Filed under: , , by: Arun


Recently, my employer promised a revision to their existing incentive policies, promising us more money in an attempt to win over some good will. Good will that was lost when we saw an exodus of employees from the organization when the economy tanked. Most were forced exits and this left a bad taste in all of us who remained. But what really caught my attention was how quickly those people (who were so bitter about what the organization did to so many employees for no fault of theirs) took the bait and reverted to their chirpy ways of life. Those people who wanted to leave the organization because the management was caught napping and could have saved a few 100 jobs had they cut out on some indulgences, didn’t seem to care anymore! I was especially furious when our Managing Director addressed us in a “Re-Connect” town-hall meet stating that he was sorry but the management was caught in “delightful strategic vagueness” post a take over from a European firm! I digress…this thought led to various other thoughts in my head and….

A few centuries ago, God or fear of his wrath caused most citizens to act in a way the religiously inclined King / Tribal Leader (any other form of Patriarchal governance) saw fit. Religious institutions still wield some of that power today but the masses are turning to a newer religion based on self indulged voracity for wealth. Ringing in the capitalistic era and redefining “fittest” in the ol Darwinian quip regarding survival, we have successfully morphed into a race that chases heaven on earth rather than saving it for the afterlife.

Historians have studied the annals of the past, carefully scrutinizing each religious practice, each pagan law and symbol, pegging the evolution of the man from bipedal primates to the homosapien to his religious practices and fear of the almighty. Who then will study the modern man and what will the development of the future human be pegged to? Not historians who can study pagan symbols and decipher obscure religious acts. Not even people who are well versed with art, architecture and literature.

The future man will be judged by historians who are economists. They will dice and slice GDP data, inflation rates, market indices and other parameters that revolve around wealth. Already, countries with greater wealth have greater clout in negotiating and enforcing their wants and needs on others. So all man has been successful in doing is replacing the god with the money. Man fears the wrath of this money and strives to protect his new god, his money in the bank. Much like the earlier times…don’t you think? (Except it’s a lot more inclusive, free trade binding us all secularly….and securely :-) to this new religion).

Now let’s imagine that the “humans from the future” (from here on forward referred to as HFTF) have constructed a device that allows them to view their past.(HTFT will occupy another planet because all of our natural resources would have been devoured in true capitalistic style) HFTF will be observing us worship this money god and perform ritualistic sacrifices in terms of armed conflicts, they will witness thousands that die because of a stock market crash, they will witness us celebrate on building vulgar gas emitting water polluting structures….

They will probably be as bewildered as I was when I read that Aztec priests pulled out hearts of human sacrifices to offer to their gods so He may shower them with rain!! “Humans were stupid back then” they will think….as I thought. At least the Incans and Aztecs prayed for rain…

Soon the $ sign will truly denote divine providence!

voices (2)

MBA quest and the emotional revelations that are his bedfellows

Filed under: , , , by: Arun


Yes, yes…like the gazillion people trudging through what my better half so eloquently calls “quarter life crisis” I am chasing the MBA dream. And in the process so far (In retrospect of course…cause life is a lesson…you learn it when you’re through :p) I have learnt a butt load. Before I get into the agonizing details of what pain I endured, let me just say the whole route taken, from when I entered college, has been in the quest for meaning. I have been desperately attaching myself to things, people, events, and thoughts …all so I can justify my existence…at least to myself. And sometimes I have gone out of the way to alter my path to gain social acceptance…something I falsely value a lot cause of my past…when I was little and I saw how quickly family dissolves in times of constraint…mostly financial. So instead of visiting a shrink (I know one and she is really good…we’ve overcome a lot of internal tribulations together)…I’m vomiting out a post…after a fairly long break so pardon me if I lack clarity, flow and structure!
I have always wanted to do an MBA….and I have spent so much time trying to conquer that dream that somewhere in between “diversifying my profile” and slogging my butt off….I forgot why exactly!! So while waiting for the results of one of my applications (I was dinged….I’m still waiting on a few more though) I spent some time actually trying to track back and “get in touch with my roots”. I still have not been able to unearth why I originally wanted an MBA! But my findings are below:


College
My MBA dream originated before college….but this is the farthest I am able to track it… I wanted it because all the technical stuff I learnt or attempted to learn as an engineer had meaning only if they were useful to the common man… I wanted to be an agent that delivers technical findings and cutting edge to the masses to help make life easier. Utopian and all…but when I learnt about the carnot cycle…what really mattered was how it was used to study thermodynamics and how the results translated to practical use! I was never awed by fascinating theory…I enjoyed simple practical application. I believed an MBA (rather than an MS…that’s the other route engineers take to satiate their craving for a life purpose) would help me attain the acumen to bridge the gap between the commercial and scientific world!


First year at work
Was happily in love after having almost wrecked the relationship with the most wonderfulest person in the world. She was going to go away to the USA to do her MS, she was the conventional types. Needed to fit into her world…needed to be accepted by her family…I could do that with an MBA from a good institute… could redeem some pride, that which I had lost after not graduating from IIT or BITS or REC. So now there was an ulterior motive behind my goal…and this is where the “reason” was beginning to get lost.


Second year at work
She was in the US now…so distance allowed / forced me to focus on work, I worked harder to keep myself from missing her---> getting frustrated ---> doing something stupid --->breaking up --->blaming distance for the failure of a wonderful relationship. Of course she being away meant being less reminded that I wasn’t from a premier institute like her or almost all of her other friends and family…so that aspect began to dilute. However, my focus at work threw open so many “managerial” venues that fascinated me, so now I wanted an MBA to get to know how and why these corporates do things the way they do and why not in a simpler efficient way…like what I saw in my head. I had to find out why HR existed (I swear HR is the most redundant aspect of any organization). So this is where I began obsessing over top line, bottom line (Pri….dont pull a Joey and laugh at this), productivity et al. I wanted an MBA so I could improve all these things. Now, at this stage I wanted an MBA because I wanted to be a better manager than those around / above me!


Third year at work
Excelled at work, I mean really kicked booty…couple of promotions, delved deeper into the management world. Six sigma, mathematical modeling, developed interest in theatre and saw that as a venue to engage my management know-how. Spilling with ideas, no boundaries, no limits….creative epitome and excitement ebbing about an MBA…and soon a huge reality check…I really cannot afford to get this wrong….I need to get into a good b-school and quick. My parents are getting old, so are her parents…so am I and so is she!! We need to get married soon. “You need to settle down Arun….where are you going with your life…what are you doing, are you taking steps to get where you want, why don’t you discuss any of this with me?” asks dad! Now I’m almost back to where I was at the First year of work. She’s still there…I’m still here…we are still madly in love with each other but the pressure is mounting, clocks ticking and I have a feeling I’m being watched…monitored…measured….judged!!



GMAT 1 not good enough….squirmy feedback from important people…I take a break, thank you Antony Robins and other self help people, and try again…GMAT 2 made the cut. Happy?…transient happiness is the worst…Applications begin…write your essays and have them reviewed….don’t submit applications late, some good feedback and suggestions from important people. Productivity at work dips, boss expects a lot more…my track record featured when he gave his projections to his boss…and I’m so of track now…pressure from a new front. And now I lose track of why I wanted an MBA…and how do I realize I’ve lost track of the reason…first question in all my applications “Why is an MBA a critical next step toward your short- and long-term career goals?” and I’m answering that question 5 times in 5 different ways (with so many ulterior motives) thinking I am cleverly camouflaged and will not be discovered.


I blog about this cause an old friend asked me if I was fulfilling my purpose and was satisfied with my being. I told her I was and that I always wanted to be an entrepreneur and I wanted an MBA. She said I had a harmonious energy about me and that I’ve turned out well. First real words of comfort in an otherwise judge-ey world!! Wait for the big fish to come your way and don’t panic…it will come cause the universe is with you. Wow!

I’m stepping into the 4th year at work…I have plenty of reasons to do an MBA…but I will do it because it’s on the path to discover my purpose…it’s a goal that has kept me “harmonious” despite the badgering my ego and id took! My purpose is a lot of things…staying madly in love with her (Shes the bestest in the world incase I haven’t mentioned before), getting an original idea and entrepreneurially excelling in reaching it to the masses, redeeming my pride amongst a pantheon of academic gods, and most of all giving back to my parents who didn’t dissolve when it rained acid….and created that aura of harmony while soaking up the pain.
I will wait for the big fish… a little happier now! Thanks you guys! :D

voices (8)

Blind Dating is so passé...we Indians prefer Blind Wedding

Filed under: , , , by: Arun


Not too long ago an acquaintance of mine set her gtalk status message to “Do you know anyone in Thorraipakam CTS?” and since I work in the recruitment industry, I understood that she was possibly looking to change her job. Being the naïve idiot I am, I buzzed her saying I knew someone who worked in the HR department in that office. Her response amused the crap out of me!!!

She was looking for “background information” on some poor guy who worked there!!! And it wasn’t even for her….it was for a friend of hers!! Imagine my surprise!!

It just felt wrong trying to dig up dirt on someone you don’t even know (or at least being a part of a group that did). But I did end up helping her gain some more info on this poor guy….and here is why.

First of all, this is standard protocol apparently and the guy could be looking her up as well. Second, her parents have given her the luxury of deciding whether or not she wants to spend the rest of her life with this guy but of course she cannot meet him or even talk to him. She has two days to make her decision and so, given her confined freedom, she cannot verify anything more than if he works where he said he does and if anyone at his workplace has anything bad to say about him. Thirdly, and this is the most important reason of them all, I decided to help her because the numbers just seemed to add up…let me elaborate…

There are a lot of us who do get into relationships and eventually get married to our respective partners and there are a lot more of us who subscribe to the whole arranged marriage custom (willingly or unwillingly) and get married to complete strangers based only on an online profile in some matrimony site. Both forms of marriages have couples facing ups and downs, sharing joy and facing problems. A few couples may end their marital vows but this is never attributed to the fact that the marriage was arranged. In fact I have only heard stories of bitter divorces from the “love marriage” side of the scale and although divorces also occur in almost same numbers in the arranged marriages demographic, they aren’t as bitter as the other side.

In the end…the order in which love and marriage appear in one’s life is fairly non consequential. It just goes to show, if you want your relationship to work, you can get it to work. And with the arranged marriages scheme, you sidestep the pain and heartbreaks most people go through pre-actual-relationship. So it’s a good practice practically speaking, especially if you’ve burnt your hands trying to find the perfect partner by yourself. I am against people forcing someone to get married to a stranger when that person already has a committed relationship with a person they believe to be their life partner. That’s just fundamentalist and scary!! Blind wedding concept, however, seems like fun and is possibly just as effective as and more exciting than the love marriage.

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