Essay on Personal and Organizational Inertia

 Inertia is a concept well-known, thanks to Newton and his first Law. 

It is hard to wake up in the morning, we all know. We have to galvanise ourselves into waking up, and making that cup of tea. I have now mastered the art- of doing both. I usually wake up at 5 am, coz the Sun rises early in Kolkata, and I feel I have a duty to keep up with it.

Getting ourselves to do anything of significance- making up the bed, or writing a work email- sounds like a chore. Somewhat like washing dishes. So we generally delay, or to use a Tharoorian word, procrastinate. And this goes on, with various To Do lists in life.

We generally don't forget to marry, because of a constant push from parents, in accordance with Newton's First Law. But do you know that organizations also have inertia? Because humans make up most organizations- for now, until robots throw them out. 

They should be doing things like strategising, right-sizing, growing, implementing strategies, and many other things, to keep owners, or shareholders, happy. But they don't. They get caught up in an inertia vortex, and 'This is how we do things around here syndrome, and forget to do the few essential things for survival and growth. So some remain sleeping giants, like those mythical entities. And some slip into a coma, never to come out.

Those organizations that remain agile, beat them by a mile. Happened to K Mart in the US when Wal-Mart came along. Happened to Biyani (Future became Past?), when D Mart came along. And will happen to many others..

Traffic Jams- How to Utilise Them

The country's competitiveness and GDP can grow if we do the following (choose any two) during a traffic jam.

Invent a new product. Who says you have to be sitting on the "think tank" in order to think? You can use a traffic jam.

Think of 5 ways to kill your boss-he's the one hampering your productivity, right? (We didn't promise that it would be good for you-only for the country)

Throw apples at the passersby..the demand for apples will directly go up..you can also choose tomatoes, if they are selling at 100 bucks a kilo.

Honk until your battery goes dead..demand for car towing services will increase, and therefore,....

Order a takeaway pizza and desrcibe your location as the ---- jam..he'll understand, he'll deliver..you have managed to contribute your mite to mitigate the unemployment problem.

Write a resume/autobiography/poem/..circulate them to the other people in the jam.you may get lucky and find a publisher among them..or an employer..

Holi Matrimony

Some thoughts about Holi and matrimony.

Both are colourful, especially the clothes bought/coloured and the language used in marital fights (the martial arts).

Both are confusing. Which day is Holi, exactly, for instance? And who is to cook in the married household, for instance.

Holi gives you excuses for chhed-chhad. Or used to, before various laws were enacted to take better care of women. Now, one less excuse to be inebriated with ''manly" power, I guess.

Just when you thought all the Holi songs had been written, there comes another. I think Ranbir and Deepika starred in one recently. On marriage, there are only jokes. Bollywood (happy) songs are all pre-marriage. What is the significance of that?

Marriage is supposed to provide security. And it promotes GDP growth. How? Married couples need a house, a car, a fridge, a washing machine, a cooking gas, restaurants, work to pay all the bills,...

So all you need to do to increase GDP growth to Chinese levels and beyond...you guessed it. Promote holy matrimony.

Positivity

There was an air of resignation and frustration in the country (India) during the last three or four years. The rot started at the top. Actually, a downturn in the economy is not the end of the world. Every country has faced one, including The Great Depression of 1929 in much of the Western world. But what accompanied that downturn was a sort of 'waiting for doomsday' attitude among everyone, starting at the top-the PMs' office.

The Modi campaign caught on to this and projected their version of a rosy future (achche din aanewale hain), which got the young voters and old enthused. There was a spurt in voting percentage, and selfies abounded on the social media, showing that someone had voted. Somewhat like the "Yes, we can" campaign that Barack Obama ran.

Now that government formation has happened, all that goodwill must be utilised to do some serious building up of the physical and other infrastructure of the country. The positivity should remain, and be a part of the growth story, before cynicism gets hold of everyone (as it is prone to), and the gains of the campaign are frittered away. This is a great opportunity that the electorate has given- a clearer mandate has never come for good governance to unleash our potential.

Incidentally, Sumitra Mahajan, the Indore M.P. is the Speaker of the Lok sabha. Wishing her good luck and the government good sense!

Learning From Big Brother

We live and learn. So it is that we learn from the Big Brother. There's only one left after the Gorbachev ideas of Glasnost and Perestroika, in case you haven't noticed.

Like everyone else, Big Brother also suffers scams, budget deficits and trade deficits. But unlike everone else, BB has a solution. There are two major angles to this.

1. Count the number of countries in the world. Around 190 at a rough count.

2. Bomb one every 2 years. Reasons, like an audit of a forest strewn with a few skeletons, can be found if you look hard enough. Any reason with a word like genocide, weapons, and innocent civilians sounds convincing enough. Soldiers on a draft have no choice, in any case.

You are now Ok for 380 years. After that, Martians may take over anyways.

The spinoff benefits on the main and ancillary industries, can keep you going for two years at least. There could be some add-ons if you also get oil cheap from the enemy of the country you bomb, in case the bombing happens in the Gulf region. Got it? Keep it simple, stupid, is the policy.