I was coming from a discussion I had with one of my friend who is working for a MNC and heading a team of about 100 people here in India. This team is responsible for providing the development & testing support for the parent organization located somewhere else.
He was so frustrated in motivating the team over here. From his discussion I could figure out that there are primarily two major issues
a) The team here feels that
- their opinion is not being counted by the members of the parent organization
- they are getting micro managed
- they don't have freedom in doing certain things in a way they wanted.
- they don't have any visibility into the product / business roadmap
b) Some members of the parent organization feels that
- people are spending time here, but the output is not coming
- team members are not completely able to understand the task at hand and this is resulting in schedule delays
- the lack of proper communication by the respected managers sometimes making them to talk to the engineers directly.
Well I could really understand the frustration from my friend who really played a key role in building this team, but I was not at all surprised.
I was telling him that this is a mindset issue at working level from both the sides and it must be addressed by people who have right attitude in understanding and respecting the customer from his team.
In my opinion whether it is internal customer or external customer "customer is king". The very existence of an organization is because of its customers. If customers are not willing to give business then none of us have any role to play it is as simple as that.
When individuals join organizations they go with a mindset I must do this, I must do that, and my opinion must be respected, I should not be micro managed etc etc. For example many people make strong assumption about themselves that they must only be involved in development activities and not in any testing related activities. Many a times they underestimate scripting, automation related activities and they feel they are working for a great MNC and they should not do these things. Similarly some experienced team members, and first level managers feel that they must be involved in all technical / product discussions by the parent organization. They feel that they should be seen in such a way that they are simply not executing the requirements given to them by their immediate customers in the parent org, but they are really capable of much more.
Well none of these are wrong expectations, but you need to understand how well you are positioned today to set these expectations on your immediate customers.
This is where the management has to build a culture in an organization in making the customers happy first before you start influencing them. Say if every senior member in the team understand that we must deliver what was requested by doing 100% justification whether it is development, testing, scripting etc etc it becomes that much easy to make the rest of the team understand. Get to the bottom of the details and build relationship with peers in the parent organization in meeting the set targets. How good you do your ground work really determines how successful you are in building such a relationship with your peers.
Every organization has to go through this phase initially and there is no short cut to it. The beauty is when the team grows from 100 to 1000 all these 100 members can proudly say that we made this happen. The moment you are responsible for delivering more you are in more command to understand the big picture, start influencing the customers and may be directly start interacting with external customers and so on.
Now the question is is it good to be part that initial 100 or to be part of that 1000 when everything is smooth. If we decide that we want to be part of the initial 100 do we really bother about whether we are doing testing, scripting, development etc. Do we really bother about whey some people are asking daily status updates, probing into lot of details. These are so small things to handle when we go with right mindset.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Do we see our kids going to schools with Tablet PC's
Very interesting topic to discuss. People who are closely following the recent trends in tablet PC evolution, might get this question in their mind.
This is not something new in developed countries, various pilot projects were conducted and many schools in these countries are encouraging students in using tablet PC's for accessing text books. In US the Washington think tank had come up with a proposal called "A Kindle in Every Backpack". This is about using eTextbooks in American schools, from KG to high school offered using Kindle or similar electronic devices.
There are many people who believe that education market holds the real potential as a consumer of this kind of technology. Textbook publishers may get into this path very soon. Kids can hold a library in their hand instead of just few text books. The in built applications like text to speech conversion will help kids to listen to the books instead of just reading. These devices use high-resolution display technology with configurable fonts and expected to provide the appearance and readability of printed paper. There are also very interesting other features like taking notes directly onto a page, highlight topics and mark it for future reference.
As a parent if you are worried about your kid carrying backpack with many books may be you can offer a tablet PC and your kid is all set. Of course you can offer this device once the books as such are available in electronic form. One tablet PC and one lunch box is all what your kid takes to the school...
As technology evolves may be kids can take notes as if they are taking it on their books using a stylus, and can share the notes with others. May be schools can conduct exams on these devices. In addition to the existing text books developing new content with audio & video support will improve the learning. Using Innovative Software applications it is quite possible to engage kids while learning which may not be that easy to do in a traditional classroom environment.
It is very interesting to study and explore opportunities in developing countries like India the induction of tablet PC's improve
a) The Quality of education.
- With innovative and interactive content may be this is realizable.
b) Increase the reach.
- If Govt can sponsor one tablet PC at a reduced price to poor families education reach can potentially increase.
c) Are these devices supplementing the traditional mechanisms, or do they have potential in completely replacing the existing mechanisms.
d) The technology side effects ...
This is not something new in developed countries, various pilot projects were conducted and many schools in these countries are encouraging students in using tablet PC's for accessing text books. In US the Washington think tank had come up with a proposal called "A Kindle in Every Backpack". This is about using eTextbooks in American schools, from KG to high school offered using Kindle or similar electronic devices.
There are many people who believe that education market holds the real potential as a consumer of this kind of technology. Textbook publishers may get into this path very soon. Kids can hold a library in their hand instead of just few text books. The in built applications like text to speech conversion will help kids to listen to the books instead of just reading. These devices use high-resolution display technology with configurable fonts and expected to provide the appearance and readability of printed paper. There are also very interesting other features like taking notes directly onto a page, highlight topics and mark it for future reference.
As a parent if you are worried about your kid carrying backpack with many books may be you can offer a tablet PC and your kid is all set. Of course you can offer this device once the books as such are available in electronic form. One tablet PC and one lunch box is all what your kid takes to the school...
As technology evolves may be kids can take notes as if they are taking it on their books using a stylus, and can share the notes with others. May be schools can conduct exams on these devices. In addition to the existing text books developing new content with audio & video support will improve the learning. Using Innovative Software applications it is quite possible to engage kids while learning which may not be that easy to do in a traditional classroom environment.
It is very interesting to study and explore opportunities in developing countries like India the induction of tablet PC's improve
a) The Quality of education.
- With innovative and interactive content may be this is realizable.
b) Increase the reach.
- If Govt can sponsor one tablet PC at a reduced price to poor families education reach can potentially increase.
c) Are these devices supplementing the traditional mechanisms, or do they have potential in completely replacing the existing mechanisms.
d) The technology side effects ...
Startup Funding
Funding for a startup is always a major challenge for the founders. Based on my startup experience and based on my observation of successful startups, in my opinion a startup must be funded by customers.
Well you may ask a question how is this possible, because many a times getting first customer itself will take more than a year's time. May be that is true, but if your product is really helping customer in cutting his cost down, or in increasing his revenues, there is no reason why a customer cannot fund your startup even when the product is in alpha stage.
We will think so much about the funding instead of focusing on customer and in the course we will create business cases which we know in many cases are not possible to execute.
This is where the quality of entrepreneurship has to really show up and we must strive towards solving a customer problem than getting worried about other things. In many startups founders define their roles well and plan things very well. Especially the experienced founders will start thinking about the engineering efficiency, the best possible technical solution etc etc. They become so busy in executing their plan and they slowly start ignoring the customer. On the day product gets launched they expect customer to sign the deal. And customer will not show any interest altogether an unexpected journey starts for the founding team.
Why this happens?
Customer engagement is a continuous process. Many entrepreneurs receive "WoW" feedback when they demonstrate their product first time. All certain done this is expected because you are definitely bringing something new to the market. But then will this "WoW" feeling really constant over a period of time. May not be? This is one area an Entrepreneur must focus on. And it is not a job of one founder it is the job of all founders of a company.
You need to build a relationship with customer and try to understand whether your product is cutting his cost down or increasing revenues. Here again you need to very careful depending on the size of the customer company you must weigh these factors. A small amount of cost reduction or a small amount of revenue increase may not give enough kick for customer to look at you and start using your product.
There is a very high likely chance that a startup will see success if it is has done this exercise really well and could get the customer funded their product.
Looks good, then the other question is how do I manage till I get customer funding for my product. Very interesting question. Is there one right answer well really I don't know. What I can say is that learn how to cut down your expenses, how to sustain with bare minimum money. Pay less salaries to employees but make them part of the company let them get a feel that the success of the company is contribution of every individual and not just the founders effort.
Well you may ask a question how is this possible, because many a times getting first customer itself will take more than a year's time. May be that is true, but if your product is really helping customer in cutting his cost down, or in increasing his revenues, there is no reason why a customer cannot fund your startup even when the product is in alpha stage.
We will think so much about the funding instead of focusing on customer and in the course we will create business cases which we know in many cases are not possible to execute.
This is where the quality of entrepreneurship has to really show up and we must strive towards solving a customer problem than getting worried about other things. In many startups founders define their roles well and plan things very well. Especially the experienced founders will start thinking about the engineering efficiency, the best possible technical solution etc etc. They become so busy in executing their plan and they slowly start ignoring the customer. On the day product gets launched they expect customer to sign the deal. And customer will not show any interest altogether an unexpected journey starts for the founding team.
Why this happens?
Customer engagement is a continuous process. Many entrepreneurs receive "WoW" feedback when they demonstrate their product first time. All certain done this is expected because you are definitely bringing something new to the market. But then will this "WoW" feeling really constant over a period of time. May not be? This is one area an Entrepreneur must focus on. And it is not a job of one founder it is the job of all founders of a company.
You need to build a relationship with customer and try to understand whether your product is cutting his cost down or increasing revenues. Here again you need to very careful depending on the size of the customer company you must weigh these factors. A small amount of cost reduction or a small amount of revenue increase may not give enough kick for customer to look at you and start using your product.
There is a very high likely chance that a startup will see success if it is has done this exercise really well and could get the customer funded their product.
Looks good, then the other question is how do I manage till I get customer funding for my product. Very interesting question. Is there one right answer well really I don't know. What I can say is that learn how to cut down your expenses, how to sustain with bare minimum money. Pay less salaries to employees but make them part of the company let them get a feel that the success of the company is contribution of every individual and not just the founders effort.
Leadership vs Management
I think many a times about this topic. I feel most of us face difficulty in drawing the line between Leadership and Management. We always get into subjective discussions when we talk about Leadership & Management.
I would like to share my experiences in bringing some clarity. Let us start with the great proverb, which says "leadership is doing the right thing; management is doing things right."
When I was working for a semiconductor company few years back our top management had set some goals for executing a very important program for the organization. The goal that relates to my immediate team was, we must provide a software platform using which the firmware for the chipset must be developed and tested much before the silicon. The most interesting part of this goal was the firmware must be up & running on the silicon within 7 days from the day the silicon arrived. Well anyone who worked with DSP firmware and DSP Simulator tools will be able to appreciate how difficult the task was and what it takes to execute and meet the goal which was being set.
We really succeeded in meeting the above goal and the complete team and all other supporting members were very well appreciated for demonstrating such a wonderful execution.
For me this result was the output of great Management talent the organization had. The Management with the help of all stakeholders could define the problem well and demonstrated a very well planned execution.
Now the question comes why is such a goal? What is the kind of result the organization is expecting by setting such goals. The organization wanted to demonstrate its Leadership in delivering chipsets ON or Before time to customers so that customer gains Time-to-market advantage. In simple terms the top management bigger goal was "The silicon must go out of doors to customers in less than 2 weeks time from the day it arrived with complete software up & running". This was really a direction shift the way chipset firmware and software development and validation was done traditionally. This is what to me looks like "doing the right thing".
After the direction was set by the leaders then the management excelled in "doing things right"
In my view every organization must have high quality leaders and equally well equipped managers. Leaders will set the direction for the organization by using their foresighted vision and managers excel in making this happen.
I would like to share my experiences in bringing some clarity. Let us start with the great proverb, which says "leadership is doing the right thing; management is doing things right."
When I was working for a semiconductor company few years back our top management had set some goals for executing a very important program for the organization. The goal that relates to my immediate team was, we must provide a software platform using which the firmware for the chipset must be developed and tested much before the silicon. The most interesting part of this goal was the firmware must be up & running on the silicon within 7 days from the day the silicon arrived. Well anyone who worked with DSP firmware and DSP Simulator tools will be able to appreciate how difficult the task was and what it takes to execute and meet the goal which was being set.
We really succeeded in meeting the above goal and the complete team and all other supporting members were very well appreciated for demonstrating such a wonderful execution.
For me this result was the output of great Management talent the organization had. The Management with the help of all stakeholders could define the problem well and demonstrated a very well planned execution.
Now the question comes why is such a goal? What is the kind of result the organization is expecting by setting such goals. The organization wanted to demonstrate its Leadership in delivering chipsets ON or Before time to customers so that customer gains Time-to-market advantage. In simple terms the top management bigger goal was "The silicon must go out of doors to customers in less than 2 weeks time from the day it arrived with complete software up & running". This was really a direction shift the way chipset firmware and software development and validation was done traditionally. This is what to me looks like "doing the right thing".
After the direction was set by the leaders then the management excelled in "doing things right"
In my view every organization must have high quality leaders and equally well equipped managers. Leaders will set the direction for the organization by using their foresighted vision and managers excel in making this happen.
Friday, February 5, 2010
When to Start a Startup
Many of us would like to do something on our own, create value proposition and bring in some change to the way things are being done. These very motivations will keep on bugging us and we will look for ideas / opportunities / problems to realize our dreams.
Definitely this Entrepreneurial bug in us will help in identifying few ideas by networking with various people. We will debate on these ideas and we will do the ground work necessary to get to a conclusion that the idea once realized will solve a problem.
But the very first question we will forget to ask "Whose problem are we as Entrepreneurs trying to solve". Are we solving our own problem or are we trying to solve someone else's problem.
If we are trying to solve our own problem then in most cases things are under control, we can very much begin with the "End in Mind". Because we can visualize the end ourselves.
As an entrepreneur if you are trying to solve someone else's problem, you need to ask yourself the questions like
a) How much I think is a problem is really a problem as such in the others mind
b) Will my idea really solve this problem. And how do I validate?
c) Can I really begin with the "End in mind".
We are often so passionate about solving the problem and we will not even worry about understanding these very fundamental things. Essentially we may land up in providing a value added service to customers / users rather than really solving a problem.
Doing this is it wrong?
Well, here I don't mean offering a value added service is wrong.
a) But then, do I need to start a starup for creating this value added service?
b) Entrepreneurship does it mandates to start a starup always?
Not at all. But many entrepreneurs get very easily tapped into this dilemma.
No organization stops any individual in creating more value to its customers. You as an Entrepreneur can influence your Employer and create more value and take out that great satisfaction with you always. Don't get into the perception that you can create this value if and only if you start a startup. Please note that not many people in an organization think on these lines like creating value proposition, increasing customer sanctification. Because of your very instinct nature of Entrepreneurship you are doing this.
Think of starting a startup the moment you realize that you are solving a problem which you are facing in your life. Many a times this problem may have something to do with technology or it may be completely non-technical. I am sure an Entrepreneur doesn't even worry about this.
I will keep on sharing my ideas on how successful you will be if you start solving your own problems using your Entrepreneurial mindset and feel the change very much in yourself before you even start selling your idea.
Keep reading .....
Definitely this Entrepreneurial bug in us will help in identifying few ideas by networking with various people. We will debate on these ideas and we will do the ground work necessary to get to a conclusion that the idea once realized will solve a problem.
But the very first question we will forget to ask "Whose problem are we as Entrepreneurs trying to solve". Are we solving our own problem or are we trying to solve someone else's problem.
If we are trying to solve our own problem then in most cases things are under control, we can very much begin with the "End in Mind". Because we can visualize the end ourselves.
As an entrepreneur if you are trying to solve someone else's problem, you need to ask yourself the questions like
a) How much I think is a problem is really a problem as such in the others mind
b) Will my idea really solve this problem. And how do I validate?
c) Can I really begin with the "End in mind".
We are often so passionate about solving the problem and we will not even worry about understanding these very fundamental things. Essentially we may land up in providing a value added service to customers / users rather than really solving a problem.
Doing this is it wrong?
Well, here I don't mean offering a value added service is wrong.
a) But then, do I need to start a starup for creating this value added service?
b) Entrepreneurship does it mandates to start a starup always?
Not at all. But many entrepreneurs get very easily tapped into this dilemma.
No organization stops any individual in creating more value to its customers. You as an Entrepreneur can influence your Employer and create more value and take out that great satisfaction with you always. Don't get into the perception that you can create this value if and only if you start a startup. Please note that not many people in an organization think on these lines like creating value proposition, increasing customer sanctification. Because of your very instinct nature of Entrepreneurship you are doing this.
Think of starting a startup the moment you realize that you are solving a problem which you are facing in your life. Many a times this problem may have something to do with technology or it may be completely non-technical. I am sure an Entrepreneur doesn't even worry about this.
I will keep on sharing my ideas on how successful you will be if you start solving your own problems using your Entrepreneurial mindset and feel the change very much in yourself before you even start selling your idea.
Keep reading .....
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