31 August 2010

The Seed - CEO management story/lesson

A successful business man was growing old and knew it was time to choose A successor to take over the business. Instead of choosing one of his Directors or his children, he decided to do something different. He called all the young executives in his company together. 'It is time for me to step down and choose the next CEO,' he said. 'I Have decided to choose one of you.'


The young executives were shocked, but the boss continued. 'I am going To give each one of you a seed today - a very special seed. I want you To plant the seed, water it, and come back here one year from today with What you have grown from the seed I have given you. I will then judge The plants that you bring, and the one I choose will be the next CEO.'


One man, named Jim, was there that day and he, like the others, received A seed. He went home and excitedly, told his wife the story. She helped him get A pot, soil and compost and he planted the seed. Every day, he would water it and watch to see if it had grown. After About three weeks, some of the other executives began to talk about Their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow.. Jim kept Checking his seed, but nothing ever grew…….


Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks went by, still nothing. By now, Others were talking about their plants, but Jim didn't have a plant and He felt like a failure. Six months went by - still nothing in Jim's pot. He just knew he had Killed his seed. Everyone else had trees and tall plants, but he had Nothing. Jim didn't say anything to his colleagues, however.. He just Kept watering and fertilizing the soil - he so wanted the seed to grow.


A year finally went by and all the young executives of the company Brought their plants to the CEO for inspection. Jim told his wife that He wasn't going to take an empty pot. But she asked him to be honest About what happened. Jim felt sick at his stomach. It was going to be the most embarrassing Moment of his life, but he knew his wife was right. He took his empty pot to the board room.. When Jim arrived, he was amazed At the variety of plants grown by the other executives. They were Beautiful-in all shapes and sizes. Jim put his empty pot on the floor And many of his colleagues laughed. A few felt sorry for him!


When the CEO arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted his young Executives. Jim just tried to hide in the back. 'My, what great plants, trees, and flowers you have grown,' said the CEO. 'Today one of you will be appointed the next CEO!' All of a sudden, the CEO spotted Jim at the back of the room with his Empty pot.


He ordered the financial director to bring him to the front. Jim was terrified. He thought, 'The CEO knows I'm a failure! Maybe he Will have me fired!' When Jim got to the front, the CEO asked him what had happened to his Seed. Jim told him the story. The CEO asked everyone to sit down except Jim.


He looked at Jim, and Then announced to the young executives, 'Here is your next Chief Executive! His name is Jim!' Jim couldn't believe it. Jim couldn't even grow his seed. How could he Be the new CEO the others said?


Then the CEO said, 'One year ago today, I gave everyone in this room a Seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it, and bring it back to me Today. But I gave you all boiled seeds; they were dead - it was not Possible for them to grow. All of you, except Jim, have brought me trees and plants and flowers. 'When you found that the seed would not grow, you substituted another Seed for the one I gave you. Jim was the only one with the Courage and Honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in it. Therefore, he is the one Who will be the new Chief Executive!'

Moral:- (As you Sow, you shall Reap)
If you plant honesty, you will reap trust.
If you plant goodness, you will reap friends.
If you plant humility, you will reap greatness.
If you plant perseverance, you will reap contentment.
If you plant consideration, you will reap perspective.
If you plant hard work, you will reap success.
If you plant forgiveness, you will reap reconciliation.

So, be careful what you plant now; it will determine what you will reap later.

26 August 2010

Hard to please men - Falling Short - A story.

A shopkeeper watching over his shop is really surprised when he sees a dog coming inside the shop, He shoos him away. But later, the dog is back inside again. So he goes over to the dog and notices that it has a note in its mouth. He takes the note and it reads “Can I have 12 soaps and a shampoo bottle, please. The money is with the dog.” The shopkeeper looks inside the dogs mouth and to his surprise there is a 100 rupees note in his mouth. So he takes the money and puts the soap, shampoo and change in a bag, and then places it in the dogs mouth.

The shopkeeper is so impressed, and since it is the closing time, he decides to follow the dog. The dog is walking down the street, when it comes to the zebra crossing, he waits till the signal turns green. He walks across the road till the bus stop. He waits on the stop and looks up the timetable for the bus. The shopkeeper is totally out of his mind as the dog gets into the bus and sits on a vacant seat. The shopkeeper follows the dog. The dog waits for the conductor to come to his seat. He gives the change to the conductor and shows him the neck belt to keep the ticket. The shopkeeper is almost fainting at this sight and so are the other people in the bus.
The dog then moves to the front exit of the door and waits for the bus stop to arrive, looking outside. As soon as the stop is in sight he wags his tail to inform the driver to stop. Then not even waiting for the bus stop to arrive the dog jumps out and runs to the house nearby.
It opens an big iron gate and rushes towards the door. As it approaches the door, he changes his mind and walks towards the garden. The dog walks up to the window and beats his head several times on the window. It then walks back to the door and waits. The shopkeeper maintaining his senses walks up to the door and watched a big guy open the door.
The guy starts beating, kicking and abusing the dog. The shopkeeper is surprised and runs to stop the guy. The shopkeeper questions the guy “What in the heaven are you doing? The dog is a genius he could be famous in life.”
The guy responds “You call this clever? This is the 3rd time in this week that the dog has forgotten the door keys.”
Moral of the story:
You may continue to exceed onlookers expectations… But will always fall short of the bosses expectation…
Men are hard to please but with God all things are possible…..

24 August 2010

Law of the Garbage Truck

A man hopped into a taxi and took off for the airport. They were driving in the right lane when suddenly a car jumped out of a parking space right in front of them. The taxi driver slammed on his breaks, skidded, and missed the other car by just inches! The driver of the other car whipped his head around and started yelling at the taxi.




The taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And he was really friendly. So the man asked, "Why did you just do that? This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to the hospital!"


This is when the taxi driver revealed "The Law of the Garbage Truck." He explained that many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it and sometimes they'll dump it on you. Don't take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Don't take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home, or on the street.


The bottom line is that successful people don't let garbage trucks take over their day.


Life's too short to wake up in the morning with regrets, so…


"Love the people who treat you right. Forgive the ones who don't."

19 August 2010

Triple filter test - Life/Management lesson.

In ancient Greece, Socrates was reputed to hold knowledge in high esteem.


One day one fellow met the great philosopher and said,
"Do you know what I just heard about your friend?".
"Hold on a minute", Socrates replied. "Before telling me anything I'd like you to pass a little test. It's called the Triple Filter Test."


"Triple filter?".
"That's right", Socrates continued. "Before you talk to me about my friend, it might be a good idea to take a moment and filter what you're going to say. That's why I call it the triple filter test.


The first filter is TRUTH. "Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?".
"No", the man said, "Actually I just heard about it and ..."
"All right", said Socrates. "So you don't know if it's true or not."


Now let's try the second filter, the filter of GOODNESS. Is what you are about to tell me about my friend something good?"
"No, on the contrary..."
So, Socrates continued, "You want to tell me something bad about him, but you're not certain it's true."


You may still pass the test though, because there's one filter left: the filter of USEFULNESS. Is what you want to tell me about my friend going to be useful to me?"
"No, not really."
"Well", concluded Socrates, "If what you want to tell me is neither true nor good nor even useful, why to tell it to me at all?"


This is why Socrates was a great philosopher and held in such high esteem.


Friend(s), use this triple filter each time you hear loose talk about any of your near/dear friends/colleagues and so on.,

16 August 2010

Qualities of a Good Leader

'...Seek out... men of good reputation... whom we may appoint over this business.' Acts 6:3


Good leaders practice four qualities.


First, Submission. Only a leader who has followed well, knows how to lead others well. Connecting with people becomes possible because you've walked in their shoes. Leaders who've never submitted to authority tend to be proud, unrealistic and autocratic


Second, Self-discipline. To make consistently good decisions requires character and self-discipline. To do otherwise is to lose control of ourselves. British essayist John Foster writes, 'A man without decision of character can never be said to belong to himself. He belongs to whatever can make a captive of him.' Peter writes, 'Knowing God leads to self-control' (2 Peter 1:5-6)


Third, Patience. Leaders look ahead, think ahead and want to move ahead. That's what makes them leaders. But the true goal of leadership is not to cross the finishing line first, but to take as many others with you as you can. For that reason you have to deliberately slow your pace, stay connected to your people, keep them informed and inspired, enlist the help of others to fulfill your vision, and keep going. And you can't do that if you're running too far ahead of everybody. Solomon writes, 'Finishing is better than starting. Patience is better than pride' (Ecclesiastes 7:8).


Finally, Accountability. Many people feel that accountability is a willingness to explain your actions. In reality, real accountability begins long before you take action. Most wrong actions come about because we are not being accountable early enough.





12 August 2010

How to get happiness? Story Solution

This story is about a beautiful, expensively dressed lady who complained to her psychiatrist that she felt that her whole life was empty, it had no meaning.
So, the lady went to visit a counselor to seek out happiness.


The counselor called over the old lady who cleaned the office floors.
The counselor then said to the rich lady “I’m going to ask Mary here to tell you how she found happiness. All I want you to do is listen to her."
So the old lady put down her broom and sat on a chair and told her story:
"Well, my husband died of malaria and three months later
my only son was killed by a car.
I had nobody... I had nothing left. I couldn't sleep, I couldn't eat, I never smiled at anyone, I even thought of taking my own life.
Then one evening a little kitten followed me home from work.
Somehow I felt sorry for that kitten. It was cold outside, so I decided to let the kitten in. I got it some milk, and the kitten licked the plate clean.
Then it purred and rubbed against my leg and for the first time in months, I smiled.
Then I stopped to think, if helping a little kitten could make me smile, maybe doing something for people could make me happy.
So the next day I baked some biscuits and took them to a neighbor who was sick in bed.
Every day I tried to do something nice for someone.
It made me so happy to see them happy.
Today, I don't know of anybody who sleeps and eats better than I do.
I've found happiness, by giving it to others."
When she heard that the rich lady cried.
She had everything that money could buy, but
she had lost the things which money cannot buy.
Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed.
You can make your parents happy by making them comfortable with your attitude and the divine love.  You even can give surprise gifts, take them out once in couple days/month, so on so on.,
You can make your friends happy by cracking jokes, sharing the happiness by giving a good pat on their shoulders, giving and helping 'em with nice advises.
You may cheer-up your employees by motivation to do the best to the themselves and organization's growth.
Everything is in understanding things.
Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace and gratitude.

06 August 2010

Confidence in achieving a goal - a story

A businessman was deep in debt and could see no way out. Creditors were closing in on him. Suppliers were demanding payment. He sat on the park bench, head in hands, wondering if anything could save his company from bankruptcy. Suddenly an old man appeared before him. "I can see that something is troubling you," he said. After listening to the executive's woes, the old man said, "I believe I can help you." He asked the man his name, wrote out a check, and pushed it into his hand saying, "Take this money. Meet me here exactly one year from today, and you can pay me back at that time." Then he turned and disappeared as quickly as he had come. The business executive saw in his hand a check for $500,000, signed by John D. Rockefeller, then one of the richest men in the world! "I can erase my money worries in an instant!" he realized. But instead, the executive decided to put the un-cashed check in his safe. Just knowing it was there might give him the strength to work out a way to save his business, he thought. With renewed optimism, he negotiated better deals and extended terms of payment. He closed several big sales. Within a few months, he was out of debt and making money once again.


Exactly one year later, he returned to the park with the un-cashed check. At the agreed-upon time, the old man appeared. But just as the executive was about to hand back the check and share his success story, a nurse came running up and grabbed the old man.” I’m so glad I caught him!" she cried. "I hope he hasn't been bothering you. He's always escaping from the rest home and telling people he's John D. Rockefeller”. And she led the old man away by the arm. The astonished executive just stood there, stunned. All year long he'd been wheeling and dealing, buying and selling, convinced he had half a million dollars behind him. Suddenly, he realized that it wasn't the money, real or imagined, that had turned his life around.


It was his new found CONFIDENCE that gave him power to achieve anything he went after.

Financial management in a story

A beggar to another beggar: I had a grand dinner at Taj yesterday.


How? The other beggar asked.


First beggar: Some one gave me a Rs 100/- note yesterday.


I went to Taj and ordered dinner worth Rs 1,000/-,


And enjoyed the dinner. When the bill came, I said, I had no money.


The Taj manager called the policeman, and handed me over to him.


I gave the Rs 100/- note to the police fellow, and he set me free.




A wonderful example of financial management indeed :)

Short story competition - TCS

There was a contest in TCS to write a fictional story for 500 words max which would start with the line ” On a dark and foggy night, a small figure lay huddled on the railway tracks leading to the Chennai station “




This is what a guy wrote for the contest……. and surprisingly, it was adjudged the best short story : ))


On a dark and foggy night, a small figure lay huddled on the railway tracks leading to the Chennai station. At once I was held back to see someone in that position during midnight with no one around. With curiosity taking the front seat, I went near the body and tried to investigate it. There was blood all over the body which was lying face down. It seemed that a ruthless blow by the last train could have caused the end of this body which seemed to be that of a guy of around my age. Amidst the gory blood flow, I could see a folded white envelope which was fluttering in the midnight wind. Carefully I took the blood stained envelope and was surprised to see the phrase “appraisal letter” on it. With curiosity rising every moment, I wasted no time in opening the envelope to see if I can find some details about the dead guy. The tag around the body’s neck and the jazzy appraisal cover gave me the hint that he might be a software engineer. I opened the envelope to find a shining paper on which the appraisal details where typed in flying colors. Thunders broke into my ears and lightening struck my heart when I saw the appraisal amount of the dead guy!!!!! My God, it was not even, as much as the cost of the letter on which the appraisal details were printed…. My heart poured out for the guy and huge calls were heard inside my mind saying “no wonder, this guy died such a miserable death”… As a fellow worker in the same industry, I thought I should mourn for him for the sake of respect and stood there with a heavy heart thinking of the shock that he would have experienced when his manager had placed the appraisal letter in his hand. I am sure his heart would have stopped and eyes would have gone blank for few seconds looking at the near to nothing increment in his salary.




While I mourned for him, for a second my hands froze to see the employee’s name in the appraisal letter… hey, what a strange co-incidence, this guy’s name is same as mine, including the initials. This was interesting. With some mental strength, I turned the body upside down and found myself fainted for a second. The guy not only had my name, but also looked exactly like me. Same looks, same built, same name…. it was me who was dead there!!!!!!!! While I was lost in that shock, I felt someone patting on my shoulders. My heart stopped completely, I could not breathe and sprung in fear to see who was behind……… splash!!! Went the glass of water on my laptop screen as I came out of my wild dream to see my manager standing behind my chair patting on my shoulder saying, “wake up man? Come to meeting room number two. I have your appraisal letter ready”.

Impact of job change

Impact of job change

A taxi passenger tapped the driver on the shoulder to ask him a question.
The driver screamed, lost control of the car, nearly hit a bus, went up on the footpath, and stopped centimeters from a shop window.

For a second everything went quiet in the cab, and then the driver said:
"Look mate, don't ever do that again. You scared the daylights out of me!"
The passenger apologized and said, "I didn't realize that a little tap would scare you so much."

The driver replied, "Sorry, it's not really your fault. Today is my first day as a cab driver - I've been driving a van carrying dead Bodies for the last 25 years.. You can imagine what went into my mind when u touched my back!!

Management stories - Washerman, donkey & dog

There was once a washer man who had a donkey and a dog.


One night when the whole world was sleeping, a thief broke into the house, the washer man was fast asleep but the donkey and the dog were awake.


The dog decided not to bark since the master did not take good care of him and wanted to teach him a lesson.


The donkey got worried and said to the dog that if he doesn't bark, the donkey will have to do something himself. The dog did not change his mind and the donkey started braying loudly.


Hearing the donkey bray, the thief ran away, the master woke up and started beating the donkey for braying in the middle of the night for no reason.


Moral of the story " One must not engage in duties other than his own"
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Now take a new look at the same story…


The washer man was a well educated man from a premier management institute.


He had the fundas of looking at the bigger picture and thinking out of the box. He was convinced that there must be some reason for the donkey to bray in the night.


He walked outside a little and did some fact finding, applied a bottom up approach, figured out from the ground realities that there was a thief who broke in and the donkey only wanted to alert him about it.


Looking at the donkey's extra initiative and going beyond the call of the duty, he rewarded him with lot of hay and other perks and became his favorite pet.


The dog's life didn't change much, except that now the donkey was more motivated in doing the dogs duties as well. In the annual appraisal the dog managed a " meets requirement" Soon the dog realized that the donkey is taking care of his duties and he can enjoy his life sleeping and lazing around.


The donkey was rated as "star performer". The donkey had to live up to his already high performance standards. Soon he was over burdened with work and always under pressure and now is looking for a job rotation…

04 August 2010

Move dirt and get an ounce of gold

As a young Scots boy, Andrew Carnegie came to america and started doing odd jobs. He ended up as one of the largest Manufacturers in the united states. At one time he had 43 millionaires working for him. Several decades ago, a million dollars used to be a lot of money, even today it is a lot of money. Someone asked Mr. Carnegie how he dealt with people?


Andrew Carnegie replied, "Dealing with people is like digging gold : When you go digging for an ounce of gold, you have to move tons of dirt to get one ounce of gold. But when you go digging, you dont go looking for dirt, you go looking for the gold'.
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What is your focus? Become a digger of gold. If you are looking for what is wrong with the people or with things, you will find many. what are you looking for? Andrew Carnegie's reply has a very important message. There is something positive in every person and every situation. Sometimes we have to dig deep to look for the positive because it may not be apparent. Besides, we are so used to looking at what is wrong with other people and situations, we forget to see what is right. Someone once said that even a stopped clock is right twice a day.


Remember - When you go looking for gold, you have to move tons of dirt to get to an ounce of gold. But when you go looking, you dont go looking for the dirt, you go looking for the gold.

Be true, honest, unique to yourself

One of best IT interview [ INFOSYS ]
Interviewer: Tell me about yourself.
Candidate: I am Rameshwar Kulkarni. I did my Tele Communication engineering from BabanRao Dhole-Patil Institute of Technology.

Interviewer: BabanRao Dhole-Patil Institute of Technology? I had never heard of this college before!
Candidate: Great! Even I had not heard of it before getting an admission into it ..
What happened is - due to cricket world cup I scored badly! in 12th. I was getting a paid seat in a good college. But my father said (I prefer to call him 'baap') - "I can not invest so much of money".(The baap actually said - "I will never waste so much of money on you"). So I had to join this college. Frankly speaking this name - BabanRao Dhole-Patil, can at the most be related to a Shetakari Mahavidyalaya.

Interviewer: ok, ok. It seems you have taken 6 years to complete your engineering.
Candidate: Actually I tried my best to finish it in 4 years. But you know, these cricket matches and football world cup, and tennis tournaments. It is difficult to concentrate. So I flunked in 2nd and 3rd year. So in all I took 4 + 2 = 7 years.

Interviewer: But 4+2 is 6.
Candidate: Oh, is it? You know I always had KT in maths. But I will try to keep this in mind. 4+2 is 6, good, thanks. These cricket matches really affect exams a lot. I think they should ban it.

Interviewer: Good to know that you want cricket matches to be banned.
Candidate: No, no... I am talking about Exams!!

Interviewer: Ok, What is your biggest achievement in life?
Candidate: Obviously, completing my Engineering. My mom never thought I would complete it. In fact, when i flunked in 3rd year, she was looking for a job for me in BEST (Bus corporation in Maharashtra) through some relative.

Interviewer: Do you have any plans of higher study?
Candidate: he he he.. Are you kidding? Completing 'lower' education itself was so much of pain!!

Interviewer: Let's talk about technical stuff. On which platforms have you worked?
Candidate: Well, I work at SEEPZ, so you can say Andheri is my current platform. Earlier I was at Vashi center. So Vashi was my platform then. As you can see I have experience of different platforms! (Vashi and Andheri are the places in Mumbai)

Interviewer: And which languages have you used?
Candidate: Marathi, Hindi, English. By the way, I can keep quiet in German, French, Russian and many other languages.

Interviewer: Why VC is better than VB?
Candidate: It is a common sense - C comes after B. So VC is a higher version than VB. I heard very soon they are coming up with a new language VD!

Interviewer: Do you know anything about Assembly Language?
Candidate: Well, I have not heard of it. But I guess, this is the language our ministers and MPs use in assembly.

Interviewer: What is your general project experience?
Candidate: My general experience about projects is - most of the times they are in pipeline!

Interviewer: Can you tell me about your current job?
Candidate: Sure, Currently I am working for Bata InfoTech ltd. Since joining BIL, I am on Bench. Before joining BIL, I used to think that Bench was another software like Windows.

Interviewer: Do you have any project management experience?
Candidate: No, but I guess it shouldn't be difficult. I know Word and Excel. I can talk a lot. I know how to dial for International phone call and use speaker facility. And very important - I know few words like - 'Showstoppers ', 'hotfixes', 'SEI-CMM', 'quality', 'versioncontrol', 'deadlines', 'Customer Satisfaction' etc. Also I can blame others for my mistakes!

Interviewer: What are your expectations from our company?
Candidate: Not much.
1. I should at least get 40,000 in hand.
2. I would like to work on a live EJB project. But it should not have deadlines. I personally feel that pressure affects natural talent.
3. I believe in flexi-timings.
4. Dress code is against basic freedom, so I would like to wear t-shirt and jeans.
5. We must have sat-sun off. I will suggest Wednesday off also, so as to avoid breakdown due to overwork.
6. I would like to go abroad 3 times a year on short term preferably 1-2 months) assignments. Personally I prefer US, Australia and Europe. But considering the fact that there is Olympics coming up in China in the current year, I don't mind going there in that period. As you can see I am modest and don't have many expectations. So can I assume my selection?

Interviewer: he he he ha ha ha. Thanks for your interest in our organization. In fact I was never entertained so much before. Welcome to INFOSYS.

The fellow was appointed in a newly created section 'Stress Management' in the HRD of Infosys.

So Just be yourself......u never knw wats ahead of u.......

Be Honest and Original...............true to urself !!!!

Why Planning is important - a true story

Why Planning is important?

One Night 4 college students were playing football till late night and could not study for the test which was scheduled for the next day.

In the morning they thought of a plan. They made themselves look as dirty with grease and dirt. They then went up to the Dean and said that they had gone out to a wedding last night and on their return the tire of their car burst and they had to push the car all the way back and that they were in no condition to appear for the test.

So the Dean said they could have the re-test after 3 days. They thanked him and said they would be ready by that time.

On the third day they appeared before the Dean. The Dean said that as this was a Special Condition Test, all four were required to sit in separate classrooms for the test. They all agreed as they had prepared well in the last 3 days.

The Test consisted of 2 questions with a total of 100 Marks.

See Below for the question Paper

Q.1. Your Name…….. ……… ……… (2 MARKS)

Q.2. which tyre burst? (98 MARKS)
a) Front Left b) Front Right
c) Back Left d) Back Right


True story from IIT Bombay ….Batch 1992