Friday, October 9, 2015

Eraviperur Gram Panchayat, a Perfect Development Model:

This is an amazing story of not one, but a string of successes achieved by Eraviperur Gram Panchayat (Village Council) located in a remote part of Kerala, India. 

In four years it achieved complete digitization of its public administration functions. Certificates (birth, death, marriage) are issued same day, within minutes of receiving applications. 

Among other achievements are, free Wi-Fi to the public within accessible range, touch screen public kiosks for tracking files, ultra modern record rooms, bio gas plant, plastic shredding units, sanitation parks, and many others. A very interesting achievement is the use of shredded plastic along with tar in road works. That is quite an innovation towards reuse and environment conservation.

This Panchayat has also won string of awards of excellence for services related to health care, sanitation, bio-diversity conservation, high tech green village. Here is another uninque distinction it has achieved. This Panchayat is ISO-9001 certified for its Primary Health Center, perhaps it is the only one.

All these things achieved in just four years. Truly, Eraviperur Panchayat can easily inspire and serve as a model for every other Panchayat and Municipalities in the country.

What is commendable is the team spirit between the administration and the public. There were dialogues and open discussions and an enviable cooperation between administration, the opposition party and the public. 

It just goes to show that anything can be achieved without making a big noise about it, even by a government body. All it needs is a "will", honesty and integrity to succeed. 

Kudos to the administration of Eraviperur Gram Panchayat and to its people, especially to the Panchayat president N. Rajeev  for leading the pack so successfully.

Thanks to this source for this incredible story: The News Minute: Eraviperur Gram Panchayat Digitization

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

Unexpected act of kindness

This is an incident that happened almost twenty years ago but I still remember it very distinctly. My contract had ended with the organization I was working with. I had option of choosing from couple of offers for a job change. I was quite keen on one of them. But as the recruitment procedures were taking more time than expected, I decided to wait for the completion of formalities for the new job of my choice and hence had to leave Oman.

I did not want to sell my car as I was certain of returning, hence I decided to transfer it in the name of a friend for safe keeping until my return. My car was in joint ownership of the organization and myself. Therefore, I needed letter from the organization to transfer the ownership to my friend.

It is not a secret that many organizations in this region carry a “colonial” attitude in dealing with their employees. Most managers go around with a demeanor that of a dictator. They literally treat the employees as slaves. There was this invisible sword of “sacking” hanging always over one’s head. They would resort to everything possible to make things difficult for the employee. Things may have changed now for the better. I would not know as I have been very fortunate to be working with organizations that valued the worth of its employees, since I left this organization.

It was the last working day of the week, closing time was 1:00 PM. I was quite apprehensive of things moving slowly, hence I went to the transport office first thing in the morning. As expected,  nobody gave me definite answer on when I would get the letter. Finally after following it up several times, I got the letter along with "end of service settlement" around 11:30 AM. I went to the bank, encashed the settlement cheque and rushed to the Vehicle Registration Office. I had to hurry because the office closed at 1:00 PM.

The Vehicle Registration Office was more crowded than usual, as it was the last day of the week. I had to complete three procedures, application form verification, fee payment and transfer completion. As I was standing in the queue, I kept glancing at my watch. Finally after what seemed like an eternity, I got my application verified and moved over to the payment counter. By then it was almost 12:30 PM and there were only three men ahead of me. I heaved a sigh of relief, as I stood awaiting my turn. And then, it happened! 

The whole place went dark, it was a power outage. I stood there dazed and stunned, wondering "oh no, what will happen now, it was already approaching closing time, what will happen to my car"! I was jolted back to reality by a voice coming from somewhere behind the counters. Then I realized that the whole place had become empty and I was the lone man left standing in the darkness. I felt so stupid! As I looked towards the direction from where the voice seemed to come, I saw a police officer addressing me and asking what was wrong. I explained my situation to him, that I had to transfer the car in my friend’s name before I left the country that evening.

The police officer took my application and told me to come to the rear entrance of the building. I rushed out and went around the building looking for the rear entrance. It was a restricted area, entry allowed only for police personnel. As I approached the rear entrance, I saw the police officer standing in the hot Sun with a file in his hand. As I approached him, he handed over the transfer completion document and a manually prepared receipt for cash payment. I gave him the money and took the document, thanking him profusely. He just smiled and said “no problem, go”.

The police personnel in Oman are extremely courteous. Even if you are pulled up, the first thing they would do is greet you with “Salam Alaikum”, followed by hand shake and then only they get down to business. It is really very heart warming, something quite different as compared with what happens around some parts of the world. Of course as the saying goes, “you can always find few rotten apples in every basket”. But, it is better to cherish the good experiences and forget the bad ones.

But I was too flabbergasted at what just happened. It was absolutely unbelievable that someone, a police officer at that, would go to such an extent to help you out in such a situation. He could have just as well looked the other way and carried on with his work. But he chose to empathize with the state of quandary I was in. Something really extraordinary! 

Later when I returned to Oman, I went looking for the kind police officer. I remembered him only by his face. I searched, but could not locate him. I tried to look for him during subsequent visits but coild not find him. Either he had been moved to another department or location or he had retired. However, to this day, I cherish his act of kindness.

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Sunday, October 4, 2015

A matter of words and context!

Adesh Srivastava, the Hindi film composer and singer, passed away on 5th September 2015, a day after he turned 50! May his soul rest in peace!

It is such a coincidence that just a few days ago, I was made to watch a video in which Adesh Srivastava was present! Why I was made to watch that video, is quite interesting!

Our development team was preparing for the demonstration of one the systems to a new group of users. At the end of the preparation, one of the programmer was requesting me to be present during the system demonstration. He said it would give them confidence to do a good presentation. I replied that they have become experts on the system, hence, there was no need for my presence.

One of the programmers, said “we want you to be there so that you can give us ‘history’ after the presentation”. I could not quite understand what he was trying to convey. The other team members stared with puzzled looks as well. We thought that, he was having difficulty in using the right terminology, may be getting confused with some other word!

To make us understand what he was talking about, he started playing a video on YouTube. It was a video of an Omani singer, Asma Mohammed Rafi, who was one of the participants in one of the seasons of SaReGaMaPa TV musical show. I remembered that season, it was one of the most entertaining of seasons, more so because of the Omani singer! But I was quite flabbergasted why the programmer was showing us that video. What was the connection between a system presentation and a musical show! He looked at our confused faces and said, “Wait, wait, it will come”.

At the end of the song, the judges started giving grades for the song rendition. Adesh Srivastava, one of the judges, was the first to judge and he gave “History” grade, the highest grade.  At that moment it dawned on me what the programmer was trying to convey! He wanted me to be present during the system demonstration and give my assessment of their presentation. I started laughing at the whole thing!

The programmer was right in what he was trying to convey but it did not make sense to me until he showed the video. The word “history” has its many standard meanings as we know, but in that season of SaReGaMaPa, “History” was one of the grades for judging the songs, others being “Hit” and “Superhit”.

It just goes to show, that it is not just the words that are important, but also the context which is more important! Because, sometimes a word spoken out of context, could convey entirely a different meaning and could even create utter confusion and chaos, sometimes even misery!


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The power of saying "NO"!

In 1909, Harry Gordon Selfridge came up with the phrase “The customer is always right” as a business strategy to attract and please his customers. Which translates into saying "YES" to whatever the customer wants. Unfortunately that strategy does not always work.

Sometimes, you have to say "NO". There is more power in saying "NO"!

Sometimes we come across people who are impossible to deal with. They make all sorts of unreasonable demands and suggestions based on misdirected assumptions and most of the time, due to ignorance and even arrogance due to their positions. I have come across several such people in my professional experience.

Some clients are so unreasonable and bull headed, that no amount of convincing and arguing helps. It is absolutely useless to even try to convince them. Whatever you try, it only ends up in utter waste of time. To such clients, it is better to simply say a big “no” or even to say “take a hike” or “go fly a kite”!

During implementing a system, the management of our client had appointed a Senior IT Person for coordinating the project. During initial stages of the project itself I was quite apprehensive on the success of the project because of this person’s obnoxious behavior. Fortunately for us, he was sent to UK on a course. This was indeed very good news for us, a blessing in disguise.

A younger person was appointed in his place who had recently graduated in IT.  I realized that the Young Man was thirsting for knowledge and experience, and that was a good sign. He was full of excitement and had a very pleasing attitude. He organized the user meetings smoothly and even acted as a translator when we had to deal with some users who were not comfortable with English language. Everything went on smoothly. The system was developed according to plan and it was ready for User Acceptance Testing.

Unfortunately for us, the Senior IT Person had returned from the course.  The Young Man had to transfer his duties back to the Senior IT Person and that was not good for us. This time, not withstanding his obnoxious attitude, he was full of “UK returned” attitude. We handed over the system for user acceptance testing along with documentation with step by step procedures on system setup and testing conditions based on agreed test samples.

For several days nothing happened. When I asked why the testing had not started, the Senior IT Person looked at me with that “fresh UK returned” arrogance and said “Why should we go through all these lengthy procedures? With a click of button the system should give us results!”. I paused for few moments trying to compose myself and then I asked him, “You are a computer science graduate, have you heard of GIGO?”. He had never heard of it. He simply retorted “What is it?”. I said “It means ‘garbage in, garbage out’. If you enter garbage, the system will give you garbage. Since you do not even want to enter anything, the system will give you nothing, not even garbage”. With that I walked out, with the Senior IT Person red in the face.

He made a big issue out of it. We did not know what he had told the management, but they were pretty upset. An emergency meeting was scheduled. When we entered the meeting hall, the place looked quite tense. It turned out that the Senior IT Person had misled the management into thinking that we wanted to run away without completing the project. I quietly explained to the management everything that had transpired. The manager was quite embarrassed, but he was graceful enough to apologize for the unfortunate incidence. He immediately took the Senior IT Person off the project and replaced him with the Young Man . From then on, things went on smoothly. We handed over the project few weeks earlier than promised.

In the beginning of the project, the manager had said that if we finished project on time he would reward me. I thought he was just joking. But he surprised me with a gift. It was Christmas time when we finished the project. He gave me an envelope saying, “this is your Christmas gift”. Inside the envelope was a job offer! I was over the moon, for it was a very substantial offer! Unfortunately it did not work out, as someone else made a job offer with working conditions exactly to my liking.
I am sure lots of people come across such impossible situations in their day to day professional life, one way or another.

One day during the time when we were learning swimming, I saw a man walking towards the swimming pool with his wife and two teenage daughters. He was beckoning to the swimming coach. After talking to them in whispers, I noticed the swimming coach becoming quite angry and upset. As he swam back towards us, he was cursing and muttering under his breath. When I inquired what the problem was, he said the man wanted him to teach his daughters swimming without touching them. He also put the condition that the girls would wear their arm length regular dresses, not the swimming costumes. The swimming coach simply told him to go find some other coach!

Sometimes diplomacy may work, but not always. Most often, being brutally straight forward saves lot of grief. I have seen many people, mostly marketing and sales guys, making unrealistic promises just to get business. They may not even know the nitty-gritty of the technical aspects of the project, anyway they go ahead and make the tall promises. Most of the time these projects end up in failure and financial losses. I have seen quite many people fall from grace as victims of such mistakes.

More than saying “yes” one has to learn how to say “no” for, "customer is not always right". It will certainly save you from lots of grief and financial losses!


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