Silent Voices

Us Vs Them: Is there really democracy?

2012-01-25T02:52:00.002+05:30

It's often told , especially by the westerners, that we in west are able to decide our government and we have freedom and Chinese don't have such a right. And I have been believing all this for years really. But now I am really starting to doubt this fact. Is there real democracy anywhere? This is a big question in my mind. In west, we have seen governments changing in many countries in last few years, especially since this financial crisis started, e.g. in US, in Spain, in Greece, in Belgium, and even in India.

And these changes in the govts. were done through the so-called democracy. But what have these changes given to the citizens, to the people? The more of the same. In India we see the same corruption, same kind of policies continuing or policy paralysis. In western countries, same policies are continuing which caused this financial crisis in the first place. Increasing level of unemployment. In fact, some govt. heads are replaced by unelected leaders like in Italy and Greece so as to make decision-taking unhindered without being concerned about the citizens. So there is no change, it's continuation of the the same even if there is change in govt. Politicians promise something when they are not in govt. but once they are in it they continue with the status quo.

But in case of Chinese communism, at least govt. act and they deliver, that too regularly. So is it not the better system for as long as at least economic management of the country is concerned?

Watch two episodes of Big Boss less and become wealthier

2012-01-18T01:29:00.002+05:30

Yes friends, you read it RIGHT! Maybe read again the heading, it's exactly what you read. You can definitely become much more wealthier than what you currently are just if you cut down around two episodes of Big Boss (or any other mindless sitcom) per week. Most of us spend precious time in watching every week. But none spend any time in enriching oneself with personal financial education. Most of the working young Indians are horribly illiterate when it comes to managing their money. They know how to earn money but they don't know how to manage it. And what matters in life is not how much you earn every month or every day but how you manage that money over your life is what matter. People like Warren Buffett and Rakesh Jhunjhunwala have become multi-multi billionaires just by managing their money (probably they never earned any money they just managed money and that earned money for them).

But the question would be in your mind, if indeed you have come this far by reading this post, how to learn about money management? Most of us would think, I am earning enough, I can hire someone who would manage it for me. But let me warn you friends, if these guys, who we think can manage our money better, know really better then we would not be having this current financial crisis which is gripping the western world. Someone else would manage your money well only when you know enough the rules of the game. So friends I am just suggesting to learn the rules of the game which is one of the most important game of life.

So back to the question.."How to learn about money management?". Just google it and you find loads of information on it. And read religiously about it for a year and then see how your l(w)ife changes after that?

How and why West ended up in this financial crisis?

2012-01-15T02:32:00.004+05:30

Here, in very brief , is why Europe and US is suffering from this financial crisis:

Banks knowingly gave loans to the customers who were, for sure, not able to pay them back. This happened mostly in US.
then banks sold these loans to other banks by mixing and making cocktail of the loans. This all just to earn more and more bonuses. Banks of Europe also joined this party.
such cocktails were sold at higher and higher prices by one bank to another and to another...like British game of "pass the parcel", with only difference that the parcel did not contain the gift but assets worth zilch so when music stopped, the bank which was holding the parcel lost everything. and in this game almost every bank had parcel when music stopped.
so this way almost all western banks lost most of their market value and almost became bankrupt
Now since all banks were "too big to fail" so govts saved them by paying money without asking anything in return
since govts did not have money of their own so they had to borrow, and since banks debts were so huge that govts' debt became HUGE.
thus most govts in West ended up becoming hugely indebted.
and now to repay those debts, govt have to get money from somewhere so they are squeezing their own citizens, by cutting their pensions, social services, taxing them more.
So as a result every citizen is suffering or will have to suffer
So in a line citizens will be paying for banker's mistakes.

Different satellite navigation systems

2011-12-28T03:26:00.002+05:30

Currently four major economic power blocs have their satellite navigation systems, either fully operational or in process of being so. These systems are used for military and civilian purposes both. Here are four systems:

GPS - US government-run satellite navigation systems. Global Positioning System (GPS).
Beidou - China's own GPS. It offers location, timing and navigation data to China and surrounding areas. China has 10 setellites at the moment and plan to have 35 by 2020 to cover entire world.
Glonass - Russia's satellite navigation systems
Galileo - EU's satellite navigation systems. First satellite was launched in Oct 2011, planned to be fully operational by 2019

Why FDI in retailing is good for India?

2011-12-01T03:21:00.010+05:30

Recently Indian govt. proposed to allow 51% FDI in retailing. As expected there is big hue and cry and opposition to this. But I think it's good for India. Here is why I say so:

retailing is one of the biggest employer in the western world so India would have many employement opportynities for youth. Since retail does not require very highly qualified employees so this would be good opportunity for Indian youth who can't and dont go for very high education

average standards of goods and services would increase in retailing and consumers would have more choices

there will be backward integration in the entire supply chain so many more opportunities in entire supply chain for both employement and business

With improved supply chain, farmers would get better prices for their produces

With increase in demands from retailers, better quality seeds and high yield seeds would make way into agriculture so overall agri-productivity would increase

Better supply chain solutions like warehousing and cold-storage would reduces the wastage of agriculture produce which is astonishingly high in India.

There will be knock-on effect on other secots like real estate, transport, packaging, and almost all sectors of the economy

expansion of middle class, as the employees in retail would be mostly coming from lower middle class and low-income families so with their higher earning they will join burgeoning middle class

in local mom-n-pop retailing, there are hardly employee friendly policies and employee generally overwork, with corporate retailing better employee policy would be followed and employees would be better paid.

Overall quality of life would increase in India

More competition so better prices for end-consumers

When worlds leaders in retailing like Walmart, Carrefour comes to India and they may start sourcing for their global markets also from india, thus increasing the exports.

There would not be much threat to mom-n-pop stores as they would still be dominating corner areas in societies and in fact they would benefit as they can source their goods from these big retailers. With stores like Lifestyle, Shoper's Stop and Central, shops on streets selling clothes did not disappear. Similarly Reliance and Big Bazaar have not displaced kirana stores, which continue to complement the services provided by these big stores.

Indian large retailers would get stronger and improve with competition as Pizza Hut could not destroy Haldiram but made it only stronger. So this fear is misplaced.

Small retailers indulge in malpractices like under-weighing, adulteration, this would go away and government can better regulate big retailers

better retailing technology and practices would come into India

This would expand overall retail market instead of just eating into share of existing players so more opportynities and growth

Local stores in India avoid paying taxes completely, which is huge revenue loss to govt. But with retailers, income would increase for govt.

Over a period, govt have to come up with good regulations to regulate the retail markets so the market develops well and it does not hurt others like farmers. So success depends on unbiased regulations. If the market regulations are good and there is fair competition, consumer is always going to be king.

Internet can change government too? Amazing!

2011-02-23T22:22:00.001+05:30

I have always been fascinated by (the power of) Internet and I always feel lucky to be born at a time when Internet came into being. As I moved into my mid-twenties and Internet started to become widespread and famous and that was the time I hooked onto it and ever since have been riding on it. I feel lucky because it’s the Internet where I go when I have any doubt or any question and it has always given me an answer for my questions, I guess always right one.I was always aware of the power of Internet but never believed that it can change world so much. If one sees the events taking place in the Arab world these days, one will just be amazed at the power of Internet. It’s Internet that helped the protesters in these countries to unite and protest against the authoritative governments, it was Internet that gave people voice to share with like minded people of their countries and spread among all. Internet was the media which then spread it to another country and then another and then entire Arab world. So it’s the Internet which is trying to democratize the part of world. I never thought that Internet can change a government also.It’s just amazing.

We get what we deserve: being citizen of a developed or poor nation!

2011-01-11T03:19:00.000+05:30

Currently history of how the US became favourite destination for immigrants in early years, back in 1400s, and how it grew from there is my favourite reading interest. So I am exploring this topic a bit. And this has made me think how few countries became wealthier and others remained poor despite almost same opportunities. Here I give my take on this as to why some countries became wealthier and others not.

I wonder how so many countries like US, Australia, New Zealand, and even Brazil and many other, which are all completely full of immigrants only with very low native population, have same characteristics, well almost, but only the US is a super power but others not. Local native population in these countries is very less or in fact negligible they are mostly migrant population and all are natural resources rich. So we can say that all these countries had almost same kind of people or culture to start with when these lands began to take form as countries. But today they are all at different stage of development or influence in the world.
Similarly lot of Asian countries like Japan, China, Korea, India, Malaysia to name a few were all at almost the same level of development around 60 years ago but today they are very different. Some have rushed way past and others are left way behind and it will take them decades to catch up with others.
Similarly, at the time of independence India and Pakistan both were at almost the same stage but today the gap between the two have widened beyond imaginations both politically and economically.
Almost all these countries I mentioned up here were all at the same stage of development at some time and had same sort of resources to start with but some of them have gone way up in development but others are lingering at the same level where they started, or just a bit up from where they started. All had everything same except the people who led them were different, or of different characteristics.
So in my understanding what it says is that the two countries, with same sort of problems, and same amount of resources at their disposal to start with may end up being completely different countries few years down the line if the political masters who ultimately takes the decisions about the future of a country are not competent enough. So the future of a country and ultimately that of its citizen lies completely in the hands of politicians of the any day. How today’s politicians behave today will decide our and country's future tomorrow. It’s only the decision makers at the helm that differentiate a country from other. If a country has an able and competent leader at the helm it’s surely going to go in the right direction. This seems to be the reason why US and Japan are where they are today and other countries are not there yet.
Then if we see little deeper, these all countries are democracies, or mostly have been democratic in their history, so their leaders were and are decided by the societies of these countries only. That means the leader of a country is as good as selected by citizens of that country and deserved by that country.
So does it prove that if a country is developed it’s citizen deserve it and if a country is not developed it’s because its citizen do not yet deserve it? Else they would have chosen such leaders to lead them to a developed future? So ultimately the future of a countries is in the hands of the citizen of that country and politicians are only there to be blamed.

Demise of a dear friend called ELSS.

2010-09-04T19:22:00.002+05:30

Recently govt. brutally killed ELSS by removing it from tax saving instruments. With the implementation of DTC it will no longer would be available to me and many like me for saving our taxes. For many years I was using ELSS only as my tax-saving instruments so with this announcement of DTC, I am shattered and so are some of my friends. Now we have to be reluctantly use the blood-sucking ULIPs or PPF and none of them seems attractive to me.

Future IITians and IIMians would not be stars ****.

2010-07-04T15:03:00.006+05:30

Entrance exams to IIT and IIM are considered to be the ultimate frontiers to cross for a student in India. Once a student crack either of these exams he or she is considered to be having a high-paying, smooth and successful career for rest of his/her life. These institutions have been there for long now. And we have seen the products (pass-outs) of these institutions achieving great success in their chosen fields later in careers. And since the earlier alumnis of these institutes have achieved huge successs in businesses and other areaes, we are attaching more and more importance now to those who get into them. As a result students who crack these exams become overnight celebrities because they are considered to be sure to be successful.

But I have a kind of fear and doubt that not all of this new breed of celebrities would be successful in their careers. Because there is difference beween the kind of students who were getting into these institutions earlier and students getting in in last few years. Now a days there are coaching institutes who train students. Coaching class teachers and students put all their efforts and energy for cracking these exams.

So it's not that only talanted students are getting into these institutes but average students are also getting in. The average stuents put extraordinary effort and get through these exams. But such average students can not perform at the same high level all through their lives. So obviously such students would always be average later in their careers (Though this is not true for every average student).

Earlier only the real talented students would get through in these institutes as there was not much rote preparation so the quality of student would be maintained. So we see the alumnis of these institutes achieving extraordinary successes in their careeres. But now when average students are getting in, there would definittely not be superachievers. But this would only be realised very late.

Smoke & Drink your way up to Corporate ladder.

2010-05-22T18:12:00.008+05:30

If you are an ambitious person who wants to achieve a lot in the corporate career as an executive and run up, mind you not walk up or hurry up but run up, the corporate ladder fast then I would advice you stop being a good guy and start smoking, drinking, partying, and on top of that remain single until you achieve what you want. Else you are never gonna be what you have always desperately wanted to be. Why I say so..? Do not agree with me? Then read on .....to end up agreeing with me!

If you are a good guy, you would not smoke, you would not drink or party as you would want to give as much time as possible to your family. So after office you would rush to be with your family to share the diner, over weekends you would want to spend precious little time with the family and family friends, so you would hardly have time to network. The ways of networking are to share a smoke in office with colleagues, call colleagues for a drink after office, party with influential people over weekend.

Since you are a good guy and you do not smoke so you would not go to smoking areas in the office. And that's the best area for networking. Over the time smokers in offices, not only from the same but from various other departments, forge great networks as they get to see each other at common area, get to ask for match box daily and very often each day. So they have great networks. But if you are a good guy you would want to finish your work in as less time as possible as you have to rush to home for diner daily. So you would avoid wasting time for smoking, in fact you would have your tea at your desk only. So NO networking during office hours. Then drinkers create opportunities for networking after office hours also by getting together with same interest guys at pubs/drinks. So over time they forge great networks there also. They may not give much time to family. Similarly weekend partying can be used for networking. As this networking is investment into the future which would ripe and grow many fold over the years and you can redeem this investment whenever you want or need it.

As a family man or mamma's boy you would not get all these opportunies for networking i.e. investing into future.

At the end it's all about networking. Honey!

Who said drinking or smoking is injurious to health. It's NOT!

Hope now you agree with me now....

An Cash-rish Opportunity at an Unexpected place

2010-05-20T21:54:00.004+05:30

Entrepreneurial people will find some or other opportunity somewhere, that's for sure. I saw truth in this when I went to apply for my passport at a local post office. Now let me explain what the opportunity is..
The otherday I pulled my bike in the parking area in front of a local post office and before I could get down from my bike a person approached me asking if I have come for passport application. I nodded to him and he told me that the PO only accept fee in DD and not in cash and he had the DD which he can sell me for an additional amount of 100.

He had a bunch of readymade DDs with him. I did my mental calculation quickly, and I decided to buy one from him. Though I was a bit hesitant initially in buying as he may be a fake.

My calculation went something like this...if I do not buy from him, I have to find a bank nearby,
for which I have to spend time, petrol and mental and physical energy. After that I have to stand in a queue which would not be short for sure as banks are always crowded. Then I have to fill in application for getting DD, here I have to enquire or search as to to whom the DD should be paid to. And all those tensions. So I would have spent at least one hour in getting all this. So by buying I was saving myself precious time for standing in queue so I can get apply for passport earlier and faster.
So to avoid all this hassles, who would not pay just a little Rs. 100 extra?
That was the opportunity..
Coming to business model...
That person always keeps 5-6 DDs handy with him, it means his investment is 6000-7000 daily.
now if he can sell these all and depending on his average daily sale he can have that many no of DDs. So his daily investment would vary accordingly. That money will be blocked but can be encashed anytime so it's highly liquide investment.
Risks
This is purely a cash positive investment without any risk of loss so completely risk-free.
Potential
I assume at least 50-60 applicant must be coming to this post office for passport application daily. And I would guess at least half of them would be coming without DD, so that's opportunity. So it's a huge opportunity.

Additional Source of Income...

The person offers filling up the passport application forms, charging 50 each, also he sells form.. charging 30 bucks..etc..so such are additional source to earn hot money without much investment.

The biggest risk here is...

But the business is not scallable at all, it's not for educated guys and there are high chances that competion can come in or the govt policies can change and business may bomb.

If Nehru were today, could he become so GREAT? NO.

2010-05-17T22:52:00.005+05:30

I consider Nehru THE greatest prime minister of India and it's because of him that today we are a thriving, optimistic, secular and a strong democracy, else we would have been another hindu Pakistan. We, probably, still would be an IT super power. But in that case IT would probably have meant "International Terrorism". By the way that's IT too. ;)
But if I imagine Nehru were to be ruling India today, in the same circumstances as, say, Dr. Manmohan Singh is or A B Vajpayee ruled, could he have taken such decisions as to take India towards further greatness. I would say no, and an emphatic NO. Whosoever is the prime minister of India today, would take the same weak decisions as are being taken. However strong that personality could be, however smart that could be or howsoever educated and wise that could be. Barring a few decisions here or there, everything else would be same. As in last 20 years, we have seen many PMs come and go but overall they took almost the same decisions.
Why I say so, obviously the circumstances decide or influence a person to the greatest extent as to how to act and what to decide. For today's politician or so to say for PM, their immediate concern is always the next general election or upcoming assembly election in some state or to keep alliance partner happy. And these situations are not rare but they are recurring, almost daily. So in such scenarios, the decision one will take for is to reap immediate reward, not the long term rewards. So even if our prime minister (whoever he is or whichever party he is from ) is well-intentioned, he can not take far-reaching decisions else he would be hounded out from the parliament to his grave by his colleagues only on the very same day.
But for Nehru, things were not the same, they were completely different. One he was educated, he knew what is wanted, he was prepared for this as he had probably been foreseeing himself in PM's chair for quite long, so he was all along planning for what to do. He also did not have those compulsions of upcoming elections as he had no serious opponents at all at that time. So he knew that as long as he was alive he was going to be PM. So in such situations he took decisions which were good for India in long-term, like establishing secular democracy, setting up heavy industries, setting up IITs, building dams, and many more.
Today also we want someone to take similar far-reaching decisions like, making primary education compulsory and qualitative, not on papers but in spirit, building world-class hard infrastructure in India, removing bureaucracy and corruption, improving public accountability, making India's foreign policy more suitable to India's stature, improving India's relations with it's SAARC neighbors, and so on. But we have no one to do that. Because none of these decisions are going to get immediate gains to any political party.
So let us not pray for a new Nehru to born but pray to circumstances to be amicable.

ULIP Crisis: More time to dupe gullible custoemer, Hurrey...!

2010-04-12T19:50:00.005+05:30

Govt. has come out and said that the SEBI and IRDA have agreed to maintain the status quo on the issue of regulation of ULIPs. Why should court decide as to who should regulate the ULIPs? It's simple, ULIPs with any equity portion should come under the purview of SEBI as SEBI is mandated to regulate the equity markets. And IRDA should stick to insurance part of it.

First of all it's absurd on the part of both the SEBI and the IRDA to wash their dirty linens in public. One day SEBI bans ULIPs and the very next day IRDA comes and says publicly to SEBI, fuck-off from governing the ULIPs, it's none of your business. And so it's the business as usual for insurance companies to loot the gullible insurance-customers. They are looting public, like there is no tomorrow, all under the blessing of IRDA and citizen friendly-govt.
Why not the two regulators decide who to do what and then come public before making fun of themselves by fighting in public.

It was similar case where regulators were not sure who was to govern a particular area and they led to many scams, like CRB MF scam, in not-so-distant past.
But it's true to Indian character we never seems to learn from our past mistakes.

Sachin: Miracles do Happen.

2010-02-26T10:19:00.004+05:30

This week a cricket record was written in the history books and a legend re-confirmed his place among the rare greats of our times and the sport greats of all times. In years from now and decades from now I would be feeling proud that I lived during the time when a great called Sachin Tendulkar reigned the Cricket. I would proudly be telling his stories, about his great exploits in cricket, about his humility, about his coolness during toughtimes to my grand children.
There are no words today with which I can express my joy that I saw Sachin breaking a record and writing two in his names. I simply feel ecsatic to be born Indian, to be born when Sachin is on earth.

ATM Risk: Did Banks noticed this?

2009-12-20T23:37:00.002+05:30

The other day I went to withdraw some money from my neighbourhood ATM. I took my 2 year old son along. Since in India ATMs are housed in nice Air-conditioned secured room, I left my son in the room without paying attention to his activities. I got into withdrawing money. After I had entered PIN and it was about to disburse me money, I realised that the machine had shut down. When I looked around I realised that it was my son who had switched off the power to ATM and soon he had switched it on. I was worried if my account could have been updated with the transaction but I had not received the money.Bank should take into account this risk as well and place switches accordingly.

Money Resolutions for 2010

2009-12-20T22:24:00.004+05:30

I strongly believe that each new year one should have money resolutions separately for oneself. Here are my "Money Resolution" for the coming year 2010.

Keep track of every investment regularly and count & consolidate every month’s investment. So That you know how much money is invested every month and consequently for the whole year.
Every 6 months look how investments are doing, redo them if required.
Start Tax Saving investments early in the financial year.
Every month invest surplus money somewhere, be it even the Liquid funds. But let your money earn at least something for you.
Don’t ever dither on any financial decision. Make it then and there but not without thinking.
Keep yourself up-to-date with personal finance knowledge.
Be little bold in investing for your long-term money.
Maintain proper balance in your portfolio by investing in all kinds of assets.
Keep booking profits if profit goes beyond your expectations.

Can Wipro and HCL be top two IT service player from India

2009-10-31T19:07:00.003+05:30

Somehow my gut feeling says that few years down the line Wipro and HCL would be top two IT services companies from India as against the current pack. My reason is that slowly the area for IT service companies is widening and they are adding more and more services to basket of services they offer. Currently infrastructure management is earning big dollars for IT companies and this means management of desktops among other things for customers. Would it not be a logical extension if customers start giving contract to the service provider to also bring desktops that means buy desktops from the service provider, give it contract manage it and etc. So service providers can offer a complete end to end solution in this. I see Wipro and HCL can do this to their worldwide customers as they already are into hardware.

Missing Spark: Am I reading it correct?

2009-07-03T22:52:00.011+05:30

I have been working in IT service industry for quite a few years now and have worked in quite a few different IT companies in India, with lot of and a variety of animals (called software/IT professionals), coming from different backgrounds and different social setup and even from different economic strata of the society. In my view, many of IT professional come to the office to surf Internet, chat with online friends and do some gossip in cafeteria and in between do a little work, if time permits, for which they are paid at the end of month, that too handsomely (I bet if you find even a single software professional who would say that he or she is happy with the salary he/she is getting). Everyone would proudly flaunt their respective companies' (employer's) access card around their necks, like domesticated dogs carry belt around necks, on the streets but would jump onto next company if the pay packet is bigger there. They would not even consider once if because of this action of theirs, the client's work could be impacted and employer's image would be impacted or what would happen to company'bucks spent on their training.

These guys work daily without fail but they do not seem to work for a longer future. A long-term vision is not there which they seem to be trying to achieve. I do not find much in them a spark which says that these guys are inspired in their life to achieve something great. Neither are the so-called IT team managers are smart enough who seems to be inspiring individuals who can inspire the guys under him. All I see in these guys, including in managers, is that they are worried about the work they have to do, not because they want to do but because it is given to them or thrust upon them, then they are worried about next appraisal whether or not they deserve it. Everyone wants bigger and fancier title, bigger and bigger pay-packet without thinking even once if they really deserve what they are asking for and above all the want all this with less and less responsibilities.

And yet another reason of worry among IT professionals in getting fast onto the housing ladder. This is the biggest worry among most as today it has become a huge status symbol and a sort of competition is there among all to get a bigger and costlier house and more number of houses in one's name. This cause them to fight their reporting manger to grant them an ONSITE trip.

Onsite trip grants some guys huge status boost, Huge bank balance and proves that this guy has truly arrived.

The life of an IT professional seems like a fairy tale to an outsider. And as an insider I can say yes, indeed it is like a fairy tell. But all these above perks are, I would say, relatively easier to get because you do not have to do much of an effort to get these. Hard work is hardly required to get all these.

I would say the guys are talented, no doubt about that, if given a challenge they would face it bravely and succeed on it. But that sharpness is not there anymore in most of the guys, all have become blunt. I hardly see these guys talking about doing something greater in life or in next few years, or creating some vision and discussing some ideas. No, this never happens or to be politically correct, it rarely happens. But since these are knowledge workers and so-called brightest engineers from our academic institutions, so it's their responsibility to think on those lines, to imagine a better future not for them but for others in society. This is a real pity. We can not blame govt. at the centre for this because I don't remember if it has imposed any tax for imagining a better future for our society. Still they do not do this.

And just imagine the price we are paying for all this inactivity. We may me missing on some visions or some opportunities which would have become realities and would given something to the society at large.

I would have to blame someone for this huge problem. Two roles come to my mind who could be squarely blamed for this nation-shaming problem. One is the teacher who never taught us to think or imagine and this was his/her responsibility. Teacher never went beyond giving us some rote lessons and checking our homeworks.

Second role to be blamed for this is IT professionals reporting manager. As a manger RM is responsible to mould a rookie engineer into a thinker. But I feel these RMs always feel why should he spend his time in improving an engineer anyway she/he will leave company as soon as he gets a better job or he would go to another project under another RM. So there is hardly any culture in industry where employees are made to think. They are not taught or guided as to how and what to think.

Here I am also part of the above herd.

Resurgent India: Our time is coming!

2009-07-01T23:07:00.003+05:30

Two news stories of last couple of days have made me proud. For anyone outside India (especially westerners) these news stories would have been nothing short of shocking or even disgusting but for me they were pleasant pieces of news. You would wonder if Iam insane or even call me a sadist if I say I was pleased to know that a union minister sought to influence the justice or an MP slapped a bank employee on duty.

No, you are seeing glass as half empty, whereas I am looking at the glass half full. I am happy that the High Court judge made the incidence of calling by union minister public instead of following minister's advice( or threat) and happy because the bank employee filed a police complaint against the errant MP instead of toying with him. These sides of stories make me happy or joyous.

I am not surprised by the actions of minister and MP because we in India take these things as usual and they happen regularly so nothing to be shocked about. But the reactions of the two public employees are exemplary and I salute them for having taken their respective stands. They deserve all the praise and adulation from public in India. I am sure these two reactions would set the precedence now and more of such misuses of privileges by politicians would become public. These are course-changer events in Indian public life. They are true leaders.

These positive developments make me proud of my country and fellow citizens. Long Live Great India.

Leadership lesson: Doing what is correct and just without thinking of the consequences is what we called a true leadership.

Product Design: You can not escape, my love.

2009-06-30T06:22:00.007+05:30

Automobile in India is now moving (or has already moved if I am late) from one being part of basic needs onto a luxury for the middle class. And when anything becomes a luxury, it doesn't just have to fulfil the basic requirements of that product (like for an automobile, to ferry people around) but have to satisfy the ego or even shoot up the status (in his or her own mind) of the owner. So for an automobile product to be bought it has to satisfy many criteria. And the top most of them would be the looks or the design of the product.

If we observe the automobile products launched in India over last decade, by having only a (and first) look at the product you can easily tell whether the product is going to be successful or not. Or you can even write obituary of the product at first look if looks are not very striking. In my mind I wrote the same for three Suzuki two wheeler products and two Honda products (Unicorn and Shine). In retrospect, I think I am fairly correct (no braggin or boasting) on those counts as these launches have not been so successful for their respective companies.

Today when a consumer in India (Indian consumer is mostly going to be a young person) buys a product he (mostly the automobile buyer is "definitely male") sees the look of the product as the most important thing. Yamaha has not been able to make any presence in Indian two wheeler market simply because none (except the latest launch FZ. Oooh! that's the best bike in India so far by looks) of their product have been worth looking at. The same could be the case of Suzuki two wheeler as well, since all three products launched so far are not at all good at design. Yamaha and Suzuki are well known world over for their superb two-wheeler technology still they are failing in Indian market. I am sure the only reason is that they do not have great product designers in their studios. Superb technology only gets appreciation when it's presented in best designed box. Even Honda is not able to make much of an impact in two wheeler because of the same reason. Bajaj would not be successful or worthy competition to Hero Honda until they hire some top-notch designers. Right now their products looks like underfed dogs or foxes. Pulsar had been successful mainly, because the category which it sells in, did not have worthy competition so far. By the way now Pulsar design has improved considerably but still not the best and has a long way to go. In this category the two new entrants TVS Apache and Yamaha FZ are going to be the scorching hot products, if they have good enough technology.

Obviously when a product's design is great second most important thing should be the underlying technology. Hero Honda has got these two things right in the same order in most of their products and we can see the results.

Same could be said of the passenger car market as well. Unknown (at start) Hyundai is successful in Indian market whereas the mighty GM and Ford are still struggling here for precisely the same reason.

I always wonder why can the management of Yamaha, Suzuki, Bajaj etc not see this point? A business magazine "Businessworld" (oooh, my favourite) carried a cover story on product design couple of years back but probably CEOs of these above companies did not read that issue and paying price now. Had they paid Rs 5 for that issue they would have made a few thousand crores for their companies and we Indian consumers would have had even superior product marquees to choose from.

Being Responsible at every time: How aware are we?

2009-06-29T23:44:00.004+05:30

Today I was on my way to office (in Hyderabad India), I was driving on a stretch of the road which is very wide road (6 lanes) and is normally never congested (surprise! isn't it?). You always get smooth drive through here but today there was a huge unbelievable pile-up of the traffic and traffic was moving very slow, at snail's pace. I was stunned (yes, I really was!) by seeing traffic-jam at this road. I went on and on and finally at one point road became clear as it always was. When I looked for the reason for this traffic pile-up I could not help shake my head in disgust.

The reason for the jam was that people were moving slow even though there was clear way. And why there were moving slow? The reason was that there was a minor accident on the other side of the road divider and people were slowing deliberately to see the accident site. This caused accumulation of slow moving vehicles and ultimate traffic congestion.

So what can we learn here from this incidence. People who wanted to know or understand the accident scene were (un)knowingly causing others problem by blocking their way. People may be in hurry to make it to an urgent customer meeting, or to attend an interview, both of which are very critical in current situations and are life-or-death situations. So some were being irresponsible unknowingly which could cost someone else very dearly.

So we should always be aware of our actions, be it in traffic or at anywhere in public or private place. Sometimes unintentionally, a trifle act or ours could prove very serious for others. If we try to learn be responsible in such small ways and become aware of the consequences of our little actions or gestures, over time we could become compassionate which is one of very essential quality of a leader.

Career Confusion: Loyalty vs. Money

2009-06-18T21:34:00.004+05:30

People working in IT service industry are always confused about their career. They are always in dilemma whether to stay put in the same company to move up on the ladder and forgo the chances of more money outside or opt for job offer from another company for more money and a higher position. There are always confusion, one have to spend long time on bench sometimes even around year doing almost nothing. This sometimes frustrate guys (smarter guys make use of this time to hone their hobbies, interests).
Then comes the time when recession starts and everyone including the loyalist start fearing about their job. Here probably everyone has the risks of loosing his or her job.

Choosing a career: Based on strength?

2009-06-17T21:42:00.004+05:30

I was recently reading a book on Strength Finder2.0 by Gallop. This says that you have to first find your correct and exact strengths and then choose a career or profession accordingly. If you do not do so and choose any career, you may not achieve true success in life and cannot do justice to your chosed profession. I do not agree with this (at all). The Gallop findings may be true for western countries, but not in Indian context.
What I observed in Indian context is that normally a person follows his parental profession. Be it business, profession (medical, law or anything ) or anything else. And the second generation make it good in their parental profession, sometimes even better. Take examples of Ambani brothers, so many generations of politicians, innumerable small businessmen, people in Bollywood, just to give a few examples. I have also observed some families where there is good environment in home about education or spirituality or religion, the kids of such households grow up to be stronger in those area. This confirms that what kind of environment kids get at home and how serious they take their chosen area,they would become successful in that area.
In Indian middle class, students almost always choose their career options based on either family members suggestions/insistence or influences by peer group's choices. Hardly anyone has any idea as to what he or she really likes, barring a few exceptions. And even in such situations people turn out to be quite successful in their career. I feel except for few areas like art (painting, music, etc), or research when you really have to be passionate all other areas could be mastered by interest and hard work (obviously smart work).
I do not claim to be a researcher but I can claim to be a good observer in the above area. Please leave your comments and views on the topic.

Books One should read

2009-06-16T20:36:00.000+05:30

Recently I have added one more person to the list of my role models (I am not going to disclose all), or the people whom I like to follow. This person is Rajesh Setty. I found his book selection for reading match exactly to my interest. So I am putting a link to his list here on my blog.
Two reason for this:
1. so that I can refer as and when I wish
2. if someone bump into my mind he can also view the list.
http://www.squidoo.com/inspire
I have always wondered what books should one read and who to tell what to read and what not to as there is huge information flood (books, journals, blogs, Internet). I thanks Rajesh for putting his list on Internet.

Best Way to layoff employees

2009-06-09T11:30:00.000+05:30

Media is flooded with reports about the imminent layoffs at Satyam and how management of TechMahindra and Satyam are planning to layoff 5000/10000/18000 employees from Satyam, depending upon who is the source of news or which media is publishing the news. Whether there has been any layoff or not at Satyam, at least one thing has been constant for several month is that there are imminent layoffs. What this has done is created fear in the minds of Satyam employees. And they have started to look for jobs outside on their own. Employees, who were not very serious to change job at this time, are now seriously in the market. The constant news of layoff have made these employees creative enough to find ways to get new jobs at any cost.
How this has helped the management at Satyam is that without them having to layoff employees company's employee strengh has come down significantly. What else would managment ask for when their goal is being achieved without them having to worry about consequences of laying off.
I wonder if the constant media coverage of layoff was a well tought out strategy of management. Whatever it was it was good. As neither employees had to go through the anogy of being laidoff not management had to draw any flak.

Monetise Taj

2009-05-20T08:29:00.000+05:30

Taj Mahal is a historical place and Indian govt. has control over it. Why not govt. use it to monetise it's appeal. There are lot of companies who use Taj's image in their marketing, like Berger paints, Taj tea, etc. Why not govt take some kind of royalty from these companies?

Long Leave Indian democracy

2009-05-17T14:42:00.000+05:30

The election results yesterday was simply stunning by any measure. None, absolutely none, in his/her wildest dream would have thought that the Congress would be getting absolute majority (almost!) at the centre. But that happened, and in style. I, though, did not favour another term for Congress govt. at centre, however I am really happy for the way Indian voters have given so clear a mandate for politics which is not divisive, not communal, pro-people, and inclusive, at least on paper. Voters have chosen the best option available to them.

I have never felt so confident about India and it's future as I do now. I now feel confident that if there is problem and none is able to decide which party, which person or which ideology should lead India, I think we should leave that to Indian voters and they will decide it best. Today I really feel proud of Indian democracy, they way it has matured and the way it will protect my future and that of my son. We can proudly tell to the world that we can teach you a lesson or two about democracy.

Long Leave Indian democracy.

More instruments in financial markets?

2009-04-28T18:57:00.000+05:30

The current crisis in the world is caused, as they say, by the new instruments created by bankers to make more profits. The new and innovative instruments like sub-prime lending, Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDO) and likes were introduced to encourage more and more lending. And this led us to this point.

Now every experts see the problem in these instruments and blame regulators of the time for not having checked on them when these were introduced in the market.

Why not regulators make it a point that they keep a close eye on the market and see if any new types of instruments are being introduced by market players like banks, PE players, hedge players and investment bankers. When this happens the regulators should not clamp down upon them immediately instead get some of the experts together and discuss pros and cons of them threadbare. This can help unearth any shortcoming if they have and accordingly regulations can be introduced so that we do not come to this point. I know it's easy on my part to say in the hindsight.

Foreign Coaches: and their payback

2009-04-27T23:44:00.001+05:30

I never knew that a foreign coach can add so much value to a team's performance and lift it up at least by a place. That too a coach who has been very successful in his last assignment as a coach of a successful sledging team, incidentally this team was also very successful in two formats of a gentlemen's game. Having a foreign coach, and entire an entourage of assistances and what-nots, all forrign born with white skin, to help(?) the team in every department possible. After this coach was hired, the team has been doing wonders and the coach is making sure that the team is at least not on the last spot in the ladder.
A lot of new innovations were done by this coach, like making every team member, except the one who captained team in last season, captain of the team. This way everyone has incentive to do his /(her?) best. Another innovation of packing back team members who are not fitting in the team's scheme of things (saving a huge amount of money specially during recession when money is honey). And another innovation is recruiting coach's sons in various newly created positions within team. And another innovation .......will come later. Not all today.
So out obsession with everything phoren is really paying dividend. Next time think this team's owner should also be foreign and so be all the players. That way team would be wining more games.
Our national team also had a foreign coach who is compatriot of the above coach. During this national coach out team also did wonders.
I just wonder should we not have our PM, president, everything phorener so that they take us up and up and up and we enjoy the fruits sitting on the ground.

Keeping promise: At the cost of other’s life!

2009-04-17T19:14:00.001+05:30

Infosys has been telling (or boasting) all along that it will honour all its promises of job offers made out to the campus recruits (close to some 16000). Infosys has also got a huge bench of over 25000 staffs. So if Infosys is to be believed they will have 41000 free people to be employed in this financial year on various project (this figure may be little less if attrition is to be factored in). This tells that the company must have so much work coming its way (pipeline in industry jargon) in near future which can absorb all new and existing bench employees. There is also news that more staff would come off project this year.
But in contrast, Infosys itself has been telling that there will be almost no growth (projected 1.5% in rupee terms) in current financial year. Now we hear that company has asked its employees who are on the bench to work for its BPO arm. I understand that if company do not have enough work then it should ask employees to work for associate companies. This way jobs are saved, employees get to learn new skills and associate companies get resources when required without recruiting from outside. But what’s point in sending your existing employees to associate companies against their wishes and recruiting new (which Infy is doing by honouring its campus promises). If company does not have enough work why should it hire more which impacts job securities of its existing employee, severely impacts company financial affecting shareholders.
There is a famous saying in Ramayan “Jaan Jaaye par wachan na jaaye” (Keep your promise even at cost of your own life). Infosys seems to be following this saying, but with a little twist. Twist is that if life has to go it will not be its own but that of its employees. How unethical!

Infy Guidance: Impact on years to come.

2009-04-16T22:55:00.000+05:30

The result by Infosys yesterday were not that bad, they were almost on expected lines but what guidance Infy gave for the year ahead was really SHOCKING. Infy gave guidance of just around 1.5% of growth in rupee terms (a negative growth in dollar terms, worst still). This was the most shocking news of yesterday and I would say of this year so far.
Implication of this piece of news is:
1. Infosys is considered the bellwether of the overall Indian IT services industry and any trend set by it is considered to be replicated by the overall industry. So we can safely assume that the overall IT industry would also grow at the same rate. That is almost a 0% growth.
2. As there would be hardly any growth in IT service industry so there would not be need for new recruitment and certainly IT industry would like to rationalize their existing bench (generally Indian IT companies maintain up to 30% bench strength). This means there would be lay-off of resources that are currently on bench in companies.
3. Real estate in India is almost singularly dependent upon the uptake from IT industry be it for commercial or residential sector. So as a result I would say it’s safe to say that there would be no takers for real-estate that means the property prices are going to CRASH badly and LOUDLY in a years’ time.
4. Indian IT industry employs a huge no. of youth. As there would be hardly any growth this year so there is going to be significant problem of unemployment this financial year.
5. As lot of industries, home loan, financial industry to some extent and many more industries depend directly or indirectly for their growth on the growth of IT industry, so these industries would not be growing and that would impact employment too. So ultimately India would see huge unemployment problem among the educated youth (thankfully for political parties the election would be over by that time).
6. Infosys is saying that there would be hardly any new requirement for IT services in their target markets (western world), that clearly says that there would be no growth in those economies for this financial year. So a badly needed pickup in economic activities are still at least a year down the line. This means if we reasonably assume that economies in the west would start picking up only after this financial year (if nothing goes wrong now of which there is no surety). It would take at least a year for western economies to take off and then they will generate the requirement for IT offshoring so Indian IT companies should wait at least 2 year for their services to be required.
7. When in 2000 dotcom went bust, IT industry in India was impacted in 2001 and it took another 3 years for requirement to pick up. It’s only from 2003 end that serious recruitment started by IT companies. Which means a small problem like dotcom took two years off from the job market growth in India. Assume how long it will take this time as the problem is far far serious this time.

Impact of the World Recession on Indian economy

2008-11-25T00:12:00.000+05:30

Recession has already arrived in US, UK and major EU economies; China is also going to be affected badly. China’s growth is going to come down from 12% last year to around 8% this year which is a big hit on its growth. So there is overall slowdown in the growth of the world economy so the impact of recession is going to be felt definitely in India. Here in my view how some of the sectors would be impacted in India.

Stock Market
As already seen, Indian stock markets are down more than 60% from their high point. So we can already see the impact there. As more money dries up in the world this is going to impact stock market in India further. The bull run on Indian stock markets have been due to easy availability of cheap money in the world market but this is no more the case now so we are not going to see the same high for few years now.

IT and BPO
Indian IT has always survived because of the western economies, as major western economies slowdown the work being offshored to Indian IT companies is going to freeze in near terms as client cut on all unimportant work (and some important work too). So there will be less work for IT companies in near term. This will trigger job cuts in IT in west and India. This is already happening in India, though will be on very low scale as compared to the west.
But in the long term, as the western economies start getting back on their feet, they will generate more IT work and then they will not have enough IT workers (after having laid off in current recession) so they will offshore more of that to India. Also the rush for efficiencies in the operations would drive more work to offshore so we will see better future for Indian IT in medium to long term.

Housing and real estate
Real estate in India is going to suffer badly, even if govt. tries to provide any incentive, which real estate industry is asking for. As most of growth in this industry came from speculation and false future projections, the industry is going to have a hard landing before picking up again. With likes of Lehman brothers gone with the wind, there will be less of outside money to invest in real estate in India, so realism will set in here. Already the stock prices of major real estate players are down more than a shocking 95%. It was pure speculation.

Infrastructure
Infrastructure projects like, roads, ports, power etc. will suffer because of difficulty in getting money and general aversion among investor for any risk now. Also Indian govt. does not have money like China which can spend on such project to stimulate the economy.

General Economic Reforms
Already Indian govts. have always been reluctant to go for far-reaching reforms. Now they will be more so. And political parties like Left would be making more noises now. Seeing the mayhem in the world financial markets govt will be very cautions to go for any reforms. Also earlier US govt used to push for reforms in India but now they would be shy in doing so one for the mess in their backyard and second they do not have a face now to show to the world that free capitalism is the only way to go. This will slowdown the economy.

Non-IT export
We have already been hearing news of layoffs in export oriented industries like gems and jewelry, apparel, leather, auto component etc. The impact of this is definitely there on general economy.

General Economy
Though we hear people say that Indian fundamentals are strong and we can sustain our own growth but that is like running away from reality. Because of globalisation we are now more linked to the world economy than anytime in future so if world is suffering we cannot remain immune to it.
When all industries are slowing how can we expect the general economy to grow. Never. If IT slows down it impacts job market and the easy spenders, related ancillary industries gets affected too due to this. If there is slowdown in infrastructure then that would impact cement, steel and other industry. So we can see that almost all the industries of the economy are going through the rough phase so there is overall slow growth.
But we in India have lot of optimism as we can see the light at the end of tunnel. So this time is just for reflection and to prepare ourselves for better times which are just around the corner.

Financial Crisis:Animals extinct so far

2008-10-31T15:48:00.000+05:30

Whenever there is earth shattering change on the earth some animals just disappear because they can not cope up with the changes and they were not prepared for these changes. Dinosaurs were a breed which became extinct because they could not survive the changes taking place on the earth at that time. Now in the current financial tsunami as well many financial animals (banks) are becoming extinct because of the very same reason.
Here are some of the banks and financial institutions which have now become extinct or become too dependant on others or governments they can not survive on their own.
Animal extinct so far

New Century Financial, one of the biggest sub-prime lenders in the US
Dillon Read Capital Management, UBS’s US sub-prime lending arm
American Home Mortgage, one of the largest US independent home loan providers
Sachsen LB Landesbank faced collapse, Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg buys it
Northern Rock
Bear Stearns was acquired by JPMorgan Chase
US mortgage lender IndyMac collapsed -- the second-biggest bank in US history to fail.
Fannie Mae, rescued by the US government
Freddie Mac, rescued by the US government
Lehman Brothers
Merrill Lynch
Insurer American International Group
HBOS, British bank
Bradford & Bingley is nationalised
Germany’s Hypo Real Estate, commercial property lender
Washington Mutual, mortgage lender , sold to its JPMorgan Chase
Goldman Sachs
Morgan Stanley
Fortis, the European bank, partly nationalised
Glitnir, Iceland’s third largest bank is nationalised
Wachovia, bought by Citigroup
European bank Dexia is bailed out by he Belgian, French and Luxembourg governments
Icelandic internet bank Icesave is closed
Icelandic banks Kaupthing Edge gone into administration and is nationalised
Icelandic bank Heritable Bank gone into administration
Royal Bank of Scotland (60%) end up being owned by govt.
Lloyds TSB/HBOS(40%) end up being owned by govt.

There are only the prominent names there have been many hedge funds and smaller insititutions who are closed unceremoniously and not reported in media.

…..and more to come

After institutions now it seems it’s turn of countries:
Following are the countries who have so far felt the pressure due to tsunami and their existence is dependant on other’s help

Iceland
Pakistan
Ukraine
Hungary
Belarus

Obviously the tsunami does not seems to be mild one.

Sub-prime criris and how it started..

2008-09-24T21:36:00.000+05:30

Thanks to www.rediff.com for having produced such a nice cover of subprime crisis.

August 9, 2007
The official date when the crisis is said to have hit global finances. But the rot had started much earlier.
In 2006, the US housing market started to feel the pain of high interest rates -- which, between 2004 and 2006, had risen from one per cent to 5.35 per cent -- resulting in default rates on *sub-prime loans rising to record level.
February 22, 2007: HSBC fires head of its US mortgage lending business as losses reach $10.5 billion.
March 8, 2007: Biggest US house builder DR Horton warns of huge losses from sub-prime fall-out.
March 12, 2007: Shares in New Century Financial, one of the biggest sub-prime lenders in the US, were suspended amid fears it might be heading for bankruptcy.
March 13, 2007: Wall Street hit by sub-prime fears and on March 14, the sell-off on US and Asian markets saw the Sensex close with a loss of 453 points at 12,530.
March 16: US-based sub-prime firm Accredited Home Lenders Holding said it would sell $2.7 billion of its sub-prime loan book -- at a heavy discount -- in order to generate some cash.
April 2 2007: New Century Financial, which was once the second-largest originator of sub prime mortgages in United States files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and lays off 3,299 people.
May 3, 2007: GM finance unit loses heavily on sub-prime mortgages, and UBS closes its US sub-prime lending arm, Dillon Read Capital Management.
June 22, 2007: Investment bank Bear Stearns revealed it had spent $3.2 billion bailing out two of its funds exposed to the sub-prime market. The bailout of the fund was the largest by a bank in almost a decade.
July 18, 2007: Bear Stearns rings the warning bell. It tells investors that they will get little, if any, of the money invested in two of its hedge funds after rival banks refuse to help it bail them out.
July 20, 2007: US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke warns that the US sub-prime crisis could cost up to $100 billion.
July 27, 2007: Worries about the sub-prime crisis hammered global stock markets and the main US Dow Jones stock index slipped.
July 31, 2007: Bear Stearns stopped clients from withdrawing cash from a third fund, saying it has been overwhelmed by redemption requests. The lender also filed for bankruptcy protection for the two funds it had to bail out earlier.
August 6, 2007: American Home Mortgage, one of the largest US independent home loan providers, filed for bankruptcy after laying off the majority of its staff.
August 9, 2007 French banking major, BNP Paribas announced that it could not fairly value the underlying assets in three funds -- Parvest Dynamic ABS, BNP Paribas ABS Euribor and BNP Paribas ABS Eonia -- as a result of exposure to US subprime mortgage lending markets.
Faced with potentially massive exposure, the European Central Bank immediately stepped in to ease market worries by opening lines of euro 96.8 billion (then $130 billion) in low-interest credit. The Federal Reserve, the Bank of Canada and the Bank of Japan also intervened.
August 16, 2007: Largest mortgage lender Countrywide draws on its entire $11.5 billion credit line as liquidity crisis looms. Australian mortgage lender Rams also admits liquidity problems.
August 17, 2007: The Fed cut the rate at which it lends to banks by half of a percentage point to 5.75 per cent, and once more warns of credit crunch.
August 21, 2007: UK sub-prime lenders begin to withdraw mortgages.
August 28, 2007: Leipzig, Germany based Sachsen LB Landesbank faced collapse after investing in the sub-prime market. Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg buys it for euro 250m. It was one of Europe's biggest victims of the credit crisis.
September 3, 2007 German corporate lender IKB announces a a loss of $1bn on investments linked to the US sub-prime market.
September 4, 2007: London Interbank Offered Rate or *Libor rate rises to 6.7975%, highest since December 1998. (*It is the rate of interest at which banks offer to lend money to one another).
Bank of China reveals $9bn in sub-prime losses but Chinese government said its foreign exchange reserves will not be affected
September 14, 2007: British bank, Northern Rock, which relied heavily on the markets, rather than savers' deposits to fund its mortgage lending asked for and was granted emergency financial support from the Bank of England. The bank is now owned by the UK government.
September 18, 2007: The US Federal Reserve cut its main interest rate by half a percentage point for the first time in four years, to 4.75 per cent, a move that resulted in a strong rally across the globe.
September 19, 2007: The Bank of England announces that it will auction pound 10 billion.
October 1, 2007: Swiss bank UBS world's biggest bank announced losses of $3.4 billion from sub-prime related investments. Later investment bank chairman and chief executive officer Huw Jenkins stepped down.
Citigroup unveils a sub-prime related loss of $3.1 billion. Two weeks later Citigroup is forced to write down a further $5.9 billion. Within six months, its losses stand at a whopping $40 billion. On November 5, its chief executive and chairman Charles Prince resigned.
October 5, 2007: Investment bank Merrill Lynch reveals $5.6 billion sub-prime losses.
October 30, Merrill Lynch chief Stan O'Neal resigned.
November 9, 2007: US's fourth largest lender Wachovia revealed a $1.1 billion loss due to decline in value of its mortgage debt plus $600m to cover loan losses (total $1.7 billion).
November 12, 2007: The three biggest US banking groups -- Citigroup, Bank of America and JPMorganChase -- agree to a $75 billion superfund to restore confidence to credit markets.
November 13, 2007: Bank of America writes off $3 billion in sub-prime losses.
November 14, 2007: Mizuho, Japan's second largest banking group, saw a 17 per cent drop in first-half net profits and cut its full-year operating profit forecast by 13 per cent, largely as a result of sub-prime-related losses at its securities arm.
November 15, 2007: British banking major Barclays said it had written down $2.6 billion in sub-prime losses.
November 20, 2007: US mortgage guarantor Freddie Mac sets aside $1.2bn to cover bad loans and reports a $2bn loss.
December 4, 2007: US mortgage giant Fannie Mae issues $7 billion of shares to cover losses linked to the housing market.
December 6, 2007: President George W Bush outlines plans to protect more than a million homeowners hit by the US housing slump. The Bank of England cut UK interest rates for the first time since 2005, amid signs that the economy is slowing.
December 10, 2007: Swiss bank UBS reports a further $10-billion write-down caused by bad debts in the US housing market. Lloyds TSB reveals that bad debt linked to the US sub-prime mortgage crisis will cost it pound 200 million.
December 11, 2007: Fed cut interest rates for a third time to 4.25 per cent to ease the credit crunch.
December 13, 2007: World central banks agree coordinated action to inject at least $100 billion into short-term inter-bank credit markets to restore confidence.
December 19, 2007: Morgan Stanley writes off $9.4bn in sub-prime losses and sells a 9.9 per cent stake in the company to the Chinese state investment company CIC for $5bn to rebuild its capital.
January 7, 2008: President George W Bush admits that the credit crunch could slow the US economy in 2008, but says it is still fundamentally strong.
January 9, 2008: Bear Stearns boss James Cayne steps down after the firm reveals $1.9 billion in sub-prime losses, the largest in its history.
January 15, 2008: Citigroup, the largest bank in the US, reported a $9.8 billion loss for the fourth quarter and wrote down $18 billion in sub-prime losses.
January 28, 2008: Belgian bank Fortis warned its losses connected to bad US mortgage debt could be as high as $1.47 billion.
January 29, 2008: The US Federal Bureau of Investigation launched an investigation into 14 companies involved in the sub-prime mortgage crisis.
January 30, 2008: The US Federal Reserve cut interest rates to 3% from 3.5%. It was the second cut in nine days. US economic growth slowed.
February 5, 2008: US financial firm GMAC, which owns sub-prime lender Residential Capital, said it has made a $2.3 billion loss in 2007, compared with a $2.1 billion profit the year before.
February 10, 2008: Leaders from the G7 group of industrialised nations said worldwide losses from the US mortgage crisis could reach $400 billion.
February 12, 2008: Swiss bank Credit Suisse said losses on sub-prime investments were $1.8 billion.
February 13, 2008: Britain's Bradford & Bingley cut the value of its sub-prime mortgage-related investments by $284.5 million. Japan's financial watchdog said Japanese banks suffered losses of $5.6 billion by the end of 2007.
February 14, 2008: Commerzbank, Germany's second-biggest bank, cut $1.1 billion off the value of investments linked to the sub-prime mortgage crisis and warned its losses could worsen.
March 7, 2008: The former bosses of Merrill Lynch and Citigroup were questioned by a Congressional panel over their bumper pay -- despite huge, sub-prime related bosses at their banks.
March 11, 2008: Central banks made another coordinated attempt to ease conditions in the credit markets, by announcing $200 billion of new emergency lending for banks.
March 14, 2008: Investment fund Carlyle Capital failed as the credit crisis spreads from sub-prime related products to other mortgage-backed investments.
Bear Stearns received emergency funding, after its exposure to mortgage-backed investments undermined confidence in the bank.
March 17, 2008: Wall Street investment bank Bear Stearns was acquired by JPMorgan Chase for $240m, a fraction of its share price, in deal backed by $30 billion in Fed loans.
March 18, 2008: Wall Street investment banks Goldman Sachs and Lehman Brothers revealed that their first quarter profits have been halved by the credit crunch.
March 31, 2008: US Treasury announced major package to reform regulation of US financial markets and prevent future financial crises.
May 22, 2008: Swiss bank UBS, one of the worst affected by the credit crunch, launches a $15.5bn rights issue to cover some of the $37bn it lost on assets linked to US mortgage debt.
June 19, 2008: The FBI arrests 406 people, including brokers and housing developers, as part of a crackdown on alleged mortgage frauds worth $1 billion.
Separately, two former Bear Stearns workers faced criminal charges related to the collapse of two hedge funds linked to sub-prime mortgages. It is alleged they knew of the funds' problems but did not disclose them to investors, who lost a total of $1.4 billion.
July 13, 2008: US mortgage lender IndyMac collapsed -- the second-biggest bank in US history to fail.
July 14, 2008: Financial authorities step in to assist America's two largest lenders, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. As guarantors of $5 trillion worth of home loans, they are crucial to the US housing market and authorities agreed they could not be allowed to fail.
September 7, 2008: Mortgage lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- which account for nearly half of the outstanding mortgages in the US -- were rescued by the US government in one of the largest bailouts in US history.
September 10, 2008: Wall Street bank Lehman Brothers posted a loss of $3.9 billion (?2.2 billion) for the three months to August.
September 15, 2008: After days of searching frantically for a buyer, Lehman Brothers filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, becoming the first major bank to collapse since the start of the credit crisis.
US bank Merrill Lynch agreed to be taken over by Bank of America for $50 billion.
September 17, 2008: Insurer American International Group apparently was too big to fail. The mammoth insurer, which had been pushed to the brink of bankruptcy by problems originating in the US mortgage crisis, is being bailed out by the Federal Reserve.
The Fed will extend a 24-month bridge loan of $85.0 billion to the insurer, in return for an unprecedented acquisition of a 79.9 per cent stake in the firm by the central bank.
Barclays announces that it will buy Lehman US units for $1.75 billion.
September 19, 2008: The US government proposed to create a $700-billion rescue fund for the American financial sector.
The fund will be used to buy back bad debt from ailing US banks and other financial institutions.
President George W Bush urged the Congress to endorse his plan as soon as possible. Congress is expected to take a decision in the coming days.
The move increased the US public debt to $11.3 trillion.
The President said: "This is a big package because it was a big problem." He argued that the drastic measures were necessary to keep the economy going. The president admitted that the plan would be funded with tax money, but added that "over time, we're going to get a lot of the money back."
Story continues...Climax is yet to come.....

Terrorrist Attacks : Gandhian Philosophy at the best

2008-09-14T02:53:00.000+05:30

India today is truely following Gandhian philosophy. Today there were again terrorist attacks in New Delhi, right under the nose of the national govt. This is after a series of smilar attacks in Jairpur, Banglore and Ahmedabad. We did not learn anything from previous three attacks. Securities agency could have been alert to prevent this. But probably govt. at centre, which is Congress-led, is following Gandhi's philosophy, that if someone slaps you on your one chick, put forth the other chick as well. Congress-led central govt. went farther than that by giving fourth chance to the terrorists.
Prabably govt. is thinking at best how many such attacks will terrorist carry out. After they have done one such attack in each of cities in India, they will themselves stop. Why to worry and why put intelligence agency staffs with unncessary burden? Govt.'s thinking is after all cities are attacked once, terrorist will stop and eternal piece will prevail all over India.
God save India.

Coming housing bubble in India

2008-06-29T14:27:00.000+05:30

The housing bubble is imminnet upon us in India if we still consider the media reports, that this will not happen, to be true. Media is still feeding us the news that the buying a house at this moment is still a good option and one should buy a house now otherwise one would never be able to do so.
What they are doing is that they are either following ostrich's policy or working for builder's lobby to further its interest.
But we can see the signs clearly in India.

sky-rocket growth of property prices in last 2-3 years
Interest rates have been rising,
Rising inflations; inflation has been highest in last 15 years this will definitely force RBI to either increase interest rates or hold on where they are.
rising oil and other commodity prices.
Elections are on the corner this will force govt to take policy decision which are more populist than good for economy creating more unfavourable conditions for economy and for real estate industry
US have already gone into recession that would dampen the sentiments (If I am not wrong it has already done so in India) and rest of the western world is following US
IT, the main power house for grown for last decade is showing sign for slowing down considerably, putting less money into pockets of employees.
stock markets showing bearish signs
slow overall growth in corporate earnings
short-sighted real estate industry, which is bent on making hay while sun shines than ensuring a steady and long term growth for industry. If people are not greedy enough they will not raise prices disproportionately, instead value properties rationally and realisticall so the actual users can buy. But because of the short sightedness of the industry prices have gone out of control and buyers are no more interested.

Because of these very reasons, the real estate prices would crash in India and by 2010, the price would be realistic.

Oil Price - An opportunity for India

2008-06-28T20:30:00.000+05:30

Oil prices have been going through the roof. And irony is we can not do anything about it. As long as the Middle East controls the most of it and US is the policing state of the world.
So should we just sit by the side and watch people crying for help.
There would be scores of solutions for solve this problem but one Indian govt. should consider is about public transport.

The state of public transport in all Indian cities is pathetic and if govt. can improve this it may help reduce the oil import bill.
Private players would fall over each other to invest in public transport.

Credit Crunch to hit Indian IT? No

2008-01-30T18:35:00.000+05:30

Most of the Indian IT companies work in supporting legacy application, application development & management, BI & data warehousing and BPO services. These are the areas, which are very essential to support the day to day running of businesses. These functions are crucial to running the businesses. So these are the areas where businesses can not afford to cut back. Because even if these are bad times they can not abandon their existing systems or cut back to support services to their employees or customers. They need continued support to run them.
Also businesses need to keep enhancing their IT systems and processes that are required by regularatory requirements like BASEL II, SOX, etc. Such requirements can not be postponed by businesses just because there is recession.
So I strongly believe that Indian IT outsourcers would keep on getting their business from international clients.
In fact during recession, businesses would be looking at cutting cost down so they would be evaluating more areas of their IT spending which could be outsourced/offshored. So it may even open up new business opportunities and increase the business for outsourcers.
It’s the high-end consulting business which may be affected in big way as businesses may not want those services and Indian IT companies have hardly any significance presence in that area.

Emerging IT hotspots in world and competition to Indian IT

2007-12-26T19:02:00.000+05:30

A lot is being made out of Chinese threat to Indian IT industry and also threat from other emerging cheap IT labour markets like Eastern Europe (Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic), Latin America (Brazil, Argentina), China, East Asian Countries (Malaysia, Philippines), Russia, etc. But I don’t think any threat from any of these countries at least in next 10 years.
The reason why I think so is because the Outsourcing industry in the world is flourishing because of following three reasons:

Cheap IT/ Engineering labour,
English speaking skills and
Easy and quick Scalability.

All of these three skills or differentiators are equally important for a country to be a real outsourcer and a real threat to India. Because if you have engineers and they are not cheap no point (case is Russia), or you have cheap engineers and also in abundance but no English (China) no point and you have English speaking engineers but not in abundance (Latin America, East Europe and East Asia) then again no point. And all these three above criteria are satisfied by India only.
A lot is being made of China that China will be able to teach English skills to all its engineers in no time and it'll be a threat. But teaching English is no child's play, it take years to be comfortable wit it. The biggest Chinese IT outsourcing company's turnover is not more than $300m in 2006 and that is no match for TCS and Infosys of India. Also most of Chinese companies’ work is domestic.
Another thing IT project management skills (5+ year experience) are costly in China than in India. So the so-called cost advantage of China over India is just a mirage not reality. Also China mainly caters to Japanese market because Dalian area in China provides Japanese speaking resources. There is hardly any work being done for non-Asian market in China. Similarly other countries like Russia, Brazil, Philippines, etc. can not provide scalability which is required in any service industry. Outsourcing jobs requires huge numbers of engineers which are not available in these countries.But all these countries can be very good partners for Indian companies. Indians can utilise these countries by setting their operations in these countries and can tap their local market. So I feel there are more opportunities for Indian IT companies in these countries then threats. Like Indian can open centre in Russia for high end IT work and product development work because of the excellent talent there. Latin America and Eastern Europe could be used to cater for non-English clients. China and Eastern Asia can be used for servicing local and Japanese market. So emergence of these new hotspots should excite India rather intimidate.

China a Threat to India in IT? Not at least for now!

2007-12-26T18:40:00.000+05:30

In last 4-5 years if anyone has said that China could be a major competitor to India in IT outsourcing & BPO business, it would have definitely sent shocking waves among big IT players and even among IT professionals (they stand to loose jobs).
Media, especially the research firms like IDC, Gartner & Forrester had been proclaiming from perch top that China was going to be a big powerhouse very soon in IT outsourcing and India should worry about dragon. They were predicting for this to come true as early as by 2007. Everyone was saying so looking at the way China had been making strides in manufacturing and the way it was improving its hard infrastructure. And for us as well there was no way but to believe because if Chinese think of doing something they would make that happen at any cost. That’s the kind of reputation they have got.
But nothing significant in IT outsourcing industry has happened so far in China and I don’t see this happening for at least another 7-8 years. That’s when it may be starting to emerge a contender for competitor, still it would not be a competitor. That would still take few more years from there if Chinese are prepared.
Today there is not a single IT vendor in China worth its salt. There are many outsourcers like Objectiva, Bleum, etc. but they are just fringe players who would either never become serious players or would have to try too hard to become one.
Here are some of the reasons why China can not just become a serious IT player in IT outsourcing business:

There are no big IT companies comparable in scale to Indian giants like TCS, Infosys. Today to bag a big outsourcing contract you have to show scale. Otherwise you can just become a body-shopper.
Project management experience is one thing which you can not learn in an institute or college that comes only from work experience and India has that in abundance. Indians have been working in IT industry for decades now and so they have built formidable skills in this area which is their selling point and also huge differentiator.
Even though the IT industry is so small there in China still attrition in China is more than 20% as against 15% in India. Not so goon signs at the inception.
The experienced IT resources in China are 50-70% costlier than in India. Even the entry level resources are not very cheap in India and those are also not English speaking so the cost factor is hardly an advantage.
Patent and IP protection is biggest problem in China and IT being such an important and sensitive area for customers they would think twice (or more?) before sending work to China.
Should we mention English as one of the reasons? Can Chinese learn English in few years to become strong contender? Most of the business world over happens in English, even in non-English speaking countries.
Nothing works in China without guang-xi i.e. connections, so for an outsider if they have to set up shop they either have to tie-up with local partner just for guang-xi or wait for years to grow whereas in IT you have to be very fast and nimble. International players like IBM, EDS, and TCS may not find it easy to grow there as they have grown in India.
IBM, Accenture and EDS have been in China for 15-20 years still their service staff is minuscule that tells what the current IT environment there is.
Indian IT is not because of government support or any institutional support but because of entrepreneurship of some individuals. In China it’s government that is pushing, but govt. can set up manufacturing companies not IT. It’s a people business. Better the people, more is success.
China’s one child policy hampers employee movement between different Chinese cities as people normally are hesitant to leave their parents and grant parents.

This is not to say that China can never become a serious IT player and Indian IT should also not become complacent. I’d hope China to come up fast in IT so India also improve its quality and there is overall improvement.

How a leader change the course of an organisation.

2007-08-18T02:51:00.000+05:30

The role of an able leader in the development of any organisation is as important as the oxizen to our body. It's just one leader who can make or mar an organisation. There are plenty of examples scattered around us to support this.
When India was born and Nehru became the first prime minister, his aim was to make India a country worthy for her people. He along with others created a democratic and secular government, created public institutions with broader purpose of serving the people of nation, gave people of the country equal opportunity, created equality among people of various religions and social strata among other things. He set out in creating a modern India by building dams, core-industries, higher education institute, etc. which were clearly meant to take India into league of leading nations of the world. Nehru had long term vision with which he acted for india. That is where the foundation for today's vibrant India was laid. Had he went the otherway of fulfilling his own short term gains, India would not be in position where it's now. Here the leadership of a single person Nehru was very important for india to follow either the path of peace and prosperity or the path of chaos like many other countries.
Similarly Tata group was just languishing and stumbling along in early nineties when Ratan Tata took over it. At that time hardly anyone would have thought that Tata group would be so globalised that it'll take over companies around the world. But it was sheer leadership and the vision of Ratan Tata that Tata group is where it is today. It's one of the most globally diversified and most ambitious diversified group from India. This success is again simply due to the vision of a single leader Ratan Tata.
Obviously, in all this we can not deny the fact that every leader needs to have an able and supporting team which can turn the vision of a leader into reallity. But here again it's the leader who selects his team.

Advantages of Offshoring

2007-08-12T19:32:00.000+05:30

Apart from obvious advantage of saving money, there are huge benefits for entire world, some of them are listed here:

The first and obvious is benefits of lower cost for the business offshoring the work to cheaper locations like India, China, etc.
Improve the quality of their work by taking advantage of excellent and quality oriented workforce of India.
Saving huge time and tension to the Client top management which would have been spent in interviewing a lot of prospect to fill a few posts. To adress urgent requirement for people, they have to spend time which can be cut when they engage offshorer who can supply people fast, saving opportunity cost as well.
Assemble teams and projects much faster than possible as offshorers already have people of all skills on bench ready for deployment.
Huge profits for banks like HSBC, Barclays as they save more by cutting cost.
They save lot in cost-cut. The US healthcare costs have dropped by 30% since all the data is processed in low-cost locations. And these profits definitely benefits local by way of either dividend distribution or by creating more job, or by investing in new R & D, etc.
More opportunities are generated for UK / US business like more sales for airlines, Microsoft, IBM in hardware and software sales. As countries like countries grow demand for UK/US’s high end product grows so UK/US. American products and services are highly regarded and popular among this new breed of Indians creating growth opportunities for US businesses in many spheres. Similarly more businesses for food chains, sport accessories chains as more spendable money in hands of Indians
More stability in Indian region as job keeps people busy making world a peaceful place.
Ripple effect to Indian economy improving entire economy.
More lean and mean UK/US corporations so more values for shareholders
More profits so more new innovations and more high end job creation in US
Better services to customers, as without offshoring all services would not have been possible due to higher cost.
Lower cost so cheaper services and products to consumers
Lower jobs go to India so people in developed nations have to go for higher education to remain employable and improve overall education level in developed world.
Higher education so more entrepreneurial public creating more jobs in newer areas.
It’s more a tool to increase growth and boost efficiency than just pure cost saving exercise.
Companies have cut down time to market by more than half and also reduced their investment in product development as it shares the same with outsourcers.
It helps corporate clients meet their tech needs without worrying about h/w or s/w trends
These create local jobs also, recruiting local skills which are not available in India, setting up office.
Offshorers also create local jobs and employ local people.
new skills sets like handling offshore team, etc. come up in local markets
Vendors, having worked with several customers in same area, can provide a lot consulting advice from their experiences, share the experiences of other organizations and their use of particular solutions. This knowledge would not have been possible to corporations otherwise. It's like learning by others' mistakes so save time, money and stress.
Can be used by all areas of business, from software development to claims processing, HR administration, and accounting and finance, reasearch, legal, any service you can think of.
Thirty years ago, electronics companies such as Motorola, Texas Instruments, and Intel sent manufacturing overseas to cut operating costs and speed product development by taking advantage of wage gaps and time zone differences. Without global resources, these companies couldn't cost-effectively develop the hundreds of new product designs needed each year.
Studies have shown that with globalization, gross domestic product figures have gone up for all participants in the global economy, both in emerging and developed regions.
automation brought a host of new conveniences and capabilities to American companies,
the species that survives is the one that is "most adaptable to change."
by having design teams working in multiple time-zones companies can reduce time to market, so save cost and also remain first to market winning more market share.
Indian software industry association, Nasscom, figures that each new worker in the info tech sector creates seven indirect positions, from janitors to security guards. it's a virtuous economic development model.
the labor savings from global sourcing can still be substantial. But it's peanuts compared to the enormous gains in efficiency, productivity, quality, and revenues that can be achieved by fully leveraging offshore talent.
If we want to recruit a great engineer in Silicon Valley, our lead time is three months and in India it is just 2-3 days.
Clean, well-paying service jobs boost demand for educated workers, an impetus to improving schools and training. And the high-level skills learned "spill out to the economy as a whole,"
Other industry advantage: Over 60% of the commercial real estate in India in the last 3 years was leased to the IT and BPO industry players. The automobile, hotel, airline, catering, computer, telecom and construction material industries and many professional services industries like legal, recruiting and accounting get a major boost from the IT and BPO growth.
the most optimal use of global resources and challenges the benefits of trade based on comparative advantage.
faster service X-rays that are taken at night in a U.S. hospital when the radiologists are not on duty are e-mailed to foreign doctors in another time zone who analyze the x-rays and either e-mail the diagnosis to their American counterparts or call them back to discuss the results.
Products are broken down so that their respective parts are simultaneously manufactured in the U.S. and abroad -- all with close collaboration among the manufacturers. The finished product, when all of its parts are ready, is then assembled at the most convenient and economical location, faster time to market.
Due to globalisation, inflation remain arrested that creates a stabilizing factor in society.
Things become cheaper so that more people can afford things improving overall lifestyle and prosperity and bringing more homogeneity in society.

IT Services Vs. IT Product

2007-08-12T18:56:00.000+05:30

Indian IT industry and IT players have often been criticised by so-called 'arm chair critics' for being service oriented and not being product oriented. They often criticise companies like TCS and Infosys for not investing much in creating products instead looking for quick money by going after service market where money in relatively easy to be made.
But I see nothing wrong in this. It's with this same service industry that entire India got the confidence which it enthuse today. Before the birth of same the IT industry, hardly any industry was confident enough to stand up on it's own feet forget about going into the world arena but today many players from other industries like steel, automobiles, FMGC, electronics ect. are becoming global thanks to the path shown this IT service industry.
Critics forget this. They forget that to reach to the top one has to take small steps. You can not simply spring to the top but you have to take small baby steps initially then take faster steps and once confident you go into fast lane. That's what IT industry has been doing. Now we are even seeing some product companies in India as well. I will not say that we'll displace US just tomorrow in product space, that will again take time. Moutains can not be moved just overnight, they take their own time. So we'll also take time to build IT product industry.
Critics compare that TCS was even born before Microsoft and they say look where Microsoft is, but they turn blind eye to the environment each of these companies born in. Where India was when TCS was born, that was not the market supportive of any kind of industry. India was a bleeding ground for freed enterprises before 90s whereas US have been breeding ground.
So you can not compare a poor's son with that of a King's when comparing their lives and achievements. But with the kind of environment created by these giant IT service players, not the ground is set for product companies to take birth.

Oracle in DWS Space

2007-07-28T21:24:00.000+05:30

Oracle database is mainly a product suitable for transation processing systems (OLTP) and it's got a dominant position in that market, a clear leadership. This market is almost saturated now with not much growth or expansion left in this area. Newer market for growth is datawarehousing (DWH) space where the growth is at the moment and it would be high growth area in forseeable future as corporations across the world try to make sense out of data stored in OLTP systems. Such DWH systems require huge storage capacity and huge data processing capabilities. Normally the database products suitable for OLTP are not suitable for DWH.

The leader in DWH space is Teradata which can store huge amount of data and has got huge processing capabilities as well. Netezza is another promising product in this area.

Oracle being such a agressive company currently has got no product in this area and Larry Elison would definitely not give a miss to such a growth-promising area. He would definitely try to enter into this area. Building a product from scratch would not be a feasible solution for him. So Larry would definitely try to gobble up any of existing product either Teradata , which is listing soon on bourses, or Netezza.
We would not be surprised if Larry does a hostile bid, like done many in recent past in ERP space, for any of these or any other such product in DWH area.

Leaders are made. Full Stop.

2007-07-15T23:36:00.000+05:30

People say that the leaders are born and not made but I disagree with this to a great extent. I strongly believe that most leader are made and not born. It they are just born then every such person would just be declared at the time of birth that this is a leader. And by now scientists would have found out a way or a detective device to identify whether a person born is a leader or not. Then if she is leader then she would not be sent for formal education and simply given responsibilities of leadership instead of wasting time in getting formal education and taking small and hard steps to go up the laddar in any organisation, be it corporate or political or of any other kind .

Why a person go for formal education and then join an organisation at very low level and reach to the top after very gruelling learning journey of life, is to learn leadership. Look around in any walk to life and we find leaders, in business, in politics, in society, in sport, or any fields. And the people we find there whom we call leaders are those who have learnt leadership hardway, toiled hard to reach where they are today. Some learnt in business schools, some learnt on job but every one learnt in this world only. A successful sportsman can not become one just like this she has put a great amount to work to be what she is. Gandhi was never a born leader. By the time he started pactising law in South Africa he was just a normal person. But then circumstances taught him and he became a leader. Take any successfule businessman or executive, she would have gone to some school to learn a few lessons and then work hard to be what she is today.

Now the question arise then why not every person who takes formal education or joins an organisation becomes a leader. The reason is those who becomes leader very early decides that they have to become leader, they know where they have to reach and accordingly they start aquiring those skills on the way. They keep learning lessons of leadership at every small step and those learnings finally make them leaders. Some just languish here and there are those who have never decided to be a leader.
So every born person is a potential leader. The only thing is she has to learn to be leader.

Rising ruppee and experienced IT guys

2007-07-03T22:29:00.000+05:30

Indin IT companies had been growning at more than 35% y-o-y for many many years now but now that growth seemed to be slowing down considerably. There are many reason for this slow down. Rise of ruppee against the dollar is one of them.
With ruppee rising against dollar significantly in the last year and no slowing down in sight for this ascent in near future the IT compnies are hard pressed to maintain their margins and past growth. They have to look for ways to maintain margins.
One of the way being followed is to hire more and more freshers and take less of experienced guys to work on projects. There was time when all would be experienced guys on all projects in IT companies but now they are putting freshers and one experienced person for a team of 4-5 freshers. Freshers are given some initial training and are expected to work and experienced guy is expected to enforce quality on the deliverables. This way compnies are saving a huge amount by paying pittance to freshers in comparison to experienced guys. When it comes to internal appraisal /increment, not-so-freshers-now are given better increment than experienced, because if given same absolute amount, for a less experienced guy it is better increment than an experienced guy. That means company is saying indirectly to experienced guys that you are not as important as the guys next to you.
This means experienced guys have to work doubly hard to keep themselves relevant. It's not only IT skills which will be enough but also management skill, leadership skills will be required.

Infosys lapping up Capgemini: will politics allow it.

2007-07-01T16:44:00.000+05:30

Ever since the rumours of Indian IT service giant Infy taking over Europe's largest IT serices & consulting company Capgmini cropped up in the media last Friday, the shares of Capgemini on european bourses have gone up substaintially whereas Infy's shares hardly moved that shows how much European shareholders expect to gain from this deal, whereas Infy shareholders hardly see any short-term gain out of this deal.
Shareholders are mostly the creatures who see just the short term gains. They want to see how much money they can make from now upto a year or two. They hardly see if the deal is a strategic fit or it's going to be a good one for long-term or it's good for social fabric of the area where the company operates.

Definitely if eventually Infy does take over Capgemini, the first thing shareholders of CG would expect is to cut the cost. Since the operating margin of CG is hardly 5.5% whereas that of Infy's is above 25%. So shareholders of CG would expect this margin going up significantly up. For since cost cutting is the most important step management can take to improve margins in service companies. And service companies being people intensive, they would cut down employees in Europe and such other high cost western markets and hire more and more in India and other low-cost markets.
This would surely create a huge political and workers-union tension in Europe, where already unemployment rates are high.
And problem Infosy management would face is that of retaining consulting unit employees. Main reason why Infy wants to buy this is to make easy and fast inroads into lucrative consulting pie which have so far proved to be tough nut to crack for all Indian players. This business is mostly dependant on how good people you have in your team. So if Infy can not culturally merge CG than all important people would leave CG and making deal meaningless for Infy. So Infy have to leave core consulting business of intact in the way it functions and have to give full freedom to operates then only it can reap the benifit of deal in the long term.

Globalisation and a hair dresser's reaction.

2007-06-17T12:20:00.000+05:30

This weekend the first priority for me was to have haircut as I had not had one for many weeks. I went to a local hairstylist where one did’t need an appointment, just walk in. That shop has 3 hairdressers so you get chance faster. I hardly waited for 5 minutes, which I did not realise as I had picked up a local newspaper to read, before my turn came. It was Carlos who was doing haircut for me. Incidently his girlfriend is an Indian so he has learnt quite a few hindi words/phrases /short sentences. So you can just tell him that you want 'chhota hair' instead of short hair and at the end you can tell him 'badiya haircut' and dhanyawad. So that's globalisation of a sort.
The main hairdresser,named Charlie, of the shop, I guess he is owner as well, has been working on that shop for decades now as I came to know from himself on my one of my earlier visit to the shop.
When yesterday I was having haircut I overheard Charlie speaking to his customer while giving him haircut. He was talking about the current phenomenon of outsourcing to Asian countries like China & India. What Charlie was saying to his customer is that these Chinese are manufacturing everything in their country and selling back to us stealing our jobs. And the politicians and businessman are not having a long-term view of this situation and indulging in short-term profiteering. He was saying that when he was very young, around 40 years back, he read in Bible that time would come when yellow people would rule the world and he said it looked like the time was very near now. Specially he was trying to mention how Chinese are manufacturing British cars like MG in china and selling them back in Britain. But what he does not understand is that this car company had already gone bust and Chinese came after last moment to save this brand. Had Chinese not come and taken over this MG brand of cars would have become a history. Now that Chinese are manufacturing these cars a lot of businesses in dealerships, maintenance, etc are saved and so are saved the jobs in such supporting industries. Even Chinese are promising to start some manufacturing at local British factories as well means creating some manufacturing jobs.
I was sympathetic to his views as I understood what it was like loosing a job to some other country and not having much hope for future. But I can’t do anything. I am also here to steal somebody’s job. But it’s global phenomenon and everyone has to bear the fruits of this, even we Indian are also bearing in some of other way and I am sure even Chinese would also be bearing. It’s give and take thing. You loose some we gain some and vice-versa.

Presidential election

2007-06-17T00:52:00.000+05:30

The announcement of name of Pratibha Patil as the candidate for presidential elections was almost a shock to most of Indians (I think so). She was hardly known to most of Indians before her name was announced barring few areas like Maharashtra and Rajsthan where she has been active in political life.

According to the media reports she was selected because left and congress were are agreeing on any one candidate so then they chose a least controversial candidate. Least controversial means being a rubber stamp. Criteria for the highet post in nation is not credential of a person but how easily he/she could toy a party or a person's line.

Everyone is bragging now that it's triumph of womer power in India yes that is very true it's triumph of women power not because Pratibha Patil was selected but because she was selected by Sonia Gandhi.

She was only selected at the last moment tell itself that she was the last choice and all these days name of not a single women firgured in discussions.

What are we doing with our great institutions, like president's post, putting people who are more loyal to a particular family? Is this how a democracy should work.

President like Dr. Kalam has raised standards for this institution to a very high level. It'd be very difficult for any new person to even match them, forget raising them further.
I just hope that Pratibha Patil lives up to the standards of that post and she herself creates new
benchmark and leave a mark of her own.