Is it too late to start?

Once in a while, you come across stories of ultra successful people. When you see their track record, it seems like they were born with success. But were they really much different from you when they started off? Consider these examples:....More

Not enough skills?

This question typically arises when starting a business. You don’t have much idea about selling that gadget you have made. You also don’t have the confidence whether the gadget is of top quality or not. So, do you start selling now? Or do you attain more perfection and then start selling?...More

279 days

Strange! I wrote the previous post about writing and since then, haven’t written. And then I read this manifesto by Chris Guillebeau: 279 days to overnight success. If you haven’t already read about Chris, I think you should read now...More

Writing

When I worked at my previous company, my manager used to tell me “Be very careful when you put something in black and white”. The reasoning was that, things you write weigh heavily as compared to what you say. Write an autobiography and you will be judged about your every move thereafter...More

Open to Change

A few days back, Paul Graham found a basic quality of good startup founders: Be relentlessly resourceful. Really, a beautiful definition. Think about it, one of the most important qualities required in starting up is the will to accept change and adapt to it in every possible way...More

Start a company

Recessions are good for startups. Everything is cheap. Real estate prices come down, so office space is cheap. Good employees are available for affordable salaries...More

Getting organized

The numerous checklists, policies and timesheets tend to reduce the employee into a robot. At least, that is the employee point of view. But aren’t they present because of a reason? The methods used may be flawed but the reason in most cases would be very valid...More

Weepers

No matter whether it is a real emotion or not, it definitely creates some amount of skepticism about his authenticity. Yet, you find so many weepers out there. They exist in all different forms...More

Special Economic Zone

SEZs were an example set by China. Emulating the same in a democratic country just leaves me puzzled. Each line of the preamble seems to have been disregarded. For example...More

Bribes and Fear Psychology

How does a government employee manage to extract bribe from you? Experiences in the past one week have clearly showed me that it is by installing fear. Example this conversation:

Chief Idea officer?

Ideas are just a small part when you embark on a big project. As long as you have the ability to think wide, ideas never fail you. However, ideas by themselves do not take you anywhere. Execution is what is required to realize the idea.

The pace of development!!!

Santa for entrepreneurs

An entrepreneur needs to know how to make the perfect pitch. If Santa were to be one, what would he do? He’d make a business plan with lines such as “Projections"...

Outside the cubicle

The cubicle life constrains you to only a limited amount of knowledge; The ones coming from the papers, TV and sometimes from other’s experiences. In most of these cases, you only get a spiced view of the reality.....

Realities

The same company makes money in reprehensible ways, takes advantage of the ignorance of illiterates, pushes its products on people who didn’t even know they required the product. Wow!!....

Customer satisfaction standards

Once in a while, you come across this really amazing company which doesn’t look like the typical faceless corporate. There are just a handful of such companies whose policy is “Break company policy when the customer says so”. These companies go all out of their way to make the customer feel like he is getting value....

Customer is everything

That is what is meant by exceptional customer service. Zappos in their own words is a service company that happens to sell shoes and handbags and clothing and accessories and eventually anything and everything......

Making Sense of the Internet

Now, even Seth Godin is quite unsure about the internet. Its become full!! No, not that there isn’t enough space to fit the data. Its just that our attention is quite full. Probably the first time you used the internet, it was more about finding relevant information in the easiest way. It was about finding information even before it appeared on TV or the papers. Is it the same anymore?....

Word power

Apophasis has been used to a very great extent by politicians. For example, how often do we not hear this: “I want to run an honourable campaign based on national issues and will not stoop to mentioning how my opponent is an alcoholic and a womanizer”.The power of this psychological tool was demonstrated best in a 1900 experiment.....

Decibel Level

casual remark or a casual discussion sometimes turns into a high temper, high volume debate. Egos clash and nothing remains in control. I try hard and then intentionally fall silent every time the volume of a discussion crosses a certain decibel, no matter the opposition’s stance....