balancing it out

Coldplay, possibly the biggest band of the current time was to play in India. In Mumbai. A friend of mine, one day called me – “Arey boss, tell me fast, I am on the site and I can book tickets for the Coldplay concert. Tell me now and I will book now”. “How much for the tickets?” I enquired. “15 thousand for a ticket and we are all going. Tell me now and I will book.”. I thought about it for a minute and said – sure. I know Jispa likes Coldplay and I know that they are not going to be in India again and again and hence I booked the tickets. I came home and had a chat with jasmine – the tickets were definitely pricey. But that was no issue. We could always sell them later on. Then I sat to understand what tickets we bought. These were for the Global Citizen show which had a whole host of people performing and Coldplay was one of the many attractions. I searched more and realized that kids under 18 were not allowed. Ok – that was a bummer and then I offered the tickets for sale.

After us, most the friends who had also booked along with us, offered the tickets for sale and very few were really going. I explained the same to Jispa. She was disappointed but understood. Closer to the event news started filtering that young ones are going to be allowed as long as they are accompanied by an adult. As the tickets came in last week, it was clear, kids above 12 were allowed if accompanied by an adult. Hence the tug of war had already started. Between a friend and me we had six tickets of which 2 had been sold. So it was 4 left and we decided that he would get his daughter and I would get Jispa and got o the concert. If someone was willing to buy all four then only we would sell. Then another twist came in – Jispa had an interschool competition that day. I was ok bunking. Jasmine said – no issues, she can finish the competition and come. The concert was to start from 1.30 pm and last till around 10 pm. So she could always go late and obviously Coldplay would be the last performance. This was then the plan. One day before the organizers put out a bomb – no entry after 4 pm. Oh man – that meant waiting in line from 2.30 pm at least. Now what? So then I tried selling the tickets again online, on some facebook forum. Then my friend told me that I shouldn’t sell his tickets since he had promised his daughter. In all this Jispa had earlier been quite ok to sell the tickets or else we would go. In the end it was a chaos. I was getting a buyer and then I called to be sure. Now Jispa was feeling like she really wanted to go and WTF, and all hell was breaking loose. She also had a sore throat and a cold and was wondering what to do. Plus, the swim meet. What would she tell the coach? The pressure was real, decide now, I have some guy ready to transfer funds NOW. In the end, the call was taken – sell. Fine. I got a buyer and closed the deal with an advanced payment. Deed done. Now to sit and feel guilty about the whole process. Jasmine and me were feeling really bad. We knew she wanted to go and we bought the freak expensive tickets, but we just couldn’t make it happen.

So on the day we just simply sat in front of the TV screen and watched the concert live. Watching it on TV was a mixed reaction. It was an amazing concert with some amazing performances but then we noticed that the silver passes (which we sold) were really far away from the stage, unless you try and squeeze right in front near the barricades and risk getting crushed by the crowd behind you. There was no way that the passes were worth the 15k that we spent on them. We felt happy that the passes were sold. Jispa and me spoke about it and we discussed how badly a waste of money they actually were. I felt guilty that she did go but I also felt relieved that they were sold off. Even at 15k a pass if you are going to be that far away from the stage, it doesn’t really add up.

But we still felt really bad. We wanted her to go to the concert but it wasn’t to be. The next day my friends report came in. It was the most horrible moment of his life. The water was over most of the time, the food was over, the lines were long, the dust was too much, the stage was far, the performer wasn’t seen and the phones didn’t work. There in short – was the experience that ticket paying fans are going to be subjected to. On TV it looks like an awesome performance and it was. Chris Martin was awesome; the energy was infectious but the whole experience of seeing it live was a bad one. I spoke to Jispa about it. I had a chat with her. Sure it was bad and sure we couldn’t go because she was unwell and she had her events, but she deserved the right to go and see it for herself, experience it for herself and know firsthand what it takes to be at a rock concert and see for herself how bad it is. All the kids of course who went there, thoroughly enjoyed it. They are ok being hungry and thirsty and pushed around. They want to be there and experience what it is to breathe the same air as their band and they want to say ‘I was there’. Well so be it.

So now I told her that when she grows up, I would be happy to fund her concert and the ticket of her boyfriend as well. Ah… no reaction besides that of mild disgust. Jasmine is quietly still feeling bad and went online to check when is Coldplay next performing. She figured there is one concert in Singapore for Jispa to attend on 1^st April. I am happy to send them but I think that plan too fizzled out thanks to Jispa’s school.

I think there will be more moments for her to enjoy and more rock concerts for her to go to. Possibly the environment that we expect for her is way to sanitized. Maybe we aren’t able to set her free. She is now 14 plus and she needs her freedom. We check on her too much and we bother her too much. I think it’s time we set her free. I don’t think we should monitor her too much now. In the exams we told her that if you get good grades studying the way you do, then we are going to back off. I am keeping to my word. She gets her grade and I stay off. She can study the way she wants to and listen to music while she studies. I am not going to say anything. My dad used to tell me that he would force me to study and be after me till the tenth grade, after which he would simply stay off. I appreciated it a lot. He was true to his word. He never once questioned me on my marks or what I did or anything in college. He stayed true. So now one full generation down, can we not go down two year and three grade years. Now that Jispa is in the 8^th, she should be largely left alone. Left alone in her swimming and left alone in her studies. What more can you do. You can’t keep pushing your kid on this. Permit where you can and protect where you must.

I also realized that now Jispa has different issues in life. He issues would be interpersonal, boyfriends, girlfriends, attention, friendships, interpersonal. Here I don’t think she should come to us to sort them. She has to sort them herself. Sure she needs help, but not the in your face and let me tell you what to do help, but more subtle ones. I had a chat with her. I told her that now her issues are going to be her own and she will face them. She is going to find it funny to talk to us on them. She must talk to others, she must have friends who are elder to her and would chat with her. I told her that I would tell her about my issues that I had as a child and how I dealt with them, the mistakes I made and the various different experiences I had. I have opened up to her on my adolescence in the hope that she learns from it. She doesn’t need to find Buddha on the road, she needs to find them in her head. In the stories that she has seen around her, from the experience that history teaches her. She has to eliminate some basic errors or at least learn fast from them. Errors will happen, shit will hit you but you have to learn. If you learn fast you will grow better.

Somebody asked me if I would rather be old as today or go back 20 years. That is a crazy question. I am far better off today than I was 20 years before. I am healthier, smarter, more patient, richer, more aware of myself and my surroundings, more confident and everything else. I rather be today than yesterday. Possibly that’s a sign of a well maturing individual as much as it is a sign that I had a stupid childhood. Who knows.

At 41, my body is fats showing signs of wear and tear. I heal slower and I feel I can’t do the things that I used to do earlier. But I still like it. 20 years ago I was a thin kid with 16 kgs less mass and infinitely less money and even less confidence. I think 40 is a great balance. Yes, I am losing hair and that took some time to get adjusted to, but hell, it’s fun. I guess, I have to now fight to keep the balance that is there with me alive. This seems just right.

clever? No. Clear.

i think the single best innovation that has happened from the time i was in college to now, for a young guy is simple - the availability of coffee shops. Simple affordable coffee shops that are open for just hanging around. When Jasmine and me were going around, the single biggest issue overtime was - khan jay. Where to go? Right from 91 till 00, the big question was where to go to get some private conversation going. Where do two love birds go for sitting and staring into each others eyes. Where do they hang out, by themselves or with their friends, where do they while away the most part of the day. 

Jasmine and me used to try and be with each other all the time when in college. The problem was simple - we could be in college till a point of time - after that where could we go? Where to go for some privacy, some conversation, or simply to just hang out and chill. Where? Often we would search for new places - a garden perhaps (yuck), some restaurant but they would want you to leave after eating and finally the movies. Movies at least gave you 2 hours of together time, but cant really talk and know each other in a movie theatre,; you are merely spending time with each other, not ‘knowing’ each other!

We ended up seeing a lot of movies with each other. It was the best of times and watching movies wit each other has given us the most amount of joy. of course i was perpetually broke and we had to rely on Jasmine’s tuition fees to keep the romance funded! There is no cheap place for romance.

So when i saw the first coffee shop open in India, it was well after my marriage. It was in the year 2001 i think where i first experienced the coffee shop in the form of Barista. It opened its outlet near Sterling at VT. I clearly remember my first time there. We had gone with jasmine and a friend. I also remember ordering a cappuccino which i thought was awesome and a great drink. I remember enjoying it and thinking that this is a great concept. And the fact that one could simply spend hours at the place simply enjoying the coffee and the experience. Th idea of working from a  coffee shop, meeting at a coffee shop, talking at a coffee shop. I remember ruing the most - the fact that these things were not available to me while growing up with Jasmine.

But still, i am not complaining too much. First we used to sit often at the Barista outlets. Even as a married couple - one of things you need the most is spending quality time with each other. The ability to spend time talking, reading and discussing things is good but most important feature is the change of environment. With Jasmine sitting at home the most part of the day, it was a welcome change of routine and scenery when I got home late evening. this was after Jipsa was born and things got sour at home with mom and Jasmine. Mom and Jasmine would not know how to get along and Jasmine would be dying to get out. So we would take Jispa and go out for a walk and invariably land up at the Cafe Coffee Day outlet near our house. V-inu was also staying in Matunga at the time and so he too would join in. At one time our third friend from college days, Dinesh was back from Paraguay and so all four of us would step out for a coffee with Jispa in tow. The coffee shop gave us an environment to escape from it all and give us a chance to just simply hangout. I remember it being the best of times. It gave us immense joy.

Barista has long faded away - i dont know if its still in operation… Cafe Coffee day is there but somehow the quality doesn't stick and then we briefly tried the Costa but now Starbucks for some reason is winning hands down. I love this place. I have no clue why. I come often to just hang out at Starbucks. In my last job there was a Starbucks that opened near the office. From the first time i went there, I knew this was my place. I have been here so often that i have my own set of memories here. the best Starbucks ‘feel wise’ has to be the Horniman Circle outlet. The one near my new office at Bandra is also one crazy hot bed of activity. It is huge but is stuffed whenever i visit it. But still this cute one near my old office - the Starbucks at Prabhadevi in Century Mills Building has to be my favourite. There is something about the vibe of the place that is hard to beat. I am not a big believer of vast - in fact i wouldn't care too hoots about it. But there is something i feel nice about when i come here. I like the people, the atmosphere, the lay out, the fact that its on the first floor, everything. I think at the end  - every place is about the memories. here i have the best memories. In my last job, i was doing great, i had achieved some real big stuff and all without any strong support from the management. In fact i was completely gainfully unemployed. Whatever i did, I did with almost half a day to spare every day. I face a lot of criticism, ignorance, lack of understanding , cynicism etc. People had no clue what great stuff was happening. Whenever i wanted to escape it all, i would go to this Starbucks. typically with a team member, i would run away and have a nice conversation with them. i built my relations with them at this place. I remember running away from all the issues and getting joy over a cup of coffee in this place. Even now, i like to come here from time to time. I like to have the coffee here. One staff knows me well and makes for me my cup of coffee. She knows exactly what i want - one cappuccino, soy and dry. Its the best place for me to be. Its my space.

Of course its got nothing to do with the coffee (almost nothing). Someone told me once that the lighting at a Starbucks is designed to give you corridors and spaces of privacy in an environment thats fundamentally public. Sure - there is a warm feel to it. But i think the most of all - its is what you experience. So far I have experienced nothing but joy and escape from drudgery here. And this is what i associate from this place and hence there is an emotion. 

Brands must realise this and recognise this and keep it close to their hearts. Every small thing matters. The menu design, the pricing, the lights, the crowd you attract, the service, the quality of the people serving. Barista was awesome but in the end it had too many owners and no one person to spearhead the experience and keep it sacrosanct. The coffee quality changed and then the atmosphere. The last time i had been there - the place was full of stupid monetising schemes run by the head office - there was a counter put by red bull (i think) and then by a chewing gum company and then they wanted to sell t shirts and merchandise and other crappy stuff. Everything that could be used to crowd the place was used and then it degenerated into a chaotic environment. Monetising the place may help in the short run but is stupid to do in the long run. people will see the chaos, they may not complain but they will feel it and slowly the crowd dwindles. I have seen it happen over and over again - one small charge levied, one small feature removed, one small change just to be clever. Who will notice - lets do it and then - it will slowly fail! people notice more things than what we give them credit. Small things matter. We keep cutting corners and disaster strikes over a period of time. We have this one year concept in firms for accounting. This accounting logic will dictate the bonus we pay our people - the kind of work we do in one year is the amount of nous we receive. When the life of the business is supposed to be over a 100 year period why should bonus be yearly. How will what i do this year help the firm in the long run. It may not necessarily be right for now but will be right after three years - who accounts for that?

In my last firm i steadily built the foundations of the digital practice that will pay dividends for years to come. Even if i have left the firm it will keep paying dividends. While everyone might acknowledge the benefits of the same - doing it does not give any benefits to me beyond the value it adds to me as a professional.

The solution I think is for the firm to give yearly and three year bonuses. The three year bonus has to be for steps taken in the long run. It forces people to think for the long run. People should wonder what is it that I have done that will impact the firm in the next three - five years. What is it that will make the customers happy. What steps I will take that will come back to bite me in the bum and make the firms’ image poor in the eyes of the stakeholders. 

Now working in a start up funded by VCs there is an even greater problem. Quarterly numbers. People have to meet quarter in quarter numbers. People are running every quarter. Quality businesses are not built by the quarter but are built by the years of being in the business doing the right thing. When you think quarterly how can you build for long? People will simply think about flipping a deal, passing the buck and letting the incentives just matter for the immediate. Who will reward long term business decision taking? I understand the speed is important. A firm that cannot build of speed is extent but this quarter on quarter business planning will kill viable good businesses before they get a decent shot at success.

Recently a lot of start ups are in the use for going bust. The growth was simply not sustainable. Giving free money away and playing the game of incentivising customers cannot run forever. Even good companies start wilting under pressure. A lovely food  rating app that does really well was in the news. It raised money on the back of projections that they will sell ad space on the app. Possibly here we are talking about restaurants who advertise on the app promoting their meals. The CEO wrote a letter to all employees blaming the sales team for not delivering upto promise. That letter leaked and caused havoc on social media. The app was doing well simply growing its user base and getting people to use, rate and browse the app. Its a good app. Then possibly an over committed number was used in a business case presentation and then that became the number to live and die by. Or possibly the sales guys genuinely underperformed. the young CEO was possibly a great guy to design and manage an app but really sucked at managing a sales team. Whatever the reason - the sales did not happen and the blame fell on them. IN any case - whats the role of the CEO? writing stupid mails to the entire team and showing his displeasure or simply folding his sleeves and getting to work with the sales team, region by region. Either improving performance or simply recalibrating the target to be more real and rooted. Writing mail helps none. I don’t know why CEO’s have this grandiose notions of writing mails to all staff. It helps none. i can understand that in case there is an immediate controversy or that the firm is being slammed in media, but beyond that this mail writing culture is stupid. Very large organisations sometimes need it as the CEO cant really talk to tens of thousands of employees but if you have a good management team in place, you normally dont even require to do this. Just talk and solve the problem.

In start up environments there is a lot of hero worship. Everyone who religiously follows another start up head. They are all insecure. They are constantly raising money, constantly trying to outdo the other in PR and constantly trying to be in the limelight. I think this culture of writing mails comes from some other startup CEOs writing mails to all employees that get viral. So if a CEO of a successful start up writes a personal mail to all - then I must as well. 

I feel entrepreneurs are crazy - they are crazily optimistic people. They see everything with rose tinted glasses. I don’t think practical real people can become entrepreneurs. These guys dream all the time. They equate themselves to other people who have made it and believe that can pull it off as well. Not all will make it. In fact a crazy small number of people will really make it to any real scale. But everyone believes it is them that will do it and they are really that smart. They seem to discount their shortcoming and have a super sized view of themselves. But seriously - they really really believe in how everything will just unfold and work out for them. They know it and they sell it. they sell it all the time. I think its just their own ability to believe and sell it to other smart people who join in, led by their vision, is the major reason that they succeed. Only a hyper enthusiastic sales man can convert a sale, regularly.

So thats our man.

Coming back to the first point - yup the coffee shops have been amazing for me and for a number of other people. It has become my oasis of calm and frenzy at the same time. The place is just beautiful. In so many cafes there are people sitting check by jowl, someone working, someone flirting, someone interviewing, someone chilling and someone at a kitty party. Its amazing. Also with the com boom now - someone is sitting and pitching to an investor or someone else all the time. Its a lovely environment and as far as I am concerned, simple companies that focus on the core experience and keep it uncluttered like Starbucks, are the ones marching a steal over the others. People will come to your location and walk a little more, but the atmosphere matters. I don't think any coffee can really pass a blind taste test. No one coffee is seriously superior in the average customers mind frame as long as you don't really botch it up by downgrading or varying your blend. All you need to do is to keep your core proposition clear and stick to it. I remember reading the biography of the Starbucks CEO, where he developed it and passed it on to others to run it, only to come back and clear things up. Starbucks started losing it till he came back and refocussed the company on the core service. The simple message being: Don’t try and be clever - be clear!

keep trying!

When I first came to this job 5 years ago, this was an established broking outfit. It had a marketing team and it believed that things worked. They did not believe that they really needed anyone like me. They would be fine doing their job and that what could one other guy who came in really help. On the other hand as I saw it, it was a boring place with no real marketing activity happening and anyone who would come in would be able to add substantial value to the beast and thereby improve the lot. So when I came here as a transfer from the wealth management business to the retail broking business, I saw no big challenge. Of course I could add value here. How difficult would it be? The marketing function over the last couple of years was run by sales guys who generally lacked marketing direction and had taken marketing to a place where the senior most guy felt that he was the most highly paid courier boy in the country. All they did was emailers and posters. A few brochures and leaflets thrown in for good measure. Anything else was a question.

I came in not really knowing what to do. I tried to destroy some stuff, invent some stuff and I came in from my wealth hangover where we would spend inordinately large amount of time for trivial stuff. Beinga marketing manager in the wealth management business is a complete waste of time and resources. You do very little through the year, so people like me who would like to be busy would spend a large amount of time and effort for the little that we did. So we would spend so much time planning and organizing an event that the kids under me would go crazy trying to make sense of it all. They called me Raavan, with ten heads. I would come and think of what could go wrong and then try and mitigate it. It was a really pain in the ass. But that was me. Try and do the best of what was possible. So I came with a  similar mindset to run eth marketing function for a much larger base of customers that securities business seeks to provide. I think I was a disaster to start with. I did not think that giving leads through digital marketing was anything that cool to do. I generally ignored the lead side of the business. The leads was a black hole. We take leads and put it into the system and then wonder what happened. Whenever the top management woke up, hastily one presentation would be arranged in which some statistics would be twisted to show the efficacy of the system. It made no sense.

One of the first things I worked on, I remember was to design a brochure; I took team meetings and what not to try to design the perfect brochure. That was complete rubbish as well. This was retail business. No one really looked at the brochure and most of our customers did not care too bit for the English we put in to it. I spend a long time trying to design a few thank you emailer. I over designed them and then no one really used them. Simple shit was complicated. In all this there was only one thing going for me. No one really expected anything of me. I had to just keep doing what was happening and not ruffle feathers and all would be well. The sales head was an ass who only played political games and tried to keep all the key things to himself. So while I was promised the product role by the MD, he played games to ensure that product stayed within his control. But one thing he did not understand – was the power if digital. That was one thing I did not understand as well, but atleast I was well placed to understand that one thing.

Anything new requires a strong sense of curiosity and ability to tinker, experiment and trust. And of course measure what you are seeking to achieve. Digital is tough business. Stuff changes every day. Google will change its algorithm and Facebook will introduce a new set of measures. What will you do then? You have to learn every day. I was no stranger to digital. I was part of the first dotcom boom, but that was completely different. In the year 2000, there was a boom but there was no Google to consider. Now Google was a behemoth and Facebook was taking root into the minds of people. What was happening? I knew one thing from my earlier job. I had read a book called “the Search” by John Battelle. It opened my mind to the potential of Google as a medium to get free leads. If you optimize your pages correctly and put the relevant content traffic would come and if you put your lead form or a way for someone to contact you on every page then invariably people would contact you. You would have lead flow. As a gujju guy, this was free money coming in.

SO while I was a part of the wealth business, I was also made responsible for the marketing of the international business. That time I pushed the idea of search engine optimization (fresh from eth book) and got it done. This was in around 2005/6. It was pioneering in India around the time and I think I was the first in my company to implement these ‘radical’ ideas. I did not think they were radical, I only thought of it as things to do with little money. I think if I was a marketing manager with tons of money to spend then I too would have gotten busy trying to spend that money. The best argument for this is simple – I did that for the international business and did no such thing for the wealth business as in the wealth business there was enough stuff to do. So it’s not like I saw it early. It’s just that I had the energy and drive to do new things and a strong curiosity to back it.

So here in the broking business, I implemented the search optimization thing (SEO). Actually its not that I implemented it; it was there, I gave it a lot of focus and teeth. I pushed it hard. We did simple things like increase the content, rearrange the content and then put the lead form on every page on the site. Every page. I did not want to see a page without the lead form. What’s the point of a page without a lead form upfront staring at you. The result is that the leads went up 10 times from eth time I joined the place to now.

I then started other digital marketing stuff – like buying clicks from search terms. Here I think the genius lie in a simple thing – measurement. The way we measured the efficacy from the start was clear to me – how much brokerage did all this result in? I fought as hard as ever to get eth MIS and reporting right. The simple thing was that there is enough metrics available – the simplest would be the metric that we would like to intuitively think. I put x money in month 1. How many months would it take me to get this money back in terms of brokerage. This figure was the holy grail. The term we coined was cost per rupee of brokerage. The aim of a presentation would be to show how long it takes to get a figure of 1. 1 Is the breakeven point. This was the corner stone of all we did. Of course we then did a lot of work in a lot of areas but this was the greatest achievement ever. No one was tracking digital spends but we were. No one was going into the granularity of the stuff like we were in the banking and especially the broking space. We pushed hard and we were buoyed by the success we got. It made me what I am today. I plunged myself head long into this space. It excited me like no other. We put in a culture of trying everything. I could try everything as I could measure the efficacy of all my investments. Everyuthing was possible as long as it could be measured.

 Itw as one hell of a ride. Until it was small and no one really bothered about it, I could do everything I wanted. Now it was a big beast and everyone has gotten involved. Everyone wants to regulate the thing and wants a pie of it. Further improvements in digital to incorporate every small portion of the pie require a larger investment and more so require people to get out of the way. This was getting too tough to do. Everyone started having valuable input to put it and generally mess things up. Too many people were involved in it and believed that it was in their career interest to be a part of this. It was designed to stop.

And hence the change – now I as am gearing up for my new innings in my new firm, I am a little scared. Here there are expectations. People expect me to do stuff. I know that I know stuff, but is it adequate. I came here and I was burned a bit by the politics, but in the new firm would I survive. There would be a different level of politics, insecurity and willingness to change (or not). I am confident. I would be able to solve most of it, but I have to put systems in place, I have to put processes in place and all this will have to be done at warp speed. Agile development as they call it. The fundamental thing here in agile processes is that you keep releasing features into the market by means of ‘releases’. You can’t have a perfect product but you test as you go and keep building on what you have. Marketing, my suspicion will need to follow this agile development. You keep putting things out and you manage as you go along. the internet throws up this definition “Agile programming is an approach to project management, typically used in software development. It helps teams react to the instability of building software through incremental, iterative work cycles, known as sprints”. This is new and interesting. Its exciting.

As Rehan who coached my kid for swimming for a brief period (a former Olympian from India), there is good nervous and bad nervous. You like good nervous, it gives you that tingling feeling when you move out to conquer the world, and there is bad nervous that stops you, puts self-doubt and seeks to paralyze. This is good nervous. I am thinking, I am all senses open, I am keen not to take anything for granted, I am ready to work hard. I am on! Completely ON! I cant make the same mistakes, I have to build support and build rapports with all. I have to take on board suggestions and opinions. I have to inspire and to trust. And I have to trust myself as well. I know my stuff. I have been trained to think, I have trained myself to think. It has to work. The place I am joining is start up. The pressure is larger. If I get things right, I can change the face and the orbit of the startup. 100 of millions of dollars are potentially at stake with my success in marketing the product and making it work. As one of my bisses explained to me once – you have to be able to constantly move between two three things and give adequate focus to all that you have at the moment. Can you focus on multiple things one after the other. That is going to determine your success. Prakash Dalal – your words ring true. That is going to be the key to success as one moves up the corporate ladder.

Focus, refocus, repeat!

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end note

Here is another entry on agile

Agile software development is a group of software development methods in which solutions evolve through collaboration between self-organizing, cross-functional teams. It promotes adaptive planning, evolutionary development, early delivery, continuous improvement, and encourages rapid and flexible response to change

I see no reason why marketing can’t be like this. You have to keep the focus of the customer and hold a few things like core insights dear. But the rest has to be evolutionary. If your market is not static and is evolving, your targeting methods are evolving, your product is evolving – how can marketing be static. It has to be agile!

free bonus inspirational video!

Bakwaas band kar

Yesterday we were watching the movie Citylights. In fact I have been trying to watch it since two days. I hate the stupid movie. It is really that bad. First, it’s depressing. It’s a story of a couple to whom only bad shit happens. At first I was disturbed. I thought it reminds me of my failings or my issues or my troubles and that’s why I hate it. Yesterday while I was watching it I realized that I hate it as it’s a piece of shit. It’s a couple who are so dumb so dumb that everyone wants to take advantage of them. Its full of old clichés in which people – gullible people come from the villages to the mean bad world and will be taken advantage of by the bad guys. It’s a piece of crap. No one is that dumb really! I have been to the villages, yes some are not yet exposed but they really are not that dumb. They are stupid and they fall for some stuff or the other but nowhere near this. The story is also just designed for cry porn. Show anything just in an effort to make you cry and feel bad. You feel nothing for the characters and nothing for their struggles. Just bad bullshit cinema. I think its amongst the worst we have to offer in the name of realistic cinema. Like this movie  - Queen. I hated that movie as well. A chic who is dumped days before her wedding goes to France and discovers her individuality. Puke on that movie. Everyone loved it and thought it was a great movie. I completely hated it and thought it was over the top. Way over the top. BAH!

But the reason Citylights was at home was because Jispa wasn’t at home. Where’s Jispa. Jispa is busy attending a camp at Japaloupe. That’s a place where the main aim of the camp is to ride horses and have fun. Nice camp reason. We don’t know the place too well, but my nephew used to go there and our friend’s kids go there often. Its pretty popular. In fact its so popular, Jispa knows some 12 other kids who have gone for the camp. Now that’s a nice thing. She is 12 years old and that’s her first camp. My first camp was when I was 15 and the first time I was out of home for a trip was when I was around 14. My friend had come to me after the tenth standard vacations and said – hey there is an ad in the Marathi paper on camp in Boisar – a military camp. It was for three weeks. Wow. I always wanted to go for a military camp and in fact I wanted to join the military. Misdirected aggression! So I went for it. Three weeks of camp, staying in tents and doing lots of fun stuff. The best was when I first say the toilet facilities. I think we were around 300 kids or so and the toilets were basically pits dug with a huge plank of wood on top with holes to let the stuff in. yuck. I think on the first day or so people did not aim right and there was shit around the hole and now no one wanted to go there. Luckily this camp was in an open field and all of us simply went into the fields. I first tried not going for a couple of days, then I remember having a little too much buttermilk on one afternoon and I couldn’t hold on much longer. Into the fields and far away so get some secluded undone spot! Hah! That was fun. We would run, do karate training and march past and other stuff. Then I went for three more camps through the NCC which I joined in college. They were much better with accommodation in dorm kind of places. I remember them as fun and I think it’s best if Jispa stars experiencing some of this.

As a dad I hate sending her where there is risk. Horse riding is as risky as it gets. I don’t like sending her, but I guess the maxim ‘protect where you must, permit where you can’ works well. So Jasmine was keen to send her and I didn’t protest. I too have to teach the kid that the world is there to be explored on her own. Uff. I don’t like her unprotected but this is as protected an environment as ever. Let go Jaimit. Let her go.

While she was preparing I told her of a few rules of camping. Some of personal hygiene. As I know how we were as kids. You need to have your bath regularly. Keep you nails and feet clean. To have your food on time and other stuff. None of which I used to follow too much, but its good advice to give Jispa. (Evil snigger). Then she tells mom – dad is making this out as if it’s a life and death situation. Rascal. She is now big enough to figure her dad’s tricks by now. Full Bakwaas it must be for her.

So there she is off and we are here. We are not missing each other… but that is another story…

Eat a lot of chocolates

The Pro kabaddi league is off to a great start. I happen to be in the middle of the entire drama as one of the teams is owned by Uday Kotak in a personal capacity. Like always I love being exposed to a variety of experiences and being involved in a sports team is definitely amongst the most interesting experiences of a lifetime.

The first thing was naming the team, then some designs and some posters… I have blogged about being involved in the making of the song and video… here is the final video

Man it was amazing fun!

The matches have started well in earnest. But I see quite a few issues that need to be ironed out. At the start itself I had told the team to focus on diet and nutrition along with training as a core requirement. Budget constraints pushed it out of the reckoning. I had my chance again when we lost two close opening matches. I saw what the team was having. They were having energy drinks and protein drinks at no predefined intervals. No plan no thinking only drinking. This made no sense to me. Thanks to Jispa and her sport I am aware of a few things. You need carbs before the matches and you need protein after to recover. Simple basics and you have to be hydrated with electrolytes and not with high sugar energy drinks. Sugar is a killer. And where the F are the bananas in the entire picture? The team was without any such food. Hence I got the ear of a senior guy and I directly rammed it in. This team is eating all wrong. They are getting wrong nutrition and wrong training.

I see being a team owner as a kind of responsibility. A responsibility to all the players that you have bought for your team. They need to be taken care of. Especially in kabaddi when the players are from the hinterland and are not really well off or are not really exposed to the scientific training mindset. These guys are players whom we need to groom and prepare for the long run. They will go back to their teams and they have to tell everyone and spread the word what they have learnt. So now thanks to Jispa I could push my point across and thanks to that we have got a budget sanctioned for a trainer and a masseur for the kabaddi team.

Then I remember the experience I had with the cricket team and then the interaction I had with Anil Kumble once and how he spoke about enjoying practice and I found that a big thing. Even Tendulkar and Dravid can get bored doing the same net practice every day. That’s right. You may be the best in the world but you can still be bored at doing the same thing every day. The idea is to have fun and do a wide variety of things that can get you to be the best at what you are. Its fun and a challenge.

The point being that life is a collection of experiences. You build on what you experience. On what you learn from anywhere. I never knew that Jispa’s swimming and an event with Anil Kumble along with my cricket playing would help me help a Kabaddi team and then who knows where this experience will take me. I am reminded of the movie Forrest Gump and eth famous dialogue of life being like a box of chocolates. Here look at this scene… its lovely and extremely philosophical.

Life is like a box of chocolates. Only thing is that you have learn from every chocolate you eat!

here.. one more bonus video!

so whats the point of a vacation, anyways?

So whats the prime focus of a vacation. Getting away from it all. Yes and no. getting away from it all is important. You cant really face the stress of everyday living on a vacation. You like to go away, forget the daily grind and enjoy life a bit. So getting away is important. But another one is trying to bond and spend time with family. That’s an important one for Jasmine and me. For us vacation is family time. Spending time with each other and spending time with Jispa. Full on family time. We like to do things together and hence we end up searching for stuff that allows everybody to be together. Of course that means that we elders can get really really bored trying to do things that the kid enjoys because you can’t really expect eth kid to understand stuff that parents enjoy. So invariably it becomes a kid centered vacation. I understand why my mom once told that she is now completely bored of seeing zoos. Everywhere we went she and daddy would just take us to the zoo. Yup.  It does get boring after a while. Where all have we visited zoos. From the more interesting ones at Singapore and Mysore to the more tiring one at Junagadh. We have been everywhere. Go to a city and check – zoo? Yup we are coming. One full hot day gone. Man it’s a good thing that Jispa is growing up. I am nearly totally done with zoos.

This time around in London as well. I was completely tired of them. I was going through the motions. Trying my best to enjoy the dam zoo, but it just wasn’t fun enough. Also the fact is that Singapore zoo is far better than the London zoo and once you have done that London doesn’t come close. It does seem to me that Singapore copied the London zoo model and taken it to another level altogether. It’s great and I was awestruck by it. So I honestly hope and pray that is my last zoo experience to come for a long time.

But the point I am trying to make is slightly different. Jasmine and I often discuss this. There are many of our friends who leave their kids and go on vacations. The kids stay with the grandparents while the couple takes off. That’s also a cool vacation but we just don’t understand it. I would want to spend every time I get off with Jispa and Jasmine together. Of course the dumb ass zoos come with the package but there are so many other benefits as well. There is so much to talk to them, listen to them, have conversations and have fun. Jispa is integral to the whole thing. I guess will grow older without the chance to do many fun young stuff that young adults can do. But it would have still been fun. I probably started working early, got married, became a father before I got the money to do what I could have done as a young adult, but hey, the joy of growing up with Jispa was unparalleled. So Jasmine and I just can’t understand the others who go out for vacations without kids. But then eacht o their own. Who am I to pass judgement.

The other thing about vacations is – luxury. Of course as income goes up the kind of money one spends also goes up. We don’t travel by second non AC sleeper trains anymore. That is too much. The loos and the crowd and the dirt are probably too much to handle. And if the trains aren’t convenient a flight booking is in order. But I think I want to draw the line as far as a complete luxury holiday is concerned. I FOR NOW… don’t want a holiday in which the family goes to a resort of sorts and stay at ease for a week, eating , drinking and relaxing. I don’t have anything against the five stars. I think they are pretty cool and nice to be pampered, but I am not too sure on the pampering thing for us. There is so much learning to be had just by staying in slightly less sterile environments. You stay close to the city, you meet and talk to more people, you take the train and public transport, you walk around… the works. That’s the fun bit. When we stayed in London we stayed at a friends place. She opened the doors of her home and heart to us. That was the only reason we could afford a London vacation for as many days. It’s impossible otherwise. But in hindsight, that was the smartest move we made. I think vacations are as much about learning as much about relaxing. You go around, you meet, you see, you explore and you learn. You learn about people, cultures, nature, and life. Everything about things you weren’t exposed to. In London, staying at a friend’s place gave us a sneak peek into the life of an everyday Londoner. What’s the commute what’s the life and what normal people do. Taking the train and the bus to reach home gave Jispa a real feel of London and its people. That is important. She all sorts of people in the tube, she saw all the different types of stations, she changed trains and understood how efficient and organized it is. That’s the learning bit and who said learning can’t be fun. Staying with our friend in the end is what made the trip extra memorable and FUN.

I admit I was being a  bit judgmental or a bit of an ass when a friend was asking me about my vacation and I replies “well, we have a choice either to go on a one week luxury vacation and come back dumber or go on a different vacation and come back smarter”. I am not saying that every vacation has to be a boot camp but hell, going out and feeling the city is a great thing to do. Leaning may be as important as anything else in a vacation. It doesn’t cost too much to open your eyes. In fact in hindsight I’d say it’s far better a call then a five star. Money can make people do many things. Losing touch with reality is probably one of them. But hell, when you are rich – do you really care about reality? You can afford not :)

turn it around

A ha. We successfully organized the Matunga gymkhana open swim meet. A grand success by any measure and people came on congratulating us. It was an experience like none before in any meet of any kind in the city. The people were mesmerized and couldn’t stop talking about it. The swimming department now walks with a little extra bounce in their steps. But when you coldly step back and look at it, what was it actually that made it so big. The swimming pool on the day belonsg to the officials. At every meet you have the same commentator, the same officials and the same events. Ours was also the same. But the difference lied in the packaging. There were large banners outside welcoming the participants and at the entrance was the clincher – the greeters. Borrowed from a bit from Walmart and a bit from the Singapore immigration authorities. At Walmart you have greeters when you come in to shop. At most other immigration checks they give you a cold stare, but at Singapore there is a bowl of fox sweets greeting you. In line with that we had apples and bananas awaiting all participants. So at the entrance a team was waiting with the fruits. In addition we gave them a folder with the schedule. And if that was not enough we also gave them two iron rich bars which we bought from an NGO. So that just shook them out. We then put enough cut outs around the place and just before the swimming pool a huge massive 36X6 banner greeted them. All these were of course done in corporate style with amazing visuals. With so much stimulation at the start, I left very little at the main pool area. That was taken over by the sponsors. We also gave space to a pro shop, a free stall for the isotonic drink guys to freely sample their products and some other stuff.

For those expecting a boring placid swim meet were completely shocked. There was shade all around with the pandals being erected and fans installed. I was rather amused by the reactions of the people. I thought this was par for the course. This stuff is simple. Like the checkerboard backdrop against the winner’s podium got a lot of comments and people thought it was really cool and ‘IPL style’.

I can still think of a million different things that I want changed from next time around. I want a different way to submit entries. I want to email stuff and want IDs, I want to have a better registration, I want better side games for the kids, I want a relaxing lounge, I want a winners picture booth,  I want flowers for the winners, I want better food stalls selling better food and drink for the champions, I want better invites, etc etc… a lot is still left to be done. The dream is to have a small souvenir shop for the event as well, selling high quality merchandise branded – the Matunga Gymkhana Open Swim Meet. That will be so bloody cool. That’s when the brand will be really built.

Ah well. I am a dreamer. But only if you can dream it can you possibly do it. Dream on. There are so many things to be done at this meet. Next year I am definitely going to ask for a bigger budget. I will have a better campaign to bring in the entries and hype the bloody thing before the event. I want to run it in style. Raise the bar so much that people have no clue what to expect next. I want to make it really really BIG.

But while I am talking about the event… I too took part in one race. The under 40 men’s freestyle. In my time trial I dived in and swam really fast. I reached the other side and turned. Not knowing the tumble turn I wasted precious seconds. While coming back I was tiring and slowing down. I hadn’t eaten well and the energy was sapping. I emerged second best by a small margin. I then heard the commentator explaining that I messed up the turn and lost there. I saw the video and everybody also told me – I was leading till the turn. My daughter was at the finish line waiting for me. She greeted me and took the time from the officials. She told me – not bad –“you did 37 seconds. You did two seconds better than your last time”. She was doing a Jaimit to me. Okies.

I always wanted to learn the tumble turn. But I tried it once and the water just rushed into my brain. I hated it. Jispa kept telling me to learn but I just couldn’t try. Now I have additional incentive. My knees have robbed me of my running victories but I guess I found another race. Tumble turn it is then. To learn the tumble turn and to push myself hard.  Jispa keeps telling me to learn but because I have the power in the equation I am unable to push myself. If the roles were reversed I would have harassed her, but the poor thing can’t do that to me. I must set that example and do it. I must learn the tumble turn. It’s not just about the turn but it also my duty as a parent to show that I can do it. It an example.

When was the last time you spoke to yourself?

Experience is important. That is saying the obvious but having an insatiable curiosity with a deep urge to relate seemingly disparate experiences or incidents at every possible instance – that is what magnifies experience. I think I said much more than I can chew. But simply speaking…

Yesterday Jispa and I were trying to get her Hindi elocution right and she was saying it in her style. I told her, that’s how second grade students say it. They try and emphasis every third word. It’s like a jerky dance move. You don’t need to space out every third word or line with a space followed by an emphasis. You need to sing it, or say it in a way that it sounds straight but vary your tone to get your emphasis. Let it be a one smooth flow but the variation will allow for the emotion to get through. I explained to her while dancing and by singing and by humming. What is it that you like?

Now where did I get that theory from? I also did not know I had it in my brain till I explained it to Jispa and it did sound quite right. Then I asked Jasmine if I made sense. And then I asked her “you know where I got this from?” I realized that the genesis of this theory was in a Ted video I once saw of Benjamin Zander. Here he explains how kids while learning the piano first start by giving an impulse every note then every second and … till he reaches a point where there is only one impulse and he.. he becomes a one buttock player. Haha. Yes that’s what he says. See this video and you will love it. This is explained within the first four minutes of the video.

Benjamin Zander on Ted – the transformative power of classical music

What I loved is that I had seen this video years ago and I could relate what he saying to some other thing in life. You need a lot of experiences in life. A lot of exposures. All exposure is good. That’s what I love about my field. It thrives on multiple exposures and application of these exposures in varied places. Like when designing a motif I could explain how many horns does an Indian rhino have or using the ghariyal in another. Or using the ending of the movie Parinda to explain to the creative guy why his ending will be difficult but critical to the entire design, or some other vague stuff.

These days, as if there isn’t enough to do, I have gotten myself elected as a subcommittee member with the Matunga gymkhana swimming department. As a part of that I thought we should design t shirts and amongst other things I saw the logo. On the logo were the words in Sanskrit - Sharira maatram khalu dharma sadhanam. Which lead me to research what it means? Simplistically it meant that the Body is an instrument to fulfill your dharma.

“Any acharas (customs and rituals) which can contribute to better health fall under this category of acharas. It is told that sareeram adhyam khalu dharma sadhanam. Body is the first tool for performing the dharma. Hence health is very important factor for maintaining a dharmic life.”

Now what can I write on the tshirt. “dharma” can also be interpreted as religion as opposed to the path of righteousness, which led to me further research on what the hell is Dharma? If I need to simplify I need to be clear. It led me to more research. Amongst a lot I found nuggets of wisdom like:

“How the acharas used to get refined? It is said that acharyaath paadam aadatthey paadam sishya swamedhaya paadam sa brahmachaaribhya sesham kalakramena cha. One quarter of the acharas is to be learned from the teacher and one quarter by the student himself, one quarter by discussing with others and the last part during the process of living ( by addition, deletion, modification and correction).”

I agree. As a teacher I can only give you so much. Max one fourth. Then it is up to us to push our learnings. Discussion with others and the process of living teaches us 50% of what we know. I don’t meet to many people with whom I can discuss stuff similar to what I like but I find tons of people with whom I can discuss stuff that they like. Together they add up. And the biggest teacher is life itself. Hmm… this stuff is pretty cool.

Then I got this nugget:

“Is it compulsory that every Hindu should follow these acharas ?  It is left to his/her discretion whether to practice or not to do so. It is said that Swagrame pooranmacharas anya graame thadarkhakam pattane tu thath paadam yaatre balaath acharatheth. If you are living in your own village, follow all the acharas. If you are living in other villages, follow one half of the acharas. And if you are in a city /town one quarter of the acharas are to be practiced. But in en tour, acharas need not be followed like a child.”

This is also true and it sounded a lot like what my dad once told me. At the early stage of his career he was in London for a year. I was conceived there. And later for a large part of my childhood we stayed in Dubai. He said – when you are in a foreign country you have to be like them to enjoy that life. You have to follow their customs. Like in London you have to go to the pubs and enjoy your beer on Friday evening. That’s their culture and when you are there you have to be like them. My dad would have best understood what the Sanskrit was saying. He was raised in a small town in Gujarat and then moved to the city of Mumbai and then moved abroad and afterwards returned.

It’s true. There are rules in your life or broad principals you live by. A lot have been taught to you (yes yes in moral science class), a lot you have seen around you being followed and lot you have seen broken around you. What is important is what you learn and interpret from all that is available to you. Nothing is sacrosanct. There are no dogmas. Like another cliché ‘believe noting, question everything’. Follow your own path. A good teacher can only open your mind to a way or a style of thinking. A good student builds his life and his thinking on top of that.

That’s what I like about marketing. There are so many instances where I can take one learning and apply it elsewhere. That’s possibly what I love about teaching nd that’s possibly why I love parenting. See… writing this blog help me realized this. You don’t even need to discuss with someone to learn more. You can learn more by simply talking to yourself. When was the last time you spoke to yourself?