Sapiens - Why humans dominate the Earth?

A meaningful life can be extremely satisfying even in the midst of hardship, whereas a meaningless life is a terrible ordeal no matter how comfortable it is – Yuval Noah Harari

There are some books that make you sit up and do a lot of “deep thinking”, make you question your core beliefs and as a result, possibly alter you as a person. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari is one of them.

Harari is an Israeli historian and a professor in the Department of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is gay, vegan and a practitioner of Vipasana meditation for 20 years (and vocal about all of them). Harari specialized in medieval and military history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and has a Doctorate from Oxford. He has many best sellers and articles to his name, Sapiens being the foremost among them. Sapiens was published in Hebrew in 2011, became a national best seller in Israel and was published in English in 2014; it has since been translated into some 50 languages. It made Harari a superstar.

Sapiens is breath-taking in its scope (which is the entire history of our Human race and projections for the future thrown in for a good measure!), Provocative in its assertions, entertaining in its language; this book is surely an unputdownable.  Some of what is written in the book is not new or original, some are wild assertions too, but the extraordinary writing paints a macro view of the different stages of our evolution through our many revolutions makes this book very engaging and important. As you read, you will agree that Harari does have a different way of looking at things e.g., "we did not domesticate wheat. It domesticated us", “Consistency is the playground of dull minds”  (The last one would have been inspired by Oscar Wilde who said “Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative” ).

Sapiens is mostly about how we (Humans) came to dominate the Earth - in spite of having many disadvantages and being an “insignificant animal” (sic) and a little about what may lie ahead for us in the years to come. The book traces human history through various human revolutions, It starts with the first, about 70,000 years ago with the cognitive revolution, and then to around 12,000 years ago as the agricultural revolution starts with domestication of plants and animals and start to settle down in colonies; third is the scientific revolution, about 500 years ago that leads to industrial and later information revolution about 50 years ago and then the Biotech revolution – which is just evolving and transforming; probably into bio-engineered cyborgs that could live forever – which in some ways signal the end for Sapiens!

The key change, of course is the start of the cognitive revolution, which set us on a different evolutionary arc. This Cognitive revolution helped us to create stories and imagined realities (myths) like money, country, God (yes, all these are only real because we have collectively chosen to believe so), this enabled us to work in large groups in a flexible, cooperative manner, that in turn enabled us to create economy, empire and religion. This was a game-changer as we out ran (or wiped out) our competitors including our cousins the powerful Neanderthals - who lived until about 40,000 years ago. Much like the network of low powered computers made the mighty standalone mainframes insignificant and eventually obsolete. Long story short; our human domination is the outcome of our cooperation and ability to use tools and technologies and the cooperation is because of our beliefs in common ideological or religious myths.

The future according to Harari, holds dangers and opportunities. From what I read, opportunities for a minority and dangers for the majority, primarily because of the gaps between rich and poor and a huge class of humans who would be rendered useless thru AI. We are seeing both these scenarios are already in play, the divide between poor and rich is wider than ever before – (the Oxfam report states that the wealth gap continued to widen in 2017, with 82% of global wealth generated going to the wealthiest 1%. Another report states that 2,153 billionaires owned as much wealth as the bottom 4.6 billion people in 2019) and more and more workers losing jobs to AI, robotics and automation in general and unable to repurpose themselves (Forrester predicts job losses of 29% by 2030 with only 13% job creation to compensate). Such economic disparity along with job loss is a perfect recipe for political instability and a general moral crisis (Widening income inequality is the defining challenge of our time- 2015 IMF report). History proves that humans have not handled power responsibly, for us the relationship between power and responsibility is inversely proportional.

Harari touches upon various topics across a wide spectrum; globalization, human greed, the definition of happiness; whatever the topic Harari never ceases to surprise with his ability to connect the dots (which at times, does look a little far-fetched) and thus creating an amazing visual of the past and future of mankind. So, as Aristotle said; ‘It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it’ or as Venkat says ‘leave your opinions in the parking lot’ and get ready to ‘immerse yourself’ (this is important) and start to question your values, judgements and the opinions that you left behind at the parking lot!

Sapiens is listed as one of 10 favourite books of Bill Gates and is the Gaurdian’s best brainy books of the decade

“You could never convince a monkey to give you a banana by promising him limitless bananas after death in monkey heaven.”

― Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

The Palace of Illusions

The Palace of Illusions is Mahabharata told from Draupadi's perspective; she is the Protagonist. Given this premise and given that the Mahabharata is the most complex story ever told (wiki: With about one hundred thousand verses, long prose passages, or about 1.8 million words in total, the Mahabharata is roughly ten times the length of the Iliad and Odyssey combined, or about four times the length of the Ramayana), this could have been a magnum opus by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni (CBD). Unfortunately CBD falters after a great start.

The initial phase of Draupadi's tale, her interactions with her brother Diru and friend Krishna, are told with great sensitivity and style. As Draupadi grows up and gets married, she sounds more and more like an ordinary human (with 5 husbands, of course). Much worse is that Draupadi keeps cribbing (I agree that she had many reasons to crib) and page after page yearns for the forbidden love of Karna. Although these feelings towards Karna (and vice versa) are hinted in other versions of the Mahabharata; the palace of illusions talks about it in almost every page, which kind of gets annoying – ‘for heaven's sake, the human race as we know is getting erased and millions are getting killed in the great war and here we are crying over love’, is what you want to say.

The other disappointment is the characterization of Kunti and Yudhisthir; both are portrayed as one-dimensional cardboard characters and in fact Draupadi treats them with disdain throughout. There is a bit of remorse in the end, but that is probably too little too late. The mother in law - daughter in law interactions between Draupadi and Kunti are so clichéd and you wonder, if the author wants to portray Draupadi as a stong and extraordinary women, born to rewrite history, then why does Draupadi get into these petty trappings?

The good aspects are: the book keeps a good pace, the narrative is easy and does not have the usual complications of a tale of this complexity (probably because the book is targeted at the western reader, CBD lives in the US), yet it covers most of the critical happenings of Mahabharata - with a few liberties taken here and there, like the two marriages and nine sons of Karna are never revealed, probably to keep the romantic angle alive.

For me, the highlight of the book is the Krishna - Draupadi relationship, it touches a few philosophical notes of man-god relationship.
Sample this:
When asked by Draupadi: "Can't you ever be serious?' Krishna replies: 'It's difficult, there's so little in life that's worth it’.
In the end when Draupadi is about to die, Krishna explains the futility of her remorse and tells her that she is just an instrument, this is probably taken from the essence of the Gita itself, but it is a good discussion.

If there is a God, I wish he is like Krishna, ever playful, ever intriguing, great philosopher and charioteer for the righteous (and in the process bends the rules here and there).

Wisdom Paradox

This post was trigged by a coincidence; I got a mail from Venkat about this blog while I was reading ‘The Wisdom Paradox’ by Elkhonon Goldberg; the coincidence is that the blog and book are on a similar theme – Dementia or the atrophy of the brain. It is a known fact that our brain atrophies as we age and eventually most of us will lose some and an unfortunate few will lose most of our cognitive abilities. This topic is of great interest to me since I have recently crossed the milestone 4 decades of existence and every now and then I worry about the possibility of me spending the last years of my existence wearing a bib and trying to recollect what I did a minute ago!

The book; The Wisdom Paradox is a paradox in the sense that it gives you hope and at the same time it reconfirms your fears about aging too. The bad news first -after the initial stages of development and maturity (till your thirties) our brain starts to degenerate, starting with the newly evolved neocortex that make us who we are, humans (neocortex controls the working memory, speech and language) and the right hemisphere deteriorates more than the left. So you will have issues with new learning, analytical ability and creativity. Your ability to learn new languages will be affected too (there goes my goal of learning French this year).

The good news is that what you lose in creativity and novelty you gain in wisdom. Wisdom is an acquired response to recognized patterns. So during the early stages of our life we assimilate new information and develop neural patterns. As we age, the brain begins to atrophy, losing about 2% of its size per decade, but we reach insightful conclusions intuitively based on the lifelong collection of the neural patterns. This, you see, is the strength of leadership. The experience accrued over a lifetime being used in decision making, esp in abstract situations – like running a nation or an organization.

The point to reflect is that this wisdom can’t dawn overnight when we become old, we need to collect various experiences in our early stages of life and build the neural patterns that would help in achieving this wisdom, even when as we lose our analytical and learning abilities. So, spend your early years hunting for knowledge (like reading this blog :)) that can be turned into wisdom later.

The Blog; I believe that the overall, degeneration (cells dying as we age) would be of little consequence – so it does not matter that, ‘You had more brain cells the day you were born than you’ll ever have again’. You definitely had less brains when you were born than you’ll ever have. Also, it is very complex, elephants have double the neurons as humans, and if you are talking about the brain to body ratio, then birds have a better ratio… I am sure you will agree that we have better cognitive capabilities compared to elephants and birds (of course, can’t say that for everyone I work with). So, it is difficult to say why you will lose your mind -whenever that happens; but you can be sure that it is just not because of reduced cells. It is worthwhile to note that research has not established the reason or medication for, say, Alzheimer more than 100 years since Dr. Alzheimer described it first. So I find this article to be assuming too many things and making it simplistic. It is possible that dementia is more of genetic in nature and probably has no cure or prevention. And your cognitive skills at the ninth decade would probably be thanks to the strong genes provided by your parents (and generations before them).

I agree that the brain needs constant stimulation (not the one provided by TV) that allows the neurons to form new connections. We should constantly try to learn new skills, improve your social interactions and broaden our knowledge (browsing the net does not count) and ponder about them (hence, having a mid-life crisis is probably a good thing for your brain).

Yes, every time I search for that wretched remote or the car keys; I am worried that very soon I may forget my own name, I am still not sure how to avoid it completely – let me try Sudoku or Rubik’s Cube or learn to draw and paint.

Farewell Waltz

Just completed 'Farewell Waltz' by leading Czech author Milan Kundera. The 'Farewell Waltz' is a dark comedy at the outer layer, but, underneath, is a very poignant, political novel with a touch of magical realism. The original Czech version was published in the early 70’s but was banned during the communist regime for the political undertones in the narration till 1989.

The story unfolds over five days in a small spa town with 8 contrasting characters and has commentaries on relationship, religion, politics –all with lightness and a searing satire. The end was a bit sudden and sad (although Mr. Kundera does not delve on the sadness) but overall the book was a fine read. This is my first Kundera and surely not going to be the last.

Couple of quotes from the book (all of these are dialogues between the characters):

- 'To come to the conclusion that there is no difference between guilty and the victims is to abandon all hope. And that, my girl, is what is called hell.

-'There isn't a man in this world who isn't capable, with a relatively light heart, of sending a fellow human to his death. At any rate I've never met one. If men one day come to change in this regard, they'll lose a basic human attribute. They'll no longer be men but creatures of another species'.
'You people are wonderful!'... 'When you turn everybody into murderers your own murders stop being crimes and just become an inevitable human attribute'.

Both the quotes are in reference to the political situation in Czech during the 1970s; when uprising and suppression of these uprisings thru capital punishment was a norm. After a while the roles reversed the revolutionaries moved to power and persecution of the earlier rulers started, hence there is a blur of victims and the guilty.

Second quote is a dialogue between 2 characters when they discuss about human nature and how we will punish a fellow being with certain happiness (sadistic pleasure if you will); History is strewn with people who stand testimony to this statement.

And finally the most interesting, “All I know is that I could never say with complete conviction: Man is a wonderful being and I want to reproduce him”. Again, this is a dialogue between 2 characters in the book where one gives out reasons why he will never sire a child! What a powerful reason -I have tried this life, but do not find in good enough that I will recommend for someone else!

Feeling an emptiness that follows the completion of a good book!

Following Fish by Samanth Subramanian.

Travel and cooking are 2 of my (many) passions! I just love travelogues. I have already written about Bill Bryson here, the other writer I recently discovered and loved is Paul Theroux. An unexpected but good read was Che Guevara's ‘The Motorcycle Diaries’ - of course that is not just any travelogue.

Travelogues just take you to distant and mystical lands for a few hundred rupees and you could do the journey by just sitting on your couch and without the travel fatigue.

I picked up 'Following Fish', without any knowledge about the book or the author. I was a bit skeptical, given the drab cover and a fishy title :)! Since it involved both travel and food, I could not resist. To my pleasant surprise, it indeed turned out to be a wonderful read for a weekend.

The book is divided into 9 essays and it starts from Kolkata and its famous Hilsa and rightfully so, as Kolkata is the food capital (at least for seafood and sweets) and Hilsa is the queen of fishes.

The journey takes a detour inland to Hyderabad where Samanth visits the Goud's family for the famous fish treatment for his Asthma and returns skeptical than before.

The best part of the book is the essay in search of the best toddy and karimeen in Kerala and the one about the Mangalore fish curry comes a close second. The journey continues to Goa (of course), Mumbai and ends at Gujarat. Befittingly, for Gujarat, the last essay talks about the huge fishing boat building industry rather than the cuisine.

The writing is easy and almost like a note from a friend and lyrical at times and sparkling with humor all the time. The author draws in from a host of other great writers and sprinkles their quotes throughout the book. The essays are full of colorful characters and their interesting stories - this is the book's greatest strength.

The book also touches upon the cultural, ecological issues of the day, talks about the dwindling fishes in our seas, and the sandless beaches of Goa, where the tourist industry is eating into the fishing industry. 'Goa - A state that had come to be unfortunately infected with the idleness of its guests'.

This is Samanth’s first book and I hope he continues to write in this fashion for a long time. May he continue to be the 'discoverer of people, a finder-out of stories'.

Iconoclast - Gregory Berns

The dictionary (http://www.thefreedictionary.com) definition of an Iconoclast:
iconoclast [aɪˈkɒnəˌklæst]
n
1. a person who attacks established or traditional concepts, principles, laws, etc.

But the general understanding from this book (at least for me) is that an iconoclast is someone who breaks through barriers (both internal and external) and sells his Idea to make an impact on the society (for the betterment of the society) and, of course, makes some money and success in the bargain!

Gregory Berns is a leading Neuroeconomist and the Distinguished Chair of Neuroeconomics at Emory University, where he is a professor in the department of Psychiatry and Economics! In this latest book, 'Iconoclast', Mr. Berns explains an iconoclast's ability to think outside the box (I tried to avoid this cliché) through the brain's biological functions and tells us how to harness these powers -including an appendix (Iconoclast's Pharmacopeia) on drugs that can enhance the iconoclastic powers! – this appendix, I specially found to be very interesting!

What makes this book even more interesting is that, Mr. Berns connects these theories to the many real life iconoclasts (including Florence Nightingale, Jackie Robinson, the Dixie Chicks, Pablo Picasso, Richard Feynman and Steve Jobs) and provides valuable insights around the central theme of the book.

Many books are termed as life changing (probably for the author :) ) and this is such a book. According to Mr. Berns; an iconoclast has three traits that differentiate them from the others:
1. Will view things differently - perception
2. Overcome their fear of failure - Fear factor
3. Have great social skills - Network

View things differently: Brain runs on very little power (around 40 watts -if you must know) and hence will conserve power wherever possible. In the process of this conservation, our brain uses perception gained from experiences to form ideas; so to think differently (like an icon) we need to avoid these brain shortcuts and bombard the brain with new information, change in routines and novel experiences.

Overcome the fear factor: Novel experiences stimulate the fear factor in us and we need to overcome this fear to succeed, fear is a major success inhibitor. The author describes options to overcome (rewire the brain) this stress, by accepting (preconditioning), by avoiding unpleasant associations (blocking) and by developing a don’t care attitude (develop a thick skin). Even a short physical stress (exercise) can be used to overcome long term mental stress.

Learn to network: Developing and nurturing good ideas is not sufficient, one must sell these ideas to others and this can be achieved through strong networking skills (Picasso Vs van Gogh). One has to build a social network with the realization that the brain works in a 'tit for tat' basis (a good deed will be reciprocated), maintain a good reputation and constantly being in touch with the social network (breed familiarity).

This is it… three traits that can make you an icon. Are there only these 3 differences between an iconoclast and an aspirant? I don't think so, but these are some good starting points for the Icon to be!

The book drags a bit in the middle, but as mentioned earlier, the relative stories from the lives of icons makes it interesting and keeps us going (including Dixie Chicks as one of icons was stretching it a bit far).

Some good quotes from the book:
-Perception is a process that is learned through experience, which is both a curse and an opportunity for change. P. 8
-Unfamiliarity forces the brain to discard its usual categories of perception and create new ones. P. 33
-The more radical and novel the change, the greater the likelihood of new insights being generated. To think like an iconoclast, you need novel experiences. P. 57-58.
-The critical fears that inhibit people from sharing their ideas: the fear of being rejected. At its core, this fear has its origin in social pressure, which is one of the most common of human phobias. Pp.77-78
-Groups that allow for minority opinions are statistically more likely to make better decisions than groups that require unanimity. P.103
-A group with a lot of diversity among its members is more likely to arrive at a good decision than a group that is composed of members who are alike. P.104.
-The brain is lazy. It changes only when it has to. And the conditions that consistently force the brain to rewire itself are when it confronts something novel. Novelty equals learning, and learning means physical rewiring of the brain. P. 199.

Bill Bryson

My wife calls me the most boring person in his 30s (very late 30s), for, it is not very often that I break into a laughter or even a smile. It is not an exaggeration to say that I am emotionally as flat as a warm beer. So, whenever she sees me chuckle she orders a cake to celebrate and these celebrations happen very often when I am reading a book by Bill Bryson.

Bill Bryson was born in Des Moines, Iowa (1951), spent most of his professional life (as a Journalist) in the UK, moved back to US very briefly and moved again to England. In the process he wrote two wonderful books: 'Notes from a Small Island', a travelogue across 'United Kingdom', just before moving back to US and 'I am a Stranger Here Myself' - a compilation of his weekly column on the changes that have happened to the US in his absence. Today, he is probably the best selling non-fictional author, surely the most loved. It is not an exaggeration when Chicago Sun-Times says that, "Bill Bryson could write an essay about dryer lint or fever reducers and still make us laugh out loud."

I got introduced to Bill Bryson on the 21st of July 2004, when i brought his popular science book "A Short History of Nearly Everything", in a small, excuse for a book shop at the Pune airport (finally, some use of noting down the date and place of purchase of a book!). 'The Short History of Nearly Everthing' is a wonderful compilation of, as the title suggests, a short history of nearly everything, right from the big bang, thru the early stages of our planet, evolution, and an impressive cover of various developments in science. All of which is told in an engaging, dry 'Bryson' humor.

It all starts from an admission that he is not familiar with science and how science books at school were a bore (they still are!) and one fine day in a trans Atlantic flight he was struck by the realization of how little he knew and became curious to know more; how lucky for us! This book must be a mandatory study at every high school! The book really shows us how little we know of the planet we call home and even about ourselves. It is a huge seller internationally and won the Aventis Prize for Science Books as well as the Descartes Science Communication Prize.

After finishing this book, I hunted for all the other books written by Mr. Bryson have managed to read whatever is available in the market! All of them written with the same great wit and a style that is so endearing.

BTW, I have just got home his latest book 'At Home" and my dear wife is ordering for cakes!

Here is a sample chapter from his book "I'm a Stranger Here Myself" -an absolute joy.

His other books:

The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid
Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words
Bill Bryson's African Diary
In a Sunburned Country - Travel - Australia
I'm a Stranger Here Myself
A Walk in the Woods
The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America (1989)
Neither Here Nor There: Travels in Europe (1991)
Notes from a Small Island (1995)
Made in America: An Informal History of the English Language in the United States (1998)
Shakespeare: The World as Stage (2007)
And the latest:
At Home: A Short History of Private Life (2010)

Track your Plaque - Book Review

How often do we come across news wherein a friend or a relative suffered a heart attack and had to die all of a sudden?

Do you know that the conventional tests (HDL, LDL, Triglycerides, Total Cholesterol, Treadmill test) for assessing whether a person has a risk for future heart attack are woefully inadequate? Meaning, even after all the above are performed on time (with results are considered normal range) – still that person can experience a fatal/non fatal heart attack?

Very often we hear that an apparently otherwise healthy individual suffering from heart disease had to undergo bypass surgery or had to operate with stents etc.

If you want to find answers for this and to educate how to protect yourself – you have to read Track your Plaque book. Dr. William Davis addresses heart disease and what causes heart attacks, how we can identify the risk one has against heart disease, how we can improve upon those parameters through life style changes, diet and medicines.

Why this book? Don’t we have hospitals for cardiovascular care and incase if someone has heart disease – he/she can get better treatment in the hospital, why read this book and make changes to life style among other things?

From Dr Davis's own words - Cardiac care is big business. As a nation, US spent $59 billion on cardiovascular care per year (American Heart Association, 2002). Annual hospital revenues for bypass surgery total $25 billion. Thirty percent of hospital revenues and 50% of profits are from cardiac care. Heart care to a hospital is like the Accord is to Honda, or Windows is to Microsoft—it’s a hot seller.

We live in an age when hospitals measure their success by the number of coronary bypass surgeries they perform. Incredibly, it is still easier to get a bypass operation than it is to get good information on heart disease prevention. There are even billboards on the highways advertising bypass surgery.

Second – this book explains that plaque take decades to grow (for most people) in the arteries and by taking right steps and actions at the right time (not when taken to ER) – we can successfully regress it. This is not big money to you or for the hospital. You can achieve this at much lesser cost than a bypass or an operation involving stents etc. So hospitals are not going to be advertising preventative things to you and me over TV and media. There is no money for them in this. It is your responsibility to protect yourself.

This book explains that - non-invasive 10 min scanning of the arteries for calcium deposits using an Electron Beam Tomography (EBT) Scanner. Based on the scan results, the cardiologist will assign a risk score to the patient, and will order additional blood tests least of which is LDL, HDL, triglycerides and Total cholesterol. Not that they are not important. There are more “definitive” tests that can/need to be done today and identify our current state of Cardio parameters rather than relying on the same old LDL, HDL and triglycerides. A good result in LDL, HDL test does not mean that one is not going to have heart attack.

Based on those results – the patient can work with the Doctor and identify what needs to be done for improving the odds.

One thing I wanted to mention – in the changes that need to be done to improve health - food/fats – the Dr and the author Dr. William Davis argues against saturated fat. He castigates that saturated fat is unhealthy and is not required for the body. In fact it is just the opposite. Second he also says you can consume Canola oil which I do not agree. Vegetable oils (Corn oil, cottonseed, rapeseed etc) are a menace and humans are not evolved to consume that in industrial quantities, which we do . Third he also mentioned that Oat bran can be consumed – I am against it. Oats raise blood sugar and it cannot be good for anyone’s health including Cardio parameters. Recently William Davis wrote in his blog that he has changed his mind on Oats.

Dr. William Davis also runs a program called Track your Plaque. All of the concepts explained in the book – you can also have it done thru this program.

The key takeaway is - artery plaques can be identified in humans using non-invasive techniques, additional blood tests will need to be done to identify what caused the plaque, adopt life style including medicines, supplements and diet and you can regress the plaque.

A must read for anyone who is interested in staying healthy and not wanting to give a surprise to oneself or family.

Black Swan

I was watching this program on a business channel last week (I rarely commit such a sin, but it was one of those days) the program was on: "How markets will behave in 2010", with great dismay I watch an expert talk (with great authority) that the market will cross 20k in 2010. The market will need a lot of Bull (pun intended) to cross 20k, the man was doing his bit. I am sure you have the same feeling of dismay while you switch to one of those news channels and hear the pundits predict a poll outcome.

I have seen the head of sales and marketing of my company make a series of calls to his contacts at critical client organizations and conclude and report back that we are not going to be severely affected by the slowdown, of course he was wrong, we were not spared and neither were our clients (this was in 2000 - 01). We have seen this happen over and over again, especially in the current globalized economy, Chaos Theory rules. A butterfly flap in New York will crash (or push up) the markets in Tokyo. We have seen many predictions and decisions based on past data/experience going awry in business and in our day to day life. This is the theme of Black Swan, a multimillion copy seller by Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb is an extremely complex character, he is the grandson and great grandson of former deputy prime ministers of Lebanon (his grandfather and his great grandfather were both deputy prime ministers of Lebanon), he is a mathematician who prefers to call himself a philosopher, had a short career as a trader and investment banker in many leading banks (although, he is very skeptical about the many models used for trading). Later he started Empirica a hedge fund that trades in options and then retired from trading in 2004 (he continues to be an adviser for Empirica) and incidentally Empirica made a few billions during the recent market crash. He is a distinguished professor and of course he is the author of hugely successful books, Fooled by Randomness and later Black Swan. He has sold more than 2.7 million copies in some 31 languages. He never watches television and never reads newspaper! Hope I covered the many facets of Taleb. Here is a write up by Malcolm Gladwell on Taleb (this write up is also a part of the new book by Gladwell titled "What the Dog Saw").

Taleb strongly believes (and I would agree) that we lack the ability to predict events that are rare but have great impact, he states that there is no difference between the person in a position of power ( A deputy prime minister of Lebanon) and his car driver when it comes to knowing the way events are going to play out. Both believed that the Lebanon war would end soon, but it took 15 years when you look at most of our ministers you would readily agree. The difference is that the qualified think that they have some privileged info and the unqualified does not think so and puts the burden on fate/God.

Taleb talks about Inductive Reasoning and why it will fail, the title of the book is a good example of inductive reasoning. Let me explain, since people in Europe had never seen a black swan, they thought all swans were white. In fact there used to be a terms about Black Swans that people used when they wanted to refer something improbable (I would rather see a black swan before I see you coming on time!) and the sighting of a single black swan in Australia blew away the belief held for centuries. Inductive reasoning is generalization, we tend to generalize with specific set of (past) data and when this generalization proves to be wrong, it is often with disastrous results. Mike Gatting had seen many spinners before and Australia is not a country that has produced decent spinners in the past (Rajan to confirm). He would have thought that this is yet another bloke from down under and this first Warne delivery against England (known as the Ball of the Century or the Gatting Ball) was a complete Black Swan, the look on Gatting’s face was priceless.

Black Swans can bring good fortune too; the explosion of IT in India is a Black Swan - at least for the many graduates who passed out after 1991.

Black Swan events are random, hard to predict and rare events that create high-impact (Outliers). Taleb, defines black swans as below:
1. Hard to predict (based on historical information)
2. Has disastrous effect
3. Explained after the occurrence of the event by experts.

This has not been an easy book for me... but it is entertaining never the less and been an information overload and introduced many useful terms for sure : platonicity, narrative fallacy, modernistan, falsifiability; to name a few). I found the style to be contentions, probably a bit too aggressive and egoistic. The (repeated) digs he has at the cost of many economists and statisticians are at times in poor taste, so are his digs at the French.

Taleb also gives 10 points/principles to a Black Swan proof world, can be read here with description. Giving below some that I liked a lot:

• No socialization of losses and privatization of gains.
• People who were driving a school bus blindfolded (and crashed it) should never be given a new bus.
• Counter-balance complexity with simplicity.
• Do not give children sticks of dynamite, even if they come with a warning .
• Only Ponzi schemes should depend on confidence. Governments should never need to “restore confidence”.

In our everyday life we come across many Black Swan events and hence it is important to approach each day with a fresh perspective and leave behind preconceived notions.

Try this (from the book):
All Snoogles are Boogles.
You see a Boogle.
Is that a Snoogle?

Spend a minute and you will get it. I tried this on my daughter and explained here the logic and it was an interesting experience, she thought that I had finally gone crazy completely:-)

The answer is 'may be'.

Rajiv Kolai Vazhakku - NHM's new book

Ordered the book online – “Rajiv Kolai Vazhakku” (Rajiv assassination case) authored by Mr Ragothaman – Chief Investigating officer of Special Investigation Team (SIT). Kizhakku Pathippagam has published this book too. (pages 227, Rs 100).

I was interested in this book for 3 reasons. First, this incident happened right around our graduation years where we can understand and analyze (and discuss endlessly!) the social, political situation that lead to this (unlike Mahatma’s where we have to go by books or hearsay), Second this happened right in Tamil Nadu, third being Rajiv was former Indian Premier and had all chances of bouncing back in that elections to power. Other than that I am not a Cong sympathizer and hence do not believe that Rajiv would have ushered in Raama Raajyam.

So, back to book. I received the book one afternoon and started reading it casually. Could not stop in between and completed it in one shot. Wonderfully written book. The author has narrated the investigation process from the beginning till its end.

The book explains step by step how the SIT started with just Haribabu (photographer) camera, his employer Suba Sundaram’s denial that Haribabu was not employed with him, Haribabu’s Mom’s doubtful behavior before the investigation team, his Dad’s body language – conveying that he wanted to share information but holding back because of his wife’s presence etc. From there, the book travels to Baghyanathan (Nalini’s brother), other LTTE functionaries and by implicating Pottu Ammaan and Prabhakaran and finally also explains why SIT team was waiting outside Sivarasan’s hideout in Bangalore with no meaningful action.

The book details the motive behind - why LTTE wanted to kill Rajiv and cites evidence towards that end. And also implies that this is not the work of any other group(s) or individuals.

3 assassinations have happened in India since Independence. Mahatma, Indira and Rajiv. Time has taught that we (Indians) lost Mahatma due to sheer irresponsibility. The powers that be at that time, felt that no one will kill Mahatma and hence the security was very lax and finally we paid the price. The same thing happened in Indira’s case also. The book says that in the senior Intelligence officers meet it was decided to remove all Sikhs who was employed to provide Indira’s security. One of the affected police guy went and cried before R K Dhawan and he rolled back the order. We know the result.

The book talks of ineffective security and a general lax attitude when Rajiv made his last trip. Rajiv flew in from AP that day and his copter was delayed by 2 hours. None of the policemen involved in providing security at Chennai were aware of the delay whereas Sivarasan was aware that Rajiv is arriving late by 2 hours. When CBI enquired with a Sub Inspector (in charge of recording and allowing who is permitted to garland Rajiv) – Inspector had recorded names in a piece of paper he picked from the floor. It did not carry any additional information about people seeking to garland the leader.

Secondly, the author talks of his anxiety in not allowing CBI to investigate the political leaders. Even when CBI had many reasons to suspect that some of the prominent TN leaders had prior information of the assassination, they were not allowed to enquire any of the politicians. The book details the reasons for suspicion and raises many questions in the readers mind.

Thirdly, the coordination between RAW, IB, CBI and Jain Commission etc. The author has explained that instead of working together, these agencies were at loggerheads helping the common enemy. (Apparently, the then RAW chief kept stating, LTTE did not commit this crime and hence that angle should not be probed at all).

On the whole, I agree with the author that we need to know the truth and what happened during those days. For those inclined to know about the Rajiv assassination case, I would recommend to read this book.

China - Vilagum Thirai - A Book Review

Recently I read this book – “China – Vilagum Thirai”. This is the translation of the much acclaimed book 'Smoke and Mirrors' by Pallavi Aiyar. This is translated (in Tamil) by Raman Raja and Kizhakku Pathippagam has published this book (Price Rs 200; pages 350).

Pallavi – a journalist, has stayed in China for 5 years and travelled the length and breadth of the country, met different set of people from businessmen to saints, lived in one of the old type settlements (Hudong) in Beijing and mingled with the local people as one among them. This experience gives her the insights normally missed by the standard travellers and their travellogues. This book is more about China in the eyes of an Indian, so it is easy for us to understand about this Marxist Country.

Here are the salient points from this book.

• Though you can see poor people in rural China – they lead a better life compared to similar economically challanged people in India; It is not an exaggeration to say that the Govt of China has made them live a gracious life.
• Govt’s iron hand is visible in all places – people think what Govt wants them to think.
• Apparently Chinese people have a confused sense of patriotism and dissent – they consider dissent is not good – whatsoever and they toe the govt drawn line.
• People cannot settle from villages to cities – they have to obtain inland permit (something like passport called as “Hukou System”) and then move. Else, they will be sent back to their village if caught by the police; this is the reason why they do not have slums in Beijing and in other large cities.
• When a journalist meets a religious head/businessman/professor – a Chinese govt appointed person will follow the journalist. The guest cannot say anything that they think in their mind.
• Any dissent will be viewed seriously by the Govt – they will be arrested and put behind bars
• Ordinary Chinese people are not bothered about the type of work they perform – that is just an avenue to earn a living; they are proud of doing any work.
• Related to this is; there is no caste system in the country – Marxists act tough on religious activities – so no question of caste. This means – a person who is cleaning road/toilet, will not be identified and picked by birth. He may work today cleaning toilets, tomorrow he may be a businessman or something like that. He is not identified by the work he is doing.
• Tibetans resent Chinese interference – but cannot help it – when China sets its eye on Tibet.
• Religious freedom is allowed as long as it does not question/comment/feedback anything the govt does.
• If Govt wants a piece of land – buildings, farm lands will be demolished after issuing notice. Owners will be given a pittance and they cannot go to court.
• Personal productivity of a Chinese labourer is better than Indian labourer.
• Coruption is rampant – but not the type of corruption you see in India but the types you see in the US and other developed countries. If they have to build a bridge – they will build and take some money from that; not like do crappy stuff and swindle all the money.
• Govt encourages businesses big time and people have sort of given up worrying about the govt – they are busy making money. This generation in China is apathetic to politics (like any other country’s younger generation) and they are only bothered about their own growth.
• Lots of foreigners including people from India move there to China and start Yoga schools, work in hotels, buying products wholesale, etc.

The book is an interesting read for anyone who wants to know about China. The book maintains the interest in the reader throughout. One thing is certain – Raman Raja has done a wonderful work translating this book – you do not get a feeling that you are reading a translated book at all.

I recommend this book for anyone who wants to know about China.

Master of the Universe – Carl Sagan

Nov 9, 1934 - Dec 20, 1996

I don’t remember when exactly I got hooked on to Carl Sagan; it was probably in the eighties when I watched his Cosmos for the first time in Doordarshan or probably when I read his book Contact a bit later, I don’t know, but it was an association for life and an association that introduced Science to me (okay, whatever little science I know) and it also introduced skepticism.

Carl Sagan, in many ways is similar to my favorite writer Sujatha, similar in the way they spent a lifetime popularizing science, similar in the way they sowed the seeds of knowledge in a young mind. The difference could be that Sujatha was a writer who was also a man of science; Sagan was a man of science who was also an author. The other difference is, probably Sagan was a skeptic and I guess Sujatha never wavered from his Srirangam upbringing!

Beauty of Sagan’s writings lies not only in the way he simplifies complex theories (which he does very well) but also in the way he inspires and creates a sense of awe in the readers mind, especially the young readers.

I wish we have more science teachers like him (or like Sujatha) in our schools.

Contact is a science fiction by Carl Sagan this was published in 1985 and later made into a movie starring Judy foster and directed by Robert Zemeckis. Given his background as a renowned scientist (astrophysicist), it is not surprising that the book is written with real science as the foundation of the book, unlike many other science fiction books that are full of ‘made up’ science and harbor a gloomy/doomsday outlook.

The protagonist Ellie Arroway (named after Eleanor Roosevelt and Voltaire Arouet) is an Astronomer (the character is very similar to Sagan himself). Ellie is convinced of intelligent life out there in the universe (…I'd say if it is just us... seems like an awful waste of space) and pursues her belief and becomes the director of ‘Project Argus’ that scans (with the help of many Radio Telescopes) the sky for intelligent signals from the cosmos as part of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). She does hit the jackpot when the telescopes start picking up a sequence of coded messages coming in from the Vega star system – the first contact from an extraterrestrial intelligence. The message once decoded contains, among other things, a blueprint for building a machine (vehicle). The struggles to building the machine (a multibillion venture) and undertaking the space travel by Ellie are the meat of the book (Ellie travels thru a wormhole to the Vega star some 26 light-years from Earth!).

The culmination of the book indicates a creator of the universe and an intelligent design, which is very surprising (and a bit disappointing) given that Sagan is a confirmed atheist (or at least a skeptic), or is there a different message – honestly I am not so sure. But, I would like to believe that the Creator, Sagan hints at is the collection of many physics and mathematical laws that govern and that are interwoven into the universe and not the Creator as propagated by the many religions. Nevertheless the book is a wonderful read for its scientific accurateness and the awe it can inspire.

The movie by Zemeckis is equally powerful and worth a watch, I will leave the review of the movie to my good friend Toto. Meanwhile you can enjoy the opening sequence of the movie here.

Sagan can make us feel very special (‘we are made of star stuff’')and at the same time make us feel very humble (A vision... of the universe, that tells us, undeniably, how tiny, and insignificant and how... rare, and precious we all are!) But, my all time favorite (and a longish) quote is from

Pale Blue Dot: Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

The other book I would recommend is The Demon-Haunted World. This is a great book that advocates Science and fights against the practice of Pseudoscience, right from UFO sightings to religious superstitions. Sagan speaks about the power of reasoning and importance of questioning the many beliefs without bias. The Baloney detection tool kit introduced in this book is a great tool thru which such beliefs are to be passed before accepted. The book does not spare scientist and sets high ethical standards for them. It’s a vast canvas that Sagan paints in this book and what a beauty it turns out to be.

Bad Science

There are in fact two things, science and opinion; the former begets knowledge, the latter ignorance. - Hippocrates,Greek physician (460 BC - 377 BC)

Last time I went to my doctor (M.B.B.S, M.D, PhD!), he examined me for a while and gave me 2 plastic bottles with green and blue caps and filled with mini white spheres, tasting like sugar (they were sugar globes indeed!). Homeopathy, he said, and gave a set of instructions along with the pills. I dutifully discarded the pills, the instructions and finally the doctor!

In the recent times many forms of alternate medicine has become popular; the most popular of them is probably Homeopathy, so much so that even some general practitioners, like my own doctor, of the so called Allopathy (interestingly the terms Allopathy/ Allopathic medicine were coined by Samuel Hahnemann, the founder of homeopathy and considered derogative!) today prescribe homeopathic pills. In most of the cities, every street has a homeopathic practitioner and a long line of patients waiting outside, not the least worried about the practitioner’s credentials.

I have always wondered about the effectiveness of alternate medicine and this wonder led me to Ben Goldacre. Ben Goldacre is a doctor by profession from the Oxford and a celebrated journalist. He has a master's degree in philosophy. He writes a weekly column in the guardian titled ‘Bad Science’ and blogs here http://www.badscience.net/. His recent (Sep 2008) block buster book is titled; you would have guessed it by now – Bad Science. He is just 34.

His columns are very critical of the many pseudo science practices that are popular today. The book is a follow up to the columns and continues the scathing yet witty style of writing, but a style that is very thorough. The book covers a lot of things from detoxification myths to media’s role in the health fads and even large evil pharma companies. Since it covers a lot of ground it is a bit laborious at times and that can surely be excused.

Bad Science has a long chapter dedicated to Homeopathy and followed immediately by a chapter on placebo effect. Ben Goldacre completely debunks the practice of Homeo and writes: “Homeopathy is perhaps the paradigmatic example of an alternative therapy: it claims the authority of a rich historical heritage, but its history is routinely rewritten for PR needs of a contemporary market; it has an elaborate sciency sounding framework for how it works , without scientific evidence to demonstrate its veracity; and its proponents are quite clear that the pills will make you better, when in fact they have been thoroughly researched, with innumerable trails, and have been found to perform no better that Placebo.”

The other book that has received great reviews is the wonderfully titled “Trick or Treatment”; co authored by the other popular British author/journalist (pseudo patriots can take pride in his Indian origins!) Simon Singh. This book is all about alternate medicines and goes all out at Homeopathy and criticizes the two pillars of Homeopathy 1. Like cures like and 2. Dilution increases potency – for more details watch this video where Simon Singh talks about his book and Homeopathy in detail (you have to tolerate his weird hairstyle ;-)).

Both the books argue based on meta studies based on rigorous trials and the outcome of these trails have been fairly conclusive in terming homeopathy as no better than Placebo.

If Homeopathy is no better than Placebo, then why is Homeo so popular today? It is a good question, and the answer lies in the power of Placebo and the desperation of people when mainstream medicine (still) has no answer to many of today’s ills (we have to remember that mainstream medicine has only taken off in the last 70 odd years after the start of proper clinical trials and advancement in science - otherwise it was no different from the pseudo medicine and followed practices like bloodletting for cures for more than 2000 years).

Placebo is usually a non medicinal substance (like sugar pill, saline water, etc); that will have no effect on the illness, but administered to the patient. The patient believes that the substance has medical value and at times his condition improves, purely based on psychological stimulus.

Many trials have proved the effectiveness of placebo; especially when the Doctor is confident and sounds very honest and caring. Tests have proved that the color, shape (capsules are more powerful than tablets), the brand (Crocin seems to be more effective even though there are hundred other Paracetamol tablets available in the market). In all this, the elobrate ritual and props are very important.

The power of Placebo effect can be seen in the many other beliefs like: astrology, spiritual gurus, good luck gems, etc. and of course, the biggest of them all – God.

People Leave Managers Not Companies. Really?

People Leave Managers Not Companies. This is the statement that Marcus B is making in the book; ‘first, break all the rules’. This is also the philosophy that Gallup is pushing around. This statement is being applauded, quoted and communicated by many HR professionals. This is just another management jargon, one that is very convenient for the HR team in any organization. Bring on any ‘employee friendly’ policy, reorg experiments, compensation confusions and layer upon layer of abstractions in the HR processes and when attrition increases can blame (or at least share the blame) the managers. ‘Managers’ is a faceless entity when it is abstracted at the organization level, so you are blaming a faceless, generic group, rather than being specific and taking the bottom-line for the many failed initiatives -rather convenient isn't it?

This statement could possibly (only ever so slightly) be true if the lower requirements as indicated by the Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs get fulfilled. This maturity can only come in a developed job market where the national GDP is stable and salary for similar roles are fairly equal across organizations. In a developing country; where the needs at the lower levels of the pyramid are unfulfilled, the National GDP keeps fluctuating, salary levels uneven across organizations for similar roles, the reasons for people to leave an organization would be salary, position and location and in an organization of mostly freshers it could be even higher studies. Moreover the culture across these markets are radically different, people needs are very different.

Yes, it is a tough challenge if you get a really bad manager who is unreasonable, bad mouthed or unconcerned about the team and primarily after his own visibility. It is very frustrating to compete with your own manager. The only option would be to quit and move on. But concluding bad managers as the only or primary reason for people quitting organization is pushing the generalization a bit too far. It is sheer desperation and passing on the buck to faceless group of people or merely a matter of convenience.

Truth is, manager is just another cog in the organization wheel; larger the wheel (organization) smaller the cog (manager) becomes. With many standardized and normalization processes the role of a manager is becoming smaller and smaller; one has to just feed in the list and rest taken care by the xls (or an application if your organization has mature people practices :-)).

PS: Abraham Maslow's book ‘Motivation and Personality’, published in 1954 introduced the Hierarchy of Needs, which states that Human motivation moves up a pyramid as each level gets fulfilled and this is a concept that every MBA student is very much familiar with and used for various subjects, like psychology, HR, marketing, etc.

first, break all the rules

Started this book with great hesitation and without much expectation (This book was first recommended by a trainer from our leadership center, any recommendation from the leadership center or from HR has to be approached with caution :-)), "First, Break All The Rules", is written by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman, both seasoned Gallop employees (I guess Marcus is not with Gallup anymore, but that is not important, atleast not for us ;-)) and hence I expected this book to be in some way a marketing material for Gallup – it is that and a bit more.

That 'bit more' is what is interesting (obviously!). The core of the first part is: "we can’t change basic traits of people by a day’s training” this is something I very strongly believe in and hence I started reading with some genuine interest.

Yes we can’t, we can’t change the basic nature of a person so easily. This concept is something we have seen in the previous posts on “Personality”, A person’s trait is 50% genetic and rest 50% is molded thru early life experiences (‘parents have no role’ – I can’t get over this point!) and it is nearly, as they say, cast in stone. It is Fairly impossible to change; unless the individual takes an extraordinary effort to change (after realizing his basic traits -which, by itself, is a big challenge). So, the book begs managers not to waste time focusing on talents that people don’t possess, but accept and nurture the talents that they possess.

The book says:
People don't change that much.
Don't waste time trying to put in what was left out.
Try to draw out what was left in.
That is hard enough.

I have different team leads, one of them is always in the thick of the things, pretty vocal, an extrovert by nature. The other leader is calm, keeps to himself and communicates in a limited but effective manner. Bottom line is, they get things done and their respective teams are happy to work with them. I admire them both. I cannot search of the absent qualities in them and ignore their strengths. Each one is different and this difference is the strength of my team.
Net-net; Conducting half a day 'Assertiveness' session is not going to make a person any more assertive than what he was before the session.

Okay, we saw the point that i agree with the authors whole heartedly; there is also a point in the book that i am really appalled at; more about it in the next post.

Note: Since 1997, Gallup has polled some 3 million individuals across 80 thousand units. Gallup uses 12 questions to measure the engagement of employees. The result of these surveys is extensively used in this book.

Chapter chat - "Innum Pirakadha thalaimuraikaaga"

Interlinking of rivers - few rivers and many crores.

I'll be sharing about the books or interesting topics that I come across in books [ க‌டைசிப்ப‌க்க‌ம் ?! இது ஒண்ணு தான் குறை.].

I had this relation with the rivers at a level of a school kid running to buy 2 India river maps [ we linked them by making too many mistakes in the paper .. [காவிரிக்கு கீழே எங்க‌டா கோதாவ‌ரி ஓடுது..ஸார்.. காதை விடுங்க‌ ஸார்..வ‌லிக்குது] and 'checked' graph sheets for sheets. The inter-linking of rivers comes in the media limelight on and off. What do we actually know about this issue [ any subject in that case :) ] ?

S.Thedore Bhaskaran [ பாதிரியாரா?! ] - I knew this personality as a film historian with his books on cinema [ Chithiram Pesudhadi, Sivaji Ganesan and Em Thamizhar seidha padam ]. Of late, I came to know that he is an ecologist [ ய‌க்கா ?!] too.

Some points to ponder [ taken majorly from the book ]

* Is it easy to join rivers just like that ? Has it been done anywhere else in the globe ? Was it successful or a failure as introducing new alien water creatures in Andaman islands.

* The Indian rivers flow at different heights, in the first place. The power needed to elevate the water level is more than the power expected to be produced by the inter-linking.

* The cost estimated for this project is.. have some ice water..Rs.560000 crores [ to be precise 559999 and the 1 c from Rajini ].

* Have they joined 2 water resources anywhere else in the world ? Have you come across the effect of South and north Aral sea [ lakes ] in Russia ? One lake is completely drained .

* It's wrong to think that the river water is wasted by ending up in the sea. It's the cycle of biodiversity [ ப‌ல்லுயிரிய‌ல்].

* We do have water treaty with Bangladesh and that will be affected if we really get into this project. Also, we know the status of the treaty between TN and KA on the existing water distribution [ without any alteration in the path ].

* We failed in water channelising methods and the native methods of storing waters. Lakes have turned as Lake view apartments and villas.

* The existed polluted rivers will spoil other river by combining them.

* What happened in Alwar district - Rajasthan ? Few effective NGOs constructed Jathos [ mud check dams for rain harvesting ] and it benefited the most dry district of Rajasthan. Remember the forceful condition of rain water harvesting yielded some good results in TN [ rain ille enga harvest panna ? ].

This is just a drop in the ocean from the book written by Theodre Bhaskaran [ இன்னும் பிற‌க்காத‌ த‌லைமுறைக்காக‌- what a beautiful title ?! ]. In fact he is inspiration for drawing [ அப்ப‌டியும் சொல்லிக்க‌லாம் :) ]about the house sparrows in the competition. He clarified that planting enormous number of trees can't compensate or create a forest because a forest is not just a group of trees and cannot be man-made. You can feel the same when you think about the days you spent in any of those hill stations. Can it be recreated ?

I am not favouring him blindly - at least, he shows the other side of the coin. It's better for us to read more about these topics and know the real things instead of following the speech of Rahul Gandhi or Gnani.

So next time, when a politician or a celebrity talks about interlinking rivers, think before spending time in their speech. Media cherishes as long as the public is kept in the dark - better make our people follow the Vijay TV program "Rajini's pilgrimage to Babaji caves". [ It's like Veerappan is to Nakkeeran and Rajini is to Vikatan group ]

I recommend this book - "Innum pirakkaatha thalaimuraikkaaga" by S. Theodre Baskaran from Uyirmmai padippakam [ Rs.120/- ].

:)

Toto.

Who moved my Blackberry – Lucy Kellaway

Who moved my blackberry is an Epistolary novel (written as a series of letters, diary entries, etc – Arvind Adiga’s The White Tiger is one and uses letters). The book has been written by Lucy Kellaway, but the protagonist Martin Lukes is credited as the Author and Lucy’s name appears as co author.
Before this book, Lucy introduced Martin Lukes thru her columns in the Financial Times that and continued for many years (sample: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/6ca3db5e-989e-11dc-8ca7-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1) . Lucy’s name is never mentioned in the column to maintain authenticity!

Martin Lukes is the Marketing Director of a-b global’s UK Operations (a-b Global is a fortune 100, US company). The story revolves around his struggle to move up the corporate ladder. He manages to climb with very little ability, but a lot of management jargon, super ego, kissing-up to the CEO and finally with some help from a personal life coach. He manages to get to the position of Special Projects Director (heading special projects, is the management’s way of saying that the exit door is nearby).

The book is a wonderful satire of the corporate world and all its Bull (a bit to the extreme at times). It has everything that is wrong it today’s corp world, right from life coach (the jargons used by the life coach (named Pandora Barry) are the best – “strive to thrive, better than your best, etc”), massive egos that are so self obsessed that make people oblivious of the situations they are in, usage of blackberry (or any other e-tool), rebranding, off shoring, downsizing, reorganizing, affairs, you name it. And it all culminates in a scandal (Insider trading).

A great moment in the book is the coining of the word "creovation" by Martin; this is the half creation and half innovation. These two words are the current buzz words in any self-respecting organization. And, Lucy has a good amount of fun by poking around this concept. The second best is the 'Phenomenal Performance - Permanently' by the CEO himself

This books explains how so many people with limited talent/intelligence are way up there – and what hits the nail is that we all know someone who closely resembles Martin Lukes –sometimes, it is a mirror that Lucy Kellaway is holding! And what you see there is frightening!

This is a well written book, considering the constraints of constructing the entire book with a series of blackberry messages. Some of the emails are laugh-out-loud types and many will bring a smile for sure. This is not a serious book, but a wonderful deviation if you are into serious stuff. An enjoyable parody into the world of corporate and its wretched culture. Does it carry a message? Probably.

Personality by Daniel Nettle

Alert: this will probably be a bit dry, but this is a facinating topic for me, hence pls. tolerate and travel with me!

Book Reference: Personality by Daniel Nettle

Each one of us is very different in our own way…is this true? Why are we different? We react to same situations/stimulations differently, why is it?
What drives these differences in our individual personality.

According to Gordon Allport, Personality is, “The dynamic organization within the individual of those psychological systems that determine his unique adjustments to his environment”. Yes, it is complex; but quite simply put- it is the way we react and interact with the environment around us in a consistent manner.

The various dimensions of this personality is known as the traits. Traits is the pattern in our behavior- it is the way we are wired! Although there are many (some count to 80) identified traits the five major traits that are used popularly to measure personality are:

1. Openness (to experiment new things, curious, imaginative)
2. Conscientiousness (being dutiful, dependable, etc)
3. Extraversion (highly social, etc)
4. Agreeableness (good natured, trusting, etc)
5. Neuroticism (nerves, emotional stability)
Collectively these traits are known as the The Big 5.

According to WIKI; The first public mention of the model was in 1933, by L. L. Thurstone in his presidential address to the American Psychological Association. Eversince there has been a large body of research on this framework and we will be focuing on these traits.

How The Mighty Fall - Jim Collins

In this book, Jim Collins tries to answer the question, why some companies that are doing exceedingly well turn around and fail (and also on why some continue to do well - but the focus is on the failing companies). Jim Collins comes out with the following framework of five stages of failure and discusses the stages with well-researched case studies of 11 organizations that have gone thru them.

Stage 1: Hubris born of success –Assuming that Success is a given no matter what we do.

Stage 2: Undisciplined pursuit of more – Going after quick gains and abandoning the core strengths/values (flywheels) for something new and radically different and deep into stage 1.

Stage 3: Denial of risk and peril – blinded hubris, refusing to see the risk vs. reward symmetry of venturing into a new strategy and abandoning old core strengths.

Stage 4: Grasping for salvation – Looking for a silver bullet (getting a new hotshot CEO, going after (with millions) an all-out drug that is still not proven) that will salvage the organization. Losing out on the culture of the organization.

Stage 5: Capitulation to irrelevance or death - the final stage, where everyone just gives in after the financial power gets eroded by the many false starts. And the organization just melts away.

The organizations that he discusses range from HP (HP took down two of my favorite companies – Digital and Compaq), Bank of America, Ames Dept Stores, Circuit City, Merck, etc. Jim Collins argues that the fall is mostly self-inflicted and not driven by the environment (environment does play a role).

It is really surprising and staggering to read about some of the decisions some leaders take even as they stare at the downfall of their company, it is as if they are blinded by the ego and confidence. It is also amazing to know that many companies that fall are at the peak of their innovation cycle, for example, Motorola and Merck had the highest IP filings during the respective slides. We always think that companies that innovate survive, Jim proves it as otherwise, the message, is probably, innovate at the right time.

Another interesting point is that many companies that are on the downward slope do a lot of restructuring (Scott Papers restructured some 3 times in 4 years during their fall). I can relate to some of the findings to what is going on in my organization (esp. the restructuring), I hope we get it right and prove Jim wrong. The way the book is written is very interesting to read, he has contrasted the company that failed, with a company (in the same market and competitive environment) that has succeeded.

This book is only 123 pages and well structured with chapter-end summaries. The book is easy to read and understand for a layman like me. It is also quite updated (published May 2009) with references to the recent meltdown, but I guess the draft was ready a couple (or at least a year ago), hence not too focused on the recent happenings.

On the downside: like any other solutions book, the conclusions seem to be quite simple and the research findings looks to be twisted to suit the writer’s framework.

Jim Collins is the celebrated author of Good to Great and Built to Last (Trivia: Steve Ballmer considers Built to Last as his single favorite Business Book!). Built to Last, is on the Business Week best-seller list for more than six years, and has been translated into 25 languages. According to Wiki, this book (How The Mighty Fall) has sold more than 2.5 million copies and has been translated into 35 languages.