Human Angels

From DailyOM. Reading this made me feel good, positive, peaceful and one with the universe...even if only for a fleeting but precious moment. Inspiring enough to share it here. Haven't we all come across people who make us feel better during the worst of situations? And sometimes they don't even know how much of a difference they've made to the person in distress. I'd love to have such a quality...the quality of filling someone's heart with hope, faith, love, courage, confidence and inspiration. It overwhelms me to even imagine a world full of such people. Paradise...!

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Beings of Light
Human Angels

During each of our journeys, there are those inevitable moments when someone comes into our life at precisely the right time and says or does precisely the right thing. Their words or actions may help us perceive ourselves more clearly, remind us that everything will turn out for the best, help us cope, or see us through difficult situations. These people are human angels – individuals designated by the universe to be of service to those in need at specific points in time. Some human angels make a commitment before their births to make a positive contribution to the world at a particular moment. Others were chosen by the universe. All human angels, however, come into our lives when we least expect them and when we can most benefit from their presence.

A few of the human angels we may encounter are in professions where helping others is an everyday occurrence. But most of them are regular people, going about their daily lives until called upon to be in the right place at the right time to bring peace, joy, help, or heal someone when they most need it. You may have met a human angel in the form of a teacher who gave you a piece of advice that touched your soul and influenced your path. The person that momentarily stopped you to say hello on the street, delaying you long enough to avoid an oncoming car or a collision, is also a human angel. They may offer nothing more than a kind word or a smile, but they will offer it when you can draw the most strength and support from their simple action.

You may be a human angel yet not know it. Your fate or intuition may guide you toward other people’s challenging or distressing situations, leading you to infer that you simply have bad luck. But recognizing yourself as a human angel can help you deal with the pain you see and understand that you are there to help and comfort others during their times of need. Human angels give of their inner light to all who need it, coming into our lives and often changing us forever. Their task has its challenges, but it is they that have the power to teach, bring us joy, and comfort us in times of despair.

7 Rules of KM

Dave's updated list of 7 rules of KM has been doing its rounds in blogosphere and twitterworld for almost a month now. It just occurred to me that the second rule could possibly have an addendum (not a rule for knowledge sharing per se but one relevant to KM nevertheless) - *We are sure of what we know and are capable of improving it only when we act on it.*

Music is My Mother Tongue

Yay! Yippee! Yay! Finally! No, I did not get to go to the moon...but, hey, I had an out-of-the-world experience nevertheless. I got to attend a 2-hour music concert by S.P.B in Namma Bengaluru. Perhaps the best thing about attending the concert was that it was not planned in advance and came as an unexpected surprise. We went over to the venue almost 45 minutes before the concert began (don’t ask me why) but I managed to kill time with premium popcorn (popcorn that costs more because it is accompanied by music) and amused myself by watching people stream in, screen the ground, eye random chairs, avoid the dirty ones and the ones next to people who seemed like recluses, move from one section to another every few minutes and finally make up their minds and settle down somewhere once for all.

S.P.B was punctual and made his entry bang on time. I smiled at the stage and the speakers and took a few deep breaths as if to inhale the music in the air. I knew that the concert was multi-lingual and was looking forward to some of my favourite Tamil, Kannada, Telugu and Hindi songs. S.P.B was supported by 4-5 other local singers and a popular Kannada singer-TV anchor. I thought S.P.B was, not surprisingly, cautious about the crowd -He felt it necessary to mention that all languages were the same in his view and for him, personally, there was actually just one language – Music. That statement of his, btw, triggered off a spark in me actually. I’ve decided that one of the best ways to express my undying obsession for music is to say “Music is my Mother Tongue”. Thank you. Thank you.

When SPB sang the first Tamil song, he chose one that referred to a deity in Kerala and even said “We are now going from Karnataka to Kerala!” ;-) As if people would imagine it was a Malayalam song. Fortunately, he got a little less conscious when he sang the other Tamil songs. Sigh. I wish we did not have to be so scared in our own country!

As I sat through the lovely songs, drinking in the music, I did allow myself to be distracted. There was this active little kid next to me who contributed to the entertainment. He first interrogated his dad about where the latter had parked the car and why he could not park it in the VIP lot and whether the car was safe outside. The kid then went on to brainwash, bully and emotionally blackmail his dad into buying most of the available snacks at an alarming frequency. When I thought that was all the kid would be interested in and there would be no more entertainment from him, he demonstrated his versatility. He insisted that his dad demand S.P.B for a particular song that he (the kid) was apparently fond of. His dad gave in and got up and lifted the little boy and presented him to S.P.B (who was too far away and engrossed in his song to notice) a la the famous Lion King scene, while screaming for the song. I giggled as softly as I could and turned back to focus on the stage. A while later, a tiny hand made its presence felt in the periphery of my vision. It was drawing imaginary sine waves. As you may have guessed, it was our little friend again. I marveled at the talent and thought to myself that kids are now even learning to conduct music and turned back to the stage a little dazed. Soon enough, I realized that the character under question was, ahem, simply imitating our legendary singer. So much for a budding prodigy.

Coming back to the music, I let out a whoop of joy when S.P.B sang two of my most favourite Kannada songs - Naguva nayana and Jotheyalli.

The supporting singers attempted to cater to the universal request for Anisitude yaako indu and Ninnindale. But I must say that I was not particularly thrilled…it was nowhere near the original. Sonu Nigam is inimitable. Period. (Forget the videos, folks…just soak in the music. At least, that’s the way I like it. Watching a video sometimes kills the beauty of the music! :-()

Coming to the Tamil fare, though I was left craving for a lot more, I was lucky to listen to two of my favourites - Sundari kannal oru and Guruvayurappa. S.P.B also sang Engeyum eppodum, which turned out to be something that made most of the audience go quite crazy.

So, that’s that. Sigh. I wish there were live music concerts in office. That would inspire me tons. Anyone listening? Hmn?

The Human Mind...

I have been through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened - Mark Twain.

Aaah! :-) What a way to teach people not to worry unnecessarily, eh?

Umm. Er. Well. Huh...

Umm. If you've been wondering.....yes, I am alive. But ain't really kicking. Rarely have I been away from blogging for such a long time (2 weeks is a long time given my erstwhile blogging frequency) while still leading a routine life.....Makes me wonder how I survived without imagining that I must be dead, before blogspot happened to me. Patience. Let me explain what I mean by that baffling statement. Because Blogspot tends to bluntly 'tell' me whether I am thinking or not. And to not think - about something profound, creative, worthwhile - for too long a time is suffocating. Don't get me wrong. Silencing the mind is a great thing. But if I am not thinking about something 'important' for, say, more than a week...I almost feel like a log of wood (aka dead). To think but not be able to express the thoughts is a different feeling. To stop blogging is almost equivalent to have stopped thinking, at times!

Been busy with some official procedures, but that shouldn't be stopping me from thinking/writing, however stupid an exercise form-filling happens to be. Sample this...I had to make a card for a friend who celebrated her birthday recently and something tells me what I came up with is the stupidest card ever designed by any human on earth. If you're thinking that the financial crisis may have something to do with it, you're not right. I don't work with any of the financial majors. I guess I just have to wait for this phase to go away...or even better....see it as something that will save my blog-readers from the agony of reading my posts. The thing that makes me somewhat happy though is that I recently managed to get my brain active enough to write a strong letter on behalf of a friend's friend who is waiting to get back some money that she was cheated of. Apparently, the letter made a difference and the organization that cheated her has woken up and is talking to her to understand what exactly can be done to recover from the situation...though there is no guarantee that she will get the money back as yet.

What all this means, anyway, is that I am hungry. Extremely. Looking for some food....for thought. Almost starving, actually. And, please, I am not looking for "fast" food. Note to self: You should probably try and take some time off and finish the book that you started reading a couple of weeks back - Presence. Will surely make your brain feel better.

I did catch up with my blog-feeds after a week's gap...to look for something that would bring some life back into me. I found three posts that changed my mood. Here they are, in the order in which I found them.

- This one made me guffaw
- This one made me stop, think and wonder about life
- This one made me introspect on my own tendencies (on prescriptive thinking)

Google Vs Wikipedia

Bill talks about Google's potential decline in the wake of more sophisticated versions of Wikipedia. Being a big fan of Google, I am not sure I know how to respond, without getting a bit emotional. But then I am a fan of Wikipedia as well. :-) Coincidentally, the other day, when I was in a local KM community meeting, someone spoke about an article that apparently suggests that the birth of effective and meaningful social networking hints at the death of search. That was surely an Aa..ha! moment for me and I continue to entertain the idea. (After all, it is akin to organizational KM's shift from repositories to communities...isn't it?) Only time can tell how true this prediction is going to turn out to be. But here's some food for thought....whenever I want to learn about something brand new, I tend to visit the Wikipedia while I go to Google if I am looking for a specific article or ideas on something I am somewhat familiar with. Does this tell you something? And, btw, how do you choose between W and G?

Bill points to this elaborate article on Google Vs Wikipedia 3.0.

Update: Atul's interpretation of this post has made this debate/dialogue even more interesting. Go here to read his thoughts and my response to them.

Intelligence is Diverse, Dynamic and Distinct

Thanks to @gapingvoid for his tweet link. This video is absolutely brilliant indeed! Ken Robinson is hilarious and extremely thought-provoking. His remark, "Intelligence is diverse, dynamic and distinct" and his subsequent classification of intelligence should find essential application in the way children are understood and brought-up. I don't know about other countries, but his talk seems incredibly relevant in the Indian context.

On a related note...many of you may have come across T-Shirt art that proclaims "I was born brilliant. Education ruined me!" and I've believed that to be very close to the truth rather than a sort of half-truth or a complete joke.

PS: The original video is here.

Prosperity Index

The last time I got really involved and excited about deciphering and analyzing such a matrix was, I think, when I worked on some assignments in the Economics class. Thanks to MT for pointing to this intriguing report.

Believe me, this index can really challenge some of your beliefs if you're looking at it for the first time. Some of the discoveries as reflected in the Index reminds me of the proverbial battle between perception and reality (reality here means government-generated numbers and surveys which, of course, can also be challenged). I think it is fascinating to see the correlation between the last two parameters of the index - Religious Freedom vs Religious Belief. (I find the whole concept of including 'Social Supports' parameters in this index to be a very worthwhile idea.). What can possibly surprise you is the discovery that India does well on the 'Low Unemployment' column and does not do as well as we might have generally imagined on the 'Religious Belief' column.....what with India being considered the spiritual capital of the world. Australia tops the overall ranking. Singapore tops the Economic Competitiveness ranking (and, of course, the 'Commercializing Innovation' ranking). South Korea's high ranking on the 'Commercializing Innovation' column goes a long way to reiterate how the country has leaped into the limelight over the past decade or so. India does not do well in the 'Better Education' column! :-( And no surprises on discovering that European countries are great on the 'Comparative Liveability' parameters.

There's no end to the number of indirect discoveries and conclusions one can arrive at based on each of these columns and, of course, based on correlations between some of the columns. If you happen to make some interesting discoveries, please do leave your thoughts here.

PS: Can't help wondering about the direct and indirect implications of the countries' performance in the 'Better Education' and 'Community Life' columns, in the context of KM and Collaboration....! ;-)

Music Madness

This one's taken a long time coming. This is a song that I should have ideally raved about long back, given that it has a huge impact on me every time I listen to it. And, ironically, I should have at least spoken about this song in lieu of its unsuccessful attempt at getting me into serious trouble.


But first things first. Why do I like this song so much? Because it is a complete package...with so many wonderful dimensions to it.

The music has been composed by the one and only Maestro, Ilayaraja and the way it reflects the mood of the song to perfection can very well go into the encyclopedia of music.

The lyrics are so moving that it leaves me quite speechless.The urge to memorize the lines is unavoidable even for a person who is more musically inclined like yours truly.

The actress, Sridevi, is a favourite. One of the few Indian actresses who can claim to be genuinely versatile and amazingly talented. Her Charlie Chaplin act in Mr.India left me in complete awe of her. If she isn't brilliant....then I don't know brilliance when I spot it. And of course, in this very song, her talent for acting oozes out of every single frame.

And then...the voice! Suresh Wadkar! Ah! There is something about his voice that awakens my soul...
And not to forget....I'd perhaps give a million dollars to see the live performance of the flock of birds from 00.20 mins to 00.26 mins. And perhaps another million for a rendezvous with the cute puppy that tags along with the actors. :-)

Overall, this song is a heady mix that puts me in a trance. It is the first play list on my iPOD. Hold on. You read it right. It is a play list....a play list with just one song. :-P

Coming to the experience that I alluded to earlier, the story goes like this. It was one of those fresh and delightful mornings and I was staring at the world with unseeing eyes on my way to office when the radio station that we had tuned into decided to do the morning air and me a musical favour and played this song. I was getting to hear it after a long gap on that occasion...so, the unexpected joy made me rediscover my...er...eccentric nature. ( Umm. I told you it puts me in a trance!) Unable to experience the joy alone, I turned around and grinned at my co-passengers in glee. To my utter disappointment, no one even noticed. In retrospect, I think that should read "To my utter joy, no one noticed". If anyone had, I am sure I would have had to look for alternative transportation the very next day or perhaps agree to be accompanied by a psychiatrist from then on. How about you? Are there any songs that make you behave like you just escaped from the zoo? Eh?

See What I Found... :-)

I loved reading this post! Maybe because I have a thing for enthusiasm and expertise (knowledge) :-)
It also led me to another wonderful post on passion, on the same blog. And do follow these posts to catch up with amazing blog conversations, from some really thoughtful (and passionate) people!!

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I left some excited comments and thought I'd reproduce one of them here...for it provided me with a wonderful opportunity to reconsider and collate many of my previous musings on the topic of competition and passion.

Sukumar,

Brilliant post and, once again, brilliant conversation as well! It feels so good to see your posts provoking such introspective and genuine conversations. :) Here are some additions to this wonderful conversation.

- I suggest that all the people who are passionate about passion and success read the book Success Vs Joy by Geeth Sethi. It is simply awesome. Check out some of my comments on the book here

- And check out some of the things I discovered and wrote about with re. to competition

here

here

here - (Even I believe Google is what it is more because of its own passion rather than an intention to do better than others)

here

and here

and here as well


- Finally, I shall play my own devil's advocate - Gary Kasparov says he is what he is because of Karpov! See this. (Sigh....you can't expect simple and unilateral solutions to life's complexities!)

Waiting to see more such conversations on topics close to my heart! :-)
Nimmy

Making it Simpler is Simply Stupid

Next time someone says "Keep it simple, stupid" when you think you've tried your best to simplify and don't deserve to be at the receiving end of the much abused KISS principle....try this - "Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler." And, hey, do tell them it was Albert Einstein who said it. Har Har. ;-P

PS: Finally, if you feel like, you can also tell them that I told you to tell them. Stop. Something tells me I must learn to make everything complex but not complexer!

KM - Best Practices

Reference:

KM Queries

KM - Training Needs

KM - Competency and Skill

KM - Organizational Knowledge Base

KM - Individual Domain Knowledge

KM - Project Management

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How does KM help in the identification of Best Practices?

Does KM drive or simply enable this? Drive

Traditionally: In earlier times, I guess most of the best practices would be left to the management to be discovered and spread across the organization. Benchmarking practices, meanwhile, would enable formal best practices transfer from across the industry. Apart from discoveries and promotion by the senior management, board meetings and internal conferences would perhaps serve as a convenient platform for identifying, discovering and sharing of best practices within the organization. Word of mouth would probably be heavily relied upon among other things.

KM’s value-add: KM can bring in a formal process for best practice identification and transfer and can also provide an efficient technical platform for the purpose. KM can also add value by targeting tangible business benefits from best practices transfer and formally monitoring and reporting these benefits to the top management. This in turn will provide more tangible reasons for its pursuit.

The idea: One of the best examples of how KM can drive best practices transfer can be found in the book Learning to Fly. Please read my previous post on this here. This book outlines every detail that one may require in planning and executing a best practices transfer initiative. Starting from bringing people together, identifying best practices, deciding on who should learn from whom, how it can be sustained and monitored etc. For organizations really serious about best practices transfer, the KM team can be engaged to even develop exclusive dashboards that help the top management perceive the benefits and progress.

The details- culture, process and technology: The culture will have to be driven by the top management, exclusive campaigns and advertisements, incentives and recognition for sharing and reusing best practices and so on. The process is best explained in Learning to Fly. The technology could be in the form of a platform for listing and rating best practices, forming groups of people who want to learn from the group that shares – repository, discussion boards etc, and a dashboard for monitoring the progress and benefits of the best practices initiative.

The Logic of Analogy

On my mind this morning.....if you can churn out accurate, interesting and thought-provoking analogies on the spur of the moment, you will make a great trainer/coach, be capable of influencing people, sound intriguing and convincing, make for an entertaining speaker, and even stimulate more ideas. So, how can we possibly become good 'analogy generators'? There are two things that occur to me -

a) read a lot - vertically (specific subjects covered in depth) as well as horizontally (variety)
b) learn to be creative, that is, learn to make connections where they are not so evident!

On the other side, interestingly enough, even force-fitting an analogy between two unrelated fields may lead to surprising and exciting discoveries or perhaps - once in a long while - result in an innovative idea worth pursuing. Analogies can, I believe, create new paradigms.

Observation: I have noticed that Spiritual thought-leaders, more often than not, make good use of analogies. I guess they are forced to do so. Otherwise, they are likely to be perceived as vague and assumed to be in the realm of abstraction!

What is (are) your favourite analogy(analogies)?

Emotions - Influence - Crowds

Not so new. But good reading. Focuses on emotions in the context of accepting advice.
Brings out the importance of understanding the subject's emotions - state of mind - before attempting to influence her. This is a bit of a digression, but as a KMer, I not only 'am thinking of influencing individuals but also groups of people - mass communication - and that is a different ball-game altogether. It is a paradox that influencing a crowd can either be very difficult due to there being a complex set of independant minds or very easy due to there being a flavour of herd mentality. But then, one must remember that herd mentality cannot be sustained and can only cause harm because of its sole reliance on emotions.

Laughing Riot

I watched this 1941 black-n-white movie on TV yesterday and enjoyed it immensely! Makes me smile even now. (I love B&W movies!) I just stopped short of rolling on the floor and laughing at times. At first, it seems like an absolutely lighthearted, silly, slap-stick comedy with no care for logic or maturity. But underneath the veil of comedy, there were a couple of important and not-so-hidden messages for the people of that era (and maybe even for us). A delightful sugar coated pill, in short. Apart from the humor, the content of the messages was another reason why I enjoyed the movie. It appears to be one of the oldest movies celebrating the concept of feminism....or at least equality....and it indirectly celebrates literacy as well. Overall, it was a ridiculous and jolly riot worth every frame.

The hero and his male servant were tremendous with their expressions and the latter's character was that of a typical illiterate and dumb villager who is capable of following orders without any thought whatsoever. The movie has its leading women helping their husbands with their education! :-) I was so kicked about this movie that I decided to check out Wikipedia for information on it and was not disappointed. Wikipedia has everything under the sun! :-) This movie will bring a smile to my face whenever I think of it. Sabash Sabapathy!! :-D

Update: Here's a link to the movie in the IMDB, with a positive review! And I just realized that this is akin to Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster stories except that Bertie has the most intelligent companion in Jeeves.

Social Media in Business

This is a brilliant all-in-one list of how organizations are making use of Social Media (Blogs, Wikis, Microblogs, Communities: discussion boards, networks, second life, Video, Podcasts, Photos, Mashups, Voting, Crowdsourcing, Meetup, Bookmarking, Widgets). The most popular, not surprisingly, seem to be Blogs, Microblogs and Communities. Goes a long way to show how social media can change the face of business. Be it communication, branding, interaction, feedback, innovation et al. I am ready to bet my last rupee that these things are and will continue to be brilliant for businesses (and non-profit), really. But only if the entity under question is so passionate and innovative that it stands out of the crowd and knows exactly what it wants out of the web 2.0 paradigm. It cannot be there to just join the bandwagon. There is so much information out there in the WWW that it will turn out to be nothing more than a sticky and horrifying mess of posts, tweets, questions, discussions, forums, files and utilities if there is no method to the madness. (What a paradox, eh? Leveraging on crowd power is by the show of leadership and highlighting differences from the rest of the corporate crowd!).

Hat-tip: Thanks to Dina for her tweet pointing to this list! :-)

The Little Treasures of Life

From today's DailyOM. Comes at a great time. What a pleasant surprise just after my previous post on happiness! :-) I really loved reading this and think you will too!

Treasure Hunting
Discovering the Little Things that Make Us Happy

Life is full of little wonders that can make us happy. The sound of a baby’s laughter, a good book, the comforting smell of a favorite old sweatshirt, and the warmth from a cup of hot tea are simple pleasures that can easily put smiles on our faces. These “little things” are easily accessible to us and can be sources for finding happiness. A key to doing so is taking the time to put those rose colored glasses from childhood back on so you can easily find the joy in all the “little things” that life has to offer.

Finding a puppy rummaging through the laundry basket, trying on that perfect shade of lipstick, or discovering the extra change you left in your back pocket can turn into moments of delight. Like kids digging in the sandbox for buried trinkets, we may even begin to experience happiness when we engage in the seemingly mundane. Figuring out a software program can feel like deciphering a treasure map, and that first sip of tea in the morning can taste like a forbidden delicacy. Swaying to music playing on the radio can turn into an interpretive jig, riding a bike can seem like flying to the moon, and getting a phone call from that special someone can feel like winning the lottery. A pickup game of basketball becomes an exciting match among champions, and observing an elderly couple walking hand in hand can turn into a meditation on peace and contentment.

When we begin rediscovering that the little things in life can make us happy, we naturally want to share this joy with others. We may gush over a friend when we run into them unexpectedly, praise a street musician for their talents, or blow bubbles for the neighborhood kids to chase. We may even start to think of the little things we can do to make other people happy, which in turn makes us happy all over again. There is an endless supply of little things and little moments that can make us happy. All we have to do is look for them, and they’ll magically start to appear.

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Happy Pursuits or Pursuit of Happiness....?

Dave Pollard points to this article on the pursuit of happiness. I couldn't agree more with the author, John Barlow. John says one ought not to pursue 'happiness' but realize that happiness comes free with (primarily?) four acts. Well, one can always argue that what it means is that we should nevertheless pursue something or the other! As in the four activities that John advocates in order to experience happiness. But,hey, don't you think all is well as long as we know how to be 'really' happy....by finding and doing what makes us happy. To be honest, I personally believe that in most cases people don't pursue happiness per se, but genuinely go looking for something that they can do to be happy. Or, yes, they get so distracted by the challenges and unpredictability of life that they are unable to experience even the extremely obvious happiness that stares them in the face all the time.

John says "I have found four qualities that I believe naturally enrich the ecology of joy. When I'm capable of sustaining them, they sustain me and continue to do so even in these strange days. They are: a sense of mission, the casual service of others, the solace of little delights, and finally, love for its own sake". In his article, when he elaborates upon the sense of mission, he goes on to say how being creative (in the pursuit of a mission) can make one experience great joy. (Yeah!)


It is the sense of mission that all of us need to have or find. It is the creative outlet that we all need to discover. Casual service for others as John explains it should be a lot easier than we think. Coming to the little delights of life, they are extremely easy to spot for some and pathetically unobservable for others. I have no clue how anyone can be taught to appreciate the scurrying of the squirrel, the forlorn look in the eyes of a pup, the mirth of a child, the flight of a flock of casual birds, the orange sunset on a beach, the sound of a flute and so on. I suspect it has to be there...within you....to be able to find the awesomeness of such seemingly mundane things. And then, we have finding joy through love. I guess it is easy to fall in love but the difficulty is rather in sustaining it! And that's because love is rarely unconditional. And even if you expect nothing in particular from others, the complexity of handling love increases as we get into situations involving misconceptions, lack of transparency, deceit, selfishness and what not. So, is it a blind obsession of sorts for mankind that presents itself as a solution? Duh! Maybe! More understandably, it may not necessarily be in ignoring such problems that you get joy, but in being able to accept and get over them (forget and forgive) for your own sake. So, let's listen to the story of Jack... :-)


Jack had found his mission in life

For it filled him with immense passion and purpose

And there was no sense of strife

It made him stretch and learn

And made him believe he was a significant part of this wonderful world

It made him jump out of the bed every morning

He loved helping others whenever he could

At work and outside of it

He enjoyed nature, music, children and art

He had a family and friends he loved from the bottom of his heart

He knew how to give. He also knew to forgive and forget.

Jack was, truly, a happy man...!


So, the answer, I presume may lie in these - large and little - happy pursuits rather than the pursuit of happiness for its own sake.

PS: Attachment to God and detachment from everything mortal and temporary - worldly - is seen as another happy pursuit in the Indian context. And this is generally what most Indian housewives (of the previous generation) want to engage themselves in, to get away from the so-called pangs of life.

KM - Project Management

Context

KM - Identification of Training Needs

KM - Competency and Skill

KM - Organizational Knowledge Base

KM - Individual Domain Knowledge

How does KM enable Project Management?

I had taken a stab at this last year and believe that it answers the above query even though it does not adopt the framework I have been using to answer other queries from this set.

KM - Individual Domain Knowledge

Context

KM - Identification of Training Needs

KM - Competency and Skill

KM - Organizational Knowledge Base

How does KM help in Building Individual Domain Knowledge?

I don't see this to be very different from the way I responded to the third question on Competency and Skill. It is the building of knowledge and the application of it that eventually leads to improved competency and skill.

KM - Organizational Knowledge Base

Context

KM - Identification of Training Needs

KM - Competency and Skill

How does KM help in Building Organizational Knowledge Base?

Would KM drive this need or simply enable it? Driver

Traditionally: People keep their knowledge artifacts with themselves and use it whenever they need it. They approach others in their teams and networks for help in case they do not have the required knowledge artifact. Sharing proactively is limited to the distribution of the artifacts via email if the employee feels like. Storage and retrieval is entirely based on the individual’s style of managing content. When someone picks up something from the internet, he would download the file and maybe create a personal bookmark of the source.

So, What is KM’s Value-add? KM can bring in clear objectives in terms of the knowledge that needs to be managed, analysis of what knowledge is required, where it can be found or created, how it can be created and managed, who are the key people and also why it needs to be done. KM can help in the improvement of the knowledge life cycle in relevant business processes. Concepts of KM can be leveraged upon to better understand how knowledge is created, what are the motivating factors, how it can be distributed and reused efficiently and effectively, and how it benefits the organization. Overall, KM can bring in discipline, purpose, and passion for building a knowledge base.

The Idea: The KM team needs to understand the business dynamics and the knowledge therein. It then needs to understand existing process of knowledge generation, analysis, capture, storage, classification, distribution, application, reuse and enhancement. It needs to consider what knowledge artifacts are appropriate candidates for the knowledge base and what aren’t. It needs to tackle them accordingly. It needs to understand the sources of knowledge and identify elements that motivate the generation, distribution and reuse of knowledge and establish them. The KM team needs to work on the requisite culture, environment, process and tools and continuously manage them. The management needs to happen via activities like measurement, feedback analysis, best practices and tool developments.

The Details: Culture, Process and Technology: Appraisals, Incentives, Recognition and rewards, Repository, Content Management, Document Management, Collaborative Tools, Email management, Reuse initiatives, Analysis of knowledge processes to improve knowledge creation, distribution, capture, application and enhancements.

KM - Competency and Skill

The Context

KM and Identification of Training Needs

How does KM help in Competency and Skill Mapping?

Would KM drive this need or simply enable it? Enabler

Traditionally: The work experience per se, the training plans and programs, the self-learning as well as mentoring programs help develop the competency of the employee. Not so sure what is meant by mapping here. If you’re talking about recognizing someone’s competency and skill levels and keeping track of them in an employee matrix, then I guess this is traditionally put together by the HR team in coordination with the business managers

So, What is KM’s Value-add? KM can bring in the following to contribute to competency and skill development as well as mapping: a) Focus on mentoring using social network analysis b) community-based learning and competency development c)mapping of competency and skill levels using the participation quotient of the employee in KM initiatives like expertise banks, discussion forums, repositories, communities etc. Additionally, Blogs can help the employee reflect and collate his thoughts and establish his competencies in a much more transparent manner.

The Idea: A KM environment promotes competency development programs that leverage on not just formal and external agents but also internal resources on a part time basis. It can help connect people who can learn from each other and of course mentors and mentees. Additionally, a person’s real expertise and knowledge (which is a reflection of the competency) can be gauged by his participation in the collective endeavors that form a part of typical KM systems.

The Details: Culture, Process and Technology: Mentoring, Social networking tools, Blogs and community interaction.

Social Intelligence

Zeph pointed me to this wonderful resource - not surprisingly, from HBR - on Social Intelligence that Dan Goleman is now working on. It has a video, an article and a quick summary of the parameters of Social Intelligence. I found it to be fascinating, motivating and exciting. Thanks to my work roots - KM and Collaboration. I think this will find great use in the field of KM & Collaboration...as a framework for enabling such a culture. Social Intelligence is not just required in leaders but also in every employee if one is looking to nurture a culture that is rich in knowledge management and collaboration.

Here is the table (Summary of the SI parameters) that HBR has on the home page of the link that I've provided above. You can watch the video and read the full article on following the link.

Empathy	Understand what motivates other people, even those from different backgrounds? Are you sensitive to their needs?
Attunement	Listen attentively and think about how others feel? Are you attuned to others’ moods?
Organizational Awareness	Appreciate your group’s or organization’s culture and values? Understand social networks and know their unspoken norms?
Influence	Persuade others by engaging them in discussion, appealing to their interests, and getting support from key people?
Developing Others	Coach and mentor others with compassion? Do you personally invest time and energy in mentoring and provide feedback that people find helpful for their professional development?
Inspiration	Articulate a compelling vision, build group pride, foster a positive emotional tone, and lead by bringing out the best in people?
Teamwork	Encourage the participation of everyone on your team, support all members, and foster cooperation?

Do organizations today have the purpose, intent, motivation and time to pursue such skills? Or will most business leaders trash this as rubbish and fluffy?

How we learn...

Terry has an interesting post on how we learn to be leaders. I am inclined to believe that this is how we learn almost everything....not just how to lead! :-)

Reproducing an excerpt that I want to remember forever...

~ 70% of the learning is in the doing (learning by experience)

~ 20% of the learning is in relationship with coaches and mentors (learning from others)

~ 10% of the learning is in formal settings like seminars, classes, and training programs (learning in formal learning environments)

Now, I think there is a lesson for KM as well here. The tools for collaboration catering to the 20% learning and the personal KM tools catering to the 70% learning.

Another thing on my mind is that this distribution also depends the stage of learning that you are in. For example, when you begin to learn something for the first time, the training and learning from others would be more critical than at later stages. Another not-so-obvious example would be the need for refreshing theoretical concepts after a long stretch of practice that almost makes us forget why we do something the way we do it.

Uh-Oh...

By Paulo Coelho -Don’t try to be brave when it is enough to be intelligent. (The Pilgrimage)

Something to think about!

And...folks, I stepped into office this morning expecting a regular day but here I am, all cold and shivery. Not sure what could be wrong. So, scooting off to get some rest and medication.

Jeevan: I know there are a few KM queries that are pending to be answered. I wanted to post my responses to those over the next few days but it looks like it will have to wait. Apologies. Hope I come up with better answers once I recover!

Have a great weekend, everyone! :-)

You've got Mail....to You've got Knowledge

This comes at a controversial time - a time when many KMers I know are on a roll against Emails. While I quite agree that Emails are meant for one to one communication more than anything else (especially not for collaboration), I shall not rule out emails as a good source of an individual's knowledge as yet. In fact, increasingly, there are tools that are adopting the approach of analysing email flow from and to a person in order to assess her connectivity, popularity in terms of knowledge sharing, and expertise levels. This, ironically, is providing inputs for determining social networks, identifying potential communities, expertise identification etc.

My intention of writing this post was to share an idea that just came to me. This is a simple and obvious idea of cross leveraging on the comparatively recent phenomenon of tags and tag clouds. Its underlying intention is to help people manage knowledge via emails as well as share it. I think it would be a good idea to introduce tags for email management in applications like Outlook. (Gmail already allows users to attach tags to their mails.) Default tags could be suggested by the application (based on the sender of the email, the subject and the contents). Additionally, the user should be allowed to edit the tag list. Tag clouds should then be created on a dynamic basis so as to allow for a visual image of the individual's interests and further aid the easy location of knowledge via the tag cloud links. And, yes, these tag clouds could be made public and searchable as well. Another point I almost forgot to mention - users should be allowed to mark certain emails as public (and such emails should be copied and pushed into a corporate email tag cloud via links).

I think this would be an example of adapting to the culture rather than trying to change it radically!

Simplify and Simply Fly

I like playing with my GTalk status message. It is fun to key in something extremely inspiring or something ridiculous and meaningless. The rest are more or less boring. But I don't really stop to think what made me compose my status message. I let anything dictate and like it that way.

Here's my current message: Great Life = Enthusiasm+Energy+Excitement. Always. And while I was generally looking at the message and wondering how incomplete the message sounded and that there has to be a lot more on the right hand side of the equation, something struck me in a flash.

Imagine any task that you need to take up in life and then look at my silly equation, if you will. When you get started with the task, you must have all the enthusiasm that it takes. When you get going, you must give it all the energy that it needs and when you're done with it, you must have all the excitement that it deserves (be happy about the outcome and what you've done irrespective of whether it goes to the Oscars or not. Just be excited about where you are and what you have learnt). Taking this to the next step, a string of tasks approached from this perspective promises a great life. Uh?

Sorry if you don't believe in simplification. My view on simplification is otherwise. If it's true that what matters is our attitude and how we react to things, then why not look at this complex world/life (that's the truth, of course) and simplify your perception of it, so you start believing you know exactly what to do (and not worry about other things which are anyway not under your control)? After all, what you believe....you can achieve! ;-)

With due apologies to an erstwhile local airline....simplify and simply fly!

Brain Games...

Awesome list.

There's so much that one can do to lead an exciting life!...and here we are....most of us....complaining about this and that! Hmph!

The Need for a Common Repository

I was just thinking about wrapping up Atul's recent musings on the need for a common repository with re. to KM (as opposed to separate team KM areas that are independently maintained but searchable) and my own excited response to that, in a single post. So, I headed towards his blog promptly and... what do I discover? He has saved me some energy and created such a post himself! :-) So, all I have to do is provide a link here...! Thanks Atul!

Here's the link then...

================

"Lots of organizations don't seem to buy the idea of a common repository! And my key point was very much what you have mentioned here - having a common repository urges employees to get into the sharing (and out of the silo) mentality. A common repository means common taxonomy...a common way of identifying and locating artifacts. A common repository means a visually rich big picture that tells you about all sorts of possibilities....not one that is carved out of a narrow search term!! A common repository means a process of consolidation and integration. A common repository means an upfront identification of overlaps and differences! :-)"

Contribution to a Noble Cause...

This is a post based on a request from Chessia Kelley. Here's what she wrote to me and I, in turn, urge you to consider her organization's noble intentions and participate in whatever way possible. And do spread the message...

My organization, International Medical Corps, was nominated to be one of the Top 25 in American Express' Members Projects, "Saving the Lives of Malnourished Children." Our project was chosen out of 1,190 projects and is now eligible to receive up to $1.5 million to help feed hungry children, but the voting ends next Tuesday and we need your help to spread the word. I've put together this blogger friendly web release explaining everything.

http://internationalmedicalcorps.smnr.us/

If you are able to post something on Aa..Ha [Thinking Inside The Blog!], please send me the link, it would really help and could potentially save many lives. At the minimum, please vote for "Saving the Lives of Malnourished Children." Please let me know either way. Many thanks.

Silos - Silent Killers

HBR articles never cease to intrigue me. Here's something interesting and KMish. For your benefit, here's the gist - Research conducted by a HBR team indicates that boundaryless organizations exist only in theory and that silos are a given. Goes a long way to prove that the larger the organization the more difficult it will be to break silos.

Interestingly enough, just before reading this article I was wondering about why senior managers are so hesitant to aim for a consensus. They seem to run away from anything that calls for a consensus. They see it as time-consuming, pointless, unmanageable and so forth. There is this underlying urge to be quick and get things done rather than understand or admit the long term implications of not involving as many people as possible. No wonder we live in silos. Silos of departments, silos based on seniority etc. Communication, itself, is seen as a pain. Imagine discussing, debating and concluding on a regular basis! What we need to realize is that engagement of employees need not necessarily contribute to decision making but they are nevertheless required to ensure commitment and enthusiasm.

Web 2.0 will help in bringing to light the existing boundaries and provide a path for breaking them. Web 2.0 will enable movements within the organization that may or may not scale all the levels. More often than not, they may cut through the lower and middle levels but not enter into the senior levels of heirarchy. They may help erase some department-based boundaries but I am not so sure about seniority based boundaries. But the movement at the lower levels will, I believe, force the management to reconsider their management philosophies or face failure.

KM - Identifying Training Needs

Click here for the context

So, here's my response to the first query. How does KM help in Identifying Training Needs?

Would KM drive this need or simply enable it?: KM is an enabler for identifying training needs

Traditionally: The employee along with her manager identifies the training programs that she needs to attend on an occasional basis. The inputs come from the Job description, performance appraisals and futuristic plans.

So, What is KM’s Value-add? KM can bring in peer perspective and peer triggers and improve overall awareness of the training (aka knowledge) gaps

The Idea: A KM environment promises awareness of peer knowledge and competencies, which in turn can prove to be a trigger for identifying training gaps. Additionally, focused peer feedback and interaction can bring to light the knowledge gaps which results in identification of training needs. Also, an environment that is knowledge-oriented (repositories, blogs, wikis, expertise locators) brings to light the potential areas that the employee needs to be in touch with.

The Details: Culture, Process and Technology: Social networking tools, community interaction, access to experts, publicity of organizational knowledge maps, and peer-based feedback are some of the solutions for the above

KM Queries

A friend from my personal KM network sent me a few queries a couple of days ago and I decided to attempt to answer them on my blog. He has various questions related to how KM can enable or drive something (viz. training, innovation etc). I have broken them up into different individual posts revolving around one query each (or similar queries) and would like to invite inputs and experiences from the readers as well.

Here’s the framework I’ve decided to use to answer his queries.

· Would KM drive this need or simply enable it? (Drive: The initiative can be owned, designed and managed by the KM ‘forces’. Enable: It is likely to be owned by someone else in the organization but KM can very well play the role of an enabler and work in coordination with the owner of the area)

· Traditionally….: This will indicate the traditional methods of handling the requirement under question. Mentioning this will hint at the benefit of adopting an approach revolving around the concepts of KM.

· So, What is KM’s Value-add: This will explicitly state the value that KM can bring into the situation

· The Idea: Very briefly, this will touch upon how KM can add value from the perspective of the typical KM elements

· The Details: Culture, Process and Technology. Wherever applicable, I will delve deeper into the Idea and provide readers with some details of each of the KM dimensions - C, P and T.

Note: Here’s a very important principle underlying this KM framework. What do I call KM?

· Purpose-led collective thinking, collective learning (past, present and future) and collective activity

· Identification and management of knowledge (business, operational, support, people, process, technology, strategic, competitive, customer, partner, market etc), its sources, its generation, its classification, its storage, its retrieval, its distribution, its usage and its enhancement

· Simplification of knowledge (through its life cycle and various forms) as it appears in business and operational procedures and practices

· Consolidation and presentation of information and knowledge in a well-organized manner. Assigning responsibilities, designing processes and tools

· Knowledge sharing – organized and on demand - and organized mentoring activities

· Proactive building a network or community of people who think alike, people from whom you can learn, people who need your help, people who can contribute to your tasks directly or indirectly

· Inculcating a discipline around, motivating, encouraging, facilitating, recognizing and rewarding the following behaviours – reflection, learning, sharing, mentoring, leadership, reusing and individual as well as team-based innovation

· Tools, utilities and applications that help in a) generation of new knowledge, b) consolidation, organization, distribution and usage of knowledge, c) collaborative activities and endeavors, d) discovery of trends and patterns associated with knowledge, e) reflection and sharing, f) reuse of knowledge, g) learning from the past, h) facilitating a collective approach to innovation g) recognition and analysis of people dynamics leading to better leveraged networks and creation of effective communities

· Personal KM elements – organizing one’s knowledge (thoughts, ideas, resources, network, articles etc), connecting with people, learning, reusing, working together with others.

· The study, measurement and assessment of the tangible and intangible benefits of KM - knowledge reuse, collective knowledge generation and collective competency development due to sharing and mentoring, management of knowledge artifacts resulting in improvement of performance, productivity, customer satisfaction, and employee satisfaction, and business growth due to innovation

I have a few more points hopping around in my mind and asking to be added to the list above but I think I’ll draw the line here, lest it gets confusing rather than add any further value. Hopefully, the list should be representative enough for us to go ahead with the queries.

PS: Answering the first query in the next post.

Stains are Good!

Been a long time since I discovered and/or wrote about examples of paradox thinking. You may know this if you're a keen observer of advertising in the Indian Media......especially visual media. There was a time when all advertisers demonstrated the pain of removing stains from clothes. The advertisement would be focused on proving how easy it was to remove stains with the product under question as compared to other competitive products. Period.

And then....someone in the advertising world suddenly woke up and thought otherwise. He/she adopted paradox thinking and created a lovely advertisement that said "Stains are good!". It shook most of us. We were intrigued. We wanted to know why. We wanted to understand the logic behind it. We thoroughly enjoyed the first such ad. It showed two little siblings get closer when the girl fell into a mud puddle and the brother pretended to fight with the puddle for what it had 'done' to his little sister. There were more such advertisements following the resounding success of the first. The advts. revolved around how stains could bring people closer, stop fights on the road, and- the latest - stop someone's hiccups. (I wonder if I missed any other such advts. given that I am not a regular TV-watcher). The subtle message, of course, was that we should not avoid stains when they could do so much good and the product under question was anyway available for removing stains in a jiffy! :-)

I love all these advts. I am sure they've had an impact on most people. Proves that one of the best ways to bring some excitement into life is through paradox thinking. Have you experienced it?

FemiNONE

The mother bears the baby. She, then, bears with the absolutely unfair rules of the society as well.
Sample the world we live in....Are feminine principles only meant to be celebrated but not followed?

Ills of the Corporate World - Aftermath of Lehman and AIG

Do we do anything much beyond reading such articles from HBR, Wharton, McKinsey and perhaps Business Week? Knowing is different from accepting. Knowing is different from doing. The unilateral pressure to increase profits can only spell more disaster.

KM in 2 Minutes...

Here's a simple and light product that includes most of the stuff that organizations might be interested in from the knowledge management and collaboration perspective. Noodle.

- Intranet pages and announcements
- Ability to create new pages and portlets
- User profiles and an associated social networking dimension (What are you working on, expertise etc)
- Blogs
- Wikis
- Calendar
- Discussion forums
- Folders and files
- Notifications

Gaps - RSS? Security? Roles? Content management based on taxonomy?

I am not so much of an expert when it comes to software evaluation and comparison. Looking at too many products that are designed with a similar purpose in mind sometimes makes me wonder whether it all, eventually, boils down to user experience (which in turn depends on so many factors), the price and politics more than anything else. The product road map is rarely clear to the makers of the product themselves. Of course, that's why marketing strategies and the style of selling make a world of difference.

Anyway, here's what I think. This one's a cool product for the smaller organizations!

Digital Grapevine

Here comes micro-Blogging within the enterprise.

PS: And I'd said....

CANTrol....

I think this is extremely sensible advice; especially for parents. From www.dailyom.com

Resisting the Urge to Control
Imposing Your Will On Others

The right to make your own choices is a precious one. We grow when we have the freedom to decide our own paths and determine what makes us happy. Yet there are those who are inclined to try and control others. They may be driven by insecurity, envy, fear, or the need for power. These people are deeply critical of themselves in their own minds, and underlying that critical nature is unhappiness. Their need to feel sure-footed and secure is quenched by controlling those around them, whether they are friends, colleagues, or even pets. However, nearly everyone has found themselves imposing their will upon others at one time or another.

Trying to impose your will on others can be tempting for many reasons. You may feel that your way is the best way or that you have a keener insight into the direction their life should be taking. But, in imposing your will, you are indirectly saying, “I want to control you.” Even when you have the best of intentions, others may end up resenting you for your actions. It is always helpful to remember that it is possible to influence people and change their behavior through education or example without imposing your will on them.

If you’ve caught yourself being a bit bossy on a regular basis, make a note of it. Write down what the situation was and why you acted the way you did. You may have pushed a friend to try something new, because deep inside you wanted to try it yourself but were feeling hesitant. Or you may be unjustly interfering with work teammates, because you aren’t sure of their abilities. Next, make an effort to understand and accept their preferences and ways of doing things. It can feel natural to impose your will when you feel that you “know best.” But there is a freedom to trusting others to find their own methods and joys, even when they might differ from yours. Sometimes the best course of action is to step back and relinquish control. You may, in doing so, see everything from a different point of view.

Just Like That....

While I write frequently about introspective and philosophical thoughts that cross my mind and quite happily soak in the subsequent discoveries and revelations, I must admit that I tend to go around with a crazy grin and walk with a spring in my step only on occasions when I happen to churn out a hilarious (silly for many) post or a cool poem. (Psst: This may be because an introspective or philosophical post means you have something to mull over for a long time after the post is published while other posts are done the minute you click the 'Publish Post' button. More importantly, the funny and poetic posts make me feel like I own the world! ;-))

The reason why I mention this is because I've not had an opportunity to sport that crazy grin or jump around with joy for some time now! :-| It's been ages since I got to write a hilarious post or pen a thoughtful poem. Makes me wonder whether something is wrong with my outlook these days...! I hope not. I can't wait to come across an event that will elicit a hilarious post from me. It will feel like I am alive and connected with everything good again! I can't wait to come across something that will make me churn out some satisfying poetry. It will feel like I can see beyond the ordinary and express it in the best ever way possible! Hello World, are you listening? Huh? Nimmy wants laughter and rhyme and not for no rhyme or reason. Whatever!

Double Juggle

On my mind this morning is what appears, to me, to be one of the most intriguing paradoxes - It is most important to have an open mind, be ready for all the experiences that life has to offer, be flexible enough to absorb contradictory opinions from the world around us, be humble enough to accept that truth can have multiple flavours and dimensions etc. At the same time, it is equally important to be firm and confident about one's thoughts & ideas, to act based on conviction, to have the faith that one's decision will turn out to be appropriate & accurate and so forth. While it is hard to work with people who think they know it all and rarely have space for outside views and apprehensions, it can be equally hard to work with people who can't take decisions because they have too much of an open mind. If you've learned to juggle the two attitudes so well that it appears like you're not juggling two independent things but just playing an easy game with one continuous entity....you're it.

Being Yourself

I like this story. From Paulo Coelho's.

Funny Truth

George Bernard Shaw - "When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth."

...one of the reasons why I am fascinated by certain kinds of humour. Sometimes I laugh till it hurts and then suddenly freeze to an absolute stop as I begin to see beyond the initial humour. It takes me a while to come out of the see-saw experience. Have you heard of clever humour? Have you heard of utter nonsensical humour? What is what? When do you laugh and then think? When do you think and then laugh?

Mmm. Nonsense sometimes makes more sense than sense....you know?

How True...!

Erica Jong -"Take your life in your own hands and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame."

Aaahhh!! Taking just the first part of the quote - Taking life in your own hands - I guess there are people who.....

......do this and are happy (Bliss! Freedom!)
......do this but are unhappy (End up looking for support and approval...! Can be confusing! Are they looking for someone to just guide or someone who will take decisions for them? Where does the influence stop?)
......don't do this and are unhappy (Unable to release themselves! Terrible! Blame game indeed)
......don't do this but are happy (Blind followers. Thinking isn't easy anyway? Go get a life?)

Hmmm. Blink. Hmmm. Sigh. Is it parenting that largely determines which category one belongs to? Or is it really about the context. Some people can take their own decisions on what to eat when in a restaurant but not what to purchase when it comes to clothing! Eh?

Tag!

Update: I think I have not done justice to this tag and post. I realize that my language is almost indifferent and somewhat crazy. I had absolutely no intentions to hurt the person who so kindly passed this tag to me and also appreciated my blog! God! And I took up the post like as if it is a burden! Thanks to the foul mood I was in at the time of writing this post. It seriously has nothing to do with my not wanting to take this tag or pass it on! I was too disturbed to write like my usual self and I guess I did not have the mental strength to spend time on passing on the tag and awards to selected people because of my state of mind. Shame on me! And apologies to all those who felt they were wasting their time on a neutral post. S-O-R-R-Y! :( And if you decide to pick up this tag and pass it on, please do so and let me know. You can make amends for my crazy state of mind and general blogging lethargy! Thanks in advance!

==========================================================

I've been tagged (and given an award as well)....and after a really loooooong time. There was a time when I found tags coming to me somewhat frequently but then, later, the traffic died down. Since then, I've wished for tags to come my way especially when subjected to extreme blogging boredom. This isn't really such an occasion but I, nevertheless, would love to take this tag and pass it on. The tag comes from here. Thank you, Prashant! So, here goes....

1. Print screen your desktop, post the image here and write a story on it.
2. Give away some Blogging Friends Forever awards
3. Give away some Brilliant Weblog awards



Here's what my desktop looks like - for the past one week or so! I actually had a cute little pic of Calvin and Hobbes till last week. But, having recently celebrated Ganesh Chaturthi and feasted on lots of sweets and snacks prepared for the one and only Elephant God, I replaced the C&H pic with one of my favourite pics of the former, on an impulse. I love this pic of Ganesha. He looks fresh, charming, colourful and creative - made out of beautiful flowers and the special 'Ganesha grass'. Apart from the pic, if there's anything else I must say about my desktop, I like it to be as 'empty' as possible. The fewer the icons, the better. Love to have all my shortcuts on the thin bar on the right hand side. Can't manage without a few desktop Post Its. And I rarely keep the same pic for more than a month. I like variety...in life as well as on my desktop.

The Blogging Friends Forever Award: If you're reading this, then it's yours. Simple. :-) (Psst: I don't intend to rely on my memory to list down all the people I have met in Blogosphere. Remember, I've been blogging for more than 4 years now)

The Brilliant Weblog Award: I think I've already mentioned most of the blogs that I like to read in many of my previous posts and via my Blogroll. I believe that there are plenty of blogs that make for brilliant reading. I have no inclination to repeat my previous posts or for that matter list down just a handful of blogs here. I sincerely think we all have flashes of brilliance now and then....so most blogs will qualify for this award. I am in a generous mood today! (Did I hear you say "Generous or Lazy?!" ;P) No....really! I think there are too many brilliant blogs for me to be able to list them here. But if you insist, I think I'll give it to one top-of-the-mind blog now - The truly brilliant Eknath Easwaran. He is no more...but his thoughts are eternal. He has the capacity to weave wonderful stories around profound thoughts. I find his writings to be unique in the sense that they are very simple and yet extremely compelling.


PS: I pass on the tag to anyone who is reading this and feels like spending some time on it. :-)

Children!!

I love this delightful list created by Anthony Fernando, called Seven Life Lessons we can learn from Children.

1. Live in the moment***
2. Give yourself time to learn*
3. Believe anything is possible**
4. Laugh out loud**
5. Don't be afraid to love***
6. Forgive quickly and completely*
7. Never lose sense of your wonder**

Note to self:

*Work harder on these
**Pat yourself on these
*** Understand where you are on these

PS: Reminds me of a post I wrote four years ago...and I see that there is, naturally, an overlap in the list.