1."Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity."
- George Patton
2."The best teacher is the one who suggests rather than dogmatizes, and inspires his listener with the wish to teach himself. - Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton"
3."The very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. You can't blow an uncertain trumpet. - Theodore M. Hesburgh"
4."The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet notwithstanding, go out and meet it." - Thucydides"
5."If you do not know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere." - Henry Kissinger
6."You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing you think you cannot do."
Eleanor Roosevelt
7."Don't be afraid to take a big step when one is indicated. You can't cross a chasm in two small steps." David Lloyd George
8."Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, concerned citizens can change world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has." - Margaret Mead
9."I am certainly not one of those who need to be prodded. In fact, if anything, I am the prod." - Sir Winston Churchill
10."Be willing to make decisions. That's the most important quality in a good leader." - General George S. Patton Jr.
11."Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other." - John F. Kennedy
Cheers,
Amol
Showing posts with label Work. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Work. Show all posts
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Monday, October 06, 2008
Desire to do something extra
Desire to do something extra …………
I have a big canvas in front of me now. I want to paint something beautiful on it. But not really sure what to paint? Many times, it happens that you want to do something. You have that inner feeling within you to do it but you are clueless about what it is. I am thinking about innovation and applying that innovation to the products resulting in either new products or enhancing existing products effectively.
I wish I had a factory which emits the products as and how I want……………..
Cheers,
Amol
I have a big canvas in front of me now. I want to paint something beautiful on it. But not really sure what to paint? Many times, it happens that you want to do something. You have that inner feeling within you to do it but you are clueless about what it is. I am thinking about innovation and applying that innovation to the products resulting in either new products or enhancing existing products effectively.
I wish I had a factory which emits the products as and how I want……………..
Cheers,
Amol
Friday, August 22, 2008
Meeting with CIO of one of the top Investment banks
How does it feel when you are having dinner with CIO of the one of leading investment banks? How does it feel when you can actually have a glass of scotch in your hand while taking to him?
Well…well…well….All I can say is that it feels great. You will get this opportunity very rarely in your life where you can express your opinion with the CIO of one of the world’s largest investment bank.
I have had my share few months back. It was really good learning experience for me. I cannot disclose the names due to copyrights and branding issues. But I can definitely tell my grandchildren that you know what…I talked to Mr. XXX in person. :)
Cheers,
Amol
Well…well…well….All I can say is that it feels great. You will get this opportunity very rarely in your life where you can express your opinion with the CIO of one of the world’s largest investment bank.
I have had my share few months back. It was really good learning experience for me. I cannot disclose the names due to copyrights and branding issues. But I can definitely tell my grandchildren that you know what…I talked to Mr. XXX in person. :)
Cheers,
Amol
Monday, November 19, 2007
Quotable Quote
“Luck in life always exists in the form of an abstract class that cannot be instantiated directly and needs to be inherited by hard work and dedication.”
Cheers,
Amol
Cheers,
Amol
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Professionalism
Professionalism is nothing but pursuit of an activity as an occupation. You can choose any profession and succeed in it. But professionalism matters in every profession. Professionalism is not about money only. It has various other dimensions as well. So many times we hear this phrase that this particular person is professional. We all have our own definitions of it. I am not trying to redefine it here but just want to add various dimensions to it for software professionals.
So, what makes you a real professional? One can start with attitude. Your attitude is the most important thing. You should have positive attitude otherwise it will be difficult to achieve results. In today’s result oriented world, having the right attitude in conjunction with passion and desire to work will give fruits of success. Typically, people crib about bad working conditions, salary factor, partiality etc. In larger organizations, you will always find some reason to blame for. But if you have positive attitude then it will emit positive energy and ultimately positive results. No matter what happens, you should concentrate on tasks in your hand. While doing people management since last few years, I find a very common trend. People just carry their outside/personal/family problems to workplaces. And that affects your attitude, your working style and ultimately output. I believe that ability to ‘Switch on and off’ is the key factor in being a true professional. Irrespective of all the problems, you should concentrate on job in your hand. You just cannot run away from your basic job duties because of the blame game. You can be right or wrong as well but that should not take away your focus from job in hand. One thing you should always remember that you are getting paid for doing your job. That job can be anything from writing code to painting walls. For example, if you have heated arguments with your driver then it does not mean that your driver should drive your car carelessly. You as an employer will not accept it. Right? Similarly, if you have problems at the work place while working on live projects or products in Software industry; then that do not mean that it should affect your customers. Customers should get high quality products because that is why they are paying for. Isn’t it? Young generation developers may find lot of job opportunities but they should also concentrate on professionalism. You can be a child at home. BUT you cannot afford to be a child or behave like a child at work. That will not be tolerated any way. So, having right attitude and positive energy is equally important.
You should have right kind of skill sets required for your job. Of course, having right attitude is not sufficient. It has to be supplemented with right kind of skills. Most of the times, you will be given tasks to work on new technology features. You just should not run away from these tasks just because you are not aware about it. You have to train yourself continuously to acquire desired skill set required for your job. Consider you are the best batsman in the world and you have been asked to open an innings without a bat in your hand. That is the role of skill set. You have to have that kind of bat of skills if you want to bat for your team in any cricket match. ;)
Communication is also equally important pillar of the professionalism. You have to have communication skills. You should be able to express your selves. You should be able to understand what has been told to you. You should able to understand requirements. You should be able to write professional business mails. In short you have to excel in verbal as well as written communication. Then it is has to be in conjunction with manners. It is all about how you talk to your managers, sub-ordinates, customers etc. Trust me, how you greet people is also counted sometimes. Giving a smile or saying hello to the people around you is not going to harm you. But it definitely portrays positive picture of you.
Dear friends, these are just few petals from the professionalism flower box. As and how you march forward in your career you will go on finding other petals from the box. :)
Cheers,
Amol
So, what makes you a real professional? One can start with attitude. Your attitude is the most important thing. You should have positive attitude otherwise it will be difficult to achieve results. In today’s result oriented world, having the right attitude in conjunction with passion and desire to work will give fruits of success. Typically, people crib about bad working conditions, salary factor, partiality etc. In larger organizations, you will always find some reason to blame for. But if you have positive attitude then it will emit positive energy and ultimately positive results. No matter what happens, you should concentrate on tasks in your hand. While doing people management since last few years, I find a very common trend. People just carry their outside/personal/family problems to workplaces. And that affects your attitude, your working style and ultimately output. I believe that ability to ‘Switch on and off’ is the key factor in being a true professional. Irrespective of all the problems, you should concentrate on job in your hand. You just cannot run away from your basic job duties because of the blame game. You can be right or wrong as well but that should not take away your focus from job in hand. One thing you should always remember that you are getting paid for doing your job. That job can be anything from writing code to painting walls. For example, if you have heated arguments with your driver then it does not mean that your driver should drive your car carelessly. You as an employer will not accept it. Right? Similarly, if you have problems at the work place while working on live projects or products in Software industry; then that do not mean that it should affect your customers. Customers should get high quality products because that is why they are paying for. Isn’t it? Young generation developers may find lot of job opportunities but they should also concentrate on professionalism. You can be a child at home. BUT you cannot afford to be a child or behave like a child at work. That will not be tolerated any way. So, having right attitude and positive energy is equally important.
You should have right kind of skill sets required for your job. Of course, having right attitude is not sufficient. It has to be supplemented with right kind of skills. Most of the times, you will be given tasks to work on new technology features. You just should not run away from these tasks just because you are not aware about it. You have to train yourself continuously to acquire desired skill set required for your job. Consider you are the best batsman in the world and you have been asked to open an innings without a bat in your hand. That is the role of skill set. You have to have that kind of bat of skills if you want to bat for your team in any cricket match. ;)
Communication is also equally important pillar of the professionalism. You have to have communication skills. You should be able to express your selves. You should be able to understand what has been told to you. You should able to understand requirements. You should be able to write professional business mails. In short you have to excel in verbal as well as written communication. Then it is has to be in conjunction with manners. It is all about how you talk to your managers, sub-ordinates, customers etc. Trust me, how you greet people is also counted sometimes. Giving a smile or saying hello to the people around you is not going to harm you. But it definitely portrays positive picture of you.
Dear friends, these are just few petals from the professionalism flower box. As and how you march forward in your career you will go on finding other petals from the box. :)
Cheers,
Amol
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Where are you looking today......
I came across this beautiful article written by Evan Mehlenbacher as given below:
BUZZARD
If you put a buzzard in a pen that is 6 feet by 8 feet and is entirely open at the top, the bird, in spite of its ability to fly, will be an absolute prisoner. The reason is that a buzzard always begins a flight from the ground with a run of 10 to 12 feet. Without space to run, as is its habit, it will not even attempt to fly, but will remain a prisoner for life in a small jail with no top.BATThe ordinary bat that flies around at night, a remarkably nimble creature in the air, cannot take off from a level place. If it is placed on the floor or flat ground, all it can do is shuffle about helplessly and, no doubt, painfully, until it reaches some slight elevation from which it can throw itself into the air. Then, at once, it takes off like a flash.
BUMBLEBEE
A bumblebee, if dropped into an open tumbler, will be there until it dies, unless it is taken out. It never sees the means of escape at the top, but persists in trying to find some way out through the sides near the bottom. It will seek a way where none exists, until it expires.
PEOPLE
In many ways, humans are like the buzzard, the bat, and the bumblebee. They struggle about with all their problems and frustrations, never realizing that all they have to do is look up.
Sorrow looks back, worry looks around, but faith looks up.Where are you looking today?
BUZZARD
If you put a buzzard in a pen that is 6 feet by 8 feet and is entirely open at the top, the bird, in spite of its ability to fly, will be an absolute prisoner. The reason is that a buzzard always begins a flight from the ground with a run of 10 to 12 feet. Without space to run, as is its habit, it will not even attempt to fly, but will remain a prisoner for life in a small jail with no top.BATThe ordinary bat that flies around at night, a remarkably nimble creature in the air, cannot take off from a level place. If it is placed on the floor or flat ground, all it can do is shuffle about helplessly and, no doubt, painfully, until it reaches some slight elevation from which it can throw itself into the air. Then, at once, it takes off like a flash.
BUMBLEBEE
A bumblebee, if dropped into an open tumbler, will be there until it dies, unless it is taken out. It never sees the means of escape at the top, but persists in trying to find some way out through the sides near the bottom. It will seek a way where none exists, until it expires.
PEOPLE
In many ways, humans are like the buzzard, the bat, and the bumblebee. They struggle about with all their problems and frustrations, never realizing that all they have to do is look up.
Sorrow looks back, worry looks around, but faith looks up.Where are you looking today?
Thursday, October 12, 2006
My overseas work experience……..
How did I get job in Sydney?
I was in Sydney for almost a year or so. After initial struggle of finding job (because not having any local experience), I finally got the job in the Software company located at North Sydney. Thankfully this struggle was not so long and I managed to get used to new circumstances in that time span. I remembered that evening when I got a call from CTO of this company. He was looking for .NET, SQL Server professionals and hence called me for technical interview next day. Then I quickly analyzed the options to travel to North Sydney. By this time, I was familiar with Sydney city internals. I was lucky to have my best friends and relatives there for me. That helped me a lot for smooth transition. And I must say that everyone helped me in whichever way they can. But getting a job was my own battle, right? Okay, so next day I catch a train to North Sydney and was thrilled to know that this train would cross the harbor bridge. It was raining heavily that time. I entered the office premises. Again, thanks to accurate road maps and directions.
Can you imagine what was I thinking that time? My first overseas interview. Totally unfamiliar circumstances, unfamiliar people, unfamiliar places and so on. I must say that before leaving India, I was very much settled in my job. I was full of butterflies in my stomach. I was anxious. I was curious and I was also little bit nervous. One good looking receptionist politely asked me to have a seat and offered me a cup of coffee, which I politely refused. I was told to come there at 5 O’clock in the evening. And I reached there at 4.50. So, I waited, waited and waited for next 35 minutes. Obviously, the CTO was a busy man and was help up in some kind of conference. Finally, the wait was over and CTO himself came to see me. He apologized me 10 times for coming late. He started with informal chat and offered me a cup of coffee again. ;) I was amused by his personality and his manners. Then we went to the conference room and started the first part of interview.
First part was sort of generic. He asked me generic questions. He was basically trying to check if I could suit in his organization or not. First part was over and I though that I had performed well in the first part. In the second part, lots of techie questions/scenarios were discussed. I was really confident discussing these questions which ranged from ASP to .NET to BizTalk to XML to BPEL4WS. That was really good time of the interview. And I could feel that during this time my anxiety, butterflies were gone completely. After almost 1 hour, he finally told me to join his office from very next day. And all I could remember is that I was sitting in a train back to home. All the time I was thinking that people say that every dog has its own day. And yes, that was my day. ;) Getting job there in the IT Company (that is also purely development) was not an easy task. This is what I was told. I had met few people and everybody advised me to be patient as it was going to be a tough task. This is how I was in and I knew that half of the battle was won in one day.
My first day in office
Suit bute me aa kanhya..band bajane ko…:) No, no, I was not singing this song while going to office. ;) I was well dressed (as usual ;)) and entered the office premises. Then the formal round of introduction took place with all team members. Monday was the meeting time in the office. Everybody was served the coffee. And who do you think bought coffee for all team members from the coffee shop? It was MD of the company. He was more interested in the project I was about to join. That was a big account for the company and initially a team of 10 people was set up. I was now one of them.I was expecting formal round of induction for at least 2-3 days. That is what we do in domestic companies. So, I was in sort of holiday mood. I was also happy to know there were 2 Indians in the team. You know…mitti ki khushbu aayi :) Then I met this guy, my project leader. He handed me various print outs. It included a database diagram consisting 40 tables or so, functional specification and a very high-level technical specification. He welcomed me and then assigned me 30 ASP.NET pages to be completed in 40 hours. :) That was my first day. Later on he told me that he wanted to check my capabilities in the first week itself. ;)
Conclusion
My friends, my juniors, relatives….so many times ask me about what I learned there while working. Well, I can go on and on writing on this but this time I will keep it really short. WORK HARD AND PARTY HARD. You will be given lot of responsibilities if they think you are capable of doing.
I was in Sydney for almost a year or so. After initial struggle of finding job (because not having any local experience), I finally got the job in the Software company located at North Sydney. Thankfully this struggle was not so long and I managed to get used to new circumstances in that time span. I remembered that evening when I got a call from CTO of this company. He was looking for .NET, SQL Server professionals and hence called me for technical interview next day. Then I quickly analyzed the options to travel to North Sydney. By this time, I was familiar with Sydney city internals. I was lucky to have my best friends and relatives there for me. That helped me a lot for smooth transition. And I must say that everyone helped me in whichever way they can. But getting a job was my own battle, right? Okay, so next day I catch a train to North Sydney and was thrilled to know that this train would cross the harbor bridge. It was raining heavily that time. I entered the office premises. Again, thanks to accurate road maps and directions.
Can you imagine what was I thinking that time? My first overseas interview. Totally unfamiliar circumstances, unfamiliar people, unfamiliar places and so on. I must say that before leaving India, I was very much settled in my job. I was full of butterflies in my stomach. I was anxious. I was curious and I was also little bit nervous. One good looking receptionist politely asked me to have a seat and offered me a cup of coffee, which I politely refused. I was told to come there at 5 O’clock in the evening. And I reached there at 4.50. So, I waited, waited and waited for next 35 minutes. Obviously, the CTO was a busy man and was help up in some kind of conference. Finally, the wait was over and CTO himself came to see me. He apologized me 10 times for coming late. He started with informal chat and offered me a cup of coffee again. ;) I was amused by his personality and his manners. Then we went to the conference room and started the first part of interview.
First part was sort of generic. He asked me generic questions. He was basically trying to check if I could suit in his organization or not. First part was over and I though that I had performed well in the first part. In the second part, lots of techie questions/scenarios were discussed. I was really confident discussing these questions which ranged from ASP to .NET to BizTalk to XML to BPEL4WS. That was really good time of the interview. And I could feel that during this time my anxiety, butterflies were gone completely. After almost 1 hour, he finally told me to join his office from very next day. And all I could remember is that I was sitting in a train back to home. All the time I was thinking that people say that every dog has its own day. And yes, that was my day. ;) Getting job there in the IT Company (that is also purely development) was not an easy task. This is what I was told. I had met few people and everybody advised me to be patient as it was going to be a tough task. This is how I was in and I knew that half of the battle was won in one day.
My first day in office
Suit bute me aa kanhya..band bajane ko…:) No, no, I was not singing this song while going to office. ;) I was well dressed (as usual ;)) and entered the office premises. Then the formal round of introduction took place with all team members. Monday was the meeting time in the office. Everybody was served the coffee. And who do you think bought coffee for all team members from the coffee shop? It was MD of the company. He was more interested in the project I was about to join. That was a big account for the company and initially a team of 10 people was set up. I was now one of them.I was expecting formal round of induction for at least 2-3 days. That is what we do in domestic companies. So, I was in sort of holiday mood. I was also happy to know there were 2 Indians in the team. You know…mitti ki khushbu aayi :) Then I met this guy, my project leader. He handed me various print outs. It included a database diagram consisting 40 tables or so, functional specification and a very high-level technical specification. He welcomed me and then assigned me 30 ASP.NET pages to be completed in 40 hours. :) That was my first day. Later on he told me that he wanted to check my capabilities in the first week itself. ;)
Conclusion
My friends, my juniors, relatives….so many times ask me about what I learned there while working. Well, I can go on and on writing on this but this time I will keep it really short. WORK HARD AND PARTY HARD. You will be given lot of responsibilities if they think you are capable of doing.
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