Feb 13

5 Life Lessons Learned From Super Bowl XLVI

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Perseverance

Take Chase Blackburn, he was cut by the New York Giants after the 2010 season, a season in which he was the captain for the Special teams.  So what did he do? He waited for another team to sign him but when no team came calling, he started substitute teaching for a middle school in Ohio, USA.   When on November 29, 2011 he received the call he had been waiting for, the Giants were in dire need of an experienced Linebacker due to injuries.  What makes the story even more impressive is he made what I believe to be the pivotal play of the game.  While covering the Patriot’s Rob Gronkowski, Chase managed to make a key interception that helped prevent Brady from retaking the lead.  Pretty impressive for a guy who was cut from the team and was substitute teaching less than 4 months earlier.

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Feb 01

Internships…A Step Above The Rest

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Imagine this you are in your last year of college and the realization that you will be interviewing and competing in the job market is fast approaching.  On top of that, you have no practical experience in your area of study.  My question is why you have waited so long?  Your summers off from classes should be a time to expand your business mind or whatever field you study in and gain that valuable experience that will set you apart from your competition.

Now imagine this; you are interviewing three candidates for a position in your company.  Candidate One has had multiple internships in a variety of areas of business.  Candidate Two has had one internship and Candidate Three has had no internships at all.  Now without even interviewing them and just looking at their resumes it’s clear in this situation that Candidate One has an advantage on paper! Continue reading »

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Jan 19

Interviews … The Untold tricks for Gatecrashing into the Party!

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If you are fresh out of college and do not have top class grades from a first class institution of higher learning, you are part of the crowd that is queuing up to get into the ‘best parties’ … I mean the best organizations! You get a huge advantage (and I mean really huge and I am seriously not kidding with you!), if you have strong academic credentials from a top institution because you make the hiring manager’s job easy. If you don’t its OK here are some tips to get you into this party.

Understand the role – Understand the organization – Show them what you Have – Ask smart questions

You are showing up at the interview session to demonstrate your fit for the role and the organization, right? Do your homework … make sure you understand the role very well – recruitment firms or job listings provide detailed information regarding the attributes and traits needed for the positions that they advertise for. I would also ask you to map your experience and accomplishments to every attribute and trait listed for the position or for as many as possible. Your examples should have quantifiable proof points as much as possible. Show the hiring manager what you can do for him … three examples are ideal, have five ready. He will be satiated and tired by then!  Continue reading »

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Nov 29

5 Managerial Motivations More Important than Money

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MONEY may seem like the obvious draw but surprisingly it isn’t the only carrot you’ll need!

1. Continuous Improvement

Commitment to continuous learning, a performance metrics based culture where personal growth and related rewards are linked to achievement of quantifiable goals, an environment that promotes risk-taking, where business is run with a broad worldwide outlook rather than an inward focused approach and tight hiring standards that brings in the best talent into the organizations are more powerful drivers.

2. Feedback

Top talent also thrives in an environment that provides constant feedback about them from their superiors, subordinates and peers, what they think about their organization and their work environment and how satisfied the customers are with the organization. Continue reading »

Apr 18

Young Guns – Fresh Insights from Rising Talent

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I have truly enjoyed the journey of building and sharing my experiences on Workplace Readiness, Leadership Development, and Personal Branding in business and in life with all of you. The feedback and comments I receive are encouraging and fascinating! In my physical and electronic engagements I have also recognized the new tsunami of talent, skills and leadership that is being heralded by young professionals many of them still in tertiary institutions completing their undergrad or post grad studies. At the workplace, we have instituted a University Hiring program which is delivering us great dividends in terms of talent, outlook and approach that Gen-Z is dramatically altering!

To recognize and share the unique insights that this class of rising talent bring in their own right, I have decided to begin showcasing this fresh talent in a new section of this blog dedicated to “Young Guns”. The first “Young Gun” is Abhirup Bhattacharya. Abhirup is a fashion technology graduate of NIFT, India, with global forays in marketing and merchandising. He has worked with Walmart and Macy’s.  Abhirup is also the creator of the blog – Ideas Make Market. This is a wonderful blog that features young professionals from a variety of fields examining a range of issues related to business, economy and marketing.

The article Abhirup shares here, “Unlocking Collective Wisdom,” is an insightful analysis of the Linux Operating System and Open Source computing – two of the larger disruptors of how modern day software applications are built, shared and implemented that has provided a platform for the ascendency of Google. Its alternate Android operating system allows a host of developers to build and market their products through an easier and quicker go-to-market. In 2005—carrying forward the “spirit” of the Linux model— Google acquired Android’s operating system code, middleware and applications to build smarter, more adaptable mobile devices; thereby threatening the age old hegemony of Microsoft and Windows. In his article, Abhirup illustrates the power and the value of Collective Wisdom. Then he dares you to try it!

I look forward to reading your comments about Abhirup’s article as well as the other articles we publish in this category.

If you are interested in contributing an article to “Young Guns” section or sharing an article on Workplace Readiness, Leadership Development or Personal Branding, please reach out to me at debdutta101@gmail.com.

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Mar 09

Hiring Great … Hiring Right

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Organizational and team success and failures are driven by a collective set of people. So a leader’s capability begins with the quality of people the leader can bring into the team and organization.  Hiring the right skills and attitudes not only gets the job done while exceeding expectations but also frees up the leader’s intellectual bandwidth to apply to more strategic and impactful matters. Conversely, when inappropriate skills and people are hired, they end up being high maintenance, taking up more of the leader’s time, delaying schedules, and lowering the performance of the entire group.

Identifying and hiring top talent takes practice. I encourage my team to interview people as a habit—regardless of whether or not a position may be open.  Through professional and social interactions, you will meet people that you will want to keep in view for the future.  If you are lucky, you may come across outstanding talent and you may want to create a position for them where it makes sense. Learn to identify these opportunities and don’t let them pass you by!

You will also want to leverage your current employees when seeking talent. It’s cheaper and more reliable to hire through internal references rather than looking more to outside sources. Make internal referral bonuses financially attractive for the employees and actively market the initiative internally. I have seen many organizations where employees are amazingly unaware of this ‘easy money’ and are not being leveraged enough! If an internal reference leads to hiring, make sure that the employee who referred gets paid on time. Organizational credibility can be built or destroyed depending on how long it takes to respond to its reward commitment.

When interviewing potential talent, you want to begin by making a first-class impression about yourself and your organization the moment you meet the candidate. Most hiring managers forget that the interview process is a two-way evaluation. You don’t want to interrogate the candidate! Treat the candidate like you would treat a top customer and watch the magic of the chemistry unfold. The interview will yield better results when both the interviewer and the candidate are at ease and open to discussion. Such an environment brings the best out of both participants.

You have finally identified that top talent—Now it’s time to hire them and get them in the door! Continue reading »

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Oct 19

How Collaborative Efforts Benefit Organizational and Individual Success

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Today’s fast paced world requires speedy execution. It is virtually impossible to succeed with a 100% baked plan – the required time to execution will not permit that luxury. Collaboration among individuals within a team, or among differing departments no doubt benefit the effort of all involved while adding to the potential success of the organization and initiative.

Career Path to SuccessSuccessful individuals and organizations approach an initiative with the end result in mind;l they have and execute toward a clear vision. The steps to the end result are carefully considered in terms of priority by impact to the end result and each step is then provided an appropriate amount of time and effort based on its priority – this will never be uniform.

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Sep 13

Energize a Teen and Transform the world!

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There is always a first time. As long as I am doing something new that is meaningful to those involved, I try having fun doing it. There are situations when I need to really ‘stretch’ myself and do things way outside my comfort zone, these moments are not uncommon at all. To address such situations I have conditioned myself to go ahead and give it a shot anyway and pat myself on the back afterwards and say – “Hey! I just grew my myself some – did something that I had never done before”. Sounds challenging but once you get into the groove, it starts to become kind of fun. No big deal. After all, nothing worth doing is ever easy to start.

Mentoring Teens In early August 2010, an administrator and teacher of a progressive local school in Singapore expressed interest to have me speak to grade 9 and 10 students. The school lends a lot of focus on development beyond the curriculum instilling character in life and work-life. They host an annual lecture series where leaders from society, business, and government are invited to share experiences and deliver motivational messages.

I was very humbled by the invitation and gladly accepted but on afterthought I thought, “Wow! What a difference communication has made in my life.” Following a childhood of relative reservedness, I started taking interest in people and communication as I grew up. Chatting up people, even walking up to a group of unknown people and striking a conversation now comes naturally to me, in fact I enjoy it. But this was different! Try visualizing today’s 14-15 year olds – opinionated, impatient, informed and intelligent with zillions of energy pulses zipping through their neurons. If you have parented adolescents and teenagers in the twenty-first century, you know exactly what I mean … This was two hundred of them!!

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Sep 09

Moving Out and Moving Up

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Today’s workplace is evolving at lightspeed! Organizational, sectoral and macroeconomic challenges face every organization on the planet! The underlying opportunities that these challenges present to us are dramatic and all of us are morphing ourselves to address them. It’s an exciting time to be around but also an intense period of reflection, introspection, planning and execution.

In times like these the ability to travel and the willingness to listen and feel the pulse are crucial to remain on top of the game. My travels enable me to engage in situations, opportunities and challenges which excite me tremendously regarding the possibilities while presenting opportunities for invaluable learning. Let me tell you two interesting incidents…

Moving Out…

Career Change

Recently, I met a prominent Chief Information Officer (CIO) friend over lunch. After exchanging pleasantries, he enquired how we were dealing with the integration of a major acquisition we had done in 2008. What were our learnings?

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Aug 17

Personal Branding A Primer on Workplace Readiness

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Your Personal Workplace BrandIn the past I spent time on a panel for a gameshow that selects MBA students and pits them in competition against each other. Obviously, this competition is fun, but not unlike the competition one finds the workplace. Personal Branding in the workplace is an area of growing trickiness. Those who do it well will benefit greatly, those who do poor job of balancing the weights of personal and organizational initiatives will fall flat on their efforts.

Here are some points to consider…

Be Succinct

Brands in general are tightly woven, to-the-point representations of the services or products they represent. Similarly, your personal brand should be succinct enough to fit robustly into one encompassing sentence.

Be Different

If you and the person next to you and the person next to them are all gunning for the same position and you each have the same qualifications what advantage does that lend you? Finding an area to specialize in important and helps differentiate you from the crowd.

Be Flexible

As you discover and strengthen your personal brand emphasize the skills you have that compliment your current workplace initiatives. Perhaps you dream of doing something different and want to live the dream, be sure to serve your current employment. Don’t ever overlook the opportunities you have to deliver and grow even if you’re peering into the horizon.

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