Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Convocation Post

It is a dull afternoon and I am sitting in the office jobless (albeit temporarily ). In spite of the boredom around, some excitement is yelling at me from a distance. It is the convocation ceremony slated for this weekend. Wow, so I am going to receive a degree(actually a PG diploma) this weekend. For most of the people who receive their degrees this would probably be their second convocation ceremony. But for me this is the first such ceremony. This fact adds to the excitement.

A Convocation Ceremony
In MBA college we were made to believe that people who quote famous people are well read and proficient in communication. That thing still refuses to leave me. So I ran a search in Google to find some interesting quotes on the theme of convocation. Google, as usual, did not ditch me and threw some 1.5 million results in 0.17 seconds. I got hold of an 'interesting' quote which I made my Facebook status message. It was a quote from Robert Orben (do not ask me who is he, probably Wikipedia can tell you that). 'A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that "individuality" is the key to success.' 

Sunday, July 18, 2010

I Want To Be An Entrepreneur

Off late there is a lot of buzz about entrepreneurship. Back in my MBA college I was a member of the entrepreneurship cell where a lot of teachers and industry leaders  praised entrepreneurship and in a way exhorted students to take up entrepreneurship. Media reports often put the stories of successful young entrepreneurs and people who give up "comfortable" jobs to pursue entrepreneurship in limelight. All these things had an impact on me and one day I thought I should be an entrepreneur myself. That was great!! But who is an entrepreneur or what is entrepreneurship?

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Did Harappans speak Tamil ??


 It was a fine morning in Harappa in 2398 BCE. Sun was shining brightly when a joyous procession of people proceeded towards a local temple. A lean man appeared out of the temple and people shouted ‘Muruga.. Muruga’. A man and woman wearing ceremonial dress moved towards the lean man standing in front of the crowd. The lean man performed a religious rite and asked the woman to look northwards. She said ‘ Vada Meen Pol Naan Iruppen’ (I shall remain as firm as the northern pole-star).

If the Dravidian hypothesis of Indus script as proposed by Professor Asko Parpola of Helsinki University were to be true, the above scene could have happened in Harappa and Mohenjadaro. 

Sunday, June 6, 2010

Spelling Bee Champs


It is a hat-trick for Indian-Americans in the Scripp's National Spelling Bee Championship. Anamika Veeramani (seen seated in the photo with last year's champ Kaavya Shivashankran) is the winner of the 83rd edition of the event. Anamika (14)  finished fifth in the last year event and was the bookers' favourite this year. Anamika, a composed and confident girl, crossed nine rounds of hurdles before clinching the title by spelling 'stromuhr' ( An instrument for measuring the quantity of blood that flows per unit of time through a blood vessel). The different words she spelled to win this coveted championship are Exacerbate (increase in severity of a disease), Foggara (I couldn't find its meaning), Osteomyelitis ( an infection of bone), Mirin (a japanese condiment), Nahcolite ( a mineral of sodium),  Epiphysis (end portion of a long bone), Juvia ( a Brazilian nut).



Wednesday, May 19, 2010

A Note on the World Conference on Classical Tamil



I feel very delighted to write this post commemorating the World Conference on Classical Tamil. This article presents the basic idea of a classical language, position of Tamil language and the scholarly research initiatives pursued worldwide.

A classical language is that language which is the root of whole set of languages and traditions. To quote the University of California at Berkeley (UCB) professor George Hart, ‘a classical language is one which is of considerable antiquity, has an independent literary tradition and has a

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

University's Role in Nation Building -MIT's Study


A country is, often, what it is and what its people are. Human resources play a crucial role in the rise and fall of a nation. An island nation called England ruled over half of the world just because of its strong human resources. Almost all countries realise the importance of human resources. But how many of them have worked to improve and harness the ability of this resource? Not many. A country's educational system plays an important role in developing and harnessing the potential of human resources.



Monday, April 19, 2010

Long Live CKP


Writing an obituary is always a difficult task. Especially when it is about a person whom one knows only vicariously. CK Prahalad, world-renowned management thinker passed away on 16th April. He was the Paul and Ruth McCracken Distinguished Professor of Corporate Strategy at Ross School of Business, Michigan University.

I share a special relationship with him. He is a distinguished alumnus of Loyola College (Chennai), the same college from where I secured my post graduate diploma in management. As a management student I had an opportunity to read some of the works of this management guru. Although I did not spend sufficient time to understand and reflect his ideas, still some of his ideas provoked a few thoughts in me. One of my earlier posts also talked about that. (See http://karthiksgraffiti.blogspot.com /2009/05/interview-with-ck-prahalad.html).

I still remember Prahalad's visit to LIBA early last year to give away the Mother Terasa Award for Corporate Citizen. The picture above shows Mr.Prahalad along with other dignitaries during the ceremony that took place on 23 March 2009. During this occasion he presented a talk on India@75.

Although I have been exposed to many ideas of CKP (as a part of my academic exercises), the idea that impressed me a lot was the one where CKP describes the kind of innovation that is needed in the 21st century. N=1 and R=G is the simple one-liner that he proposed. This simply meant, treat the customer as an individual and mobilise resources globally to serve him. This is a radical idea and is the best possible exposition of mass customization.

Being a management guru is all about mastering the art of abstraction. CKP is an unreputed master in that. Most of the ideas of CKP sound common-sensical. Some of us may even feel that it is the case with most of the management thinkers. It may be true. But by bringing commonplace knowledge into a framework, this management guru has helped us overcome our mental blocks which hitherto prevented us from looking at things the way we see them with the guru's framework.

Management theory, especially business strategy, is a fast evolving field of inquiry. There are many more questions to be answered and dimensions to be unearthed. More and more excellent theoreticians will make their mark in this field. But the vacuum created by CKP's demise will remain a vacuum for a long time to come. Long live CKP.

Friday, April 2, 2010

Forbidden Forbidden






I have never been a traveler. The last long holiday I had was five day stay at Prot Blair some five years back. Now I am again on a long holiday. This time to Ladakh in Kashmir. The picturesque, adventurous, Buddhist part of Kashmir is the holiday home.

This region's sobriquet is the forbidden land which is how Tibet of China is also known. This may be because of the historical links between Ladakh and Tibet. From preliminary researches I understand that weather may be a bit inclement but should be thrilling. A lot of places are there to be visited. I am sure the geography of the region is going to be splendid. Excited to feel the lunar-like surface of Ladakh.

This holiday also presents me a interesting opportunity to write a travelogue. I knew nothing of the basics or essentials of a travelogue. I have never tried one. May be I learn by soiling my hands straight away. I shall publish the travelogue as a multi-part series in this blog. A lot of information that my readers may need to plan their trip to Ladakh will be a part of it.

Bye for now. I will back with Ladakh posts soon.

Thursday, April 1, 2010

Gurubhyo Namaha.


" Without inspiration the best powers of the mind remain dormant. There is a fuel in us which needs to be ignited with sparks " said Johann Herder, an 18th century German philosopher. Being inspired is always a great feeling. I write this post to thank my teachers at LIBA who inspired me a lot. Hence the title Gurubhyo Namaha (meaning salutations to the many gurus).

In my two year stay at Loyola Institute of Business Adminstration (LIBA), Chennai, I saw more than thirty teachers. All of them taught me valuable lessons both within the classroom and outside. But four of them made deep impressions in me. In the following I recollect with gratitude some of my memories.

Professor AC Fernando (ACF as we call him) taught me Economics. I had a formal exposure to economics only at LIBA. I always aspired to become a writer. ACF as the editor of LIBA's official magazine, Management Matters, recognised a writer in me and published two of my book reviews in the magazine. Winning an editor's appreciation is always a dream for any aspiring writer. For me the dream came true at the most unexpected moment. Other articles that featured in the same section were from some of the most experienced teachers. That made me feel very humble. I have always admired his thirst and passion for writing. He is one of the very few teachers at LIBA who continually publishes books. Dear professor Fernando thank you for the generous gesture and thank you for inspiring me.

Professor U Srinivasa Raghavan taught me Retail Management and Business Strategy. He is a great teacher. He is a man who believes in simple living and high thinking. Each and every word he uttered in the classroom reverberated with credibility. He had an illustrious career before he took up teaching at LIBA. He retired as Secretary to Government of India. Sometimes back I was a civil services aspirant. I missed to convert a golden opportunity into an IAS job. I have pondered a lot on the possible reasons behind my failure and would conclude everytime saying 'it was tough luck that day'. But during one of his Strategy sessions he presented the 'Vision Statement' that he prepared for India Posts way back in 1994. As he presented the statement slowly I realised the real reason behind my failure. I wanted to cry out but just shed a few tears regretting my failure. Then I thought probably I should have met this man before my IAS interview. Dear professor Raghavan thank you so much for helping me understand something that I never understood before and thank you for inspiring me.

Professor Jayaram K Iyer ( JK as we call him) taught me Marketing Management. In fact he taught me more than that. JK is popular for his characteristic style of interaction with the students both inside and outside classroom. He taught me a course on Research Methods. In his first session he threw a question at us asking 'Can mother's love be measured?'. Almost the entire class said 'nay'. But he slowly proceeded proselytizing students and made them believe that it is indeed possible. But at the end of the session I was still not impressed with the lecture. Slowly it dawned upon me that the true purpose of the session is not to make me believe that mother's love can be measured but it is to drive home the message that anything and everything can be measured. Today I would attribute my interest for research, however rudimentary it is, to that lecture of JK. He also introduced me to different interesting areas of inquiry like Behavioral Finance and Social Media Marketing. Dear professor JK thank you for raising the bar every time I came to you and thank you for inspiring me.

Professor SV Vijayaraghavan taught me a course on Financial Markets. He is a dedicated and energetic teacher with a long corporate career behind him. He added a lot of value to the course by leveraging his practical experience. In my limited interactions with him outside the classroom I understood that he is a self-actualised (Maslow's ideal) person. When many teachers work to maximise their returns by visiting maximum number of campuses and teaching as many sessions as possible, here was one teacher who attached a bit more importance to teaching than to the returns it generated. The initiatives he took out of his way to help some of the slow learners of my class (myself included) spoke volumes about his integrity and passion for teaching. Dear professor Raghavan thank you for teaching me the essentials of Finance and thank you for inspiring me.

There were a few professors who visited LIBA campus to teach. Among them there were two professors who inspired me a lot.

Professor Ananthraman taught me Inter-personnel Dynamics. He has a very long academic career. His characteristic laid-back approach in the classroom impressed me a lot. He used to remark that 'I consider people who bunk my lectures as geniuses' (though I never bunked his lectures). He is a true genius. One thing that inspired me a lot was the fact that he actively published in leading international journals, a hall-mark of a great teacher. Thank you professor for inspiring me.

Professor Mohan Kuruvilla taught me Business-to-Business Marketing Management. He is popular for his characteristic Bihari-Hindi laced lectures. Most of his students would remember phrases like 'याद है वो दिन साहब ', ' Sheela and Shyamsundar' etc. He taught me one of the most important lessons of my life - 'Marketplace will make you humble'. Thank you professor for inspiring me.

Sometimes in the future I aspire to become a teacher. All my teachers whom I remembered here will be my sources of inspiration then. Thank you teachers. गुरुभ्यो नमः ।


Sunday, March 21, 2010

A Suitable Farewell

Bidding adieu has always been a very tough task for most of the people. It is same case with me. But the toughness is differential in nature. There are always three kinds of people. First are those people to whom we can bid goodbye without much difficulty. They are good friends and wishing them goodbye and great future will be an enjoyable moment. Second is the category to which bidding goodbye is indifferent. So far I have seen people in both the categories. But the macro-majority of them belonged to the first category.

There is a third category of people. To this category of people I have never been able to get my acts together and utter 'goodbye' because I never wanted to do that. With such people I can only exchange silent glances. A farewell party becomes more valuable and memorable only when there are more people to whom one cannot bid goodbye but only silent glances.

The farewell at LIBA was a valuable and memorable one because there were a few belonging to the third category. Though I wasn’t there due to ‘some’ reasons, it was a suitable farewell for me.

When I joined LIBA I had my fair share of ups and downs of life. I did not expect a lot of metamorphosis to happen here. To my surprise LIBA managed to make deep impressions on me. Most of it came from the most unexpected quarter, my peers. Most of my peers were unique individuals and offered me some unique lessons. I learned a few and missed a few. The collective impact of my peer group helped me to learn a lot about myself. Thank you guys for all those invaluable, timeless lessons.(The picture shows some of the good friends I earned at LIBA.)

No farewell will be complete without confessions and apologies. First let me start with general confession and apology. I tried my level best not to hurt anybody here but certain times I failed. I own responsibility for my rude behavior and apologize to all my peers whom I have hurt knowingly or unknowingly.

In my opinion the most abominable sin is hurting someone who loves you truly. I committed that heinous sin too. No apology can be sincere in this case. Hence I would like to make your apology contingent upon my not committing this sin again. I hope this would be a fitting punishment.

Time cooks all of us in its cauldron’ said Yudhishtra in Mahabharata. With passing time many of our priorities may change. There may be someday when I see one of my good friends on some road and that friend doesn’t have time to stop by me and say ‘hello’. I am also prone to such behavior. When such a thing happens let us not curse each other. Our priorities are bound to change with passing time – a very natural phenomenon.

Now it is time for us to break our hiatus at LIBA and venture into the real world that keeps throwing surprises at us every moment. Let us try and live a worthy life. Wish you all the very best.

Friday, March 5, 2010

Transcending the Space


I am writing this post after watching a refreshing tragedy. How can a tragedy be refreshing? Then go and watch ‘Vinnaithandi Varuvaaya’. In this movie of Gautam Menon we get to listen to some of the most romantic tunes of AR Rahman. Listening to Rahman has always been special. But this time it is more special because this album comes after Rahman won his Oscar. Thamarai’s love-ladden poetry is light on ears but heavy on the heart.

The hero of this movie, Karthik, is a young energetic and creative person who aspires for a behind-the-screen career in the tinsel world. His lady love, Jessie, is a beautiful voluptuous young woman of good breed. Karthik is of the philosophy that love should approach him and make him mad turning him upside down. Love strikes him quite heavily at the moment when he sees Jessie for the first time. The girl is reticent in expressing her heart. But Karthik, an adamant guy, breaks the ice which Jessie tries to build around her heart. Jessie expresses herself for the first time in a church, moment before her marriage with some other guy.

Their love has only one villain. As usual it is the society. A Hindu boy and a Christian girl try to join hands against all odds. But destiny has it otherwise. The girl is forced to take a call between her lover working in a far off city and her own father who threatens to kill himself. Jessie chooses to say an abrupt ‘no’ to Karthik hoping that this rudeness will help him in hating her and subsequently in moving on.

Karthik, an adamant guy resists forgetting her. One day he learns that Jessie has married somebody else. This makes his life miserable. It is here that Gautam Menon presents a different lover. Karthik turns his own painful experience with Jessie as a source of inspiration to script his debut success in tinsel world as a film director. He writes his own story with the same character names and circumstances. This script earns him the most coveted entry into the film world which he brilliantly exploits to produce a successful movie. Gautam has made the last half-hour of the movie extremely interesting and lovable by seamlessly interspersing two different sequences of events.

I have always been a fan of Gautam (since his second movie ‘Kakka Kakka’) and a fanatic of Rahman. This movie is the first production where two of my most favourite creative people come together. My expectation for the movie was a bit high. After watching the trailer a few days back my expectation shot up to the summit. The protagonist’s character name is Karthik! Oh my God, that’s interesting. More interesting is that his lady love’s name is Jessie. The name Jessie has got no special significance for me. But Karthik falling in love with a Christian girl made my heart-beat race for a few moments. This is a theme that has been so close to me in the past. So I kept asking ‘how would the movie be?’

To my pleasant surprise the movie was a tragedy. Karthik never holds the hands of Jessie in marriage. More importantly Gautam has portrayed Karthik turning his pain as the fountainhead of his success. I should whole-heartedly appreciate Gautam for dishing out an excellent lesson for me. Many Karthiks like me believe that when love breaks one should drown in sorrow. But one can also use it positively. Gautam has always portrayed such positive energy in his films.

‘Would Gautam show someone like me on the silver screen?’ was the question that lingered in my mind just before I watched the movie. But Gautam’s Karthik was strikingly different from what I am. I have never believed in love at first sight for the simple reason that there is nobody in this world who can fall in love with me at first sight. I am a kind of person who practices ‘untouchability’ with women and more with my lady love. To feel the beauty of a woman one has to consume her in all the five senses. Touching, kissing and hugging are definitely divinely and heavenly. But I would like to win the society’s sanction before I can treat myself with my woman’s satiny skin. But Karthik’s characterization had one striking resemblance with that of mine (or I would like it to be that way).

“Gautam thank you for making this movie. With this piece of creative work you are transcending the space in many of your fans’ estimations. Thank you so much for the Jessie and Karthik that you painted on the screen. Thank you so much for portraying Karthik as a person who neither complains nor curses his Jessie. I see myself in this characterisation. I am or at least I expect myself to be someone like this.”