Interesting facts!!

I once read an interesting and funny story in which a high profile and young MBA holder, who also happens to be a banker and an investor, chats with a cool and smart farmer in a village on changing his lazy lifestyle... This fellow tries hard to convince the farmer to quit such a lazy and boring life and sell off his farm to grow faster and enjoy the life in the fast lanes. The best part is that the farmer disagrees and counter questions the young fellow with a simple   " Then, what will happen ? " 


The young fellow tries harder to explain and comes out with a lot of happening probabilities for every counter question like the farmer can get some good grands and can start his own business, can get a nice house in the city life, have luxurious cars, have a beautiful wife, have kids etc etc.... finally he claims that after saving a lot of money for himself, he can buy a nice farm house and live a peaceful retired life and relax till the end of his life  ;)


In return, the farmers simply asks him, " What Am i doing now then ?? "


Its really funny, how we make a circle of our life. Ofcourse, the above example is not a practical one in life and Iam sure no one agrees to spend their youth as a retired person with nothing to do but look after the farm, the sky above and relax.. 


As someone has rightly quoted, "The grandest of all laws is the law of progressive development. Under it, in the wide sweep of things, men grow wiser as they grow older, and societies better. "


Today societies are changing and so are the lifestyles. People meet more on the internet than in real lives. That doesnt exclude me as well as Iam not a real social creature.Our generation is more closer virtually and one good advantage is that the world looks very small now. We can talk, we can befriend, we can consult or we can share to anyone in the world even if we have never met them.


Technology changes everything. Can you imagine, we can now access theatres on the web, can explore movies, can book tickets, can even book a snack and can book the seats of our choice. 


Everything is available at your doorstep, on your screen.   :))

Lets Welcome 2011

Fighting Competition!!

How to Compete with Discounters

                                                                                                                                                                                        Written by Jeff Mowatt   

If you manage a small to medium-sized business, chances are you encounter pricing pressures from some version of a large discounter.  Large competitors may have more money to spend to attract new customers, more buying-power to undercut your prices, and more resources to outlast you in a price war.  If they’re from overseas, they may also have cheaper labour.  

On competing with price discounters, my advice: “Don’t be better – be different.”  In other words, don’t even try to beat their prices.  Instead, be different in these three areas…

Target Different Customers

Don’t waste your time or money trying to attract bottom feeders.  These are customers whose only buying criteria is low price.  You might attract them with a sale or discount, but they’ll leave you to save a nickel.  Let your mega competitor have them.  The good news is most people do not buy strictly on low price.  If that we’re the case then everyone would live in the cheapest homes, drive the cheapest cars, wear the cheapest clothes, and only dine in fast food restaurants.  People typically buy on low price when they perceive no extra value.  That leads us to our next area to make your business different…

Supply Different Offerings

By definition, mega-suppliers appeal to the masses.  They supply stuff that average customers buy.  So don’t go there.  Instead, position your business a notch above.  Yours is the boutique experience that provides either different products, better quality, expert advice, or preferably all three.   Think about bicycles… you can buy them relatively cheaply at department stores, but serious cyclists shop at bike stores, or they order custom-made on-line.  Either way, they’re willing to pay more for quality.  That’s where small businesses do well and make more money.

Provide Different Service

Remember your goal is to target customers who are smart; more interested in quality and value than just buying whatever’s cheapest.  Contrary to popular opinion, smart customers no longer value information.  Before smart customers even contact your business, they’ve already collected information about you and your competitors.  They’ve given their smart phones a shake or searched Google.  It takes them less than a second for the search and the information is free.  Free is worthless.  That means that if your employees are merely providing information to potential customers they aren’t really creating any perceived value - at least not enough to warrant charging a premium.

The question, when it comes to service, is what are customers willing to pay a premium for?  It isn’t friendliness.  Nothing wrong with being friendly, but employees at your discounting competitor can also be friendly.  More to the point, your customers already have friends.  And they’re also free. 

What customers do value when it comes to service are three things: analysis, interpretation and advice.  They want a genuine expert who has analyzed the plethora of options that are available. They want that same person to interpret which of these options might be best suited to that customer’s unique needs.  And they want that expert to advise them on a few options.  This requires that your employees need to not only know your products and services; they also need to know which questions to ask customers to clarify their unique needs.  And they need to know how to position short-listed options in a way that helps customers make smarter, faster, decisions.  These are easy techniques and come with experience.  

When it comes to customer service, remember - this is business.  Customers don’t want a buddy.  They don’t want an informer.  They want a trusted advisor.  For this, customers will pay a premium.

Bottom line, managers and business owners would do well to worry less about beating their competitors’ prices, and focus more on becoming a category-of-one.

Burn Your Boat!!

Written by John Boe

I believe that the great NFL Hall of Fame coach, Vince Lombardi, had it right when he said, "The quality of a person's life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor." Do you agree with Coach Lombardi, or are you the type of person who has difficulty staying focused and keeping commitments? Do you allow the negative influences of fear, anxiety, self-doubt and worry to dominate your thinking and sabotage your results? Sadly, most people fail to achieve their goals, not because they're lazy or lack self-motivation, but because they were never "fully committed" to succeed! I can't think of a single great achievement that has ever been attained without first a plan of action and then an unshakable commitment to its accomplishment. Walt Disney was arguably one of the most creative dreamers and determined men of the twentieth century. Walt understood the power of commitment and would frequently tell those around him, "When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionably." The ancient Greek warriors were both feared and respected by their enemies. In battle, the Greeks established a well-deserved reputation for their unsurpassed bravery and unshakable commitment to victory. The key to their overwhelming success on the battlefield had far more to do with how the Greek commanders motivated the warriors than it did with issues of tactics or training. The Greeks were master motivators who understood how to use a "dramatic demonstration" to infuse a spirit of commitment into the heart of every warrior. Once the warriors had been offloaded from their boats onto their enemy's shore, the Greek commanders would shout out their first order…"burn the boats!" The sight of burning boats removed any notion of retreat from their hearts and any thoughts of surrender from their heads. Imagine the tremendous psychological impact on the soldiers as they watched their boats being set to the torch. As the boats turned to ash and slipped quietly out of sight into the water, each man understood there was no turning back and the only way home was through victory. In your sales career your battles are not fought with weapons on foreign shores, but within the confines of your own mind. A truly committed salesperson does not have the luxury or the time for the self-indulgence of negative thinking. The true underlying motivation for all success is a deep and unwavering commitment to the task at hand. The sales profession is a demanding and challenging career, but it is also personally rewarding and financially lucrative for those who are fully committed to becoming successful. If you are being pushed around mentally by thoughts of fear, anxiety, self-doubt and worry, it's time to "burn your boat" and become fully committed to your sales career! "Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, and then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Food for thought!!

Technology and a change in the generations are making people live in a capsule life. If we rewind our lives 20 - 25 years back, children those days were most often seen playing in grounds and not in their homes unlike these days. The games played were more physical than mental or virtual which are been played these days.Even parents encouraged their kids to play with their friends in their house or allow their kids to visit their friends house in the vicinity.

I think as a kid I remember, I used to visit so many of my friends house to play or to study and it was so much fun. The evenings in our days were so full of physical activities as we used to play games like badminton, Lagori ( a popular game in Maharshtra), Cricket, Bhokancha ( hide n seek), Daba Aispais ( very popular game in Maharashtra), Gotya ( Marbles), Football,  flying Kites  and many more.

Check with todays kids whether they know or have heard of such games. Forget about outdoor games, even during our Super summer vacations, we used to play so many indoor games and computer was far far away from us. We used to hear it only as an intelligent and expensive machine which were being explored by Banks and Railways.

Snakes and ladders, Sharing interesting ghost stories, Card games like Challenge, Jhabbu, Not at home, Gulam chor, Badaam Saat and god knows how many more, were played almost every afternoon at some friends house or were played when we were sent to some cousin's place to spend the vacation for a couple of weeks.

Todays kids are pampered like anything and some parents are afraid to send children to their friends house as they fear the kids can spoil each other by playing computers or watching unwanted programmes on Television. In fact, unlike the good old days, parents do not leave their children independant even during the summer vacation. Staying away from the kids for more than a week is like big task or punishment on them. More than the kids, we, as working parents miss our children and get them back in our family capsules.

I used to stay at my cousins place for weeks together and used to enjoy the time even if i used to miss my home.Those days even communication was never easy. Telephones and Televisions were also luxury. Today, we have every means of communication yet we cant leave our children for more than a week.

Speaking about Televisions, I remember, Sunday was such a special day for everyone. Epic serials like Mahabharat, Ramayan were a big hit and they were screened only for one hour every sundays. Our parents use to give extra background knowledge on every characters of these epics and that was making it more interesting. There used to be just one channel, the main channel no.1 ( Doordarshan) and for the second channel, one had to invest some good money to buy the 14 spoke Antennae to get a clear reception. It was also termed as luxury.

Things changed after the 2nd channel got introduced. The poor fellows who could not afford the extra investment did some R&D with their Antennaes and occasionally they used to adjust the angles to catch the reception free ;)

The 2nd channel got phased out and Cable TV got introduced and so on.... Today you can watch hundreds of Channels giving  every wanted and unwanted information a kid should have.

My kid, 6 years old, comes out one day from the school premises and tells his mother about a co-student ( girl) who was standing few feets away from him that She is in love with him :(( Stunned, my wife asked him why he feels that way for which he says that she is constantly looking at him and smiles whenever he sees her.

Jokes apart, the influence of technology is changing the generations faster than normal. Whether it is right or wrong, we have to sometimes dig our childhood days and learn on things that our parents did to us. Iam not concluding my blog at this moment as in this fast life, me and my wife, as a parent are struggling and learning many new things on parenting. Every day is a new day for us and a new challenge which iam sure many parents of my age might be facing. The blog is open for all those parents in case, you also want to comment on things that we miss now or on things that we can do. Comments are always welcome!!!

Marathi Movie '' Shikshanachya Aaicha Gho"

Last week, I got the opportunity to see this marathi movie titled " Shikshanachya Aaicha Gho"  which I had never heard even the name before. The English literal translation would be " To hell with Education". Just like the Hindi movie " 3 Idiots" , this movie targets the Indian education system and addresses issues as to where the system is going wrong. The motive behind this movie is to ask every individual as to why do we put our kids in a rat race without even bothering to understand if the education being imparted to them would be helpful in any ways.Just to bring pride to the family, they are driven towards the family goals.

Another important and a well made point by the makers of this movie is on the educations system. Especially the kids these days carry the weight of their school bags which is even more than their weight sometimes.Also, on the corruption front with regards to the school books, new note books and the frequent syllabus changes, they have raised a strong voice. Sometimes, these things are being done only to increase the sale of these publishing houses and printing Industries to earn extra business and has no basis or relevance if the student will have any use of such syllabus in his future.

the story goes as under;

Bharat Jadhav, the lead actor  takes most of the on-screen time, the plot revolves around his son Shree (Saksham Kulkarni) who is just an average student in his school, but has a passion for playing cricket. Shree always shows his talent while playing cricket which is appreciate by few coaches around him. However, Bharat Jadhav is too involved working hard and forcing his son to study harder and to get good marks for the scholarship, but Shree's average intellect and interest in studies spoils the situation and Bharat Jadhav in a fit of rage goes beyond the limit of hitting his son so hard that he goes into coma. This is exactly when the story takes a turn and makes it more interesting."

Though, the movie is really short and the climax of the movie is not very convincing with the story line. The strong point of the movie are the dialogues which are really caustic and makes you think twice. Conversational scenes where a school kid with loaded school bag is compared to a railway porter are really thought-provoking. 


One of the interesting question of the movie which the lead actors asks to many people and expects an abrupt answer is 17x7 equals how much?? He gets a blank face from many professionals that include a police inspector, a minister, and even a History teacher. Its a fact, these tables or multiplications are not expected to be answered in your professional lives and no body cares if one knows this because you have so many tools available. Why is it so necessary that the child has to by-heart tables up to 25?? A history teacher who couldnt answer this question claims she is not teaching Maths so it doesnt bothers her, then why should the kid be penalised on something which he might or may not require in future.


One of the scene was quite emotional, where the father needs to buy medicine in the shop for his son but is refused as he doesnt has sufficient money to buy them. I remembered, when i was a child, we had similar situation where we were barely able to pay the doctor fees. We had to skip the expensive ones sometimes or take only as much as we can afford in the available funds, which was most of the time a big issue.


Overall, its a good movie for a change!!

My Composition

I didnt realise till my company won the best corporate Song award that I could also compose a song. Our parent company in Germany decided to have a good corporate song that depicts the culture of the company, show cases its products, their features. Every subsidiary including us in India were asked to contribute their share which should be based on an international tune so that every country can easily adapt it. And so did we...

The lyrics are as under and is based on the popular Michael Jackson track " We are the World";

" When we think of a song, we always sing along,
How can you be a Solo, when the team is so strong,
Together we stand, together can never go wrong,
Hensel is the name, that keeps going strong" - ( I stanza )

We are one ( Shining), We are the one ( Driving)
With a common goal & a clear vision
Together we stand, together can never go wrong,
Hensel is the name, that keeps going strong. ( Chorus )


" Dust proof, water proof, the rust proof,
Hensel products are proven and they need no proof,
If there are any - issues to be aloof,
Hensel keeps them, out- of- the- roof" - ( II stanza )

" We are the one....... ( Chorus )

" Enyboard, Enyfit, Enymod, Enycase,
We are an Ace to be in the race,
Its the new Change that grows and gives a pace,
It’s the new ideas, leads us a place - ( III Stanza )

We are one, we have always been the one,
when its dark in the night or the scorching sun,
Together we stand to make Hensel always Shine,
We are one from the same sunshine :)



We got the first prize for this lyrics and composition and the song is currently played in every event as our Corporate song.

A decade of my life!!

Just last month, i completed a decade of my employment with the present company to which i have been emotionally, mentally and truly attached. To think about it, ten years is quite a long long time and to stick with a company for more than ten years is an achievement of its own. There are a lot of people as credits for this milestone achievement and the blog here has just given me an opportunity to express it. After a hopping of around 3 companies in a span of 7 years, I got this opportunity to work for my present employer. With just a strength of three employees in India, including me, was an indication for me that there was a chance of Super growth if everything went well. So did it, executing  my job with dedication, found me on the ladders of success.From a senior engineer in Sales, i climbed up almost every alternate year and today i feel proud to handle a large team of more than 55 people under me. On top, the south east asian operations of our company has opened another vision for everyone in the company including me. If it was not under the leadership of my current boss, I wouldnt have completed my tasks successfully. He made sure the focus never went waywards and believed in me and on my capacity. In return, I ensured the goals were met and together we were able to see our dreams turning into reality. Today, the company is fast growing and so are we. Apart from this, a factor more personal is deeply involved to this success. I have always kept my father as an example. He is spending a retired life now. During his service days, he was extremely talented, less qualified, hard working but was never consistent. He worked for almost every kind of company, be it a chemical company, Inks manufacturing, Printing press, Paints, Construction, Electronics, Travel agency, you name it. In his days, he shuffled companies like hell and the fact remained that he was never successful as there was some or the other problem and he had to quit. From my childhood days, I had seen him struggle and whether you call it a risk or intelligence, I never thought of changing my job so far even when there were some good offers knocking at my door. Thanks to Dad :)

Some of them feel even now that Iam afraid to take risks so I havent yet changed. But I dont care, maybe Iam afraid that i might not succeed in other company or who knows i might get double the success... Anycase, I dont bother to explore these angles as I simply enjoy in what I do.

If a change has to happen, it will happen and would be very natural. For any change there is a lot that depends on circumstances. At the moment, under the present and future anticipations, I see myself retiring with the present company.... Who knows... Maybe or Maybe not...