Scoring marks..

This just sums it up...

A little secret from my engineering years, I used to write my paper by thinking of what the examiner wanted to see. I would make up diagrams that looked relevant and made my handwriting more legible for sentences I was sure about. Worked!

tl;dr: Examiners like to flip through many pages of relevant looking content. Make their life easy.

Who's the Boss

Context:




Here is the context: http://imposters.blogspot.com/2014/04/organizational-hierarchy.html

Believers

It's like what Sartre said, freedom is terrifying.

If you make people accountable for their lives, people won't be able to handle it.

If you tell them that whatever place/situation they are in, is solely because of themselves and the decisions they made in life, it's going to be painful for them.

I think God is a way to comfort themselves, to hang on to a hope that someone other than themselves is incharge...and if they have faith, that someone can change their lives for better.

Understanding Risk in Investing...

Infinite number of factors influence the future. This results in large entropy (more randomness), and the weak relationships between many possible outcome events. 

Hence, the future events cannot be predicted with any consistency.  

This brings me to my next point:

We should not see future as a fixed outcome and capable of being predicted. 

Rather, future should be viewed as a range of possibilities.  (hopefully on the basis of insight into their respective likelihood occurrences, as a probability distribution).

This uncertainty, as to which of the possibilities will occur, is the source of risk in investing. 

Risk means more things can happen than will happen.

Reverse of above is also true. Even though many things can happen, only one will.

For investing, there should be two main risks to consider:

1. Risk of permanent loss

2. And risk of falling short. 

Either one can be eliminated but not both. In other words, we should consider the risk of not taking enough risk.

Another risk to be aware of is FOMO risk:  risk that comes from excessive Fear Of Missing Out (FOMO).

Whereas Risk Control is mandatory, Risk Avoidance is not an appropriate goal. 

This is because of simple reason: risk avoidance usually goes hand-in-hand with return avoidance. 

Risk Avoidance <==> Return Avoidance

One should not expect to make money just for bearing risk. 

At the same time, we should not expect to make money without Bearing Risk.

In short, Move forward, but with caution.

Also Read my old post: Understanding Risk

Source: My understanding of OakTree's memo Risk Revisited.
Image Credits: iStockPhoto

Organizational Hierarchy...

There is so much a simple street photography image can tell you.

For instance:

Source: unknown; credits due

• the trainee, usually the youngest guy, starts by cleaning the tools and equipment. Probably allowed to install and uninstall the minor parts too.
• the regular mechanic who knows how to do stuff when told what to do. Most of the work is done by such people.
• the expert, I think the guy squatting and smoking, provides diagnostic and knowledge expertise but do little of the actual work himself, unless required.
• the owner or customer keeping an eye on the work(ers).

Bonus: Writing on the wall.  "yahan poster lagana mana hai"  (it's forbidden to put up posters here). Rarely followed.

These are like corporate policies, may or may not be directly related to employee daily tasks. 

On Managing People...

1. The best way to manage people, is to persuade them that you are good for their careers.
2. The only way to get people to believe that you are good for their careers is actually to be good for their careers.

Life...

Life..

• is nothing what it seems...
• Moving forward/progressing would happen no matter what direction you take..
• is filled with obstacles that repeat over the course of your life, but looking at things differently each time lets you explore opportunities you might have missed..

Ideas...

Ideas are not stolen...Ambition is!

Sawaal hi Sawaal...

It's that time for us..when parents deal with endless questions day-in-day-out.
And we make sure to enjoy this phase..just hope it stays though.

by guftguvara

Sawaal Jawaab

वो वक़्त भी क्या वक़्त था
सवालों का छज्जा जवाबों से मिलता
हर मोढ़ पर एक ऑर सवाल इंतज़ार करता
जवाबों में ऑर सवाल ढूंढता

आस पास हो रहे फेर बदल ने
परत दर परत चढ़े अबोध ने
हरप्पा मोहेनजोदरो की सभ्यता की तरह
सवाल कहीं गहराई में दफ़ना दिए

जेबों में भरे सवालों को
किसी जेबकतरे ने चुरा लिया
जहाँ सवालों पर जवाबों की छूट थी
उस दुकान को क्यों बंद कर दिया

Source: Rajesh's Blog.

Believe in Schedule

Source: Image Search

..not because they are supposed to be accurate or they are 'right'.










But because, a schedule can:
   1. help track your work progress. Breaking a big piece of humongous work into small chunks and tracking against time.
   2. help encourage accountability, commitment and frequent communication.
   3. tie people together in a project and help them being part of the process.

It should not matter if your schedule is inaccurate or your project progress is not respecting your schedule.
Though, it does not mean it should not strive to make it as accurate as possible.
Try your best with this but it's more important to make sure you have a schedule.

Also read: The Dirty Little Secret of Project Management

Mistakes are Useful..

..only if you learn from them.

And you can learn from them, only after you have admitted that you have committed one.

Blaming others (people, circumstances etc) for your mistakes means you are distancing yourself from the possible learning that might come your way.

If you have not committed mistakes in your life, you clearly lack experience.

IMHO, learning from your own mistakes requires few qualities.
Most important of them being, being able to role-play yourself in situations where you made mistakes. i.e able to go beyond denial mode.
Second, self-confidence that is needed to admit things.
Third, courage which is needed to bring changes.

So, In short:
1. Admit your mistakes. Be wise.
2. Make sure to make use of your mistakes. Learn from them.
3. & MOVE ON to next venture.

Remember: Mistakes are not shameful things.

Experimenting with camera...

Location: Hotel Hilton Union Square, San Francisco.

Not-So-Good Organizations

It's a poor organization if the following happens:

1. You observe people spending much of their time fighting organizational boundaries. (think broken processes and practices).
2. You observe people are confused about their job. Or are not very clear about expectations from their job. This leads to the situations where/when no-one knows if they are getting the job done (or not). (missing value-add)
3. You see some people working hard and extra hours, and they think that they get the job done. But in the hindsight, they have no idea what it means for the company and their own careers. 
4. If someone finally manages to work up the courage and tell management how screwed their situation is. Following things happen (in sequence):
1. Denial mode ensues. Management denies there is a problem.
2. And then..Defend mode ensues. Management defends status-quo.
3. And then, Do-nothing mode ensues. Management ignores the problem.

Hiring is too much skewed towards referrals and interview feedback is not respected.

...

Good Organizations

From an employee perspective, In a good organization:

1. People 'can' focus on their work.  
2. And 'can' have confidence that, if they get their work done, good things will happen. (for both, the company as well as personally themselves). 

I should be a true pleasure to work in an organization that satisfies both the above.
This is what makes a job motivating as well as fulfilling.

What have I learned...

- Always plan assuming that it would change sometime soon. Still plan.
- Understand risk management. Many people claim to understand risk, but that is not true.
- Identify your blind spots (thought process). This will take years and a mentor to do it right.
- Hope for the best. At the same time be prepared for the worst. This is not easy to do both of these at the same time.
- Learn to learn from what people *did*, not what from they *think*. (Even if they have failed.)
-- Opinions are just opinions.
-- Strategy is also just a strategy until it's executed (even if you fail).
- Execute quickly...and if you have to, *fail early*. Or *Pivot* into new strategy before you start hearing about it from outside.
- Don't paint everyone with the same brush. Context/perspective is the key to understand the world around you.

Self Image, Self Worth and Ego...

line between self image, self worth & ego is not easy to draw...heck most of them don't even know the difference between these.

Defining Ethics

“Ethics is knowing the difference between what you have a right to do and what is right to do.”

-Potter Stewart  1915 – 1985

 Lawyer and Assoc. Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1958 -1981)

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potter_Stewart

Understanding Risk

RISK is mostly counter intuitive. 
If you think there is no risk, it may be at its maximum.
And vice-versa .

Americans are stressed..

According to the poll, 46% of Americans say they're suffering from debt related stress.

" About 46% of those surveyed say they're suffering from debt-related stress, and half of that group described their stress as "great deal" or "quite a bit." On the other hand, about 53% say they feel little or no stress at all.

That's in line with findings from last year, even though times seem better today: The economy is growing and generating jobs, and households have made progress in repairing their financial footing, trimming debt, watching spending and saving more.

It's a big turnaround from a year ago — a shrinking economy, jobs jettisoned as businesses struggled to survive the deepest recession since the 1930s.

So why aren't the stressed — and the not-so-stressed — feeling better?

For starters, it just doesn't feel much like a recovery to many people."

Ring a bell?

Source:  http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-05-30-stress-debt-poll_N.htm?csp=hf

Be Worried..

http://bit.ly/9cF2Ot

"...one of the best ways to protect against a decline in purchasing power is to buy whatever is "out of favor, loathed and despised." So forget about gold or other trendy hedges. Instead, wait patiently for markets—European stocks, perhaps—to get so cheap that they turn most investors' stomachs. Then you can pounce."

"Sometimes, when you can't figure out a good defense, the best thing to do is to go on offense."