Lessons From Golf

 Sport teaches you many things. Football and Cricket thrive on teamwork. Basketball on shooting ability to score. Defence too, in some of the team games. What about Golf? It can teach you a few things.

1. Planning a shot. You have choices, starting with what Club to use. Where you want to reach.

2. Concentration. While hitting the shot, all energy is focused on the ball and the swing of the club, or the Putt, on the green. 

3. Visualising. On a green, particularly, it's tricky because of slopes-up or down, the behaviour of the ball, because the green can be fast or slow depending on the moisture, grass length and so on. 

4. Execution. For all the planning, and the right grip, stance etc., how you play the shot matters the most. 

5. Consistency matters more than genius in one or two shots. It's a long haul. 

6. Practice on a given course matters, in addition to generic practice. Understanding the course you are playing on is important. 

Translate these into life learnings, or work.

What Fruits and Vegetables Teach Us

 Maybe we can learn from 

- a Pumpkin how to be well-rounded.

- a Brinjal (eggplant), that Purple can drive away the blues

- a Custard Apple (Seetaphal), that you can be sweet in spite of having Pock marks

- a Bitter Gourd on how to survive and thrive by combining with an onion to drive away your bitterness

- an Orange on how to be sweet and tangy at the same time, just like Life.

Maybe you can add a few more.. 

On the Importance of Golf

 In school, we read essays about the Importance of something or the other. Oscar Wilde wrote The Importance of Being Earnest. So I thought I should write about the importance of Golf.

It is important to play a sport, if you want to get health benefits. Golf is also one you could try, especially if you think you have the potential to be a CEO.. no, just kidding. You can always be the CEO of your own brand! It helps if you play Golf, in either case!'

Like MBA jargon, Golf jargon is also impressive. Birdies and Bogies, Hole-in-one, Sand bunkers, Putters and Drivers, and Caddies and Golf Carts make up the world of Golf, among other things. A tee shot is not after consuming tea, but after placing the ball on a tee- a privilege you have for the first shot on each hole. A Hole-in-one, of course, is like a Lifetime Achievement Award in any other field. It may happen, or it may not.

What Golf teaches you, cannot be measured with ordinary metrics. You have to experience the game to learn what it has to teach you.

Latch on to a friend who is a member, is my advice. Getting a membership is a dream in most cases, but the point is, you don't need one to start playing. Pay as you play, as a guest who accompanies a member. 

Learnings Over 40 Years

 The first step after my MBA in 1984 was into advertising, and then into Marketing Research. Followed by a trip to the U.S. that lasted 5 years, including a Ph.D. and a lot of teaching experience. And driving too, on beautiful 4 lane roads and 2 lane country roads. A couple of pics, from Niagara Falls and Bryce Canyon, below-

Then, my academic journey started in India with XIMB, followed by VJIM, KIAMS Harihar, IIM Lucknow, IIM Kozhikode, PES Bangalore, IFIM, IMT Nagpur and Ghaziabad, IIM Indore, NMIMS Bangalore and now, Prestige University Indore.

My learnings are not easy to summarise, but let me try-

1. Learning never ends, whether you are a student or a teacher. Unless you close your mind.
2. People are generally nice, except for a toxic minority. If unchecked, the toxic ones spoil the environment for others. 
3. Productivity is hard to measure, and so is success. Sales figures can also deceive, because quality of customers matters.
4. Advertising is losing its credibility, but over a long period, brands can achieve credibility through good performance as per customer expectations.
5. Hard work does help, in various phases of a long career.
6. Conceptual skills and problem-formulation skills separate a leader from others.
7. People skills too, sometimes. 
8. Most employees are confused by contradictions in the workplace. Advice? If you have control over things, be consistent.
9. How to succeed? Have multiple goals, and achieve as many as you can. If you cannot achieve some, it may not matter. Refer to No. 3 above.
10. Chill, have a hobby, travel, meet friends. This always works, no matter your situation.

My Comments on the Headline News

There have been, in the past three days, around three or four stories doing the rounds of the news channels on Indian TV. Uncannily, all channels have the same stories. Makes you wonder, in a country of about 1.2 billion, if that is all that is happening. As I speak, a new story, on onion prices, has started doing the rounds. Instead of investigating who is planting the stories (not onions), I will concentrate on the learnings from these news stories.

1. PM goes to Bhutan. This is a masterpiece, because firstly, it improves everyone's general knowlegde. Not many people in the world know where Bhutan is. Heck, many in South Carolina (US) did not know where Florida is. You can imagine what educating India must feel like. TV journos too-educating them, I mean.

2. Preity Zinta, actress, filed a case for harassment and verbal abuse against ex-boyfriend and current business partner, businessman Ness Wadia. Moral of the story seems to be- if you are pretty, don't mess with Ness. Or is it Ness, you don't mess with pretty women? We'll find out.

3. There are murders and rapes happening at the rate of two per day in U.P. Having tried to set up records in many different things, the state has at last established a clear lead in these unsavoury stats - a sad 'state' of affairs. Badayun, made famous by the lyricist Shakeel Badayuni, is at the rough end of the stick.

4. The Kedarnath tragedy (landslide in the mountains) is still producing random bodies, among charges of inadequate rescue and search operations. Moral- venture out there when all your worldly affairs have been settled, because you never know if you'll make it back.

Learnings From Current Events

I don't know if you can make such a leap, but this is an attempt to cull out learnings from events that were in the headlines in the last few weeks.

The Tarun Tejpal Saga

If you 'sting' others, you better be prepared for a sting too.

For female employees, it is that you have to be careful of situations that may lead you to be in close proximity to the (male) boss by yourself. Harassment is a fact of life in many workplaces. You must know how to protect yourself. And of course, if it happens, have the courage to call a spade a spade. Of course, that is easier said than done.

For male employers- a female employee is a human being, not your property. She cannot be mistreated just because of her gender. Neanderthal males need to wake up.
There are also occasional false allegations of harassment, for whatever reason. So you also need to be careful not to put yourself in potentially dangerous situations. Have witnesses, mails, evidence for any such above-board encounters with a female employee. Keep the door open when talking to them in office, if you suspect any foul play might happen.

The Aarushi Murder Case

Do not have male live-in servants if you have a teenage daughter. Prevention is better than a cure for what may be a natural attraction.
Also, get a heart to forgive trespasses of a daughter (or a son). They are still growing up. You, the parent, are supposed to be wiser. Compassion is a necessary quality in a parent. Life is not a race, nor is it trying to live up to the neighbours' view of what is right.

The Asaram Bapu Saga

There are few good (god) men around. Be careful, very, very careful in choosing one, if at all. Rely on the dead ones. They can do no mischief, at least.

Learnings

Learnings from Photography- It's the angle that matters. How you see life, or want to see it, depends on which angle you choose. Pessimism versus optimism, joy versus despair, etc. etc. You can also throw light on the 'objects' of your interest, focus, and forget the rest.

Learnings from teaching- You cannot teach a person that does not want to learn. If you create love for learning, you don't have to teach. And, you can't stop someone from learning, if he wants to.

Learnings from Jobs- Your happiness depends on what you do, not what others get/make. You can always do better.

Learnings from Movies: Indian-good used to triumph over evil. Now we don't know which is which.
Hollywood- We are intruders in a world of aliens, vampires, and comic book characters.

Learnings from kids- Be happy, nothing matters in the end.