Friday, 11 November 2011

What is Life all about... It is living it!!!



Wayne Dyer says, ''Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice.’’.... 
                          
                      After my first article on employability, which gave me lot of encouragement from Sri K P Acharya and many of my friends and well wishers, I am now presenting you some ideas I have collected on my way to Motivate people. 

                  I do regular Motivational workshops. In fact, I used a comparison in my latest workshop at Anjani Cements for their marketing team. I told them the story of SEETHANVESHANA in Ramayana where Hanuman and his team finds out that Seetha has been abducted by Ravana and taken to Lanka across the ocean in his Pushpaka Vimana. Though hanuman through a curse forgets his capability of flying across the ocean, Jambavantha mentors him and explains him his additional capacities of flying which Hanuman had not realised. I told the Anjani Cement marketing team that I am that Jambavantha, who has come to transform the Hanumans of Anjani Team to be the Mighty Anjaneyas.

                      There is a saying that when you fall, don’t see the place where you fell, instead see the place from where you slipped. Life is about correcting mistakes." Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do, but it doesn't get you anywhere".

                     Ayn Rand says, ''The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me.'' 

                       Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Says, ''Even if you are a sweeper, sweep the floor so well, that angels passing by from above will stop for a while and say, wow, what a sweeper!!!''
                                    
 Life is ten percent what you make it - and ninety percent how you take it!

This is explained by this small story-

‘’One day I hopped into a taxi and we took off for the airport. We were driving in the right lane when suddenly a car jumped out of a parking space right in front of us. My taxi driver slammed on his breaks, skidded, and missed the other car by just inches! The driver of the other car whipped his head around and started yelling at us.
My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And I mean he was really friendly. So I asked, "Why did you just do that? This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to the hospital!"
            This is when my taxi driver taught me what I now call "The Law of the Garbage Truck." He explained that many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it and sometimes they'll dump it on you.
                   
                      Don't take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Don't take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home, or on the street. The bottom line is that successful people don't let garbage trucks take over their day.
Life's too short to wake up in the morning with regrets, "Love the people who treat you right. Forgive the ones who don't."
                                        The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers, wider Freeways, but narrower viewpoints. We spend more, but have less, we buy more, but enjoy less. We have bigger houses and smaller families, more conveniences, but less time. We have more degrees but less sense, more knowledge, but less judgment, more experts, yet more problems, more medicine, but less wellness.
 We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often.

                           We've learned how to make a living, but not a life. We've added years to life not life to years. We've been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet a new neighbour. We conquered outer space but not inner space. We've done larger things, but not better things.

                            We've cleaned up the air, but polluted the soul. We've conquered the atom, but not our prejudice. We write more, but learn less. We plan more, but accomplish less. We've learned to rush, but not to wait. We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies than ever, but we communicate less and less.

                        These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion, big men and small character, steep profits and shallow relationships. These are the days of two incomes but more divorce, fancier houses, but broken homes. These are days of quick trips, disposable diapers, throwaway morality, one night stands, overweight bodies, and pills that do everything from cheer, to quiet, to kill.

    Are we going to take some time to think where we are up to?
This brings us to the point of philosophy and the profound truth of the almighty.

If God exists - Why so much pain and suffering?

                A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed. As the barber began to work, they began to have a good conversation. They talked about so many things and various subjects. When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said, “I don’t believe that God exists.”
“Why do you say that,” asked the customer.
“Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn’t exist. Tell me, if God exists, would there be so many sick people? Would there be abandoned children? If God existed there would be neither suffering nor pain. I can’t imagine a loving God who would allow all these things.”

              The customer thought for a moment but didn’t respond because He didn’t want to start an argument. The barber finished his job and the customer left the shop. Just as he left the barber shop he saw a man in the street with long, string, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and unkept. The customer turned back and entered the barbershop again and he said to the barber, “You know what? Barbers do not exist.”
    “How can you say that,” asked the surprised barber. “I am here, I am a barber and I just worked on you!” “No!” the customer exclaimed. “Barbers don’t exist because if they did there would be no people with long dirty hair and untrimmed beards like that man outside.” “Ah, but barbers do exists! What happens is people don’t come to me.”
 “Exactly,” affirmed the customer. “That’s the point! God, too, does exist! What happens is people do not go to Him or look for Him. That’s why there’s so much pain and suffering in the world.”

Instead of trying to correct the problem …
 Many years ago, while on a visit to America, a wealthy Chinese businessman was fascinated by a powerful microscope. Looking through its lens to study crystals, he was amazed and most fascinated at their beauty and detail. So with great delight he decided to purchase one and take it back to his homeland.
 Back home, this businessman was thoroughly enjoying using the fine instrument until one day he so happened to examine some rice he was planning to eat for dinner. Much to his dismay, he discovered that there were tiny living creatures crawling in it.
 Since he was especially fond of this staple food in his daily diet, he wondered what to do. Finally he concluded that there was only one way out of his dilemma; he would destroy the instrument that caused him to discover this very distasteful fact!

 So in his denial and dismay he smashed the microscope to pieces. Yep, just broke that thing into scrap and there was nothing left but broken parts. "How foolish," we might say.
 But many people do the same thing with their own discoveries about themselves and about life.
 So often the heart of man will refuse an obvious truth and instead of trying to deal or correct the problem and make things better with their knowledge or discoveries, they attack, break and destroy the instruments that somehow enlighten or help bring them a very clear insight to the real problems.

 Sometimes a friend becomes our microscope! Sometimes our mates are those instruments!
 Maybe a teacher or a relative magnifies our hidden problems and we refuse to see. But we have all in our own way, helped destroy the instrument of enlightenment and refused to correct the problem!

I have provided some food for thought in this issue.... Till next issue, Live your life KING SIZE, like there is no tomorrow, and today is the first day of the rest of your life.


AMARNATH RAO.
Amar.rao.06@gmail.com



Thursday, 10 November 2011

Employability is the need of the hour for Gen(Y).



 I will concentrate on the most important aspect of my young friends, which is undoubtedly, the employment. When we were young, we aspired to be employed by any of the many Public undertakings like, BEL, ECIL, BHEL or many others. Respect used to be a lot, money was decent, and the main thing is, the prospective in-laws were eager to get married their daughters to us. Came 1990s, and we all were up for a cultural shock. Things like Wipro and Infosys happened, and some new phenomena like the Campus interviews started happening regularly. The children started coming home in the 3rd year only with appointment letter with salaries more than what the father aspired to take home around retirement time from Good companies.
The world started looking towards India, especially Bangalore for opening anything in India. Citybank opened 75 ATMs in one go in Bangalore as Bangalore had the maximum middleclass population in the world. Then the rest of them stood on Queue like, KFC, Pizza Hut, and what have you. India and India youth saw a new India and a bright future. Engineering colleges and MBA colleges became a cottage industry, with one being opened in every Kilo meter or so, both In Bangalore and Hyderabad and surroundings. Millions of students were lured and are being lured to these places, and the graduates  are being manufactured. 
This brings us to the current topic of mine. Can all these be employed? In a recent national Student symposium, it was declared that it is not that there is unemployment problem for these students. But, it was said that these students have an EMPLOYABILITY problem. The industry finds them unemployable, and through the scores of articles, panel discussions round the nation, it has been brought to light that these students or majority of them are far from being touched by the industry with barged pole, leave alone being employed.  I have been in the Industry for around 4 decades, being Computer Society Chairman of both Bangalore and Hyderabad Chapters, and also being Treasurer of NHRD. I find lot of truth in this. That is why, I am crusading now with going round to colleges charging up the youth, and giving them lot of ideas to counter the employability problem. 

One of my popular lectures is the Ten Commandment, I have chartered, which I tell them, thou shalt. Here are these gems.

1. Be good In Communicating Skills – Oral & Written. Majority of the youth fail in this department, when this is the most important skills they should posses. When the job market is not that hot, and there is hectic competition for the placements, the students almost become like commodities for the placement people with shopping list to pick from the shelf. Those who impress the selectors get the job. How do you impress people if you cannot communicate well?

2. LISTEN: One of the greatest enemies of human being is his impatience to ‘listen’. Very few of us are good listeners. The student has many disturbances in life, which will make him fail in interview, lose valuable tips given by the teachers and elders. 

3. Be Project Experienced: Most of the students take short cuts when it comes to project. Yes, it is very difficult to get project work with so many students. Normally, colleges do not take the responsibility to talk to corporate and get the students projects. This makes the students go to Ameerpet, where they get the CD and the write up for the picking. This will kill you in the interview, as you do not have any work experience and the interviewer will try to grill you in your project.

4. Be a TEAM Person: Gone are the days of Solos. Today, corporate want a TEAM man. Show that you belong to a team.

5. Be able to think & talk in English: Most of us think in our mother tongue and translate it into English. This makes it sometimes Tenglish instead of English. This is a paradigm shift, and will take a lot of effort from the students. One of the remedies for this is to stop conversing in your mother tongue at least in the colleges, and start talking to everybody in English. If you are looking for a global employability, then English and English alone can help you.

6. Be taking part in Extra Curricular Activities: College gives you enough opportunity to participate in extracurricular activities like sports, seminars, student chapters of Technical Societies to name a few. This will give the student an edge in interviews when they will be picked for showing ability to take up more responsibility.

7. Do well in Exams: This is a must, but as far as employability is concerned, this becomes a necessary condition and not a sufficient condition and hence the lower ranking. Many reputed organizations have drawn a limit to be shortlisted for Campus, and that way, getting good marks become essential. One problem student face is the paradigm shift when they get into the corporate. There is no pass mark of 40 % or a A grade of 70%. They have no other choice other than 100%.

8.Work for more hours a day: Productivity is the buzz word in the corporate. Though they talk about smart work, they expect you to work those extra hours. So, practice now only.

9. Learn foreign Languages: Every organization worth the name has branches in more one country. So, they appreciate it if you already have taken proactive steps to learn any of the foreign languages on your own. 

10. Be Smart, smartly dressed & Keep SMILING…… They say, if you keep smiling, the other guy will not know what you are up to!!!!

These 10 commandments will definitely help you, as they say that the soft skills are the one which has advantage over the technical skills. So, my dear young friends, study well, be active, enjoy your life, and be the BEST and be successful. 
         
Somebody was telling me the other day that the Gen(Y) people need patience and they sent a SMS to God, which read, ‘’ God give me patience, and please hurry it up’’

I wish you  and the magazine all the very best, and need any counseling any time,

 I am available in Face Book, or contact me in amar.rao.06@gmail.com.


-
Amarnath Rao
CHIEF KNOWLEDGE CATALYST,
MIND MATTERS,
CONVENOR- SIG - SOFT SKILLS(CSI)
Mobile:+919440651855:
              +918885443916:
I had no shoes and complained till I saw a man without leg