The Little Magazine

Opening a mountain of a book by Amartya Sen in the morning and to read some ten lines of any of his work, makes for an excellent exercise for my intellect in the mornings! At once I would be humbled by his intellectual might. This humility would help me all through the day. Once I see how small I really am, I tend to be silent and receptive.

As a bonus, an immensely satisfying one, this exercise today led me to something called 'The Little Magazine' (http://www.littlemag.com/). Am amazed at the intellectual quality of this magazine. Guess it has started around a decade ago and there has been only a handful of issues posted on the website - and articles from these issues have been given access selectively online. Very very tempting. The quality of the authors is formidable. Am happy that something like this exists. I hope it survives these tough times and lives forever. The first thing that struck me from this magazine today morning is this poem by Jerry Pinto:

Lord of the linear narrative,

Show me the point at which I should begin.

Stop me when I have said as much as I should.

Regulate my voice, I boom too much

and my whispers are shrill.

Feed me words on those long, slow afternoons.

Allow me the grace of serendipity —

To find lost continents on my tongue.

Give me the gift of silence,

and then set me adrift.

The last two lines moved me. How nicely is the thirst of any creative artist for silent wanderings captured!

If not for anything else, The Little Magazine would have my patronage because Amartya Sen regulars there.

Amartya Sen's The Argumentative Indian enhanced my knowledge about India and Hinduism. Am deeply indebted to this work of his to have made these views of mine much more broader and deeper and to have enabled me to appreciate the wealth of intellect present in India. To take a small example: learning about Javali in Ramayana who features as an atheist and who calls Rama 'foolish, especially for an intelligent and wise man', made me realize that Hinduism has these strains and all of these various lines are in the fold of Hinduism. This small knowledge which has told me that arguments are the essense of our culture, and which advised me to keep my eyes and mind open, led me to the treasure trove of the Upanishads which exemplify this tradition. It was also very heartening and satisfying to note that there is a massive body of works in Vedantic Hinduism which glorify this argumentative tradition by following it very rigorously and to realize that argumentation has been the principal tool in propounding ideas. Till then I was not aware of any parallel for argumentation in India as by Socrates and Plato.

The Argumentative Indian also made me aware of the 'Arthashastra' by Kautilya. I was always wondering if there is a parallel in India to 'The Art of War' by Sun Tzu. Arthashastra seems to be a fitting answer. To quote Boesche:

"Is there any other book that talks so openly about when using violence is justified? When assassinating an enemy is useful? When killing domestic opponents is wise? How one uses secret agents? When one needs to sacrifice one's own secret agent? How the king can use women and children as spies and even assassins? When a nation should violate a treaty and invade its neighbor? Kautilya — and to my knowledge only Kautilya — addresses all those questions. In what cases must a king spy on his own people? How should a king test his ministers, even his own family members, to see if they are worthy of trust? When must a king kill a prince, his own son, who is heir to the throne? How does one protect a king from poison? What precautions must a king take against assassination by one's own wife? When is it appropriate to arrest a troublemaker on suspicion alone? When is torture justified? At some point, every reader wonders: Is there not one question that Kautilya found immoral, too terrible to ask in a book? No, not one. And this is what brings a frightful chill. But this is also why Kautilya was the first great, unrelenting political realist."

What a little magazine!

Do drop by at: http://www.littlemag.com/about/about.html

References:

1. The Argumentative Indian – Amartya Sen

2. The Little Magazine (http://www.littlemag.com/)

3. http://nandakumarchandran.sulekha.com/blog/post/2006/11/lokaayata-ancient-indian-atheism.htm

4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthashastra

N.

EPGP Orientation 7th April - 9th April 2010

The 2nd batch of EPGP began with a 3 day orientation programme on 7th Apr – the day being a very light affair with registration, photo-op in suits, more introductions (with a success rate of remembering names at an abysmal low) and subscribing to the Airtel CUG plans. However, on 8th April as we strode into the Auditorium there was an air of expectation what with the dean for academic (Prof. Trilochan Sastry), IIMB-Director (Prof. Pankaj Chandra) and EPGP chairperson (Prof. Malay Bhattacharya) slated to address the gathering and extending the official welcome to us. Having worked for 8.5 years, it didn’t take long to rediscover the respect and anxiousness one would associate with any kind of closed classroom education (not to be confused with claustrophobia). Prof Malay was the first one to speak and he touched upon the history of the inception of this programme, the uniqueness and the considerable thought put into differentiating it from the rest of the one-year programmes. It came as a surprise to me that two professors went and observed the similar one year programmes offered by MIT, Kellogg, INSEAD, and another institute, to design EPGP structure. Prof. Shastry,based on his experience with the first batch, delved into things which needed improvement and also on the value of education per se. Finally Prof.Chandra invoked the need to align our goals and contribute to the development of India, and emphasized on the need to make the Seminar series a more successful one. During the Q&A session it emerged that the Seminar series definitely needed to be taken more seriously and the need to drawn speakers from non-management sector. It was gladdening to note that the faculty were overly impressed with the class participation from the first batch and highlighted the reasons for the same.

Prof Jose, the Chairperson for the Career Development Services, did some serious plain talking and got the audience participating actively with his occasional lighter comments. It emerged that the overall placement of the first batch was very good and exceeded his expectations, but it had its share of troughs and crests vis-a-vis the number of recruiters visiting the campus. He implored our batch to have realistic expectations and not to be swayed by the mood set by the media and hype existing in the society around the placements in IIMs. The biggest re-iteration came from him on the fact that IIM wasn’t a placement agency and it was up to the Student Place-com to drive the show, and his office would step in only on a need basis.

Post a crowded and quick, but grand, lunch we convened for the ICE BREAKING SESSION conducted by KWEC ( kwec.net - an agency specializing in behavioural sciences ) and anchored by its founder – Rahul Kapoor. Like any such training, the idea was to get the relatively over aged corporate denizens and army honchos to shed their inhibitions (within permissible limits), that would help expedite the mutual learning processes. To a large extent, the programmed seemed to have served its objective, going by the enthusiastic response right through leading up to the final two moments of quiet reflection on our parents. Rahul was all energy and it was quite amazing to notice that he lasted the course with the same vigour. As Rahul pointed out, there could be many takeaways from the entire exercise, however, he urged us to inculcate at least one to make the most of our time spent in the next one year. He signed off to take up the mike at Chinnaswamy stadium for RCB’s home game against DC. Komala, part of the CAO office, got a deserving applause from our batch and KWEC team for facilitating the entire event.

There was a “SAY CHEESE” moment with the official IIM-B photographer on the lawns of the institution, which I presume would be for next year’s brochure. That just about rounded up the second last day of the relaxed pre-cursor term before the real grind.

The final day of orientation had two sessions, the first one being on "Individual Learning Styles" by Prof.Vasanthi Srinivasan. The very first 1.5 hr classroom of the one year rigour didn’t seem to bring any of the usual phobia one would associate after a hiatus as long as 8.5 years from formal education. On the contrary, the participation from the whole of the class was very spontaneous and engaging, which I believe was due to the very engaging and humour-laden discourse from the faculty. Prof.Vasanthi expounded on the 4 types of learning styles, the associated learning patterns and what we should aim for over the next one year. The next session on "Political Entrepreneurship" by Prof.Rajeev Gowda started off on a humorous note when the Prof did a "Ungowning" himself : aka Jairam Ramesh. For the next 40 minutes or so the Prof walked us through his political aspirations which gained ground from his childhood days. Going by the session title, one would have expected the class to be about exploring Entrepreneurship in the political arena and the associated pros and cons. While that didn’t seem to be the case, at the end of around 40 minutes the Prof presented a slide seeking answers from his audience as to what he has been doing wrong which has resulted in him not getting a Lok Sabha ticket. The session wasn't didactic in nature and it seemed to be more of context setting for a problem and what could be the plausible solutions. While we wondered the relevance of this session, I personally liked the class and it seemed after all not that a big deal to sit in on a non-curricular session :-), but was equally cognizant of the fact that it wouldn't be the case with the academic courses. Later in the evening we had a welcome dinner arranged by IIM-B and were glad to spend time knowing each other, while also interacting with Komala and Prof.Sourav.

The real grind unwinds on Monday and we already have quizzes slated in 3 days time !!

P.S : Amidst all the information, inspiration and indulgence, text books too were distributed.

thoughts

Some thoughts at the end of 1/24th of the course (yes, 1/3 rd of the 1st term has already zoomed past us!!):

We started the course with Debiting the excellent Faculty and peer interactions and Crediting the loan amounts and amount of sleep etc and the retained earnings at the end of the year is going to be a huge learning and some wonderful friends.

The search, evaluate and enforce aspects are being thought about different options to outsource some or all of the key activities within the group for each of us like getting the right visibility in the market, getting a good job that will make economical sense given the opportunity cost, getting the varied inputs from eminent personalities in society to develop our own personality, getting the right subject areas covered as part of the learning etc. to utilize the division of labor effectively.

Though there is an outlier like me (with no contribution to the class), which is anyway expected in a normal distribution (knowledge gained being a continuous random variable), the amount of peer learning that is happening is amazing. With 100% confidence (though theoretically it is not possible), I can say that there will be a huge enrichment in terms of knowledge and skills at the end of the course for each of us.

The Supply of knowledge from the faculty is enormously high compared to the quantity of assmilation of knowledge that is happening and hence there is an inelastic supply at this point of time. Hoping to reach the point of elasticity soon!!

Bringing in some chemical engineering flavour (btw, I am a chemical engineer by qualification), the tests, case studies and assignments are the anti-corrosive agents that help in retaining the knowledge in spite of the high heat and mass transfers that take place and also act as catalyst in the learning process.

In a philosophical tone, probably the whole universe is conspiring to help me gain some knowledge and contacts by putting me amidst the excellent faculty and an entrepreneurial peer group.

Integrating the differential thoughts, the experience so far indicates that the next 1 year is going to be intriguing and insightful in more than one way.

-Kumar

Applied Gita

"In the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous and cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagavad-Gita, in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial." – Henry David Thoreau

Bhagavad-Gita teaches us management, of everything, most importantly, of the self.

The key to build great businesses is, without any doubt, great people. People, who can lead, inspire, innovate and achieve. The creation of or a transformation into a great business starts with its people. Gita can be used to achieve harmony among the employees in an organization and to enable them to connect themselves with the organization. Many organizations suffer from the malady of being disconnected with its employees and many employees find it difficult to tune themselves to a higher goal and to resonate with the organization. Any cure, of any entity, should start with its people. One must strive to correct and fine tune his/her way of life, its purpose, its focus and its goal through an ardent study of the Gita.

Gita on the way of life:

Gita prescribes knowledge as the way of life.

Many of today's modern educational institutions, even though are quite competent in imparting education, leave a lot to be desired when it comes to shaping the students as true champions of knowledge who have mastered themselves. Gita teaches this greatest science of knowing thyself. Men who have mastered themselves are the most fit to serve the society for its upliftment and will prove a great boon to this world's well-being. The essential parts of Gita are those which impart us this knowledge.

Gita prescribes purpose instead of self-profit:

When we have a purpose to which we are passionately dedicated, it helps us to focus our mind with extraordinary sharpness and achieve great results. This cannot normally happen if we keep worrying about the results and satisfaction of our desires. It's the science which deals with the right attitude towards action and how to achieve great results from any of our actions.

In the context of a team, if everyone is motivated towards a purpose and if the leader can light that fire in them, which is good enough to burn their narrow desires and to enable them to see a higher goal, then everyone will work in unison. This results in true teamwork. And when motivated by a single purpose, which is communicated well to have penetrated into their hearts, the achievement will be far greater than the sum of the individual achievements.

From the perspective of businesses, moving from a profit-oriented approach to the purpose-oriented approach will do a world of good. Businesses would then cease to be short-term in their motives and gain a vision. The motivation of the ideas like inclusive capitalism, co-creation, etc should have stemmed from these principles.

Once we know the purpose of our existence, it becomes a lot easier for us to define and streamline our goals. It's much the same as, if there is a known direction to the destination, the travel would be much smoother and quicker.

Gita prescribes focus on the present rather than the future:

Gita urges us to focus on the present and give it whatever we have. This always yields extraordinary results. It's a simple logic that future is nothing but the effect of our present actions. And if we take care of the present, future should take care of itself. And past is a bunch of dead experiences from which we can only learn and move on. It does not help to worry about the past or to plan for the future too much, so much so that it affects our present.

To quote the meaning of the most important and immortal verse, to this effect, from the Gita

"Thy right is only to work;

But never to its fruits;

Let not the fruit of action be thy motive;

Nor let thy attachment be to inaction."

These few lines, when realized in their whole, will prove to be great wisdom, the light of which will guide us all through our life.

All enjoyment that we ever have, all happiness that we can ever have, should come from the present, neither from the future nor from the past. Otherwise the being can be called as deluded. This principle works great to bring out people from dejection and hopelessness into the state of clarity, understanding and vital activity. It helps us to endure the vagaries of life very effectively.

This principle has far-reaching implications in the field of business too. It teaches the executives how to manage things, inasmuch as, to focus on the management of the current situation than doing paranoiac planning on the future or deriving data from the past. It teaches them on how to strategize or envision the future goals without losing touch with the present realities or the present health of the business. It teaches anybody on how to overcome failures to step into effective action as soon as possible and it teaches on how not to waste time basking in the warmth of our previous successes. It's the most efficacious piece of learning one can ever have.

Happiness and peace as the ultimate goal:

What is life if we are not happy? Gita teaches us to identify what are the characteristics that we should develop to attain peace and happiness in life. The same principles in all their vigor and efficacy can be applied to the well-being of an organization.

What is the one measure that can measure the success of a company or a business, the success of a man, the success of a society, the success of a culture, the success of a country? It's nothing but the happiness of the people associated with it. Success of a business should be known from not from its balance sheet, not from the revenues or profits that it's posting, not from its size, not from its reputation, not from anything else other than the happiness of its employees, customers and other stakeholders. After all what are we living for!

There's a lot that could and should be taken from the Gita and be applied to self-management and to business management. It is a knowledge treasure-trove, a panacea of ethical conundrums, an intellectual and moral miracle.

N.

Where The Mind is Without Fear

WHERE the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

Where words come out from the depth of truth

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

Rabindranath Tagore