Updates

A few updates this week

1. Had a bird photography contest in office. I volunteered for activities like collecting snaps, getting it printed on A3, etc. I submitted one of my own. The result of the contest in my view was a cropper – Dr M B Krishna, the judge selected a caged bird pic as one of the winners, which to me was shocking! IMHO, only 1 pic of the top 3 deserved the award. Caged bird pics deserve no place before the bottom. Learnt a lot from this event…like the need to calibrate the monitor. The A3 print of my snap looked slightly different in color from my monitor.
2. Maybe, I should think of an advanced course in post processing.
3. Stock market has moved up nicely. Nifty PE has moved up close to 21. Maybe people should lock in their profits at least a bit by selling atleast a portion of their folios.
4. Had the worst time driving in the last 2 years. A drain got damaged on Bannerghatta road near Oracle / Accenture causing massive disruption of traffic. I took 2 hours to cover 6 Km on June 4th. The worst thing was the way how the cops handled the whole thing. Pathetic.
5. Shocked to know that most of the bullet-proof jackets that our Mumbai cops used were actually nowhere near bullet proof. Another scam cooking?
6. Everywhere I go, people ask me about the impact of recession on software techies. I am getting bored of this question!
7. I dont know why, but this question has appeared so many times in the last few days in my mind. If I weren’t a software guy, what would I have been (or like to be)?

A cheerful story amidst gloomy global news

Source : An email from a friend. Author unknown.

One day a farmer’s donkey fell down into a well. The animal cried piteously for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do.

Finally, he decided the animal was old, and the well needed to be covered up anyway; it just wasn’t worth it to retrieve the donkey.

He invited all his neighbors to come over and help him. They all grabbed a shovel and began to shovel dirt into the well. At first, the donkey realized what was happening and cried horribly. Then, to everyone’s amazement he quieted down.

A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally looked down the well. He was astonished at what he saw. With each shovel of dirt that hit his back, the donkey was doing something amazing. He would shake it off and take a step up.

As the farmer’s neighbors continued to shovel dirt on top of the animal, he would shake it off and take a step up. Pretty soon, everyone was amazed as the donkey stepped up over the edge of the well and happily trotted off!

Life is going to shovel dirt on you, all kinds of dirt. The trick to getting out of the well is to shake it off and take a step up. Each of our troubles is a steppingstone. We can get out of the deepest wells just by not stopping, never giving up! Shake it off and take a step up.

Cheers and hee-haw to you all!!!

Surviving the crisis

These are difficult times!!!

Inflation is high, stock market has collapsed, economy might be showing signs of slowing down, and to add salt to your wounds, your job may not be safe enough!

Are you prepared for the worst?

I was thinking seriously about it. How prepared am I? What should I do to be better prepared?

The following post is my idea of how to weather this storm. Please check if you can strike a chord with it.

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How to survive an IT slowdown?

TCS shows the door to 500 techies. IBM does the same to 700 ELTP’s. Will there be more?

US economy is not in the best of shapes. Neither is its currency. Rupee is appreciating. Will there be an IT slowdown? Should you worry?

I don’t know. (I think no one can predict these things).

But I think one can do few things to be ready for a slowdown, if and when it happens. I have split my thoughts into 2 parts. Career based and finance based.

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