Saturday, July 25, 2015

Dear God... ooops... Google


I am there - on almost all social networking sites, including Twitter. So, if someone follows you on Twitter, you are excited and you immediately check their profile. I did the same and found this very interesting picture on his wall.

Google has transformed our lives. You are under stress, you launch Google and type "ways to reduce stress". You need a sample resignation or last day mail, you search Google. You are not recollecting a famous actor's name, start searching randomly about him, you are sure to get the name. Good or bad is a question. Sometimes I think we were better without it. I would rather talk to my mom to reduce the stress than Google it. I would rather use my brain to write something sweet on my friend's birthday greeting card than search on Google for "nice birthday quotes". I would rather talk to my baby's doctor for ways to make her eat properly than google on "ways to handle a picky eater". Tax my brain to remember someone special's birthdays and anniversaries than use Google calendar. 

But now, I can't even think of life without Google or Internet at large. Though I don't have any research as my source to put it here but I am sure that new generation or I should say those who are more exposed to Internet or Google have slower learning power and memory rentention capabilities. Those who are still not much exposed to these mediums remember lot of things and are quick learners and enjoy their lives out in the open, under the sun. 

Oh, and this platform where I am writing all this - Blogger - is from Google too... Jai Google Baba ki!!!!

Thursday, July 16, 2015

Incomplete mail...

Yes. This blog is to complete my last day mail at my last organization. Won't name the company but this is for my group: CA group (will call it CA group throughout this post). After spending almost 4 years there I was finding it hard to write a short parting mail. From past few months though, I had not been enjoying my work there for various reasons but my office had become an integral part of my life, my routine. I wrote in my last day mail that I would rather write a blog about it than writing a 2 page Last Day mail. So, here it is:
 
Joined the CA group in August, 2011 right after the Independence Day and there started my journey of endless learning, discussions, tense moments, laughter sessions, team lunches/dinners/outings and what not. I am a much better person and professional now - more confident now. I can't forget the endless discussion sessions with the engineering team, the conflicts, the roadblocks - all of these helped me learn lot of technical aspects as well of the products I was working on.
 
I still remember my first DEMO to the US based audience. Before joining CA group, in my previous company, I had given lot of trainings but the audience was the rural population of India - to be given in pure Hindi. Demo started, my voice was shaky and all of a sudden things started to go wrong. A test call which was expected did not happen. People were running to get that call but it would take time and till then - I put myself on mute. I had nothing to talk about. No backup plan. Next day, my then manager - Nagesh - scolded me and told me to always have a backup plan and be prepared even if that means to write down my speech on a piece of paper. Always have some chit-chat stuff handy - like weather conditions of US, how things go wrong in demo, what technical/functional implications are there etc etc. That day onwards I never go to any training session or demo without preparing myself and checking the systems if they are ready for the demo.
 
The first big launch or Go Live and when we went to the client's place. Reached there by 4:30 PM IST since business starts from 5:00 PM IST. From 4:30 PM till 2:00 AM, we were up on our toes running from one corner to another solving issues being faced by the agents of the client. Following few days were tense since those issues had to be resolved during the day time and on the floor support to client during the night time. But it was so satisfying when our group was hugely applauded for the launch.
 
The planning for the outings/lunches/dinners, last day of some colleague, speeches, samosa-sweets for any trivial to big occasion, the gossip sessions, leg pulling, story grooming sessions, fights between Dev and QA teams, taking a tough stand, finding new odd nicknames of any interesting character, eagerly waiting for free cake on every Friday - Thanks to Pooja, poking nose in discussions about a mobile game (which I have never played) which my friends were part of (some clan - Hot thing)...

It was when I had put down my papers and slowly people coming to know about it that I realized that I had made so many friends there who were kind of shocked to know that I am quitting. Now that I am almost settled in the new place, I am missing my office going routine. Though, as a complimentary gift, I am getting to spend more time with my daughter and hope to spend more time for blogging.

Every journey has some happy and some sad moments. Same was the case with CA group. As the team grew and the management changed, the fun factor was fading away. Earlier to that, I was always engaged in the planning of any outing but then, the interest went away.
Had to witness a Pink Slip drive where I lost at least 3 people I so closely knew. That was a heart breaking day. And another saddest moment - when we suddenly lost our manager - (late) Dr. Ashok Kallarakkal. It was so hard to believe; more so since just a day prior to his untimely death, we had talked at length about so many things. Till now, there has been no day when I have not thought about him - a gentle soul - May he rest in peace. But life moves on.

Jhaheman, singprac, chandrsa, kamathan, gandhike, repaka.... hahaha, these are not the names but the network IDs of my friends. That's how we used to call each other. I got a name there - Strict Teacher. No idea why this name was given to me by one of the team members (probably because I came across as a No-Nonsense person during story grooming sessions) but you getting a nickname means that you have made some influence over few of the people.

Oh, I am missing my office; my gang... May they be successful and no more Pink Slip drives.