The Girl at the Library: A Short Story

It’s already getting late. I have to rush. Even if I catch the bus, the heavy traffic....phew. Oh hurry up, I am getting late.

All the rush is for a girl at the library. She is fair with blonde hair in her twenties. There is something special about her. I wish I had all the words to describe her beauty.

It’s amazing! How she picks the book, which I plan to read that day. I wonder how interests and preferences of two people match so accurately. I always get astonished as to how she knows in advance which book I am to read that day in the library. This is not about one or two days but each and everyday.

I always look at her but she always neglects me, sometimes I feel as though she looks at me as of “not her kind”. Every day, I don’t get the book because she reads the book which I planned to. And I am very stubborn by nature. So even I read the same book. How? Thing is that, I read the book but standing behind her. But never even once, she caught me reading her book from behind. May be she knows it, but keeps quite.  I think she likes me.

It’s been many months and I have read many of the library books with the help of her. Some times I get angry at myself and think why I am doing this. But I like it, the way it is.

But how long would it last this way. I wanted to say something to her. Like asking her for a date and explain her how I read many books with her help. She would laugh at me, even think I am crank. But I wanted to do it.

So the next day I decided to have a word with her. I dressed up neatly, combed my hair and polished my boots. It’s my day. I was standing for her waiting at the library. Time passed like hell, I started worrying why she is not turning up.

Oh may be, the way she knows my mind of which book I am planning to read, even she should have known my idea of asking her for a date. I started praying, “God, please don’t let her know about what I am up to, this one day.”

Suddenly the library door swings open, there she is. The moment I see her, my courage to speak starts diminishing. I start feeling nervous. I say to myself, “Come what may, I will speak to her today.” With this, I start walking briskly towards her. Even she is coming towards me.

I stopped at one point with a welcoming smile at her, who was fast approaching me. I thought for a moment, whether, even she is heading with the same intention in her mind. I stood boldly, the moment she nears me, I begin to say “hello…….” She hurriedly passed through me and was on her way to find a book.

I really felt very bad. She should have the minimum courtesy to respect others feelings. And the book she takes now from the shelf to read is “Ghost and its feelings”. Can you believe it. Any way, it was very harsh on her part to walk in and out of my body like that. I may be of different kind “non-human”, so what?

Image source: http://aura1.gaia.com/photos/48/478567/large/LIBRARY_GIRL.jpg

Industrial Giant: Jack Welch

Jack Welch joined GE in 1960. And he believed within next ten years of heading the company. It took him a decade more, but he did achieve it. He became the CEO of the company in the year 1980. Imagine how much planning, hard work and dedication that he went through to achieve this success.

He was born on 19th November, 1935 at Salem in Massachusetts. He had stammering problem in his childhood and to make him self confident his mother used to tell him that his mind worked faster than his mouth.

When his team lost the hockey game at Salem high school, he couldn’t take it. At that moment, his mother said only one thing to him “If you don’t know how to lose, you’ll never know how to win. If you don’t know this, you shouldn’t be playing.” His mother taught him how to be tough, warm, and generous and was the prime motivator for building self confidence in him.

His father was a rail road conductor and used to bring the newspapers left behind by the passengers while returning home to night. Reading newspaper at night became a lifelong addiction for Jack and called him as “a news junkie”. Jack used to deliver news papers in the evening at Salem worked at the local post office during holidays and sold shoes on commission. At early stages of his life, he was able to learn the true value of money.

Once while he was travelling with his colleague in a plane, the air hostess addressed him as “Mr. Jack” and his friend with “Dr.” He wanted to be called as Dr. Jack Welch, so he again went back to do his PhD instead of joining the job.

He remembers till date as to how he became frustrated on his first day at work i.e. on October 17th 1960. Once an explosion occurred at his office, which blow the roof off. Every company would expect their managers to come up with new ideas, but will not expect their managers to blow up a plant. This was an instant where he could have been fired out of the company, but his corporate group executive Mr. Charlie Reed comforted him and discussed with him to see that this incident might not occur in the future. The people whom he met in his life were mentors, friends, subordinates and company heads who taught, directed and supported him and made their own wonderful contributions by paving a way in his life for him to become a CEO.

He was called as Neutron Jack at the time of massive layoffs. For this he responded that he removed the positions and not the people. But one thing he used to be very impatient with the people who under performed.

He was the one of the five sector executives in the race to become the next CEO after Reg Jones. Reg Jones called once Jack and asked, if they were travelling in a plane and if they would have got killed in a crash, then whom he would recommend to become the next CEO. To this, Jack argued that would have survived in the crash and would become the next CEO of GE. That was his zeal to become a CEO.

His part in mergers, joint ventures, was a significant one for GE’s growth. He fought against bureaucracy for many years in the company and has succeeded in bringing a concept of boundary less organization in to the company where ideas flow freely irrespective of ranks and positions.

The four E’s of leadership described by Jack were: 1. High Energy levels, 2. Ability to energize, 3. Edge to make yes/no decisions and 4. Consistently execute and deliver on time. And he said that all these E’s are connected by one P i.e. Passion.

He bought in to the company a concept called “Workouts”, where employees/ trainees would come out with their own unique ideas and suggest it for growth of the company. And at the end, some superior managers are given the responsibility of implementing these ideas, which again will be reviewed in the next session. So in this manner, the company had progressed to become a boundary less organization. He says that being a CEO is the nuts. Every day some or the other crisis would rise up. But at the end of the day it would teach the thrill of winning and pain of losing. Getting involving every employee’s mind to actively participate in the game is what the CEO Job is all about. It is just like taking the employees along with you and showing them what they are capable of doing.

It requires lot of guts to head a company. A brave heart to battle the ups and down’s in the field of business. And that’s how Jack Welch today is considered to be the most celebrated CEO in the pages of History.

Source: Jack: Straight from the gut, Autobiography of Jack Welch

Book Review: One Minute Manager

The book emphasises on the point that human resources is an important asset. And how to manage them is what “One Minute Manager” is all about. The book reveals three techniques to become a “One Minute Manager”, they are:

One Minute Goal Setting:

Usually in an organisation, what employees want to do and what employer wanted employees to do is quite different. So that is where goal setting helps in defining individual’s responsibilities and accountability, let it be for a manager or a subordinate. It is one minute, because the goal should not exceed 250 words when written on a sheet of paper, so that it can be read in a minute. Periodically checked, it should assist the individual to know how far he/she has reached the goal and to help him/her keep track of it. Once the goal is clear, solutions to the problem would be clear. When the goal is not clear and if you ask anybody whether he/she was doing a good job, obviously the reply would be “I don’t know”. So set your goals first.

One Minute Praising:

It says catch people doing right and give a clear feedback of what he/she has done great. And praise sincerely, which in future should act as a motivational factor to carry out similar kind of performances. One minute of praising is, to look straight into the eyes of the performer, and say how it contributed to growth of the organization. One minute because, if you keep on praising, at some point of time he/she would stop performing, thinking he/she is the best. So one minute praising is more than sufficient.

One Minute Reprimand:

When an employer finds out that an employee has committed a mistake, first the employer should confirm the facts. Then tell the employee precisely what went wrong. How it acted as an obstacle in the rise of the organisation. Employer should express whatever they feel and can be angry with work carried out but not on the employee as a person.

The authors feel that most of the companies spend 50-70% of their money on salaries, but only 1% of the budget on training. Instead of spending on maintenance of the building and equipment, if they concentrated on maintaining and developing people, it would result in the betterment of both the individuals as well as the organisation.

If all three techniques utilized effectively, then anyone can become a One Minute Manager. In addition to this, the authors speak about crisis intervention, 80/20 principle, how practically one minute manager works along with suitable examples and quotations throughout the book, making it livelier. It is authored by Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson. And they define one minute manager as, “One who takes very little time to achieve big results from people”. The lucid language and the “message through story format” are the specialties of the book. Read the “One Minute Manager” and become one. All the Best

A P J Abdul Kalam: Passionate story of a Sceintist

It was in late 1950’s, one day at Madras Institute of technology, all the graduating engineering students gathered for a group photograph. The occasion was farewell. Suddenly Prof. Sponder signaled the photographer to wait gesturing a student standing in the third row to come and sit beside him. The student stood spellbound, unable to express his gratitude, when his professor said “You are my best student and your hard-work will help you bring a great name for your teachers in future”. The student sat beside his professor wondering how much faith and trust his professor has on him.

True to the professor’s words, the student after many years went on to become a renowned scientist in the field of rocketry. Today, proudly called as “Missile man of India”. An avid reader of books from cosmology, celestial bodies etc to classics pe nned by Tolstoy, Hardy and Scott. Plays musical instruments like veena and listens to the Bismillah khan’s music. And usually works for eighteen hours a day. The student was A P J Abdul Kalam. He was born on October 15, 1931 at Rameshwaram in Tamil Nadu, India.

His father couldn’t afford an amount of rupees thousand, when his son was shortlisted in Madras Institute of Technology to do an engineering course. Then Zohara, his sister by mortgaging her jewelry helped him to join the college.

He stood at 9th position out of 25 who attended air force interview at Delhi. But the intake was only eight. He was disappointed, but never lost his hopes. He fetched his first job at Directorate Technical Development and production, Dehradun.

Few years later he was called for Rocket engineer position at INCOSPAR and got selected. Prof. Vikram Sarabhai was one among the interview panel to select him. Who was the then mentor of Kalam and directed him in many of the projects. Kalam considers himself to be fortunate working with Prof. Satish Dhawan, Prof. Brahm Prakash and Prof. Vikram Sarabhai. Kalam was chosen to undergo training at Prestigious NASA, when a plan was put up to set up an Equatorial Rocket launching station at Thumba.

Since he was in Delhi to meet Defense Minister Mr. Venkatraman to get an approval for launching integrated guided missile, was unable to attend his niece marriage on the same day. The project was sanctioned with 338 Crores. Dr. Arunachalam, his colleague informed about the marriage to Defense Minister. Kalam was arranged with a helicopter by Defense Minister and was at the right time to bless his niece.

At school, he was canned by his mathematics teacher Ramakrishna Iyer, for entering the class room without permission. But seeing him scoring full marks in his subject, Ramakrishna Iyer later praised Kalam in the morning assembly in front of all. And kiddingly said “Whom so ever, I cane becomes a great man. Take my word, the boy is going to bring glory to his school and teachers”. The boy not only brought glory to his school and teachers, but to the entire nation called India.

Kalam received Bharat Ratna and Indira Gandhi award in 1997 Padma Vibhushan in 1990 Padma Bhushan in 1981.

He played a leading role in the development of India's missile and nuclear weapons programs which includes India’s first Indigenous Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV-3), Agni and Prithvi. His father wanted him to become a collector, but his son exceeding his father’s dream, has become the eleventh president of India. Today he is popularly known as the “People’s President”. His autobiography “Wings of Fire” is a must read for people who have the burning desire to succeed in life. As a boat owner’s son, his financial freedom was limited. But his passion, hard-work and dedication made him what he is today.

Source: “Wings of Fire” by APJ Abdul Kalam with Arun Tiwari; www.encyclopedia.com, www.wikipedia.com.

Talk Show Queen: Oprah Winfrey

Correct pronunciation, stress on the right words and uninterrupted flow in the language, these are some characteristics of an orator. Buttaking the audience along, making them laugh, cry, think and feel is what definitely makes an orator a people’s person. With television as the media tool, if an orator could create waves in the pages of history, then definitely with out doubt it is Oprah Winfrey.

From Politicians, film icons to celebrities from all walks of life feel proud, if were called on to a show. And that show is “The Oprah Winfrey Show”. In 1984, Oprah hosted “AM Chicago”, which later on demand was made completely in to one hour show and renamed as the present “The Oprah Winfrey Show”. Which has became the highest rated show in television history. This show received three Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Host, Outstanding Talk/ Service Program and Outstanding Direction.

Her actual name was Orpah, since her relatives faced difficulty calling the name, started calling Oprah. Then on she was called as Oprah. Her production company is called as Harpo, which is the reverse of Oprah. By this it is clear that it is not in the name but the fire in her to succeed made her what she is today. Time magazine has rated her to be one of the 100 Most Influential People of the 20th Century. In 1998, she received Life time Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Science.

"Arguably the World's most powerful woman" ----CNN

"Arguably the most influential woman in the World" ----American Spectator

"One of the 100 people who mostly influenced the 20th Century" ---Time

Forbes stated Oprah to be the only black billionaire for the years 2004, 2005 and 2006 respectively and the first black women billionaire in the world history. In addition, as of September 2007, Winfrey net worth was over $2.5 billion overtaking Meg Whitman, CEO, e-Bay. And she was the highest paid TV entertainer in America, earning around $260 million yearly as of July 2007, reports TV Guide (U.S.).

If the book club by her, praised any novel or any book, it would be an instant best seller selling millions of copy. Such was the power of the Oprah’s Book club. She proved herself to be a good Boss; by taking 1065 members of her staff employees along with their families on a vacation to Hawaii, for their part of effort to make the show a great success for two decades on TV.

The fourth most watched event in American history was Oprah interviewing Michael Jackson, which was watched by over one hundred million viewers. She starred in “Color Purple” directed by Steven Spielberg. This movie fetched her, the Academy award for best supporting actress. Recently she voiced the character of “Judge Bumbled don” in the animated movie called “Bee” in 2007.

Through her show and website, “Oprah Child Predator list” helps track down accused child molesters with in 48 hours and bring them in front of law. When people were badly affected by Hurricane Katrina, through her show she collected around $ 11 million and personally donated $ 10 million to help the people.

Despite her bad childhood and heart burns in her love life, she fought back in every possible way in reaching the zenith of success. Oprah was her best as a Host, news anchor, writer, producer, actress, publisher, socialist, philanthropist, and as an educationalist. And very few excel in what ever they take up. One among them definitely would be Oprah Winfrey. But she will be remembered as a talk show Queen for ever that is for sure.

Source: http://www.oprah.com/ , http://www.biography.com/, http://www.wikipedia.com/. Image Source: http://www.ecorazzi.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/oprahshow.jpg

Mountaineer Tycoons: Edmund Hillary & Tenzing Norgay

Many experienced mountaineers all over the world who have tried to reach the summit Everest had failed and in the journey many lost their lives. George Leigh Mallory, in 1924 made his attempt and ever since vanished only to be found dead in the ice, 2000 feet below the summit, after 75 years.

The Royal Geographical Society-Alpine club, led by Colonel Henry Cecil John Hunt along with a dozen climbers, 35 Sherpa guides and 350 people carrying 18 tones of food and equipments, only mission was to conquer Mount Everest. First team to attempt was Tom Bourdillion and Dr. Charles Evans. They could only reach up to 28,720 of 29,035 feet and gave up due to exhaustion, storm and oxygen tank failures.

The Second team was sent, One 33 year old of New Zealand and the other 39 year old of Nepal. They reached till 27,900 feet and halted for the night in a tent. The temperature was 30 degree below zero. They spent the night fighting the cold only to continue their journey the next day.

The sun as risen, both of them started for accomplishing their mission. They took with them oxygen tanks which would last for roughly seven hours and other tanks left out by their previous team. The summit was 5.5 vertical miles above sea level, where Jets fly today, 100 miles-an-hour cold wind which hits like a knife and the air so thin, where the human brain and lungs do not function properly. In spite of all this obstacles, the Mount Everest was finally conquered.

The day was May 29, 1953. And the Mount Everest first conquerors were Edmund Hillary of New Zealand and Tenzing Norgay of Nepal. Queen Elizabeth-II honored Edmund as Knight Commander of the order of the British Empire and Tenzing Norgay with George Medal of Britain. Then came the question put forth by public and media, “who was the first to reach the Mt. Everest, was it Edmund or Norgay”. Colonel Henry John Hunt of Royal Geographical Society cleared the controversy by declaring “they reached it together, as a team”.

Edmund served as New Zealand’s High Commissioner to India, Bangladesh and Nepal from 1985-1988. Norgay died in the year 1986. Edmund through his foundation called Sir Edmund Hillary Himalayan trust built many schools, hospitals and helped the people in the villages of Nepal. Edmund is the first person to stand on both poles and on Everest. Sir Edmund Hillary died on January 11, 2008.

Then after the first conquerors of Mt. Everest till now, 3000 people including Edmund’s son Peter and Norgay’s son Jamling have reached the summit. On a single day in 2003, 118 people climbed and reached Mount Everest.

But only Pioneers will remain in the pages of history and in the hearts of people. Take the road less travelled is Success, Taking the path never travelled and setting tracks is History.

Source: The Hindu, January 12, 2008 and Internet.

History: A Bench Mark for Success CHARLES CHAPLIN

Laughter is like a medicine. One who makes others laugh is considered to be a doctor. One who made the world laugh and occupied a special place in the pages of History is Charlie Chaplin.

The full name of Charlie Chaplin is Charlie Spencer Chaplin. He was born on April 16 1889, in England. His parents were stage performers. His childhood was clouded with sadness. His father and mother got divorced. His father died because of his addiction to the alcohol. His mother lost her singing voice, which pushed Charlie on to stage at the age of five. His mother health was suffered seriously and was admitted in hospital. His brother name was Sidney Chaplin, who was at sea. These situations forced Charlie to lead his childhood alone.

At the age of sixteen, for his wonderful performance in Sherlock Holmes’s play, his name was featured in news papers. At the age of twenty four, he joined Keystone pictures and his first comedy appearance was made in “Making a Living”. With in a year, he directed his first comedy “Twenty minutes of love”. His marriage life was not good. His fourth marriage with Oona was a happy one and lasted forever. His first full length movie was “The Kid” in which he captured his childhood life. The movie which brought him “The world’s funniest man” fame was “The Gold Rush”. He didn’t leave his British Citizenship and American people thought that he was supporting communism. For these two reasons, Americans wanted him to be out of their country. After the grand success of the movie “The Limelight”, Charlie along with his family went to Britain for a vacation. Waiting for this moment, American Government posed a rule restricting his entry again to their country. And his name was removed from Los-Angeles “Walk of Fame” celebrity list. Since he was not allowed to enter into America, he along with his family moved to Switzerland. There he continued making his movies. His Autobiography is considered to be one of the finest literatures.

After twenty years, considering his spectacular contribution to the field of cinema, America welcomed him back and the academy awarded him with “The Life Time Achievement” award. Queen Elizabeth awarded Charlie Chaplin with “Sir” title. His name was again included in “Walk of Fame” celebrity list. Even though his childhood was filled with sorrows and his life took him through many difficult times, with laughter as his strength he made his life a great success and a memorable one.If you too have any strength with strong determination to succeed in life, you too can find some place in the pages of History.

ATTRITION: THE PRESENT SCENARIO

Indian economy is booming. Many Multinational companies are making their presence stronger because of the growth opportunities and available market in India. Low cost knowledge workers constitute our country to be one of the best preferred destinations for Multinational companies. With lots of MNC’s around, job opportunities are plenty, at the same time individuals leaving one company and shifting to another company are increasing. In simple, an employee leaving the organization is known as ATTRITION. Literarily it means “the reduction in staff and employees in a company through normal means such as retirement and resignation”.
Fresh graduates and post graduates are attracted towards huge salaries, infrastructure of international level and new working environment. Soon to realize, these factors are necessary but not important. What really important is a job which challenges them, where there is a scope for learning new skills and foremost the contribution that he or she makes to the growth of the company. Experienced individual leaves the company because of the poor reward, recognition system and role stagnation.
SECTOR Attrition %

Sales
36%

Banking and Finance
25%

Outsourcing
23%

Manufacturing
11%

Hewitt Associates, the Worlds foremost provider of human resources consulting and outsourcing firm have conducted a survey titled “Attrition and retention study Asia Pacific” in 2006. The main objective of the survey was to know the reasons “why employees leave the organization” and “what are the strategies followed widely to retain them”.

And the results are quite interesting; employees leave the organization because of:

Inequity of compensation
Limited growth opportunities
Role stagnation

And the study also found out that the top three strategies followed by many organizations in retaining the employees are:

Pay above market
Provide opportunities to learn new skills
Provide favourable work life balance

The survey was conducted in 170 foreign owned, locally owned and joint venture companies from China, Hongkong, India, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand covering over 2,30,000 employees..

With rupee becoming stronger, the IT & BPO companies in India are forced to tighten the salary hikes. Now the situation is “You would get more only if you work more and perform better”. Salary cost is the biggest component of cost, accounting for 45% of IT Companies costs and 40% of BPO costs. So, now it has become a biggest challenge for HR professionals to retain the employees in the current trend. Finally, there is a desperate need for HR managers to identify the reasons for attrition before the situation reaching its climax, which is employees leaving the organization.


Source: http://www.hewitt.com/, http://www.indiabpo.com/ , http://www.answer.com/, HRD Newsletter (January, May, June, July 2007), Times of India (July 23, 2007). Image source: dqindia.ciol.com/2004/images/attrition_15april2k4.jpg

The English Pronounciation

I had the opportunity of attending a workshop on Pronunciation skills and Accent neutralization. The workshop was conducted by Centre for English Language Training, Department of English, University College of Engineering, Osmania University campus, Hyderabad. The workshop was of six hours which was divided in to two sessions. The morning session was Pronunciation skills and the afternoon session was Accent neutralization. The class started with Ms. D. Grace Sunitha, explaining some of the words which were wrongly pronounced. We usually find some symbols beside every word in the dictionary, which shows how a word should be correctly pronounced often. These symbols and the way it sounds were interactively practiced in the workshop. There are 44 sounds in English. Out of which 24 are consonant sounds and the rest 20 are vowel sounds. The workshop provided me a chance to better understand the British and American accents.

Usually in British English (which is commonly spoken in India) mostly the stress on the letter “R” is missed or not pronounced clearly and where as in American English quite oppositely the letter “R” is stressed and pronounced clearly. And we were taught many exceptions in English language pronunciation. Here I would like to mention some of the words, like “CRICKET”, the actual pronunciation is “CRICKIT” and the word Menu which should be pronounced like “Menyu” (please don’t consider the spelling, it is just for pronunciation). And in the dictionary you can find the word Menu transcribed as /menju:/ for pronunciation.

In the end of the first session, Ms. Grace has suggested to purchase Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary and practice the pronunciation part. In the second session, Mr. P. Shreehari, for a short while imitated how a native speaker of different languages (Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam etc) would have spoken English language. I could very easily notice the influence of mother tongue of various languages on English. Humorous, but it is a fact. Mr. Shreehari took us through the ways of neutralizing the mother tongue influence by proper pronunciation of English language. Some of the books and dictionaries suggested by Mr. Shreehari are 1.Longman Dictionary of contemporary English (with CD) which has both the British and American way of pronunciations, 2. English Pronunciation in U.S by Mark Hancock (with CD), 3.A handbook for English Language Laboratory by Suresh kumar and Shreehari, 4.Murphy’s English grammar by Raymond Murphy.

The courses offered by CELT-Osmania are 1.Advanced course in Communication skills and personality development, 2.Interactive course in English grammar and Vocabulary, 3.Workshop on Pronunciation skills and accent neutralization, 4.Workshop on English grammar. The center also offers tailor made courses for corporate sector and Individual groups. Fresh batches commences every month, usually in the second week. The one day workshop fee is Rs.300 and Rs.2500 for regular courses.
English language Work shops and courses show us the door, the key to speak or write good and correct English is in our hands. I hope this piece of writing/ information would prove to be a useful one for my friends and individuals who are interested in sharpening their other tongue language (English).

Image source: http://englishinguiabasico.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/conversation1.jpg