Party Gate crasher

Well, there was an incident at work yesterday that has woken me up from my slumber in the blogosphere. Here goes.

The current Business Unit that I belong to, had wanted us to conduct an event for the 700+ employees in the Unit in Chennai. As most of you would be aware, such employee engagement events are conducted by different Units at different locations quite regularly at various points in a calendar. I was appointed as the head of the Organizing committee and the D-day was yesterday, the 19^th of September. As a precursor to the event, we took out a rally within campus last week, with a professional marching band and holding banners.

We had hung up banners at many places on campus advertising that the event was on 19^th September. The tag line for the event (courtesy yours truly) was “Family. Friends. Fun.” During the course of this week, we had informed our Unit employees that they were allowed to bring their family to campus, but with a pre-registration. Family members were allowed to enter the campus after 3 PM.

Yesterday, while we were running around with the arrangements for the event, we got a call from our Security desk that there was an employee who had brought in some family member and wanted to be let inside. The time was just about 11 AM. As mentioned earlier, we were allowing family members only after 3 PM and so the Security guys had called us to see if we had any special permission for early entries.

So, we went around contacting the HR and other senior people who run the Campus to get approvals. That seemed to be running into some delays and the Security officer called us again. Finally, we asked the guy to find out who was the employee who had brought in his family. The Security officer gave us the employee number and we looked him up in the Office Directory.

Guess what? This employee belonged to some other Unit altogether!!!! He had seen the Rally last week; saw the banners around Campus and also some of the video displays we had run in Buildings. The dude assumed that this event was a free-for-all and happily brought along his family! We were literally ROFL and the one speaking to the guy had to put on a straight face. She asked some one simple question as to whether that guy got an invitation by mail and he said no. We then explained to him that what we were doing was just a brand-building exercise and the event was only for our Unit members.

After we were done with the welcome laughter at a stressful time, we also felt pity for the dude who would now have to cut a very sorry face to his family. God knows what he suffered back home.

And BTW, the event was awesome!

Mannar & Co Thangavelu is my latest alias

Long-time readers of my blog would be aware that I work out of two different offices in this city. Of course, I have used the word “work” in a very loose manner, but as long as I am employed, I guess I am entitled to say so.

And that brings me directly to the topic of this blog. You see, for the last 6-7 weeks, I have been working out of the office closer home and in fact, I haven’t visited the one near Chengalpet in almost 4 weeks now! The reason why I am doing this is because I don’t have a team per se for this said period and am doing a fair amount of pre-sales work – both of which allow for location flexibility.

Anyways, a couple of days back, my mother asked me if I was still employed. Quite shocked by her question, I asked her the logic behind that query. Her simple reasoning was that I must have been fired and in my endeavour to maintain an “image” at home and to society, I was pretending to go to office daily. Pretty much what the great Thangavelu did in Kalyana Parisu as a Manager in Mannar & Co. You can check that comedy scene here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRwJu2jROLc&feature=BFa&list=PL3432E88AF6BBE40D

Things have reached the stage where she has started calling me Thangavelu!

Fake diamonds do not help a guy

Last week, I found a really small sized screw on my desk at work and I had no idea where it came from. Since me sitting on the chair didn’t cause any harm to the chair or floor, I assured myself that it was one of life’s mysteries. Anyways, I found it a good object of distraction during a couple of telephonic discussions – I used to bounce it against the cubicle wall from my desk. At some point, I lost the screw and had a difficult time handling phone calls!

Much later in the day, in fact around 7 PM or so, I was walking along the corridor and spotted a partly shiny thingy on the floor. I don’t know what took over me, but I suddenly transformed myself to 1992 when I used to play soccer at school. I know, it was an irrational behaviour especially considering that the FIFA World Cup was more than a year old, but hey, I had to go with the crowd. Bringing back those memories, I kicked that shiny thingy, assuming that it was the screw that I had lost a couple of hours earlier.

Call it destiny or whatever, that object had rolled right into the cubicle where I sit. I was naturally surprised to see that object near my chair when I entered my cubicle and picked it up. Only then did I come to know that what I had kicked was not a screw. It was a piece of jewellery that looked like this:

I instantly assumed that it was a piece of small diamond that had fallen off someone’s earring, or perhaps, a nose-ring. My first thought was to hand it over to the Security in the building and then get one of my friends to post in the Company bulletin board that if anyone is missing a piece of diamond, they could contact the Security desk.

Considering the fact that this object had been noticed by me and also because a random kick still deposited it in my cubicle itself, the portion of my brain inundated with 30+ years of watching Indian movies, decided to take over my logical thinking portion. Then I told myself, that instead of giving it to the Security, I could keep it myself and get the “loser” to contact me directly. If the person who lost it was any one of the many good looking (or to be correct, one of the better looking) girls in that area, this would then give me an opportunity to initiate a conversation and maybe lead to better things. I even went to the extent of preparing dialogues that need to be said and how to react for whatever is said back. The exact sequence of thought process is quite foggy now but at some point in time in this mental video, there were some background dancers!

I took pictures of the diamond and mailed my friend with the relevant details to be posted. I even wrapped it in a piece of brown paper that I managed to dig up from my bag, lest any damage be caused to the stone. But till date, nobody has come forward to claim this piece of lost treasure. When I showed a couple of other friends, this piece of jewellery, they dismissed it as a piece of glass at best.

So, while the saying goes that diamonds are a girl’s best friend, fake ones are certainly not friendly with guys.

I am not gifted enough to know what is the best gift

I am not gifted enough to know what is the best gift.

My lesson for the day – size does matter! Before you think otherwise, please read on.

One of my friends at work is getting married and we attended his wedding reception today. There were plans afoot of trying to pool in money and buy a gift. I didn’t want to join the group and planned to get him something on my own. However, there were a couple of other friends who too had similar idea. At which point, we all decided to simply join the bigger group itself.

The final budget was parked in the area of Rs.4,000.00 and by some default process, the onus of buying the gift fell on me. Since it gave me an excuse to leave work earlier than usual, to buy the gift, I accepted this privilege with pleasure.

With the budget in mind, I made it clear to my friends that I would get some silverware item and checked out the options at the Sukran shop in Mylapore - http://www.sukra.com/reachus.html.

Basically it is a small set of lamps with one main piece and two small side pieces. The total cost came to around Rs.4,500.00. Since these had to be gift wrapped, I took a picture of the lamps to show my friends. Since I was very happy with the purchase, I showed it to my parents and my friends with a lot of enthusiasm. The feedback I received was also very good.

But when I showed them the gift box, people were shocked at the size of it. And more than the shock, people also seemed to be genuinely upset that the gift was quite small. Was it my mistake that I took a good picture, but without a reference size? Or was it my mistake that instead of going for the value of an item – in this case not even a notional or emotional value, but an actual value of a costly metal – I should have gone for a bigger sized gift? Should I have bought a big Papier-mâché idol/doll – because for that amount, I am sure one can get something two feet tall on a two square feet base.

So, what is a good gift? Clearly not something I buy. I need to gain the gift of being able to buy the best gift. 

My worth at work

Something happened at work, last Thursday, that gave a whole new outlook to my worth at work.

In the office closer to my place, I am, in theory, only a visitor. So, I don't get to choose a desk for myself and my department folks have been kind enough to give me an independent cubicle. But this cubicle, is a corner one and unfortunately, one of the wings of the corner is the main aisle in that area.

The picture here shows you the cubicle and the pillar you see on the left is the only thing that ensures that people don't simply walk into my cubicle. Or so I thought, till Thursday afternoon.

I was in my post-lunch near meditative state

I don't think I'd survive in Marketing and Sales

Last week, my Department conducted a road-show type of event across the Organization. The purpose of the event was to create an awareness amongst the employees, that Software Testing offered an attractive career in the IT industry. This purpose, was however, the official version. The real reason was mainly to entice those working in other Departments to move to ours.


Since this event was conducted under the auspices of the Organization's senior management, we were allowed to send mailers to everyone, hold some online competitions, create stalls etc. The Stalls were setup with volunteers - comprising of senior managers of the Department - who could be approached to clarify any doubts about Software Testing.

Of course, since my Department was the solely focused on doing only Software Testing, we were allowed to showcase a lot of cool stuff that we do - like creating tools to automate some testing work etc. So, we even had pamphlets printed out and these were to be handed out to the visitors. There was even a small corner at the stalls where we asked the visitors to just fill out a questionnaire and participate in a lucky draw. They all got some candies while filling out the questions too. If this whole setup reeks of what you see in a real estate property fair, truth be told, it was no different.

I too was one of the volunteers

What level of the Seven-Year Itch do I have?

Many of you may feel bored while reading my blog and I am finally able to empathize with you. But, my boredom is not really from reading my writing and is more due to my work or rather, the lack of it.

I am keeping this post simple

Judge Jawaman

I have obviously not become a judge in a Court of Law nor am I suggesting that I have aspirations to become one. I only wanted to share with you my experiences as a Judge in a Talent competition along the lines of American Idol and its numerous clones across the world.

The business unit I belong to in my office, recently held celebrations for reaching an employee strength of 10000. As part of these celebrations, the aforementioned Talent competition was also held. But when the event was about to start, the organizers realized that they fell short by 2 judges in a panel of 3. They were able to rope in one and this person (my ex-boss) goaded me into filling out the remaining vacancy.

I resisted the option of becoming a Judge and that too in a talent competition, but then I quickly realized that the chances of me ever donning that role again were lower than that of Raul Vinci

Joodles - My attempt at Doodles

Of late, whenever I feel more bored than usual, I have started doodling.


The first one here, was done this morning. There was a meeting scheduled at 11:30 AM and I went to the meeting room. I made the mistake of not taking my laptop and was waiting in the room. All alone. After waiting for 5 minutes, I just started doodling on my mobile phone, waiting for the 2 others who were supposed to join the call. I expected them to come in with their laptops and keep working on it while the call was on. I am giving you all this background for 2 reasons:

Sherwa(r)ni

Last Friday, the 22nd of October, we were requested by our Unit HR at work, to come dressed in "Ethnic Wear" to the office. Such requests do happen once  a month or once in two months and this one was pretty much the first one by our Unit folks in a long time.

I usually don't take part in these events, because I don't have that many options of "Ethnic Wear" at my disposal. I have one Sherwani that I last wore for such an event in Jan 2007 and it is lying inside my cupboard ever since. The only other option is to wear a vaeshti (dhoti), but I am always under a constant fear that when I wear it, the Fall season would start because (a) I would trip and fall or worse, (b) The vaeshti would fall off.

When this "Ethnic Wear" request came up this time, I decided to let the Sherwani see the light of the day, since it has been lying inside my cupboard, wrapped in the very bag that the Dry Cleaners had returned it to me, in Jan 2007. However, I was afraid if I would fit into it and so checked it the previous night. Thankfully, I did fit into it. But I anticipated issues in me being able to stay in it for the whole day at work, because the material was not 100% cotton. So, I packed a spare set of regular clothing in the form of my Jeans and a T-Shirt.

On Friday, I went to the office in the Sherwani, and I must admit that when I went to the Food Court for breakfast, I did get more than my usual share of stares from the members of the opposite sex. At one point I even heard some cat calls, but I quickly realized that it was the ring tone in someone's mobile.

When I went towards my cubicle, a couple of my team members who were standing elsewhere, actually came up to me to see if it really was me! And I got quite a few compliments that it looked good. Some of them were slightly smarter enough to say that I looked very good in it. Someone else first almost guffawed, but quickly recovered himself and said that I looked some 5 years younger! So, he basically complimented me once and ridiculed me twice in a span of 5 seconds (If you are keeping count, the compliment was that I looked younger and the ridicule was the near-guffaw and the fact that he thinks that I am actually old!). My boss even said that I looked like a Groom and I told him that I am treating this as my dress-rehearsal.

But all these compliments aside, there are somethings absolutely uncomfortable in a Sherwani. First of all, the dupatta/Stole or whatever it is called. While it certainly adds some color to the costume, maintaining it one the body is quite difficult. You have to ensure that it is hanging equally on both sides of your shoulder. Or, it should be properly wrapped once around your neck without strangling you. And in any case, irrespective of how you place it, once you sit down, one of its ends somehow manages to find its way into the casters of the chair and you would likely be strangled when you turn around or when you move the chair.

You can overcome the problem with the casters, by placing it on the table while sitting. But, the sitting itself is the next problem. You see, the way the Sherwani is designed, the leg portion of it is rather tight to avoid making it look like a pyjama. And yet, the upper portion of it is pretty much at the same shape and patter as the regular pyjama. This design, my friends, makes it extremely difficult to sit. Because, the tighter portion of the costume, actually starts around the knees. And due to the "tightness", there is way too much pressure on the slightly looser upper segment of the same piece of clothing. This means that you cannot simply plonk yourself onto a chair and have to gracefully ease yourself into that piece of furniture. If you sit down in any other fashion, those around you may hear a Big Rip! 

BUT, the real big problem with the Sherwani, is the sheer inconvenience it brings to the wearer, when the wearer has to make use of a restroom. Irrespective of whether you are inside for minor reasons or major, the sheer number of pieces of garments that need to be aligned properly, makes it imperative that you reach the venue slightly earlier than your regular routine. In fact, you need to strategise what you eat and how much of liquid you drink, so that the trips to the restroom can be well regulated and planned out as well.

So, in my opinion, this costume must be worn when you know for sure that it would not be on you for more than say 2 hours and also, when you don't have to sit that much. Its purpose is to make you look good and it sure does. So, my suggestion would be to go with a friend to a shop that sells costly Sherwanis. Try out one of them and get your friend to take pictures when you come out of the changing room. Then tell the shop guys that you didn't like it!

I need counseling

As I may have chronicled in this blog, I have the option of working out of any one of the two locations where my office has opened shop. The option is not really official, but more of an agreement with my bosses, who have been kind enough to permit this luxury.

But of late, I have been using the slightest of opportunities to work out of the office closer home. With every passing day, it is becoming increasingly difficult for me to commute to the office farthest from home. The commute is taking up 3-4 hours daily and I am simply not able to take it mentally and physically.

However, I am also feeling guilty that I am abusing an option that has been given to me. My bosses can simply tell me to limit the number of times I visit the office closer home or worse, simply revoke the privilege. Would I end up killing the goose that has been laying the golden egg?

What scares me more is the fact that at a sub-conscious level, I seem to be tuning myself away from the main location of work. Just look at this: Last Friday, my alarm woke me up at 5:30 as usual. But in what is a first for me, I simply reset the alarm to an hour later, with the plan to go to the office closer home and resumed my sleep. And yesterday (Monday), I again got up at 5:30 and even made it to the bus stop. But, I was 5 minutes late and had missed the bus. On previous occasions that I've missed the bus, I usually take my car and go to office. But this time, I took the car and simply went to the office closer home. And to top all of this, this morning (Tuesday), I again got up at 5:30. I've been feeling a little queasy due to a slight bout of acidity and I actually used that as an excuse and didn't even go to office today.

So basically, the very fact that I need to travel that far has made me tune myself out. But is it just the commute that is causing me to behave like this or is there something else deeper to look into? I need counseling.

I have progressed

Two Thursdays back, a few days short of completing the first month of my fifth year with my current employer, I received, for the first time, a letter that indicated that I have been moved to the next role. And to make things clearer, the movement is to the next higher role and not in the other direction.

While the reader may think that this is something great and worthy of some kind of celebration, truth be told, this is the first time in my career that upon receiving such a communication, I had a level of composure that even a Zen practitioner would have envied, if a Zen practitioner could indeed envy.

In theory, I could have gotten this change in 2007, but at the time of consideration of role change, it was just my first year in the organization. When the time came in 2008, I felt that I wasn’t given the change as a penalty for everything that transpired in the middle of 2007 – I have chronicled the sufferings in these posts between June and October of 2007. And in 2009, I was deemed to have improved drastically, but since I hadn’t passed a set of internal certifications, I wasn’t eligible to get this change.

But this time around, I was eligible on all parameters and more importantly, was still deemed to be good enough to get the change. And with the support of my current bosses, I did get it this time.

In my opinion, I work the same way that I worked 3 years back. The real big difference from then on has been the internal customers for my project, who have been a thoroughly professional lot and have been extremely co-operative. There have been instances where I have slipped up, but instead of focusing their energy in just blaming me, they have gone around and helped me get back on track. That was not the case 3 years ago, when a similar group was only intent on associating the project’s risk squarely on me.

And I have also been very fortunate to get a pretty cooperative team and more importantly, I had a couple of outstanding folks working at my client’s office. Were it not for these guys, I don't think I would have progressed this time either.

So what have I become now? To quote a comment I made in Facebook, I have now become a Senior Vetti Officer from being a regular Vetti Officer. And Vetti Officer = Project Manager.

Based on the current organizational structure in my company, I won’t be eligible to be promoted for another 3 years at the minimum. This structure was revamped late last year and hence, quite a few people who were in higher levels are now at the same level that I am in. So, I will have a pretty tough competition 3 years later, when the already senior crowd would obviously be more favored to move on. Let’s wait and see what happens in the future!

A skill that most people tend to ignore

A couple of months back, there was a recruitment drive in my company and I was on the interview panel, along with some 20 others.

I must have interviewed at least 10 to 12 candidates that day and I think I selected some 6 or 7 for further discussions with HR.

Just last week, I saw one of the guys I'd selected, in the same floor where I am seated. I didn't recognize him at first, though I felt that his face was quite familiar. He too looked keenly at me and his body language displayed some amount of discomfiture. I somehow recollected that I had interviewed him and so checked with him about it. He confirmed my statement, I wished him luck and went my way.

This morning, a lady (calling her a lady since she's married) walked into my cubicle and again, it was familiar face. I remembered that she too was one of the candidates I had interviewed. She said she joined last week and after seeing me on the floor, wanted to inform me about joining here. The best part, was that she said she even saw me at the Ampa SkyWalk mall (must have been on the day I watched Paiyya).

When someone you select in an interview joins the company, it does give you a great sense of satisfaction. But, between these two folks, I am obviously happier with what this lady did. She remembered who interviewed her, remembered their name and more importantly, when she saw that guy on the same floor, had the decency to walk up to that person's cubicle and inform that she had joined the company.

The other guy, either didn't remember me or didn't know if he had to meet me after joining or felt that wherever he was it was because he deserved it or somehow felt that there was no need for any such kind of socialising in an office. These are not things that one is taught anywhere and at some level, these are the small things that probably differentiate, or rather elevate, professionals who would otherwise be equals in technology, process, reasoning skills etc. I hope he learns that tip and uses it effectively in his career here.

The luncheon equilibrium

My lunch group at work consists of many of my peers and a couple of seniors. The group has been steadily growing in numbers in the last 4 years and as a result, there are at least 8 of us at the table on an average day.

Though there may be seniors, till recently, not many of us had any direct reporting to anyone else (barring 1 or 2 here and there) and so, there was no underlying tension. However, in the past few months, there has been a significant change in the equation at the table.

What happened you wonder? Due to the sudden spike in the demand for people in one of the accounts, a lot of my friends have all been moved to fill in the gap. As a result, almost 80% of my lunch group now belongs to a single account. Moreover, they all now have a direct reporting into a couple of the seniors in the group as well. I am thankfully not part of that crowd and am still one of independent members in the group.

Previously, the conversations used to be around anything under the sun. We of course did have some shop talk and that would be inevitable in a group formed in the shop! But what I liked a lot was that since all of us very pretty much disconnected from each other in terms of the project we were working on, the managers we worked for etc., even when one person talked about the mundane irritants at work, there was always another person who could talk on the same topic, but with a slightly different flavour.

We got our chances to voice things about the processes or our managers without much restraint. And like I said before, even when we didn't have to talk about work, we always had so many other topics to discuss. In many ways, this was a good opportunity to de-stress yourself.

Not any more. These days, the conversation is invariably just around the account that most of my group currently works for. The issues they are facing. The support that they are not getting from others. How important they are. How big they are. How envious others are of them. What is the level of influence they have in the "system".

As ever, I try my best to steer the conversation to general topics. And I can clearly see that somehow everyone wants to return back to discussions surrounding the account. What used to friendly banter earlier, is fast turning into accusations and counter-justifications.

So, what has changed in this group? These are the same individuals, but with a closer peer equation and a clear line of reporting. Clearly, the friendship on display at the table, was clearly just that - a display. A display that always had an underlying current and the movement into a single umbrella has regulated this current to throw some light!

These days, I am almost keen on not joining them for lunch. Or for a caffeine break. Thankfully, I am spending a lot more time in the other office these days and that is certainly helping me a lot. I dunno how many days that can happen, because my visits to the other office has already started raising many an eyebrow.

Looks like it is time I find a different group for lunch and caffeine. And only time can tell me if it is going to be in this same company!

We are coming back... baby....

It’s been quite a long time since I blogged about interviews. The reason is simple. My company had put a freeze on hiring for the past 15 months or so.

Now that the economy has supposedly improved, the freeze has been thawed (sic) and the formal recruitment process has started off. I salivated at the prospect of being on the panel for the simple reason that they give some fodder for my blog.

I didn’t get to interview many people and had to be satisfied with just 3. And out of these 3, only 2 interviews were even worthy enough to be blogged. And even they made the cut only because
(a) I haven’t blogged much about interviews recently due to the reasons mentioned earlier
(b) I haven’t blogged much about anything in the recent past

The first candidate was no good for this blog. But the second guy was. I will however start with the last guy. The last candidate I interviewed was unfortunately slotted around lunch time. And as it happens in all such interviews, there was a delay in starting the discussion on time and we actually started only around 12:30 PM. It was a fairly reasonable interview, with the guy meeting most of our expectations. Towards the end, I asked him the usual “Do you have any questions for us?” question. Usually people respond with some real simple question like “Do you have automation projects?” or “Do you have banking domain projects?” or a very terse “Nothing right now”. But this guy went one step ahead with the last option. He said “Nothing, I am hungry” with a big grin!

Now, to the second guy. He has around 4-5 years of experience out of which, 2 years have been in the realm of product testing in the mobile telephony arena. I asked him to talk about that project. He told me that he was primarily involved in testing the security feature in few high-end phones, whereby one can login to an application over the web and issue commands to lock the handset. So I asked him to tell me potential error points that can happen in this end-to-end workflow. The guy responded with issues that were related to application settings on the handset alone!

Then, I asked him to tell me how this communication from the web server to the mobile phone happens. His response – “Through WAP”. I then asked him to tell me how a web server that is connected to a hard-wired network (I even pointed to a computer in the interview room) communicates to the mobile phone. All I wanted to hear from him was about transmissions and receptions from servers to satellites or mobile towers, but he seemed to be on a different wavelength.

He said – “That’s through WAP technology” with a tone soaked in pride. He went on to say that it was only through “WAP technology” that SMS from one phone reached the other. Not wanting to hear anymore such gyaan, I went to another area altogether.

He said that he’d reviewed test cases written by his team. I asked him how he did that. First he gave me some of the standard answers like he’d check the layout, do a spell check etc. and would then look to see if all requirements have been covered. I asked him how he managed to review the work of some 5-6 of his team members from offshore while he was at onsite. His answer was that he had 2 reliable people in his team at offshore who would ensure all of that and he would simply collate the artifacts and submit to customer!

Slightly exasperated, I asked him as to what he’d do if he joins my company and his “reliable” team members don't. His response was that he’d first go through requirements and then check the test cases to see if they are all fine. And he then said that after a month or two, he’d identify a reliable person who would do all this for him! My friends felt that he was being too truthful and I don't disagree. But an interview is basically a forum where one’s ability to lie and ability to articulate theoretical concepts such that they sound practical, are the only things that help in selecting a candidate. So on that count (and also because he didn’t clear questions asked by another panelist on the technical front), I had no choice but to reject him.

Eagerly waiting for the next lot!

An outing with my teams

With the economic crisis supposedly changing directions, my company has resumed the provisioning of our quarterly project party budgets. I decided to utilise the same before they change their mind and so, yesterday, my teams had our project party.

This was in fact the first party for quite a few of my team members and also the first one for all us in this account.

We pooled in sponsors for the event in the form of funding from our team members at onsite, one person who was leaving and also treats from select few who had their birthdays in the recent past.

We first went Karting at a center along the ECR. After a really good time on the track (I drove twice, with the second round witnessing me bump out two karts who didn't allow me to pass), we went to a resort near the Mahabalipuram Shore Temple.

We had a good lunch, but must admit that we've had better ones. The dessert in the form of Gulab Jamun and Strawberry Ice Cream, was however, quite good. I must have had 3 helpings I think.

After lunch, we spent the afternoon playing the usual silly party games and when the patience of the crowd was reaching testing levels, we headed outdoors. The guys started playing cricket as usual and also as usual, the girls moved a little far away to play Antakshari! If this is not a fundamental genetic difference, I don't know what else is.

We rounded off the day with bajjis and tea and left the venue by 6 PM.

The effect of spending 10 minutes on the ridiculous contraption called the Kart and the one hour I spent playing cricket in the hot sun, has left me a little exhausted. Also, feeling a little pain in some regions of the body that I cant see! Hopefully, a good sleep should help me "recover"!

A brief history of the events in my life in the last 3-4 weeks

* Picked up a neck sprain in the first week of October. Self-medication with pain relieving gels and ointments didn't work. An Ortho' prescribed tablets, but to no avail. Registered 5 days of leave in October alone. Second opinion took me to a scan centre for an MRI. After the wallet became thinner by Rs.5,500 an obvious fact was documented - I am fat! Doing some basic stretch exercise which have definitely alleviated the pain. I am better.
Root cause - posture while operating the computer and while traveling.

* MRI scan is a 15 minute torture on the ears. The noise that the machine makes is very loud and quite irritating. And while I was inside the chute, I somehow felt nervous.

* Have been going more often to the office closer home to avoid the long distance commute.

* Had a rather quiet birthday. Some friends and team-members did organise a cake-cutting event in the evening and I had a tough time convincing them to stick to my principles of not wasting cake by smearing it on the face.

* Celebrated a very quiet Deepavali, though the officials seemed to hold a different opinion. Either I became deaf or my town has been moved out of Chennai!

* Seeing many resignations in the company at all levels. 2 in my team have quite in Sep-Oct. I have a feeling that a couple of more are due.

* I cleared all the exams mandated at work for a promotion and have been given strong indications that there are no slots for my band of employees! If it is available, I am not eligible. If I am eligible, it is not available!

* Learnt that murungaikkai is used in an oorugaai.

* Attended an awesome spectacle called Annaabhishekham at the Ratnagirishwarar temple near home. Refer pictures here.





* The rainy season finally started in Chennai last week. Pretty heavy rain. Saturday was non-stop. Memories of last year, when we witnessed a similar incessant downpour, came up.

* Nothing else of any significance. Hope to resume blogging with earlier frequency at the earliest. Have been staying away just to avoid spending long hours in front of the computer.

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy

I don't know about Jack, but as someone who shares the first two letters of Jack's first name, I think all work and no play is making me dull. And sick too.

I see a clear increase in the quantum of work that has started coming my way, in the office. This is especially because my boss was out sick for the last two weeks and was out on personal reasons a couple of weeks earlier.

I have been working slightly extended hours anyways and the peak really started from the 18th. On the weekdays between the 18th and 24th, I have clocked around 12 hours on an average. I have also had two night-outs - Friday and Monday - till dawn of the next morning.

All this has taken a toll on my health. I haven't gone to office from Tuesday to the rest of the week. At first, it was the RSI related pain in my right wrist. I took a day off to rest the hand. But I have been carrying a cold for quite some time and that too flared up.

At the outset, it does look like I am taking 4 days of leave just because I "worked" for a week. But I think the last week was probably just the proverbial last straw that broke the camel's back.

I clearly have to work better or smarter and more importantly, take better care of my health. Hiding away from exercise under the excuse of mental exhaustion does get many a nod of approval, but I have to stop using that excuse. It is really time for me to wake up!

Bowling in the office

A Bowling Alley has been opened in my office. It was opened a few months back, then was closed for a short while for some maintenance work and has been back in full swing for the past 2 months. The cost is very much in the affordable region since we have to pay only Rs.45 per person.

Couple of us at work have taken to bowling. We have decided to make it a weekly ritual and have so far been doing it for the last 4-5 weeks.

My form has been in the 100+ points range, though I scored one of my career highs of 133 last evening. Hopefully with more regular practice, I should touch the 150 mark soon.

How did you handle this situation?

There is a person in my team, who is currently on the last leg of a special performance assessment. The special performance assessment was necessitated because the annual performance evaluation cycle, found him to be in the bottom of the pile.

He is, unfortunately, not a good performer and has trouble completing some of his basic tasks. His previous managers have experienced some issues in his attitude as well – he apparently feels that he should not be working with “ordinary” science graduates when he has a PG degree.

The main issue I face with him is his attitude of a different kind – lethargy. Here is someone who has been informed that his performance is not of a satisfactory level; that he needs to improve drastically; that he is being put on a separate path where his work would be evaluated more closely.

Yet, his approach hasn’t really changed. He is still working the same way as before. In normal circumstance, I had an easy way out – simply release the guy from my team and hope that some other manager, who is in a dire need of heads more than skills, would take this individual. At least that’s how this guy ended up in my team in the first place.

But now, I do not have that luxury. If I have to fill out his assessment report now, I may not have very kind things to say. I would have to admit the lethargy that he brings to work. I would have to note down the fact that he is still approaching work in a reactive mode and not in a pro-active mode. I would have to mention that his quality of work still needs to improve. All this is only going to make the senior management decide to let this guy go. And by letting this guy go, I mean out of the company.

Here comes my dilemma. If I fill in an objective report, he is going to be asked to leave. The only way I can avoid this is by saying that he is good. But when he gets back to the annual evaluation exercise, the truth would come out. And at that point in time, my assessment is going to be questioned and probably, I might even be asked to leave.

So the obvious thing for me to do is to do the former – file an objective report. But it is the aftermath that worries me. I can’t really recollect providing feedback that has lead to the severance of the relationship between an employee and his/her employer. And in this case, the employee is actually an old guy who is at least some 3-4 years behind schedule on his career track and I believe this also has impacted his personal life. And how is someone going to fare in this current market situation when there barely any new job vacancies in the Software sector?

You can give me all the clichéd advices – that I should steel myself; that I should eliminate the “personal” angle; that I should remember that I am only doing my job; that I should remember that my job is itself at stake if I don't do this; that this is a perform or perish time; that this guy was given a chance but he didn’t take it up etc. etc..

But I want to know if you have actually been in that situation ever in your life? Did you face a similar predicament? If so, how did you handle the events after the decision was made? Or were you one of those gifted people who see everything as black and white and hence able to arrive at clear and bold decisions? Or have you been on the other side of the coin and if so, how did you handle things?