Man Ni Tarango (The Waves of Mind)

The stage is set. The heroes are ready to go at each other as the judges and the wide range of public voting through SMS/phone lines will decide the fate of the Lead India movement by Times of India. R K Mishra from Bangalore and Devang Nanavati from Gujarat [not only Ahmedabad mind you?] are left. Who wins will be decided within a few days but the question that I always feel needs to be discussed is whether this contest will give us an ethical leader. There are thousands of theories on leadership and yet it is one of the most widely researched topics by Social Scientists, Behaviour Analysts, Psychologists and so on. But, we can really assume safely that one of the most critical attributes of a successful leader is the ethical behaviour and the TRUST he has from his followers. Now, any one, whether R K Mishra or Devang Nanavati, whoever emerges the winner of this contest will have to prove this too. The reason for this is clear-whoever emerges as the winner of the Lead India movement-...

1. Introduction: Management education has come a long way in India since its introduction in 60, with the starting of IIM-A. Today, around 1400+ B-Schools exist in India. They may be university departments, self-financed affiliated colleges, private colleges which are not government/AICTE approved and so on. Even foreign universities have been opening their campuses at metros like Bangalore. Any educational institute, may of any given discipline, cannot exist without good faculty members. Although, good infrastructure, good PR, good management etc. play a very important role, if the institute does not have good faculty members, then it cannot generate sustainable growth and in some cases, it may not even survive. Now a days, we find many well designed B-Schools, with very good building, library, computer labs and all the other abilities. But, when you check the availability of the faculty, not all of them have competent ones. What is the reason for this? Why do the premier institutes l...

Mobile Viruses- Have They Arrived? ***Background*** The era of Mobile Banking and SMS marketing has arrived. At this juncture, when computers and mobile are becoming synonyms, let us try to have a "vision" into the future and have a look at how the start of mobile virus can spread! ***Introduction*** Today, the world is on our fingertips. We have Internet, which is regarded as YOUR WINDOW TO THE WORLD. We have Computers….something; I need not elaborate much about! But, as Isaac Asimov says, "In human affairs we have reached a point where the problems that we must solve are no longer solvable without the aid of the computers. I fear not computers but the lack of them." Now the time has come when, the Internet technology, the mobile/cell phones and the computers are not going to be regarded as SEPARATE entities anymore! MOBILE VIRUSES ARE COMING HOW AND WHY THEY ARE HERE? Recently, I received some 100 continuous messages from an unknown number. Whenever I opened the s...

Now a days, I've been experimenting with my teaching, and under that, I've introduced a new subject at my University named ETHICS AND VALUES IN MANAGEMENT. Though this is a typical area of Management, I felt that it touches all of us somewhere in our lives. If we put aside all the theoretical views of Ethics, the simplest definition that emerges of it would be, "Something that is RIGHT for the MAXIMUM number of people". Recently in my professional life, I've seen a lot of mal-practices or say, unethical practices. I was pretty upset by them. I saw many people reaching the heights just with some unethical practices while I had to take a long rout to reach the same height. At this point of time, I know of people who did not deserve the success, yet they MANAGED it. It really made me mad at times. I also saw people playing with others [using others/manipulate others-ah whatever!], for their personal achievement. I also saw people not delivering their promise[sss]. I ...

A BOOK REVIEW BY ME PUBLISHED IN THE MANAGEMENT JOURNAL "MANAGEMENT EDGE" BY INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT AND RESEARCH, NEW DELHI. Title of the Book: Idli, Orchid and Will Power *Price: Rs. 150/- About the Author: Vithal Ventnkatesh Kamat is the owner of the hotel – The Orchid, the world’s highest environmental award winning ecotel [environment friendly hotel]. *Background: The book is an autobiography of an entrepreneur who has seen almost everything in his life that a person could possibly go through. It is a must read for anyone who wants to become an entrepreneur. It has all the lessons of management from HRM, Marketing and Entrepreneurship perspective. Most eye-catching feature of this book is the collection of anecdotes that the author shares in almost every chapter. Divided in almost 34 chapters, this book can also serve as a counseling guide for those who are struggling with their businesses. The only lacking part is the language, which is not lucid enough at times, but lo...

Life is something more than an imagination or a dream. Whenever there arises a feeling, that now all the problems are solved, it asks new questions in one or another way. Life is all about changing faces, changing relationships, changing variables and changing results. Nothing is stable. Sometimes, there is unrest everywhere, sometimes, it eternal peace. Basically we are so disturbed somewhere in our heart that just forget it! It is not enough to get something. We want everything-better than others, faster than others and more special than others. It sounds OK that we want heaven for ourselves, but we also want hell for others! Marketing rules the life. None is ready to purchase pure gold, but everyone is after metal. The mentality of “LET GO” has died and dried up completely. And the person, who does it, is considered to be a fool, or he is ignored and sometimes such a fool is punished too! One is not bothered that for one’s own happiness, one may be giving pain to ten others. There a...

Ego Management-A practical tool to handle the ego conflicts in the organization Pathik Variya & Janki Desai, Lecturers, Center for Management Studies, Dharmsinh Desai University, Nadiad [A] Introduction "Ego", a word, which we all are aware of, and a word, which has lots of importance in what, we ultimately are. We have to a tool to handle ego and we want to give it a name ...how about Ego Management? Looks good...Let's call it EM in short for practical purpose. Ego creates a lot of hurdles in our day to day professional as well as personal life. It reaches everywhere before we reach! A lot has been written about and a lot has been said, discussed, debated upon it too. It is not at all a new area to discuss further. But, I think, if we become conscious, we can definitely avoid its negative pitfalls. [B] Definition "EM is all about handling your ego and others' ego. If you can handle an ego-conflict such a way that the outcome is WIN-WIN, you have mastered the...