Value (for money) Lanes - A perfect team outing!

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this post are purely personal and does not reflect the views of the organization I work with. I have made a sincere attempt to collate all the learning I picked up during our team outing. For most part of this post the pics are gonna do the talking while its author hunts frivolously for those charming one liners!

Ever since I joined this wonderful team, I was looking for an opportunity to know my team members and understand them better. The opportunity finally presented itself in the form of a team outing to Value Lanes on 16th April 2008.

On your mark @ MTV Banashankari - (6:35 am - 6:50 am)

We were asked to assemble at MTV at sharp 6:35 am. But people kept trickling until 6:45 am. We finally pushed at 5 minutes to 7 am. Everyone appeared really excited and all set to have a gala time. Little did they know that value lanes wasn't a resort!

Did someone really say "smile please!" I can't quite recall...

Did they know that it wasn't gonna be a joy ride altogether?

Ek Do Teen and wheels went rolling... (7 am - 8:45 am)

The bus we had hired was a 20 seater and was almost jam packed with excited souls. The driver gave the journey just the perfect start by playing some really good songs from the movie Gaalipata. The title track for sure left everyone enthused and geared up. After a while we all decided to play dumb charades. It was funny to see people at their creative best trying intemperately to convey the name of the movie. How can I forget my own desperate attempt to convey the word 'life' of the movie 'Life is beautiful'? It was simply superb!

Value Lanes ki daire main: (9:00 am)

We finally reached our dream destination at around 9:00 am. We were pretty hungry. Col Arun Dhar and Major Vibhav Kapoor received our team. The weather showed all signs of being unmerciful for the rest of the day. What seemed to be yet another bright and sunny day, was soon gonna show us true colours of a typical day in summer! After serving themselves with the morning breakfast and nimbu pani/ tea/ coffee, everyone relaxed in the shade for a while.

Ah! You guys got a challenging day ahead. So you better buckup!

Thodi si briefing and thodi si sneak peeking! (10:00 am - 10:30 am)

Soon after assembling at the specified venue for an introduction, we were given our chest numbers and a cap! Then we were split into 2 teams. Major Vaibhav Kapoor asked for two volunteers to lead the first event of the day. Venkat and Abhilash came forward to volunteer. They went with major Vaibhav Kapoor for a briefing on the first task. In the meanwhile Arun Dhar shared with us the story of how Value Lanes was conceived and also the success story of various organizations who were benefited by this corporate Training and Development venture of theirs. After 20 minutes, Venkat and Abhilash came back with Vaibhav Kapoor. They seemed very eager to explain to the team what the first challenge was. Arun Dhar left us with the task of discovering one fact about each team member which no one in the team knew about.

Dynamic Obstacle Course (DOC) : (10:30 am - 11:40 am)

Our first task of the day! All we had to do was to move a bucket of water from one end of the course to another by overcoming the dynamic obstacles. Both the teams agreed to complete the task in 45 minutes. The record time was 33 minutes. After planning and building a killer strategy for 10 minutes, we were all set to rock. We finally got going when Vaibhav Kapoor blew the whistle. The task seemed to be a child's play in the beginning. It was only after the actual execution began, we realized how over confident we were. After grappling really hard with time and resources we had, we only managed to complete the task half way. Even though we had asked for an extra time of 25 minutes, we weren't able to complete the DOC challenge completely!

Key takeaways from the exercise:

• Plan while you plan and execute while you execute. Don't mix them up!
• Always make notes while gathering the requirements. Don't rely only on your memory power.
• A great leader is one who can bring the best out of every team member.
• Situational leadership is the sign of a healthy team. Don't curb it.
• Avoid resource idle time.
• Even the best laid plans fail. Always have a plan B.
• After a failure it is extremely essential to do a route cause analysis.
• Make the best use of the most important resource you have. The human resource!
  

Time for some feedback and not to forget The Johari Window: (11:45 am - 1:10 pm)

After finishing the first task of the day, it was time for some analysis. We were all eager to know how we had fared in the challenge. Dhamu and Vaibhav Kapoor shared their observations with us and gave us some valuable feed backs. After that Major Vaibhav Kapoor briefed us about how to give and receive a feedback. A few things about feed back.

Key points on giving a feed back:

• Give a feed back only if the other person wants it.
• Validate your feed back with immaculate data and specificity.
• Convey the impact the current behavior on you.
• Avoid sounding advisory in tone.
• Never give feed backs in public. They should always be given one to one.
• A feed back can also be positive!
• For heaven's sake avoid passing judgments while giving a feed back.
  

Key points on receiving a feed back:

• Receive a feed back with an open mind.
• Never take comments made in the feed back personally.
• Look for patterns in the feed back. May be you might have a grey area that needs an urgent attention.
• Always look for the source from where the feed back is coming. If you feel it is genuine, then go ahead and work on it!

We all know that every team invariably involves a great resource called human resource. It becomes essential to deal with this valuable resource with utmost care and diligence. Having an insight on a resourceful tool like 'The Johari Window' really helps.

Johari Window - A cognitive psychological tool

Lunch Break: (1:15 pm - 2:00 pm)

After what can be arguably described as an excruciating first half, we all deserved a good lunch. So we hurried towards our rooms to freshen up a bit and off we went to serve ourselves an awaiting déjeuner. After relishing the luncheon, I had a couple of glasses of nimbu pani. I must confess at this point in time. I never had these many glasses of nimbu pani in a single day. (Nope! Not even on ram navamis...)

Keyboard: (2:10 pm - 3:00 pm)

Post lunch session promised to be more 'hot' and 'happening'. We were again divided into 3 teams. Three from each team viz. Deb, Laxmi and Vidhya volunteered to lead this event. They were briefed quite in detail by Vaibhav Kapoor. After gathering the requirements, each of the team leads went back to their teams to explain the task.

The task assigned involved punching 40 cards (serially numbered from 1-40, without duplicates) sequentially in 30 seconds. A warning whistle would be blown at the end of 25th second after which the teams would be expected to evacuate the place, failing which entitles them for a disqualification. After 3 attempts, we were able to punch a maximum of 19 cards. The other teams managed to punch up to 25 cards. But one good thing about each team was they improved after every attempt. In the end the three teams entered the place together and managed to punch about 33 cards in 30 seconds!

Key takeaways from the exercise:

• Meticulous planning always helps. Failing to plan is planning to fail.
• Divide the task in to sub tasks so that you get tangible touch points to quantify your goal.
  Managing the time and resources at disposal is quintessential for the ssuccessof any project.
  

Rapelling - When I bid farewell to the acrophobic in me. (3:30 pm t0 4:45 pm)

In this task, each one of us would be rappelling from a height of 65-70 feet. This activity mainly aimed at building your self confidence. It was an extremely good exercise which helped everyone to discover the unknown adventurer in all of us. Okies... The pics will do the rest of the talking!

After that, there was no looking back...

Joy - The satisfaction of a job well done :-)

Key takeaways from the exercise:

• Every task seems big and daunting in the beginning. It is only when you get into it, that you discover that it is do-able.
• Everyone enjoys to be in the comfort zone. But it takes a hell lot of courage to step out of it and perform in zones of discomfort as well.
• Joy is best described as the satisfaction of a job well done :-)

Rafting in manchinbele lake - (5:00 pm - 6:15 pm)

This was allegedly the last challenge we had to complete. We were divided into 2 teams and each team was asked to present the design of their raft in 10 minutes. Our team lead by Suhas and the other team lead by Parthipan submitted the design within the specified time.

After the final approval from major, we went ahead with the actual task of building the raft, which was allotted a time slot of 25 minutes. Our team (Mermaids) built it in 24:14 minutes. The other team (Columbia) built the raft in 24:32 minutes.

Major finally blew the whistle indicating the beginning of the challenge. The rafts were carefully guided in to the luke warm waters of Manchinbele lake. We had awesome fun rowing the rafts built by us. Both the teams completed the task satisfactorily. It was a thrilling experience to row the the raft.

Rafting - Columbia v/s Mermaids (trailing)

Yep! We did it :-) Koi hain jo humse takkar lena chahega?

Key takeaways from the exercise:

• Trust your team members. It can work wonders.
• Give your best shot in what you are assigned. The rest will fall in place.
• Always try to minimize the resource idle time.
  

Time to windup: (6:40 pm - 7:15 pm)

After serving ourselves with some snacks, we assembled back at the place where we had begun the day. Arun and Vaibhav summed up the days learning. Dhamu shared with us his observations during the raft building activity. He was as articulate as ever. After that the teams were asked to jot down what they would take back as a learning and implement them at their work place. Every team explained in brief the key take aways from this team outing.

But one task was still left over. It was the task of discovering a fact about your teammate that no one in the team knew about. Arun gently reminded us the task and asked us to complete it on our way back home. With heavy hearts and mind full of learning, we left the place at aapproximately7:30 pm.

On the way back, each one in the team shared with the rest, a fact that no one knew about them. I must say that it provided just the perfect ending to a great day. I got to know my team members from really close quarters! Thanks a lot to the c2 team for organizing such a wonderful outbound learning activity.

PS: Ma'm was absolutely right when she had mentioned during our previous outbound learning activity; it is during team outings that people shed their so called 'concious IT sheaths' and show their real self. I, for one tried to be so! Hope the same happened with others as well.

~IT's My Life

What keeps me motivated?

It is so unlikely of me. Anyone who has known me from my engineering days and who happens to read this post of mine would say, "Sala is ko kya hua hai yaar. Ab kisko patane chal hai?" I don't blame them. All throughout my engineering career, I was known more for being involved in stuff like debate, seminar and etc etc... I was the last person you would find on the ground, playing any sport. You definitely had to pull a trick or two to convince me to 'sweat out' on the field. I dunno why I kept myself away from playing any kind of sport? It leaves me baffled when I look back at those 4 years of engineering. Gosh! I never played any sport.

I told myself, "Enough is enough! Bahut hogaya nautanki. I gotta do something about this." I really wanted to revamp my lifestyle. That was when I decided to get started. I needed to ensure that my stint wasn't ephemeral and I kept it alive for the rest of my life (I am optimist. That explains my claims!). So I spoke with a couple of my friends (G and V) and enquired if I could find a badminton court to play. Apparently G is also crazy about playing badminton. I finally managed to find a court near my room. You know badminton is relatively a costly hobby to pursue in bangalore. But since we found an outdoor court, problem khatam!

I also needed to get myself back in shape. Not that I had begun to look like a watermelon or something similar. But I needed to aquire what people often say, "You need to be fit in order to play badminton yaar!" So I decided to hit the gym. Fortunately there is this gym close to my room. It didn't take me long to make up my mind and I absolutely had no second thoughts about my new venture. It was in the first week of february I guess that I gave my first (ever) entry in to the gym. It takes a decent amount of determination to beat the laziness in you and drag yourself to the gym. It is a challenge of a sort when an idea such as this strikes you during winter! But I was not gonna give up. I also wanted to make sure that I wouldn't try any weights in the gym. I somehow can't come to terms with the guys who believe in 'pumping iron' really hard to become a macho-man! My focus was to reduce some unsaturated fats in my body and get back to shape at the earliest. You really got to be very clear as to what you wish to achieve by 'gymming'! A battle well begun is half won:)

My routine basically involves a few stretches, followed by a decent jog on the tread mill (or an occasional cycling) and then a few other fitness excercies. I have experminted more with the tread than any other equipment in the gym. I would like to share with you some of my typical routines that I have been following till date. They say that your workout on tread mill must roughly follow a pyramid shape when you represent it in terms of time slices/distances. The following two routines is what I have been following mostly. I have swapped them quite frequently, mostly on occasions when one seemed monotonous.

Routine 1:

Activity - jogging on the treadmill

Total time - 25-30 min approximately
Total distance covered - 3.4 km approx
Total calories burnt - 200 kcal

Speed - Distance

• 4km/hr - 100m

• 5km/hr - 500m

• 6km/hr - 600m

• 7km/hr - 300m

• 8km/hr - 500m

• 9km/hr - 500m

• 10km/hr - 300m

• 11km/hr - 150m

• 12 km/hr - 150m

• 6km/hr - 300km

Routine 2:
Total calories burt - 250 Kcal

Activity 1- Cycling

Total time - 15-20 min approx
Total distance covered - 8 km
Total calories burnt - 100 kcal approx
Average speed - 25-27 km/hr

Activity2 - jogging on treadmill

Total time - 20-25 min approx
Total distance covered - 2.5 km approx
Total calories burnt - 150 kcal

Speed - Distance

• 4km/hr - 100m

• 5km/hr - 500m

• 6km/hr - 600m

• 7km/hr - 300m

• 8km/hr - 500m

• 9km/hr - 250m

• 10km/hr - 150m

• 6km/hr - 100m

You can also try out other combinations on the tread mill. I have chosen distance as the parameter of break up. You can chose time slots and work out at these speeds for selected time intervals.

You might have begun to think by now. Doesn't this routine get monotonous after sometime? My answer is yes! Wouldn't you feel bored eating the same food over and over again? When that happens what do you do? You would naturally opt for a change. That is exactly what I did too. When a routine gets mundane, change it!

A few things that might help you keep your motvation levels high.

1. Always have your expectations realistic. Don't rush in to things and hope that you will lose 20kgs in 20 days or so. Your body took sometime to add on weight. So it will defintely take some time to get rid of it as well.
   
2. It is always good to give yourself a day or two off from your regular routine, just to ensure you escape that monotonicity. You might choose to go for a walk in the park or play you favorite sport like badminton or cricket during weekends.
   
3. For heaven's sake don't make this 'going-to-gym' activity a pain in the a**. Trust me you will start to hate it after some time. Learn to make it more enjoyable venture such that you would look forward to hitting the gym in full spirits everyday.
   
4. Last but not the least, stop comparing yourself with others in the gym. It is very easy to get carried away by somebody's routine. If you know what you want at the end of the day, I am sure you will have more 'satisfaction' and your 'energy levels' will never drop.

I hope I have shared my experiences to the fullest. As far as I am concerned, I find myself totally benefitted by this new hobby or lifestyle, whatever you wish to call. I just hope to hang on to it as long as I can

~IT's My Life

Times of Mind - Subroto Bagchi speaks

I happened to visit MindTree's official site. As I was navigating through various links, I clicked this link under knowledge center where Subroto Bagchi shares with us some of the valuable learnings of his life. Read on...

~IT's My Life

Challenging yourself...

Forget about challenging others. Have you ever challenged yourself? When was the last time you told yourself, "Look I don't care what others are aiming at. I just wanna achieve this within this particular period of time." For a long time I seemed to have forgotten the real fun one gets by challenging oneself. I think an opportunity has unfolded itself in front of me. Work place main nayi challenges! I'm loving it. It is surely pushing me to my limits. I am infact discovering how far I can stretch. Trust me. It is difficult to win over yourself than winning over others!

I watched the movie 'Race' the other night. I liked a quote which roughly reads, "Winners win because they play to win. Losers lose because they play to defeat others." Many a time the intensity and the appropriacy of purpose with which you enter the arena matters a lot in ensuring your victory!

Well I surely seem to have gotten both of them straight and clear. Let's see if I can live up to my challenges.

PS: By the way my stint of hitting the gym is still on. It has been over 2 months now. I am enjoying it to the core. My motivation levels are pretty much the same as they were on day 1. I shall share my experiences about the same shortly.

~IT's My Life

Tagged - Yet another time:)

Niveditha tagged me on her blog. It is just a 'small questionnaire'. Just spilling my mind out. Lemme see how I perform!

Disclaimer: I am not sure if I have gotten my choices in the right order. I'll leave that to you to figure out!

• Ten things you wish you could say to people right now (don’t take names):
  

1. Live and Let Live!
   
2. A smile costs nothing, let go your khanjoosi for a while :)
   
3. Never compromise with your dreams and goals in life!
   
4. I am music freak, so guys please bear with some loud music when I am around!
   
5. If you haven't understood me still, don't worry... you have an entire life time to figure out!
   
6. I am aware of my responsibilities. So stop sending those reminders!
   
7. Life always offers to you in abundance. May be it's the appropriacy of the 'merchandise' that you have issues with!
8. Receiving an appreciation in the right way is an art. You better cultivate it!
   
9. Load balancing in life is an essential evil.
   
10. A few people have really inspired me very subtly in life. Thanks a ton folks!
    

• Nine things about yourself:

1. I am a blogger. (Just a gentle reminder)
2. I don't like music, I just love it.
3. Of late staying fit seems to have taken me in its stride. I'm loving it!
   
4. I watch too many movies.
5. Strange but true. I don't follow cricket religiously.
6. A TV remote controller is the last thing you will find in my hand!
7. I like reading a lot. Time is a big constraint though.
8. I hate travelling. Smitten by inertia!!!
   
9. I am an optimist to the core.

• Eight ways to win your heart:
  

1. Comment on my blog! (I tried be more meaner than that. But failed as usual!)
2. I love people who are simple.
3. A never dying smiling face :)
4. Passion towards life.
5. Love yourself. Be what you are:)
6. Music somehow creeps in. It truly binds hearts.
7. They say, "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach". Thank god! Mine isn't a round about.
   
8. Willingness to share things in life with the much needed!

• Seven things that cross your mind a lot:
  

1. What's the purpose of my existence?
2. If people could interpret my comments in 10 different ways, why is it that they tend to embrace the one that misconceives my comments the best?
3. Why do some people come in to your life and stay, while others leave?
4. Why is our education system so hell bent on quantifying intelligence and calculatedly curbing creativity?
5. Why do some people do things just for the heck of it? Is it because of the unavailability of choices?
   
6. Why don't people use the words "Thank you" and "Sorry" more often than they swear?
   
7. Am I doing things that I always wanted to do in life?

• Six things you wish you never did or want to do:
  

1. Innumerable typos.
   
2. Get stuck in an elevator. I am a claustrophobic!
   
3. Put on some weight!
4. I wish I had judged a few people in my life better than I did.
5. Miss an exam for no fault of mine.
   
6. Stop blogging!
   

• Five Turn offs:
  

1. Hypocrisy.
2. Cynicism
   
3. Bad sense of humour.
   
4. Untidiness.
5. Lack of respect for others!

• Four turn ons:
  

1. Open mindedness.
2. Smiling face:)
3. Simplicity
4. Music!

• Three things you want to do before you die:
  (Some things -> infinity!)
  

1. Wanna visit some beautiful places (ek lambi list hai) in this world with my love!
   
2. Learn how to dance well and play a musical instrument, preferably guitar!
3. Wanna enjoy even the smallest of the joyous moments in my life:)
   

• Two smileys that describe you:

:) :)

• One confession:
  

I seriously felt that clearing the SCJP exam is more easier than completing this questionnaire!

I would like to tag Vidya and Karthik. Over to you guys...

~IT's My Life

Have you earned your quota of happiness?

Have you earned you quota of happiness?

I read this article posted by Vidya on her blog. I completely agreed with her views that one essentially needs to be happy from within in order to give happiness to the world outside.

Today we had a program called 'Learning from unusual sources' where we had the privilege to meet Dr. Neha Vakharia, a trustee of O.A.S.I.S. She has dedicated her life to serve the under privileged people in the slums of Bangalore. Oasis movement is involved in the propagation of various concepts and lifestyle for the development of better human beings and a society at large. It was an extremely touching session that we had today. I made a comment saying, "We need to be happy ourselves from within before we give happiness to the world outside." Dr. Neha too indorsed my thoughts.

After the session was over, I had a small talk (almost a debate) with my PAL over the comment I made during the session. But my PAL had a different view. She quoted me with the example of Charlie Chaplin, the greatest comedian of all times, whose personal life was an utter tragedy. She was suggesting that my comment wasn't a universal truth. There could be exceptions to it. That left me thinking for a while. It was already getting late and I had to leave the office. But she did manage to leave that 'worm' in my head to bug me for the rest of the evening.

But on the way back, I reflected deeply over it. The more I thought of it, my conviction only grew stronger and deeper. I figured out that I was probably right in a sense. I felt that whatever may be the case, you essentially need to earn your 'quota of happiness' in life, before you give it back to this world. I feel it is something similar to the Conservation of Energy kind of thing. You can neither create one nor destroy it, but only transfer it from one from to another. I feel that Chaplin found happiness in entertaining others. I believe that he wouldn't have given his best in acting, if it hadn't helped him earn his 'quota of happiness'. Though his personal life might appear to be a tragedy for the entire world, for Charlie, entertaining others was the only way to get his 'quota of happiness', which he seldom found in his personal life. It probably helped him subdue all the bitterness he got to taste in his personal life. I feel that Charlie Chaplin tried all his life relentlessly, to prove this very point!

If I could draw a parallel with this thought of mine, I would quote what our Vedas and Upanishads have talked about the 4 different phases (ashrams) of life.

1. Bramhacharya Ashram
2. Grihashta Ashram
   
3. Vanaprasta Ashram
4. Sannyasa

The above 4 ashrams need to be practiced in the same order, to achieve salvation or eternal happiness. In order to appreciate the essence 3rd and 4th phases of life, one need to experience the materialistic and family bound happiness, before even deciding to move to the others. It also explains why people who are forced to take up the role played in 4th phase of life soon after the 1st phase, find it extremely challenging to control their innate needs.

It is human nature in general that largely certifies my claims. I for one, surely believe that unless you are happy, you can't make others happy. Our mind sort of tries to do this balancing act. When it feels that the 'unhappines quotient' is on the rise, it tries hard to find unusual ways to release that negative energy out of our body and gain some positive energy in the form of happiness. If you observe, the most happiest of the faces in this world are the ones that hide the bitterest of the pains in life. It is just that their mind might have discovered an unusual way of earning its 'quota of happiness'!

I am not sure if I am right or wrong. I would love to hear from you readers on this topic. Kindly pour in your thoughts as well.

~IT's My Life

Happy Days...

Happy Days - I swear!

I happened to watch Happy Days a couple of days back. It reminded me of my engineering days a lot. The characters in this movie like chandu, madhu, tyson etc seem so close to reality.

Even though I don't understand the lyric of the song, I am spell bound by the melody of this track. Thanks to some off beat music by Mickey J Meyer. It is sooooo good! Truly... music has no barriers!




~IT's My Life

My new found stress buster!

IT industry is one such industry where the life styles of people are mostly sedentary. We spend a large chunk of our time in front of computers solving problems (and in due course creating a few for ourselves...) of our clients. This definitely causes a lot of mental and a bit of physical stress as well.

I decided to figure out a new stress buster which could not only rejuvinate me but also become a part and parcel of my lifestyle, for the rest of my life. I spoke with a couple of my friends who have a regular routine of jogging. In the begining I felt that jogging and stuff like that aren't my cup of tea. I was simply relcutant (read it as plain laziness) to get up early everyday!

But you never know where you pick up that piece of inspiration from. I fortunately picked it up one from a good friend of mine.That's when I decided to register myself at a gym close to my place. Trust me... Since then it has been an absolute fun working out 6 days a week, early in the morning! I just take one day off from my workout schedule for the simple reason that the gym is closed on sundays!! Working out gives me that much needed freshness and I remain active throughout the day. I discovered a great change in my energy levels as well.

I think it's high time we peep in to our life styles and do a bit of reality check to ensure that we give our body, the much needed physical activity. It could be anything ranging from yoga to a salsa class. It could even be an outdoor game like badminton or cricket. But do ensure that you find a way to de-stress yourself. Having said that I would surely recommend you to have variety in your workouts, just to break that unavoidable monotony!

My experience till now has been pretty good and I am enjoying it thoroughly. I hope I continue to remain hooked on to it.

Why don't you give it a try? Try breaking that inertia of yours. I am sure life definitely will start to look more beautiful!

~IT's My Life

It's all about the TEAM!

Ever since I joined MindTree, I have had innumerable opportunities to work with different teams on several of the initiatives. I consider myself extremely fortunate to have been a part of few exciting initiatives like MindTree Mini Marathon 2008. Every time I volunteered to be a part of any team, my sole motive was to understand the quintessence of working in teams and what it takes to play your role effectively and deliver your best. In my quest to discover that magical formula behind what defines a successful team, I happen to figure out quite a few threads that were common across several events, which I was a part of. I have made a sincere attempt to share all of them with you, in the context of MMM 2008.

MindTree Mini Marathon 2008

If the name is misleading, blame me not; for the event was definitely magnanimous in all aspects! It was after a gap of 3 years that MindTree decided to host another event of this sort. So we were all geared up to ensure that this event was a grand success. When I first received an invitation mail from Murthy R K (who himself is an avid marathon runner) to volunteer for this event, I was pretty much skeptical. My final assessments (I was in the yellow band) were due to kick start shortly and I doubted if my decision to volunteer was prudent. But nevertheless I told myself that I shall not hold myself back and let go any chance where I can contribute (in any small way) to make an event successful. The success story of MMM 2008 speaks for itself. I have made a small attempt to collate a few observations I made while working with an extremely vibrant team.

Role definition and leveraging experience:

I have always believed that the very first step towards ensuring you formulate a winning combination out of any team you work with, is to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each member and assign roles to him/her which would maximize their contributions to the team. I am not against experimenting with assigning people roles that they have never tried a hand at before. But when time is a constraint; go with the above mentioned thumb rule for role assignment. That’s exactly what happened with our team. Murthy had loads of experience about marathon and was undoubtedly the ideal person to guide our team. We realized what each one of us would do and chalked out plans as per the requirement. We as a team ensured that we leveraged his experience to the fullest.

Trust your TEAM:

Once you have formed a team, the first thing that a team as a whole needs to do, is to pledge that there shall be no ‘secrets’ as such. Say no to all shades of grey in your team. Everything should be in Black and White! I emphasize this fact for the simple reason that once you bring candor in to our team, you are invariably instilling tremendous faith in all your team members. Mutual trust is such an impetus to any team that it can work wonders. Once you bring it in, you shall notice that people will be all the more willing to contribute proactively and shall also volunteer to go that ‘extra mile’ to ensure that your venture is a grand success. As long as you have an environment where people feel very much a part of the team, things will never go wayward.

Appreciation is good. But please accommodate constructive criticism as well:

It is human nature to crave for appreciation when they deliver something commendable. Your team members are human beings and let’s not challenge the basic law of nature. I feel that a healthy team always has its team members back patting each other whenever they achieve something; no matter how trivial it is. As long as it doesn’t take away your focus and you don’t lose your ground, a few doses of applause and appreciation is good for your health!

Having said that only reminds me of the other extreme of the spectrum. The side effects of excessive appreciation and applause can deafen your ears and render you blind. A more long term effect of this unhealthy team culture is that your team, in the long run might in fact lose the ability to question things and be critical of other people’s work. I feel that another important trait of a healthy team is its openness to criticism. A good team always encourages its team members to criticize constructively; for it knows that the source if authentic! I feel that we as individuals should be open to criticism (don’t take them personal) and work sincerely towards setting them right. I would in fact go a step ahead and say that every team ought to have some people who blow whistles just at right moment and help circumvent any mishap.

Even the best of the plans fail. Always have a plan B:

They say, “Failing to plan is planning to fail”. It’s not axiom folks. It’s just a quote! Quotes aren’t infallible. You shouldn’t dare to question the veracity of my statement if you have seen the true colors of IT industry (or any industry for that matter). A few glimpses of how circumstances caught us off guard during MMM 2008 and how we managed to cope up with the sudden mutation.

• The walkie-talkie issue:

As you might be aware, this time we had three check points; each located 3 different corners of the marathon circuit. We had rolled out a plan initially that we could borrow walkie-talkies from the security and ensure that all check points are well connected. It was crucial for us to establish this connectivity for two important reasons:

• To keep other checkpoints updated about the positions of runners at regular intervals.

• To reach out for immediate help, just incase of any unforeseen emergency.
  

But when reached the venue on the day of the event, Murthy informed us that we couldn’t get the walkie-talkies for reasons best known to the security personnel. Thanks to our commonsense. Fortunately it never let us down. All check points had a sheet that contained the contact number of every member of the organizing committee. We somehow managed to update each other through our cell phones. But it was a lesson well learnt!

• Bib numbers ki dastaan:
  

If you had been around on the day of the event, you would have noticed a glaring design glitch with the bib numbers that we distributed to the participants. Boy! There were smaller than the volunteer badges we wore on the final day of Osmosis!! We were taken aback and caught off guard, when we discovered this fact. We started worrying about how we would note down the numbers when people crossed each check point. If that weren’t enough. It also had MindTree spelt incorrectly on it. That’s something that doesn’t go well with any MindTree mind! I quote what Murthy told all of us, “Look this is a classic example of what happens in the IT industry. Client asks for something, you deliver something else. He then comes back to you saying… Boss I didn’t ask for this!” But the only difference was that in our case, it was just too late to question the designers of bib numbers, about the erroneous design.

• Behaal @ registration counter:
  

At the registration counter we all had a print out of an excel sheet containing the list of all the participants who had enrolled themselves for the event. But you know what? The list wasn’t sorted at all. We had initially decided to either sort them alphabetically or as per the employee ids. But we hadn’t done it! Volunteers at the registration counter had a harrowing time figuring out the names/employee ids. So we quickly decided that we would just note down the name, employee Id and their bib number for the moment and then map them on the excel sheet, offline. When time is a constraint, people often tend to overlook the obvious and might land themselves in situations completely out of the blue. Not every time does a situation offer you an option for last minute tweaking, so watch out for the obvious pitfalls!

The bottom line is even the best laid plans fail!

Give due credit to every soul that worked for your team’s success:

If there is one thing that really turns off team members, it would undoubtedly be their efforts going unnoticed. When your team is in the spot light for any achievement, it becomes the duty of the team to ensure that people do get their due credits. A moment shared in spotlight might go a long way in motivating your team mates to deliver better results in future as well. Over and above, it gives everyone in the team a true sense of gratification and an unwritten acknowledgement saying, “Boys! You are on track!” A nice way to cherish the feeling of accomplishment would be to go out for a team lunch or a dinner. That’s exactly what we did. Murthy treated the entire team of MMM 2008, and trust me we had a ball.

I feel TEAM stands for the following:

T – Tenacity

E - Enthusiasm.

A – Attitude

M – Motivation

I firmly believe that if your team symbolizes these traits then it is undoubtedly a healthy and high performance team.

~IT's My Life

Main aisa kyu hoon?

I am confused!

It has been almost 4 months since I moved to Bangalore. I am gradually adapting to this kind of life style. But trust me I am yet to digest the fact that; gone are those days when we friends would plan for the first show of a movie and the strength of a cricket team could be expected at the ticket counters of a cinema hall in no time. But come to think of it now, the whole idea of meeting up at one point, in large numbers seems close to an impossibility. This new life at Bangalore has definitely taken a toll of my personal time, patience and not to mention complicated my agenda for weekends.

It wasn’t long ago when I could spill out my schedule for an entire month, without any difficulty. But now I find myself caught off guard when someone asks me to meet them over a weekend, because I just am unable to commit to anyone for any sort of engagements. I just can’t predict what’s going to be the agenda for the weekend, even a day before. Such has been the nature of my life on personal and professional front. A subtle feeling of guilt haunts me every time I commit to a friend of mine and am unable to make it.

Today is a weekend and I was supposed to be at V’s place to meet his mother and his brother. It’s been over 3 months since I have been to their house. One might ask me why I didn’t call them up at regular intervals, if I was so desperate to meet them and speak to them. Well that exactly is the problem with me. I get engrossed in to something I do that I completely forget everything. I mean everything! It almost becomes like I wouldn’t have spoken to the best of my friends for months together. I don’t know if it’s a terrible habit that I have cultivated over a period of time. But having said all that, I would clarify one thing that my concern or affection towards people who care for me wouldn’t have changed at all. I am absolutely comfortable if a close friend of mine wouldn’t call me up regularly or send me a good morning or good night sms if he is really busy. I am unable to understand this whole thought as to why people jump to conclusions and engage in to the act of shaking violently, the very roots of your friendship, which had been built over mutual trust, when you happen to stay out of touch for while from them? Does distance really matter to the strength of a friendship? Does calling your friend every now and then, even though you don’t have anything significant to share, reinforce the credibility of your friendship? I definitely don’t think so!

See that’s Suresh for you folks! He might not send you a sms nor give you a call over a weekend but would still be caring about you. I don’t know how to describe this behavior of mine. Ever since I have been here, I have struggled like hell to meet my friends who stay in various corners of Bangalore. Like others, I also get only 2 days in a week to do things other than the office work. Sometimes even those days are mercilessly gobbled up by some work at office. I know that you would hit me hard saying, “Dude you got to get used to this life style. You got to manage your time well. Otherwise your personal relations are going to go for sixes.” It’s not that I haven’t made an attempt to plan my weekends. But all my attempts have failed every time I have tried that. I have kind of given up planning my weekends!

I don’t know if this has happened to you as well. Sometimes situations are such that you feel staying silent is the best reaction to it. Your relationship with someone is resting on such a delicate thread that you are utterly confused about the way you need to handle it. I am currently facing that with a few of my friends. It’s like, if I speak, what should it be about? And if I don’t, will it convey to them that I no more care about them, and I have begun to kind of show attitude. The fact is folks, I simply don’t know. But I care about them. I feel I just don’t know how to express my concern and care!

My state on the personal front as of now, is one of utter confusion. If anyone of you have been through the similar situations kindly share your experiences with me. May be I can take cue out of your experience. I am badly in need of help! Life just seems to be so confusing and relationships, even more complex!!!

~IT's My Life