Jai Ho!

Source: Cricinfo

India has been on a roll so far and the way the team has dominated the series so far has been a treat to watch. Post the T20 debacle I thought this series might be a stern test for the Indians; an Indian debacle against an inexperienced kiwi side would have been disastrous considering the momentum the team has been enjoying offlate. What had to be seen was can India inspite of wearing the 'better team on paper' tag deliver it on an away series? And boy, haven't they delivered it in style so far.

Main cause of the kiwi debacle has been their bowling department which has been in total disarray and the tremendous batting of the Indian openers. Vettori has been greeted with a 'we are not going mess with you' approach which has ensured that he doesn't get any wickets, Kyle Mills who was to be the spearhead is down on confidence - not a surprise with no wickets and the treatment meted out to him by the Indian openers what else can you expect. Jacob Oram has been a shadow of his former self and most of the new comers both in batting and bowling have been struggling so far.

What a series this has been for the Master Blaster who has been in ominous form in this series, considering this to some time back when there was a huge call for him to retire; He has played a crucial role in all the recent series which India have won so far.

• AUS tour of IND: Tendulkar was the second best batsmen in terms of runs aggregate
• IND tour of SL: Probably the only aberration, thanks to the umpires
• ENG tour of IND: Tendulkar was amongst the top 4 batsmen in terms of runs aggregate and most importantly set up the 1st Test victory
• IND tour of NZ: Inspite of playing just 3 matches SRT is the second best batsmen in terms of runs aggregate in ODIs and has had a rollicking start to the Tests - joining hands with Bhajji to script our first victory in 3 decades.With the current morale of the kiwis India should deliver the killer punch in the 2nd test and seal the series.

Amidst all this, I think Gary Kirsten has been amazing in handling the team post Greg Chappell. I haven't read any interview of this fellow so far, surprising considering the dream run the team has had so far.

Interesting Titbits

'On the face of it, Shareholder value is the dumbest idea in the world' - says who - speaketh the yesteryear Guru Jack Welch. We are in a season where everyone has started abhoring Capitalism, but interestingly no one has suggested any alternative (no one has started spelling out S-O-C-I-A-L-I-S-M out and loud). If it was so dumb, I wonder why it took so long for Jack to reveal this.It would be interesting to see in the coming months as to what will be suggested to replace Capitalism.

Record slash in salaries of IIM Grads
Securing a Crore+ Job/Jobs at exotic locations/Holy Grail of I-Banking have been replaced by more humble 'Give me a Job'. Interesting to see the PSUs in India taking advantage of the opportunity presented - not sure if it was hard sell by the B-school Placecom to get the PSUs to campus. I sincerly hope it was the other way around. Now that talent has got in, I wish the babus go a step forward, create an environment to retain this talent and let it not be lost once the market conditions improve. This slash gives a good base to start the cycle of astronomical salary hikes in the near future given the low base they start from this year by the creative placement reports and we will have the media running from pillar to post glamourising the paychecks once the situation improves.

Gartner says Indian IT firms are not bullish in going for Outsourcing deals
This indeed was surprising and possibly amongst the few news articles which induce hope in this environment; I think this is the time to set everything right and send out a strong message rather than adopt a safe conservative approach. With the equity market having written off high hopes on the IT Sector and with Neutron Jack's view to support, they are not going to have pressures to deliver on numbers. So use this time to go for acquisitions, build the sales engines in new geographies, recruit all those cheap and high quality talent available in the market to build the holy grail of 'Consulting', and chuck the deadwood onboard. I think this is the time which needs to be used judiciously to cut down on weak areas and sharpen on your USPs so that you are able to strike the market hard when the situation improves. I think the same piece of advice holds good for employees as well, drown your frustrations regarding hikes and promotions instead utilise this time to improve your skill sets.

Citibank and Bank of America announce profits on business so far in 2009
Yeah, having eliminated all toxic assets on the poor Tax payer this ain't a surprise. Vikram Pandit took a $10.8 Million Salary last year and was supposed to be replaced but with his master statement of 1$ salary until profitability has bought himself some more time.

(To be Continued)

My Current Reading List

I have been engrossed with 3 books recently:

Stay Hungry and Stay Foolish(SHSF) By Rashmi Bansal

Celebrating Success and Failure(CSF) By Swami Sukhabodhananda

Eat that Frog(ETF) By Brian Tracy I have completed SHSF and am halfway thru with CSF.

SHSF
The phrase SHSF is what made me buy this one. If you haven't then I would suggest you to download the commencement speech by Steve Jobs where he ends the speech with these immortal lines. Very short speech, no crap but lots of Gyan. Coming back to the book, SHSF at times gets boring with a total template like approach, but the book was supposed to be that way by the author so can't complain much. It is a collection of the experiences of 25 alumni from IIM-A - their struggle, their learnings and their approach to make a difference and make some moolah! My personal favorites were the ones by Sunil Handa and Orchid Chemicals. With my budding interests in entrepreneurship the book did keep me interested to begin with, but as it went, it just got boring with the template approach. So the best way is to alternate this with another book which is what I did by picking up CSF.

CSF
CSF is amazing to say the least particularly in these testing times, but as the author notes the real trick is in practicising what is written in the book. I am sure we would all know atleast 60% of what is written in the book but how many of us follow what we know. Some time back I read an interview by Kwang Ro Kim(ex LG India chief) in McKinsey Quarterly where in for a question he quipped 'All of us know Jogging is good for health, but how many of us jog?' I should say I am relishing this book.

ETF
I have just started ETF alongside and should say even this falls under the same category of CSF. Will get back once I complete this.

New Joys and Sorrows

First post of the year, hope I am regular this year, aiming to have atleast 10 meaningful posts per month. Aim to keep my personal updates less and plan to focus on the happennings around me. So here we go!

Personally and professionally 2008 was as good as it can get for me. Hope the momentum continues in 2009 as well. Sticking to my pledge of focussing on other things - the year has already witnessed a volatile start - Gaza unrest, Obama becoming POTUS, Politicians in power around the world taking umbrage under the fact that the recent crisis is a "Global phenomenon" and not restricted just to their lands (Beats my logic as to why they didn't do enough to tighten their regulations), and for Indians the Satyam scandal.

If ever there is a period which will be referred, dissected, reanalysed for learnings of what to do and what to refrain from then Ladies and Gentlemen it is NOW. We are living history here and interestingly the events are 'Made in USA'

The Satyam scandal was a real shocker and the slew of news which followed it of the shenanigans by Raju and his clan. It is unbelievable to say the least when someone has been successfully able to evade the eyes of law for so long for this magnitude. But as with the Mumbai blast I am more interested to see how this is going to be brought to justice. We needn't go very far when it comes to justice for celebrities, Do you know of someone called Sanjay Dutt and his latest activities?

Interesting observations post Satyam scandal:
1. Kamal Nath comes out saying no package for Satyam. (For once I thought there was a sensible approach being taken.Why should the Tax payer bear the burden?)
2. KV Kamath does a back of the envelope calculation to say we can't leave Satyam to die as it might affect the lives of 1 Million Indians
3. Immediately Kamal Nath comes back to say we MIGHT consider a package (I am not sure what his current stance is?)
4. Other Big Brothers of the industry say they aren't interested in hunting Satyam's clients unless otherwise the clients come to them (Now what do they mean here, It means the Sales chaps in the majors are just going to wait for the clients to come to them to initiate the talks, because we are in a prosperous period you see, We believe that) Why are you taking moral high ground here?
5. L&T states it has no interest in Satyam (Latest news in EcoT: L&T hikes its stake to 12%)
6. As with the sub-prime here again no one knows 'Where the Money went?'
7. Shocking to see that PwC had murky roles in few earlier scandals as well. I happenned to see an interview of Nouriel Roubini sometime back seeking his views on the sub-prime crisis, interestingly the interview credited Nouriel Roubini of predicting this sub-prime doom but which no one gave heed to. In the interview Nouriel was emphatic in stating that people should be made accountable and punished if we were to prevent a recurrence. But is anyone listening?
8. No one came forward from the 'IT Multinational clan' to air their views. But it goes without saying that this one single incident is going be a WMD in the sales arsenal of Multinationals
9. If a host of organisations are accused of fraudulent practices by World Bank. I am wondering about the level of resistance one might face in trying to corrupt someone in World Bank. (Looks like it isn't tough!)
10. ET had an article where it aired views of astrologers who said how all was wrong about the Satyam logo and the logic to go for Maytas name
11. This incident garnered much advertisement for the fact that 'Krishna Palepu specialises in Corporate Governance' Even his Phd work, consulting work or talks around the world would have got him this much attention

What remains to be seen?
1. What happens to Mynampati?
2. Who is going to take charge of cleaning this?
3. Who will acquire Satyam? When? and How will they value the company?
4. What happens to the Rajus? Will his battery of 25 lawyers defeat justice?
5. Is this an isolated one-off incident or is it the signal for many more to come out?
6. How are the Ex-Board members role going to be scrutinised?

Anything More

To all those nitpickers out there anything more you want our man to prove...

What a match, The God does it again in a staggering style! Finally the virtual demon of 'Tendulkar not playing in crunch' has been slayed in style. 2 days back when England were on top, I was watching the glee on the newsreader's face here in London(understandable after the one day thrashing)..But now..I am just too eager to see the news tonite.

Lords

Y'day unbelievably was bright and sunny and my visit to the Mecca of Cricket was a thoroughly enjoyable one. Alas! I had to be happy with an empty stadium. World class stadium - but the ground is a bit small and it was giving me the 'Heebie Jeebies' standing in the Players dressing room and the famous balcony where our Dada unabashedly swung his Tee, Kapil Dev lifting the world cup.

Interesting Trivia: No Test centuries from Tendulkar, Lara and Ponting at the Lords

Bombay Blasts and Implications

It was a rude shock for me as like many to read about the Mumbai Blasts. Interesting to see the comments coming in from around the world am not sure on the veracity of these reports but based on the reports I read in leading news websites what I gathered was the flip-flop comments which came on how our security team handled the situation depending on the relationship status we had with these countries

It is high time we see atleast a delta improvement in
1. Getting a proactive approach. We have had daring attempts in the past as well, Parliament Attack, Mumbai Train Blasts, Akshardham, Hyderabad blasts so on and so forth. We need to see a change atleast now
2. It is high time political parties both with and without power demarcate politics and National interests.
3. Stopping this drama of showing initial progress(like a few heads being axed, a retired SC judge heading a commission etc.) and then the investigation dying a slow death either because of lack of leads/Media distracting the attention of the public. Innumerable examples can be quoted here, I don't think we have had a tangible lead in any of the blasts which have taken place in the recent past

I was surprised to
1. See that electricity and TV connections were still available within the hotel when the siege was on (Meaning the Terrorists exactly knew the sensationalism they were creating when they were holed up, I think this would have ended up boosting their resolve further to take down as many as they could). Read this account from a lucky person who managed to escape Australian Account . Why couldn't these be disconnected, agreed the hostages would have been put to hardship but atleast we could have saved a few more?

2. Cell phones were functional the terrorists were in touch with their 'bosses'. I am a Techno illiterate but isn't there any technology available to jam the signals. I am not sure if the forces were in touch with hostages and made use of available information but I still feel they could have jammed the signal and this could have led the terrorists to panic and made the rescue even more worthy

3. Security forces tried creating smoke screens once they entered the hotels. I remember a story of Chechen rebels taking control of a Theatre few years back the Russian forces made use of some chemical gas to incapacitate the intruders as well as the hostages and there were controversies around the damage it did more than the good in rescuing the hostages. But if we had adopted such a practice I think we would have saved atleast a few lives more, in the end we lost brave commandos and innocent hostages for almost nothing.

I felt sorry for the brave souls who sacrified their lives, I still have the image of the cops who were running head-on against the bullets during the Parliament attempt. If not for these brave souls I don't think any of us would have a secure day. When the guys at the grassroots level show such raw courage and are putting their lives in such peril I feel the decision makers at the top need to show more gumption and ensure that such sacrifices don't go meaningless.

Let us hope that this situation atleast brings improvement to the current state of things.

My budding Fear..Is our 'Unity in Diversity' under immense pressure because of internal and external factors?

Internal Factors:
1. We are seeing coalition politics at both centre and state level. And this Coalition Politics is creating an increasingly divisive society with parties identifying themselves with Caste, Creed (which Democracy abhors)

2. Increasing Urban Migration is creating tension because of more people chasing few opportunities in urban locations which is being exploited by political parties, case in hand being what we are seeing in Maharashtra, won't be long before we start seeing elsewhere
3. Inequity in wealth distribution

External Factors:
1. We have trouble all around us and their internal problems are creating havoc for us. If we want to be seen as an equal to China in the Asian region then lets start exhibiting such behaviors. Let us take a hands-on approach and start helping our neighbours get their house in shape (Which is in our best interests). The policy of respecting soverignity is fine but lets be active in our foreign policies and start showing some real interests in their concerns

Unless we start focussing on sorting the internal and external issues I think the days of Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Kashmir, and Arunachal Pradesh being independant COUNTRIES isn't far away. We might be the next crumbling Russia.....