Vegetarians among Non-Vegetarians

We (a group of 8 people), had a small party at “Barbeque Nation” yesterday. Except Me and my husband, all the others were vegetarian, partially though. Added to the hitch, there was a sea food festival going on. Our barbeque course had many options fishes, prawns, crabs, squid, chicken and mutton while the vegetarians had few. As our course kept coming, others felt abandoned. Since, I was throwing the party, I felt downhearted. To my relief, they had good choice in the buffet. Ultimately, the party was good and we all had a good time.



While returning home, I was trying to comprehend the situation from both the perspective.

Non-Vegetarian Speaks:
“How is it possible to eat grilled pineapple, when there is a rooster chicken in front of you? Wow! I should appreciate their determination. But sad, they have very little choice and it looks so dull, look at my plate how colorful it is. However, we don't see how it is prepared. It's a throw of the dice, there is always a risk of tangle.”

Vegetarian Speaks:
“How can they eat something that smells so bad? I hope there is a separate kitchen and they don't mix up the vessels. I hope the waiter served only the vegetarian food. God, its so annoying to reconfirm every time a dish is served and to wait for someone to taste it first. Look at those plates, they are always full, while mine is always empty. :@”

Being a non-vegetarian, I really feel sorry for the vegetarians. Also feeling bad for not letting them have a peaceful dinner. So, I will go with the majority and try veg restaurants henceforth.

What passes your mind when you are among vegetarian/non-vegetarian?

No more meetings Please

It's over a month I have joined my new company, but I have spent around 24 hours (3 work days) attending meetings/telecasts [just the official group ones]. I get at least a couple of meeting requests/delegations every day. I have a feeling that if someone sneezes, there will be a meeting where the speaker will say “It's important to understand our objectives for the year 2010 and align it with the process of sneezing”. I just wait when the speaker will complete so that I can get out of there. But I am not so lucky, once the speaker stops, he is flooded with the usual questions. These question never change or its mostly not relevant to the purpose of the meeting. The audience who ask these questions have a strange behavior, they ask question only when we have something urgent to do or when the speaker is about to wind-up like showing the chocolate put not giving it. It's over my threshold and hence thought I will blog regarding these frustrating meetings.

Facts:

1. Every Knowledge Sharing session is best accomplished when scoped to a small group say a strength of 20 – 30 people.

2. Human capacity for observation is 30 to 45 min.

3. When met in a large group, people pay more attention to other people around them than to what the speaker says.

These are the facts that everyone know. Now I have few questions,

WTH do we have meetings for all the employees, which means for a group of 400 – 500 people (in my case), clearly there is very less we understand from the knowledge shared.

Why are the meetings for few hours? I just cannot focus on whats going on for so long. I tend to sleep or start looking at people around me.

Why do they repeat the same stuff again and again and again? Every meeting says, Lets understand our objectives of year 2010. I am tired of hearing there words.

I believe there are many other questions popping in the heads of every frustrated meeting attendees. There is a need for a re-engineering in the method of conducting the meeting. Few changes I will expect are

1. Conduct all employee meetings only when they are highly important

2. The general updates can be shared as a mail or through the managers

3. Conducting meeting whenever people come from other offices should be optional. Reason: I rarely understand his accent and He is also going to repeat the same

4. Listening to Conference calls is very irritating, same reason I just cant understand what they say and many times there is lot of disturbance in the call

5. Repeating of the same information should be avoided, because once I knows its the repeated topic I just stop listening

6. When a meeting is conducted say 1 hour, it is not just 1 hour, 10 – 15 min it may get delayed, 10 -15 min for people to commute, 10 – 30 min a small discussion about the meeting or a break after meeting. There is an addendum of 45 min to 1 hr. So meeting spoils the nearly 2 hrs of the effective work time

7. Phones should be kept in silent mode and bring laptops to take down notes should be avoided. Sometimes I just hear the jamming of the keys in the laptop or bizarre ring-tones.

Final Word: I am a person who hates meeting. Many people love meetings. If you are one of those please pardon.

Please vote the poll "What is the most frustrating part in an Employee Meeting?"

Techie a school kid

Techie is in fact a school kid. He wakes up remembering a meeting or training for which he will be late like the kid who forgot to complete his homework. He carries a bag with god knows what all but merely useless stuff and a laptop where his life starts and ends similar to notebooks of the kids. He reaches office and searches the crap he carried to find he has forgotten the access card. Now making the face of a kid who forgot to get the signature of the parent in the diary he goes to the security section for a temporary card. Security are the boss now, after the lots of gyan and procedures, he is given the temporary card. Then he hurries to the meeting which has started long back. Entering the meeting room, everyone in the room will give him a stare same as kids stare at the one who is late to the assembly.
The very authentic behavior can be seen when the performance discussions happen or the hike letter is distributed. Techie takes every efort to find out the hike of the other techies like how the kids wait to find the numbers of other kids in the exam

As a techie we should be proud we still retain the innocence of a school kid :p

Demon Named Terrorism

We, the human have left behind the barbarism of our ancestors, which they adopted for survival, and advanced into a civilized citizen by personifying a humane character with the help of codes of religion. The violent strike inherited has not been rooted out, it has unconsciously breed into demon called terrorism. This concealed demon has began to liberate and take the road down to cannibalism in the name of religion. Extinguishing these aroused demon seems impossible. But, we can always terminate the demon budding within us. With the gospels of all the religion, i.e. brotherhood, lets kill the demon and unearth the violent force within us. Lets take the road towards humanitarian.

End of the Job Hunting Ordeal

Finally on Nov 3rd 2009 my job hunting ordeal came to an end. I was confirmed an offer. I was jumping up and down, mainly because I was frustrated attending interviews and hearing rejections. I am no super human. Every rejection just weakened my self confidence and hope. I was even prepared to enroll for an MBA program as an alternative option.

Thank God!!! I got a job.. Its a great relief now. I am enjoying the office environment now. After sitting at my new desk, I realized how much I have missed this 1.5 feet space that I hypothetically own. Now I have a cubicle, a PC and loads of documents piled up on my desktop. My ordeal will consequently change its course.

But everything apart.. I have a Job.. hurray