The B-part? Best part? Business aspect? The Bigger Picture? The Bold perspective? The Broader perspective? The Bubbly part? Behind the scenes? Branding!?
When I had to decide between a campus placement offer from Infosys, and a Research Associate offer from IIT Bombay (with less than one third the compensation than the Infosys offer), I was weighing the options to know the better one of the two offers. For me, B was the Better part. And over the years, I have tried to understand, what comprises the better part of things in life.
Rourkela as a city, has people from all parts of India. It is different in many ways: we had kids from all states, religions, languages in India (including German and Zambian kids!) during school. This showed me some aspects of life that gets missed when you grow up in a more localized city or town. I moved on to study at the National Institute of Technology, Rourkela, which again had students from all states in India. Diversity as a word, became more of my nature than my habit and showed me a broader arena. Then came a stint at IIT Bombay - my interactions with individuals from all over the world was similar from the bigger perspective of humanity. To me, almost everyone looked the same from the fundamentals of human nature, and at the same time, everyone was unique! Apart from Orissa, I have resided in West Bengal, Assam, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka. I have observed people in all walks of life, and for me, every time, B stands for something new - and Beautiful!
After two years at IIT Bombay, I have spent time at TVS Motor, General Electric and Mercedes Benz. Although most of the work was as an individual contributor in the team, there have been numerous instances when I had to lead a team. Whether it was setting up the IC Engines Lab at the Mechanical Engineering department of IIT Bombay, or going for on-road tests of bikes while I was with TVS Motor, knowing people and the variety of behavior that they have, has been very useful. The audience has been different each time - and so was the learning. I have advanced technically ahead enough for challenging roles and emotionally high enough for mentally gainsaying situations. The B part that I have always tried to understand in my life has taken various forms in diverse situations but all amalgamted under the better aspect of things.
When I observe my colleagues, I find them extremely good at the things that are assigned to do. But, rarely does one find people looking at bigger pictures. When someone designs a hybrid engine controller in my lab, very few are the ones who can envisage the controller's features ten years ahead of time. Not sure whether outsourcing is the culprit, I have found many people excelling at what they have been told to do. When you look at the bigger picture, you can think better and design far better. You might argue that the management is the agency whose job is to look at the bigger picture. Well, if you have the habit of having a broader perspective than just the work assigned to you, it is far better than what the management can ever imagine. A management body basically works as an entity with quantifiable faith on the guidance provided by the field folks. It is a decision making authority - the vision part is still in the mind of the individual contributor. Like many others, I initially did not like Project Management related activities - 'we are techies, PM is for managers' was the mantra. But it was PM and related work that helped me look beyond implementation techniques. Your vision tends to grow.
When I organized the first team offsite after joining GE India, we went to Eagleton Resorts on the Bangalore-Mysore highway. Right from the decision about games till the choice of food and entertainment, it was extremely well-planned . I contacted various vendors before deciding the resort we went to (with team poll), made out lists of gifts to be given to team folks, negotiated with suppliers for offers on mass buying of items and carried out tens of other such actions at both the micro as well as macro level. In fact, I risked delaying a deliverable by sometime because my team got stuck in bureaucratic issue and as a lead volunteer for the team offsite, I thought it okay for something else to wait! (You have to learn taking such calls in life!) If the event had not gone the way it did, I might had had to hear verses from my manager! But that was a calculated risk and the whole of my team was with me. Life gives you choices and you have to make one. I felt (this was corroborated after discussing with everyone) that the only way to have a really memorable team event was to forget the previous ones and look at the broader perspective of the intention behind it - for the team members, it had to be a fun-filled event while for the management, it had to showcase team-building activities in a relaxed, away-from-office environment. The moment you lose focus of the bigger picture, you might remain stuck in just the fact that the food got colder! or the transport arrived late by five minutes (which is reason enough, funnily, for both your manager as well as teammates to start disliking you!)
I have already narrated some experiences from the days when I was the students' secretary of my hostel. You can have a look at it here. Life was bubbly, beautiful, bold and bigger!
The 'B' in business is something that needs some thought. Without this aspect, we are almost totally handicapped in achieving bigger aims. In the conventional manner, it all boils down to profit, and in the wider window of a business vision, it shows us new avenues to explore and exceed with ou skills. I had written a post about business as a social solution (click here). Entangled closely with money and benefits, you can never ignore this 'b' in life! I was reading about the expectations of an engineer doing an MBA - and I understood how important it is to look behind the scenes, why a product is made in the first place, and why/how is it branded!!
Many a times, I feel that I dream bigger than my colleagues, and am insanely passionate about achieving my visions: Dreams, broader than individuals at my level of career growth and more beautiful as well. Let's see huge visions in every aspect of our work, without forgetting that the smallest details keep the key to the biggest achievements.
One of my managers in the past, used to repeat the words 'look at the whole scenario', in every sentence of his talk. Although it was quite irritating to hear the same words being repeated so many times, there still remains a lot of truth in his words.
When I had to decide between a campus placement offer from Infosys, and a Research Associate offer from IIT Bombay (with less than one third the compensation than the Infosys offer), I was weighing the options to know the better one of the two offers. For me, B was the Better part. And over the years, I have tried to understand, what comprises the better part of things in life.
Rourkela as a city, has people from all parts of India. It is different in many ways: we had kids from all states, religions, languages in India (including German and Zambian kids!) during school. This showed me some aspects of life that gets missed when you grow up in a more localized city or town. I moved on to study at the National Institute of Technology, Rourkela, which again had students from all states in India. Diversity as a word, became more of my nature than my habit and showed me a broader arena. Then came a stint at IIT Bombay - my interactions with individuals from all over the world was similar from the bigger perspective of humanity. To me, almost everyone looked the same from the fundamentals of human nature, and at the same time, everyone was unique! Apart from Orissa, I have resided in West Bengal, Assam, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka. I have observed people in all walks of life, and for me, every time, B stands for something new - and Beautiful!
After two years at IIT Bombay, I have spent time at TVS Motor, General Electric and Mercedes Benz. Although most of the work was as an individual contributor in the team, there have been numerous instances when I had to lead a team. Whether it was setting up the IC Engines Lab at the Mechanical Engineering department of IIT Bombay, or going for on-road tests of bikes while I was with TVS Motor, knowing people and the variety of behavior that they have, has been very useful. The audience has been different each time - and so was the learning. I have advanced technically ahead enough for challenging roles and emotionally high enough for mentally gainsaying situations. The B part that I have always tried to understand in my life has taken various forms in diverse situations but all amalgamted under the better aspect of things.
When I observe my colleagues, I find them extremely good at the things that are assigned to do. But, rarely does one find people looking at bigger pictures. When someone designs a hybrid engine controller in my lab, very few are the ones who can envisage the controller's features ten years ahead of time. Not sure whether outsourcing is the culprit, I have found many people excelling at what they have been told to do. When you look at the bigger picture, you can think better and design far better. You might argue that the management is the agency whose job is to look at the bigger picture. Well, if you have the habit of having a broader perspective than just the work assigned to you, it is far better than what the management can ever imagine. A management body basically works as an entity with quantifiable faith on the guidance provided by the field folks. It is a decision making authority - the vision part is still in the mind of the individual contributor. Like many others, I initially did not like Project Management related activities - 'we are techies, PM is for managers' was the mantra. But it was PM and related work that helped me look beyond implementation techniques. Your vision tends to grow.
When I organized the first team offsite after joining GE India, we went to Eagleton Resorts on the Bangalore-Mysore highway. Right from the decision about games till the choice of food and entertainment, it was extremely well-planned . I contacted various vendors before deciding the resort we went to (with team poll), made out lists of gifts to be given to team folks, negotiated with suppliers for offers on mass buying of items and carried out tens of other such actions at both the micro as well as macro level. In fact, I risked delaying a deliverable by sometime because my team got stuck in bureaucratic issue and as a lead volunteer for the team offsite, I thought it okay for something else to wait! (You have to learn taking such calls in life!) If the event had not gone the way it did, I might had had to hear verses from my manager! But that was a calculated risk and the whole of my team was with me. Life gives you choices and you have to make one. I felt (this was corroborated after discussing with everyone) that the only way to have a really memorable team event was to forget the previous ones and look at the broader perspective of the intention behind it - for the team members, it had to be a fun-filled event while for the management, it had to showcase team-building activities in a relaxed, away-from-office environment. The moment you lose focus of the bigger picture, you might remain stuck in just the fact that the food got colder! or the transport arrived late by five minutes (which is reason enough, funnily, for both your manager as well as teammates to start disliking you!)
I have already narrated some experiences from the days when I was the students' secretary of my hostel. You can have a look at it here. Life was bubbly, beautiful, bold and bigger!
The 'B' in business is something that needs some thought. Without this aspect, we are almost totally handicapped in achieving bigger aims. In the conventional manner, it all boils down to profit, and in the wider window of a business vision, it shows us new avenues to explore and exceed with ou skills. I had written a post about business as a social solution (click here). Entangled closely with money and benefits, you can never ignore this 'b' in life! I was reading about the expectations of an engineer doing an MBA - and I understood how important it is to look behind the scenes, why a product is made in the first place, and why/how is it branded!!
Many a times, I feel that I dream bigger than my colleagues, and am insanely passionate about achieving my visions: Dreams, broader than individuals at my level of career growth and more beautiful as well. Let's see huge visions in every aspect of our work, without forgetting that the smallest details keep the key to the biggest achievements.
One of my managers in the past, used to repeat the words 'look at the whole scenario', in every sentence of his talk. Although it was quite irritating to hear the same words being repeated so many times, there still remains a lot of truth in his words.
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