Kansultant meets Gopichand

This afternoon at office...

Kansultant  meets India's Badminton icon, Gopichand

 

Kansultant Redux

CAT is done and dusted and now is the time to live up to the promise I made to myself…So here I go..

 

Today marks the 2^nd innings of Kansultant's musings.

I have so many things to write and I wonder where to start....

Okay lemme begin with the latest happenings in my life..This is the synopsis….Details will follow suit soon

1. CAT's done and dusted...I still believe I wont see the month of May'06 in this company….
2. Celebrated my parents' silver jubilee anniversary yesterday…It was one of the best days of my life…
3. Proposed to this cute li'l gal at office  
4. Got one of my "blog friends" a job at Deloitte. She is joining Deloitte in the last week of November
5. "Successfully" and "finally" wrapped up all the work in my looooooong project and am "bench" since a couple of weeks now…
6. Lost the bet with my brother. I was convinced that Sri Lanka would thrash India 6-1
7. Lost the bet with my cab mate. I was convinced that Amelie had won the Oscars in 2001.
8. Won the bet with another cab mate. He was convinced Ganguly would come back to the team
9. Finished reading couple of Sidney sheldons. About to complete Gandhiji's Autobiography – "My Experiments with Truth"…Must confess.... It's a DRAG..Next in line is "How to win friends and Influence people". In the last few days I got an opportunity to do an honest appraisal of my life and  I think this is what I require immediately.
10. Lost 10 Kgs..

Will post about each of these above happenings and many other things also in much more detail very soon…

P.S. : And for those interested, the gal I talked about in Pt No 3, asked me to "COOL IT"

Ganguly Vs Anniyan

This is specially for people who have seen "Anniyan" Tamil Movie. Enjoy

For benefit of those who are not familiar with a famous dialogue from Tamil film Anniyan, the following conversation is based on that.


Ambi: Mr Ganguly, why r u shouting at the umpire, after u have been declared out ??? athu sattapadi thapu

Ganguly: Dey kudumi, naa yaar theriyuma…. bengal tiger……. appidithan katthuven.

Ambi: Kenya, Bangaldesh kooda century adikirele australia, pakistan na bathroom poralae y?

Ganguly: Naan "dada" da , thevayana apo mattum thaan aaduven.

Ambi: Mr Ganguly, captains like Ponting, Inzy, Smith ellarum century adichu team jeyika vaikara ,aana neengo aadave maatiringale?

Ganguly: Dey kudumi, athan Sachin, Dravid, Sehwag ellarum century adikiraanungale, apuram naan yethuku adikanum

Ambi: Alatchiyama pesathingo Mr ganguly, aduthava talentla fame gain pandrathu thapu!!

Ganguly: Poda kudumi, yenake advice pandriya #%@^#$%^@$%^$%^$%^

 

Anniyan:  DEY ******(Bad words)

Ganguly: Yaarunga neenga gillespie maathiri hair style vachurikinga???

Anniyan : Naan avan ila da yema . Yenda run adika ve maatingara,

Ganguly: Batting form appo appo vanthutu pogum, cricketla ithellam sagajam thananga.....

Anniyan : Ippidi soli thapichidalaamnu paakiriya.....

Anniyan: 5 run edutha thapa?????????

Ganguly: Onnum thapu ilinga......

Anniyan: 5 matchla 5 run edutha thapa?????????

Ganguly: Thapu maari thanga theriyuthu..........

Anniyan: 5 varushama 5 5 matchla 5 run edutha thapa?????????/

Ganguly: Periya thapu thaanga...........

Anniyan: kamunati athathanda oruoru matchalayum nee panikitu iruka

Anniyan: Unakellam ballbojanam thanda. Nee than inime stump.  Akthar,sami,lee,mcgrath ellarum una vachuthan bowling practice panaporaanga!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Picture speaks a thousand words...

Yankee Ramayana !!

Couldnt Resist posting this :)

 

A young second generation Indian in the US was asked by his grandmother to explain the significance of "Diwali" to his younger brother, this is how he went about it...

".......So,like this dude had,like, a big cool kingdom and people liked him. But, like, his step-mom, or something, was kind of a bitch, and she forced her husband to, like, send this cool-dude, he was Ram, to some national forest or something... Since he was going, for like, something like more than 10 years or so.. he decided to get his wife and his bro along... you know...so that they could all chill out together.

But DUDE, the forest was reeeeal scary shit... really man...they had monkeys and devils and shit like that. But this dude, Ram, kicked ass with darts and bows and arrows... so it was fine. But then some bad gangsta boys, some jerk called Ravan, picks up his babe (Sita) and lures her away to his hood. And boy, was our man, and also his bro, Laxman, pissed... And you DON't piss this son-of-a-gun cuz, he just kicks ass and like...,all the gods were with him.. So anyways,you don't mess with gods. So, Ram, and his bro get an army of monkeys.. Dude, don't ask me how they trained the damn monkeys... just go along with me, ok... so, Ram, Lax and their monkeys whip this gangsta's ass in his own hood. Anyways, by this time, their time's up in the forest..and anyways...it gets kinda boring,you know... no TV or malls or shit like that.

So,they decided to hitch a ride back home... and when the people realize that our dude, his bro and the wife are back home... they thought, well, you know, at least they deserve something nice... and they didn't have any bars or clubs in those days...so they couldn't take them out for a drink,so they, like, decided to smoke and shit... and since they also had some lamps, they lit the lamps also... so it was pretty cooool...you know with all those fireworks.. Really, they even had some local band play along with the fireworks..and you know, what, dude, that was the very first, no kidding.., that was the very first music-synchronized fireworks..you know,like the 4th of July stuff, but just, more cooler and stuff, you know.

And,so dude, THAT was how, like, this festival started

 

His GrandMother fainted.

 

 

Its a New Season...........

After a long break from blogging, today starts the new season of kansultant's blogging.

Its a new season for many things i guess, its raining cats and dogs in Hyderabad this year. The MBA admission season has started and what more within a couple of days the Indian cricket season is gonna begin. Hurray !!

Currently listening to "Seasons in the sun" by Westlife

Next Time you waste your food, remember this

Egos at workplace

It's been almost 10 months working here and believe me, in this time, I have learnt more inter-personal skills than any classroom or training sessions could ever teach. I have dealt with the some of the most hardworking ,creative , cheerful and also as I found out last week, some of the most egoistic people you can ever find. More on that later though.

Last week, I had the first Performance appraisal of my career and was pleasantly surprised to get a very decent rating (For those of you who wonder what this is all about, appraisals are done in all companies once or twice a year. Based on the work you do, your boss lists out your strengths, weaknesses, areas of developments and rates you based on your contribution to the Project.)

While basking in the glory of my appraisal rating, I also got the shock of my life. My boss called me aside and told me that he had received some damning feedback against me. I was like what the F#$# could that be??

Guys and gals, hold your breath!! What's ahead may or may not much sense to you (at least it did not make to me!!).

It was then that he revealed that one of my fellow team members had complained against me about the way I work. According to the complainant, "I bully all others, do not listen to them, always try to dictate terms, never involves them in discussions, keep bossing around blah blah…………"

When I heard my boss telling me all this, words did not come in my mouth. Not that I was terrified or something. But just could not control my laughter. Coming back to senses quickly, I tried to understand who this complainant was!! Once his / her name was revealed, I understood the whole funda, and then explained the actual truth to my boss. I guess it was an eye-opener for him as well

I don't want to wash dirty linen in public, but getting angry at me just because I take the initiative to "get the job done" and in the process ask team members to stay on for 15 more minutes in office to complete the job, this behavior is crazyand childish. Anyways if someone has any problem with me, they should come and tell me and not my boss.

My Current mood: Oh my gawd! When will they ever learn!!

Hyderabad Defined :)

What else can one say. This sums it all :))

It's Official now !!

Yes, I am now a certified Tam- Brahm.

My upanayanam ceremony was held last week and I along with my bro became the latest members of this club. Dozens of relatives had come over and I had a whale of a time.

Will write more about the event from office. By the way, if anyone is interested is looking at those photos, here it is

Tada !!

Desi gyaan for videshis

Had less work today, so was just browsing through some company's internal sites, where I stumbled upon this.

The following are the advices given to the foreign employees before they come to India. Twas quite amusing to read them. Some of the gems are below :)

Behaviour at Office

•Supervisors generally prefer that workers come to them for assistance with tasks rather than completing tasks on their own. Indians are very team-oriented and will often work on tasks as a group, not individually, unless they are given explicit instructions.

•Indians may not acknowledge small favors and may not use words like “sorry,” “excuse me,” or “thank you.” This is not a sign of rudeness – quite the opposite … Indians simply may not be accustomed to the use of these polite phrases in the English language. It also indicates that they feel comfortable being “informal” with you, since Indians reserve such acknowledgements for formal situations and for people who are not friends or colleagues.

•Supervisors and workers generally do not socialize outside of the office unless they have known each other for a long time. There are very few project team parties.

•Office privacy, size and location are symbols of status.

•It is advisable to be punctual to appointments. Indian executives prefer late morning or early afternoon appointments.

• Business lunches are preferred to dinners

• Hospitality, such as tea and small talk is a part of conducting business.

•Offices are reserved for management. The person of highest authority or rank has the largest office. Employees generally work in open spaces. Cubicles are limited to a few.

•It is common for employees to decorate their work space with personal items (plants, photos, artwork, etc.).Indians tend to have less expectation than US natives for personal space in public situations where crowds or groups of people are present. On streets or transportation or in similar environments, some jostling or similar contact should be expected

Language Usage

•Never, ever shout to be understood. Speak humbly and remove hyperboles such as “great,” “fine” and “terrific.”

•Avoid word pictures unless they are literally what you mean (e.g., “run that by me again,” “walk me through this,” etc.).

•Do not use “Baseball English” (e.g., “ballpark figure,” touch base,” “pinch-hit,” “home run,” “off the wall,” etc.).

•Avoid negative/positive questions (e.g., “You aren’t coming are you?” might be answered “Yes (I am not coming),” where you might expect a “No.”).

Other 'gyaan'

•Public displays of affection are not acceptable within any of India’s ethnic groups. You should avoid hand holding, hugging, kissing, or any other physical contact other than a handshake while you are in public. However, you may notice a man with his hands around his male friend’s shoulder. This does not indicate sexual preference.

•Never touch an Indian (even Indian children) on the head. The head is considered the holiest part of the body

Vaccinations

The following are immunization recommendations when traveling to India:

• Hepatitis A – Recommended for all travelers

• Hepatitis B – Recommended for all travelers

• Japanese Encephalitis – May be recommended if spending more than 30 days in rural areas

• Rabies – Recommended for expatriates and long term visitors. This is also recommended if

quality medical care may not be available within 24 hours of being bitten or scratched by an animal.

• Typhoid – Recommended for expatriates and long-term visits. Recommended for most travelers.

• Yellow Fever – May be required if coming from an infected or endemic country.

• Polio – Recommended for all travelers

• Updates recommended for all travelers for Tetanus, diphtheria, measles and varicella (chickenpox).

Have you ever realized that we, Indians are actually immune to all these diseases now

States I have visited in India

Encounter with "firangees"

Working in MNCs like mine, one unique thing a person can experience is the sheer number of foreigners working along side you. I for one never knew that these many foreigners actually existed in Hyderabad, leave alone a single company I was initially overwhelmed, when I actually spoke to one of them for the first time. However, once you get over the initial jitters, you would realize that they are normal people just like you and me, and the “aura” around the firangees disappeares soon.

Yeah ,we enjoy the way they speak and try to imitate their accents within our peer group. The look of confusion and amazement in their eyes when they see an old person(Amitabh, actually) running around trees , Sharukh dancing in front of an American flag (Kal ho na Ho), Oye bubbly ads etc on the TV sets at the cafeteria makes one go ROFL

Most of them are actually a nice bunch of people. They always smile and wish you while traveling in the lift. If you are walking behind them and you approach a door, they actually open it for you and ask you to go through it first In fact, one of the ladies came to office yesterday wearing a sari

To top it all, this

Granma is Back !!

Grand mom had come home last week and she will would be staying here till june for a function at home (will write about this function later). With her arrival, the daily gyaan session has started again.

My typical day, now consists of knowing that how keerai (Spinach) is good for the eyes and why chewing gums are harmful for the body and why I should try to get a government job as soon as possible. Compared to her, mom now seems to be angel :-D

YSR Sucks !!

My office building also houses Google. They started their operations recently and had invited the AP CM Y.S.Rajasekhara Reddy to do the inauguration. Just a couple of days back he inaugurated the office for INFOTECH, another company in Hitec-City. About a couple of months ago, he had inaugurated Microsoft’s new building. Why I am writing all this is because this is the same man who used to make fun and criticize the then CM, Chandra Babu Naidu, when he was trying his best to ask all these companies to set up bases in Hyderabad.I don’t know with what face he goes to these inauguration ceremonies when he used to oppose the very reason of existence of IT companies in Hyderabad till a few years ago.

Heard a couple of days ago that YSR is going to renew Hyderabad’s bid to Formula-One races. I mean what sort of a person is he??. I remember a couple of years ago, when Formula One Boss Bernie EccleStone met ChandraBabu and almost finalized Hyderabad as the venue for F1 races. YSR raised huge outcry at that time. I remember watching the Live Proceedings of the State Assembly on TV one day when they were discussing the same topic.
The then CM ChandraBabu was reeling out statistics as to how Formula 1 would help the city and the state. To this barrage of stats, YSR replied and boy did he speak like a prospective CM?

I remember this very clearly and I translate this from telugu. “Arey CMji, You have removed the Prohibition Law as soon as you came to power, now liquor flows like river in this state. Now you want to get racing to this state. If anyone wants to watch racing they can surely satisfy themselves watching the Horse-Racing at the Malakpet Horse Course. So we do not require Formula One”. Bull Shit!!

Equating Formula 1 racing to Malakpet racing shows the intellectual vacuum of this person. Now he talks of renewing the F1 bid. Does he think Formula One people are fools and would be waiting for him.

Don’t know where this guy was, when god was distributing Common Sense!!

What's my work ?? Read on !!

Many people have asked as to what my work “actually” involves. So for the benefit for all those eager souls and also for the people who want to work in the IT industry or those who don’t want to work here but want to know more, read on.

Usually, if someone is working in an IT company, they would be working in one of the following fields.

1. Mainframes
2. Open Systems
3. Enterprise Applications <-- I am here

Mainframes: AFAIK, Mainframes are huge machines which can store and process large amounts of data very safely and quickly. These are machines built mainly by IBM and are a bit “antiquated” if I can call it so. But many institutions like banks use mainframes to get their daily jobs done. Once a person learns how to work with the machine (in other words, coding) this job becomes a dull routine. Training for this course costs a lot if one wants to learn outside and therefore people who have the requisite knowledge are paid decently.

Open Systems: Heard of Java, C++, .NET?? Well, all these things come under this category. These are highly specialized languages as in these things require a fair amount of logical thinking and practice to get the optimum level of comfort in work. Most companies in India which come for Campus Interviews, recruit students and train them in one of these technologies. The work here is more interesting and people have decent opportunity to go abroad after gaining some experience.

Enterprise Applications(EA): Home territory, baby :-) The main purpose why companies use EA in their factories and offices is that because EA actually increases the efficiency and the quality of decision making in their organization. EA integrates the functioning of all the departments/shopfloors of a company and the CEO, with a click a button in his office can get all and any data in any format about any previous or prospective future company sales/purchase orders and take decisions with real time data. Hope u understand that ;-) There are three major Enterprise application in market today. They are:

1. SAP
2. PeopleSoft / JDE <-- I am here
3. Oracle

All the three above are three different companies producing softwares with the same names.

SAP is the big brother among the three. I work in the PeopleSoft EA.

When companies decide that they require EA to be installed in their organizations, they contact the consulting companies like mine. Then the guys in my company who have the required experience and knowledge go to the client office and finds out how exactly EA will help them and what are the modules they require to use. (EA softwares are very very big and companies use only a few relevant modules).

Once that is done, he gives instructions to the guys offshore (people like me:-) ). This instructions will include the technical specifications of the work to be done. In simpler words, what we actually do is to customize the existing software (JDE in my case) to suit our client needs.

People like me(who do the actual work) are called “Technical Consultants”. And the people who have the industry/domain expertise to advice the clients on their requirements(These are usually MBAs or technical guys with 4-5 years experience) are called “Functional Consultants”

Again, training in EA is very costly and very few people can learn it outside. Only few lucky ones out of all the people recruited by the companies through the campus recruitment get allotted to this field. These people are the lucky ones ;-) Why? Because they are the best paid in the industry. That’s not all. Working in EA gives person great insights about actual workings of big companies and that experience is very unique and useful for the future.

Chalo, that’s all for now. Hopefully I have shed some cobwebs after not posting for a month. If this post was in any helpful to you or you have anything to correct or add to my post do drop in a comment.I wud appreciate that very much :-)

I knew this wud happen

Talk about identifying talent.

Most people wud have heard of this Dhoni guy only recently, but i knew about his talent long back. December 2004, in fact. This is what i had written then

Now i realize why my colleagues think i wud be a gud HR guy

Kansultant born again !!

I have not blogged for over a month now. Iam having a kinda guilty feeling, don’t know why :-( I was just browsing through all my posts so far, and believe me I cant believe that it was me who had written all that stuff. If someone asks me to reproduce all the stuff again, I will not be able to do that. I guess this is natural. Well, I hope that with this post, I kickstart my blogging again.

Oh My Gawd !!

Just one post in the last month.

Not acceptable!! Will have to improve 4 sure

Apun BBC me aa gaya

Yes u read it right.

BBC has selected my article to represent India on its website.

See moi name, moi foto and moi article here http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/cricket/4291377.stm

Iam ecstatic, will write more on this from office tomorrow

jeetege bhai jeetega ..........

It’s the time of the year where every god damn former cricketer becomes an “expert” and has his own version of analysis of the forthcoming cricket series. Well, yours truly is no less. The only difference is that my predictions are usually right. So this is my take on the India – Pakistan series.

Test Series : India wins 3-0.

One Day series : India draws 3-3 with Pakistan.

My team for the first test match:

V.Sehwag

G.Gambhir

R.Dravid

S.Tendulkar

S.Ganguly

VVS Laxman/ Md Kaif

D.Kaarthik

H.Singh

A.Kumble

I.Pathan

Z.Khan

Wah Cricket !! Woh bhi kya din the !!

While googling across cyber space, i came across an article written more than 6 years ago. I recommend that article to every cricket fan.

The situation : India loses very badly to Australia in Australia
The Mood in India : Anger

Click here to read that article.

It will make you nostalgic, I bet

Believe me ! I read all of these !!

I have been in a book reading spree for the past 2 months. I have always wanted to read novels and autobiographies like many other people do, but never had the patience to do it. But now everything has changed.

Following is the list of books I have finished reading.


My Reviews

Green font : MUST READ
Blue font : GOOD
RED font : AVOID AT ALL COSTS



Wings of Fire by Abdul Kalam

Count your chickens before they hatch by Arindam Chaudhary

The Great Indian Dream by Malay Chaudhary

My Autobiography by Lee Iacocca

Talking Straight by Lee Iacocca

Straight from the gut by Jack Welch

Engaging India by Strobe Talbott

The Monk who sold his Ferarri by Robin Sharma

The Anthem by Ayn Rand

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho


Future plans

Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

Sultans and Sultana make Hyderabadis proud :-))

I just cudnt miss this one.

I had predicted in my earlier post that "Hyderabad Sultans" will cut all the other teams to size in the PHL and i was proved right :-)) The defence of the sultans was just amazing and the jalandhar team looked like babies in front of them. Well done. I must also appreciate the scintillating work of the 3 pakistani imports, Waseem Ahmed( Should have won the best player award in the PHL), Sohail Abbas (The Hockey God himself) and Ahmed Alam(My god! World's best goalkeeper). Also great was our Indian captain Dilip tirkey.

Talking about the opposition, they behaved very poorly and we could see that they in fact could not accept that hyderabad smashed them not once but twice in the league. The performance of the forwards of jallandhar(the same as that of the Indian team) was aweful to say the least and now we know why Indian hockey team keeps losing always. The behavior of Gagan Ajit Singh was deplorable to say the least.

If Saturday we got revadi, on Sunday we got gulab Jamun

Sania Mirza did what no Indian has done b4 and has broken into top 100 of the World's rankings. Great going. It has to be emphasised that she was injured very badly throughout the tournament and it took great resilence to win and boy!! did the Hyderabad crowd help her :-))

The opposition players who were used to playing in front of dead silent crowds could not realize what hit them when they continously kept shouting even during serves and rallies :-))

As someone said, "what else do you expect when the entrance is free and girls are playing in mini-skirts"

Great week for Hyderabad, Indeed !!!!

Iam working @ Dell errrr..... Deloitte

The only problem in working at Deloitte is that it is not yet a household brand in India like say Satyam or Infy or Wipro. So when I proudly say to my relatives and friends that I work for Deloitte Consulting , they think that it one of the dozens of job-consultancy companies sprouting all over Hyderabad

Worse still, other people do not comprehend the word “Deloitte” and tend to believe that iam some call center guy working in DELL

Now what worse abuse can there be for an ERP consultant

My dear cell phone

I have decided that my cell phone requires a separate post. It is one of the most amazing pieces of cell phone you would ever see and after seeing it and touching it, almost all the people have the same reaction “WOW”. No I do not have any new Samsung or LG models. Neither do I have the Motorola E380. What I have is old and heavy. It is the one and only Siemens A-40.

Ya I know, doesn’t look "interesting" or "trendy",isn’t it. My colleagues here regularly keep making fun of me when i use it. In fact when one of them asked me to donate my phone to Tsunami victims, one another guy mocked me saying even they will not use my cell phone :-((

To hell with them and their views. In fact the more and more I use my cell phone, the more I continue to love it. It has no ringtones, has no games to play, has capacity only for 15 messages and has to be recharged daily. So what?? I have developed some sort of emotional attachment with it and so I will continue to use it no matter what others say.

In fact iam looking forward to the next few years when my cell phone will become a antique piece and same people who make fun of it now will see it in majestic awe :-))

Gustaaki Maaf !!

Me li'l busy with work. So I will just Ctrl-C,Ctrl-V my post at pagalguy.
This post is about a parody in NDTV news channel which keeps popping up in between the news bulletins.

I absolutely luv "Gustaaki Maaf" but i feel some characters are overdone and are too loud like Mayavati etc

My fav :

1. Vajpayee's Shayari session
2. Manmohan Singh with sonia peeking from the back
3. Laloo Yadav and his usual crap
4. Filter coffee with Amma

In fact last week's episode featuring "amma" was awesome. Lemme try to sample.

Inzamam ul haq has a coffee meeting with "amma"

Amma: Why r u looking so sad ??
Inzy : What to do madam, iam getting no repect in my team, and this Shoaib Akhtar is there na, he thinks he is the boss and he does not listen to me.
Amma: Dont worry Inzy , I will give u tips to gain respect in team.
Inzy: Ah Really!! Thanks madam, lemme note down ur tips
Amma: Point no 1 : Ask everyone in your team to call you "AMMA".
Inzy: But why madam??
Amma: Arey stop this madam, shadam. Call me "AMMA". "AMMA".
Inzy: Ok madam.... err Amma
Amma: POint no2 : Ask everyone in your team to touch your feet. This will give you respect.
Inzy: Arey madam, how is this possible? How can i make others touch my feet when I myself cant touch my feet. That means I do not self-respect Boo-ooh(starts crying)

And it goes on !!

The expressions of AMMA and Inzy are hard to put in words.

All that adds that to some comic relief in between the daily dose of same old stale news