Dear Friends,
Recently when I saw a long 'Q' of young boys and girls outside the Guindy park which has a zoo inside, I was reminded of my own school picnics.
My picnic memories are all of Hyderabad - Nehru Zoological Park, Public Gardens, Gandipet, Golconda, Charminar, Salar Jung Museum, Begumpet airport, Hussain Sagar or Tank Bund which connects the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad.
The regular ones from school would be either headed to the zoo or Gandipet. Teachers would announce a date and rate. Those interested will pay up and go by bus to one of the spots mentioned. The bus would leave early in the morning and return us all back to the school by evening. There would be singing of many group songs on the way. Goodies would be handed out as soon as the bus would start moving away from the school premises! The excited squeals, cries, shouting which would attract the road users. Some would wave us on.
There would be bun with jam. Biscuits. Mixture packets. Sweets. Juice. Lunch would be sandwiches. Tea time woul be tea with biscuits. In between there would be walking down the place to see the sights.
By evening all would be so very tired. On our way back there would not be too many enthusiastic voices willing to sing group songs. Some would be dozing off.
The best picnics would be those which were unplanned.
My mom worked as a teacher in All Saints High School, Gunfoundry. Since my school, the Rosary Convent was just nearby, I would be hanging around and the Rev Brother would invite me to join in too. I would simply hop inside the bus and have fun. I must have been hardly 5 or 6 then. The other teachers would pay a lot of attention as I was a teacher's daughter. I remember the picnics with my mom's class kids better than with my own school and classmates. On second thoughts, I think I never went with the Rosary Convent picnic team at all!
Each and evey picnic spot seems dear to me with varied memories of the oldest turtle, milk white pegions, the multi-colored parrots, the monkey with stripes on its forehead (aptly labelled as the 'naamaala kothi'). Have these picnic spots changed a lot? More than 40 to 45 years have passed by.
I carry in my heart such fond memories of family outings to the Public Gardens. There would be at least 4 or 5 families joining in with all the kids from all families and a few elders. Huge tiffin carriers, istaraaku (bio-degradable - dry leaves stitched together on which food would be served and easily discarded). There would be tamarind rice, lemon rice, curd rice, pickles, potato chips and deep fried papads. Huge cans of water with tumblers, spoons to serve, towels to wipe clean. The grand finale would be stopping by the ice-cream (bandi) trolley, buy for a whole lot of us. It would be such fun licking the dripping icekroot holding the thick stick intact.
The best would be the transistor-radio blaring music from the Vivid Bharati while we strolled around the huge greenery leisurely. Lata Mageshkar, Rafi, Asha, Mukesh, etc., have all kept us company on our family outings as the radio station would play Hindi film songs continuously.
Cheers.
Mahalakshmi
So much fun.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Leadership
Dear Friends,
An ideal leader is one who knows how to lead and not necessarily has to work among the crowd. It is necessary though for the leader to have come up the hard way from the grass roots level just to know what are the pitfalls and what are the peaks.
There are not many who can lead.
There are not many who can lead effectively.
There are not many who can lead effectively with kindness intact.
There are not many who can lead effectively with kindness and corrects others' mistakes along the way.
A leader is one who is not afraid that his chair is shaken by someone from down below the cadres. For he is confident of his qualities of leadership.
A leader is one who leads everyone through thick and thin, more in thin than in thick.
A leader is one who does not let his team take advantage of his kindness. Is firm when it comes to getting work done first and foremost. For many a times kindness is mistaken for leniency by others. Being firm yet being kind is the most difficult of all tasks for any leader.
A leader is one who does not have to shout at all and sundry to get the message across.
A leader is one who appreciates when he sees good work and does not hold back due to any reason & has the courage to stop and correct mistakes then and there.
Having said all the above, I think a leader is the one at the top, knows his job, knows the job of each and everyone's in his team. He knows where to pull up people and correct their mistakes to get the best out of them. Personally feel it is the next in line he should be strict and firm with and at the same time give the next in line his freedom to extract work from the third in line.
The leader should never step in directly to rectify things from the 3rd line onwards to the last one down below. Though he should be aware of each and everything that goes on. The number two is the backbone for any effective leader to lead well. The deputy keeps the boss informed of everything.
Unless really necessary a leader should not interfere in matters of the lower levels and let the hierarchy function in a healthy manner. It is so because the top man cannot monitor everything.
A leader is one who will not encourage sub-standard work to go on from his next in line just because he helps this guy with his personal problems. But is this not why many come up the ladder, eventually? By all means the next in line can help the boss with his personal problems like any good friend does, but not at the cost of office work. If this is kind of professionalism is maintained then the element of being partial should not arise.
A leader needs to be attached enough to lead others to deliver results and detached enough to not let it all go to his head!
There are leaders who shout to get work done, to get attention.
There are leaders who torture their lower level staff to work harder. This is good for the staff as they learn faster under such a dictator! They may hate this guy but they will respect him much, much later when they themselves move on up the career ladder.
There are leaders who are partial to real fools who know nothing of anything which goes around in the workplace but these fools are very useful to get some personal things done or maybe they are the leader's comforters.
There are leaders who just don't bother whether you exist in the organization as they are immersed in their own work.
And there are leaders who make the lower level staff eager to report for duty each and every day of the week and every week of the month and every month of the year! He or she is the real human asset in any organization as have the knack of making the work interesting for those who work under them with the right kind of professional encouragement and motivation and inspiration. These are the ones who lead through example.
Three cheers to the leader in all of us! We are all leaders in some level in both our personal as well as our professional life.
Lead others kindly into light.
Mahalakshmi
An ideal leader is one who knows how to lead and not necessarily has to work among the crowd. It is necessary though for the leader to have come up the hard way from the grass roots level just to know what are the pitfalls and what are the peaks.
There are not many who can lead.
There are not many who can lead effectively.
There are not many who can lead effectively with kindness intact.
There are not many who can lead effectively with kindness and corrects others' mistakes along the way.
A leader is one who is not afraid that his chair is shaken by someone from down below the cadres. For he is confident of his qualities of leadership.
A leader is one who leads everyone through thick and thin, more in thin than in thick.
A leader is one who does not let his team take advantage of his kindness. Is firm when it comes to getting work done first and foremost. For many a times kindness is mistaken for leniency by others. Being firm yet being kind is the most difficult of all tasks for any leader.
A leader is one who does not have to shout at all and sundry to get the message across.
A leader is one who appreciates when he sees good work and does not hold back due to any reason & has the courage to stop and correct mistakes then and there.
Having said all the above, I think a leader is the one at the top, knows his job, knows the job of each and everyone's in his team. He knows where to pull up people and correct their mistakes to get the best out of them. Personally feel it is the next in line he should be strict and firm with and at the same time give the next in line his freedom to extract work from the third in line.
The leader should never step in directly to rectify things from the 3rd line onwards to the last one down below. Though he should be aware of each and everything that goes on. The number two is the backbone for any effective leader to lead well. The deputy keeps the boss informed of everything.
Unless really necessary a leader should not interfere in matters of the lower levels and let the hierarchy function in a healthy manner. It is so because the top man cannot monitor everything.
A leader is one who will not encourage sub-standard work to go on from his next in line just because he helps this guy with his personal problems. But is this not why many come up the ladder, eventually? By all means the next in line can help the boss with his personal problems like any good friend does, but not at the cost of office work. If this is kind of professionalism is maintained then the element of being partial should not arise.
A leader needs to be attached enough to lead others to deliver results and detached enough to not let it all go to his head!
There are leaders who shout to get work done, to get attention.
There are leaders who torture their lower level staff to work harder. This is good for the staff as they learn faster under such a dictator! They may hate this guy but they will respect him much, much later when they themselves move on up the career ladder.
There are leaders who are partial to real fools who know nothing of anything which goes around in the workplace but these fools are very useful to get some personal things done or maybe they are the leader's comforters.
There are leaders who just don't bother whether you exist in the organization as they are immersed in their own work.
And there are leaders who make the lower level staff eager to report for duty each and every day of the week and every week of the month and every month of the year! He or she is the real human asset in any organization as have the knack of making the work interesting for those who work under them with the right kind of professional encouragement and motivation and inspiration. These are the ones who lead through example.
Three cheers to the leader in all of us! We are all leaders in some level in both our personal as well as our professional life.
Lead others kindly into light.
Mahalakshmi
Monday, June 21, 2010
Work Culture
Dear Friends,
Going to work. This is a task by itself.
Here I am not talking about qualifying oneself, applying and landing a job.
Working in some place and what goes on within office and among employees is what I wish to deal with in this blog.
I have always felt the management phrase of 80% doing 20% of all work there is and 20% doing 80% to be very true.
It may not be office politics nor disinterest in working on the job. This 80% also can be made to contribute their 100% to their jobs.
Basically it is the lack of knowledge about what and how to work efficiently.
Many in an office do not understand the nature of their jobs. They just drift aimlessly in offices. They tend to concentrate more on someone else's job than their own. If employed in a private such employeess are shown the gate very soon. But in government jobs that is not the case.
Some may be working very hard but just in the opposite direction!
Some may complain of their superiors being partial to others.
Maybe superiors just expect their subordinates to complete their work even if they dont understand how that work has to be done.
Superiors do not take the time out to teach the lower level cadres about how to work.
There is no proper leader who guides them about their role and the way they should work. No training either obviously.
Any human is capable of some work, whether skilled or unskilled. An unskilled worker can very easily learn the skills by observation, practice, hard and sincere work.
The person has to know what he is doing to be really interested in his job.
This lack of knowledge is most times responsible for all trouble between higher and lower cadres.
I think a strong training and induction should be given to each and every entrant in any workplace. Induction should include training by rotation in all departments so that the new entrant knows how inter-connected all departments are with each other. If this knowledge is lacking many have chances of falling into a pit thinking their work is superior to others or vice versa.
It is like a person who has headache saying thats the worst of all ailments. All organs should work together to keep the body healthy, so too is the case of all departments coming together to make a success of the company or organization.
Its not a question of superior department or inferior department at all. It is the synthesizing of all work to represent the whole.
One who knows his job enjoys his work. To know one has to train himself first and be aware of the role he is playing, however small it may be, take pride in his role and deliver performance day in and day out.
Here again such routines can be transformed to meaningful changes by thinking the whys and hows of doing a process or a job.
By thinking and applying our minds to why we should be doing a job the way it is done and/or how best we can improve upon the existing model without involving complexities or adding higher costs.
When a person loves his job it means three things to me.
He knows his job.
He forgets everything else while on his job and
is able to give quality inputs due to his dedication and love for the work that he is doing.
Such people are not rare to find provided the training is good, the person is placed according to his capabilities and gets due incentives for his level of work.
A job means earning money and supporting our families.
Good workers should be rewarded with good pay so that they dont worry about money. Incentives are a must to keep good and talented people working for the organization.
I have found this mantra to be so true that I keep applying it to all who do jobs. Workers who please their superiors in some other ways and get by, never last or putting it in another way, they last only until the superior lasts in the organization.
If you know your job well enough, then superiors may come, superiors may go but our work goes on...until one is promoted to a higher job.
Dint we notice that a good worker is never touched unnecesarily by the management.
Cheers!
Mahalakshmi
Going to work. This is a task by itself.
Here I am not talking about qualifying oneself, applying and landing a job.
Working in some place and what goes on within office and among employees is what I wish to deal with in this blog.
I have always felt the management phrase of 80% doing 20% of all work there is and 20% doing 80% to be very true.
It may not be office politics nor disinterest in working on the job. This 80% also can be made to contribute their 100% to their jobs.
Basically it is the lack of knowledge about what and how to work efficiently.
Many in an office do not understand the nature of their jobs. They just drift aimlessly in offices. They tend to concentrate more on someone else's job than their own. If employed in a private such employeess are shown the gate very soon. But in government jobs that is not the case.
Some may be working very hard but just in the opposite direction!
Some may complain of their superiors being partial to others.
Maybe superiors just expect their subordinates to complete their work even if they dont understand how that work has to be done.
Superiors do not take the time out to teach the lower level cadres about how to work.
There is no proper leader who guides them about their role and the way they should work. No training either obviously.
Any human is capable of some work, whether skilled or unskilled. An unskilled worker can very easily learn the skills by observation, practice, hard and sincere work.
The person has to know what he is doing to be really interested in his job.
This lack of knowledge is most times responsible for all trouble between higher and lower cadres.
I think a strong training and induction should be given to each and every entrant in any workplace. Induction should include training by rotation in all departments so that the new entrant knows how inter-connected all departments are with each other. If this knowledge is lacking many have chances of falling into a pit thinking their work is superior to others or vice versa.
It is like a person who has headache saying thats the worst of all ailments. All organs should work together to keep the body healthy, so too is the case of all departments coming together to make a success of the company or organization.
Its not a question of superior department or inferior department at all. It is the synthesizing of all work to represent the whole.
One who knows his job enjoys his work. To know one has to train himself first and be aware of the role he is playing, however small it may be, take pride in his role and deliver performance day in and day out.
Here again such routines can be transformed to meaningful changes by thinking the whys and hows of doing a process or a job.
By thinking and applying our minds to why we should be doing a job the way it is done and/or how best we can improve upon the existing model without involving complexities or adding higher costs.
When a person loves his job it means three things to me.
He knows his job.
He forgets everything else while on his job and
is able to give quality inputs due to his dedication and love for the work that he is doing.
Such people are not rare to find provided the training is good, the person is placed according to his capabilities and gets due incentives for his level of work.
A job means earning money and supporting our families.
Good workers should be rewarded with good pay so that they dont worry about money. Incentives are a must to keep good and talented people working for the organization.
I have found this mantra to be so true that I keep applying it to all who do jobs. Workers who please their superiors in some other ways and get by, never last or putting it in another way, they last only until the superior lasts in the organization.
If you know your job well enough, then superiors may come, superiors may go but our work goes on...until one is promoted to a higher job.
Dint we notice that a good worker is never touched unnecesarily by the management.
Cheers!
Mahalakshmi
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Happy Father's Day
Happy Dad's Day!
Appa, I have taken this long to write a blog dedicated to you, but at heart I was planning for one always. Today seems to that special day when I shall do just that.
Appulu. You were a special person in our lives. We used to enjoy your charming and kind nature always.
You always had a pleasant smile and I wonder how you managed to always do that even when you were in great pain.
You lived to make others happy and you also enjoyed your life to the fullest.
I remember the days when I used to get lost in the ragas you sang. You would be so absorbed in those divine Hindustani ragas like Bhopali,Durbari, Bilawal, Shivranjani,
Bhairav, Bhairavi, and those beautiful Pahadi dhuns you used to sing strumming ever so gently on the taanpura with eyes closed as if in deep meditation.
How we all, as children would surround you to soak in that pure and unblemished voice of yours, so full of devotion.
And to think that you learnt your basics just by listening to all greats while they performed at temples, sabhas, concerts, etc., anywhere.
You would go to Bombay, Nagpur, just anywhere for the love of Hindustani music and of course cricket.
The times when you would come late at night, wake us all up and give us a bar of cadbury's chocolates to eat.
The times when you would take us to the numaayush, exhibition so famous in Hyderabad in the months of December-January of each year.
You would allow us to eat chaats, ice-creams, take rides on the giant wheel, buy us tickets to see the bike-rider who went around in circles in a well, never losing his balance, the magic stall, the pink floss candies and what not. We would wait for such moments and these are memories we have of you from childhood even though you are
no more with us now.
I learnt such a lot from you. I learnt to type neatly without making mistakes.
I learnt how to draft business letters, thanks to you, from an early age. I remember I had applied for a job in some motor parts company in Ranigunj, Secunderabd.
I was excited when I got a call to attend the interview. When I saw you walking into the owner's cabin I din't know how to react.
I dint know you knew the owners. All others were called and I was the last to be called in.
The owner said I want you to write your biodata in front of me and I wrote it out. He could not just believe that a 16 year old girl would write so well in English. That was the year 1970. You taught me how to use good English and how to draft simple to complex letters. Yet I was not given the job as I was considered under-age.
You used to play the Tabla so well and keep the rythm to the songs I would sing. You always requested me to sing
Aaja re main toh from Madhumati,
O sajna from Parakh,
Allah tero naam,
Tu jo mere sur mein from Chitchor,
Radha na bole na bole from Azad?
songs from Anarkali, Mamta, Woh kaun thi, Sharmilee and many more such melodious songs sung by Lata Mageshkar.
Your magic fingers would make the Tabla come out just right for a particular song.
How we would all enjoy music together.
Appulu those were the days and the memories of it are still sweet even now.
In your lifetime I wish I had said how much I cared and loved you but I never did that.
I do that everyday and ask for your forgiveness for my scolding you always about your chain smoking habit.
You were patient and never reacted to such behaviour from me. Perhaps you were a realised soul even then?
I wonder. But Appulu I do follow tolerance to a large extent in my own life for many years now. I keep myself calmer.
You were a good human being with a lot of affection for everyone you met. There was no bias. You treated all of us equally and kindly and affectionately.
You were talented yet you wore not those things on your shoulders ever.
I am still learning through the memories I have of you, dear appulu.
May your soul rest in peace.
Mahalakshmi
Appa, I have taken this long to write a blog dedicated to you, but at heart I was planning for one always. Today seems to that special day when I shall do just that.
Appulu. You were a special person in our lives. We used to enjoy your charming and kind nature always.
You always had a pleasant smile and I wonder how you managed to always do that even when you were in great pain.
You lived to make others happy and you also enjoyed your life to the fullest.
I remember the days when I used to get lost in the ragas you sang. You would be so absorbed in those divine Hindustani ragas like Bhopali,Durbari, Bilawal, Shivranjani,
Bhairav, Bhairavi, and those beautiful Pahadi dhuns you used to sing strumming ever so gently on the taanpura with eyes closed as if in deep meditation.
How we all, as children would surround you to soak in that pure and unblemished voice of yours, so full of devotion.
And to think that you learnt your basics just by listening to all greats while they performed at temples, sabhas, concerts, etc., anywhere.
You would go to Bombay, Nagpur, just anywhere for the love of Hindustani music and of course cricket.
The times when you would come late at night, wake us all up and give us a bar of cadbury's chocolates to eat.
The times when you would take us to the numaayush, exhibition so famous in Hyderabad in the months of December-January of each year.
You would allow us to eat chaats, ice-creams, take rides on the giant wheel, buy us tickets to see the bike-rider who went around in circles in a well, never losing his balance, the magic stall, the pink floss candies and what not. We would wait for such moments and these are memories we have of you from childhood even though you are
no more with us now.
I learnt such a lot from you. I learnt to type neatly without making mistakes.
I learnt how to draft business letters, thanks to you, from an early age. I remember I had applied for a job in some motor parts company in Ranigunj, Secunderabd.
I was excited when I got a call to attend the interview. When I saw you walking into the owner's cabin I din't know how to react.
I dint know you knew the owners. All others were called and I was the last to be called in.
The owner said I want you to write your biodata in front of me and I wrote it out. He could not just believe that a 16 year old girl would write so well in English. That was the year 1970. You taught me how to use good English and how to draft simple to complex letters. Yet I was not given the job as I was considered under-age.
You used to play the Tabla so well and keep the rythm to the songs I would sing. You always requested me to sing
Aaja re main toh from Madhumati,
O sajna from Parakh,
Allah tero naam,
Tu jo mere sur mein from Chitchor,
Radha na bole na bole from Azad?
songs from Anarkali, Mamta, Woh kaun thi, Sharmilee and many more such melodious songs sung by Lata Mageshkar.
Your magic fingers would make the Tabla come out just right for a particular song.
How we would all enjoy music together.
Appulu those were the days and the memories of it are still sweet even now.
In your lifetime I wish I had said how much I cared and loved you but I never did that.
I do that everyday and ask for your forgiveness for my scolding you always about your chain smoking habit.
You were patient and never reacted to such behaviour from me. Perhaps you were a realised soul even then?
I wonder. But Appulu I do follow tolerance to a large extent in my own life for many years now. I keep myself calmer.
You were a good human being with a lot of affection for everyone you met. There was no bias. You treated all of us equally and kindly and affectionately.
You were talented yet you wore not those things on your shoulders ever.
I am still learning through the memories I have of you, dear appulu.
May your soul rest in peace.
Mahalakshmi
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