Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Some everday nuggets kind of define days

Last Week:
An auto driver literally shouted back and demanded higher price and you realise how vulnerable one can be to bullies....all said and done about arguing and fightbacks.


Like today:
My Lead after telling me that finally i would be releived from the project...smiles and we get on
to general topics and says "whats happening in the project i was asked by some other leads u know yamini and all i can say is marriages... so when's yours?" i am asked..... I just smile and its clear at least being in the same place....when you stand in the same place
you can know it ....
The answer was never given by me but spoken by the questioner themselves

" oh i know you will ask when's yours"

I again smiled and said "well that was an expected question so i did not bother to ask."

We live very different lives of similar issues.....
What can avoided by being on that side has to be fought every minute by me....
What can be avoided by being on this side taunts her every day.

She's not what one can call a right people manager and i criticize her quite some here and all
over the place but if you ask me to rate her as one hell of a fighting person in life i'd rate
her very high.But who cares...


Problem is people have a habit of getting personal ....and i never know how to tell my bunch of
friends to stop that without getting into a debate which would again end up on a personal side.
So best shut up....

I just feel so upset when you are having a simple discussion about how she's not managing
things right or is a control freak and people simply instantly attribute it to her being single .....

Visited a wedding and one lady happily married at least as per her says " Women should get married at right time else they become saddists " obviously directed towards the Lead.
Then a guy smiles and says "exactly thats what i keep saying
everyday.
"(He once had commented to me a jobless guy and a unmarried gal is a sure recipe for
sadists...his experience he says)


Ah what lovely people i live with smilingly....
my smiles for the moment simply make no one consider me to be categorized in there (or what i dont know......its a source of constant wonder to me...the immense affection i receive from such a set of people...the blind eye my such friends turn towards me as if i am an exception for the moment to every rule....though at no point are they willing to debate on the rule.)
but then i am not a LEAD.
It is the people high up there that mud and stones are thrown at.

It is not that i cant argue with such .... but point is to each their own .... some of these people young freshers and old alike are so immature as people that i feel its stupid for me to
start any kind of serious discussion with them.

Its better off discuss our brainless movies and shopping and seem as stupid.

Well thats my choice i guess... or rather thats the only way...no choice.
But soon i will too have to move .... may be slowly ...may be i will delay the ascent...may be
fate will...but as i move up so will the stones and mud flinging start . It will i expect it to.


But still while i am extremely infamous i feel in the eyes of sr management for having a
tendency to have hushed group meetings all over the office in coffee room/ at my desk / in
corridors /...

I feel one can so clearly and wonderfully criticize a person's work and attitude
and all without getting personal.Problem is all people love to think themselves as psycho analysts who deduce why a person is as such ....pah.... though they never look at themselves.


Then again i wonder why am i defending a person who is always making people get personal saying team must be like a closely knit family. She asks people in feedback to know all about the
family members of the team for team building.....its obvious they come out of the meeting room
and joke well lets have her details first.


When you say you need a leave for personal reasons to a LEAD it should be just that "PERSONAL". Why act as a great confidant and ask details forcefully.

Discretion is very important in management.
How can you ask a guy/gal who is getting married why do you need 20 days leave 10 days is just fine.Obviously they will be upset and talk like 'Heck she doesn't get married hence what would she know'.
These are nonsensical cheap comments but so are people mostly and hence discretion and
tact is so very important in minimizing some hurts to both sides.

Good Intentions never suffice.
" THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH GOOD INTENTIONS "

It probably was witha good intention she asked me to consider growth within the project than start from a scratch elsewhere but then i just wanted it my way...... i might as well suffer/regret for my own mistakes than someones's good intentions.



Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Tough Jobs of Managers...Hence No for Lazy Bloggers

Sometimes you make those decisions in life and then regret them and then sometimes you dont
regret ...you just ponder ponder and then conclude you'd probably do it the same all over again.
Well have been pondering over quite many of such decisions.....
Like one was when i decided growing up into the management echelons of this boring Project was not my cup of Tea.........though being the only Senior member left in here and
with quite some of the new experienced hires lacking communication abilities i had a great chance .
But i put myself out of the game even before it began....
I wanted a change in the next few months... I told my PL.
Hard to digest expression as ever from there but somehow it kind of ended there and
so in came a new TL a new hire.
Now This has become a classic case of "Can Do ...wont Do" for me
and "Cant but will do" for Him.

As any one new who wants to move from technical to Management will do, he beleives that management implies policing people and he has earned a nickname enough for that
when he makes rounds ensuring people are at workstations.
Well if am moved enough to write this post its not anyway for the general good it is because i got affected.
Funny part is the guy does not like Emails....
Hence whenever you write one he pulls out issues with it.
Sample 1
"I've finished xxxxxx as specified by you"
He calls me to his desk , says sweetly is it it not work.....what do you mean by as specified by me.
Hmm sadly i had put as specified by you in bold. Oh my habits of highlighting
Sample 2
Now this was a mail to my PL question why was the process not specified.I am quite handy to my PL so we have quite easy conversations and hence the mail was pretty general
" I am not sure how everyone is doing it but i guess it has to be specified when giving work
whether i have to xxx or yyyy for work given by TL"
Now funny part is the person to whom this mail was addressed was least bothered but TL calls and says Dont send such emails when person is around ask personally....(ahaaa)
Email communication is important you see esp it will be useful as you go up....(haaaaa...ab kya
bolen...this from a person who writes superbly funny mails with no spell check or grammatic sense to client...)
The guy probably had a very informal atmosphere at his previous company clients ..he was like
laughing around on a client call in the background talking loudly in regional language. Luckily my PL was on leave else he'd have had it.

I actually am fed up of these so called management theories and self help books....nah not
because i ever bother to read them except look up theier reviews which itself gets to you.

But i forget there is a big audience for these......
sad part is the people who read them think of them like some instant solutions and try to force implement them without even bothering about understanding a scenario.

So how does a guy who's worked in a very technical engg position looking for growth as a manager in a different company do...
Rattle off some lines/ proverbs about Team work...Dedication(i.e dont be late to office/ dont say no to work) and so forth.

Speak about self improvement and the good habits (they behave as if no one else but they have read it and would not know that its from a book).
It was so funny one guy a manager once was telling about dividing those things what you can do something about and what you cant and he spoke as though he was a saint and that was his sermon.
Talk about how important team is....arrange for some radical changes...i.e some one make aback up of all the stuff thats in the clients Config management as we may have issues when we have no net connection ...to US. Oho so what back up for network
here. Back up ke liye back up...ke liye back....and then its put across as a brilliant and
important idea.
No wonder i love Dilbert and Calvin.
But heck management is hard job....
To keep a bunch of no-gooders who are plenty and a few of critical quick but lazy bones like me
and those rare commited hard working ppl motivated or at least talking about motivation to such is indeed a tough job.
A job needing Self Motivation by finding errors in all others is difficult indeed.
A job involving such self sacrifice of one's integrity by talking again and again of self contradicting Lies till they seem like Truth to the speaker i.e self...(who cares about listeners anyway) is hard.

And since i am a hopeless lazy bugger.... i guess i'd stay
I ask myself why i wronged myself by my actions and then i answer myself
"I'm not a failure, I just started on the bottom and I like it there."

Ah if it wasnt for MONEY....
Hmm i love that line
There are somethings money can't buy
For everything else my salary isn't sufficient....

P.S:
OK Ok the major motivation for this post is he dares to question why i come late by an hour or two quite many times(i.e 4 times in a month tch tch).The email thing is minor... i dont feel bad if some one feels great by downplaying me....i'm too arrogant about my English and communication in the Technical set of people i'm around to be affected.
But asking me the late night blogger , to come early that too when not much work to be done......

Well i decided no more SMS from henceforth he will have no info.... suits him right.
Hell in 2 years the PL simply tried thrice to tell me to be on time....
But then some people know where to put in the efforts...and where they sure will go wasted.
Heck people...as long as their work gets done why do some people go by British punctuality stories.

Monday, January 01, 2007

New day...year Thoughts

I kinda like Picasso …I mean nah I am not that much of a painting connoisseur but I mean his quotes…..like my fav which I tell to all my hard working friends…I am a bad influence hmmm

You must always work not just within but below your means 
If you can handle three elements, handle only two. 
If you can handle ten, then handle only five. In that way the
 ones you do handle, you handle with more ease, 
more mastery, and you create a feeling of strength in reserve.  --Pablo Picasso 

so many of his quotes gel with my ideas in life…..and so witty…just read this

Patron standing next to Picasso at one of his exhibits: 
"What does this painting represent Mesiuer (sp) Picasso?
Picasso: "it represents 7 miliion francs madame."

Oks I guess I love so many things…… I am muddled up and so is this blog Nietzsche , Piccaso , Orhan Pamuk…..(Still am go get over his speech last few lines why I write ohhhhhhh… )Harry Potter

Ruskin Bond

Wodehouse

Vikram Seth

Friedman...... and what not...

What a Mélange…would it not be better to say I’m completely messed up with my thoughts….. … or I am too moody ….. may be but its my blog and here there’s no need to be better I guess let it be Happy New year….i tell myself ……

ah is it lets see how it would be……….2006 was also said to be a very Happy new year and what did I get/do in 2006 I asked myself….
I got a new house and most importantly a room though I have not been able to enjoy it at all due to all the accompanied hassles financial and otherwise that come with a house.

I got a Visa which is essentially of no use it seems.

I got a promotion which simply added to the headaches of my profession while adding no real value to my resume.


I found some lost old friends who are essentially still lost due to the profession and work.

Ah what a list…..I am essentially a bit strange I guess. As people age and approach their thirties they get religious or at least more spiritual. I seem to be reverse engineered….. I seem to be getting more agnostic and more importantly scientific.



P.S: Saddam was hanged and in the evening my sister told me the discussion at lunch at her office. It seems Saddam would go directly to heaven as as per Hindu calendar on that ekadashi as the gates of heaven were kept open that day.Some one countered no that cant be ours and theirs heavens are different..... :( what chats we educated people have ...

Good piece of gossip …we laughed. Sad part is some local channel put that too on news the next day. That’s why I am off watching TV.