An Achiever

I would like to start this with a BIG THANKS to my father, who taught me these below lines in my childhood and always stands an example for me to follow in my life.

ఒకచో నేలను పవ్వళించు, నొకచో నొప్పారు ( బూసెజ్జ పై
నొకచో శాకములారగించు, నొకచో నుత్కృష్ట శాల్యోదనం  
బొకచో బొంత థరించు, నొక్కక్కతరిన్ యోగ్యాంబరి శ్రేణి, లె 
క్కకు రానీయడు కార్యసాధకుడు దుఖ్ఖంబున్ నుఖంబున్ మదిన్

Let me share what these lines mean to me. In the journey of life, you travel a lot and we get into various situations and play various roles at different stages. As life is not always a bed of roses, sometimes you don’t get the minimum things that you expect, but still you need to get going to meet and beat the goals that you have set or that are set for you. Those missing hygiene things should never become bottleneck for your achievement. You should never ever lose confidence in you, courage and vision on your ultimate goal. Your aim should only be the one, which should drive you and your work, but not the environment, facilities and other’s support. “Where there is a will there is a way”. So keep going and conquer the world.

Now let me explain what the above Telugu statements, in poem, exactly mean. Even though the above poem mentions about HE, I took the liberty to make that as (S)he, as we all know that ladies are equally capable of achieving.

It doesn’t matter to an Achiever.....

(s)he can sleep on the floor or on a most comfortable soft bed

(s)he can have very minimal food available or a most delicious and fantastic food

(s)he can wear a normal clothing or beautiful and highest value costume

Either its tough time or a smooth sail, when it comes to reach the goal,

It doesn’t matter to an Achiever....

 

So, It’s all within YOU.

Be an Achiever in any circumstances.

A Day without YOU... Oh No.....

 That's 14 March 2015; I was packing all my luggage for my London trip. All arrangements and all checks are done. However, there was something, which brought to my mind repeatedly that I was leaving you at home and you will not be with me for more than 24 hours.

 

How can I take this? You are so close to my heart. Without looking at you, I can’t think of an hour also, I can't even imagine how I can be if you are not with me. This is a BIG thing for me. Do you really think that you can't come with me and stay with me? I never left you alone. I tried my best to keep you engaged. I shared all most all my secrets with you. The first thing I see in the morning is you, as I wake up with your sweet voice. Anything in the world comes as second priority when you call me. I am always there to attend you. My ears are always open for you. I want you to be always in front of my eyes.

If you are not with me, I am like a fish without water. Finally, the time has come to leave you back home and move on. Oh my dear, until I see you again I remain calm and speechless. I see lot of others around me happily talking to their loved ones, but me, walking lonely, watching all of them, thinking about you and your sweet voice, slowly got into the flight.

As the time flies, it was already few hours that I left, I was still not able to digest that fact. When the captain announced to switch off all the electronic devices, I was searching for you. For a moment, I was worried that I lost you. Then I realized that I only left you back at home. Airhostess was anxiously looking at me, as I looked worried and seriously searching in the beginning. As I realized that, I only left you back at home; I relaxed a bit and left a smile to the airhostess. With that, she also was relaxed and moved on with a smile and my journey went on.

Onsite Assignment

      

 

It is quite common to most of the managers that they get lot of queries and requests coming from their team regarding onsite assignments. Some may be to get an opportunity and some may be to resolve a situation at client site. The manager has to place a right candidate at the client location and that person should be able to manage the situation to the maximum extent. Only (s)he should get back offshore management when some additional approvals or some additional consulting input is needed. Not in all cases managers are so fortunate to get the perfect fit candidate for these onsite assignments.

So there is a need to have some guidelines and tips to have a better control on the situation. This can be achieved only when we create and maintain a good relationship with the client personnel we are working and reporting to. It is very easy to say to maintain a good relationship with the client and manage the situation, thereby no or very less escalations from client. But How? You are altogether a new person joining a big group of people. You might be a star performer in your own domain/functional/technical areas, but how will that alone can help you in building a good relationship with the client?

            This is where you need to do some homework before you even get into the position as we do a requirement gathering and analysis before designing the solution. Here in this situation you have to spend some time understanding the environment, client organization culture, laws of the land that you are supposed to work etc., This is the very first step to draw the lines of the court and understand the basic rules of the game.

            Now as you know the boundaries, you should get into the next level of the detail as identifying the teams, sponsors, audience, and the importantly the umpires, who will be watching your play. This step provides you a better picture about the people that you will be dealing with during your stay.

 

            When you know to this level now the next action is to understand how the teams are working each other and what are their strengths & weaknesses. Then get along with the teams. There is a very old evergreen saying “Be a Roman in Rome”. This is very important to understand and implement it. You might be thinking that this is a very normal English statement, but first it is tough to understand what a roman is and secondly to be as a roman.

            Some of the IT companies are conducting cross cultural sensitivity sessions/workshops to the people who are supposed to travel. These things will surely help them to understand the basic rules of the game before they start. These sessions make you ready for the game and help in not being an odd (wo)man out. Below are some tips, but not limited to, help making you one among them and also to be a star performer, at client site, in your strong areas.

·         Know the overall political condition of the country and state.

·         Know the sports/games and teams which are popular locally.

·         Watch little bit news and follow the recently highlighted news

·         Understand the style of the working by observing your client team members closely. For example, some organizations follow their calendars very strictly. You can talk to them only when their calendar has free time.

·         Follow Email etiquettes. You should know who all should be in To/CC/BCC. I suggest a 3C rule. Complete, Concise, Clear.

o   Here is a good site I came across in net while surfing. Just check http://www.101emailetiquettetips.com/index.html

·         Don’t get into any personal level details until you have a clear understanding of the person. Generally they don’t like to talk about personal matters.

 

With these kind of things I am sure you will be able to establish a good position to operate on a daily basis without any issues. But you should not forget you are a star performer at your own strong areas. Now this is the time you should you need to showcase your specialization and make sure that is properly presented to the right people at the right time. Most of the client appreciate if you can come with any value add with your previous experience. The value add can be based on your domain/functional/technical expertise. But as I said earlier you have time it very carefully and chose the right set of people. Any small mistake in this will backfire in multiple direction. You might have heard about the “Gold Plating”. So be careful my friend!

When you have all the above in place, there is another thing that you should have in mind always is “YOU” are representing your parent organization more than an individual. Anything and everything that you do at client’s place will have an immediate and direct impact. Mind you this can be positive and negative.

There is a huge team sitting at offshore and supporting you in various ways, so you can perform well to get the success to organization and also to yourself. So you should have due respect towards the unconditional support you are getting. This is all about “Give and Take”. Without this you will not be successful even though you are a star performer individually. Ultimately it is the TEAM (Together Everyone Achieves More) that wins. To quote an example, in the case of F1 race the driver who is reaching the winning finish line is one individual, but there will be a big team to make that happen.

So to conclude, know the ground, game rules, teams and play well to win. Wish you a grand success in your career.   

Cheers

Arun Kiran Ponnekanti - PMP

 

An Idea fish

One day a new fish was brought into an aquarium. His name is Mr.Idea. When a new fish enters into a new aquarium he has to face lot of challenges.

First and most important thing is the Environment. The fish has to live in it and grow. Idea takes birth and gets into a team, the environment plays a vital role to absorb and Idea to get into action. Testing the waters is an important thing. Before we jump on with a big bang approach, we need to test and then get the pulse, see the results and then get into the big game with enough knowledge.

A new fish should also find fellows, who like and accept as a friend to believe and to be with. Idea should be accepted by the team and also believe in it. Without which the life of Idea is very tough.

Don't come to a conclusion as some times Idea seems to be dull and not so active. It may take time for team to understand Idea or it may take some time for Idea to get in sync with the environment. Once these are done, Idea may be active and moving around. We need to understand where and how this Idea works or more active.

When Idea entered into the aquarium, this was small and new. but over a period of time, it has grown big and strong. Every one knows Idea and he can bring new positive energy into the team and start to lead and influence the rest.

Ideas are always powerful. we need to see where and with what group we are presenting. That is very important point to notice. As we all know that all types of fishes can't fit in the same aquarium. There are certain types of fishes only can gel well. So use Ideas wisely. place them where they take their right place and grow and give you a great results.

Those 7 Hours

 

Those 7 Hours

A moment comes to every one where one has to take a quick decision. These moments will be unique and there is a great chance that sometimes these may open doors for some great opportunities. At those situation it is completely with YOU how to react to that situation and manage the change and plan. Not all times we get enough time to analyze the change and do an impact analysis and then act on it, either to accept or reject. With this context set, let me share my experience with such a moment and the opportunity that tapped me, on 28th Oct 2014, during the travel [USA-UK-Hyd] back from PMI North America Leadership Institute Meeting (LIM) 2014 

As per the schedule I finished the LIM sessions, finished all the shopping and then headed towards the Phoenix airport. Enjoyed the beautiful sunset on the way to airport. Reached the airport and said bye to my friend and walked in to the check-in counters. As I have plenty of time, I was walking slowly to the gate holding the boarding pass. I was prepared that I will be alone…  But a few steps later, I saw Manoj, President, PMI North India chapter. He was also travelling back to Delhi, India in the same flight. He conveyed the message that the flight is delayed by 30 min. So there we had a quick cappuccino. There was a possible risk of missing the connecting flight. Already there’s very less time, on top of that another 30 minutes delay, it’s sure that I will miss the connecting flight. But I had no other option but to reach London and see what could be done. This is where we say “we will cross the bridge when it comes”. When Manoj and I went to the boarding gate, we saw Tajas, PMI Regional mentor for Region 11, already waiting there along with his daughter for the same flight and from there flying to Mumbai. Manoj and Tejas have their connecting flights with 7 hours wait time at London.

While boarding I checked with the staff regarding the delay. A standard answer came from them saying that pilot will cover it up during the flight. We were already running 45 minutes late. And it will be too much to expect to get to London an hour before and still be able to meet the time to catch Hyderabad flight. Proceeded to boarding leaving that tension to landing time at London.

With the timeline we can clearly see that we are going to miss the flight for sure. As we were thinking about the next plans, I heard pilot saying all the connection flights with shorter gap were rebooked through a different route. And he also said that the details will be given by the ground staff. Finally we reached London and as expected it is already late to catch Hyderabad flight. So rushed to the counters to confirm our rebooking. We were given the next earliest flight to Hyderabad via Delhi. There are 7 hours to Delhi flight. Along with me another three people who came along to these counters and working on the same. They are Kalyan, Deepa & Archana. Our introduction happened over the counters while taking the rerouted boarding passes. As we had lot of time we thought it would be great if we can go out and move around in London streets. But that needs UK transit VISA. We only have feeble chance of getting a transit visa, but we didn’t want to leave that chance. Soon after we got the connecting flight tickets, we rushed to UK boarder counter.

Our confidence is that we have Kalyan, who has US green card and also UK visa, and Archana has US citizenship. So with these two along with Deepa and myself, as a team we can request for a transit visa. Sometimes we need to think Out of the Box, and do some experiments. If not we will end up doing the same old things and you will not be able explore any new thing in life. Finally we went to UK boarder counter and explained him the situation and could convince him to give us the transit visa for 24 hours. With this we could walk on the streets of London. This was an exciting experience like doing a new project with a very much boxed timeline and open scope and completely new team members working together towards a common goal. In our team the decisions were taken very sharp. Used all the resources available, calculated risks and revisited them in a periodic intervals. Kept reminding the end goal with in the team again and again. Kept motivating each other, appreciating the skills and strengths of each other. As the team was also very new to each other, best utilized the idle time to discuss and understand more.

Finally we could travel in Bus, walked on the roads and travelled back by underground train with in given time. Had a great experience, which was not at all in the scope when we have started our journey. So Be ready for CHANGE and handle carefully to get the BEST out of it!!