Captive Adaptations

The pesti-cola war rages on in India. While most of the main stream media is spending sleepless nights in providing coverage for this, I painfully would like to point out some even more serious threats (not that I back cola companies, or the Centre for Science and Environment), such incidents serve notice to all of us, to have a heightened awareness around us.

I was pointed out to heinous acts of deception, some 8 months ago, by one of my senior friends in the company. It was a casual conversation and for the first time I heard about Aspartame. It intrigued me because it had some high profile names like Donald Rumsfeld, I just decided to dig a little deeper(not to mention those were also my diet conscious days).

The new found evil,never escaped my mind, and it was shocking in late April, to discover that its presence was rampant in our own home. Both my parents are diabetic, and I have previously blogged about some not-so-good-incidents. The doctors at Diacon had advised them to use “Sugar-free capsules” as an alternative. And for a little over 2 years, my innocent and ignorant parents were blindly using it, and I was not informed about it, till I myself accidentally discovered them in our kitchen. Infact artificial sweetners were part of their regular daily diet.

The first thing I did as soon as I found the Artificial sweetner was to see if it contained Aspartame, and it was a sinking feeling to find it on top of the list of ingredients.

For the next month or 6 weeks, I advised a complete change in their diet and recommended my parents to switch their doctors as well. The transition was not smooth either as blogged in June, but I now have first hand experience of the many ills plaguing our society and how they have encroached our safe homes.

All you “Diet Coke, Diet Pepsi, Diet Everything” guys/girls, its high time you realized that behind every “diet” word, there is mostly Aspartame, google it to realize its evilness. Pesti-Cola OR Diet-Cola, the choice we have as consumers is to choose the lesser of the 2 evils. Is packaged drinking water safe? Let me know if you find out.

Its important to remember that all professionals need to develop healthy working relationships inorder to grow in this ever shrinking world. Its always good to determine where your professional life is heading towards. And the second most important task is to make sure you are accompanied by the right people in that journey. Young minds today have to work towards getting these priorities right.

Its easier to fall prey into believing the corporate management philosophies, and adopt the thumb rules which state that everything has to be in black or white! What somebody is worth, is directly proportional to what his/her percieved value is or what his/her productivity is, or for that matter what he/she is being paid or what his/her level of employment is. Are these the only scales of measure ? NO.

Most business have already agreed, that the intrinsic value of any working relationship can not be directly judged by the deliverables, nor can it be calculated from the quantifiable or tangible outcomes of any relationship.

Intangibles, the ingredients that make any working relationship tick must be assigned the highest weightage, and people both supervisors and subordinates should learn to question their heart to find the true value derived from any working relationship. I have increasingly come to believe that quitting is the easiest thing on earth. Like anything else all relationships also have an ending, but let me stress again, its not the end that matters, its the means to the end. Lets give the means a chance before we conclude the inevitable.

Its strange how many times we react to circumstances, owing to our impulsive instincts. As I learnt it the hard way, its always best to respond than to react to any stimulus or external triggers, even during casual conversations.

Today, as part of a daily conversation I casually made the statement “Decent guys usually don’t talk to girls“, which a few of my colleagues took offence to, and the impulsive nature of their rebuttal just blinded their vision to the logical fallacy of their argument. I am not sure why they got so animated, but I am here trying to unravel the mystery of their irritation.

There were possibly 2 mistakes that took place. First, was the implicit assumption of the counter statement (to the original statement), that only “Indecent guys speak to girls” or “If some guy speaks to girls, then he is indecent“. Both of these conclusions are classical Non Sequiturs.

If its not white, then it should be black is a false assumption. It can be any of the shades between white and black which can include all sorts of gray matter!. No where did my statement imply that only “If Indecent, then you speak to girls“.

For an analogy, “Brahmins usually don’t eat non-vegetarian food” is also a similar statement. People must not implicity assume, that only “If Non Brahmin, you eat non vegetarian food”. It just means that all those people who are vegetarian by choice are that way because they choose to be so.

Second, lets look at the logical fallacy in “If Decent, then you don’t speak to girls” statement above. This is a classical “Affirming the consequent“. So no where does it state that just because one does not speak to girls, the person is Decent. Its not sufficient to the condition of being decent. There are other necessary conditions for Decency to be satisfied. However one of the accepted social norm is that “Decent guys usually don’t speak to girls”.

Again, bringing the Brahmin and not eating non-vegetarian analogy, just not eating non-vegetarian does not make one a Brahmin. However, its an accepted social norm, that “Brahmins usually don’t eat non-vegetarian food”

I would live with such misunderstandings by people, but it hurts when people assume another non sequitur called “Denying the Antecedent“. Using exactly similar equations, mostly this is what people conclude,
If I accept my mistakes, then I am Ordinary (not the Boss).
But I don’t accept my mistakes.
Therefore, I am not Ordinary (I am the Boss).

Some people just think I don’t accept my mistakes because I want to assert my authority as their Boss, but again, that is another logical fallacy that people make. I don’t appear to accept my mistakes because I believe in Logical Authority more than Positional Authority, which I have blogged about a year and a half ago.

Next time around, may be I will learn to be a little more tolerant to such Irrelevant conclusions (non sequiturs).

For the past few months here in Bangalore, I have been meeting many people from non IT background. The art of building a good business almost from scratch brings with its territory, the obligations and excitements of meeting people from various walks of life. Most often, I get along well with savvy business people even if they have pop-and-mom kind of operations without any touch of professionalism what-so-ever, IT for such people is a far cry.

Street smart business people are always easy to network with, and the same is also true for experts as well as novices in any business. The problem is with the psuedo-intellectuals who have little or no clue of the basics of business. No amount of MBA training or book literature, or even past experiences can teach you simple thumb rules of business, if you are not willing to involve yourself and learn the basics, as I have blogged before.

Today, I happened to meet a group of people in Real Estate business, who failed to understand the first and simple rule of business engagement Negotiation. Here let me define negotiation

An exploratory or bargaining process (planning, reviewing, analyzing, compromising) involving a buyer and seller, each with their own viewpoints and objectives, seeking to reach a mutually satisfactory agreement on all phases of a procurement transaction — including price, specifications, technical and quality requirements and payment terms.

As far as the phases / steps in a Negotiation is concerned, here is how I would formalize it.

• Quantifying all scenarios and options (which we did from our side)
• Identifying common ground (which we were ready provided the negotiation reached this phase)
• Defining mutual success
• Debriefing about future possibilities.
• Documentation (the last step to seal the terms and conditions of the deal)

How far can a negotiation proceed if people can’t even respect the other’s viewpoints. Should I say more of how soon the conversation with these Real Estate guys ended ?

Bangalore witnessed behavior that was uncalled for, the past week, I will not join the mainstream media on disecting “Mob Mentality” and the likes of it. But on a deeper level, I always wondered how such violent and barbaric behavior is exhibited by people who were otherwise known for their nonchallant and mellow nature.

While munching on these thoughts I recollected Adam Smiths Impartial Spectator theory, from one of his book, which I had briefly skimmed a few years ago. As I began my explorations on this, as always I discovered an amazing treasure trove on human behavior. Adam Smith, believed that much of human behavior was under the influence of “passions”—emotions such as fear and anger, and drives such as hunger and sex—but these passions were moderated by an internal “voice of reason,” which he called an “impartial spectator.”

According to Smith, Conscience, in turn, is the “internalized impartial spectator”. However, conscience itself is susceptible to confusion, for it comes from “Morality or Social Ethics”, which cannot be unbiased, as Social Morality is heavily inclined/biased with what is good/true for a larger audience, which to a large extent explains religious, cultural or lingual fanaticism.

The most interesting pieces of my learning regarding the Impartial Spectator is however the application of this theory in Corporate Ethics, and Behavioural Economics.

Smith believed that there were certain virtues, such as trust and a concern for fairness, that were vital for the functioning of a market economy. He wrote about “Trust and reciprocity” as leading to trade. One might think that the need for trustworthiness diminishes as a market develops, the kind which cut-throat capitalism has lead us to belive, but if anything the opposite is true.

And the advise to business leaders would likely be that they should weigh carefully the costs of breaking trust and risking reputation. Should I say more regarding the beating that Bangalore’s reputation must have taken?

Some people are really smart in business. Mostly they learn the tricks of the trade by going to B-schools, or by just getting involved. I have taken the latter route and I just received this email from my COO a few days ago, who indirectly is tutoring me on some tricks in business. This one was the best. The brevity and simplicity of this piece is fabulous. It might not mean much for the academically inclined, but if you are the one in the battlefield, leading the front with very little ammunition, believe me this will ring more than a bell !

Jack, a smart businessman, talks to his son.

Jack: “I want you to marry a girl of my choice”
Son : “I will choose my own bride!”
Jack: “But the girl is Bill Gates’s daughter.”
Son : “Well, in that case…ok”

Next Jack approaches Bill Gates.

Jack: “I have a husband for your daughter.”
Bill Gates: “But my daughter is too young to marry!”
Jack: “But this young man is a vice-president of the World Bank.”
Bill Gates: “Ah, in that case…ok”

Finally Jack goes to see the president of the World Bank.

Jack: “I have a young man to be recommended as a vice-president.”
President: “But I already have more vice- presidents than I need!”
Jack: “But this young man is Bill Gates’s son-in-law.”
President: “Ah, in that case…ok”

This is how business is done !

Last March, while I was working at a startup in San Mateo, I learnt some basic truths. Mediocre & Insecure minds, are a big threat to shared accomplishment & can dent your positive spirits significantly. I was acquainted to the people behind that startup for a while, and had quit a very stable & high paying job at a decent company, to help that startup with good intent.

But like all analytical minds, it did not take much time for me to figure out that ideological / cultural differences can never be bridged. I wanted to get otta there, and had started to look for new avenues, in the process I had stumbled upon a novel approach by Paul Graham. The Summer Founder’s Program I thought was a unique opportunity to get involved in. I had also counselled a few friends of mine, and nearly sent out my business idea to them, but then I was strapped in my strides, thanks to the H1-B Visa I had, which the good folks at YCombinator declined to endorse or support due to some limitations, and hence I had to endure the next few months only by venting out my frustrations.

Mostly I forgot about it with all the new beginnings later in 2005 and nearly a year after I first stumbled across YCombinator, I decided to check out how the idea has been performing, and voila, this thrilles me. Not only that, I am glad to see that a similar Winter Founder’s Program has been started by them. If any of your contacts or friends still at school are itching to start a startup, I think this is where they should get involved. At this point let me quote what Confucius the genius once said

“Tell me and I might forget, Show me and I might remember, Involve me and I will understand”.

You can’t tell people how to do business, you can’t show people how to do business, you can only get them involved & they will mean business. The success rate of the Summer Founder’s Program and the performance of YCombinator are proof of the Power that Confucius’s words carry !

Ah, all you cynics must be saying, “business ethics” - that is an oxymoron. And so, this entry might well be the shortest blog entry ever written ! Hold on, as always there is more to it than meets the eye.

Alright, for the past 2 weeks, I have gone through some serious battles in my mind about ethical decisions, since I have decided to switch companies. Again !?, you ask, yes again !. Mostly I am a spontaneous guy, but with matters concerning my profession & decision making regarding my career, there is a lot of systematic reasoning involved. Its very uphill, uneasy turmoil, simply because these are significant shifts in relationships, and for me that is serious business, and hence its not just another job hop.

So every time I do this, I have to justify it ethically more than monetarily, and I believe most of my decisions to switch, stem primarily because I disgree one way or the other on the means to achieve the goals rather than failure to achieve goals. Well, let me explain, I can confidently claim, that achieveing the desired goal in terms of numbers, deliverables, deadlines, has become quite an everyday activity, and its a given, but the bigger challenges for me has always been justifying the means.

With that background, I can fairly say that I am more inclined to the deontological doctrine of ethics, rather than the teleological doctrine. Mostly, I think I am a hybrid, lets not digress, these are huge topics in themselves, so lets save these for another day. Why am I so inclined on means to achieve things ?, and why does that strike a discord among some people I work with ?. For me the answer is obvious.

Ethics as most people perceive, is not about following a set of “absolute principles”, which are in someways divorced from or imposed on our everyday life. Ethics are how we are and how we go about doing things. (This is clearly means not the end). Its an art of compromises, that can still generate mutual benefits. And if your supervisor cannot see that his/her “means” of achieving a desired goal, will render may people in the team dissatisfied, then even though the goal is achieved, success is defeated. And in such cases, one must stand and fight for “ethical treatement” and not compromise, simply because they are disadvantaged. Not being able to make reasoned decisions, and to just follow orders is itself a failure of logical authority by your superiors, and plain assertion of positional authority. Both of these I have blogged before as well.

Now if that happens for a sustained period, inspite of repeated requests and efforts from your end, that is when its time to quit any engagement, since neither is the means appropriate nor is it any longer mutually beneficial, and that is how business ethics I think should be practiced.