My relationship with Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs has been famous for a long time, but how does that matter? I heard about him as a child, it didnt matter. When I got my first PC, apple was an expensive useless alternate. Steve Jobs was too popular to be important to me. He was just another american entrepreneur who made a lot of money whom many people followed. The iPod was a glorified MP3 player, packaged well and sold to dumb people. When the iPhone was released I was reading blogs making fun saying “it missed a ‘tactile response’ technology called ‘buttons'”

He was obviously even more popular in the Entrepreneurship circles. One of my friend from these circles persuaded me real hard to read a Steve Jobs article. I succumbed. It was the text of the famous Stanford Commencement Address. after reading that piece, I couldnt stop myself from watching the video (which I since watched more than a dozen times). Those words could not have been spoken by a mere mortal. The penny had dropped and Steve Jobs became superstar.

I’ve followed Steve Jobs, since, like an admirer. I tried to deconstruct this personality and what makes him who he is. Read blogs, articles, watched interviews, movies etc. Everyone has a theory of what he is made up of and why he is one of the most admired people in the world. None fit my understanding of this man.

Ancient Indian philosophy with origin in the Vedas and explained in several schools of thought such as Advaita, Samkhya etc propound that the world a man perceives has 2 purposes. One to experience ii and the other to understand ones own self through it. I understood Steve Jobs as doing just that.

Living life was about discovering yourself. Building Apple was about discovering your own self. I truly believe that when he says “have the courage to follow your heart and intuition” it actually means “discover who you really are”. And indeed, discovering who you really are is a very courageous exercise.

I’ve quoted Jobs so many times. I used the commencement speech in a workshop i recently conducted. I own an iPad. I’m partners with 3 hardcore apple addicts. I’m researching the iStore to wrap a business model around it. But my connection with Steve Jobs is more spiritual than that.

As I understood the man through the lens of my own life experience, it has been a sense of affirmation. The connection is of sharing a belief system. A belief system of confidence in self, a belief in possibility of greatness, a belief in creation, a belief in challenging status quo. In a world where these beliefs are akin to insane, Steve Jobs words instill faith.

I think Steve Jobs is a great entrepreneur not only because the company he built is soon to be the most valuable in USA. He is so because he relentlessly followed his heart (or so I believe). I think following your heart is the only path to greatness and Steve Jobs lived that and showed the world rather publicly.

As a tribute to the man who passed away today below are some of my favorite quotes from Steve Jobs”

“Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful… that’s what matters to me.”

“My job is to not be easy on people. My job is to make them better.”

“Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.”

“Recruiting is hard. It’s just finding the needles in the haystack. You can’t know enough in a one-hour interview.
So, in the end, it’s ultimately based on your gut. How do I feel about this person? What are they like when they’re challenged? I ask everybody that: ‘Why are you here?’ The answers themselves are not what you’re looking for. It’s the meta-data.”

“People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully.”

“We don’t get a chance to do that many things, and every one should be really excellent. Because this is our life.

“In most people’s vocabularies, design means veneer. It’s interior decorating. It’s the fabric of the curtains of the sofa. But to me, nothing could be further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a human-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service.”

“I’m the only person I know that’s lost a quarter of a billion dollars in one year…. It’s very character-building.”

(quotes courtesy Macstories)

If death is truly a beginning, may this be the opportunity for the world to wake up, Stay Hungry & Stay Foolish!

Entrepreneurial Mindset

I had made this presentation in May 2011 for a group of young people aspiring to become Transformational Leaders. It was part of a workshop on “Creative Entrepreneurship” where we helped each participant discover the Entrepreneur within!

Thanks to Bhumi, Kadambini & Sravanthi for the support and opportunity!

An Entrepreneur’s Life

 1. A Sense of Possibility

For an entrepreneur, optimism abounds. Ideas dance like Wordsworth’s daffodils. It is an Open World. It is a world brimming with opportunities. There is a feeling that so much needs to be changed, and he is the person destined to bring about that revolution. Nothing seems impossible. Entrepreneurs have that unique ability to make the incredible so believable and achievable.

No mountain is too high to climb – because it is not a mountain the first place. It becomes a series of small peaks. Where others may seem daunted by the height of the mountain, the entrepreneur keeps the top in sight, and, setting a continuing series of incrementally challenging goals, works to conquer small peaks.

This sense of possibility – that there’s so much to do and change about what exists today, that a different world needs to be created – makes entrepreneurs come alive even in the toughest of times. It may be a Mission Impossible for others, but for the entrepreneur it is an Escape To Victory.

 

2. Tryst with Destiny

Entrepreneurs want their destiny under their control. They believe that they are solely responsible for how the future unfolds, and that their actions can indeed make a difference. They refuse to believe that things are pre-ordained, and yet, feel that the world can be made to conspire to help them.

When I read “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho a few months ago, what struck me about his fable of a shepherd is how closely it mirrored the journey of an entrepreneur. An entrepreneur views the world through his (somewhat blinkered) lens and sees things that others don’t – and at times, misses the obvious things that others point out. The driving factor, like in Coelho’s book, is about listening to the heart and living one’s dream. It is about challenging and conquering destiny. It is about authoring the story of the future.

 

3. Certain Uncertainty

It is perhaps hard to imagine who would like unpredictability, but entrepreneurs seem to thrive on it. For them, each day is unique, with its own joys and delights. Yes, each day has its ups and downs, and entrepreneurs as a rule tend to have more “down days” than “up days”. But they somehow revel in this environment – it tends to bring out the best in them. Surprises – pleasant or otherwise – are to them an integral part of the landscape.

It is this ability to adapt to the changing situations which helps entrepreneurs tackle even the toughest of challenges. They take Today’s Unknowns in their stride. Progress happens only when problems are solved.

An entrepreneur accepts that while the vision and dream is definitely there, the script for the day needs to be crafted out dynamically and innovatively, based on what the situations demand. It is this desire for uncertainty that stifles entrepreneurs when they work in some of the larger enterprises, where each segment of the day is not only defined but needs to be adhered to.

 

4. Freedom To Be

Like a bird navigating the open skies or the fish floating through the infinite oceans, the entrepreneur seeks the freedom to set his own course. He does not like to be told what to do. This is not to say that entrepreneurs don’t listen – in fact, they are perhaps the best synthesizers of opinions. But they like to drive out on their own. Theirs is a mindset which seeks independence.

Part of the reason for this freedom comes because entrepreneurs find themselves at odds with much of the world. This orthogonalilty comes because they are out to change the status quo. This pits them against most of the world which doesn’t like its cheese to be moved. Entrepreneurs, therefore, want freedom – not just from the world of today, but also from the thinking that inhibits innovation and encourages conformance.

 

5. Life = Work, Work = Life

I was reading the introduction to a new book by Warren Bennis and Robert Thomas entitled “Geeks and Geezers: How Era, Values and Defining Moments Shape Leaders”. Says Thomas about the men and women who practised leading every moment of the day: “They recognized no distinction between work and life. They were the same people on the job and off. They used every situation they encountered as a practice field and they mined every experience for insight about themselves and the people and the world around them. Leading is not only what they did, it was who they were.”

Replace they by entrepreneurs, and read it again. That is what entrepreneurs are: there is no boundary between any of their lives, there is a single unified life. Work is a continuum. Learning never stops. Thinking is concomitant with breathing. Others may try and tell them how work needs to be left at the office when one comes home. Entrepreneurs may listen, but are incapable of acting upon it. What they do envelops their life and by consequence, those around them. This is the only life they know to live.

 

6. Passion for People

Entrepreneurs may think of themselves as God’s Gift to the World, but very soon they understand that if they want to realise their vision, then they better start loving people. Whether it is at work or in conferences, entrepreneurs tend to have a special way with people. It comes from inner infectious enthusiasm which is evident in all that they do. Not for them the cool confines of a closed cabin. They want to be with their troops, leading from the front, fighting from the trenches. Being with people – within the company or outside – brings out the best in them.

For entrepreneurs, people are also a natural sounding board for their ideas. Just the process of talking to others helps entrepreneurs fine-tune their thinking and ideas. By bringing their passion to bear in their talk and work, entrepreneurs elicit feedback and comments from others, which helps embellish their view of the world.

 

7. Idea to Epiphany

Contrary to the popular myth of ideas coming in the “Eureka” mould, for most entrepreneurs, it is actually a long process of incremental thinking followed by the occasional epiphany which takes thinking to the next level. It is the small steps which set up the platform the big leap; without these baby steps, there would be no “lightbulbs” going off.

It is this process which entrepreneurs thrive in. They have a unique knack of being able to take ideas and concepts from very different and unrelated processes or arenas, and apply them to the context of what they are doing. This ability to make connections and associations is a unique talent which stands them in good stead. Entrepreneurs live for these “Aha” moments. But behind that one big moment is a lot of “Hmmm” type of thinking.

 

8. Envisioning the Future

Entrepreneurs, by default, live in the future. The present and its problems are almost irrelevant to them. They work to craft a Future Fantastic, and then work towards building it out. Entrepreneurs want to compete in this future not with resources but with a blend of passion, vision and strategy. For them, business is an intellectual game of Chess, one where others need to be out-thought, because they cannot be out-spent.

It is also not that entrepreneurs become fixated on a single vision of tomorrow. In their mind’s eye, the future is not a static picture, but an evolving one. They use life’s experiences and their RTW (reading-thinking-writing) to continuously enhance and enrich their view of the world, using their intuitive gyroscopes for regular course correction.

 

9. Traveller’s Tales

Entrepreneurs are natural explorers. They like to travel, see different places, put themselves in different situations. What this does is that it takes them away from the daily buzz of work and makes them see a more holistic view of what they are doing. They come back from trips with a renewed sense of energy which very quickly percolates through their enterprise. Of course, they return with more ideas than are implementable but that’s part of the “occupational hazard”.

Travelling does a lot more. It forces entrepreneurs to start delegating – by default! In general, even though entrepreneurs recognize that they need others to get things done, they have a tendency to believe that they are indispensable. As a result, they become the decision-making hub for everything, and thus a potential bottleneck. By getting out of the office every once in a while, entrepreneurs foster the next level of organisational command (which in most cases happens without the entrepreneurs realising it). When they back, they figure that things actually worked quite well in their absence!

 

10. Friendship with Failure

Entrepreneurs are not afraid to fail. In fact, they believe that only out of failures will come success. Of course, they do not set out to fail. What they do is to set up controlled experiments to try out many of the ideas they have. It is like they are in the middle of a jungle without any maps or navigation instruments. They have a general idea of where they want to go. But to figure out the right sequence of steps, they will make multiple forays into different directions – to get a better perspective of the flora and fauna around. This helps them build a mental map of the landscape – one that is bottom-up and grounded in reality, and move forward.

In the real world, this translates to creating prototypes quickly which can be taken to customers for feedback so they can be iterated upon. It is like making a television soap opera wherein regular course correction can be easily done, rather than the big bang approach of a film which becomes an all-or-none affair and takes years to complete. Some of what they do will fail – because they are trying out multiple approaches. But entrepreneurs are normally quick to recognise what works and what doesn’t, and jettison the things that don’t. Entrepreneurs are not afraid of failure. It they are afraid of something, it is perhaps that they haven’t experimented enough.

 

11. Get It Done

Entrepreneurs are action-oriented. Making projections, org-charts, business plans are just not their cup of tea, even though these are needed as interfaces to the outside world. Entrepreneurs just want to work on getting things done.

The challenge for them lies in how to sequence their activities to get the maximum result from the perennially limited resources that they have. Their business is the Ultimate Reality Show – one in which there is no “Rewind” or “Pause” button, only “Play”.

 

12. Enjoy the Journey

For entrepreneurs, the goal and joy lies not just in reaching the destination. While it is very important to be successful, entrepreneurs recognise that their chance of success is quite small in the big, wide world, and more importantly, the odds are always stacked against them. But what matters to them is the journey, the daily battles, the mindgames, the rock-jumping. This is where entrepreneurs are a different breed of people. If they succeed, they will go on to the Next New Thing. If they fail, they will go on to the Next New Thing. The Game of Enterprise goes on.

 

Last Word

As we live through today’s challenging times, it may be a good idea to look inside and discover the Entrepreneur in each one of us. If we close one door, many others open. Too often, we are snugly ensconced in our own private worlds and cocoons that we build – not wanting to think differently, not wanting to take any risk, not wanting to make the jump. As an entrepreneur would put it, Think: What would you do if you were not afraid?

 

~ By an Anonymous Entrepreneur.

(Special Thanks to Utsow Pradhan from Learn Next for sharing this piece with me. I’m sharing it because it really appealed to me and seemed to be spoken directly from an Entrepreneur’s Heart. Hope it helps you understand a fellow entrepreneur and the one hidden within you!)

Design Thinking – The way of Leaders

Design thinking has quickly become a norm in the world. Much is being said and talked about. I came across the term “Design Thinking” about 6 months ago when Santhan spoke about how the Patanjali Yoga Sutras are structured. Been exploring the term and its meaning since then.

As I understand it, Design Thinking is a process of problem solving that enables efficient and effective solutioning. I cannot but agree with different thought leaders that a Design Thinking approach to problem solving is perhaps the most efficient method. I also totally agree that design thinking is an attitude, the attitude that produces the leaders who are capable of transforming the world.

Design thinking is not just for designers. Its for all leaders, managers and people who are faced with complex challenges and want to solve them. Its unfortunately not taught at school though I wish it was, but its perhaps the most important tool in the arsenal of a transformational leader.

From reading and my own experience I think that Design Thinking can be divided in to a 3 step process. The three steps are not linear but an iterative cycle.

• Articulating the challenge
• Understanding the constraints
• Creating a solution

This is obviously not as simplistic as it sounds. There is much texture to each stage of the process and as I apply it more, I’m able to understand the process that better. Also like I said earlier, its an attitude to apply the process/principle to all situations, including understanding design thinking.

Each step of the process is paramount. Without definitive clarity on the challenge, it is very difficult to conceive a good solution. There are several ways to go about articulating the problem. One of the methods to arrive at a good problem statement is empathy. Its my personal favourite. The more we can listen deeply to those connected with the problem, the better we are able to articulate the problem statement.

When I talk of understanding constraints, it refers to those parameters related to the problem that cannot be overlooked during design. Brainstorming is a very effective tool in being able to populate the constraints involved. More often than not there are several unstated constraints in the problem statement. The more exhaustive the understanding of constraints, the more effective the solution. I’ve seen that it also helps in prioritizing the constraints.

The final stage is to create the solution. This is the answer to the problem statement, based on the constraints pertaining to the problem. Prototyping is often discussed as a very effective tool. A friend once said “Fail.Fast.Forward” Creating quick and dirty prototypes ready for deployment is a good approach in creating the solution. I’ve personally not been able to make much progress in prototyping, but try to make it one of the constraints of my design process. It has worked particularly well when the solution is only for private consumption.

Each stage thus is important, there is no by-passing, and each stage is complex yet simple. Over the years I’ve come to believe much in experiential learning. The best way to learn and cultivate design thinking is to consciously apply it. It will soon become a way of life.

I’ve collected some good resources to understand Design Thinking http://bit.ly/hLd9qQ These resources have helped me shape my understanding of design thinking and have given me the vocabulary to get deeper into my practice. It gets me to believe, one doesn’t necessarily need to go to design school to learn design thinking!

Management tools & Strategic Analytical Frameworks – My tryst

Its always wonderful to work with revolutionary entrepreneurs. They bring perspectives to the table which can only be gained through experiences. My work over the last couple of months has given me the amazing opportunity to work with someone who pioneered unbelievable initiatives in the field of consumer healthcare. He continues to do so with a slew of new products and services.

One of the most admirable aspects about this personality, who must be in his late 50s, is his commitment to management education. He continues to learn so many tools, techniques, analytical frameworks etc. For the first time in my short career of SME consulting I saw an entrepreneur practically applying these tools for strategic planning as a way of life. He has attended workshops from so many great management thinkers of our times like CK Prahalad, Jack Trout etc has through our conversations quotes at length about how things they said are relevant to our context.

We have been involved in the communication strategy for his upcoming project. So much of the larger strategy has been based on tools like Value Innovation, Four Actions Framework, The Decision Matrix etc. The only way we could move forward with our work was to understand these frameworks. So we were forced to read books like Blue Ocean Strategy, Secrets of Word of Mouth Marketing etc.

Contained in these books are a wealth of tools and insights. I knew the beauty of tools before. Though not from a traditional management education background, I have used tools like Marketing Mix, Porter’s five forces, SWOT etc in different assignments and strategic plans. I knew tools give a direction to think. I remember subscribing to some newsletters and collecting tools so that I will use it “somewhere”. But this was different.

I got to see a seasoned entrepreneur apply these tools with diligence. This process of understanding what he did was a great way to learn, how to apply tools. By the time out turn to do our work, we decided to use some tools to help ourselves.

A lot of product strategy had already been designed and we had access to approaches used for that purpose, which had to be adapted to our process. For the purpose of designing the Decision Acceleration process, after much research, we had looked to Buyer Utility Matrix, Kotler’s Consumer Buying Process & The Decision Matrix. The outcome was that we designed our own framework to designing a decision acceleration process.

Buying Cycle Stage

Decision Frictions

Strategic Communication

Call to action

Trigger to move to next stage

WoM Generator

The most important learning of this entire journey was that “Management Tools are Useful”

• Tools help in giving direction to our thinking processes.
• Tools allow us to set on a deeper inquiry through relevant questions
• Tools allow us to give shape and meaning to what may otherwise seem unintelligent.
• Tools are a great format for presenting strategic elements of an idea

On the flip side I also realized, getting caught on with tools is also not too great. Also in context of management thinking there is no ONE TOOL, like a magic wand for all problems. Several thoughts are available, many similar with little difference, it’s the user who must apply them wisely. The other important thing I’ve learnt is that the understanding tools must not an intellectual exercise; it must be an experiential exercise. The more we use a tool, the more we discover about it.

I am so glad and thankful for this opportunity to explore tools and management education in a totally experiential way. Hope to work more, be pushed harder for excellence and thrive longer to explore deeper depths and discover newer wonders of the work I do!

Miracle called Deep Red Ink

Deep Red Ink, as I think about the name it reminds me of the explanation behind the name which ran into number of pages. Well today I will consider it as an accomplishment as CEO of Dot Now Social. But when I accepted the invitation of Santhan and Deepti to be part of the ecology it was an easy, obvious and humbling choice.

DRI is an ecology formed to support great ideas. DRI is not any other business, not one that can be defined by the boundaries of capacity and limitation of bandwidth. DRI is a “concept business” which is all about supporting great ideas driven by passionate entrepreneurs.

DRI is a concept business, in many ways but this is my favorite, because of the way it is structured. DRI is an ecology of 6 partners.Santhan, Deepti, Anil, Netrix, Quick Silver & Dot Now Social. The structure of the partnership is that all revenues are divided between the 6 partners equally irrespective of who participates in a particular project in what capacity. I’ve been enamored by entrepreneurship and enterprises for over 4 years, and have studied business models with the vigor of a geek, but DRI beats them all. To common sense it does not appeal, nor does it sound totally logical, even remotely viable. But it is perhaps the most interesting journey of my entrepreneurial journey to see DRI evolve as a sustainable, profitable and growing business.

I’m very glad to be part of the DRI experience. Please read the original post to get the whole picture. Thanks All.

Joy of Facilitation

In August 2009 I attended a workshop organized by Bhumi called Leading to Light. It was a workshop on Personal Mastery and Transformational Communication. I had the amazing opportunity to meet a host of trainers who delivered the wonderful program. I liked the job they were doing and casually inquired what it takes to be a trainer.

At Leading to Light I had the life changing opportunity to meet Kiran Gulrajani. He told me that I’m meant to be a facilitator (from my birth date). He also mentioned to me about a unique program he conducts for facilitators called Tao of Facilitation. Prior to meeting Kiran also I had done some training and facilitation.

I continued to wonder how the facilitation journey (actually revenue stream) will take shape. Kiran kept in touch. When Kiran was conducting Tao of Facilitation (ToF) in Hyderabad in Dec 2009, he cushed (loving push) me into the program. ToF was perhaps the single most important element in my journey of facilitation, I can say this in hindsight. We learnt much about ourselves during the program and I came out of the sessions thinking deeply about myself. I also wondered how this was remotely connected to facilitation.

The journey moved on and I kept meeting people in different capacities. When I started paying attention to the different capacities I was involved in one day I suddenly realized I was a facilitator in many ways. I was facilitator as a management consultant, I was a facilitator on the negotiating table, I was a facilitator as a mentor to my team and obviously I was a facilitator while delivering training programs. This revelation that facilitation was part and parcel of my life began to show how few ToF learning I was able to apply in situations. As I became aware that I’m a facilitator the approach to the situations came from depths of the self which would invariably benefit scene of application.

Recently I facilitated a small session at a Bhumi Personal Mastery session. As I could quietly apply what I had learnt at ToF it was a truly joyful experience. While there is much to learn and a long way to go to be a good facilitator, what remains underlined is the Joy of Facilitation.

That’s the story from Tao of Facilitation to Joy of Facilitation.

Customer Feedback – SBI Best Practice

Couple of months ago I was at a conference organized by Conscious Capitalism Institute in Mumbai. Easily the best session was by Mr. O.P.Bhatt the chairman of the State Bank of India. The man being credited with turning around the giant public sector enterprise. He spoke in depth about the “Parivartan” (meaning “change”) program which touched every single employee at the bank. The strategic initiatives of getting their basics right are obviously visible with the bank’s stock performing much better than the market.

There are a couple of things that he said I would like to highlight before talking about the SBI case. One was the initiative to sensitize the staff of the bank that the average customer who has a savings bank account with Rs.5000 balance or a Rs.50000 fixed deposit, its lakhs of these average customers who provide the bank with required cash to conduct its earning ways. The other was about Parivartan2, a program to help the employees of SBI find purpose in their job.

To see SBI and its functionality for myself, few weeks ago I stepped into a newly opened branch in Hyderabad. Quite expectedly I had to move from one counter to another to another in a small branch of 6-7 employees to open a savings bank account. Finally the assistant branch manager gave me a form and thats all he could do. He couldn’t tell me about the features of the account, detail forget selling it to me. Obviously disappointed with I began to walk out while i noticed a print-out stuck on the wall which read “If not satisfied with our service please SMS “UNHAPPY” to 8008202020 I immediately messaged UNHAPPY to that number, not expecting much from a Govt. run bank.

Much to my surprise I got a call from the local head office enquiring about my grievance. Once I explained to them what had happened, the assistant branch manager called me to ask me why I complained. I tried to reason that I was present in the capacity of a customer and was to be treated like one, not as a burden. Thoroughly disappointed by their rather rude behavior again I text messaged UNHAPPY.

Within half an hour I received a call from the branch manager politely enquiring about the incident. After giving me a patient hearing, he apologized and invited me to pay a visit again to the branch the next week with in which period he wanted to “counsel” his staff about behaving better with customers. Not convinced by his explanation (which I truly thought was very appropriate) I said I required to open an account immediately and couldn’t wait for his improvement of service and that I needed to choose my banker soon. He immediately as a gesture offered to personally come down to my office, take the required documents and open my account.

This was an excellent experience but it didn’t end there. Couple of days back I received another call from the Local head office enquiring about the status of my complaint, if it had been resolved, if I needed to escalate it etc. This follow up was again impressive.

The entire experience left me spell bound. A Govt. Run enterprise, with supposed red tape, with one of the strongest banking employee unions was able to deliver this kind of service. First round of applause for the bold initiative to take up asking customers to complain at will through a simple text message. Second round of applause to the branch manager, who would be a fairly senior officer, dealing with smallest of customers (just a savings bank account with a minimum balance of Rs.1000), carefully treading the path of managing his staff who would be protected by very strong labor laws & unions by not taking action but by “counseling” them. Third applause for following up and making sure the grievance is being attended to.

Since the experience my respect for the banking giant, SBI, has grown a notch higher. It makes me wonder what stops every business in the service industry from putting in place such a strong feedback system. It is more than worth investing in feedback from customers. If an elephant like SBI can do it, so can everyone else. Looking forward to my clients of the service industry implementing such robust feedback mechanisms and that this fever spreads across the world. Businesses which are not customer centric will have to fade away into oblivion.

UPDATE: SMS UNHAPPY has been nominated for eIndia mGovernance initiative of the Year Award. It is being implemented across 1100 SBI branches in AP serving over 14 million customers. In 6 months they have received 11000 complaints and have resolved 96% of them. ISB has taken up the project as a case study and is likely to implement it as part of course curriculum. Read more. Vote for SMS UNHAPPY.

10 Key Learnings of 2009

The difference between knowledge and wisdom is doing. So the learning I’m going to share are not pieces of read text, but the wisdom I gained in the year 2009. Hope many can relate, few can contradict and many more can quicken their journey’s to wisdom through this post.

1. Starting-up is good fun: I myself started two enterprises (NxT Bizness Solutions & Dot Now Social), and worked with few others in 2009. From taking the decision to start-up from understanding of market need, potential customers to actually finalizing the name, registration its all good fun. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the freebies of starting up too; the learning, the hiccups, the obstacles, the glamor etc. I explored my inherent affection for startups in 2009.

2. SMEs are a HUGE market: Studying SMEs for the entire year, taking off from my stint at Milagrow, I realized the potent market of SMEs in India. Realized how much of market need exists, how little is getting met. It was very nice to see many entrepreneurs across the country dealing with this opportunity in their unique way. I also touched base with how little is known about SMEs on the whole. There is a huge gap to fill about understanding SMEs in India.

3. Power of Social Media and Social Technologies: Though I was an early adopter of social media while in college, then graduated into a laggard after I started working. Once on my own, I explored social media encouraged by a study by McKinsey. It is a revolution that is catching up, and what we have experienced is the tip of the iceberg. Social Media and social technologies can greatly aid business. This is beyond marketing and can prove extremely useful through all Conversations of Business.

4. Ecology is the new Business Ethic: Ecologies have existed in business ever since. I got introduced to linkages and ecologies in 2008 during my stint at Milagrow in an all new way. 2009 was the year to grasp the big picture. Co-Creation, Co-evolution, core competence taken to a new level, leverage of strengths (processes, customers, relations etc) and many more forms. I came in touch with very many and truly experienced the power that lay hidden. I’m more than ordinarily convinced that Ecology is the next Business ethic.

5. Culture is the secret of great organizations: Culture is very powerful. It has defined the progress of civilizations of the world. The combination of value system and belief system manifested into practices holds the key to not only civilizations but also organizations. During 2009, I came in touch with several organizations, some had weak cultures, some had strong cultures, some cultures were elevating and some destroying. It was the year of experiencing how culture defines the organization. I also learnt, culture is not for a wall poster, it cannot be “driven in”, it must be identified and not cultivated, in the context of an organization.

6: Relationships of Business: Healthy relationships are the key even in business. But understanding the relations of business goes beyond. Business is done between one who needs and one who provides. As long as the context is business, there is no more, no less. This is the most important lesson of 2009 for me. When there is an existing relation with a person beyond the purview of give and take, it is advisable to think twice about bringing objectivity that is required for business into such a relation. It was extremely difficult for me to build the objectivity (disclosure: I failed at it) into a relation that had business as the newest dimension.

7. USA is a nation built by Entrepreneurs: I read that USA had high business quotient, it was a nation pursuing personal liberty etc. When I visited USA, it was truly an experience (much to my surprise). It was an experience of how the power of individuals has been harnessed to build a nation. I had only come in touch with the fallacies and the ills of this excessive personal liberty leading to unprecedented greed, but experiencing USA was about realizing the collective potential individual endeavor.

8. Control is an Illusion: Like most of us I was one of them who congratulated myself for each achievement and blamed circumstances for all the failures (though I truly deep within knew neither was I totally responsible for success nor failure). 2009 is when I began to accept that events happen and I only did what I could do, I did not control or create any outcome. I began to practice letting go, practice not pursuing the end, but pursuing the means. I began to respect the Hindu philosophy of Karma one more notch higher for it gave the entire civilization the strength to let go and let come without attaching too much value to it. I’m slowly beginning to travel for the purpose of travelling in this journey called Life (be it professionally or personally)

9. Money is not that unimportant: Money to me was always a secondary virtue. Of a lower class of sorts. The year that went by taught me things about money I never properly understood before. 2009 was the year I began to give a lot more respect for money in a manner that I understand its value. I realized “Money can Buy”. Hence never discount it to second grade.

10. I’m not that much of a rookie after all: I began 2009 by moving on from Milagrow to start my own consulting enterprise. For a 21 year old it was quite an important decision, but I made the leap. Many times I thought to myself if at all I’m capable enough to take on the challenges presented by my clients and my startup. But I thoroughly enjoyed many of the solutions I gave to my clients all year through. My clients were much more experienced than me, few of them had done Graduation in Business, one of them in an top 25 B school in the world. But I too added value, enough value that they could acknowledge and appreciate. While I will always be thankful to all of them for having put faith in me and given me an opportunity, I’m also a lot more confident and don’t feel like a rookie anymore.

These are just 10 of the most important ones, and mostly only in the professional domain. 2009 was a bumpy year where I learnt many things both professionally and personally. Elaborating further is beyond the scope of this post, but I’m grateful for all the opportunities I got in 2009, I’m thankful I met the people I did, I’m glad it came, I’m happy it is over!

Start-up No.2 – conversation to revenue

My father has this excellent style of narrating with obnoxious examples. Just noticed I’ve picked it up and am searching for the obnoxious example to explain the title of this post. Admit, I can’t find one… Its simply about how my new entrepreneurial journey began as a conversation and now we are on the verge of receiving our first cheque.

AIESEC was a phenomenal organization which has left an impact on my professional life. I was closely bonded to the organization because of my belief in its vision and values. Its vision said “Peace & fulfillment of human kind’s potential.” AIESEC was the international platform to discover and develop their potential.

“Discover and develop human kind’s potential” It was a life changing statement. Since then as a conscious effort I have tried my best to engage with people and help them “discover” their potential. I always had this philosophy with me.

So when I came across a tweet from a batch mate, who was looking for a good opportunity to do something related to Social Media, an obvious bell rang. The idea was see what potential lay with him and how can it be utilized best. So I invited him over to discuss “an idea”.

So that conversation, starting to be part of helping people discover their potential (and for obvious capitalistic reasons benefit from it) started this idea doing something related to the fast growing social media.

Coming from a management consulting back ground, consulting was my obvious choice. Consulting businesses on how to benefit from social media. After a lengthy discussion, he know just what to do for which kind of firm etc. I was amazed at the low down he gave me on how the new Internet is going to penetrate our life in an irreversible way. And developed nations have already begun imbibing the culture.

I being the social media ignorant chap and he being the domain expert, we began the journey at the end of the conversation sure that this is n attempt worth trying. I was to add value to the org on devising a sustainable and scalable business model of his expertise of understanding social media tools.

Thus I started exploring the space and what all could be done here. What is the value businesses are looking for? What are the tipping points that businesses will be willing to consider as enough value to pay more than cost? Who are competitors and who are peers in the business? Where can business leads be generated? Who are acclaimed thought leaders in the space?

While I was fleshing out the business model, my business partner had already identified a first potential client. A potential client who understood the power of social media. We were abruptly set into action. After only a few discussions we were sitting on a proposal to be finalized. Being a startup, and among the few of our kind in Hyderabad, we agreed on a 40% fixed and 60% performance kind of model to assure our delivery ahead of the money. And we were set in irreversible motion, even without our feet on ground.

We worked over time, spent all the time we had in either understanding the business or servicing the client. We began to track everything that was happening around us in the space. We began to realize the space holds immense opportunity. The truth was that not enough players ad taken shape. The high potential players were trying hard not to wakeup to the opportunity. We took solace in the potential that lay before us and thought to ourself we will do whatever it takes to make our mark here.

Naming this venture was not as hard as the previous one. All kudos to my partner, he is a creative genius. The name was through in less than an hour and acceptance was obviously High. We loved the name.

“.now” to be read as dot now. Dot to represent the internet and Now to represent the real time nature of social media. We stuck to it like glue. The odd dissatisfaction was obviously ignored.

Sustainable activity on social media is key success. Many enterprises cannot allocate full time resources with know how to do their social media work. Hence outsourcing was a solution we were ready to offer to our clients. Our first client also needed this service and this lead to our first hiring. I will not say it was easy, but we surely didn’t have too much trouble.

Now the implementation had begun with its usual hiccups followed by continuous streamlining. With delivering results and delight to the client several changed were brought about to our way of working. Though slightly delayed, our work has now commenced in full flow. We today submitted our first invoice and have been assured of the cheque being handed over tomorrow.

This 2 month journey from conversation to first revenue saw pitch to 4 potential clients, 2 materializing, one paying. It saw us participate in 2 conferences. It saw us reaching out to the eco-system in Hyderabad and beyond. With many more clients waiting to be served, we hope to dramatically change the landscape of social media usage in our vicinity. We hope to inspire a lot more people to discover and develop their potential.