Last October,the Entrepreneurship cell of IIT-Kharagpur,as the last lap of it's 20-day long country-wide Entrepreneurship Awareness Drive,visited our college,IISWBM.A talk-session on entrepreneurship was organized on this occasion,where the panel comprosed of renowned entrepreneurs like Sailen Chatterjee,Head of Lokenath Chatterjee & sons,Sanjay Jain,MD of TT limited and Abhishek Rungta,founder & CEO of Indus Net Technologies.All of them literally mesmerized the audience,comprising of b-school students from across Kolkata as well as budding entrepreneurs.
All the speakers pointed out the key-requirements to be a successful entrepreneur as:
1.Zeal to do something new & the preseverence to see through the odds.
2.Propensity for risk-taking.
3.Financial Backing
4.Networking Ability
While Sailen Chatterjee touched upon the pre-conceived notions of people that come your way,when you inherit a business,Sanjay Jain emphasized on the self-belief & dedication required to achive one's dream by giving examples like that of Rashmi Bansal,Founder-editor of 'JAM' & author of 'Stay Hungry,Stay Foolish',the best-seller on entrepreneurs,who incidentally was his classmate at IIM-A.Ahishek Rungta's speech was particularly inspiring as he narrated how one day's visit to a career-fair changed his life & his company was formed on the spot,which eventually has become one of the top emerging SME's of the country.The three self-made entrepreneurs,all form Kolkata,ironically a place not really known for whole-heartedly endorsing entrepreneurship,truely churned out an inspirational session through their stories of courage & determination in their own lives.
This session actually reminded me of the first seminar that I attended at IISWBM,where the guest was Navneet Beheti,who when the zonal manager of ICICI bank,was bitten by the entrepreneurship-bug,and left his cosy job to start a real-estate marketing company,Four Walls.In many ways,I could relate with the ordeal of leaving a comfort-level to pursue greater aspirations as I,myself,was going through the transition from an IT-professional to a b-school student.When you get used to getting salary every month & a definite lifestyle,suddenly if you see that you've stopped earning& your schedule goes haywire,it does take a toll.But,having said that,..it's all for the larger picture I guess.
Friday, December 23, 2011
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
An 'insight' into employee-psyche
Last September,I,as an MHRM-student in IISWBM had the chance to attend the HR-section of the annual corporate panel-discussion of the MBA-department,'Insight'.The HR-discussion addressed the topic of employee-retention.Industry-honcho's like Bhaskar Das,EX VP-HR,Cognizant,Sujoy Banerjee,VP-HR,Macknally Bharat & Subroto Deb,Manager-HR,Balmer & Lawrie enlightened the audience as they came up with varied experiences of theirs which expressed extremely profound feelings.
Special concern was raised on the decreasing level of employee-tolerance in contemporary industrial-scenario...as with rapid globalization & MNC's zeroing in on India as the cheap outsourcing option,there's really no dearth of opportunities for professionals now to switch companies if they wish to.Even if they stay back,5-6 years of service,seem to become the elligibility to expect a long-service award,specially in young industries like IT.Therefore,it becomes an uphill task for the HR-folks to find ways to retain employees,satisfying their 'conditional loyalty'.
However,from my personal experience in Cognizant,where I had come across managers who have stayed back in the same company for as long as 12-15 years on an average,still makes me believe that employee-loyalty is not an outdated trait.It goes to show the impact a truely transparent organizationl environment can have on employees,primarily by dint of effective enabling of work-life balance & sheer comfort-level of interaction amongst employees,irrespective of designations.
Special concern was raised on the decreasing level of employee-tolerance in contemporary industrial-scenario...as with rapid globalization & MNC's zeroing in on India as the cheap outsourcing option,there's really no dearth of opportunities for professionals now to switch companies if they wish to.Even if they stay back,5-6 years of service,seem to become the elligibility to expect a long-service award,specially in young industries like IT.Therefore,it becomes an uphill task for the HR-folks to find ways to retain employees,satisfying their 'conditional loyalty'.
However,from my personal experience in Cognizant,where I had come across managers who have stayed back in the same company for as long as 12-15 years on an average,still makes me believe that employee-loyalty is not an outdated trait.It goes to show the impact a truely transparent organizationl environment can have on employees,primarily by dint of effective enabling of work-life balance & sheer comfort-level of interaction amongst employees,irrespective of designations.
Monday, December 19, 2011
In retrospect
As I complete almost 6 months in an almost 60-year old institute in a 300 year old city where I've spent 24 years of my life...I can't but feel reminiscent of all the good & bad times that I've spent here.From studying in the world's erstwhile biggest school to working in a Fortune-500 Company,from early-morning cricket-coaching to late night working-shifts...Kolkata had it all in store for me.
...the roller-coaster that life is,coincidentally the best & worst phases in my life have happened here ,one after the other.The first being mostly sitting at home & cursing recession...& the next just like the ray of bright light at the end of every dark tunnel...my stint with Cognizant...undoutedly the best tenure in my life.
Having always stayed at South Kolkata,done college & worked at Saltlake,travelling all the way from Kasba to College Street was really taking a toll on me initially.But,now I've started liking the uncanny 'north kolkata'-ambience with it's dilapidated buildings which rarely fall down or it's petty-traffic infested narrow lanes which struggle to avoid accidents...the 'boipara' smell & the cheap food outlets...the congestion doesn't make me claustrophobic anymore.In fact,more importantly,I've started liking being a student once again...the b-school life with all it's aspirations & apprehensions compel me to say 'cheers' to the unpredictability of life.
...the roller-coaster that life is,coincidentally the best & worst phases in my life have happened here ,one after the other.The first being mostly sitting at home & cursing recession...& the next just like the ray of bright light at the end of every dark tunnel...my stint with Cognizant...undoutedly the best tenure in my life.
Having always stayed at South Kolkata,done college & worked at Saltlake,travelling all the way from Kasba to College Street was really taking a toll on me initially.But,now I've started liking the uncanny 'north kolkata'-ambience with it's dilapidated buildings which rarely fall down or it's petty-traffic infested narrow lanes which struggle to avoid accidents...the 'boipara' smell & the cheap food outlets...the congestion doesn't make me claustrophobic anymore.In fact,more importantly,I've started liking being a student once again...the b-school life with all it's aspirations & apprehensions compel me to say 'cheers' to the unpredictability of life.
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