Happiness is the measure of Success

Happiness is the measure of our success, whether we are students, home makers, working individuals or CEOs of company. It is our ability to see good things in the way we carry out our responsibilities and feel positive about them, gets us happiness. We sometimes feel remorse that a particular thing has not gone well but brooding over it all the time will only make us sick and prevent us from enjoying other good things around us or what we had done until that point. 

It requires a positive mind set, devoid of any ego, superiority feeling or one-up man ship, to always feel happy. A difficult task with ever surmounting challenges in front of us, but let us keep trying like a child does. 

 #mindset #happiness #successfactors

Evolution of Writing ✍️


Palm leaf writing

Nail Inscriptions

Bird feather writing

Fountain pen writing 

Mechanical Typewriter 

Ball point Pen

Electric/ Electronic Typewriter 

Electronic Printer

Inkjet Printer

Laser Printer 

Voice Printer 

Digital Printing

3D Printing

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Over the last many centuries, the art and the method of writing have taken many forms. Have the human thoughts also evolved and progressed during these times ? 

They have evolved surely yes, due to humans conquering technology , but are they felt more beneficial to the society today? – from love, affection, devotion, valour and unity to hatred, jealous,demeaning, derogatory and destructive? 

When those olden days’ scholars wrote on palm leaves, they had time to think and write scriptures or hymns or virtues that had preserved the human minds from evil thoughts and actions. Today, majority of the minds have been largely conditioned to think and act in a harmful way to fellow humans in the name of free speech and writing. 

Progressive in technology, Yes.

Progressive in thoughts & actions, Not yet. 

We have to blame ourselves because we have allowed us to be at this sorry state of co-existence of lesser love and more hatred in society that is constantly fuelled by the divisive forces and shamelessly propagated by irresponsible, guiltless media. What are we leaving behind for our future generations? Do you hope they will be less materialistic and more compassionate?

Culture Change in Organisations

Came cross this interesting chart about titles that speaks about the ingredients for a successful change of culture in organisations. Kudos to those who had helped to make it.

I am sure the above titles are worth reading and some are in my reading list. In today’s fast corporate world, people hardly get time to implement these recommendations and change the status quo for the fear that it will not be welcomed by many, especially if the organisations are a decade or more old and the leadership is unchanged during this period.

In still older organisations, this turns out to be an impossible task as people of successive generations are still serving the company and their views and practices quiet differ, resisting the change. But the same set of people follow a new culture when the organisation changes hands and the new management follows a different ethos and culture. Those unable to adapt, has to take the pink slip and move out. Culture shocks are not for everybody’s liking when organisations are taken over or merged.

In Indian corporate context, there are enough examples of companies having successive generations of employees toeing the same set of work culture that had seen them go stronger over the years. Their leadership takes great effort to bring together the different generations seamlessly and stitch up a tight system that works in tandem with the organisation’s goals.

In the recent years many start-ups have made headlines for their faster growth and their founder owners brought in a culture that resonates with success and they mostly bring in a second level management team that could identify with their vision and work ethos.

There is no definite formula for culture change that fits all. It is a continuous learning process to realign practices and methods to suit people on board and the customers.

#management #ethos #leadership #culture #change

People can discard you but not your brain

We have been hearing a lot about people leaving organisations after a long stint. Many leave voluntarily and some involuntarily. When someone is laid off, they are just letting you go, taking away your job but not your intellectual capability. Believe that your strengths are unique and your brain power could much more fabulous work for another organisation or for your own start-up. Organisations always say that a lay-off is a business decision because it was a bad management goof-up at the first place. You may have been a high performer, yet business units get closed, offices get closed, cost cuts happen or company is under an acquisition.

Involuntary separation pains you but it gives you resilience, an opportunity to work on weak spots in you and turns you a stronger individual. There is no social stigma that you need to be afraid of and there is no need to fear that your near and dear ones will leave you high & dry. On the contrary it lets you to know who your true friends and connections are, for they will stay with you long.

Focus and perseverance land you in a better job or work. Who knows, you may choose to pursue your passion that may not reward you much but provides you with a deep satisfaction and a happy frame of mind.

Branding & Marketing


Many think that both branding and marketing are the same and focus only on one activity. It is not so. A brand is assiduously built over a longer period of time and marketing is all about maximising sales revenue y-o-y. A Brand is nurtured to retain customer loyalty, confidence, trust and fairness in dealing with both internal and external customers. A well positioned brand immensely helps the marketing team to increase the sales and the reach. Large corporates don’t have a brand manager but a brand custodian as he is devil’s advocate inside the company to oppose any action that will tarnish the image of the brand. 

Communication is an important element in both branding and marketing exercises. As Peter Drucker said, the most important thing in communication is hearing what is not said and branding is the perfect example. 

We have seen the successes of many Indian consumer brands – TATA, Amul, Reliance, Maruti, ITC, Wipro, Bajaj, Dabur, IPL to name a few. But some brands have failed – Kingfisher, HMT, Jet Airways, Sahara, Onida – because there was no sustained effort and financial discipline from their management teams to keep the brand alive and they were not innovative. 

Build Better Brands for a long haul – hope the new age start-ups thriving on huge funding sustain their momentum to stay alive on their own feet. Otherwise investors will be the losers. 

 #sales #management #branding #marketing 

Are we unique?

What makes some of us think that we are unique and way ahead than the others – Achievements? Salary? Position? Clout? Social followers? Skills? Degrees? 

Making the best use of available opportunities, having the willingness to mutually exchange advantages to collaborate with others and co-creating successful careers or business models are essential to become unique.

It is not about what we think of ourselves but what others think of us and acknowledge that we are way ahead of the rest.

 #opportunities #businessmodels #careers

Pride & Humility

They never walk together as long as we know the difference between “who is right” and “what is right”.

No one teaches you the difference either.It is how we shape ourselves to learn the difference through our experiences and feedback from others.

It is a struggle we encounter every day. The sooner we tame it, the better for our peaceful living.

Making time

It is never about Having time. It is always about Making time.

What is easy:

Complaining, pretending, blaming, judging, resenting, ignoring, lying, cheating, controlling, bullying.

What is hard:

Inspiring, learning, mentoring, trusting, empowering, building, connecting, growing, helping, influencing.

Hard things need focus and dedication. I keep trying….

3 R’s of a Professional career

Retrospect, Replenish, Rejuvenate

Mid career blues is a worrying factor for many and they start feeling that their careers are not where they would like them to be. As we spend years in the profession ,we set our priorities and goals that condition our mind to shape our thoughts and actions. We become obsessed with them and sometimes fail to notice that there have been deviations in our path that had involuntarily crept in and consequently these deviations moved us away from achieving our goals.

There are individuals who had set out on their career path with certain skills or qualifications. As years passed by, they realise that these skills are not the ones that will continue to be useful to help them grow in their work place. There are enough success stories of individuals who had identified newer opportunities and grabbed them in spite of the fact that these opportunities required totally different set of skills. They acquired those new skills and repositioned them to enjoy rewarding careers. If you observe, some of those people who are successful today in Information Technology, Finance, FinTech, Retail or Asset Management are those who have switched their career from the traditional jobs like manufacturing , banking, government services or infrastructure industry.

As working professionals, we need to RETROSPECT our past and assess where we would reach to realise our goals with our current skills. A strong mind is required at this stage to move away if the present is not conducive and is not going to take us to the future that has huge potential.

REPLENISHMENT is the way of finding out what has been used up in our inventory of skills and if they could be improved to be more useful to meet the demands of industry and to reward us more in the work place. Picking up management lessons from a good school or learning a new software language or engaging a mentor to help unearth our latent talents are a few areas we could look at.

Having armed with a new inventory of skills, let us REJUVENATE our career, injecting it with thoughts that would freshen up our outlook about a renewed future. Pursuing fresh ideas keeps our minds alert and inquisitive to learn new things.

#career

#learning

#management

#jobs

Mindfulness

The new year has started on a more cautious note than the past year with people getting infected in huge clusters all over the world. However with the fatalities on a low count it is a solace that the situation is not all that alarming.

The happenings in the last 2 years have put enormous stress and anxiety on people of all ages. Living with the pandemic, which is slowly turning into an epidemic, has taught us the benefits of keeping our mind free of what is going around us – loved ones leaving this world, friends & relatives loosing their jobs, missing good times at the work place etc.

We are fully aware of what mindfulness is all about and we have the basic intrinsic ability to know how it would help us. But only our willingness to work on it to open our minds and to be unresponsive to outside events makes us feel inner peace and tranquility. It is a tough ask but practice makes an act perfect.

Let us get into a few minutes of meditation every day and enjoy its immense contribution to our work-life balance.

#mindfulness

#worklifebalance