#Letting Go

I'm sure that you have been following the events of Infosys as they have unraveled over these last 4-5 days with the resignation of Vishal Sikka as CEO and MD, and Narayana Murthy's intervention, and all that has been going on. In fact, a lot of influential people that Narayana Murthy was over reaching.  Omkar Goswami wrote: "When you gotta go, you gotta go, Mr. Murthy!" Another article by G.R. Gopinath, founder of Air Deccan, one of the earliest private airlines poses this question, "Why can't we let go?" Both these articles were on the editorial page of The Economic Times. It seems that Narayana Murthy's shadow has cast a bit of tension and has resulted in so much of upheaval in Infosys and with their clients all around the world.

Face The Facts. Change

Jim Collins brought out a book many years ago that has almost become a classic. It's called 'Good To Great." In that book, he has an interesting title for a chapter – 'Confronting The Brutal Facts'. That title has always intrigued me. Basically, he is saying is that sometimes there are facts that just sit up and beg to be looked at and analyzed so that decisions may be made. Yet, they're ignored, and instead of understanding the times and seizing the opportunity, a chance goes a begging to the detriment of a company or an individual.

He then goes on to give two examples of companies who responded to facts differently. The first was a company known as The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company, better known as A&P that was doing exceptionally well at that time. It served America through the war, and in the 1950s and 60s, it was the #1 store in the US. It was the largest organization, second only to General Motors in terms of annual sales. But, soon after the war, things started to change in America.  Re-building was going on, businesses were doing well and money was beginning to flow. At that time Kroger was another company in the picture—small, and nowhere near A&P in terms of turnover.  However, Kroger realized that times were changing, and if they needed to survive or forge ahead, they needed to act differently. And they did. They began to try new innovative ideas that catered to the changing landscape of American retail stores, and by the 70s, they had forged ahead of A&P. In fact, by the year 2000, they were the #1 retail store in the US.

The Present, God's Gift

A Happy New Year to each one of you. I wonder how you are all doing, whether these 6 days have been enjoyable or you are looking wistfully back at 2014 and wishing you were still there. Or are you looking ahead and hoping things will change. I'd like to talk to you about living in the present – living in the now.

I remember reading a little anecdote about a person who was transferred to a place that was entirely new to him – a new environment, a new culture, a new language. He was having a real difficult time trying to live in the present. One day he met a lady who gave him good advice. She said, "Always bloom where you are planted." In other words, don't just live for the future, live for the present. Look at what is happening around you and make it count. Sometimes we ship out of the present when things are not going too well. It could be that it's a bad day; maybe you are thinking that it's not going as it should and you are just waiting for the day to finish. Or maybe yesterday was a bad day and you're thinking that this week needs to get over. Or maybe it's a part of your life in which you are having difficulty and you say, "Well, this too shall pass and I'll just wait for something fresh to come my way."

CHANGE! I’M LOVIN’ IT

by Dr. Cecil Clements (19th February 2013)

Almost 25 years ago, I was in a college that was going through change. It was part of a larger group of colleges and they had decided that this particular college needed to close and the students were going to be taken into other colleges, as this college was not doing too well. I remember this college president going to the board and making a strong case for keeping the college open – how thy could get more admissions, and so on. A couple of days later the board took a decision to close the college. And they asked him to handle that change, to make sure that students were transitioned out into other colleges, close down this college, sell the assets and finally sell the property. I was in the college for about 6 months during this time.

MAKING COURSE CORRECTIONS

by Dr. Cecil Clements (8th January 2013)

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Welcome to the New Year 2013! It’s 8 days into the New Year and as I looked at the days that have gone by, I thought how on the 1st and 2nd, we were so excited about the New Year. 4 or 5 days later, it’s almost business as usual; back to the usual things that happen in our lives. A lot of things haven’t changed – we’re still in the same place, in the same company, we’re still doing the same job, still have the same profile. All that has really changed is that 2012 has given way to 2013.

FROM THE CORNER OF MY EYE

by Dr. Cecil Clements (6th November 2012)


For many of us, we have seen our daughters, as they’ve gone into their early teens, how they have loved to play with their Barbie dolls. Barbie dolls have been around for so many years and have been such an integral part of a young girl’s play kit. Mattel brought out the Barbie and it was a huge success as they carved into a niche that girls needed as they got into their teens, to have a sophisticated doll.

CHANGE? FEAR NOT

by Dr. Cecil Clements (10th April 2012)

I am not sure how many of you got a chance to read a little book that came out in 1998 called ‘Who Moved My Cheese?’ by Spenser Johnson. When it came out at that time, it was vying with large news events like Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, so it didn’t get the publicity that it would have otherwise got. But a year later, its sales jumped to 1 million. Since that time, it has sold over 22 million copies and has been on the Wall Street Journal business bestseller list for more than 13 years. 22 million is a phenomenal number, even more than ‘Built to Last’ and ‘Search for Excellence’, books that have been very much a part of the management scene. It’s a small book; about 95-96 pages and has a very simplistic story, almost a parable that the author uses. While many people have used it and have got great value from it, there are a few who have said that it is very simplistic in the way it has been written.

BE AWARE OF CHANGE

This past week I travelled a bit to some places in the southern part of India and was amazed at so many things that I saw. One of them was the vision that people, almost 170 years ago, had for education and social change and followed through with it. I walked into these institutions and looked at some of the pictures that were available, heard people talk about the history of the organizations.

Two things caught my attention:

1. Some of these organizations had continued to be relevant and even today were thriving hubs for education.
2. Then I saw others that had stopped and were now only talking about the history of what had been done. They were in a maintenance mode – there were still pictures, people talking about it, still running it at a very skeletal level. But there was no future, no energy in them today.

SEIZE YOUR MOMENT

One of my life’s passions is music. I love music; I love listening to music and also love being part of a performance, putting together a sequence of musical events that will be a blessing. I remember many years ago, watching the orchestra get ready. I always enjoy the symphony orchestra. I love to hear the sound of the instruments building up, the cadences, the crescendos and all of that. But even more, I love being a part of the build-up behind the scenes.

I remember being in the choral part, and watching the orchestra and as it began to play with the theme and different variations on the theme, it slowly began to build up the crescendo and the momentum of the whole piece. I watched different instruments as the conductor brought in the violins and the violas and the cellos and the double bass; then the wind instruments came in – the bassoons and the clarinets. Then you could see the people on the percussion; the tympani especially. You could see him moving back and forth to the rhythm, gyrating, playing one beat at a time. Then as the crescendo began to get more overpowering, more and more beats came in.

YOUR ATTITUDE: IT MAKES ALL THE DIFFERENCE

I have a Macbook Pro and I love using my Apple computer. I’ve had it for 4 years
now and I’ve enjoyed getting back to thinking of viruses as things that attack
the human body and worms found in the ground and Trojans that are found in the
history books. It’s been good for me.

However, last year I had a problem with my Mac. I shut it down and when I opened
it up again, it just wouldn’t come on. I took it to the service centre here and they
told me that there was a major problem with it and would cost Rs. 70,000/- to fix.
I looked at them and told them to shut it and return it to me.

QUIT OR STAY - THAT IS THE QUESTION

Chuck Givens was on his way to conduct a workshop 200 miles away from his home. He left in plenty of time and looked forward to the drive. He enjoyed taking the tight mountain curves in his sports car. On that particular day, however, his fan belt broke and the car immediately overheated. Nevertheless, he decided to press on in the hope of finding a gas station with a fan belt. But a few minutes later, his engine froze and he faced another choice: he could either call and cancel his workshop or he could try and get to his destination some other way.

Beyond Rainy Days & Mondays

I came into the office this morning, it was raining and overcast; I was reminded of a song sung many years ago by the Carpenters. I think it was written by Roger Nichols and Paul Williams and the words go like this:

Talking to myself and feeling old,
Sometimes I’d like to quit, nothing ever seems to fit.
Hanging around; nothing to do but frown
Rainy days and Mondays always get me down.

What I’ve got they used to call the blues,
Nothing is really wrong, feeling like I don’t belong.
Walking around, some kind of lonely clown.
Rainy days and Mondays always get me down.

In The Right Place?

While reflecting and praying on what to share with you, my mind went back to an incident that happened many years ago. When I was 15, just getting into high school (which was the 11th std at that time) my parents, in desperation I think, promised me a gold ring if I passed the 11th std with a first class. I just about did, and the gold ring was my prized possession for about 9 years. Then one day, when we were on the beach in Mumbai having a good time with some friends, while playing around in the water, I felt the ring slip off my finger. A wave had come in and was just beginning to go out again; those of you who have been in the sea, know the strong current that pulls as the wave is going out. I desperately tried to catch the ring, but it fell to the ground. I saw it through about a foot of water and stomped my foot on the spot where it had fallen. I could feel the ring under my foot but could also feel the wave pulling strongly at it. To my horror, I could feel the sand underneath giving way. When the wave had gone, I plunged my hand into the sand, desperately searching for the ring, but there was no sign of it. The next wave then came in and I knew that it was a lost cause.

Overcoming the Black Swan

I don't know how many of you have heard about the Black Swan. The Black Swan was something that came to the fore sometime in 1697. Till then everybody thought that the swan was only white in color. There was a saying, "The probability of something like this happening is like suddenly seeing a black swan." But then, in Western Australia, a Dutch explorer found a black swan and that changed everything. Black swans became something that was there, not visible and then suddenly shows up on the scene. That's something that happens in our own lives as well. We come across black swans.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb, in his book 'The Black Swan' written in 2007 but revised in 2010 says, "Black swans are events that happen that take us by surprise. They have a major impact and after it happens, then we begin to rationalize it and say that it could have been expected but we never expected it." It's almost like the saying on hindsight: "Hindsight is 20/20 vision."

Handling Change and Ourselves in the Workplace

I was reading an article by Adolf Coors IV, on ‘Changing your Course’ and he says “Sometimes life turns out to be a rat race; we go on doing the same things over and over again not knowing whether we are making any headway or going anywhere, whether we are fulfilling our potential. That was the way my life was. I read a poem that described my life at that stage. It went like this:

This is the age of the half-read page
And the quick hash and the mad dash
The bright nights with the nerves tight
The plane hop with the brief stop
And the lamp stand in a brief span
The big shot in a good spot
And the brain strain and the heart pain
And the catnaps till the spring snaps
And the fun’s done.

Room for Change

One of my favorite reading materials is a book written by Jim Collins ‘Good To Great’ and every now and then, I pick it up and go through it and see the different instances that he gives, of companies that have done well and some of the reasons for it. I was looking at it the other day as he talks about ‘Confronting the Brutal Facts’, one of the chapters. What caught my attention was the story of the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Companies as it came up in the 1950’s.

Coping with change

I had the opportunity of traveling about 10 days ago to Orissa where we have a school. As I was talking to the couple who run the school, Royce and Lydia, they were telling me about the time when the eclipse came, probably about 3 or 4 weeks ago, and how that day none of the children came to school. I asked them why? They smiled and said that was the question that they asked the children. After much reluctance, the children shared that their parents had told them that that’s the day when a snake comes and swallows up the sun. Unable to contain the sun, it spits it out. If the sun then touches anybody, they would become sick. So the parents kept all these children home on that day. This was so astounding to Royce and Lydia. They then took out the encyclopedia and showed these children exactly what an eclipse is. But it brought to my mind that we still have pockets in India, this is a tribal area in Orissa, where belief is so backward and change needs to happen and happen fast, for them to catch up with all the information that is available today.