Subhajit

Alarm. Wake up. Brush your sorrows. Shave off your sleep. Prepare yourself for the commute. Run, scamper and reach on time. So you reached on time, that is like half the brownie points scored. Is it similar to half the battle won? Hell no. Absolutely not. The battle only begins after after you feel like clearing a big milestone, punching in on time that is. Then begins the real stuff. Some folks literally live for it, they just love the drama that unfolds, by them or because of them. Because that is all that they have, that is all that they know. The social and family life is non-existent for them, for there is no room for antics there. No friend of yours would like to see your artificial self after office hours. No one has time or patience for that. We meet people who can be honest with after a day of putting a mask on. Okay, let us move on from the morning punch, you know how it sounds. It actually is a punch on all our faces. We now enter our desks, that is our little go-...

What has happened to us? Especially, in last few years where technology has barged into our lives and has made a permanent place. We have messed up few of our habits, from not speaking to someone and staying glued to our mobile handsets to writing a language which this particular planet, which we call Earth, has never invented. Sample the below conversation. “R u k?” “Ys, m k” “Nyc... Hw is evr1 @ home” “Kul…... It is bn long we met” “Ryt ya, lets meet ya” “Bt u stay buzy alwys, no tyme fr frndzzzzzz” “U r also buzy-types. Neva free…….” “Anywys, lets catch ths weeknd.” “BTW, wen u cum, get ma buk” “K bye. Gn” “C ya. Gnsdtc” Before we even start talking about what we just witnessed above, what will be more surprising is that most of us read it almost everyday and have become normal with it, while many of us picked it up as well. Because we feel that till the time we can read and understand something, what is the need to be correct (not even perfect) a...

3 rd March, 2014 So here I start today, noting down my countdown. It was like a voyage on a spaceship. You get pretty nervous while getting aboard, then you reach a land you have never been. And when you get back, you know you may never be able to get back there ever. I plan to write more as days will progress, but I will write that one defining feeling which will always summarize my stay in this city: When I was preparing to come to this city, I was not so happy and it became unbearable when I had to. And the first few months were so very difficult. I thought I can never survive. But little did I realize that a day will come when I will feel equally bad (or may be more than that) when I leave this city to go to my birthplace. That’s how insane & addictive this city can be. 21 st March, 2014 I have not been able to write down anything since 2 weeks or so on my thoughts. But there has not been a single day without thinking about it. Each day brings in millions of thought...

I  always thought that we all have got name attached to us for an unique identity. Well, I do understand that it also has got the love & affection (and what not!) of the parents. The exercise that has gone into it. The amount of time spent on finding & thinking about it. Then the process of shortlisting, final rounds of filtering and then zeroing in on ‘the’ one. We are so very meticulous in handling this particular exercise. B ut then starts the real humour, the moment we start calling a new born by the given (read ‘assigned’) name, people start moulding it their convenience. For example, a certain Rajeev becomes ‘Raj’ or ‘Raju’ or may be just ‘Ra’. By the time the same person becomes a complete grown up, he does not even care about the relevance of his name, forget about the effort (however nonsensical it is). And then it all boils down to the same old thing:  What’s there in a name! B ut all over the world, especially in our parts of it, we do not find the ...

It's been a grueling past few months with almost every possible thing happening in the workplace. Have always tried balancing both the personal & professional life, but last 3/4 months has made me almost a machine. It has programmed me to the needs of various departments, people & the organization as a whole. It's not that I am not liking it, though it's too damn hectic, but what I realize is I have started missing few things that was/is on my priority list. Won't blame anyone apart from me, for not being able to balance it out. Had taken few but effective initiatives in the ever going to attempt of 'Change Management'. It is a constant process and will take long. Aligning mindsets, overcoming the resistance to change & accepting differences are my core areas to work for these days. With my little and negligible experience in the corporate world compared to other Gurus, but loaded heavily with my experience of understanding and analyzing people, I...

     A lmost after 2 quiet and lonely days, today's Sunday. Sundays becomes nostalgic if you are not inside a bloody mall and shopping. Being bachelor has all these pros and cons attached to it. But it's a tag that I still like next to my name, atleast till the time I can push the inevitable ;) Over last few years in the corporates, I realized few things which always were my mental blocks. Became less emotional for the employees, started understanding situations from different perspectives, taking everyone around you into confidence and being simple in whatever I want to execute or implement. I always knew that everything that the B-school taught me can not be practiced in the real world but still tried my own things by covering some of those theories with my ideas. Few of them clicked, some did not and some got discarded instantly by bosses. So, with every passing month or year, I am experiencing new dimensions of looking and doing the same thing...

Day-1… The process starts. We knew it for a week now. Employees came to know about it today. It’s tough, real tough for them. Handling them is tougher even. HR at the job. Did something like this last year, but this year it is too damn hard. It involves all of us.Our COO broke the news to all the employees today. He himself is associated with this firm since inception, in fact he gave the name it has today to this company. Day is ending and just broke the news to the night shift employees as well. 16 th June, 8:53 PM. 27 Pints of beer & 4 pegs of scotch was necessary to sleep tonight… 2:12 AM Day-2… Today is official day-2. HR team knew this a week back including me. Tried all possible options but nothing worked out. Problem is the top management sitting in US does not understand/look at the vision we all have/had. For them, it’s all about numbers, as businessmen it is correct though. We all worked with one thing, sheer passion. Now we are thinking the worth of it! Posit...

10 hours at workplace plus 1 hour for travelling. Add one more for getting prepared and settling down. Half of an IPL match and few mandatory calls. One bad lunch and one not-so-bad dinner. Then few tweets. Off to bed. This has precisely become my daily routine these days. No more time for social networking or blogging. Pizza & burger doses has lessened to almost zero. Am I cribbing? No, not at all. Cribbing is what employees do. I am a part of management, I represent management. That’s what corporates say about HRs. I have devised too many new things to be implemented in my company, few already are and few are in pipeline. Employee engagement is at an all-time high. End result??? Employees thinking all we are wasting their precious time, which they could use in catching an earlier bus back home. Am I again cribbing? Nah… It’s easy for any employee to crib just about anything and HR has to term it as a “grievance”. I spend 1 hour every evening on that, corporates call it EGR…employ...

Sometimes I think why I did MBA! I actually pondered over this thought many times post my MBA. Last 18 months in corporate life has been full of ups and downs. If I only analyze it with up and downs, it’s all right. Then I ask myself how many days I woke up in the morning and really felt like going to office, with a mind full of new ideas and plans? How many days have I thought of executing my thoughts into action in the office? How many days have I thought of going to office without thinking about my boss’s temper? How many evenings have I returned home with a smile of satisfaction on my face after work? You may ask the same questions to any professional working somewhere or the other and may add some more questions. The answer to more than 90% of them would come  “very few”.  But why? We are supposed to work at capabilities equivalent to the kind of study that we have done in our MBA days and a level where managerial expertise comes into play. But all we do is to just wake u...

Things are going well & fine. I mean sometimes it’s going so fast that I want to have a pause; sometimes it’s too slow. I have got reasons for both. Details some other time. IPL fever is on rise and the fever is getting on the nerve for sure. Who all were saying shifting the tourney to South Africa will lose its charm; had to eat their words. Man, it’s India and you don’t need to play only in Eden Gardens to make it a hit. Wake up guys, this is a different age altogether. Taking a look at the political scenario, it’s getting dirtier everyday and the level is also decreasing. Even Mr. Advani is looking clueless. No need to talk about others. I am getting mad hearing same kinda news everyday. Let Mr. Singh come to rein us again, even if he says “ Soniya ji se puchna padega” for everything. We all so-called intellects will talk about BJP but won’t vote, so let Congress take us forward to Gandhian age again! Oh, look at the democratic me! Sorry, politics is only on my other blog. This...

Oh Dear... I am posting after a month... Do not know what's keeping me busy off late; my job or my laziness...or both!!!  I always believed that HR is like a doctor. When a doctor saves somebody’s life, the patient terms him as a God. He becomes the biggest hero of that patient’s life. Just like when an HR offers a job to a needy guy. Neither the doctor nor the HR classifies what is the background of a patient or a candidate before they start their job. Neither they do any favors nor do they take the place of the God. They just do their job. When we see the other side of the coin, it makes the scenario real tough. When a patient dies, then apart from his/her family, the entire mass blames the doctor. As if he deliberately let the patient die. Just like an employee blaming HR and making him/her the biggest villain when they are sacked/laid off. This is just a part of their profile. But a normal person or an employee does not understand this. For them their life or job means everythi...

I. Me. My job. I love my job. I love my company. Am I making contradictory statements? Is loving your job and your company are two different things altogether! The reason for writing this is not because somebody famously quoted “ love your job, not your company; as you never know when your company will stop loving you”.   I thought to write because as a fellow professional, I just asked myself one simple thing: is it wrong to love your company or is it wrong to be loyal to your company? If the answer to this question is 'yes', then I gotta study for another 15 years to change my thinking and perspective. Especially in a competitive and a challenging market scenario where attrition rate is so high and head-hunting and poaching is the order of the day, being loyal to your organization is considered as not-so-trendy!!! What an irony! I have to answer infinite number of questions from 'N' number of people as to why I am still in my first organization for more than a ye...