Who says life is fair…?

This morning I woke up very early with noise of crackers, which children bursting in the club house play ground in our society to celebrate Dhanteras. Previous night I haven’t had sound sleep, infect I hit the bed past 2 AM and till morning I have seen series of dreams One dream which got interrupted with crackers, where I was playing with many kids at Asha Kiran School, at Jamshedpur.

Almost after 13 years, First time today I had mentally visited Asha Kiran School in a dream, where I did some voluntary work in 1995; it was a school for special children. It was the similar time in October’95, those days was staying at “Engineers Hall’ (hostel for GETs at Telco, Jsr). During normal days, Engineers Hall used to have over 150 boys and girls. But during this deepwali season, only 12-15 of us were there rest every one had gone home, as I had been to Indore during Dusshera, there was no chance of going again during Diwali, and I had to spend first Deepawali away from home, and friends after 24 years.

As the festival days were coming closure, more and more friends from hostel were leaving for there home towns, and local markets were getting decorated with crackers, sweets, greeting cards, decorations, and I had started developing sinking feeling ( being very attached to Indore) During one of the evening walk from Bar of Telco Club towards hostel, I came to know about a Diwali Carnival in Asha Kiran School. Next day evening after coming back from plant I headed towards the School, which was within Telco Township.

School was a beautiful building, well decorated, and it was my first experience in any special school, where nearly 80~ 100 used to come for there studies, and therapies, each one of kid was unique, facing different challenge in life. That day my belief in “Fairness of God” has shattered for the first time, why “God” punished these wonderful kids, without there knowing, and leaving criminals and culprits without any punishment During my stay in Jamshedpur, I visited this school many a times, spent endless hours in meeting teachers, students, and parents participating in there hobby classes, exhibitions, events, doing some thing which can help children as well as school, developed understanding with some kids... Although I have not done any thing formidable for the school ever, but the brief interaction of couple of month’s ahs made a deep routed impression on my psyche.

Moreover during January 96, during my one month Community Development Project with Nav Jagrat Manav Samaj ( NJMS is an organisation, supported by TATA's for cure and rehabilitation of people suffering from Leprosy- president award winner society, working in area since 1981), I had interacted with many abandoned leprosy patients in interiors of Bihar ( Now Jharkhand) , visited there colonies, Old age home of Missionaries of Charities in Jamshedpur...my so called faith got totally shattered...but I also got to meet people like Dr. Shekhar, Sister Isa Bell...who lived the self less life.

However in Mumbai, initially for 5-6 years i did visited Jidd school, Maa Niketan to understand there working, spending some time celebrating birthdays of kids, or Holi , Diwali with those kids. ..but with the time and later on in the external noise and rat race, ignored the calling of my inner self. But looks like today’s early morning dream was my calling from god, to be on unfair side of his blessings.

If every thing is not fair in the world created by god…how and why we expect Fairness in our world, why we expect fairness from colleagues, friends, family, or everyone.

In life or relations Fairness is an expectation, getting Disappointment is a Reality.

My interaction with God..and Maa

I am not a hardcore religious, or spiritual person who follows daily rituals or does daily meditation or prayers , but at the same time i am not an atheist, i believe in God, his presence around every thing, every person.

I do visit temples, gurudwaras, majars, and I do have small temple with all the dieties at my home, once a while i do fasting and prayers....!

Since the age of 14 I have tried to find meanings to God & Life with the help of my mentor Da-Saheb, at Indore. I had choosen the option of worshiping God through prayers, rituals, praise Him through hymns and propitiate Him with offerings, sacrifice and gifts. All these has helped me a lot from the days of low confidence, and achieve something formidable in life.

Of late i have started accepting that Life’s definition of happiness and spirituality also keeps changing as we go along. It took me long to figure out that if it was to be a give and take relationship, wherein God gave me something only when I pleased Him, He couldn't really be God! How could God desire a conditional contract with human beings? And readied myself to face the repcurtions of any sort due to this change in belief.

Now my chosen way was easier to follow for me ... it was just to leave the things on its own, assuming god is there always, and he knows what is good from me, what is required to be done. I did the things which were right as per swadharma, I have decided to do duties honestly, fulfill responsibilities sincerely , honour obligations towards family, help needy people, giving back whatever is possible to the society as core foundation blocks of my life.

As per path chosen by me, I may not get closeness to god, i may not be ever able to understand, his nature, his creation, his laws ..But even if I am able to understand my self , and control my self and direct my actions with righteousness i will be able to achieve my life goal.

I seek God in everyday life as I go out to do my karma. For me, god is always inside me as well as always around me in the form of my parents,my kids, my family, my friends, my music, my writings, with who are real and they prevent me from falling in trap of my desires and materialistic ambitions and encourage me to reach to higher goals in life.

My interaction with god, which is rarely in temples or pilgrimage places ...but regularly in my car while driving back and forth between home and office on roads of Mumbai. or in lap of mother nature on endless roads or sea shores ..i feel that i always talk to god the very moment when i am alone.

For me god is formless, and nameless, i ask him any thing, everything and he responds to me instantly..in the same language i ask him.... he teaches me various things from being in control of my desires, controlling my thoughts, controlling anger, resting expectations from others, keeping control over anger, living a simple life.

People may interpret my discussion or prayer as nothing but a self talk of a mad person, who

questions himself and answer himself but thinks he is talking to god, be it...i am not bothered.

I am sure someday, I will meet God, not just feel the presence. But whatever and wherever, I hope God looks like ....my Maa.

Are my questions irrelevant?

" Idle mind is devils workshop..., this is one more product of devils restless mind"

Some Statistics to start with, basically describing ratio of Women Mangers to every 100 Men managers in corporate sector in different countries, including managers at lower level as well as high level managers.

USA 67; Canada 68 ; New Zealand 48; Poland: 18; Japan: 9; India : 2

For the time being if we keep Indra Nooyi, Chanda Kochar, Naina Lal Kidwai, Kalpana Morparia aside….than many questions come to my mind after reading statistics above.

I agree that the most difficult thing in this world as said by various poets and writers is to decipher women thought process, but still I am raising some questions.

ð Why are there so few women in organizations top tiers?
ð Does a manager’s gender, determine the way in which s/he behaves and/or is treated?
ð Is it related with lack of opportunities or lack of ambition of women workforce?
ð Or is it because of overwhelming sense of belonging to our value system?

Even today, the majority of the managerial workforce in organizations consists of men. Given that the inclusion of more women in the workforce has been strongly promoted in recent times, we still have very few women in the top tiers of management in organizations including business, research, educational institutes.

Even If we include women dominated sectors such as farm labour, domestic help, manufacturing, nursing, primary teaching, even than percentage of directly productive workforce of women in India is around than 32%, which means 68% do not contribute to GDP, and moreover these 32% productive work force also does not utilizes their full potential

While analyzing, first thing comes to mind based on some article studied during my organization behaviour studies during management school was there is a gender centered perspective. According to this, the attributes individuals perceive they possess vary according to their sex and women’s limited progress is attributed to factors that are internal to women.

Men are hypothesized to perceive themselves as possessing masculine characteristics (they are aggressive, forceful, strong, rational, self-confident, competitive and independent), while women are hypothesized to perceive themselves as possessing feminine characteristics (they are warm, kind, emotional, gentle, understanding, aware of others’ feelings and helpful to others). Hence gender-centered theorists have promoted that their biological and/or socialization pattern has prompted women to exhibit traits and behaviors that are not conducive to their becoming successful managers but successful anchor of the family, supporting husband, providing values, beliefs and learning’s to the next generation.

I have seen many Women sacrificing for the sake of career of their husband, within my family, my friend circle, and professional network; I have not seen a single instance where vice a versa has happened. Couples of Hindi movies I remember bring such issues very clearly are Abhiman where a talented wife gives away here career for satisfying ego of her husband or recent movie Astitava, where husband who himself had extra marital affair is not able to accept affair of his wife. Such imbalances are reality everywhere in our society.


The second perspective, the situation-centered perspective is based on individuals’ positions in the organizational power hierarchy shape their perceptions, attributes, and behaviour.

According to this approach, there are two types of situations in organizations
1. Advantageous, and
2. Disadvantageous.
Advantageous situations are located in the upper levels and offer power to their occupants. Disadvantageous positions are located at the lower levels of the organization and offer little power to their occupants.

With power, comes the ability to satisfy one’s own needs and desires within that work situation, while in contrast, work situations lacking in power, and inhibit individuals from acting on their own behalf. As a result, individuals in the lower positions in the hierarchy are more dependent on others to meet their needs than are individuals situated in the higher positions.

This encourages lower level individuals to perceive themselves as being more feminine (understanding, aware of others’ feelings and helpful to others) than upper level individuals. In contrast, upper level individuals will think of themselves as more instrumental or masculine as they can depend on themselves rather than on others to satisfy their needs. Traditionally women have been found to occupy lower level positions than upper level ones and hence the difference.

In our society women are stereotyped as having traits associated with a homemaker, which has created the second belief that women do not have the necessary traits to enter perceived masculine and/or high status occupations.

In our society Women's achievements tend to be devalued or attributed to luck or relationship rather than ability or skill , which reduces the rewards, they receive in the society or organization. While most organizations use performance evaluations in one way or another to decide salary increases and promotions to be given to employees, the underlying attribution does play a role in deciding the rating.

In my limited experience and extensive observation, I have observed that work performed by men may be valued more highly than that of women. A female student may have to outperform her male peers to be taken seriously by her teachers. This tendency to devalue women and their work was presented in a recent issue of Sunday times, in which two groups were asked to evaluate articles, paintings, resumes, and other similar products. The name on each item was clearly masculine or feminine. The sex of the originator of each item was switched for the second group of evaluators. Regardless of the type of item evaluated, those ascribed to a male were rated higher than those ascribed to a female.

Is this gender bias is because of behaviour, because of personality traits, because of social fabric, or because of our Indian values.

On one side our own literature gives very high importance to Women as goddess Durga, Lakshmi, Saraswati, Kaali, Shakti, and on other side our mythology tells us story of “Dropadi” who has to undergo trauma of living with five husbands, or getting harassed in front of family members and 5 husbands. Or “Sita” has to undergo Agni Pariksha to prove her innocence..?

Or somewhere it is the Cinderella complex - where no matter how successful a woman is, subconsciously she still expects that a prince is going to come along and rescue her.

Nobody has the answer….but are my questions irrelevant?

Innocence

I was searching etymology of word Innocence on the web, than came across this definition.

It is a term used to indicate a state of moral purity or general lack of guilt, with respect to any kind of crime, sin, or wrongdoing. Its antonym is corruption. In a legal context, innocence refers to the lack of guilt of an individual, with respect to a crime.

Where as i generally refer to Innocence as a state of unknowing, where one's experience is lesser, in either a relative view to social peers, or by an absolute comparison to a more common normative scale.

In contrast to ignorance, it is generally viewed as a positive term, connoting a blissfully positive view of the world, in particular one where the lack of knowledge stems from a lack of wrongdoing, whereas greater knowledge comes from doing wrong.

This connotation may be connected with a popular false etymology explaining "innocent" as meaning "not knowing" (Latin noscere). The actual etymology is from general negation prefix in- and the Latin nocere, "evil" or "guilty".

So to say...more experienced you are less innocent you are, or if you take people on their face value, without doubting their intention you are labelled as innocent.

People who lack the mental capacity to understand the nature of their acts may be regarded as innocent regardless of their behavior. From this meaning comes the term innocent to refer to a child under the age of reason.

"The knowledge that makes us cherish innocence makes innocence unattainable.”

Habit

I often hear various thinkers, gurus, elders talk and preach about “Habit”, It carries lot of negative connotation for most of us, and we practice and preach against habit formation (excluding Stephan Covey..!!)

Habits are a funny thing. We reach for them mindlessly, setting our brains on auto-pilot and relaxing into the unconscious comfort of familiar routine. As some one said “Not choice, but habit rules the unreflecting herd”, but in the ever-changing 21st century is it a taboo.

It seems unpleasant to talk about habits in the same context as passion, creativity, innovation and innocence. Some researchers have written that when we consciously develop new habits, we create parallel synaptic paths, and even entirely new brain cells, that can jump our trains of thought onto new, innovative tracks.

Rather than dismissing ourselves as unchangeable creatures of habit, we can instead direct our own change by consciously developing new habits. In fact, the more new things we try, the more we step outside our comfort zone — the more inherently creative we become, both in the workplace and in our personal lives.

Three zones exist in our life: comfort, stretch and stress. Comfort is the realm of existing habit. Stress occurs when a challenge is so far beyond current experience as to be overwhelming. It’s that stretch zone in the middle activities that feel a bit awkward and unfamiliar where true change occurs.

Getting into the stretch zone is good for us. It helps keeping our brain healthy. It turns out that unless we continue to learn new things, which challenge our brains to create new pathways, brain cells literally begin to degenerate, which may result in dementia, Alzheimer’s or other brain diseases.

But don’t bother trying to kill off old habits; once those ruts of procedure are set into the hippocampus (section of the brain where new memories and events gets recorded), they’re there to stay. Instead, the new habits we deliberately ingrain into ourselves create parallel pathways that can bypass those old roads…!

The first thing needed for innovation is a fascination with wonder, excitement, but we are taught to accept or decide instead of exploring and experimenting. We even attempt to mould (different from influence) thinking of our kids….., To accept or decide is to kill off all possibilities but one. A good innovational thinker is always exploring the many other possibilities.

All of us work through problems in ways of which we’re unaware. humans are born with the capacity to approach challenges in four primary ways: Analytically ( Logically), Procedurally (Step by Step), Relationally (or collaboratively), and Innovatively ( can call it instinctively, or experientially, or gut feel)

At teenage years however, the brain shuts down half of that capacity, preserving only those modes of thought that have seemed most valuable during the first decade or so of life.

This breaks the major rule in the belief system that “Anyone can do anything,” That’s a lie that we have perpetuated, and it fosters mediocrity, instead of meritocracy. Knowing what you’re good at and doing even more of it creates excellence, this is where developing new habits comes in.

In order to cultivate our thinking, we should always try to do something different every day — listen to a new radio station, watch different TV channel, talk to different friends, write some thing in your journal or blog, listen to different music, read new author, take another road, getting out of routines makes us more aware in general. Even a Japanese technique called kaizen, which calls for small, continuous improvements.

Whenever we initiate change, even a positive one, we activate fear in our emotional brain, If the fear is big enough, the fight-or-flight response will go off and we’ll run from what we’re trying to do. The small steps in kaizen don’t set off fight or flight, but rather keep us in the thinking brain, where we have access to our creativity and playfulness.

Simultaneously, take a look at how friends and colleagues approach challenges, by talking to them, interacting with them, observing their life style, spending holiday’s together, analyzing there behaviour with kids and spouse.

We tend to believe that those who think the way we do are smarter than those who don’t. That can be fatal in business, particularly for managers and leaders who surround themselves with like-thinkers. If seniority and promotion are based on similarity to those at the top, chances are strong that the company lacks intellectual diversity.

Lastly one cannot have innovate and create unless he / she is willing and able to move through the unknown and go from curiosity to wonder….outside the comfort zone, which itself is a habit , generally shielded under garb of choice or fate.

My Teachers and Their Teachings

We always learn from others, either through direct one to one communication, or by observation or by reading their thoughts.I have some very distinct memories of last 30 years of my life, specific incidents which inspire me to be a better human being.

I am not sure whether I am covering 100% of important learnings of my life, but i am making an attempt to put them together without any order of significance or importance, each one are equally important and significant.

Swami Vivekananda : Strength is Life, Weakness is Death, identify your weakness and overcome them.

Sarla Kingrani (My Mother): Character, honesty and Integrity are first stepping stone of your journey towards success.

Ajay Mehta ( My best friend..my shadow) : Only thing you need in life is sincerity to your work, no work is big or small. Money you earn is incidental not the purpose of working...

Indranarayan Chandrawal ( Da- Saheb): More difficulties you face in early part of your life, stronger you become to face challenges in your life.Don’t look for excuse once you have made promise, always honour commitment you made even if it means loss of anything materialistic.

Javad Ahmed Siddiqui ( My teacher in engineering who transformed me forever)
Trust your dream, you have great potential, have believe in what you are doing, no matter what other tell you. Limitations are only imaginary.

S K Kingrani ( My Uncle): Respect hard work & labour of your employees, if you take good care of your them, they will take care of your challenges team will do anything for you

R K Sharma ( My friends father) Giving me dream of becoming an successful person, a business manager … “ If you fail to plan, you plan to fail”

B K Singh (My first Boss in TATA Motors): Respect your customer, understand them, spend time with them, understand their business model, they are your only GOD

R K Ghosh ( My boss for 5 years, my guru, my inspiration, my mentor): In most of the challenging situations of life sincere effort is more important & Valuable than intelligence or smartness

Don't hide any mistake...a mistake is only a mistake if you don't learn and grow from it. And if you do (your choice), how can it be a mistake? Because it's served to make you better/wiser/more excellent."....be genuine.

Ratan Tata : Even an introvert and humble person can achieve the top most position in life.....as well as be humble when you reach on top. In life ethics, reputation; values are more valuable than wealth you create.

Tushar Dave ( My Manager in Satyam): Whose unflinching faith in God and Never say die attitude with absolute simplicity and sincerity is foundation of my resilience in professional life, Learning's from Tushar were..."Never give up, you loose the deal the day you stop trying getting it. God always helps when you sincerely try"

Dhruva chandrie (My Manager for 4 years in Reliance, person who influenced me most as a professional): Importance of being focused and detail oriented in life. Organization pay managers for getting things done, not for developing relationships or friendships. Take my words .. He is Jack Welch in making

Hital Meswani ( My super boss in Reliance): Respect each individual and his knowledge, it is humany impossible to know every thing about anything in business...one should be genuinely interested in understanding brass tags.God lies in details and if anyone ignore details he is surely heading for disaster

Mukesh D Ambani : Think Big, Act Fast but Plan Micro ( key to success)

Anjaney Bhutada (my friend, philosopher and guide) : Success can be achieved with Simplicity and without hidden agenda, geniuness and true spirit of helping others help us in long term

Badi Maa (My conscience keeper) : Face any adversity with grace and unflinching trust in God.

Prabhakar Bisen ( My friend and Inspirtaion) : Leave small things for others, aim for Big in Life.

Sudip Narvekar (My friend and buddy) : Corporate positions are not a pre-condition for friendship.

A big thank you to all my Guru's . I am sure these learning's (some new, some reinforcements) are going to shape my life, my future, and my next generations.

Success An Exploration...& Journey

Every time i revisit my memories, or dream about future, word "Success" comes again and again and again in most of my thoughts and sentences. All of us have different aspirations of becoming a successful something..CEO, Brand Manager, Project manager, Teacher, Son, Father, Mother, Spouse, or whatever ...I want to understand meaning of the word "Success " what it is and why it is so illusive...for most of us, always.

Success, in a worldly sense or by societal yardstick, is mostly evaluated in terms of status, recognition, fame, money, awards, rewards, and similar criteria. Success mostly connotes a comparison...comparison with people of similar background and competition generally siblings, friends, colleagues, neighbours.

If a person has done better than others in his or her field or area of work, he may be considered successful, else...like will be considered like me ( a wanderer) , my understanding says Success means different things to different people.

Success is defined in terms of being able to do what one wanted to do. In my circle of friends, for one, success meant changing people’s lives...helping others and gaining name. For another, it meant happiness...enjoyment, living life full of comforts and luxuries ...

And I perceive success in terms of achieving benchmark standards; great relations with people, doings things differently; curiosity, originality and significance; and keep setting newer & higher goals and reaching those goals...gaining fame...I give much emphasis on doing what I thought I should be doing.

Personality traits such as social skills and interpersonal ease are central determinants of success in the corporate world....at the same time i believe in Luck, good connections, timings, and burning desire is critical and important in determining success

Another crucial key to success is a sense of positive self-esteem...belief of " I can do it" “Thousands of people are exposed to golden opportunities in their life-time but the person who can capitalize on those opportunities that knock once or several times is the one who has inner sense of confidence in his competence to convert possibilities into successful products. Because of the high regard one has experienced in the past, the person with positive self-esteem has the psychological energy to pursue his goal impediments, frustrations, and other limitations

People may say that ‘success’ is subjective, but everyone is likely to define success differently. Further, personal definition of success of an individual may not necessarily match with the societal definition of success. ... terms such as money, status, awards etc. may not appear in the personal definitions of many successful people, whom i know...

It is very important to acknowledge that people do not necessarily work towards getting something that society acknowledges as success, or achieving of what they have not had in the past

Analysis of success brings me to the thought of identifying role models of the successful people, and what qualities did they admire in their role models or what qualities or values they tried to imbibe was thought worth exploring.

My personal experience is very very positive in case of experiments with Role Models.... someone we are/were influenced by, someone we admired and looked up to, someone we tried to emulate. Generally whom we interact in real life, may be our family member, teacher, friend, neighbour.....few role models are constant for me in the life, some are changing with the changed life and career stages.

Lastly.. success costs some price and that price is usually in terms of the deterioration of one’s private life, increased stress, self-doubt, loss of emotional feeling, loss of friends, decreased ability to relate to others, sense of selfishness, and moreover what is success today, would be just one more past incident of life tomorrow.

Success is a moving target, always relative to make you run behind it till eternity. Isn't Happiness is more important virtue in our life than Success...!!

Success may give us temporary Happiness, but Pursuit of Happiness can give us permanent Success..

Good Night