Superpowers to overpower bosses

In a rosy life of a corporate employee, there’s always a villain. Unlike any villain you have seen in movies or comics, this villain generally has a good taste in fashion and ‘your blood’. I will lose the bet if I ask you to guess, because you already have him in your life – Your Boss.

Dressed in black as ‘the Satan’, he pokes you with the trident of his evil taunts, make you feel nervous when you had it under control, finds faults in you, your work and attitude; in short, tries to belittle you at every step, just to prove who’s boss.

What is the best way to give it back to him? Turn into a HULK and call it a ‘Clobbering Time’!? ‘Hulk-Turning-Thought’ always reminds me of a question asked by my friend once– ‘Do you have spare clothes before you turn to Hulk?’.  An intelligent argument indeed – Be prepared before you wage a war. Carrying a pair of clothes, and hatred too, all the time with me wasn’t a very good idea, so I dropped the idea of being Hulk. We still have lot of Superheroes left that I can be!

Next in my list of inspiring superheroes, were Catwoman – Scratch my boss’s face and run off, HellBoy – Punch my boss right in face with my rock-fist, Human Torch – set ablaze my boss’s hair so that he looks like Hades - his real self, posses a hammer like Thor and strike right on his head to set things right inside. But, all these are Image Destroying for my boss and me both! I should be smart enough to end the war and the enemy in one single attempt. And this requires for great deal of planning.

There’re two ways to win a war with your boss –befriend him, win his trust and make sure it remains so, and the other way is to destroy him completely. The first way is always amicable and actually the best way – the Mr.Fantastic way, however, there are two factors to consider; you need to have real low Ego-Quotient and secondly, not all bosses deserve your amity.  For the second way, unless you know you are more powerful than your boss, don’t charge. But if you are at higher grounds then make just one perfect move to get it all leveled with him, a swift move!

So, in any of the two ways of war you first need to know your Boss. Till then lie low like Batman or Spiderman would have. Find out what are his strengths, weaknesses, is he worth sparing and offering your friendship to him, what he thinks about you, who else can be your ally in this endeavor. You also need to find your strengths and weaknesses.  You need to be very detailed in this phase, more the information the better you can plan. Once you have all this information first decide on should you be offering your friendship or cry out loud for war.

A little ego-balm can work wonders to win your boss’s favor. Be known that avoiding conflict is the best way to win it, and of course one less foe to worry about.

Should you find yourself in a beyond repair situation, tie your laces for bulldozing. Compare your strengths and weaknesses with your boss. Find out where the boss can attack, device a plan for defense. Use your strengths. Keep a dash of surprise element. Hit the boss where he least expects it. Most importantly, plan all this stealthily. That’s the Batman way. Equip yourself with best possible defense and attack plans. Make sure you are not overconfident like Iron Man, as not all possess the intelligence like a superhero. Be vigilant like Hawk-eye, as your boss can attack in return; always try to find what he’s up to – dig in like Agent Romanoff would; be flexible to give it back to your boss for his advancements like Mr.Fantastic. In the end, all that matters is that you end it swiftly before anyone can notice.

Bosses are unique creatures, not all have same traits, so find the best way to deal with him using the superpowers of your superheroes; be a Marvel!

Parting note to bosses who are reading this – The need to read this article will never arise if you can be good to your team, blend in and win confidence of your subordinates. Make office a happy place to work, or else be ready for a Superhero! 

And here's your Facebook movie!!

Throughout human history we have seen man finding innovative ways to express himself, first through sounds and gesture; then these sounds became more complex - giving birth to words, words soon became statements and statements became sentences. This gradual development of expression brought forth the need to document thoughts, and as we all know that need is the mother of all inventions, we had script or symbols for each expression soon. First it started as the symbols on the caves of distant ancestors of homo sapiens around sixteen thousand years ago after the last ice-age, which grew more and more complex by 3000 B.C. Caves, mud tablets, carvings on stones, papyrus, palm leaves etc all have our historical expressions recorded.

These methods though being very effective in expressing oneself lacked to fulfill one key motive - addressing the masses or in other words broadcast. But we are humans, every challenge is a new opportunity for us. We made paper and later printing techniques to overcome it. We had newspapers by the end of industrial revolution in Europe!

And that's how it all started. Now we have satellites, televisions, radio, internet, twitter, facebook, wassap, telephones, mobile phones and so many other tools to broadcast our thoughts. But does world really need all of it , is a matter of debate.

When TV came to existence, people liked the idea of being entertained; however a set of visionaries realized that this can't address the need of humans for communication. They said how much ever we be laughing , we will still be alone watching it. So true. They knew we human always need a two way interaction when it comes to expressing their thoughts. But why are we ignorant! Or may be we know it but somehow don't accept this fact.

At my home, we had an unchallenged rule enforced by my father that we won't watch TV while having food. This was considered family time and a time for recap of our daily lives, sharing our ideas and thoughts, fruitful enough to have a strong family bond. He knew the significance of direct communication. He's not the only one who knows this, corporate world revolves around this idea too. There must be a reason why we still have meetings in our offices though emails are considered to be the legal/formal way to communicate. We can't deny the fact that personal touch to any communication makes it more effective. Social networking sites lack that personal touch, and I don't blame it. Technology always will be a step behind a man's imagination. Networking sites were created with an intention to make it easier to communicate between friends. However, it has somehow turned into a graveyard of stale thoughts, photos and conversation that no one cares about.

When the first time my generation was introduced to Orkut, all we cared about was how many testimonials have we got from our friends; we competed for the count of friends we had. If not that, it was used to spy on whoever made to the publicity chart in school. And soon enough we got bored of these games. Orkut didn't have much to offer and we had its competitors by then in market - namely - Facebook and Twitter.
We had more options here like tagging people in uploaded photographs and statuses including them in events of our lives. I have seen people sharing almost everything on these sites from when they sneezed to how many pairs of shoes they have bought; and to my astonishment there are people liking their statuses and commenting on them. Newest tool to highlight your boastful presence on FB is to have your 'Facebook Movie', which just goes over the board to show your Aww-some-est moments. Whoever has posted this movie on their wall, should know that their life is interesting but not so much to be publicized in such a hilarious fashion; or if this is about you want it as a reminder about your good moments then, there's a need to realize that either your mind has stopped registering the happy moments of your life or that your life is so shallow that it needs proof of your happiness and 'likes' of your friends to testify that those were real good moments. In both of these cases, the world is not even a percent interested in your movie.

Studies have been conducted, and found that social networking sites have done more damage than good for your happiness-quotient. More and more photos and statuses are posted by individuals about their happy moments, without realizing that it triggers a comparison in mind of their own 'friends', which not always has positive result. It is an accepted fact that people won't showcase their failures, so what we see on these sites is one's life seen through rosy glasses. And we fall pray to these superficial portrayal of lives, weaving our own lives online to compete in these baseless battles of boasts endlessly.

I seek an answer to this problem once and for all. I want people to know no matter how advanced the technology can become we will still rely on the personal touch when it comes to communication. I am not against the Social Networking on internet, but I want people to use this power more effectively and restrain from broadcasting the information people don't need. Long talk over a cup of coffee with your friend is always a better idea than to digitally 'poke' him for a hello. Rest is up to you to decide......

The latest IT Trap

One of the most influential economic sectors in India, the IT sector, has come up with their newest weapon to harness (I insist you read it as harass in capitals) the true potential of its Resources. Please do note that we, the people working in IT in India, are mere ‘Resources’, and we truly deserve this name due to our over-the-board competitive spirit.

India has been in constant battle with her ‘Yellow’ neighbors in field of IT for a considerable time now, and they have proved to be worthy contenders. China’s minimalist labor laws, and Philippines’ low cost resources have put forth a mammoth challenge for India's IT market to provide low cost, and high quality IT solutions. And thus began a war, where only entity making the sacrifices is the Resource (be it of any country).

In 2008, a trend of 9 working hours a day came to picture; a decision taken by almost all IT companies in India unanimously to so called provide economical solutions to our clients. Technically, it means your company asks you to be in office and work for 10 hours, as they don't think eating food (the one hour lunch time) is productive for their resources. With a fear of losing their jobs in recession, IT professionals accepted this change with a heavy heart. Not that we don't like our companies or work, it is more about their hypocrisy - At one point they advocate about your work-life balance and on the other hand they just throw it off the balance by such inhuman expectations.

 It is an untold rule in IT firms, that if you need a promotion, get visible which necessarily doesn't mean - 'by your good work'. Now, I don't have the liberty to mention all of them, however the most common among them is 'Pretense'. Yes, pretending that they work a lot and that they work late sacrificing the precious moments they could have spent with friends and family. I have just one argument or rather advice for these Pretenders - 'Do something about your low productivity, Dude!!'. I fail to fathom what our Masters think about it. Working more than the working hours means any of these - the resource is incompetent - 'A misfit', resource is new to work - 'Benefit of Doubt', he's been given more work than he can handle - 'A beast of burden' (bring in the HRs who claim the company is best in work-life balance here and of course the leadership that fails to estimate correctly!), or a plain 'pretender', to name a few. I have seen all types in my 6 years of career in IT, but the biggies haven't, or they just ignore!?

But, the main reason for me to write about IT miseries is not all this. The last nail in the coffin was when I found out that many companies have now started spying on you like the insecure wives. When you enter the office premise, how much time you were in breakout area or cafeteria, when you are leaving the office, when you logged into your system, which sites you visited (Ok! that is one place I think they are doing the right thing. IT guys can't be trusted!). You get an Angry-Email if you are found that your productive hours found in system are less than the norm. Wow! None sends any email when people work all night and weekends to make unrealistic deadlines met, and I can't even question why as I don't know the Organizational Strategies (big word! just learnt a few days ago, so thought of showing off).

I am fine with such arrangement if they agree that they won't ask me to work overtime without a compensation (I work for money, no charities please!), they won't ask me to sacrifice my precious sleep when system goes down at wee hours, and if they don't ask me to work on weekends or holidays. I understand a few people do dupe the company, but there are better ways of tackling it. Having such inhuman rules will only make it difficult to love one's job, specially in IT where half the junta doesn't like what they are doing for a living.

It is a sincere request to all the leaderships of IT firms in India to reconsider and find 'out-of-the-box approach' (yeah biggies, it's the payback time) to deal with the situation, than making such annoying rules that can backfire. Till then, I will just work with my mind, not heart.

Am I just a number?

My birth timestamped almost 28 years ago, a proof of my existence, is nothing but a mere paper; so will be my death certificate, and in between there will be so many phases, all either identified by a number or a date.

Before I can even start counting on my finger, I was given a number to identify me in the class. I wasn't the only one with a number. All my friends were roll numbers in the attendance sheet as well. Our presence in class was recorded against these numbers. As a kid, I never thought about giving it a personal touch but now in retrospect I think the idea of calling out the names would have been a good ice breaker move for teachers. But we Indians are 'too good with numbers', and lack the same passion when it comes to being sensitive to other's emotions.

Somehow my mind adapted to remember me as a number....roll no 4, roll number 32 and then some complex roll numbers like 2003ELX2704. To my relief, I was never a number for my friends, however there were a different set of numbers that took precedence. These numbers defined how popular you can be in your class. Yes, you got it right - the Ranks! This number not only was an indicator of your 'Teacher's Pet Quotient' but also, the count of friends you have was directly proportional to it, unless your 'coefficient of arrogance' is too high to defy this formula.

All along I have just juggled between such combination of digits - Roll number, Marks, Percentage, Ranks, Seat numbers, my salary, all were part of it. Then came numbers with bigger impacts - 'to the world', the numbers we see in news. Some good, some bad. I have seen new records being created for tallest buildings and longest bridges - pretty numbers. However, some numbers are not that pretty, they bring tears in my eyes. Skewed Sex Ratio in India, Ratio of Cancer Patients to healthy in the US of A, Counts of Cities hit by calamities to name a few.

We didn't stop here to count, we made human lives a count too. 'Thousands' of lives were lost in typhoon Haiyan, and they were just a number in news. Every time a calamity like this happens, all we see on our TV screens is a counter to keep a track of dead bodies, just like the way they do in elections. Those who broadcast the news forget that the people they are talking about are not just any-'bodies', they were part of someone's world, they were part of someone's happy moments. They are no entities, they were lives, they can't just be counts.

I refuse to be a mere number or a count, rephrase, I refuse to be a whole number. And yes I am not, I am part(fraction) of my family, I am a Speed Dial number in my friend's phones, I am natural number to those who know me and my crazy mind and I am definitely a complex number for who don't.
My existence might owe a bit to numbers, but my presence is much bigger than these digits. You don't etch numbers on someone's heart, it's your love for them that is; and that is tattooed all over the memories of my family and friends.

I am definitely not just a number!

Miss you my Sister

एक अजब बैचैनी , एक अलग ही एहसास है,
वो लम्हा मिलने का अब इतना जो पास है,
हर दिन सोचा करते थे कैसे मिलेगे उस पल 
अब दिन कम गिन कर मन फ़िर से उदास है।

ये काम - ये दूरी, दुनिया भर की मजबूरी,
सौ बहाने पास, सब तुमसे बने ज़रूरी,
हाय! पछताये मन, तरसे दरस को तेरे 
बिन तेरे जीने की हर चाह है अधूरी।

अब छोड के आऊगी मतलबी ये फ़ेरे,
अब न बनेगे बहाने मेरी खुशियो के लुटेरे,
बस कुछ दिन बाकी हैं, गुज़र जायेगे,
फ़िर गले लगाऊगी बहेना प्यार से तुझे मै मेरे 

कलयुगी मानव

कलपुरजों का एक उपासक,
है यही कलयुगी लोभी मानव,
संवेदना से परे विचरता,
ना जीने सा जीवन जीता.


था कभी यह भी जीवन्त,
पर इच्छाएँ भी थी अनन्त.
बस धन-जन-शक्ति पाने में,
मिट गया यह आप मिटाने में.
          
मशीनों सा अब चलता है ,
दिल धड़कता नही खटकता है.
सोने की देह, हृदय पाषाण,
बस काया है , छूमन्तर प्राण,
खाली आखें मृत अतृप्त ,
पर फ़िर भी कहें हम संतृप्त .           
   

नभ तेरी हो जाऊँ मैं

ये पंख देख इतराऊँ मैं ,
मन मुस्काऊँ, लजा जाऊँ मैं,
रन्गबिरन्गे इन परों को आज पसार,
अब नभ तेरी हो जाऊँ मैं.
 

देख पवन पर खुजलाऊँ मैं,
चाहे मन हवा हो जाऊँ मैं,
कर बेडियाँ स्वातंत्र्य पर निसार,
अब नभ तेरी हो जाऊँ मैं.

नीले इस अंबर खो जाऊँ मैं,
हर दुख से लुक-छुप जाऊँ मैं,
बस तेरा ही प्राभुत्व कर स्वीकार,
अब नभ तेरी हो जाऊँ मैं.

aakrosh

दो सांस ज़रा भर लेने दो मेरे इस सीने में,

जान अभी बाकी है इस ज़र्ज़र् पिजरे में ।

दो कदम चल लडखडाता है, गिर पडता है,

पर हिम्मत अभी बाकी है, हार रहे इस दिल में।

तानो के गलियारो में, मीठे बोलो की उम्मीद नही

सपनो की धुन्ध छुपाये इन नकली चेहरो को, वही सही।

ये बिकते ज़मीरो के बाज़ार में, रोशनी भी बेबस है

इन नापाक अन्धेरो के सब, पर, मै इनकी गुलाम नही।

 

आज धूल में घुली सही, कल मै बन आन्धी आऊन्गी ,

दुनिया के उसूल को तज के, खुद के नियम बनाऊन्गी।

फ़िर ये मौखल मेरा उडाने वाले अन्धेरे में खो जायेगे,

मै रौशन, रौशनी मै, मै सूरज बन जाऊगी।

माँ - पिता

जिन उँगलियों को पकड़ कर चलना सीखा ,
आज उन्हें छोड़ किस्मत के पीछे भाग रही हूँ ।
जिन हाथों में अपने सहारे पाती थी मैं ,
आज उन्हीं से इतनी दूर जा चुकी हूँ।

जिस लोरी में मैं अपनी नींद तलाशती थी ,
आज वही सुनने को तरस जाती हूँ ।
जिस डांट से मैं बरसों भगा करती थी ,
आज वही वक्त से चुनने की कोशिश करती हूँ।

जिनको कभी अपनी आंखों से दूर न करती थी ,
आज उनकी तस्वीर से यादों की धूल हटाती हूँ।
जिनकी सीख से मेरी दुनिया रौशन होती थी,
आज भी मैं वही दिये जलाती हूँ।

जिनकी गोद में मेरी नींद जगह पाती थी ,
आज तकिये को वही समझ सो जाती हूँ।
जिनकी जिंदगी मेरे नखरे उठाते बीती थी,
आज भी उन्हीं से कुछ तोहफे मांगती हूँ।

जिनको हर पल मेरी याद सताती है ,
आज मैं उन्हें एक बात बताती हूँ ।
'जितने भी दूर हुए तोह क्या ,
आज अपने में मैं आपको ही पाती हूँ ।

एक पतंग : हौसले बुलंद

देख , एक टुक उस कागज़ के टुकड़े को ,
तो कभी आसमान में उड़ती पतंग के मुखड़े को ,
मन में अजब सी उलझन जगी ,
ऐसा क्या इस पतंग में - जो यह नभ में भगी?


मैं बताऊँ ,
उसमें थी छिपी मेहनत , बनाने वाले की,
और
हौसला अफजाई उसे उडाने वाले की,
हवा के झोंकों में उड़ी, जैसे नाव तरंग में,
मैंने देखी वह पतंग , जिसके हौसले बुलंद थे.

Yaadien

बीते लम्हों को याद कर , होंठों पर मुस्कान तो आती है ,

पर यह तो बताओ उन यादों से , यह आखें क्यों भर आती हैं ।

वो पल जो बिताये साथ साथ , गुदगुदा तो देते हैं ,

पर वही पल , आँचल भी क्यों भिगो देते हैं।

बहुतों से मिले , बहुतों से मिलते हैं,

पर हर किसी में तुमको ही क्यों ढूंढते हैं ।

तुमको आज भी मुझे समझाने के लिए ढूंढती हूँ,

पर फ़िर खामोशियों से ही समझ लेती हूँ।

मिलने के वादे तो हज़ार होंगे ,

पर जब तक हम हैं आप मेरी यादों में होंगे.....