Oviyaa Arrives

Oviyaa Arrives....
Nilaa Receives....
Leela Delivers our second part of our lives...

Thanks to all your wishes to be blessed with a baby girl....

எங்கள் வாழ்கையின் பாதைக்கு நிலவின் வெளிச்சம்...
எங்கள் வாழ்கையின் கனவுகளுக்கு ஓவியத்தின் வண்ணம்...
என் வாழ்கை இன்றும், என்றும், எப்பொழுதும் லீலைகளோடு...

வாழ்திய அணைத்து உள்ளங்களுக்கும், எங்கள் நன்றிகள்....

- Raj

Employee Engagement

In today's corporate world there are a lot of initiatives that are run for improving their employee engagement index. Somewhere, I think there is a disconnect on what it means to the employee. In my view, I think, the more often than not, the whole discussion of Employee engagement for some strange but valid reasons are revolving around fun, outing, lunch, family and so on. I feel it is absolutely necessary, however, in my view it just probably 10% of it.

The other 90% is all about (not in any particular order). There could be many more to this list as well.

• line of sight (how do I contribute to overall organization’s goals)
• how employees feel valued (rewards, recognition, appreciation)
• am I listened (skip levels, luncheons)?
• how my mistakes are received (encouragement to be innovative, am I shielded by my manager)?
• how is my team environment (support from my peers, friends)
• how secured do I feel about my company’s prospects (any press release or rumors within market)?
• am I respected for what I’m (Manager treating everyone equitably)?
• do I have a work environment where I can contribute (training's/support system)?
• does my manager care about me and my well being (professionally and also personally)?
• am I learning constantly (new challenge)?
• are my ideas received well (or at least not ridiculed)?
• have I grown (career progression, new role)?

These all directly relate to the immediate manager on how he/she manages his team mates. How well has a manager enabled, respected, trusted, challenged, motivated, related, empathized with his/her direct report is what it matters. The manager's leadership styles, character, personality and most importantly honesty and integrity of the manager matter a lot. And as one of my friend said, there is no specific formula for Employee Engagement and it cannot be generalized, for all we know, even the above factors may mean different to different individuals. 

It is also all about those intangible emotions like passion, pride, honesty, integrity, commitment, respect, trust and so on and these have to be exhibited by the manager first and which will trickle down to the team. These can never be measured with numbers!

To me, Employee Engagement starts and stops with the immediate manager! It is a huge responsibility on the manager's shoulders to keep an employee feeling engaged and have him/her motivated to be committed to the organization, particularly in these trying times that we have put ourselves in!

- Raj

Women!

The other day at work, on the 8th of march, we have been celebrating the International Women's day.

I thought it is a bit unfair to Women to celebrate them on just a day. Never the less, here is what I said and thought.

Every single relationship that a woman gives to a man has a lot of meaning. The below are a few roles that I see from my perspective and what they mean to me.

Grand Mother - Give unconditional love and affection. 

Aunt - Give the sense of direction and guidance.

Friend - Give a new perspective about life.

Daughter - Give the purpose of a life.

Sister - Trusted and loyal friend forever.

Wife - Life.

Mother - God (though I say nature is God and that is why we call her Mother Nature!)

Of course, there are many other relationships which mean a lot to a man and I mean no disrespect by missing them. I think they are pretty much included in the list above!

A woman is creator. Everyday is new and let us celebrate her everyday!

Women complete men!

- Raj

A Talent called Kamal Hassan!

There has been a lot said about Viswaroopam being a commual movie. Here is my thought that I shared on my FB wall added with few more emotions that came from this day! This is not against any section of the society! Kamal Can withstand these crap, I cannot!

- Raj

Sorry Kamal! Or Should we say... Apologies Kamal? Sorry that you are not celebrated because you are an Indian born in Tamil Nadu! 

What is secularism in India? I really now am confused!

We cannot just generalize and make it a communal problem... Movies are entertainments... 

If this goes like what is being said, then no movie should be released... All Thamizh/Indian movies have gundas or villains .. And not all of them are Muslims or not always are they are non Muslims... 

From Nayagan to Paruthiveeran we have enough examples of where a lot of different religions, castes and sections of society have sourced the villains in the movies... Doctors/Engineers/Advocates/politicians/Media/Students/Police even beggars, every section that we can think of has done that.. 

If every community starts making issues something like this then world cannot move on... Besides this is not politics.. this is bloody entertainment... Entertainment has to be entertainment, it cannot be taken as a judgement about an issue or a cause! 

If Viswaroopam is not released at all, can we say terrorism will stop? Can anyone from the Muslim community that states this as a communal movie, guarantee that no Muslim will be involved in any terrorist attack ever across the globe? If that is the case and they can stand up and state this, let us all support them...  But, it can never be possible, because terrorism has no religion. When a bomb explodes it does not know whether it kilss an Hindu or a muslim or Singala or Thamizh or otherwise. All it needs to find someone dead, is that someone being alive just before it explodes. It does not know color, caste, creed, gender, religion or even age! Do not bring these into entertainment world and play this bloody cheap politics of using Kamal's fame to gain fame which is worse than being a beggar...

People who do not like Kamal, he respects that. You may hate him, but you cannot ignore him because he never gives you that choice! You will watch his movies no matter what!

Let that movie come out and let us all enjoy it! We cannot just be suppressing a great talent by cheap politics. But, be assured! 

Every hurdle will make him reach his goal faster! 

Every criticism will make him wiser! 

Every fall will make him climb the heights that none can dream of! 

And every failure is a success for him! 

So, as a simple Kamal Hassan Fan, I request all not to reduce his speed. Imagine what all he could do without these hurdles! It would be absolute waste of a talent for him to be running around to solve these issues. Allow him to be who he is! He will bring laurels to this nation and land!

Don't worry Kamal Hassan! Time will prove everyone wrong and you right like every single time! You have been ahead of us in time at least by 10 years always! Happy that we have lived in your era!

We know you will never quit! Thanks for what you have been so far and what you will be! Keep proving us wrong! We will be glad that we have been defeated by a world class talent!

Happy 2013!

When I look back at the year 2012, I'm a bit surprised how sanely did I pen down something at the start of the year and I feel it holds good for the current year as well..... Here is what I wrote last year!

But when I look ahead am a bit skeptical as I do not know how to wish for this New Year! It has become very customary to say Wish you all a Happy and prosperous New Year, every single year! But at the end of every year when we try to reflect back, we almost have not had what we have been wished for at least as a society or as a Nation or even as a race. 

Each year we go through a lot of back stabbing, deceptions, mistrust, disrespect and so on that sometimes it feels so inhumanely impossible to believe that we are human! Worst is, it keeps increasing every year. Can it be stopped? Of course yes!! After all, we are humans and can't we return to be human again? This is nothing personal for or about me. It about us as a race in this world.

I see the problem for all of this is greed! Greed for anything and everything! Isn't it? Isn't greed the mother of all problems we have in this world today? We live in a world where we trust money more than people around us and buy security with our money. Not sure how we could have changed so much for trust was the basis of everything.

I'm not trying to be negative here, in fact, am trying to see how we can remain positive about our future and what we need to do to live an happy life! And let me be also honest, am in the same league as others! This is no mean an advice to everyone.

So, here I'm wishing myself and everyone an year with less greed and work towards what only we need! Let us go back to our roots or at least search for them! Am sure we were lot humbler a few decades back!

In this New Year,

         May we feel lot safer because of people around us and not because of money!

         May this world get the peace and harmony it deserves! 

I want to still call the Year 2013 as the year of Optimism!

-Raj

State of Affairs - 29th December, 2012.

I really do not understand what people are talking about in terms of special parliament session, stringent laws, non bailable offence, capital punishment, clemency and all such stuff!

This is not a law and order problem for goodness sake, this is a societal and cultural issue after all. An issue of making both genders aware and honor that female gender is not weaker. It is about making men to respect womanhood.... It is about making each mom, sister, daughter, wife and aunt feel safe....

No law can make a man (or a woman for that matter) respect and protect a woman from this. It is a society that will make her safe! It is the guidance we give to the younger ones that will make a daughter feel safe and the make a son a responsible person.

It is a bloody change that we all have to have within! Ask me how? I don't know, but for sure I know that law alone cannot make a man not have a boner every time he says a lady alone! I don't know. People are so emotionally tied up to a problem and are thinking from within the problem where we will never find a solution. 

May be sex Education? I don't know... but I feel and know laws alone would not make this change!

You 23 year old brave heart! You represent every single Indian woman who for sure feels unsafe in this country, not now, not then and even here after. My heart goes out to your family who will now get into the public glare while they will forever be inconsolable!

While you will rest in peace, may you be the torch that guides us to our inner peace. We may in due course of time forget the issue, but not you! Certainly I'll never forget you or the issue!

I now know what I need to do to protect my little one!

- Raj

Childhood now and 20-25 years back.

The other day at office, a few of my friends over lunch were having a discussion on how our generation was when we were kids and what were the advantages of those days.

One thing that we debated was on the art of relationship building, how our generation (age group) built that talent.

In those days, when I was a kid, I used to get out of my house myself, make friends and play with them safely. From where I hail from, the friends that I had then are still mine. They continue to be who they are.

How did they become friends? Not like how it is now. None of our parents brought us all together and said be friends. We got out, we shook hands, became friends, formed a team, bought a team bat, sticks and ball, played together, went for matches (ball bet matches). Nobody taught us how to become friends or how to be careful from people who are harmful. These instincts were ours and only ours. We even knew each others strengths and weakness (there was no luxury of coaches), who will bat up the order and who will bowl the first spell and so on. This of course did not stop with Cricket. When there was football fever, we did the same with that game as well. Of course, everything in the localized games as well like the Bambarams, killi thaandal, Koli Gundus, Ice Numbers, Medu pallam etc.,.

We built the art of team building, knowing each others strengths and playing accordingly to the situation. No matter what happened (like losing the ball bet matches) we all stuck to each other as a team and we ensured that we bring our pocket money to buy the new ball! We knew how to survive as a team more than with the team we build in our corporate world (I mean no offence here, but the politics of corporate world is a separate topic altogether)!

Our friendships did not stop there alone. We went to build relationships with each others family and eventually we become family friends. We took our friends family as our family, our moms, our sisters, our brothers. Was it not a good example of building relationship?

Back then we had one bat/kit for the team and often it used to lie in some one's place depending on whose parent was less strict. We could move in/out of every one's house irrespective of how rich one was or if they had a girl and so on. There was trust in everyone and everything (of course once the trust was established). 

While I cannot complain on the current system where we talk to our neighbors on the social media than personally, we talk to our friends over phone, chat and email than again personally, sometimes am scared. I see a lot of parents complaining that their children do not get out of their houses and play and that they need to force them out. For we ourselves do not have any great relationship with the neighbors, how would we expect children to do that? I'm scared because I wonder what it would mean to Nilaa in future. Would she have the instincts to build the skill of building trust, relationship and team? 

Each child now has a bat/ball on his/her own. Where would they have the life's training of how to build trust and respect? I'm concerned that the current generation may not have the instincts of adjustment and for all I know the families are get increasingly more nuclear not just from a joint family context but with the decision of single child concept as well. Back then, when TVs were rare we used to accommodate our friends and even their families into our living rooms to watch Chitrahaar, Oliyum-oliyum and even Ramayan/Mahabaratha. Not to forget the cricket matches (Reliance World Cup - 1987)! We did not have remotes to fight for and when there was a conflict, it was resolved. Now, we have TVs in each room literally for the sake of conflict avoiding. How do we learn the art of conflict resolution?

I know I may sound a lot paranoid here by jumping on to various topics, but I feel my concerns are genuine. I hope that this generation picks up the instincts to know whom to trust and build trust with them. They learn how to build relationships and also know how to sustain them. They know how to build teams and live with them.

I know I have good people around me because of how I was brought up when I was a child; how well my family supported me; how well my friends responded, but most importantly, the initiative was from me. Everyone else supported.

I hope I support Nilaa in this aspect. I wish she has good people around her by virtue of her own choices and actions than our (Leelas's and mine) wishful thinking. 

Hope is the only cure to all problems. :)

- Raj

Capital Punishments for Rapists?

I don't know why people want capital punishments for Rape... What is the point in making those buggers go away in just few minutes? Should it not that they should live their whole lives regretting what they did?

This is what I think they should go through!
1. Their Man hood cut.
2. Made to walk nude for number of days that the court determines.
3. Spend the rest of their lives as servants of the victim and the family.

Is it not possible? I do not think this is radical or even really an extremist view. I'm just asking for just taking away a few inches of the muscle rather than the life.

I do not really think a capital punishment would ever scare those who would want to even think of a rape or would the rapists be regretful of what thy did!

- Raj.

I wish the Mayan Calendar ended yesterday!

Not sure how to express my grief and anger.... 
I do not know how the families of those kids would live with this tragedy for ever! 
Can't imagine what we call as free world and see this happening....

Is it that, we can be at peace only we die and cannot enjoy peace when we live?
I'm very literally disturbed....

May those who died rest in peace! :(

I wish the Mayan Calendar ended yesterday!

- Raj

5th October, 2012 - 35 years passed

Well one more time and one more time during this era of social networking with blogs and face books of the world.

I've been wanting to pen down my 50th blog, thought I could hold until this date to do so! And here I'm!

As always, it felt good to be remembered and good to see love of people. All I can say is that am fortunate. I wish, I could have this love and affection till my end! So many phone calls, SMS', emails and Facebook messages. It will take a lot of time for me to thank everyone individually, but for sure I'll do that.

Now, at 35, am I cross roads? Of Course Yes!. I realize that! I also realize that time is running fast and there are a lot that I would want to close before the steam is over. But this blog is not for what I want to do going forward, but for what I have had in the last 35 years and where I think I stand now!

Have these years been very tough? For sure they were and I think it is the same for each one of the living being in this world. May be mine was a bit more tough than a few at my age as life always thrust me to take up responsibilities too early in my life. Be it starting schooling at the age of 2+ and completing graduation when I was 20, to losing dad at 24, to even good growth in my professional career, I was probably ahead of people of my age in terms of being thrust with responsibilities. And I now know what my mentor used to say, responsibilities are the measure of your growth and for sure I've grown.

Can I complain? I do not know.

On one hand, it has given me a lot of valid lessons  unforgettable experiences, unconventional wisdom and a bit more maturity which has ensured that I take life as it comes with lesser fuss. On the other hand, it does sometimes overwhelms in certain situations be it personal or professional. But then, those are one of times and I get back to normality easily.

I have faced so many adversities that now with no challenges or small challenges am really scared if all is well with my life. But all of these scares go away very quickly because of whatever people call it as maturity for it makes me understand that life goes on and that I need to move on.

Looking back at this one year, this has been more than significant particularly the last one month on certain decisions I've made regarding change within myself and external and trust me, the transition has been easy. Now, I'm looking forward for the changes to give visible benefits. The last one week has been really terrific with a lot of mixed emotions and of course will pen down the outcome in the coming months.

This year had a lot of milestones, one certainly Nilaa's school going would mark as a very one important in my personal life. On the professional front, being identified as a MVP and Key Talent within my organization was a certain high!

For today, the day started off well, went on with a day long meeting, so could not take calls or even respond to emails. Towards the end was a farewell for a long timer in my organization and then had to rush back home with Nlaa, Leela and Amma. And could not believe myself, doing a celebration because Nilaa forced me literally. Went and bought few balloons, cake and candles, and had a very private celebration at 8:30 in the evening! A moment, that made me realize that my priority is only keep people happy. I have never wanted to celebrate my b'day and had to do so because of Nilaa! And I just had to budge to see her smile and that was worth it all!

Coming back to my life, one thing that has been certain and probably a clue or cue or example or experience from my life is that, no matter what you collect in your life, the precious ones are people. Like responsibilities are the measure of one's growth, people are the measure of one's wealth!

I know, I'm wealthier than a lot of folks by means of people wanting something good to happen to me always and I do not know whom to thank for this. I feel, I'm just fortunate. Sometimes I feel that Mother Nature has been so liberal for she had sent me a lot of people who make me feel worth of their love.

While, I embark onto my second phase in my life, I acknowledge all the love, care, support and cheer that has been showered on me. I wish I come back the same day, next year and say the same and that Nature treats me as good as it treats me now.

And Miles to go before I sleep,
And Miles to go before I sleep.

Keep loving me!

I love to be loved!

I live to be loved!

- Raj.