Start every day as a beginner

At an investors’ conference in Mumbai, I once asked a guy, “So, what do you do?” He was so stunned that for a few seconds he was speechless. Then, he turned to others and said, “You know, once, everyone knew me. Now I am asked what I do!” Realizing that I had...

Unseen side of human nature

On 31st Oct 2002, a bloody riot on the roads of Trivandrum showed me an unseen side of human nature. That morning, a protest march of 20,000 people was demanding the release of an extremist political leader, arrested in a bomb blast case. As the chief of the...

You need a break – here is why

The harder you work, the more you get done, and the more value you create. Right? Wrong! It turns out that life is not that linear. Working long hours, non-stop, is not the recipe for value creation. Nor is working without a break for months and years. Every once in a...

Commitment is the key to learning

At the fag end of my MBA, having had enough of finance courses and the hyper-competitive MBA crowd, I wanted a short break from the rat race. So I signed up for ‘History of Western Classical Music’, a course outside Wharton, offered by the music department. The...