A thought provoking excerpt from a friend's blog - disturbed me a lot

A
politician is an individual who is a formally recognized and active
member of a government, or a person who influences the way a society is
governed through an understanding of political power and group
dynamics. But do you think Politicians any means conform to the
definition? The meaning of is to look for the people without
really thinking of his own. One who lives for the people, elected by
the people and serves to the people can be termed as a representative.
But where can you really find the link between today's politicians and
the one in the books as definition or the meaning. You can anybody and
all will tell that politicians are worthless. I am not here to tell the
same to you. I want to tell you it's we who are worthless. Even if I or
any of you be a politician, you will be the exact photocopy of today's
politician. You know why? We don't have courage to be truthful, honest
and tell the truth. Same is the case with me. But I want to be truthful
at least in this blog.

It's
all about the system. We all know that we want our child to take birth
in a nursing home. So we have money to spend and hence admit to a well
recognized nursing home. There you go. So Govt. hospitals that are
authorized to serve people's health is not opted for. So the doctors
out there will suggest you to go to a nursing home. And we also go. Now
the same an ordinary people whose monthly income is 1,000 Rs. can't
afford. It leads to degradation of Govt. Hospitals
and inflation (astronomical) of medical costs. Can't we admit our wives
to Govt. Hospitals and fight for better facilities and doctors. That
time we are selfish and while blaming others we shout. Isn't it a
mockery of us?

Next
will be our education. Best school (private, English medium), best
private tutor (preferably from the school) and pay high to get the
leaked notes, question paper. Why? We don't want our children to be
educated rather we want them to earn huge money so that they can give
money at our old ages. This leads to degradation of education system,
unfair examination system and incapable future. What they will study?
Education imbibes enlightenment which can bring knowledge, power,
thinking judging skills and to decide what to do. But if the
pampered sons/daughters of riches be the IAS/IPS/Politicians/Govt.
Employees/Doctors/Engineers/IT professionals what more we can expect?

"Sunshine
shows the day"-So what does this shows? Will anybody among them will
think for the downtrodden or will go on similar lines as their parents
did to make him successful (paying high donations during admissions to
higher education, tuition fees use references to get into reputed
MNC's/high govt. jobs). Life is a full waste of them as they can't
think they don't know what is life? Never read any science still their
degree and job shows a lot. How can you expect them to do something for
the nation/human civilization when their society taught them to be
selfish to gain more wealth, power, love (sex, glamour and not love)
and attention? He will never know the struggle of a farmer to reap a
grain of rice which he's leaving off every day in his plate. He will
never know the sufferings of those for which he's so comfortable in his
life (A.C, flat, car, mobile).

During
employment we are either doing useless, clerical white colored
work which is mundane, repetitive and non-creative jobs else we will
grew up as a manager to exploit/drink blood of others only to make
somebody more rich. Their billion crore asset is increased by 1 million
so take .001% of the amount (we give more to our pet dogs).

"Do
everything to make your baby lead a happy life"- So what needs to be
done? buy 3 cars for 2 people contributing to pollution and increasing
cost decreasing attention public transport, auto/taxi's
in deciding destination fare and higher prices of fuel
(demand-supply methodology) with more traffic jam. So we give a world
of selfishness, unprecedented usage of natural resources, pollution and
a perverted mind full of anger, frustration, greed, division w.r.t
money, status, power and never nurture the true humanity, ethics,
morale values, soft senses.

Do
we realize the same, do any introspection or feel regret/guilty or
understand consequences or ever try to think to revert the progress of
humanity to utmost destruction unknowingly? Life is short. Even if you
realize (self-realization or forced) do we have the courage to do
something or have the clarity of what to do? I think we have it when we
are at death beds which are expected in 60-70 yrs of age. So let's
think it before the realities of life, the raw truth hit our
consciences hard enough to our lives miserable.



(Thanks to Tirtha Dey )



Now I start :

/>Do u agree with this?

Have we become like this ?

I will post my thoughts tommorow

Falling apart

That summarizes what I am going through and why I haven't been posting lately .



A lot of things have been going wrong , very very wrong .And I am trying to grapple with the facts of facing the after effects of a few wrong decisions , very wrong decisions.And not helping it further are a series of unfortunate happenings at home and personal life ...



My Dear Reader , I am at the crossroads now , I think I am looking at it now , a Mid Life Crisis .Yes , I think I am having it now .



Hasty decisions often prove to be costly and in my case that is happening .One of the most important things that you need to be at peace with is where you execute your daily business of earning a livelihood.I urge all of you to put enuf due diligence into the process of selecting the place .Because sometimes , it turns out that the place is great , absolutely fantastico ! and you too are nothing short of a genius , but put together the combination does not yield results .Meaning that the equations sucks at both ends .And when that happens , daily life becomes a drone and that can kill your mind , body and soul very painfully .



The next thing I want to tell you is about the most misunderstood word in the software industry ; a Performance Improvement Plan .Well at face value , you think that this is a plan to improve your performance .It is not ! It is just a heads up and notification to start looking out .If you take actual numbers , the number of people who actually come out successful from a PIP is dismally low .Why ? Here is what I think .Although the intentions are there .The execution matters a lot .And the way these PIP are executed are very far from professional/desirable.There are various ways in which they are executed ; one of the most popular ones is the method of assigning a simple but impossible task to be completed in a week.For example : Move to UCM in the next week ! .



The next popular method is the hounding method .Here the boss chooses a hound ( a person/colleague) and asks him to start hounding the guy in PIP.The objective hound him to the extent that he throws up his arms and goes by himself , a win-win !



I must say that both these methods do not aim at improving performance but at making the guy quit and they invariably work all the time .I am telling you as an Engineer and a Manager .They work damn well !



One side , we go crying wolf that people are hopping like rabbits across companies and that retention is the eternal challenge .On the other end we have HR chiefs reading through all your work from home mails to count the number of days where it looks less than 8 hrs so that it becomes half a day off !! Then there are the band of mouthies m the folks who work with their mouths and cannot stand people who work with their brains and hands .It is amazing how the mouthies often find management favor easier than the real techies .The just sail along after that .No worries !!



We are going to a world where you can pull out your mobile phone and say "restaurants" and it shows you a list of restaurants based on a profile of your likings and preferences and even your budget .Then it goes on to download the route to your selection into your car after booking a parking slot and a table for you .If it is a long drive , you can order and the e-wallet on your phone pays for you while you are getting there .



To make this happen , we need to keep the Human Resources human and not turn them into zombies .Encourage and foster trust and try and make them belong and not report to you .Ahh ! Utopia !! Where is it ?