Variation in Variation Analysis

In one of the usual reporting cycle, I was updating project progress. Different matrices, performance factors, baselines, forecasts…. I updated all. Then I came to the variance analysis section, planned vs actual figures (hours), as I say it autopsy section. I put in reasons for positive or negative variation, mitigation action, lesson learned, impact it is to cause etc etc … The report contained some ten items with variations, interesting part was the portions where I was filling in the reasons……  I was collating all the factors which could affect the project. If I took these words out of the report such as vendor/supplier delay, forecast error, change management, performance/efficiency, client response, site condition, erroneous planning, wrong reporting, force majeure.. quite a list of factors affecting any project. Thus, amongst the projects I have been a part, I have been playing with this jugglery of causes to prepare reports time and again.

I just changed the order in my latest report. Earlier, the way it was put appeared as, Variation value (planned minus actual for the period), reason(s), mitigation action(s), responsible person(s) and expected date of resolution. Now, I keep the causes in the first column, variation value against it, person responsible and date for resolution. It’s a small change in orientation of the report, but the reviews have been quite better, where each review cycle would beat around, similar issues… now, the focus shifted to known issues and the impact it is causing, making the project management aware of historical issues, affecting the project repeatedly.

Another symbolic change was in the name of person responsible and date of mitigation, the focus shifted from reactive approach to proactive. For example, management could tell the individual discipline underlying, that variation due to vendor supply is this much and individual to look after to comply by certain date (date of mitigation became more accurate as the cause was known and helped responsible person to attack without any fuss).

Concluding I want to mention, the portion of ‘risk’ in my report has gone down! As in the list of risks, I used to mention variation analysis in a passive way, which was a repeating potential variation to come.

It’s a challenge to keep the project progress without any variation, I just changed the outlook towards variance analysis, hoping that we carve out better results in coming cycles.

 

Is Project Controls generic?

When I wrote ‘Project Management’ to Google it out, the first prompt was from Wikipedia, it stated “Project management is the discipline of planning, organizing, securing, managing, leading, and controlling resources to achieve specific goals. A project is a temporary endeavor with a defined beginning and end (usually time-constrained, and often constrained by funding or deliverables),” and this is what most of us would agree to. Next I wrote Project Controls, there wasn’t any straight forward definition, but many links directing to Project Controls organizations.

Before writing it over here, I had a question, that how valuable is Project Controls to Project Management? Project reports, reporting cycles, analysis, planning, forecasting, budgeting…  Project Controls did everything.

I almost got my answer, where I could conclude that everything which makes a Project look like a Project would be a part of Project Controls.

There came another part of query to me, can a Project Controls guy be part of ‘any’ Project Management team? , over here I want ‘ANY’ to be cross-functional, from construction project management to development project management, from research and development projects to major investment project, from software project to bio-science project…. I could not get an answer.

I looked ahead…. How much of technical depth, behavioral/hands-on knowledge is necessary for contributing to Project Management? Other way to put this question would be, Can a construction project person handle a software project just on the basis of his project management potential? such as Cost performance Indexing or Schedule Performance Indexing …….

Now I want to wrap up, its inconclusive as of now. “ I’ll wait for some more time and try to look out for some examples where there are Project Controls Professionals, contributing to cross functional support in their career.”  Cheers…

Information Flow in Project Controls

Engineering execution and design development is what I have worked with so far. The critical issue of information flow has come across many of the time. Points worth noting about this can be – a) Source of information. b) Repetitive information or new information. c) Audience of information. d) Time duration of information flow. e) Feedback of information.

I have noticed information getting distorted in more than one ways amongst them I could list a few as – a) Authenticity of source of information. b) Completeness of information. c) Assumptions of audience. Now as I write about Project Control, where information can conclude or dismantle hours of work put together, the actual delivery of information or idea is obvious.

The interdepartmental congruence and dependence for work progress makes it complicated. The advent of information technology can be used for our advantage, but prior to that the schematic map for originator and audience of information should be in place.

Taking a step back, the Project Control team encompassing cost engineering, planning, scheduling, estimating, reconciliation and forecasting has got lot of in house data and information exchange. Care need to be taken in this case of replication of data and populating data to next level.

A simple solution such as schematic diagram for Project Control work procedures can be shared between execution and design disciplines.

Furthermore, meetings on issues need to be mitigated with a formal track record so that concentration is on future progress rather than past clarifications.

I personally feel if information is taken care of, project progress via Project Control will be a success.

PROJECT CONTROL: A team Inspired Effort.

An engineering procurement construction and management company has two pronged forefront – Business Development and Project Control.

Business Development wins the contract and Project Control sets it right.

The team act starts right away when business development seeks estimated hours from project control and project control receives as bid/quoted hours to work upon.

The idea now is to adjust the budgeted hours in to various disciplines depending on their deliverable.

Now the ‘team’ spirit plays the role where each discipline burns and earns hours and project control sets up efficiency index for them.

The best part in the process so far is systematic job hours allotment, but when efficiency comes in to playing engineering disciplines tend to shy away which generally becomes a pain to cover up and maintain a performance factor of optimized level.

Why I have been saying that Project Control is a team inspired effort of engineering, document control, project engineers, quality services and IT support Project Control can’t formulate a very responsible and useful Package. The Package shall consist of weekly reports like staffing updates, short term work plan etc. and monthly updates such as bulk curves and actual vs. forecasted situations along with other important reviews.

Each of the report’s basic data comes from engineering and project engineering’s role is important as when project control does the projection and prediction analysis, the call goes back to discipline.

Briefly I have tried to circumvent the project control execution. Next I’ll be trying to focus on risk analysis and mitigation via project control then future scopes and advancements on best practices of analysis in project control.

Mid-Term Look ahead Schedules

These schedules are used when a project requires a 3-, 6-, or even 9- or 12-month construction look ahead schedule, usually to coordinate in detail a particularly complex and/or closely integrated design process in support of construction. Productivity curve for staff efficiency performance and delivery schedule shall be the basis for look ahead schedule. This formulates the impact curve. The impact curves are responsible for connecting the quantum of work assigned-work completed vs time.

Here we can propose a Mid-Term Look Ahead Schedule, which will reallocate the resources and based on past performance, this will determine the impact areas and act upon it in a crunched schedule. As some process need more emphasis than the other process, the project control team can take of review schedules and reforecast progress in the form of Mid-Term Look Ahead Schedule.

Amongst the benefit one can see that assembling the relevant players of a particular process can be agreed upon for planning procedures and information flow based on Look Ahead Schedule. Look Ahead Schedule is easy to be made on simple MS Excel spreadsheet or primavera, where one can filter out the delivery time and deliverables. By doing this the resource re planning can be planned. Concluding the write-up, it could be stated that Mid Term Look Ahead Schedule is a powerful tool for project scheduling where resource’s utilization can be improved subsequently.  

© Ashish Ranjan

Email – ashishranjan.in@gmail.com

Project Control Engineered

In this article, it would be possible to break down in to pieces the Project Control gambit and by the end assemble them together to form a lean Project Control (PC) setup.

Project Control setup is common in most of the engineering design companies and is supposed to be eyes and ears of the project manager. So right from the inception stage PC team is looked up as a monitoring and tracking system. In this regard PC shall be looked up for basic budgeting, scheduling, estimation, forecasting and setting up of control points along with staffing plans. The data which PC shall work upon shall be hours allocated or deliverables for various disciplines.

Any project shall constitute the well known mechanical, civil, electrical, architecture, structure, electrical, instrumentation or control systems, piping and layout engineering systems. The PC’s idea is to quantify the quantum of work associated with each discipline and this becomes the scope of work. Along with this comes the division of responsibility (DOR). The project managers pass on the engineering deliverables which are drawings and related schedules to project engineer. Now, as per organization hierarchy there shall be discipline leads along to follow project engineer, who is responsible to do actual engineering calculation and drawing.

Feasibility of the plan above is governed by – 1. Correct budgeting 2. Actualization of these budgeting 3. Forecasting logically. These three are the PC’s prime deliverables after the project is live. Another feather which PC adds to its planning and scheduling scheme is cost budgeting.

Cost budgeting is performed by Project Cost Engineer, who shall keep a track of job hours invoicing and take care of charge codes. Personnel should be charged to projects depending upon the job hours or deliverables. In case of any scope change how the budget is affected is overseen by the cost engineer.  

Performance Factor based on earned and budgeted hours is a key performance criteria found out by PC. The reason behind the performance factor and future directives are also found out. Project and Performance curves are named differently in different companies. But the idea remains same. A design engineering office deals with various statuses of drawings such as IFR , IFA, IFP, IFD, and IFC.

The working on Project Data Sheet and Project Execution Plan is updated by PC. In addition to this, following keywords are important for PC teams, such as chart of accounts, overhead, baseline, critical path, contingency, escalation, milestones, quantity tracking, retrofit, risk,  office types ( permanent, project, construction, home etc) and use of software as Microsoft Project, Microsoft Access, Excel, Primavera etc.

Thus, assembling PC together it can be stated as PC for a project evolves by sorting a preliminary interface table for various Engineering Disciplines, Draft Level Schedule with Control Points, Draft Interface Table, Schedule with Critical Paths, Risk and Rewards, Final Interface Table and Scope Dictionary.

          ©Ashish Ranjan, NICMAR.

            ashishranjan.in@gmail.com

Soft Leadership Creates Strong Companies:

The openness and plurality in a company’s leadership has a direct impact on its actual performance

At the recent TEDIndia conference in Mysore, the Minister of State for External Affairs and MP Shashi Tharoor argued that India’s vast, open, pluralistic society is creating a stronger, more respected Indian identity that will translate into greater power globally. Indian power will be less the “hard power” of military might and more of what Harvard’s Joseph Nye calls the “soft power” of attracting others simply by being desirable. If McDonald’s and Hollywood colonised the world with certain American values, so, too, can palak paneer and Bollywood (and yoga, ayurveda, Tata and ICICI Bank) help to “Indianise” the world through their own particular intrinsic appeal. The standing ovation at the close of Tharoor’s remarks says that his insights resonated with the largely Indian audience present.
My field is leadership in corporations – what it is and how to develop it up, down and sideways in organisations. Minister Tharoor’s observations make me ask the leaders in Indian companies: how can you enhance the soft power of your leadership – and attract better employees, more loyal customers and higher quality earnings, particularly as you expand around the globe? Hint: how much openness and plurality reside in the leadership of your company?
I am alert to this, of course, because I come from America where we have struggled with these issues for years. There, women and non-white men are tremendously underrepresented at the highest levels in most corporations given their achievements in university and up through middle management.
How do we know that homogeneity at the policy-making level stunts company results? Because the few competitors who have a healthy mix at the top consistently outperform those who don’t. A broader range of voices at the helm can even save a sinking ship: IBM pulled off one of the greatest turnarounds in history in part through draconian diversity efforts that brought more ideas and experiences into decisions and shook up IBM’s approach to business.
One perceives this phenomenon most clearly when reviewing the statistics on gender equity at the top, the most easily measurable form of demographic mix. Consider the following research: Companies that have at least 25% women on their senior leadership team make 35% higher ROE (Catalyst); are consistently in the top quartile of their peer group (McKinsey); return substantially higher innovation and effectiveness (London Business School). Hedge funds with non-token numbers of senior level women make more money in an upturn and lose less in a downturn (Hedge Fund Research, Inc.).
This leadership gap around women will particularly matter as Indian companies go increasingly global. A recent BCG study published in Harvard Business Review shares that the world’s women, for example, control far more buying power than the much-coveted Chinese and Indian markets combined: conservatively, the world’s women directly earned and spent $13 trillion USD in 2009, contrasted against a Chinese GDP of $4.4 trillion USD and an Indian GDP of $1.2 trillion USD (women actually controlled $20 trillion USD in consumer spending). By 2014, women’s income is projected to rise to $18 trillion. Thesewomen will increasingly demand products and services that will reflect their interests, values and preferred buying patterns.
After all, it was women who invented windshield wipers, Scotchguard, liquid paper, the miracle safety fabric Kevlar, fire escapes, ironing boards, disposable diapers, dishwashers, electric hot water heaters, alphabet blocks and chocolate chip cookies. No accident that women as a group score high on caring about safety, education, children, cleanliness and comfort. And, yes, cookies, too.
Leadership is about strategy and execution, as well as about inspiring, enabling and growing people. The individual leader’s personal experience and insight informs the endlessly emerging decisions around markets, products and services, diverse customers and assorted employees. Plurality at the top will open up that key executive body to deeper wisdom and more attractive solutions around the market, business and people.
Soft power, in other words.
Kate Sweetman is a consultant with the RBL Group and co-author of Leadership Code: 5 Rules to Lead By

Leadership is a choice, not a position Using the 8th Habit as a guide for leadership in turbulent times. – Stephen R Covey

Leadership is a choice, not a position

Using the 8th Habit as a guide for leadership in turbulent times.

– Stephen R Covey

The world is experiencing an unprecedented economic slowdown. The uncertainty that comes with such an economic environment is compounded with accelerated and profound changes in today’s business world — technological, cultural, social, economic and personal. The net effect is increasing anxiety, insecurity, and more pressure than ever before on today’s employees, managers, leaders and organisations.

In this article, I would like to discuss with you some of the principles that I believe can help individuals, at any level of the organisation, inculcate and express leadership qualities that enable them to be an inspiration to all around, contributing to positive growth for the company. Great leaders, formal and informal, know what to do in turbulent times. They manage change, communicate a vision and serve in the role of a coach and supporter for those around.

I have worked with organisations around the world for over 40 years and have been a student of the great minds who have studied organisations. In times of economic uncertainty, organisations often need to make cultural shifts. Most of the great cultural shifts — the ones that have built great organisations that sustain long-term growth, prosperity and contribution to the world — started with the choice of one person. Sometimes that one person was the formal leader — the CEO or president. Very often it started with someone else — a professional, a line manager, someone’s assistant. Regardless of their position, these people first changed themselves from the inside out. Their character, competence, initiative and positive energy — in short, their moral authority — inspired and lifted others. They possessed an anchored sense of identity, discovered their strengths and talents, and used them to meet needs and produce results. People noticed. They were given more responsibility. They magnified the new responsibility and again produced results. More and more people sat up and noticed. Top people wanted to learn of their ideas — how they accomplished so much. The culture was drawn to their vision and to them.

People like this just do not get sucked into or pulled down for long by all the negative, demoralising, insulting forces in the organisation. And interestingly, their organisations are no better than most organisations. To some degree, they are all a mess. These people just realise that they cannot wait for their boss or the organisation to change. They become an island of excellence in a sea of mediocrity. And it is contagious.

Where does a person get such internal strength to swim against the current and to withstand negative cultural provocations, subordinate selfish interests and develop and sustain such vision and determination?

They learn of their true nature and gifts. They use them to develop a vision of great things they want to accomplish. With wisdom they take initiative and cultivate great understanding of the needs and opportunities around them. They meet those needs that match their unique talents, tap their higher motivations, and make a difference. In short they find and use their voice. They serve and inspire others. They apply PRINCIPLES that govern growth and prosperity in human beings AND in organisations — principles that draw the highest and best from a “whole person” — body, mind, heart and spirit. Equally significant, they also choose to influence and inspire others to find their voice through these principles.

This is a bold statement born of my deep conviction: leadership is a choice, not a position. Understanding this fundamental precept of leadership is critical because it is the key to success in any undertaking of life. When you’ve got good leadership, families, businesses, schools, hospitals, communities, and governments thrive. Under poor or mediocre leadership, none of these enterprises fulfill their potential. Leadership, therefore, is everybody’s business. It is the business of choice, of making things happen, and of making a difference.

The premise of this article is that human beings have the intrinsic power and freedom to make choices. Next to life itself, the power to make choices is our most precious gift. Perceiving yourself as a victim, without choice, is the greatest inhibiting factor to achieving what matters most to you. We all have the power to make choices in our personal lives as well as within the workforce.

We routinely call people in with titles our leaders. We rate the performances of people in authority and call them good or bad leaders. It is easy and convenient to explain situations — and thus to assign blame when things do not work out — as a function of other people’s actions and choices. By thinking this way, however, we empower formal managers’ weaknesses and thereby disempower ourselves. Only when we truly understand and accept the concept of leadership as a choice, are we able to replace the notion of leadership as a position with leadership as influence. And then we can even become the leaders of the people we report to at the workplace.

To help you increase your power and capacity to lead, to help you choose to exert influence, regardless of your position, whether you are a factory worker, a CEO, a middle manager, a janitor, an entrepreneur, or a single parent, I urge you to consider leadership as a choice, not a position.

In order to accomplish this goal, I offer you a two-part framework of thinking drawn from my book, The 8th Habit, which will help you tackle your greatest personal and organisational challenges.

The   solution
The two-part framework I suggest is as follows: 1) Find your voice 2) Inspire others to find theirs

This is a road map for individuals at ANY level of an organisation to maximise their fulfilment and influence, become an irreplaceable contributor, and inspire their team and the broader organisation to do the same. It is a roadmap to move from pain and frustration to true fulfilment, relevance, significance and contribution in today’s new landscape — not only in your work and organisation, but in your whole life. It will help you to find your own voice, and also expand your influence, regardless of your position, to inspire others you care about — your team and your organisation — to find their voices and increase manifold their effectiveness, growth and impact.

Find  your  voice
Everyone chooses one of two roads in life — the old and the young, the rich and the poor, men and women alike. One is the broad, well-traveled road to mediocrity, the other the road to greatness and meaning. The range of possibilities that exists within each of these two destinations is as wide as the diversity of gifts and personalities in the human family. But the contrast between the two destinations is as the night is to the day.

The path to mediocrity straitjackets human potential. The path to greatness unleashes and realises human potential. The path to mediocrity is the quick-fix, short-cut approach to life. The path to greatness is a process of sequential growth from the inside out. Travelers on the lower path to mediocrity live out the cultural “software” of ego, indulgence, scarcity, comparison, competitiveness, and victimism. Travelers on the upper path to greatness rise above negative cultural influences and choose to become the creative force of their lives. One word expresses the pathway to greatness: Voice. Those on this path find their voice and inspire others to find theirs. The rest never do. Once you make the choice to follow this “road less traveled,” the first step on the pathway is to:

Discover your voice: You discover your own voice by coming to understand your true nature. Every one of us is born with magnificent “birth gifts”— talents, capacities, privileges, intelligences and opportunities with infinite potential. Of these the three most important birth-gifts are those of choice, principles, and the four human intelligences (physical/economic, emotional/social, mental and spiritual) that correspond to the four parts of our human nature. In my seminars, I urge people to see that they are ultimately free to make choices. When you understand this, you can see how your choices literally create the world in which you live by directly impacting the events that unfold as a result of your choices. By exercising your freedom to choose, you can change your life for the better, especially if you make “wise use” of your freedom to choose, by living by principles and by developing and using with integrity the intelligence tied to each of the four parts of your nature — mental, spiritual, social and physical. Developing and using these intelligences will instill in you quiet confidence, internal strength and security. Your efforts to develop these intelligences will profoundly impact your ability to influence others and inspire them to find their voice.

Express your voice: You express your voice by cultivating the highest manifestations of these human intelligences—vision, discipline, passion and conscience. Vision is seeing with the mind’s eye what is possible in people, in projects, in causes and in enterprises. Vision results when our mind joins with possibility. Discipline arises when vision joins with commitment, while passion is the fire, the desire, the strength of conviction and the drive that sustains the discipline to achieve the vision. Conscience is the inward moral sense of what is right and what is wrong, the drive to meaning and contribution. These four words essentially embody many of the other characteristics used to describe those people whose influence is great. Great leaders such as Gandhi, Mother Teresa and Nelson Mandela all embodied these human intelligences in the work they did, driven by conscience, with passion, vision and discipline.

Inspire others  to find their voice: Once you have found your own voice, the choice to expand your influence, to increase your contribution, is the choice you make to inspire others to find their voice. Inspire (from the Latin inspirare) means to breathe life into another. As we recognise, respect, and create ways for others to give voice to all four parts of their nature—physically, mentally, emotionally/socially and spiritually — latent human genius, creativity, passion, talent and motivation is unleashed. It will be those organisations that reach a critical mass of people and teams expressing their full voice that will achieve the next-level breakthrough in productivity, innovation and leadership in the marketplace and society.

Simply put — at its most elemental and practical level — leadership is communicating to people their worth and potential so clearly that they come to see it in themselves. Think about this definition. Is this not the essence of the kind of leadership that influences and truly endures? To communicate the worth and potential of others so clearly, so powerfully and consistently, that they really come to see it in themselves is to set in motion the process of seeing, doing and becoming.

By inspiring others to find their voice, we enter into the domain of leadership. Again, this is not leadership as a formal position, but leadership as a choice to deal with people in a way that will communicate to them their worth and potential so clearly they will come to see it in themselves. Regarding our focus on this kind of leadership in the organisation, I would like to emphasise four simple points:

At the most elemental level, an organisation is nothing more or less than a relationship with a purpose (its voice). That purpose is aimed at meeting the needs of one or more persons or stakeholders. The simplest organisation would be two people who share a purpose, such as in a simple business partnership or a marriage.

Almost all people belong to an organisation of one kind or another. Most of the world’s work is done in and through organisations. The highest challenge inside organisations, including families, is to set them up and run them in a way that enables each person to inwardly sense his or her innate worth and potential for greatness and to contribute his or her unique talents and passion—in other words, voice—to accomplish the organisation’s purpose and highest priorities in a principle-centered way. We could call this the Leadership Challenge.

In short, an organisation is made up of individuals who have a relationship and a shared purpose. You can see, then, how this organisational application applies to each one of us.

The process of Inspiring Others to Find Their Voice could be summarised in two words:

Focus and  execution:
Focus embodies the modeling and path finding roles as a proactive intention to affirm the worth and potential of those around us and to unite them as a complementary team in an effort to increase the influence and impact of the organisations and important causes we are part of. Being a model involves finding your own voice first and then choosing to take the initiative to expand your influence in every opportunity around you. Modeling character and competence lays the foundation for trust in every relationship and organisation. You cannot have trust without trustworthiness. Knowledge and application of this principle and of the principles underlying the path finding, which involves creating with others a common vision about your highest priorities and the values by which you will achieve your priorities, are together the doorway to influence.

The crucial question now becomes, ‘How do we execute both values and strategy consistently without relying on the formal leader’s continuing presence to keep everyone going in the right direction?’ The answer is in aligning structures, systems, processes and culture to the very principles that people have built into their value system to enable the vision to be realised. Aligning requires constant effort and adjustment because you are dealing with so many changing realities. Systems, structures and processes must remain flexible to adjust to these, yet remain based on unchanging principles. Within such a format it is easier for employees to release passion and talent, and for leaders to clear the way before them and then get out of the way. Empowerment is where the rubber meets the road in a team and is the culminating fruit of leadership.

The business environment today is challenging. Trust in leaders is at historic lows and challenges that once took years to materialise now arise overnight; competitive advantages vanish and there is a shortage of capital and talent. People are no longer satisfied with just showing up, they want to make a difference. The best people hire their employers, not the other way around, and the contribution they can make is more motivating than their paycheck. In times of high economic volatility, living by principles can provide a compass to tide over the storm.

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ABOUT  THE  AUTHOR:
Stephen R Covey is the vice-chairman of Franklin Covey Co, a global leader in organisational and personal effectiveness, with offices in over 148 countries (www.franklincoveysouthasia.com), and is an internationally respected and sought-after leadership authority, family expert, teacher and organisational consultant. Dr Covey is the author of several acclaimed books, including The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, which has sold over 15 million copies and is the largest-selling non-fictional book till date. He has also been recognised as one of Time magazine’s 25 most influential Americans.

Speech given at the HT Leadership Summit Delhi, November 21, 2008 © Chetan Bhagat

Speech given at the HT Leadership Summit
Delhi, November 21, 2008
© Chetan Bhagat

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Good afternoon Ladies and Gentlemen. Thank you for the opportunity to speak at the leadership summit – the first of its kind for me.

 

I am no leader. At best, I am a dreamer with  perseverance to make dreams come true. As I have made my own dreams come true already, I am tempted to think we can make my country’s dreams come true. And that is why I am here.

Before we become one with the world we have to become one with ourselves. If we get our own house in order we don’t have to make an effort to be one with the world. The world will want to be one with us. Everyone wants to be friends with happy, rich, thriving neighbors. Nobody wants a family festered with disputes.

A lot is wrong in my country. There are too many differences. The question is not who we blame for this. The question is how do we fix it? Because to do anything great, you have to become one first. Two generations ago, our forefathers came together to win us Independence. It isn’t like we didn’t have disputes then. Religion, caste, community have existed for centuries. But Gandhi brought them all together for a greater cause – to get the country free.
Today, we have another greater cause. To get India its rightful place in the world. To see India the way the younger generation wants to see it. To make India a prosperous, developed country, where not only the spirit of patriotism, but also the standard of living is high. Where anyone with the talent, drive and hard work alone has the ability to make it. Where people don’t ask where you come from, but where you are going. We all know that India, as we have all dreamt of that India.
There is a lot required to be done for this, and it doesn’t just start and end  by blaming politicians. For in a democracy, we elect the politicians. If our thinking changes, our voting will change and the politicians will change. And since I have made a nation that didn’t read, read, do I believe people’s thinking can be changed.

To me there are 3 main areas where I think we need to change our thinking – leaders included. And I’m not just saying we need to do it because it is morally right/ ethically correct/ or because it sounds nice at a conference. We need to do it as it make sense from an incentives point of view. These three areas are changing the politics of differences to the politics of similarity, looking down on elitism and the role of English.

The first mindset change required is to change the politics of differences to the politics of similarity. I’ve been studying young people in India, not just in big cities but across India for the last five years.
They are the bulk of the population – the bulk of our voter bank. Yet, what they are looking for is not what politicians are pitching. It is not too different from the old school Bollywood where they think item numbers, big budgets and tested formulas work while the biggest hits of the year could be Rock On and Jaane Tu. Yes, times have changed.
Here is what the politicians are pitching – old fashioned patriotism, defending traditions, being the torchbearer of communities, caste and religion. Here is what the youth wants – better colleges, better jobs, better role models. Compared to the talent pool, the number of good college seats are very limited. Same for good jobs. These wants are the biggest similarity that we all share. We all want the same things – progress. I see a huge disconnect in the political strategies of existing politicians vs. what could work for the new voters.
I think broad based infrastructure and economic development will satisfy the young generation’s needs. It isn’t an easy goal to attain – but it is the great cause that can unite us. Today a dynamic politician who takes this cause can achieve a far greater success than any regional politician. And the slot is waiting to be taken.
Another aspect required to convert the politics of differences to the politics of similarities is a  strong moderate voice. When someone tries to divide us, people from the same community as the divider have to stand up against him. If person A is saying Non-Marathis should be attacked, then some Marathis need to stand up and say person A is talking nonsense. If a Muslim commits terrorist attack, other Muslims should stand up and condemn it, as Hindus are going to condemn it anyway. This moderate voice is sorely missing but is critical in keeping the country together. And the youth want to keep it together, as we want to be remembered as the generation who took India forward, not the one that cut India into two dozen pieces.
I hate telling people what to do, but the media does have a role in this. I agree that media is a business and TRPs matter above anything else. However, there are ethics in every business. Doctors make money off sick people, but it doesn’t mean they keep people sick and not heal them. If you find a moderate voice, highlight it as soon as a divisive voice appears. And don’t take sides, argue or debate it. Don’t validate the ridiculous. Focus on the greater cause.

The second mindset we need to change is that of elitism. From my early childhood days, to college, to professional and business life, and now in the publishing and entertainment circles, I have noticed a peculiar Indian habit of elitism. Maybe it is hard to achieve anything in India. But the moment any person becomes even moderately successful, educated, rich, famous, talented or even develops a fine taste, they consider themselves different from the rest. They begin to move in circles where the common people and their tastes are looked down upon. This means a large chunk of our most qualified,  experienced, connected and influential people prefer to live air-conditioned lives in their bubble of like minded people. Naive people  who elect stupid politicians – that is the bottomline for all Indian problems, and they want nothing to do with it. But tell me, if the thinking of the common people has to be changed, who is going to change it? What is the point of discussing solutions to Indian problems if there is no buy-in from the common man? Just because it feels good to be around like-minded, intelligent people? What is the use of this intelligence?
If you switch on the TV, seventy percent of the time you will see Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. The reason is the media is centered in these cities. However, ninety percent of India is not this. Unless we represent these people properly, how will these people ever come with us?
Again, I am not making these points as a moral appeal. I think understanding India and being inclusive makes massive business sense. And trust me, it doesn’t take any coolness or trendiness away from you if you do it right. Look at me, I am the mass-iest English author ever invented in India. My books sell on railway stations and next to atta in Big Bazaar. I have an Indian publisher who operates from the bylanes of Darya Ganj. And yet, on orkut the most common words associated with my name are coolness and awesomeness – tags given by my wonderful readers. I think it is cooler to know how people think in the streets of Indore and Raipur than who’s walking the ramp in South Mumbai. You may have planned your next vacation abroad, but have you visited a small town lately? Have you shown your kids what the real India is like? Don’t you think they will need to know that as they grow up and enter the workforce. Yes, I want people to look down on elitism and develop a culture of inclusiveness. If you are educated, educate others. If you have good taste, improve others taste rather than calling theirs bad.

The last aspect where we need to change our thinking is our attitude to  English. We have to embrace English like never before. Not England, but English. This point may sound contradictory to my previous one, but I am not talking about confining English to the classes, but really taking it to the grassroot level. English and Hindi can co-exist. Hindi is the mother and English is the wife. It is possible to love them both. In small towns, districts and even villages – we need to spread English. India already has a headstart as so many Indians speak English and we don’t have to get expat teachers like China does. But we must not confuse patriotism with the skills one needs to compete in the real world. If you are making an effort to start a school where none existed, why not give the people what will help them most. I can teach a villager geometry and physics in Hindi, but frankly when he goes to look for a job he is going to find that education useless. English will get him a job. Yes, I know some may say what will happen to Hindi and our traditional cultures. I want to ask these people to pull their kids out of English medium  schools and then talk. If you go to small towns, English teaching classes are the biggest draw. There is massive demand for something that will improve people’s lives. I have no special soft spot for this language, but the fact is it works in the world of today. And if more English helps spread prosperity evenly across the country, trust me we will preserve our culture a lot better than a nation that can barely feed its people.

We are all passionate about making India better, so we can discuss this forever. But today I wanted to leave you with just three thoughts – politics of similarities, less elitism and more English that we need to build consensus on. If you agree with me, please do whatever you can in your capacity to make the consensus happen. It could be just a discussion with all your friends, or spreading these thoughts in a broader manner, if you have the means and power to do so. For the fact that we are sitting in this wonderful venue means our country has been kind to us. Let’s see what we can give back to our nation.

CAN ENGINEERS BE ‘TOUCHY FEELY’? -an article written by Chetan Bhagat

-an article written by Chetan Bhagat

I remember the incident – I was in a restaurant, and one girl in our group was especially charming. So I, like any other male, tried to put on a wooing act. You know the routine, a nanosecond extra eye contact, a few more nods to whatever she says, and attempts to throw in those one-liners which you know you wouldn’t if she weren’t there. And it seemed to be working. She leaned forward when she spoke to me, and every now and again, we’d have a small conversation of our own, separate from our group. She laughed at my approach with the fork and knife, and I teased her about her hair band, which had little teddy bears.

Yes, we were flirting. A while later, she asked me the question – what did I study? I said engineering, without any particular meaning attached to it. And then like a cold metal rail, she went stiff. My jokes weren’t funny any more. Her eyes wandered to everyone else.

What was it?
Why? Why? Why?
Two days later, I still couldn’t get over my great start that had dissipated listlessly upon mentioning my education. Engineer? What was wrong with that?

My mom had wanted me to become one since I was five! I had to call her. ‘So what happened to you that day, hot and cold, missie?’ And then she said, trying to be nice, ‘Well, it’s just that I am skeptical about engineers as friends. I don’t know, they can be, you know, very logical and everything…not very touchy feely’.

Not touchy-feely. Now what the heck did that mean? Well, she obviously did not mean it literally, since girls don’t really suggest that sort of stuff, certainly not in the first meeting across the table. I guessed it was something to do with feelings, sort of having an emotional side. The stereotype being, the nerdy guy who sees relationships like laws of physics, to whom love is just a bunch of chemicals going crazy in your brain, and getting to know a person means obtaining their bio-data.

It’s time to set the record straight. It’s true that a lot of what engineers study (and they end up studying quite a lot), has to do with formulaes, laws and numbers. No matter how hard we try, some of the vocabulary we read all day gets into our language. So when my mother said, ‘Are you getting married next year or not?’ I was liable to say, ‘Well, at this moment in time, the probability is relatively low,’ and felt it was completely normal to say it. And when my sister went sari shopping and couldn’t explain the shade she wanted, I told the shopkeeper the percentages of pink, orange and red in the sari.

Yet, ladies, I don’t think we’re bad at relationships, love and getting to know people. We too, can be touchy-feely, as that is part of our education as well. The reason for this is that most engineering students live in the ultimate educator – boy’s hostels.

Now, let me explain how this plays into this ‘touchy-feely’ thing. Relationships. Imagine eating, sleeping, brushing your teeth, bathing (ok rarely this one) and partying with the same people all the time. So, when you are kicking that bathroom door down for the tenth time, or when you stand in line for ‘gulab-jamuns’ in the mess, and when you are done with the vodka bottle and sharing all your secrets, you know it is good practice. Yes, hostels maketh the man.

So, next time you are in a flirtatious situation with the techno types, go on, flirt a bit more. Of course, I am biased towards my kind, but if you find the conversation turning too geeky, just ask them, ‘So, what were your hostel days like?’ and chances are, you’ll see a heart behind the calculator.

Coming back to my missie, I thought of what would make me win her over. Flowers… too cheesy. Music… don’t know her taste (nor trust mine). Teddy bears… don’t even go there. Desperate for some good lines, I just turned it right back at her. ‘Yes, I know what you are saying about engineers. The thing is, unless people with depth like you start hanging out with us, we won’t get any better. Can you meet me some time for some touchy/feely… oops, I mean coffee/tea?’

She giggled. When they giggle,you have won.

Hence proved.