Tuesday 6 August 2013

Heaven means harmony

Co existence is the fundamental law of relationships. The whole universal system functions on this law. Leadership is nurtured in your ability; maturity and willingness to co-exist. 
 In a world where two finger prints do not match each other, two human beings do not look exactly same; nothing is created which doesn’t have the other side of it. It is immaturity to expect two people to think in a same way. When we differ in our opinion from other person, the other person is not wrong. He or she is only looking at the same thing from a different point of view. Ability to see things from other person’s point of view facilitates the process to co-exist. Calling other people “you are wrong” and getting into arguments is the surest way to become law breakers of co existence and lead a life of loneliness in our own self created prison.
 It needs courage to accept when we are wrong, culture to express our mistake and character to be empathetic towards others who are hurt due to our words and actions. Sorry seems to be the hardest word for many but the wise ones realise “sorry” as the most powerful word to resolve conflicts and bring in harmony in relationship.
Conflict is not a threat in a relationship, it is the process to understand the other person much better and create a strong binding between each other. Let us bridge this gap in understanding with wisdom.  By intentions everyone is good. We are all seekers of happiness. If we approach people in a friendly way and make them say “Yes” to us... If we can make them feel that the idea is theirs and be sympathetic towards their ideas & desires... If we can appeal to nobler motives and reinforce in them the trust and the belief we have in them ... we all can become the architects of building beautiful relationships and creators of heaven and harmony in this planet. 
 Heaven means harmony ... When we learn to live in harmony with all created things around us we are already in heaven. To be in hell is to raise a wall in between us and others with our opinions and our relentlessness to co-exist.
 Happiness belongs to those who learn to co-exist
Let us be happy people and create happiness to others and in the process of such happiness let explore our success and enrich our Leadership.

Friday 26 July 2013

Leadership is your ability to create leaders


Leadership is your ability to create leaders.

Compassion is your willingness to care and respect another person the way you would like to be cared and respected. Ability to see good things in others is your beginning to have a vision. Expression of good things you see in others is your first step towards leadership. If there is a choice between Good, bad and ugly is it so difficult to choose the good ? Then how come we choose to express bad and ugly instead of good in our relationship with others. It is easy to win a friend; a smile can make it happen. It is much easier to lose every one as one word that hurts their feeling can ensure your loss. It is our choice. A choice to be a friend or a choice to lead a lonely life..

 Let our first value in relationship be respect. No one in the name of status or situation, in the process of justification or vindication or in the verge of emotions or intelligence, has the right to hurt the self esteem of another person. When we relate we learn to worship the self esteem of those we relate with. In such relationship alone we can nurture Leadership.  

In this great path of self improvement and an adventure on self discovery let our torch to overcome the darkness and bring in the light of wisdom within, be the first lesson in relationship..

“Don’t criticise, Condemn or Complain. Give honest and sincere appreciation”


 May be we will find that everything is so beautiful, everyone is so good ... as good as we are and as beautiful as God is. We have all reasons to be happy, every relationship to cherish and every day to celebrate our life.

Sunday 21 July 2013

Top of the World!



Its the feeling probably Tensing & Hillary had when they first reached the top of Mount Everest . But all of us can have our won Mount Everest which we want to climb and reach the Top . A worthwhile Goal that can give meaning to our life can be the avenue to be at the Top of the World. Every one of us are created for achievement, engineered for success and everlasting happiness is the very nature of every human being. Our whole life should become the avenue to express our inner beauty and in that expression we  can experience this feeling of being at the Top of the world.

Excellence is a term for recognising any constructive improvement in our behaviour towards achieving this goal. Every day is day to touch our excellence. Constructive discontentment is believing in the fundamentals of creation which is “everything can become better”. Every day be yesterday plus and let us begin each day with the two sentences.. 

“My best is yet to come and it shall come today .
Today I shall do much better than what I did Yesterday “

Converting our weakness into our strength is the process of growth. Accepting weakness and hiding behind or running away will only make us weak and result in cowardice. Facing life is facing problems. Winning life is overcoming challenges. Living life is being an inspiration. Let there be an unquenchable thirst and an indomitable will in us to convert our weakness into our strength .Make every day as a day of achievement. Let every thought, word, action of yours be towards this endeavour of growth. Let us grow to be reasonable, responsible and respectable.


We have come into this world, 
it is our duty to make this world a better place to live in.

Friday 5 July 2013

Interviews

One of our advertising campaigns for ZEAL read "Hi Failure". The ad said: No one likes to be a failure, but everybody does not become successful...why?! We were very doubtful about the response we would get from people for such a negative ad, but it turned out to be a huge success. The reason - everyone wants to be successful, but more importantly, no one wants to be a failure in life! 

MY FAILURES

Most of us relate success and failure in our life to our career. The battlefield in our career to ascertain success and failure happens in interview situations. I recall some of the interviews that I went through. During my MBA at Madurai Kamaraj University, I had to go through a series of campus interviews, one of which was with the Brooke Bond Company. I immediately considered that as my lifetime job because I come from a plantation family. Besides, a guy brought up on a coffee estate couldn't ask for a better job than that of a management trainee at the coffee division of Brooke Bond. After passing through the initial rounds, I was called for the final round at Bangalore. Completely awed by the ambience of the place, I promised myself to spend a lifetime working for BB. I had even dressed up perfectly for the interview. I believed at that moment, I was confidence personified! I knew the offer would land on my lap because I was the only candidate with a background in plantation.

I scaled through the group discussion and entered the chairman’s room with great confidence. On seeing my CV, as expected, the Chairman and the head HR wanted to check my knowledge about plantation culture. It was all very easy until I was asked the difference between Robusta and Arabica coffee plants. I said Arabica is a small plant while Robusta is a big one. Arabica grows in good soil and Robusta grows on rocky soil. Arabica’s life span is about 15 to 20 years but Robusta’s is more that 50 years. They were not happy with my answers and said: “Mr. Rajan we are here to market coffee. From a marketing point of view what is the significant difference between Arabica and Robusta?”  I couldn’t answer the question, but came up with many other explanations.

The outcome was that I had to experience my first failure in an interview. I realized later that it was the taste and price of the coffee that I should have spoken about.

My next interview was with Taj. This time I decided that I shall prepare myself more than the best. I did extremely well in the preliminary interview. I was then called in for the final interview in Bangalore. Before I could go for the interview, I wanted to have complete knowledge about the hotel industry. I approached a friend of mine who was in the catering industry. We had a party almost every night in the name of getting to know the world of hospitality. Finally, I went to Bangalore with the highest level of hope and telling myself that I can’t be written off in this interview. While waiting, I interacted freely with all the other people who had come to attend the interview and they were enthused that I called them by names during the group discussion. I was obviously the best member in the group discussion.

When I went for the final interview with the Marketing and HR Head of Taj, I was able to answer question relating to my MBA very confidently. Then I asked what my main focus would be as the Marketing Executive of Taj in order to bring in business. I started thinking about all the unique information I had collected in seven precious days and answered that I would bring in revenue through Conference rooms, Banquet hall, Restaurant… They said, “Mr. Rajan, you are missing the most important part. Tell us, in the hotel industry, where does the revenue come from?”. I thought again and replied, “I would bring in revenue from the Boutique, the bookshop, club membership, the swimming pool…”

This time, the marketing and HR Head were very obviously disappointed. They said this would be my last chance to come up with an answer. So, giving my best, like a bright 100-volt bulb, I said, “Yess! The laundry service!” I was very politely shown the door. I realized later that it was the rooms in the hotel that I should have talked about.

MY SUCCESS IN AN INTERVIEW

I would also like to discuss one more interview that I attended – one for my Bachelors of Business Administration in Madurai. At that time I was in Chennai and aspiring to get into a film institute and had no intentions of doing a BBA. But my mother forced me to attend the interview. I went with a strong determination to fail, and kept giving wrong answers. Finally the professor asked me the easiest question possible: Who is the Prime Minister of India? I purposely answered M.G.Ramachandran (a popular Tamil star). By then the professor had lost his temper and asked me who is the chief minister of Tamil Nadu? Without any hesitation I answered “Rajinikanth”. I was sent out, but after a week, I received the admission card for the BBA program! Until this day, I do not know how I got through that interview and joined the BBA Program.


The lesson we can learn about success and failure through these simple experiences is that Success can be archived by any means, but failure can occur only through mismanagement’