Welcome 2008

Yes, it came 29 days back but by BLOG New Year has just arrived. 29 days into the new year and no new blog. It means not lots of things are happening around me or maybe I am not noticing the lots of things happening around me till today. Yup, a thing about which I wanted to write came into my mind and 1 free with 1 blog offer hit me. New year needs to start with a blog dedicated to the NEW YEAR and so here comes the free blog. The actual blog which I wanted to write will follow this one.

When Reel Life soaked my Real Life

Long time back (enough time for me to forget the name of the movie) while watching an Amitabh starrer on Doordarshan, Amitabh died in the movie. The scene made me believe that there would be no follow on movie of Amitabh and THAT WAS IT. I cried and only an assurance from my parents that it was REEL LIFE and not REAL LIFE made me wipe off my tears.

Red Light

Road Rage has been on the up in Delhi. There have been numerous instances of people hitting each other because of traffic problems and most of the problems happen at the red lights when people are waiting for the lights to become green.

An idea struck me while driving yesterday. If the Red portion of the Red / Yellow / Green parts in the Traffic light could be enhanced with a Smiley, then it would remind people to take a break, sit back and smile.

Just visualizing it in my mind made me smile, so I think executed with the help of Traffic Lights would definitely make millions smile.

Bharat Ek Khoj

My wife has a bag, the bag has many things
In those things, there is a key without a keyring (just to rhyme it right :))
The key goes inside the bag in the morning
And it needs to come out in the evening

This need of the key starts Bharat Ek Khoj
And my biwis hand goes inside the bag roz roz
Out it comes with the key in the hand
Like she has just discovered a needle in lots of sand

Price of a guarantee

Post Office of India has a scheme where they give you around Rs. 1000 a month if you deposit with them Rs. 1,50,000. It is around 8.5% interest per year. If you put the same money in the stocks at the same time as you hand it over to the post office, the worst of mutual funds nowdays give 15% returns in an year i.e. around Rs. 1800 per month instead of Rs. 1000.

Why does the Post Office do this?

Its the price of a guarantee. Post Office pledges you that they will keep your money safe and give you 1000 per month irrespective of the market conditions. Thats their Price of a Guarantee.

Taking Interviews

Taking interviews is an experience in itself. Different companies place different requirements for recruiting candidates. We need to check out different things. The question is: How do we check those?

Here is my guide on how to check out different aspects of the prospective candidates:

Stability: Ask the candidate about his future plans. Whether they want to study further or not is enough for fresh candidates. For ex. if they say they would go for MBA after 2 years, then check your requirements whether two year is an enough interval for them to be helpful to the company. Past record can tell about experienced candidates.

Gets stuck: Keep on increasing the standard of the questions till the candidate gets stuck. For ex. Ask them what is 5 * 5. Then ask them what is 7*7. Then 11*11. Keep on increasing this level till they are unable to answer. Lets say they get stuck when you ask them 59*51. Does the candidate give up without thinking? Do they try something logically like 59*51 = 59*(50+1) = 2950 + 59 = 3009? If they do, then they are a Thumbs Up on this one. They got stuck and they managed to get their way out.

Seek Help and Move forward: Grill them on one of your favorites. For ex. take them out for a treasure hunt where each next stage depends on the answer of the previous. Check how many stages they are able to cross themselves! Once they get stuck, do they remain stuck forever or do they ask for your help? If they do, do they do it immediately without thinking. If yes, Thumbs Down. If not, then give them hints. Are they able to understand the hints and work logically forward. If yes, Thumbs Up.

Team Work: Tell them that they have to answer a question on How much is 11*Z. Z is an input that they require from a team member but the team member is a little slow and thats why your dates are getting slipped? How will they solve this problem?

Confidence: Try and test their skills on how sure they are about what they speak. For ex. Ask them how much is 5*5. If they answer 25, ask them Are you Sure? If they say it with confidence, ask them again. If they are again sure, they are one up. Then look out for a question where they are wrong. For ex. Ask them how much is 9*11. If they answer 98, ask them Are you Sure? If they say it with confidence, then they are Thumbs Down on this one. They would be putting bugs here and there without bothering to ask whats right or wrong. If they rethink, then they are a Thumbs Up on this one.

Communication Skills: Ask them to explain something which they are very comfortable but you are not. If you are able to understand, it means the candidate can explain what he knows well to a person who does not know it. Then ask them to explain a thing they do not know and maybe you know. For ex. Ask them to visualize how Alps look like? If they explain it well, they are a Thumbs Up when it comes to explaining both things they know and things they might not.

Treasure Hunting with the Freshers

I have been involved in training freshers joining my company for the past 3 years. For the past two years, I was doing it in my previous company and this year I am doing it in my current organization. One of the most useful things which I have been able to do with the new freshers is helping them get the basics right. It is very important for them to understand how things flow in a project. For ex. how things flow from specification to design to coding to testing. It is almost like a game of Treasure Hunt where the answer to each question provides a clue to the next step. Without completing the first question, you cannot jump to the next one and this is very important for the freshers to understand. If they do not understand the specification, they cannot understand the design and so on.

Now in most cases it happens that the puzzle has already been solved by some experienced guys who have been playing the Treasure Hunt game for quite a few years now. In these cases, it is important for the freshers to understand how the puzzle was solved.

One thing (both theoretically and practically feasible) which I work on with freshers is to help them map the specifications onto the code with the help of design. It consists of the following steps:

1. Start reading the specifications and give a presentation on it to ensure basics are properly understood
2. Read the design document to understand the clues on how to convert specifications to code.
3. Prepare a document which maps the specification line by line to the code.

In doing so, they understand how everything is linked together and help in finding problems in the existing code helping in getting a better product.

White Coat Hypertension

Wikipedia gives the following definition of White Coat Hypertension:

White coat hypertension is a phenomenon in which patients exhibit elevated blood pressure in a clinical setting but not when recorded by themselves at home. It is believed that this is due to the anxiety some people experience during a clinic visit.

I got to know this phenomenon when my wife and myself went to the doctor to get my BP checked. The first time the doctor checked it came out as 140 / 87. The doctor then asked me to rest of 5 minutes. The second time the doctor checked it came as 120/84 and the third time too it came almost the same.

The medical reason for the above behavior, as the doctor explained is White Coat Hypertension (even though she was wearing a black jacket at that time, but still I knew she was a doctor).

My wife asked the doctor why her comes 120/80 the first time if there is really something like White Coat Hypertension. It is because this is individual to individual.

And as my wife had said just before we went to the doctor: It just happens that the Doctor has done his / her MBBS and is sitting there to give you proper advice. Take it or leave it.

Thats why her BP is 120/80 the first time and mine is 120/80 the second time.

Team Management

How to arrange your team? This is one question which drives all top shots in the industry nuts. There is no SINGLE RIGHT answer to this. Well not really. Actually the ONLY SINGLE RIGHT answer to this is the TEAM MATURITY. But it is normally only there in the wish-list of everyone and never ever in execution.

Before we get into the details, let us understand briefly how most product companies are. A product is made up of parts and the same part can be used in different products. So Product and Part form a N x N matrix between themselves. For ex. Salt, sugar and water are three parts and sweet water + salt water are two products.

Now there are two broad ways of management in a product company:

a) Different Product Owner and Part Owner: We have an expert who knows the exact quantity of sugar that should be mixed in exact quantity of water to get the taste which sells. So this EXACT guy becomes our Product Owner for Sweet Water. He is worried only about quantity and does not spend too much thinking about quality. Quality has to be ensured by the guy from whom this EXACT guy borrows sugar and water from. These guys form the QUALITY guys. Now if a customer comes in the saying water is too sweet, the EXACT guy goes to the SWEET QUALITY guy and breaks loose on him. But it could be that water quantity mixed was less. So this EXACT guy was not REALLY EXACT. He pretended to be EXACT.

HOW CAN THE EXACT GUY DELIVER A QUALITY PRODUCT WITHOUT QUALITY PARTS? He can only if the same QUALITY PARTS are being used in some already proved QUALITY PRODUCT.

WHY WILL THE QUALITY GUYS BELIEVE EXACT GUY IS REALLY EXACT? They will only if the EXACT guy proves it time and again.

b) Same Product Owner and Part Owner: Now there is this ONE guy who knows EXACTLY how much sugar and how much water goes to form SWEET WATER which sells. And this ONE guy knows which QUALITY SUGAR and WATER will get him QUALITY SWEET WATER. Well, this is possible. BUT WHERE IS THIS ONE GUY? Nowhere most probably.

And if he is there somewhere, WHY WOULD OTHERS BELIEVE THAT HE IS THE ONE GUY AND THAT THEY ARE GOOD FOR NOTHING? They will if this ONE guy proves time and again that he is THE ONE GUY.

What is a mouse?

Couple of weeks back a new office boy has joined our office. He has come from Chennai and does not know Hindi. We have 16 people in our office right now (including two office boys) and 13 of us know Hindi, 14 of us know English. Now if we need to recruit a new office boy, what would be the requirements:

• Should be ready to do office work
• Should be ready to do misc. stuff (may or may not be part of his job profile)
• Should have a good integrity so that things are safe in the office
  
• Should be able to understand what needs to be done

But the only language our new office boy knows is Tamil which 12 people in the office do not know. I am equally amazed how he got through as some others in my office are. Maybe because he knows the language of the master. Anyways, I got a feeling of how important sign language is when early today morning a mouse came to say hello to me in the office. It scared the wits out of me. I had to explain that we have a new unwanted guest to our new office boy who was the only person around. I could not because he does not know Hindi / English and I do not know Tamil. I told him we had a mouse. He told me it is in the drawer. A little more brain tuning and I could make out he was talking about the COMPUTER MOUSE and not the MOUSE MOUSE. I tried to show him by hands that I am talking about A MOUSE WHICH WALKS. But I could not get through. I talked to him about a lion and a tiger and then suddenly RAT was the WORD OF THE DAY.

Monday morning blues

Early monday morning. Nice songs in the background. Chatting with a friend in the US. And an unwelcome guest.



Yes, this is one of the immense joys you HAVE TO enjoy in a startup (all pun intended). It suddenly jumped onto the cubicle wall, said hello to me and then in a flash I moved back and in next flash it went back to where it had come from. All pleasantries exchanged phew.....

Next began the cat and mouse game. But we were not able to house the mouse in a mouse trap. We have a new office boy and explaining whats a mouse to him was the icing on the cake.

The Hindu is for sale

BUT I WOULD NOT BUY IT. WHY?

Early Sunday morning on a cold winter day in Delhi, you can be only doing one thing happily: Sitting inside your quilt and enjoying tea. If just then, someone knocks on the door, then it better be something important. On one of such a cold Sunday morning, someone knocked. I opened the door. The person introduced himself as being a distributor of The Hindu. I continued talking to him without opening the door but he insisted I open the door with his hand movements. I opened it. HE HANDED ME A COPY OF The Hindu and started asking questions. More stress was on his English than the questions he asked as if he had just returned from those theoretical Learn English in 30 days and was not doing the practicals. He asked me my name, qualification and so on. He then asked me my phone number. I said I had none. He asked for landline etc any number. I kept firm and NO was the answer. AS YOU LIKE IT, he again tried his practicals on me.

Finally he came to the point. Start taking THE HINDU from 12th was the message this whole conversation was meant for. I told him I would be informing my newspaper wala if I needed it. He said something which only he could understand and then said would come again next week. WELCOME was something I could not utter and I DID NOT WANT TO ALSO.

Finally he almost snatched the copy of The HINDU he had given to me saying that it was a reference copy just to show. Even if there was half a chance of me betting on buying a HINDU, that was the last one.

Mere Filmi MiyaJi!

This is what my wife has to say to me everytime we talk. A lot of this can be credited to me for my incessant use of Bollywood dialogues on every situation with her.

a) I love long hairs BUT today morning I happened to tell my wife to get a BOB cut. Why? Actually every second is precious in the morning when we are fighting the WAR TO CATCH THE BUS, and if she goes for a BOB cut, it would save us a couple of precious minutes. But my wife was ready for it. Pat came her reply: BUT you told me you love big hair. Pat came by filmi dialogue:
Movie: Lakshaya
Dialogue: Agar mali banna hai to sabse acha ghaas katne wala bano. Agar scientist banna hai to sabse acha scientist bano. Agar bal bade karne hai, to sabse lambe baal karo. Phew....

b) Later in the day she asked me how to copy and paste certain text while chatting. Bollywood set me thinking and out came my reply:
Movie: Sholay
My Reply: Woh to main usi tarah sikhaunga jaise Dharmendra ne Hema ko gun se shoot karna sikhaya tha

Stay informed!

Stay Informed, YOU WILL HAVE TO EVEN IF YOU DO NOT WANT because they would leave you with no other choice.

I had applied for an IPO of Edelweiss. I was allocated 8 shares and I came to know about it in the following ways:

1. SMS from NSDL
2. SMS from ICICI Direct
3. E-Mail from the Registrar
4. Money refunded to my account was lesser than what I had applied for

Needless to stay, the same thing was said to me in 4 different ways and coming back to my favorite topic of Bollywood, it reminded me of Amitabh singing this to his beloved:

Angrezi mein kehte hai ki I love you
Gujrati maan bole tane prem karun su
Bengali mein kehte hai Ami tomake balo bashi
aur punjabi mein kehte hai Teri taan, ke main tenu pyaar karna waa

Now I wonder had Amitabh said it in only one language would he have won her heart or was it love at first sight, so he did not know what language the lady spoke and hence he tried all of them one by one. Anyways, at the end of the movie, he had won her over and I ALSO KNOW FOR SURE THAT I HAVE RECEIVED 8 STOCKS OF EDELWEISS.

Catch it if you can!

Moneycontrol put up this article on their website with the heading "BSE to suspend 37 companies on non-compliance issues". Here there are some bullets where they talk about when suspension will be removed from companies.

• In case, the company complies (to the satisfaction of the Exchange) with all the provisions of the Listing Agreement on or before Thursday, December 20, 2007, trading in securities of the company will be suspended for 5 days i.e. upto Friday, January 04, 2008.
• In case a company complies (to the satisfaction of the Exchange), with all the provisions of the Listing Agreement on or before Monday, January 14, 2008, the trading in securities of a company will be suspended for 30 days i.e. upto Tuesday, January 29, 2008.
• However, in case the company fails to comply with the provisions of the Listing Agreement, to the satisfaction of the Exchange on or before Monday, January 14, 2008, the suspension will continue till such time the Company complies with the procedure prescribed for revoking suspension in a scrip, or upto Tuesday, January 29, 2008 whichever is later.

In case of bullet 2 and 3, it is interesting to note on what will be the action by BSE in case a company complies with the provisions between January 15 and January 28.

Some wierd things which you immediately relate to

Which Bollywood fan does not remember this famous scene from Sholay!

Gabbar: Kitne aadmi they
Kalia: Sardar, do
Gabbar: Wo do they aur tum teen, phir bhi laut aaye, kya soche sardar khus hoga, sabasi dega

And then he shoots the three of them one by one.

Today I was reading some quotes and came across this one from Adolf Hitler:

If you win you need not explain ... But if you loose, you should not be there to explain

How to win a proxy battle?

Around 4 years back in my old company, there was a huge hue and cry over the caterer who used to provide lunch to our office. The quality to say the least was pathetic. We all wanted it to change and requested the management for the same. The management decided to conduct a poll. The poll question was:

Please send an E-Mail if you want the caterer changed. No E-Mail would be considered that you are happy with the caterer.

As with any rebellion, there are a few leaders and the rest are followers.

In this case, the leaders of the revolution sent the E-Mail but the followers did not follow as it was not too important a cause.

The caterer continued, the stomach-ache continued BUT the hue and cry died. Only the leaders decided to go and eat outside more often than before.

Vari Varsi

Vari varsi khatan gaya si, khat ke lyanda ladoo
Ek tarf hai soni bedi, to dooji taraf hai Navjot Siddhu

- Baba Sehgal on a show with Mandira Bedi and Navjot Sidhu

Arz Kiya hai

Aaine ne jab tujhe dekha, hua teri tareef mein shaamil
Bola woh roop ko tere dekh kar, uff hai yeh kitna katil

Pehle Dharti Hili, Phir Biwi aur Finally Main

First the earth shook, then my wife and finally me. This basically summarizes my earthquake experience that hit Delhi today morning at 4:45 pm. As my cousin put it: Woh to bhabhi ne balance kar diya nahin to aaj to bas :)

My friends experience was a little different. First the earth shook, then he shook and then his wife finally had to scold him to stop shaking. Only if he had the power to shake the earth :)

Another colleague of mine who has come here from US for an year remembered the tips he was given in US in case an earthquake happens. They were requested to hide under something wooden so that nothing falls on them. Only in this case, his dining table would have been the first thing to break in case something happened.