tech talk tick tock

Technology – I have got so many technology innovations wrong that I almost believe that I have no sense of what the future holds. But funnily I am in a job that requires me to forecast and work towards using technology in our daily life. It’s not that the job description says so, but I guess my interests in technology make me feel so, behave so and be so.

But so many times I have seen myself as an older person not really embracing technology as I should be. I remember I got my blackberry well after a lot of the others got it. I saw it as a tool that people used to become wannabe peoples. People with the blackberries were the ‘I am so uptight that I will pull off my BB in a lift and check it rather than do nothing but look at the lift screen and get bored.’ This was especially trues because I worked in an uptight wealth management set up in a building teaming with investment bankers – all seemingly more uptight than the other. Hence – I resisted buying the BB for the longest time. Then once I got it, I used it way past it expiry date. I used it for three years it so till one day, it gave up on me. Then I bought the tough screen interface form Samsung. And I am hooked for ever to it. One thing I get really scared of doing is buying an apple device. With the restrictive iTunes interface, I really can’t get my head to work with it. See I am getting far older than I thought.

Some time back, I bought a shaving brush and a shaving round. I guess in ten years or so if any one were to read this blog they would be pretty confused as to what a shaving round is. Here, this best describes the round.

Basically a soap on which you vigorously rub the brush to get enough lather and then it goes on your beard. It was fun a start. A throw back to the time I first started shaving. My dad had this which I used after the tenth exams to get rid of my moustache. I was sure that the mouchie was a dam uncool thing to have. So I used my dad’s stuff. My dad realized I shaved and then sat me down and gifted me a set. My own shaving brush, I think a shaving cream and a razor with spare supplies. I think that was the ultimate father son cliché moment. The coming of age. I soon graduated to shaving foams. That was thanks to Jasmine and her cousins from US. Jasmine would routinely get me the cans. I kept the cans going for many years till one day I saw the round at the supermarket. It was cool to be retro I thought. And really really cheap. Till I realized a week back that it’s stupid. It takes more space and more time and given that shaving is the most boring thing to do when you are 39 (and amazingly exciting at 15), just take the latest thing and move on. So back to a fast and quick shaving solution. I am now waiting to get through my blades to figure if I would enjoy an electric shaver. The technology on those things seems to have improved drastically since I first used it many years ago.

And cars – there is one place I always wanted all the technology I could afford. I like to think small when it comes to possessions. And I have always had simple (relatively simpler) tastes in car. I don’t really drool over fancy sports cars and see no real use for them. But I wanted some stuff in my car. Always! Lets take a feature check. Tubeless tyres – who wants to change punctures in the middle of the road – I got that from the second car onwards. Alloy wheels – one friend in MBA had a brother who dealt in alloy wheels. He explained how they were lighter and stronger and cool to look at. Then I wanted rear defogger – my second car onwards. Air bags – safety first – third car had it. then you have stuff like keyless entry. Why would you need keys at all. Push start – all my life I wondered why we need a key to start the car. Just press a button. Isn’t that simpler. And the holy grail of them all – automatic. You need an Automatic. I was done changing gears after 20 years of driving. What a freaking pain. So now my new car is the 2014 Honda City. Push button start, automatic, alloy wheels, rear defogger, Rear parking camera integrated into audio system, key less entry – no button to press – just open the door if your key device is on you, a lock that automatically happens at a speed of 20kmph, sun roof (absolutely lovely useless stuff), airbags, ABS EBD and some other really cool stuff that I don’t know about. But it’s cool. and yes yes – Cruise control. How could I forget that. And the simple audio controls on the steering wheel. I am eligible for something much more than a Honda City from the company but I am ok with this. This is good enough for now. My first car was the Indica, we sold that and bought a Honda City, then we bought a second car – the iTen which we just sold to buy this City. So now we have two Citys. But truly for some reason this car is one that I am truly very excited about. I have no clue why I like it so much. The dam waiting period was 8 months, but I felt that it was well worth it. Japanese trouble free engineering with cool gadgets built in. I know it and I hate it, it’s not nice to covet something so much. it’s wrong. It’s just a car. But I like the leather seats and I don’t want to see them spoilt.

One thing I always wanted at the bare minimum was a clean, rattle free, reliable free car. I hate a car which has a rattling part. Or a car that needs to go to the workshop again and again. I love technology in a car. That’s one place it needs to be. And I figure if I spend at least 90 minutes in a car every day, I don’t mind spending a little on this car; which gives me the comfort I want.

There… now let me leave you with a completely irrelevant bonus video… but is it that irrelevant…?

perspectives

Long ago I too thought that the solutions to all traffic woes would be to build flyovers. As many as you possibly can, just build them and the traffic will simple cease. The simple logic being that if you don’t have halts you don’t have traffic.

Reading books by intelligent people gives you a perspective on life that is different than the average Joe. You look at life from different angles. That is the single biggest thing about reading. You understand that there are multiple perspectives and viewpoints for various issues. You also realize how much to trust propaganda and simplistic thinking. Also being in marketing you realize that you are not the center of the world. Most people (even in marketing) market to themselves and their own sensibilities. That’s not the right way to understand things. Just because you like it is no reason to have a pack design in a certain manner. Its what your core customer wants that’s important. I have learnt that India is not English speaking and we continue to throw English inside our communication. We marketer’s believe that everybody understands English. In offices in metros we think since we use English as the primary means of communication, that is the answer to everything. Of course you must understand English. May be earlier it would suffice as the big markets were the well-developed metros. But now as we look beyond the metros the vernacular languages need to addressed. The politicians and the film world have got it bang on. They are ones who have embraced the vernacular since time immemorial. But since we marketing people are based out of cities we forget the basics.

Simplistically as well, we think that the only spending on infrastructure we must do is the roads. So many people (very smart at that) have told me that the solution to Mumbai’s infra mess is more roads, costal roads, ring roads and flyover etc. No one seems to understand the huge amount of money being spent on what is a fraction of the people enjoying the service. Mass Rapid Transport is not about roads for cars but using bus and train services to connect people across the city. A network that takes a huge mass of people from one end to another. This opens out the city and flattens it evenly. People want cheap reliable mode of transport. The car is the worst thing for solving city woes. My argument has been rather simple here. My guess (only a guess) is that the amount of money the city spends on these massive flyovers can be simply utilized to do something else. Suppose we just take the number of busses on the road and triple it thus reaching far off corners and for good measure put air-conditioning to placate the office goers, the cost of which can easily be borne in lieu of the flyover constructed. Me thinks that with this kind of money you can even charge normal rates and give AC service. Ofcourse this is simplistic thinking. Flyover can last many years, far more than an average life of a bus. Plus no point having busses if your roads are jammed to start with. But the thinking is different. The point is to look at lakhs of people at the lower level than the few bums at the top.  

But it’s not easy to change habit. Over the last few years I have got the habit of travelling by car. First at kaliana and then at worli – my house is ill connected to office by public transport. It doesn’t make sense to travel thus. It takes far more time and is tedious. So I have the car habit. While I was in nariman point I used to take pride in travelling by train. This way I got my reading time as well. There is some loose talk that our office will get transferred back to Nariman Point. Jasmine and I saw it differently. I thought great - there is a new freeway from town right upto my building (literally – mine is the first building you get off to) and Jasmine said – great, now you can go by train and catch back on your reading. Oops. I missed that one. No body like change from routine.  I too am a victim of my own routine.

zoom

Last week I was in Udaipur for a personal leave. Jasmine and I have realized the value of staying put in as few places as possible during a leave. First we would go to multiple places in one leave. Like our honey moon, in which we did more than 6 places in 15 days. We covered practically the whole of  Kumaon region in Uttrakhand when we were there. Slowly slowly we were down to three places, then two and now we are at one place one week. The last two holidays have been just that. Reach, plonk yourself and if needed use that as a base to explore further. So this time, it was one week in Udaipur. This also affects the hotel choice. We end up taking a smallish but cute and clean hotel, that is typically family run. And this time for the first time, we deliberately went for a hotel with a pool in it. if you are there for eight nights and you might get a bit of hot weather, you need a pool. So we got, history, culture and relaxation – all in one vacation.

Another thing that we have discovered in India is the Golden Quadrilateral. The new highways of India. I have been hearing about how good. I used to try and get Jasmine to agree on driving holidays. The last time we had no option but to drive to our spot as it was pretty remote. The highways are amazing. These are segregated lanes with flower beds in the middle. And enough space to zip through. When I first drove on Indian highways, it was around 20 years ago. We had a Fiat premier padmini car. Here is a similar model. Ours was white as well.

My dad had bought it second hand. My mom had insisted on buying a car as my eldest sister was marriageable age and we must have a car to prove that we were well off. That we had two flats and that we had stayed in Dubai or whatever else was probably not too much of a show off value. So dad bought his car for around ninety five thousand rupees. A princely sum of course in those days. Must have been around in the year 1990 or thereabouts. The only thing we kids did not like about it was that it did not have an AC in it. We were keen that we have atleast an AC car. We wanted a Maruti but our conservative parents preferred this car, which we made do with. BUT NO AC? That was a bummer. But hell, we still loved that we had a car and as soon as we turned 18, we enrolled into a driving school and got our licenses. Dad actively taught our driving and soon enough we were driving on highways.

The highways. Oh the highways on a premier padmini. It had no acceleration to talk about. It was good for doing 60kmph at bets. Reaching any speeds beyond that required a large empty stretch of road and 90 would be around the best available speed. That too only if we got like a straight road with no traffic on the way. I must crossed that only once in my padimini. Add to that were the state of the highways in India. I was explaining to Jispa that the highways were just one road with one lane going up and another lane going down, with no segregation. The lanes were simply painted. So when you drive you have to be very carefull. For overtaking every time, you would have to tail the truck in front of you and then move little to the right and check for oncoming traffic. Then if you found the coast clear you would press the accelerator completely and hope to pass the truck before an oncoming vehicle came face to face with you. But that’s not enough similarly you have to constantly look for incoming vehicles that are overtaking by coming onto your lane. You would have to adjust your speed accordingly. I have been pushed off road one more than one occasions by a truck who has mistimed his overtaking. So I move off the road rather than get smashed into as pulp.

I was explaining this to Jispa and she found it quite amusing. The highway to Udaipur is around 800 km long and is one super straight drive. Only in one 50 km patch between Ahmedabad and Ghandinagar is the old style highway. I guess that is because it is the Ghandinagar bypass. If you go through the city then you get the segregated lanes all the way. This is like a shortcut. It helped to have it as it was like giving a live demo to Jispa. I talked to her while I was driving. See now I must overtake this way. Now I must look for this truck. She now found all it even funnier. All the cars waiting behind a truck and then suddenly all of them accelerating together and overtaking. Then she saw how we were stuck behind a truck at 40kmph waiting for a chance to overtake. As opposed to 100 -120 kmph on the normal highway, it felt like a hare waiting impatiently behind a tortoise waiting for an opening.

The superb highways made me think about my political leaning. The bridges in Mumbai which got much acclaim were thanks to the right winged group in power. The Golden quad highway project was a brain child of the same right winged combo in power at the center. The more secular party leans almost left and is a ‘welfarist’ at heart. While I think some of the legislation like the NREGA which guarantees employment may have much greater long term impact than what most understand, I need good roads and bridges now. No I am not talking like a spoiled brat who wants roads for a self drive vacation. But I see the benefits of good infrastructure.

Long ago in my naivety I had argued that India does not need so much infrastructure. After all we led the IT boom in spite of the no government support and in the absence of any backing. Adversity led to innovation. But I couldn’t have been more stupider. We desperately need it and the multiplier effect is for there to see. Good roads means better transport for goods and materials, we can now use large trucks on the highways, better trucks, better facilities for drivers, faster transportation. May be capital intensive in the short run but cheaper in the long run. Business comes up in and around the area and you definitely gain in terms of efficiency. It’s bloody important. So this time around if I vote right winged, it’s not that I love secular less, but that I love infrastructure more (sorry Brutus).

Its the chair

Its really quite funny. The head of marketing in a 250 man company is different from the head of marketing in a 4,500 man company. I have been head of marketing for a long time now. The roles kept expanding and now in my current division which has around 4,500 employees, I am the head of a department. And here I am being made to feel like one. If you have read some of the old blogs you would know that here I have a largish cabin to sit in. I think the visibility that it gives others about me is something very very different. Like I was telling someone, this can get to your head. It can bloat your already expanded  ego. It takes effort to be level headed. Simple stuff can be seen. People look with some amazement that I drive only a hatchback. Now that can mean two things, either I am a really simple humble guy or I am a stingy miser. I guess I must be getting equal measure of both. The other day, I did not get my car. I was about to catch a taxi to go home, when I saw a colleague of mine leaving at the same time. So I offered him a lift. He pointed to the company bus which takes people back to the train station in the evening from the office. Ok, what the hell, let me hop on to it today. The station is on the way home. I was the last one in climbing the bus while it left. As soon I boarded it, I felt a silence. For a few seconds all eyes were on me and the bus fell quite. The receptionist who was sitting at the front, looked at me and remarked “sir, the first time some senior person like you has come on our bus”. I just smiled, shrugged and walked on. Two three remarks “you, sir, are in this bus?”. “err, ya”. I just took the seat at the end and felt like a Chinese doll at an exhibition.

I must be the only hatch back to be given a designated parking slot in the company. For an overcrowded place like Mumbai, I must have really achieved in life to get this slot. So when I once got my sedan, which normally Jasmine uses to office, the watch man loved it and even remarked “Sir, nice, this car is good. It suits you”. I could only smile back in response.

I think we humans area  show off society. We like segregation. We like us and them. We like to show off our feathers and mane and other forms of success.

All this can get to you if you are not careful. In one of my earlier avatar, I was easily one of the most powerful people in the mutual fund industry in India. It was because of a default. My business head who was really the most powerful man (because his decisions could swing the future of the fund houses) would refuse to meet any one from the industry. SO the only way to him was to convince me and everyone in the industry would meet me. The same guys would get their CEO’s as well as their fund managers to meet me and try their best to talk to me. I would have meetings lined up, one after the other meeting these guys. It was tough but I think I never managed to get heady. My immediate boss Prakash Dalal and my colleague Suman who taught me about the industry, always maintained a level head and I , I think, followed in their footsteps. So I tried to remain level headed. I always maintained, that they are not here to meet me or respect me. They are here to meet and respect the chair I have, I sit on and that is not mine. It belongs to the company and I am nothing compared to it. This attitude kept me level then and it keeps me level now. When the bust followed the boom and slowly that job lost its importance, fewer and fewer people came to meet me. Slowly the role got swept into oblivion and I moved on. I was right. They only wanted to meet the chair.

Sure enough I must have gained some respect. I treated people right. I never kept them waiting and I tried to be honest with them. At the same time, I was a tough negotiator and I extracted every penny till the very end. They probably realized that as well. I have many acquaintances from that period but almost no friends. A sales guy who has come to pitch to you is not likely to be friends with you for life. He is focused on the job and his smile, manners, discussion is focused. I don’t think he has the time or the inclination to court you beyond his scope of work.

I have had friends from my marketing side of my work. Agencies, vendors etc. Some people for whom immediate sale was not the priority. Slow happy relations that translate into sales, perhaps.

So here I am sitting on my chair with hope that I never lose sight of it. I should never ever think that this is my ass doing things. The sun doesn’t shine off my ass. It shines off my chair and that my ass is on it is just a coincidence. It fools most people. They think it’s their ass. But no, believe me, it’s almost always the chair.  

Thats my chair.i have given up on the normal office chairs with wheels and reclining back support after facing severe lower back pain. I love my chair and i am thankfull to my earlier division that allowed me to bring this chair along with me when I moved. Thanks Agnel, you are an angel.

can you ask me that answer again?

I was explaining to the poor customer care lady from my car service station (Jay Bharat Hyundai) that I cannot remember how the service was done. My Hyundai i-ten was serviced in Jan. that information was also provided by her. I can’t remember when it was done. I don’t even remember what I had for lunch yesterday. She still insisted that at least I know if what I said or had complaints about were addressed. Lady, how can I know that? We are right now in May. At best I might remember if you had botched up the service. Which I don’t think you did. My car is running fine right now.
After a few minutes of me stonewalling and refusing to say something I don’t remember at all she agreed and moved onto the next question in her interview. Could I please rate the service on a score from 0 to 5. Oh shit man. Lady. I just told you I don’t remember anything. Do you remember what you did in Jan. Do you remember what you did last week? What were you doing yesterday? You don’t right? How can I score you guys if I don’t remember what experience I had? It’s been four months.
Sir, but at least some score. NO. I DON’T REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENED. Surely you did not screw up big tie and hence I have no bad memories but I have none. What part of that did you not understand?
That’s proactive customer service for you. We care so we call you. Even four months from then and ask you what had happened then. Hopefully you don’t remember shit and you score us good. Since you guys are obviously so polite not to give us bad marks on things you don’t recollect. Hence I have a great customer satisfaction score and I am doing a good job.
I told my wife about the conversation and she was wondering why the call was made. She had already got the call a few days after the service was done. That’s a good thing. A decent follow-up call, just after. After four months your call can be at best a call that checks to see if your car is working all well. Not to score what happened four months ago. Especially on something as unearthshaking as routine car service. Why? Don’t you realise we get shit from tele marketers all the time.
While right now its pretty cool to have follow up service, my prediction is that this too will become a nuisance factor soon enough. The companies that will do well will be the companies that do not need follow up calls as their processes and procedures themselves are tight enough to provide the best service and their redressal mechanism would be swift and powerfull while being accessible.
But that seems to be pipe dream. In India we are busy chasing growth and are tapping into the vast India as it gets richer and richer. Who cares for the leaky bucket if the tap on top continues to pour its bounty? Growth always comes at a cost. Rapid growth comes at an even higher cost. If it is too good to be true then it is too good to be true. I don’t think our immature capitalism understands this yet.

I am probably needlessly taking off on Hyundai right now. It is a wrong thing to do. At least they are trying to do something. But the point is that in trying too hard they end up getting data that is wrong. Data has to be understood in its context and not by itself.

I hope companies like Hyundai understand this and not merely take action on quantitative scores. A process to get the data is as important as the data that is being gathered. Everyone knows that, even the folks at Hyundai. But we end up being so lazy that we don’t bother to put in a check for this. It won’t affect the short run but it will hide serious flaws in the wrong run. Anyone remembers ‘the broken windows theory’ made famous by Malcolm Gladwell? Look it up.