random ramblings

I was thinking about time management, personal effectiveness etc and how we figure out ways to keep up. I am not claiming to be an expert, but wanted to share few things that worked for me. Would like to know any better tips and techniques that have worked for others. I think at this stage, as professionals, we are expected to take care of our responsibilities, we can’t have (mostly don’t want to also) someone to followup and not supposed to make up excuses for missing something that we were supposed to do.  In short, it is assumed that we are effective in what we do. There are a lot of advice out there such as Get Things Done (GTD) etc. I have tried many things – outlook tasks, followup with red/green/yellow/orange flags, to do lists in notepad, excel, notes (on paper or otherwise) etc etc. I think the key is to find a routine that works in which we can fairly stay on top. Some of what worked for me – Use a Daily planner / diary:- I don’t do hourly planning for a ...

Is giving the secret to getting ahead? The greatest untapped source of motivation, he argues, is a sense of service to others; focusing on the contribution of our work to other peoples’ lives has the potential to make us more productive than thinking about helping ourselves. The message sounds terrific: Feel good about your work, and get more of it done, and bask in the appreciation of all the people you help along the way. Nice guys can finish first! It is also interesting to see how this could be manipulated and types like – givers, matchers and takers. Our inconsistent ethical instincts We like to believe that the principled side of the equation is rooted in deep, reasoned conviction. But a growing wealth of research shows that those values often prove to be finicky, inconsistent intuitions, swayed by ethically irrelevant factors. What you say now you might disagree with in five minutes. And such wavering has implications for both public policy and our personal lives. I ...

After a long break. Sharing few links for now. Train a parent, spare a child During a function at my daughter’s school last week, a speaker was stating that by the time a child is 5 years old, he would have learned all the values for the rest of the life and that it is all "copied" from the main textbook which are the parents. I was thinking whether I have taught my daughter the right values and why didn’t I know that the "value graduation" is at 5 years.. Better parenting is one of the goals. economic predictions for 2013 Keyword seems to be “Cautiously optimistic”, like in our quarterly result. Btw, one good quarter changes the entire news cycle – everything that was gloomy now looks positive. What is entrepreneurship? I had read the book "Innovation and Entrepreneurship" by Peter Drucker. This article seems to be a good summary. future of programming Which programming skills to pickup? Smartphones can run consumer’s lives One of our pr...

I saw a headline other day about Nani in trouble with Fergie in Manchester United. He has been demanding more money, saying his career is being curtailed and got benched. Next day I was watching a ManU match and saw the veterans Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes playing – I think they had long career with ManU, well past their 30s and still favorites. I think Paul Scholes had an injury where he had some vision trouble – still Fergie stuck with him and he is still considered one of the best, still scoring crucial goals and making perfect passes. On this particular match, saw Nani wasting too many chances and Scholes opening the score. Then there was news of Fletcher getting a standing ovation – making appearance after a serious illness. At the same time the kind of stars that exited (or forced out) are staggering – Beckham, Nistelrooy, Ronaldo, Tevez. Rooney came close to getting kicked out when he acted too smart in between. Then there is the example of Real Madrid (who in fact picked up mo...

a good quote, from Innovation and Entrepreneurship by Peter Drucker. individuals will have to learn new things well after they have become adults – and maybe more than once. what individuals have learned by age twenty one will begin to become obsolete five to ten years later and will have to be replaced – or at least refurbished – by new learning, new skills and new knowledge. individuals will increasingly have to take responsibility for their own continuous leaning and relearning, for their own self-development and for their own careers. they can no longer assume that what they have learned as children and youngsters will be the "foundation" for rest of their lives. it will be the "launching pad" – the place to take off from rather than the place to build on and to rest on. they can no longer assume that they "enter upon a career" which then proceeds along a pre-determined, well-mapped and well-lighted "career path" to a known destination...

Few more from Wal-Mart story. As before, I compare continuously with Infosys from the perspective of organizations which continue to perform even when they are big. It’s almost embarrassing to admit this, but it’s true: there hasn’t been a day in my adult life when I haven’t spent some time thinking about merchandising. I suspect I have emphasized item merchandising and the importance of promoting items to a greater degree than most any other retail management person in this country. It has been an absolute passion of mine. It is what I enjoy doing as much as anything in the business. I really love to pick an item – may be the most basic merchandise – and then call attention to it. Many of our best opportunities were created out of necessity. The things that we were forced to learn and do, because we started out underfinanced and undercapitalied in these remote, small communities, contributed mightily to the way we’ve grown as a company. Had we been capitalized, or had we been th...

Just completed Sam Walton’s auto biography . The contrast of Walmart and Kmart (then and now) and story of the growth of Walton from one franchisee store to an empire made it very interesting. In case you are not familiar with Kmart, this statement from the book puts in perspective. Compare Kmart and Wal-mart after they had both been on the street for ten years. Our fifty-plus wal-marts and elevent variety stores were doing about $80 million a year in sales compared to kmart’s five hundred stores doing more than $3 billion a year. but kmart had interested me ever since the first store went up in 1962. I was in their stores constantly because they were the laboratory, and they were better than we were. I spent a heck of lot of my time wandering through their stores talking to their people and trying to figure out how they did things. Now the situation has reversed. I had a Kmart near where I lived – parking lot used to be empty, whereas nearest Walmart used to be full – enough sai...