Where does your loyalty lie?

Whenever I travel, I try to strike up a conversation with my fellow passengers. This is a great opportunity to meet diverse people, learn new things and have interesting discussions. On a recent flight I was talking to a fellow passenger about a variety of interesting topics. When the topic of consultants/contractors came, he said that he hated consultants. When I asked why, he said that they are not loyal to their clients. That really got me thinking about loyalty.

I, for one, always feel that consultants when working for their clients and should be loyal to the clients. I strongly believe in establishing relationships. One cannot build good, long standing relationships by not looking after the client's interests. As long as I am working for a client, I am their employee and it is my duty to align myself with their organizational strategy.

What is loyalty? Who is loyal to whom? Who should be loyal to whom?

Loyalty does not mean that an employees should work for only one employer for all their working life. An employee can be loyal to an employer as long as he/she is employed by that employer. The same holds true for consultants. Just because consultants switch clients doesn't mean that they are not loyal to their clients.

Smart employees are loyal to no one but themselves and their careers. It is in the best interest of an organization to make sure that an employee's career goals are aligned with its own strategy and goals. That creates a win-win situation. This creates loyalty from both ends: the organization is loyal to the employee, and the employee is loyal to the organization.

How does an organization ensure loyalty? The answer lies in building relationships.

Organizations need to build a trusting relationship with their employees, and the employees will show their loyalty in response. Some short-sighted organizations believe that training and nurturing employees will result in the employees jumping ship. To the contrary, emphasizing employee growth ensures an organization's growth. As employees grow, organizations grow. Of courses, you will lose some talent, but you get to gain a lot more in terms of improved core competencies as well as loyalty.

Another aspect that ensures loyalty is transparency. How do employees see the value they are creating or adding? How are they affecting the bottom line? The more visibility they have, the more ownership they feel. The more ownership they feel, the more loyal they will be.

Gone are the days when one used to work for the same employer all their life. Gone are the days of blind lifetime loyalty. Job security, commitment, loyalty and lifetime employment used to define the Japanese labor culture. It is interesting to note the direction in which loyalty flowed: it was both ways. Recently, this culture has changed even in Japan, and personal goals are taking priority. Also, within organizations, meritocracy is reigning.

I feel that employees are always loyal to their employers, and that holds true for consultants too. Organizations that are loyal to their employees tend to retain their star employees, and grow with them.

JFK taxi line and meetings

For once, my flight out of JFK seemed on time. The plane had arrived well in advance. All the passengers were in their seats, and the flight crew had locked the cabin door. So far, so good. My flight was to leave JFK at 7:15 PM and was supposed to arrive in Seattle 6 hours later. Our captain gets on the PA and announces that there is a good tail wind and we will make it to Seattle in 5 hours and 40 mins!! Wow, imagine my excitement. Forget being late, we are going to be home early! That put a grin on everyone's face.

The plane pulls out of the terminal on time and off we go onto the taxi way. I switched off my phone and my laptop. The plane taxis for about 5 mins and stops. Our captain comes on the PA and announces that he is going to turn the engines off to conserve energy and instructs that it is OK to use our electronic devices. He then announces that we are number 28 in line, and will take off shortly.

To make the story short, we take off at 8:40 PM and arrive in Seattle 40 mins late.

The main reason was that flights from morning started slipping and we, at the end of the day, ended up slipping way out. This reminded me of some of the days at the office. Almost every meeting that I attend starts to slip by a few mins. This starts to accumulate, especially if there are a few common participants, and finally the meetings in the afternoon are slipping by 30 mins or more.

Everybody complains that meetings are counter productive. There is some element of truth in this statement. The main reason being the way the meetings are run. Efficiently run meetings are always short and very productive.

Here is a nice article on Google's Marissa Mayer's philosophy on running efficient meetings. There is nothing earth shattering in her techniques. We all know that having a well published agenda goes a long way in running efficient meetings. What I liked most was the idea of projecting a countdown clock to remind everyone of the time left. All this assumes that the leader sticks to the clock. The second idea that I liked was the transcription. It would be great to see what the note taker is writing down. It is not always possible to have multiple projectors in a room, but this is a great idea. Saves a lot of time and keeps the meeting rolling along.

I have been to several meetings where no one knows what the agenda is. Everyone just lands up in the room because they were invited. Always have an agenda and publish it in advance so the audience knows what the meeting is about.

Meeting facilitation is the key to a successful meeting. A strong leader should direct the attendees towards the topics on the agenda and make sure that they don't digress. There are several players in a meeting:

- The leader (facilitator)
- Time keeper

- Note taker

The leader plays several roles here. The leader needs to make sure that the agenda is covered in totality, and everyone follows the agenda. The leader should also make sure that everyone in the room gets to share their thoughts. The leader should also summarize whenever a significant point/decision is made, or whenever an agenda topic is closed. The leader also sets the tone of the meeting.

Try some of these tips and see how productive your meetings become.

Green Ganapathi

Every year we celebrate Ganesha Chaturthi and I make it a point to make my own Ganesha idol. The main reason being that I love creating it. I believe that it is a service to God when I put my skills and effort to craft the idol. It gives me great pleasure to create the idol and worship it on Ganesha Chaturthi.

I mostly use clay to model the idol, and since I don't bake the model, I paint it with a water based paint. My philosophy has always been to use the materials available in nature, and around us. I say that I mostly use clay because I use other materials (paper, cardboard, wire) to provide the skeleton to the model and hold it together. This is especially true for the four hands as well as the trunk.

The Hindu scriptures say that Goddess Parvathi created Ganesha out of the dirt (saffron paste) off her body. In order to follow a similar route, some say that we should only create the idol out of clay (earth, sand, dirt, etc.). I have always used clay to create my idols. I love the texture and pliable nature of clay. I love working with clay.

And, at the time of immersion, it is fitting that we give back to nature, what came from nature. Clay lets me accomplish this.

Nowadays, people have started using all kinds of materials to create the Ganesha idol. The most common one being plaster-of-paris. First, plaster-of-paris is not a naturally occurring material. Second, plaster-of-paris does not disintegrate easily when immersed in water. Plaster-of-paris is not a nature friendly material. To top it, most manufacturers use oil or latex based paints to obtain a glossy look. Even these are not environment friendly, and are known to harm fish and other marine life.

Since the practice is always to immerse the idol back into water after the pooja, why not make the idol out of the materials we find in riverbeds or lakes: Clay.

Always buy or create idols made of clay, and water based natural paints. Let lord Ganesha help keep this planet green.

OM Sri Ganeshaya Namaha.

Child labor?

Last week, while strolling on a street in Waikiki, I saw several street performers entertaining passers by. Here is a rough estimate of number of onlookers flocking around the performers, at the time I was there:

Caricature artist - 0

Basketball man (guy performing basketball tricks) - 25

Charcoal portrait artist - 8

Golden statue dude (guy posing as a golden statue) - 10

Ukulele player - 0

Karaoke girl (girl singing pop songs on a karaoke machine) - 18

Guitar player - 0

At first glance, everything seems in balance. Not a lot of general public cares for a guy playing the ukulele or shredding the guitar on the streets. These need very specific audience. Same goes true for the caricature artist.

The charcoal dude was doing an awesome job, and hence people were flocking to watch him work (many were waiting their turn). The basketball man was attracting a huge crowd by yapping a lot (and doing a few real cool tricks).

What struck me was the fact that people were watching a young girl (maybe 8-10 yrs old) singing while her parents were sitting around and collecting money (pic above). This, for me, is child labor. We talk a lot about what happens in China and other countries, and here we were, encouraging a little girl (and her parents) to sing for us. The girl should have been playing with her friends in the beach on that pleasant evening. Instead, she was 'working' for her parents. What a pity.

BTW, I just took a few pics and walked away as soon as possible. I, for one, did not want to encourage this.

Pluralistic ignorance

I was walking towards the baggage claim area in the Orange county airport during one of my business trips. People from my flight were walking towards the baggage claim area, while others were rushing towards the terminals to catch their flights. I saw a woman, a few paces ahead of me, unknowingly drop her boarding pass. She was rushing towards her terminal, just like everyone else. There must have been about 5-6 people between me and the woman. I assume most of them saw what happened, but no one bothered to do anything. I, too, passed the boarding pass on the floor, and for some reason it flashed that something was wrong. I stopped to pick up the pass, and ran back and gave it to her.

On the way out, I was thinking about what happened. I knew that something was wrong in the whole scene, but could not put my finger on it. Until, I read about the pluralistic ignorance at the Media Studies. This article explained exactly what happened in the airport the other day.

We see such acts daily. During a project meeting, you see that some things need to be taken care of, and mention it. Everyone nods in agreement, but nothing is done. Why? Everybody in the room thought that the other person would pick up the ball. That is why we need to assign specific action items to individuals.

I specifically remember of seeing a video as a child about what to do in case of an emergency. Imagine an accident scene and a man is lying unconscious on the road. On lookers surround the accident scene. You see that the man needs medical attention and scream "Somebody call 911" or "Can someone get a fresh towel?". Guess what happens? Nothing. Same reason. Everybody is assuming that the other person is going to respond. So, the video specifically suggests that in these situations, you should point at a random person (an adult) and scream orders. "You, call 911 immediately". That will get things done since there is no plurality. Orders are aimed at an individual, and everyone is watching how you react. So, you better react and get things done.