What's in a designation?

Please excuse the play on the Shakespearean adage but had a nice animated discussion with folks a couple of days back on the topic of designations and the importance they play on a person's professional life specially in the IT sector.

The way I look at it - the value of designations is driven a lot by the socio economic environment in which the job / role is located.

Typically, in America it seems to me that it is easier to get fancy titles. People with not that much of experience in the profession do call themselves Directors, there are lot more hierarchies between the Director - President level etc. Maybe that's driven by the fact that there is lot of entrepreneurial focus in States and of course when one is running his / her own business one can decide to call himself / herself what one wants. The other reason could be that everybody prefers a shorter job life i.e. one prefers to retire earlier or get out of a job mode earlier and do what one wants to do.

In Germany, on the other hand I find that the designations have lesser value, hierarchies start much lower, middle management is bloated etc. I believe one of the most important reason for this is the fact that the job life of an individual is longer. People are typically risk averse and when they join an organization they tend to retire from it. Maybe the entrepreneurial spirit is lesser as compared to other places. Also people concentrate a lot on quality of life where they really value their free time and sometimes prefer not higher designations or responsibilities concerned with the fact that it might affect their time for themselves. People do value the work they do and believe a lot more in perfection even if it means that they are doing repetitive tasks.

In India I notice there is extreme importance laid on designations. Here India is more like US but the difference is that the hierarchies are more extensive. Maybe that is got to do with the fact that designations back home are linked to the professional success of an individual. Unless every 2-3 years a person gets a vertical growth he / she is not seen to be good. Maybe it is got to do also with the fact that the work which is done is not that high in the value chain and to retain talent organizations depend on titles. Many things like marriages, house ownership, social standing etc. are all linked to titles too and hence they have critical need for people. Typically job lives are longer in India but people do change many jobs and one of the important criterion for talent acquisition or talent retention is designations. With entrepreneurial opportunities growing there is the trend coming up that designations in previous jobs also influence the ease with which people get funded for their ventures.

Of course some of the things which i wrote are controversial but they are my own observations. Do let me know what you think about it.

its fine for sustainable practices to not be altruistic

Yesterday while watching the televised debate between the UK Prime Ministerial candidate I happened to view a TV spot announcing a new contest known as "World Challenge" which focuses on sustainable practices which are today changing the world.

One of the first contestants to be featured was a vegetable market from Indonesia. Now whoever has been to a typical vegetable, fruit market ( not the supermarkets ) would easily recognize that on a daily basis these markets produce a humongous amount of organic and inorganic waste. Apart from the fact that most of this waste makes its way to open landfills where it rots and releases greenhouse gases like methane, it is also a breeding ground for diseases. The solution which the Indonesian market has come up with is to segregate the organic waste, process it and convert it into fertilizers. This is used locally by the farmers and the crop yield has grown by almost 30%. The produce from the local farms is then sold again in the local markets setting up a cycle of reuse and thus a sustainable business model.

This is one example which goes to show that many times sustainable activities also make sense economically and when ever they do they are adopted faster by people. The example I quoted was from Indonesia but I believe the model could be replicated in many places and probably is being followed in other places in some form or the other.

As a foot note, I found the UK Prime Ministerial debate very dignified. Should something similar be initiated in India for the next general elections? Interesting thought but might be difficult logistically as there are so many parties in our country.

Fly to or into the Everest

China again proved it can do what it wants to do with absolute no disregard to anyone else.
First it was the road to Everest and now read today that an airport has been opened up at Xigaze. Why do we make absolute perfect effort to spoil everything pristine? China wants to make this area a climber's paradise but did anyone ask the climbers whether they want this "luxury" possibly at the cost of environment.

Thank God I am a Woman!

No I didn't get a sex change but it's the catch line at the launch of the Spring/Summer Collection of a woman's clothing brand.
Today while watching news I saw the shocking news of female infanticide still prevailing in Rajasthan. In today's world where we as Indians are talking about the great progress we are making as a nation news like this makes my head hang in shame. Will we blame the government for this? Well yeah if anybody wants to take the supposition in that direction then sure as usual we can blame it for this too by contending that not enough is being done towards education improvement in the hinterlands of the country. However, I believe government cannot do everything in this matter. It is the society and the people which have to make the paradigm shift in thinking and break these chains which are termed as traditions. Its the new generation of Indians which have to break out of these molds in which some of our archaic unreasonable "traditions" try to bracket us in. Keeping our cultural traditions alive is absolutely fine but basic human emotions, human right - the right to live can never be sacrificed in the name of demonic practices camouflaged as "traditions".
We still have popular TV serials like "Is desh mai na aana Ladoo" which make the practice of female infanticide as their punchline. I don't follow the serial and maybe it carries a social message pointing out the evils of this social curse but the couple of episodes I saw I didn't get the message. Probably in matters like this subtlety doesn't work.
Yesterday I was sitting with friends and heard about colleagues at work who are still thinking in terms of "arey yaar meri beti hai. mujhey uskey liye bhi tu sochna hai". When we have city bred, highly educated professionals living abroad talking in these terms one can understand how deeply ingrained the malaise runs in our society.
Will we ever reach a stage where women in India would be able to say "Thank God I am an India woman" and not worry about being termed "manhoos"?

Defining success is difficult

The other day we saw "3 Idiots".

The movie is a great fun to watch and in addition to the fun factor also brings out the problem with the Indian Education system which does not encourage innovation and out of the box thinking but is focused on regimented mugging of lessons in order to achieve maximum marks.

S and I started discussing the ending of the film and we both had the question as to how does one define success. If the ending had shown Amir Khan, one of the main protagonist, as being "just" a school master and considering the admiration from the students and the community he was working in as his "success" it would be too idealistic an ending for a "Tenties" movie. The actual climax where the schoolmaster's measure of success is depicted in the form that he has 400 patents and is being pursued by international conglomerates is the other extreme. The hidden implication is that the protagonist is successful from a material aspect too as he has money flowing in from all these patents and collaborations. The other friends are also successful as one has 5 books published in 4 years, one has a Lamborghini and a huge house in US, one has a very good job and is doing some research etc. which all reflect that in the material aspects they all are well endowed. However is monetary the only measure to define success?

It is an ongoing discussion between the two of us and it is becoming obvious that even in today's times it is as difficult to define success as it always was. Why do not you also join in and let us know your opinion?

Illuminated by the Green 3D - AVATAR

Still in awe of the 1st 3D movie experience of my life ( if I disregard the sorry attempt of Appu Ghar way back in time ). Saw AVATAR yesterday and immensely liked it. Do not know whether it was Cameroon or his avatar, but whoever it was who spent all these years making the epic ( remember Titanic came out when we were still experiencing our teen infatuations )did not waster the time.

Many people have already talked about the movie in detail e.g. David Edelstein so I will not go into the technological wonder or the simplicity of the plot but will just touch upon the couple of things which struck me instantly.

The first of course being the fact that there is no limit to a human being's imagination. Left to dream without boundaries a human mind can conjure up limitless possibilities which can manifest themselves in fantasies as exemplified by Pandora. I really wonder why was it referred to as "a hell"! A land with floating mountains, synaptic trees, mystical creatures ( with surprisingly mundane tendencies though ), chiseled inhabitants with magical powers etc. cannot be a hell.

The other thing which came through was the emphasis on the purity of the pagan thinking - the balance of energy, the strength of heart, the purity of purpose all pointed to the times when man had not evolved a lot in his thinking but was probably more in touch with the ecological balance. Do science and progress always induce conflict? Does paganism always imply backwardness? These are questions which do not have easy answers.

Man, can destroy a perfectly good thing working :-)though if he / she puts their mind to it man can also achieve remarkable things.

Did anyone wonder as to why the animals in Pandora serve the same purpose as they do on Earth - the big dogs bite, the many legged horses are used as cavalry, the big birds fly, the big elephants charge etc.? And what would I give to have a body like that of a Nevi - leaving aside the tail bit, though.

Deal Struck?

Have not been able to get into the details of the Copenhagen accord yet but going by what I have heard in the various medias the deal seems to be a beginning hopefully towards bigger and concrete actions.
This is definitely positive as I do believe that finding a solution which is mutually agreeable for 191 countries is a daunting task and the usual methodologies will not work. Hence, probably non-binding targets based on voluntary decisions on the premise of equitable distribution of responsibility is probably the right way to proceed. As you would gather I am a proponent of individual action so the thinking seems pragmatic to me but I still wonder whether it will achieve what we all want by the time we want it.
Will have to read the text from Copenhagen in detail to understand it better