’re getting too many phone calls from your team, it also could be because you have not delegated enough, not mentored your team, or they’re not empowered for decision-making.

The other extreme end of this situation is when you’re not getting any calls.  In that case either you’ve built the team so well (with the right delegation/empowerment mix) that nobody senses your absence OR nobody thinks you could solve any problem so they stop calling you!

In either case, start hunting for a new job, mate!

It is tricky, ain’t it?

😊

Management Bytes

Aren’t we all living in the age of super-achievers?

Few weeks ago, Justin Trudeau visited India. Keep aside the success of that trip(that would be another topic), but how many of you know his age? He is only 46!  Now, Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, is visiting India. He is only 40 yr old! (By the way, youngest president (head of state) in the world is Vanessa D’Ambrosio. She is 30 & leads San Marino in Europe. Austrian chancellor Sebastian Kurz (31) is second youngest!)

Looks like heads-of-states are competing with the start-up-founders! Isn’t it?

When it comes to Forbes list, Jeff Bezos is the richest billionaire (& first one to amass $100 Billion Net worth!) & he is only 54! Mark Zuckerberg (yes, the one who came up with Facebook & the world changed forever) is #5 richest individual & he is only 33!

Closer home, we have the founders of PayTM, Flipkart (& many more) vying the Billionaire tag & they’re in early 30’s!

So now let me ask you a question.

How do you feel if your manager is younger than you?? (And to complicate this further, … what if it is she & younger than you???)

I have seen some of my friends (mostly from engineering industry) getting extremely uncomfortable when the immediate manager is younger than them. Some have taken the extreme step.. of resigning!

WHY?

Look at the examples I shared at the start of this article.  What would be the older colleagues (in cabinet / in organizations) could be feeling? And I don’t think there would be any jealousy or rancor! Yes, because the said person had fantastic capabilities, s/he is there in that place & you need to accept it, appreciate it / reconcile with it & work without enmity!  Closer home, many felt that Advani, Murali Manohar Joshi, Yashwant Sinha were betrayed but look at how Modi almost single-handedly got the landslide win for BJP in 2014! Look at the Team-Modi’s performance in last four years! Haven’t they delivered? Or, look at Dhoni, the super-successful captain-cool! How sportingly he has accepted Virat as the captain?

Ergo, it’s high time we shed the ego!

Pronto!!

😊

Employability and Staying Ahead of the Curve

Do you know that approx. 18 Lac Engineering students pass out each year in India?

And do you know that a shocking 80% of them are unemployable?? ...

...If this is the plight of engineering graduates, one shudders to think of what arts/commerce/science graduates could be going through..! While there are scores of reasons to explain above anomaly (mass-copy/cheating at exam. centers/fake degree certificates, distracted students to lack of teaching faculty/infrastructure/falling standards of teaching, lesser jobs at entry level so on and so forth), the article is for that average student who is honest, keen to get his first job and aspires to get ahead in life..!

Let’s first be clear on some concepts.

Employability is not simply getting a job; neither is it a list of skills that can be ‘taught’!

Employability is on-going success for now and in future, whatever career a student chooses.

Employability is leveraging a range of skills, abilities and attributes that are developed in a whole range of settings and that vary from individual to individual.

The classic definition of Employability is - “It is a set of achievements – skills, understandings and personal attributes – that make graduates more likely to gain employment and be successful in their chosen occupations, which benefits themselves, the workforce, the community and the economy”.

To further expound employability -

·         It is the ability to gain initial employment (For the same, the interest in ensuring that ‘key competencies’, careers advice and an understanding about the world of work should be embedded in the education system)

·         The ability to maintain employment and make ‘transitions’, changes between jobs and roles within the same organization to meet new job requirements or

·         The ability to obtain new employment in another organization if required.

·         An ongoing developmental process that benefits from active reflection

Considering the rising cost of education, Educational Institutes should strive to provide a good return on investment to students. They need to be engaging in the educational process, rather engaging in the whole student experience. Innovative teaching, learning and assessment methods help students engage in the education process and have the added benefit of also helping them to develop attributes which make them attractive to potential employers. Students’ interest is more likely to be maintained if they can see the relevance of their studies to their future careers and life beyond university.

Students who make an effort to fully participate in the total student experience (academic, co-curricular, extra-curricular, including work experience) benefit from a well-rounded education, contribute fully to the life of the University and community and hopefully have fun in the process. Involving employers in the education experience, for example, through case studies, delivery of guest lectures, can help students appreciate the relevance of their course and learn how to apply theory and knowledge in practical ways in the workplace.

Developed by Pool & Sewell and based on a range of employability models and theories, the CareerEDGE model provides a useful summary of five essential elements that aid students' employability:

Career Development Learning – the knowledge, skills and experience to help students manage and develop their careers.

Experience – work and life experiences help students develop a broader range of skills and are attractive for prospective employers. (How seriously have you taken internship? What have you observed/learnt at the work place?)

Degree subject knowledge, understanding & skills –  Do you know the fundamentals of the stream you chose for graduation? Do you love at least one subject passionately out of the 40 subjects you would have studied in 4 years of engineering?

Generic Skills - Communication skills / body-language / etiquettes (Can you speak fluently for at least two minutes on any given topic? Does your body language exude the confidence? Is your attire too casual/too fashionable (due to which the recruiter may think of you as a not-a-serious candidate while hiring)?

Emotional Intelligence – “the capacity for recognizing our own feelings and those of others, for motivating ourselves, and for managing emotions well in ourselves and in our relationships”  

All five elements are important and missing one can considerably reduce a student's employability.  Each element is important in its own right, but all five overlap and are integral to each other.

Although attitude is a big parameter (& it is briefly covered under Emotional Intelligence, which is also called as ‘Emotional Quotient’), I won’t delve much on it in this article.

The important reason being, the focus of the article is for freshers/engineering graduates/juniors with hardly one-two years of work experience. Assume, there is a requirement of 20 BlockChain professionals & you (as an employer) received 100 profiles/applications for it. You will filter, say 40 applications/profiles purely based on whether the said candidate has done any course/certification/training in BlockChain or has worked in it. You won’t filter the applications going by the great attitude the applicant might have described in his CV. You will try to gauge the attitude only in 2^nd (or 3^rd) round in F2F interaction. So, the hard-skills (read, relevant degree/certificates/training/job-skills) is the primary filter (or, call it a door-opener) to increase the employability. 

A degree is no longer enough –

Due to changing market conditions (in short – glut of supply and very less demand of entry-level jobs), it makes sense to augment the basic degree with a post-graduation or with a training course in the latest technology.

As per one survey conducted by Times of India, following skills and experiences are the most predictive of a graduate’s employability (in the descending order of importance, top-most being most important):

1.       Professional experience

2.       High degree of specialization

3.       Excellent academic record

4.       Extra-curricular activities

5.       Proficiency in at least two foreign languages

6.       Graduation from a top university

To be employed is to be at risk, to be employable is to be secure –

Can anyone disagree with this?

Remember, employability is not restricted to passing out graduates (freshers) alone. The way IT (rather, ICT) has been impacting our daily life through many disruptive innovations, lot of skills are becoming outdated.

The Big-4 IT organizations in India (TCS, Infosys, Wipro & Cognizant) are investing a lot in automation, Artificial Intelligence, which in turn could reduce the in-take of freshers/junior-level hiring drastically. It will also impact thousands of middle-level managers. And then there are many middle-level managers who are either working on some archaic technology (which no other organization is using) or who just fell in love with their big titles and so are working like clipped winged birds (and so are highly prone for lay-offs) .The only way to survive in today’s corporate jungle is to develop a keen eye (to see which are the emerging trends/technologies & which will be obsolete) & to develop an open mind to un-learn, continuously learn new things, re-invent, adapt ourselves, say after every 5 years! (Can’t resist sharing Andy Grove’s quote here, “paranoids survive”)

Rather going one step ahead, the thinking needs to be, not to seek employment but to create it! (And that will be my next blog)

Best luck!

References – Wikipedia, http://www.ed.ac.uk , Times of India

Bad Boss? …Blessing in disguise!

I won’t go defining a bad boss here because each one of you would remember at least one name (rather, face!) once the words ‘bad boss’ are heard! Right :-?

But how many of you would look at the positive side of it?

Well, most of us would agree on one thing for sure. And that is, a bad boss, somehow, would always keep you on your toes, would ensure you’re never in the comfort zone!  Isn’t that a good thing? Your survival instincts (or, your hurt ego) would make you learn new things, shoulder bigger responsibilities, put in long hours, just to prove your mettle. Also keep in mind, you cannot choose your boss! So, if things are really getting worse in spite of you trying earnestly to put your best foot forward, you might want to consider looking out for opportunities. (Yes, it is true. People leave managers, not companies!) 

And in either case, you indeed might have learnt a couple of new things/skills in your current job or might be performing a different/bigger role in a new organization & all this happened because you were not complacent, you were not in the safe/comfort zone in the first place!  Right? Won’t you be thankful to him/her for it:-?

My own personal experience echoes same thing.  It was my first job (after engineering graduation) in a manufacturing company. My manager was a great human-being & I used to like working with him. One fine day, he got transferred and came in another manager, who somehow made my life miserable almost from day one. The ‘well-ensconced’ me was shaken out from my comfort zone & I began thinking of ways, options to tackle this. It led to my aspiration of doing post-graduation & which in the hind-sight seemed to have done wonders to my career!

So guys (& girls), don’t curse your stars for a bad boss.

Think positive; it could be a blessing in disguise!!

Cheers!!!

Email Etiquettes

‘Leadership and communication are inseparable.  You can’t have one without the other.’      

- Claude I. Taylor

Well, in the times of smartphones and amidst all the social media apps, good old email is still alive & is very much relevant (at least in the corporate world)..! And while everybody would have sent/received at least few thousands of emails, there are still some things, some of us might be blissfully unaware of. (We never know what we don’t know…! Right?)

Personally, I’m a big fan of emails.  And why not?

•       It is the unobtrusive way of reaching the recipient (s/he could be in a meeting or on vacation – s/he still will receive the email).

•       More importantly, you have all the time in the world to construct/write the email with all the points you want to bring out without any interruption (unlike in a telephonic or face-to-face discussion, where the other person may interrupt / may not give you any chance to put your views across or you could forget some things in the heat of discussion)

•       It is for the records. (The best documented evidence)

•       I personally have worked on many projects/proposals with team spread all over the world from US to Europe to APAC to Australia. Without meeting even once, we used to complete the work purely using emails and conf. calls. (& of late, video conf. calls / skype)

First things first:

Any email should have following structure.

•       Recipient? (whom to send / whom to CC)

•       Subject line

•       Salutation

•       Body

•       Signature

Recipient – Choose your recipients carefully. No need to copy all the associates/managers all the time. Unless there is a reason (say, escalation or giving visibility to a great performer), avoid marking CC to senior Leadership. Usage of BCC needs to be avoided unless there is some strong reason.

Subject line – It is too important to leave it blank! Put some meaningful subject relevant to what you’re going to write. Use Keywords in Subject line, like -

•       Action: Prepare slides for 'scope' by June 17

•       Info: Update on E-mail Etiquette Presentation

•       Confirmed: Presentation will be ready for review on June 6^th

•       Delivery: Slide deck for  June 17^th Leadership meeting

Salutation – This varies from organization to organization and from countries to countries, so difficult to generalize. Go with the flow (& choose Dear or Hi, whatever the majority is using). But certainly, no salutation is seen as curt or even rude.

Body –

•       Talk about one subject (rather, relevant topics) per email message. (Don’t mix unrelated topics in one email)

•       Format your email, break message into sections (paragraphs), bullet points

•       Action summary – What is the point of the e-mail?

•       Background – Detail, but organize into key points

•       Close – Next steps or actions items / actionable

•       If you include attachments, give explanation of what they are. (Insert attachment before writing the text in body. This way you won’t miss sending attachment)

•       More importantly for business communication –

•       Include facts / figures. Make it crisp, preferably bullet-point list.

•       Avoid emotions / arguments / lengthy sentences / colourful background / jazzy fonts

•       Avoid emoticons

•       If sending excel file, try to include a snapshot/table in the body of email (Very few recipients will bother to open the attachment)

Signature - Include your name & contact details. (Unless you don’t want to disclose them).  And do you really want to include that motivational quote in signature?

Take another look…before you hit the ‘send’ button. 

—  Is this email needed? (Does the recipient need this email to do their job?)

—  Is the content appropriate? (Professional, inoffensive)

—  Targeted (right usage of To/CC/Distribution Lists)

—  Did you insert the attachment you were referring to in the email?

Some Do’s and Don’ts:

·         ALL CAPS IS CONSIDERED SHOUTING

·         So is over punctuating!!!!!!

·         Not using capitalization or punctuation makes e-mail hard to read

·         Text messaging abbreviations r confusing 2 ur co-workers

·         Avoid emoticons (You’re not on Whatsapp chat with friends/family)

·         Explain Acronyms (Don’t assume that client knows RICEF)

·         Check spelling and grammar before sending (Activate spellcheck)

·         No slang

·         Mind the spelling of receiver’s name. Everybody is sensitive about his/her own name & doesn’t like seeing it misspelt.  (e.g. Daniel or Danielle, Srinivas or Sreenivas)

·         Avoid asking acknowledgement of ‘read’.  (Don’t request a Read receipt. You can configure a Delivery receipt though. )

·         Set your system clock (Date, time zone) right. (Make sure you don't send messages from 1980)

Some more wisdom..

•       Don’t mix external & internal email threads. (i.e. don’t use long internal email thread as a base when writing to a client. Similarly, unless required, don’t copy your internal DLs (Distributed Lists) when writing to a client. If you do that, someone, from some DL would inadvertently be sending email like ‘I’m not aware of the issue / nobody is working on it’ etc. without even noticing that the client is also marked on the same email!)

•       3 Volley Rule- If a topic is bounced back and forth more than 3 times with no resolution seen, it is time to pick up the phone or schedule a meeting/conf. call.

•       24 Hour Rule- It is okay to write a heated e-mail, just save the draft, wait 24 hours before you send it. (And chances are, you will edit it OR will not send at all!)   

Happy emailing!

Selling 101..(but not Zig Ziglar!)

Congratulations!

You’re in the most critical business function of organization and that is “SELLING”!

Let’s face it, unless you bring in revenue, all other things will come to a grinding halt!

You’re going to make (break is not the option) it to a stupendous success!

So be immensely proud of yourself!!!

And don’t be tense too..

Because we all have done some selling, many a times, even inadvertently, right from the childhood. (Remember how you convinced your Papa for buying that glitzy bike as your birthday gift :-?)

And you know what, selling hasn’t changed a bit. No matter what tons of tomes say about all those changing paradigms and blah, blah! After all, it is just the inter-personal relationship stupid..!!

How quickly you can strike a chord with a total stranger, determines how quickly you can convert a prospect into a customer. It also separates the men from the boys in the challenging selling field!!!

And in today’s always-connected, so-shrunk world, there are no strangers. Utilize social media wisely before you meet a prospect. Search on Google/Facebook/LinkedIn/Twitter & you’re bound to know the softer side of that person, his/her hobbies, interest, passion, something which you need to bring into your conversation seamlessly & you will see the glint in his eyes! Gotcha!!

I remember my B-school’s dean’s famous saying here, “You should be able to talk to your CEO’s wife for 5 minutes”.. Think over it. What it means is, you should be so well-read & articulate that you’re able to hold the attention span of CEO’s wife, without sounding timid or currying for some favor or flirting!

If you can make the other person comfortable with your demeanor & communication, you have almost won the battle!  Mindshare to wallet-share comes next..!! 

Surviving In the Corporate Jungle

..So you had a bright academic career, were picked up on the campus (on day one or two) & joined the company of your dream? Right? Well, even if the answer is no, don’t lose heart.  Bright academics doesn’t necessarily translate into a great career!

Here are some tips (which I learned through trial and error, many a times at a big cost!) which may be useful for anybody with work-experience less than 5 years or someone who will be joining in a year or two.

Before you sign on the dotted line –

When you look for a job or change in job (proverbial – greener pastures), more than just the salary package, you should be really looking for following things –

·         How is the company doing? (Market performance, financial stability etc.)

·         What will be your role?  Your responsibilities?

·         What is the potential for growth within the organization?

·         Does that role/skills have market outside? (else, you become trapped in the same organization)

·         Is the title commensurate with your role? (Many companies provide fancy titles. I have seen many employees, not able to change jobs, just because their current titles are too heavy for the miniscule role they are playing & they got so much used to lofty titles that they can’t accept another job with lesser one)

Find out your DNA - 

It is very important to find out what kind of organization suits you best.  e.g. a MNC of global repute may bring in lot of structure, lot of procedures in everything you do, right from what kind of training (internal/external)  you need to undergo to meticulous career planning to a refined performance appraisal (including 360 degree feedback). It will put you on some world-renowned projects, your international travel could be business class (well, take the last one with a pinch of salt!). Now look at the flip side. You could be working on a project like, say, Boeing, but could be a part of 170+ team, working in some corner in third shift for months (or even years, in some cases)! For any simple thing, there could be N approvals you may have to take, flexibility could be too much to ask for & the tall hierarchy (from entry level to CEO) could be of 15 layers ..!

Compare this to working in a start-up or a smaller organization (or as some say, tier-two, tier-three company).  Here you may like it or not, they will put bigger responsibilities on your shoulder (almost from month one, if not day one). You can’t hide in a corner here. Whatever good or bad you perform, you’re visible to the top-brass. And if you’re a performer, well, then I may sound clichéd but yes, sky is the limit! But note, there won’t be much of a structure (if you ask for one, they may ask you to make one!), training will be on-the-job (in plain words, forget training. You’re deployed for work! Learn it somehow & deliver). And they can’t afford the overheads of putting you in a Hilton on a business trip.

You can’t choose your boss –

People leave managers & not organizations! 

So no matter what kind of organization it is, there is one person, who will impact your career growth (in either direction) greatly & that happens to be your immediate manager!  And yes, you may do quite some research before joining a new Organization but you can’t do much when it comes to your boss.

So, once you start working with him, it is important to find out what kind of person/professional he is.  (I will just share some key-words, one or some of them could be applicable.  Micro-manager, hands-off manager, delegates too much, participative, authoritative, etc.) You need to align yourself with the personality/working-style of your manager.

Here is one more piece of advice. Refrain from using the word ‘politics’. No matter what kind of organization it is, some politics is bound to be there & you need to learn to live with it. In fact, a better name for politics is ‘group dynamics’ which is bound to be there when two or more human-beings are interacting on anything, may it be work or sports or any other activity.  If you think your boss favors someone else more than you, the fact is, that other person is in the trust-zone of your boss.  You call them soft-skills or call people-skills, but they matter most here than sheer technical skills.

Keen eye -

Besides working, keep your eyes (more than ears) wide open & observe people in your organization (from various teams, various roles and various countries). See how they work, how they communicate.

Instead of just getting awed by your CEO or COO, find out the qualities that made him the CXO-level material.  You will learn a lot more by observing. It will help not only in enhancing your career but also will provide invaluable inputs to your entrepreneurial aspirations, after few years.

Sixth sense –

Remember Intel’s Andy Grove’s famous quote? Only the paranoid survive!

Thanks to the globalization, digitization and brutal competition, no matter in which country you’re in and no matter which industry you’re in,  in course of time, your organization will acquire another company or your company will be gobbled by someone else. There could be some corporate re-structuring (due to M&A or as per management’s dictat) or plainly down-sizing.  Barring the last one, earlier mentioned events don’t impact much at a junior level.  Also, such events need not be construed as solely negative. I’ve seen many individuals’ career blossoming in spite of (or due to) such events.  But if you feel you cannot cope up with the change, then watch out for the signals & keep your parachute ready.

Running away from stress? –

As you rise up the career ladder, the stress factor is going to increase exponentially.  And all said and done, you can’t eliminate (or even minimize) stress. You need to manage stress, learn to live with it, with a smile! Remember, you need to be working for at least 20 years (assuming some of you want to retire at 50!). But think of 20 years as a marathon race (& not T-20 cricket match) You can’t burn out in first 5 years itself! If you realize that you can’t handle stress, then curb your ambitions. Period.

Don’t get tied up with one location –

Yes, all of us like to settle down in one place but at least in the first 10-15 years of your career, you need to be flexible to move to any location (within or outside India). This can not only fast-track your career but also will provide you a new experience. Your social skills / adaptability (& in turn, emotional quotient) will enhance too (& which again, provides a big intangible help to your career).

Last but not the least-

Just like you upgrade to a new model of mobile phone almost every couple of years, you need to upgrade yourself to a new skill / new role / new organization almost every couple of years else YOU become obsolete in the corporate world!

Now ..go & conquer the corporate world!!

Best Luck!!!