Looking beyond the Odd-Even Rule

As Delhi braces itself for the implementation of the Odd-Even rule to help decongest the roads and bring down the extremely high levels of pollution in the city, it's also important to think about some of the other solutions that will help smoothen the flow of traffic.
If you have driven (or have been driven) on any city in India you will agree that one of the main reasons for traffic jams (apart from the high number of vehicles on the road) is the complete lack of adherence to basic rules of driving like sticking to lanes, following traffic lights, etc. In my view if we  are able to convince/coerce people to follow some of these simple rules then a lot of the traffic congestion can be eased. I derive this understanding from my visits to developed countries where people (including Indians) tend to follow the rule of law and that really eases the flow of traffic and eases the stress of driving on the roads.

How to get people to follow traffic rules?
Fear of law. Period. That's how people in developed countries are kept in check, because they know that if they mess up, there is a high probability that they might be caught and penalized heavily.
I can hear you all saying "Well we all know that!" and "It's easier said than done", and although I may partly agree to your outbursts, I still believe it may not be difficult to implement this if we can cross the threshold of political and bureaucratic lethargy.

Here is the plan.

1. Identify a few key junctions/points around the city (and keep these a strict secret)
2. Install high resolution video cameras that record the traffic movement and relay to a central server.
3. Create a team of 10-15 traffic officers that pick a random time of the day and analyze the footage to identify offenders.
4. Send challans to the offenders with photographic evidence, also use newspapers to highlight the offenders that were caught to further drill the point among others.

"The Plan"

What would it take to implement this?

1. High resolution cameras
2. Storage space for the recorded footage
3. Video analysis software to go through the footage
4. Team of slightly tech savvy traffic officers
5. Software to record and generate challans (If one doesn't already exist)
6. Heavy fines for offenders.
7. Co-ordination among traffic and transport departments.
8. In case of Delhi, political will from Central (owns traffic police) & State (owns transport) govt.

There will be some hurdles in the way and I am sure we can iron them out to create a sense of fear of law. For instance, you might say:

"This is going to be really expensive"

[Response] Well, we can start small, maybe just with 15-20 key places for starters and then ramp up slowly. Cameras and storage space needed of this small number may not be cost inhibitive, if these places are kept a secret then even this small number may be enough to keep people guessing and instill the fear of law among people. Also, if this is successful the benefits may far outweigh the costs.

"It's going to be really time-consuming to review the footage"

[Response] Not all the footage needs to be analyzed, the traffic officers can pick random periods every day and identify the offenders during that period, they don't need to analyze the footage for the entire day. Again, the idea is to instill fear that if you don't follow the law then you will be caught.

"How will you penalise out-of-town vehicles"

[Response] This is something that I still haven't been able to work out. Does anyone have any suggestions?

"People may not pay for the challans/fines generated from an "automated process" and still keep driving around"

[Response] - To begin with, publish the car numbers that have been issued fines on a website. Also, allow people to pay for these fines online. For any challan/fine that is unpaid for more than x days the fine amount is doubled and if it remains unpaid for an year then visit the address and impound the said vehicle, also you can enforce insurance companies to not issue insurance policies to such vehicles until their fines have been cleared.

This solution is not new and in all probability has been suggested by someone else, but I still think its worth trying in addition to the other initiatives that would help.

The 10 Year Itch!!

In 10 years, the building has moved, the profs (quite a few) have left, the hairlines have receded, and the beer bellies have flourished, but the camaraderie has remained intact and so has the joy of exchanging tons of those memorable stories.

What started as a casual conversation on a WhatsApp group culminated in the 10 year reunion for the batch of 2003-05, obviously none of this would have been possible without some very industrious batch mates and the alumni office at GIM. Around 30 of us made it to Goa from all over the globe with some of us coming from the US, Europe, and the Middle East to make this reunion a grand success and help us relive those wonder years.

Just one of the breathtaking views from the new campus

The reunion kick started with an informal get-together the night before the main event at GIM, which followed the next day.  Given the late night, it was amazing to see that everyone was up and ready in the morning to take the longish ride from Candolim to the new campus together. When the talk of moving to a new campus was initiated a few years back we all thought that it would be really difficult to find a location that can come close to the Ribandar campus, but the new campus is not only located in one of the most scenic places in Goa but also boasts of ultra modern facilities like centrally air-conditioned classrooms, well-maintained hostel accommodation, in-campus faculty housing, a huge auditorium, tennis and (indoor) badminton courts, a well equipped gymnasium, and (my favorite) a huge swimming pool.

Prof. Parulekar also ran us through the other things that have changed since we left campus. The batch size is now 240 as opposed to 110 in our days, we also have more than 50 full-time faculty to support this growth. GIM is also involving itself more actively in the industry and picking up consulting projects to supplement the brand. Probably the most impressive initiative is the outreach into the local community through various touch points and with an overall objective of sensitizing students to the lives of the vast populace that is underprivileged. We all left from campus with the overwhelming confidence that the institute is poised to take itself to greater heights in the near future.

The reunion rounded-off with a grand party in the evening where we all got down and boogied like the clock had never moved. If your batch is next in line for a re-union then, don’t think, just do it! I promise it will be worth it! 

And again, a BIG THANK YOU to Divye Goel, Ajay Chopra, & Mohit Golcha for pulling us all together and to the folks at the GIM Alumni office for all their leg work. This wouldn't have been possible without you!

View of the faculty housing & beyond at the new campus

The one's who made it!

The Most Important (yet ignored) Asset

I learnt this lesson during my management course and it immediately struck a chord and has always stuck on. The course was called "Services Management" and our professor used a simulation game to explain a very simple point about the services industry. In the simulation game we began with a set budget and the players had to invest that amount in various components like Marketing, Sales, Research & Development, Operations, Human Resources, etc so that the overall business could flourish. The traditional mindset is to create a stellar product and market it well, this should settle you as the winner. However, in a services-oriented business the players who invested smartly in their Human resources (a.k.a People) would end up on the winning side since happy and empowered employees will provide the clinching customer experience. In other words, "people" are the most important asset for a service-oriented business and how you invest in recruiting, training, rewarding, and empowering your employees will have a direct impact on your bottom & top line.

I know that this may not be a eureka moment for most of the readers and they would have read/heard this before, some may even argue that we are already following this, haven't you seen our Mission/Vision statement we have mentioned "employee satisfaction" in bold and even our tax friendly benefits structure should tell you how much we value our employees. Some others may also point out that they have a dedicated human resources department and also provide free cola and snacks in the pantry. What else do you want!!?

While doing the above is important, in today's workplace they are merely hygiene factors. On a day-to-day basis your people interact with their peers, managers and customers, and it is this environment that generally lacks the "people" focus it needs. Therefore, it's imperative that we continue to avoid the following pitfalls and foster the kind of environment that might end up being your USP.

Before we begin this, the underlying assumption is that as an organization you have spent a considerable amount of time in hiring the "right" people i.e. people who possess the raw (or finished) ingredients suited for your business, and not just another "body" to fill the manpower targets.

Stop treating people like a resource - Technically, people are resources but are very different from the other resources that you would encounter in a traditional manufacturing scenario. They have ambitions, moods, personal issues, quirks etc. and all this needs to figure in our thinking especially when we take calls on planning their career paths and while staffing them on assignments. Moving people from one project to another cannot be played out like it does with machines on the shop floor of a manufacturing unit. Do that more often than once and you are playing with fire. Remember, if the person isn't happy or convinced about what he/she is getting into then it is more than likely that this will impact the manner in which they service the client. At ThoughtWorks, in order to ensure that we are addressing people's interests, we take inputs from people about the kind of software projects we should be targeting. This helps ensure that we atleast have a buy-in from (majority of) folks on the ground and moving across projects is not a big deal since each project has something unique to offer.

"Empowerment" is the word - Interacting with clients and across internal teams, employees need to feel empowered and trusted to bring out the best in them. Managers constantly feel the need to micro-manage people to fulfill the needs of the demanding customer, this creates further distrust and frustration in the team. If you have hired the right people then have the guts to trust and back them, and they will deliver whatever is within the realm of "possible" or maybe even beyond that. Yes, they might make the occasional mistake but the value of an employee that feels that he/she can take ownership will soon surpass any losses. The practice of constantly pushing people by offering superficial rewards might only work temporarily, in my experience the employees who feel trusted and empowered will get the job done and still be satisfied.

The World is "Flat" - Flat hierarchies are not a new concept but even though a lot of companies have been able to move towards a flatter hierarchical structure and realize the benefits, there still are tons out there that enforce the almost military-like command and control structure. The only people who can actually change this are the senior level managers, but I guess if you have worked hard for so many years to climb the corporate ladder you want to feel privileged and you want to have your own office and you want people to address you as 'sir' (atleast on your face). No sir, sorry to have to tell you this but get your priceless *** out of that closed door office and sit where the rest of your folks sit. This one move in itself will send a very strong message to your people and further enforce the feeling of trust and empowerment that is key. It will also help you sense the pulse of the people without having to do meaningless point based employee satisfaction surveys every year. Use a meeting room for all the "closed" door discussions that you want to have.

Why are people leaving?  - Don't fool yourself to think that people are leaving just because they want to start their own venture or because you just couldn't offer a higher salary package. Bad managers and short-sighted people practices are still a big reason for people quitting, whereas compensation is the last reason most people leave. Is that true for your firm too?

Why Palestinians need your Support?!!

Ok, so I am not a Palestinian or a muslim, but that doesn't stop me from being  human or a global citizen and that is why I write this piece. Would I expect the same kind of support from the international community if fate and so-called international super powers had given my nation a raw deal? The answer is a "yes". 

The disturbing fact is that most international commentators and journalists don't talk about history of the conflict and the fact that the Palestinians were the inhabitants of the land which is now called Israel and were removed from their lands forcefully and with little or no compensation and now have to live in inhuman conditions. They also don't make any reference to the role played by the US in "UN-levelling" the playing field, and the fact that this entire mess is the handiwork of the UK. The Britishers (in their right minds) thought that the best way to bring justice to one set of people was to enforce injustice on another set, something that was doomed to fail from the outset.

The fact is also that rockets are being fired by Hamas into the Israeli territory and that is wrong. Period. The only lasting solution to this or any other conflict can be a peaceful one, where all the concerned parties sit on the negotiation table. However, meaningful negotiations are not possible when the 2 parties that are participating are not "equals". 

Palestinians have no military might and absolutely no support from the UN or any other country. The Palestinians have made multiple representations on the atrocities that have been inflicted upon them, but all have been vetoed by Israel's supporters. On the other hand we have a military heavyweight like Israel that is fully supported by the US, UK and other countries. The other countries have supported Israel through their silence and to safeguard their selfish interests. 

Still not convinced? Then let's try an analogy that's closer to us, would we call any retaliatory action from Tibetans (using covert guerilla tactics) on China as "terrorism"?
What if China decided to take over Arunachal Pradesh and the only way for India to defend itself against China's might was to launch covert guerrilla strikes? Who would you blame in these conditions? If your answer is that you blame India/Tibet, then I guess there is nothing more to say...

In Conclusion: It doesn't matter if we support Israel or Palestine, what's important is that as global citizens we build the right perspective on such important issues and the historic facts, and not go by everything that the international media feeds us as "current affairs". 

The embedded video presents some historic insight into the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. If that one is too long for you then maybe this shorter version will help get some perspective.

EXTREME ANALYSIS - Pairing for Business Analysts

Extreme Analysis in action

Pair programming has been used by software developers in most progressive software companies to help churn out quality products and to ensure that context is shared across the teams. For the uninitiated, traditional pair programming (in short) is a practice where 2 programmers work on developing a piece of software functionality in tandem. 
This practice helps improve code quality since you have 2 sets of eyes and brains trying to solve the problem and as one person writes the code, the other continuously reviews it, thereby eliminating the need to have separate code review sessions. Also, if the pair has worked efficiently then any mistakes in design have been caught upfront, thereby eliminating any waste caused by defects which would have been discovered at a later stage. This concept has mostly been applied to the working of software developers and other roles have not quite adapted it, as yet.

Why is this important? - Business Analysts (in general) are used to working in an individual capacity since most team's have a single BA, and a lot of analysts find it hard to work with other analysts in an amicable manner. My guess is that since there is a dearth of opportunities to work with other's, the skills to work with others does not get the opportunity to blossom.

“Business Analysts, User Experience (UX) Analysts, Project Managers, and (to  a lesser degree) Quality Analysts are used to working alone, and may need to work out how to deal with situations where they too need to collaborate among the community, and deliver.”

My primary role is of a Business Analyst, and I had wanted to share my experiences on the projects that I executed at ThoughtWorks, where I was able to pair with the other BAs with some level of success. This piece is my attempt to not only share some of those lessons and experiences, but hopefully also generate some healthy debate/discussions.

The Basics

Before we go into any specifics of how to pair as Business Analysts we need to first get some basics right. 

Any successful working relationship needs to have these elements at the core, the absence of these will render any attempt at pairing to be futile.

• Commitment to work from the individuals in question
• Mutual Respect
• Equal sharing of tasks and responsibilities
• Leverage on each others strengths and work around the rough edges.
• Willingness to take feedback from each other and work towards improvement
• Helping each other through personal time-offs by temporarily taking ownership of tasks
• Ability to share a laugh and work through stressful situations
• Personal Hygiene, since the expectation is for both to sit in reasonably close proximity to each other, personal hygiene will be an important factor. :-P

Pairing Practices

When we look at Business analysis in an agile project the following tasks would generally have to be undertaken on a day-to-day basis. I hope to tie the practices we used and make my case for "EXTREME ANALYSIS".

Daily Sign-ups - The day generally starts with a stand-up where the entire team participates and thereafter programmers, quality analyst and Business analysts sign-up for their tasks. Its important that the BAs get together and list down the tasks that they intend to pick during the course of the day and sign-up for them based on an equal distribution.

This activity is important since there can be multiple things (other than story detailing) that need to be addressed during the day like responding to emails sent by the customer, escalating blockers, reviewing analysed stories etc. And these tasks need to be identified and responded to as a team.

Tools/Practices: When the BAs are co-located then it makes sense to sit next to each other and list the tasks on a notebook or stickies and striking them off as they get done. However, when the BAs are working in different timezones (or geographies) then apart from a 15-30 min daily catch-up the sign-ups can be managed via a lightweight task list manager like Trello. Its web-based, free to use, and simple as hell.

Story Detailing - This is the most significant task that BAs undertake and pairing here can help to set a mutually agreed direction that the BA detailing the story can take. 

Tools/Practices: The tool being used here is the most effective one i.e. conversations. The BA who has taken the ownership of a feature will explain in brief the approach that he/she plans to take and solicit inputs from the other BAs. This ensures that context is shared and also helps build a better story right upfront (fail fast).

Story Review (Internal) - In Extreme Programming, programmers use peer review to ensure that the coding practices are being followed. Keeping in mind the same principles, Business Analysts should get their stories reviewed by another set of eyes just to make sure that all the bases are covered.

Tools/Practices: Ensuring that all stories (especially the complex ones) are peer reviewed by atleast one Business Analyst to capture any obvious omissions/errors.

Story Review (with Customer) - Stories need to be signed-off by customers before they can be picked up by programmers and these meetings can be managed better if you work as a team. If the BAs have followed the earlier steps they will take a uniform message and present a unified voice to the customer.  

Tools/Practices: Having feature kick-offs, where as a team you present the outline of the requirement and get inputs from the customer.

Iteration Planning - The stories that need to be picked in the forthcoming iterations need to be planned and communicated to the customer. Its important that this activity takes into account the dependencies and priorities that are associated with the stories and features.

Tools/Practices: Rotate the responsibility of creating the iteration plan among the BAs and then review the plan that has been set forth as a team. Again this helps get inputs from a larger group and in the absence of one of the BAs the others can take over the Iteration planning meeting with the team and/or customer.

Difficult conversations - When we talk about scope and prioritization with customers there is always the possibility of conversations turning hostile, especially if the team is set-up in the onsite-offshore model. Added to this is the fact that customers can be very direct, demanding and (sometimes) just plain uncooperative. All this could lead to frustrating conversations which can test the BA's patience, communication, and negotiation skills.

Tools/Practices: If one of the BA's is feeling particularly frustrated and bogged down by the conversations and not able to respond in a calm and composed manner, which is a perfectly natural feeling to have in such tense situations (Maybe it's just not their day). The other BA should have the ability to sense this and attempt to bring the calmness and logic back into the conversations. This obviously means that the BA who is not able to respond in a calm manner should back-off and let the other BA lead the discussion this time around. Good teamwork requires people to understand the personality (and mood) of their colleagues and support them adequately.

Women Empowerment: Moving Beyond Lip Service

Almost all progressive new age organisations and their leaders would publicly support higher participation from women in their workplace, some even boasting how women have occupied senior management positions in their company. 

Generally this boils down to a 3 month paid leave on maternity, additional security during late night drops, and a few "women groups/forums". Although all this is welcome and much needed, there still is a need to up the ante when it comes to actual Women Empowerment.

In my view ThoughtWorks has tried to change the game through the following initiatives and as we try to continuously improve and innovate I am sure there will be more such attempts in the future.

Target 50% women hires during campus placements - ThoughtWorks has set itself a target of fulfilling 50% of their annual campus hires with women. This is done without compromising quality and without ignoring an equally capable male candidate. How? By targeting women only colleges and holding focused recruitment drives.
There is no doubt that this is challenging and a tough ask from all involved, especially if you consider the dwindling number of women in software. But the intent (to enable 50% of the population) is there and the team has worked really hard to attain this goal.

In-office day care - A very significant number of women are forced to give up their careers to support and raise their children. Mostly this is due to lack of a support system (nuclear families), lack of good quality and reliable day care options, or the overwhelming feeling of guilt about leaving your child in their most vulnerable and cute phase. In my opinion it is this guilt which either comes from the family or is self-inflicted, that leads to most women choosing to stay at home.
In an attempt to enable its employees (men or women) and quell the guilt, ThoughtWorks Bangalore office offers in office day care facilities to employees. I'll let the expert let you know more about this (click the link).
Although other offices don't have a dedicated day care facility (as yet) they have always allowed parents to bring in their young ones along with a nanny if they are very young. The offices also have a small children room to help parents. Personally I am rooting for a day care facility to be set-up in my home office of Gurgaon as well, so that I can spend more time with my daughter (guilt free!). 

Must read about another initiative "Vapasi" being run at ThoughtWorks to bring technical women back to work.

An Open Letter to Fellow AAPtards

Dear fellow AAPtards (incl. Shazia, Capt. Gopinath etc.),

So we tried our best and we gave the current political setup a run for its money, however we didn't get the desired results. Did we expect BJP and Congress to just roll over and die, especially with so much at stake? We all knew that this was going to be a fight for the long haul and we could only hope to make inroads through continuous efforts and sacrifices. Think of this via another example, Coke and Pepsi are the dominant players in the Cola market, they have the money, resources and people's loyalty. Do you think you can introduce a new (arguably better) product as an alternative and hope to rule the market in a couple of years? Well, we all know the logical answer to that.

We also have recognised that there are a plethora of lessons that need to be learnt and strategies altered without sacrificing our core values. But most of you are wondering if this movement remains valid and does it hold any significance anymore. I firmly believe that it does and here's my take on it:

Viable alternative - Although the number of seats that we won across the country in our first effort does not justify this, but after the stellar performance in the Delhi polls the BJP and Congress realised that they need to bring their A-game if they want to remain relevant, and they fought really hard (especially BJP). Delhi taught them a lesson that they can't take people for granted, and obviously AAP could have done a better job of communicating their exit, but still the impact was telling. As the Congress and RaGa (hopefully) become irrelevant, it's important that we maintain the threat and force the market leaders to continue improving, being transparent, being connected to the people on the ground, and make systemic changes.

Focus on our core agenda - AAP as a political alternative came into existence to CLEAN UP POLITICS. This should continue to be our focus and all our messaging should be targeted around this. Will the BJP (having a clear majority) bring police reforms, judicial reforms, a strong lokpal structure, electoral reforms, political parties under RTI, concepts of swaraj etc? Only time will tell, and if they don't then we are back in the mix and if they do then AAP doesn't need to exist and that should be the happiest day for all of us.

The Road Ahead

A Mohalla Sabha - Let's bring power to the people.

There is no doubt that with the BJP bringing their A-game we need to revamp our strategy and target our energies on making a significant impact during the upcoming legislative elections in Haryana, Delhi, and Maharashtra. Again there is no guarantee that we will make significant inroads in all/any of the state assemblies, but if we truly believe that our message is true and our path is right, then we MUST CONTINUE irrespective of the setbacks.

Your Sincerely,

Jagbir (a.k.a. AAPtard)


P.S. - Are you are upset with me using the word 'AAPtard', which has been primarily used to demean people in some way? Well don't be, I use this word because for me it means that as an individual I am brain locked in the principles that will lead to a corruption free India, where we can hold our leaders accountable and build a system that serves all classes of citizens (rich or poor).