“Can Management Gurus Manage?”
May 31, 2008
Read T T Ram Mohan’s interesting article in the Economic Times. It’s called ” Can Management Gurus Manage?”.
Its amusing to think that the Professor of Organizational Behaviour is going through a major crisis in his personal life and that the Professor of Economics is virtually broke. This reminds me of a story.
Many years ago when I was studying at the XLRI, Jamshedpur, the construction workers carrying out building work on campus went on strike.
Email: Friend or Foe ?
May 30, 2008
In the context of managing time, do you consider email as a friend or a foe? The amount of time executives use to deal with email is increasing by the minute, as it were. The Daily Telegraph reported a study done by the Radicati Group which threw up some amazing figures. Worldwide email traffic, they say, has reached 196 billion messages a day and is predicted to reach 374 billion messages per day in 2011- which is not very far off.
Changing Times for IITians
May 29, 2008
Many of my generation were used to the fact that a large number of graduates from India’s prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) would go abroad, largely to the US.
Like many trends that have revealed a new changed face of India, here’s one concerning the present day IITians. I read an article in Business Today which indicates that an increasing number of IITians are opting for jobs in India. They are not looking at opportunities abroad -as they did in the past-because they see India as the place to be in the future.
As many as 84 % of IIT graduates from 2002 to 2008 gave India as their preferred destination. The US had fallen to 9 % as against 30 % for the graduates of 1964-2001.
Career goals too showed interesting differences. The Company they join, Consulting and Entrepreneurship were the top 3 career choices.
In another survey, 72 % of 677 IIT graduates polled said India was the which held the most promise for success in 10 years time. That’s why we now speak of the reverse brain drain.
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This is Post No: 178 of the “A Step A Day” series : To provide perspective and provoke thought to facilitate self-development across a wide spectrum of issues- big and small- crucial for executive success
Back Your Interest
May 28, 2008
As the evening was coming to an end, I mentioned to my friends that increasingly people in India were turning to newer and more unconventional businesses than before. This struck me as being very true. More so in the case of ladies who were looking to take up different vocations while managing their homes and families. In the old days, a career meant a job at the office where more often than not one was an engineer or a finance professional, if not a marketer or a HR person.
Do You Have A Family Budget?
May 27, 2008
As soon as a new Government is elected, we wonder how on earth the Finance Minister will manage to take care of the huge expenses required to run the nation without taking recourse to increasing taxes. We face the same issues although on a much smaller scale when it comes to balancing our family budget.
In India, as elsewhere in many parts of the world, costs of living are increasing. Inflation in India has been at its highest point for the last few years. The Economist recently reported that the inflation rate is closer to 10 % than the latest estimates of 7.82%. Prices for most items are rising because of increases in prices of two dissimilar but rhyming items- international crude and food.
How Close is Too Close?
May 26, 2008
I was chatting with Dana, the new intern from the US about how she was getting on. She had come out to Bengaluru in India for an internship of 2 months - her first trip outside the United States.
Her observations included the fact that she hadn’t seen so many people in one place in all her life. The cricket matches of the Indian Premier League were on and with friends she had seen a few on TV and one in person. The Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru is quite big but is nothing compared to Kolkata’s Eden Gardens which for a good match can house more than 100,000 people!
Why People Resist Change
May 25, 2008
Shepherding any change program has its own challenges. For many managers today, change is a part of life and they are frequently tasked to bring about change in their operations. These changes are aimed to improve - amongst other things- profitability, productivity, quality and customer satisfaction.
An important aspect of change management is the people aspect. What I would call the People Side of Change. Before we plan to implement a change program, it’s a good idea to prepare ourselves for a certain amount of resistance because this is inevitable.
Self Starters
May 24, 2008
One more training program was over. We were discussing the program and how well it went off. The subject naturally turned to how much of the learnings the participants would actually put into practice back on the job. This is a matter of some concern for all associated with people development. To what extent do participants actually attempt to incorporate their learnings into their managerial styles/individual behaviours when they get back to work?
E-mail Mistakes
May 23, 2008
Very amusing to read the mistakes people have made while sending emails. I must add that it is amusing for everyone except the sender.
“What’s the Worst E-Mail Mistake You Ever Made?” is an article in the New York Times by Stephen J. Dubner.
Top 10 in India’s Best Workplaces
May 22, 2008
Does your organization:
- inspire success?
- have an approachable management?
- generate pride in the corporate image?
- foster transparency?
- follow ethical practices?
- focus on employee development?
- provide a caring environment?
- share power?
- empower employees?
If it does all these, it could be considered to be a good place to work. Today’s Times of India
