The Curse of Mediocrity

A recent discussion over a stupid 10 marks quiz being held again on the request of some students who couldn’t score well in the first quiz triggered this debate which I am going to elaborate with some more dimensions added to it. To summarize the entire debate which lasted for 2 days and died its natural death, let me just write that it was a debate between meritocracy and mediocrity. Some people might take some offence on this statement but, doesn’t matter to me.

 The love for mediocrity is not new in India. It started the very day reservations based on any factor were introduced in education, employment or any other field. Don’t confuse me with someone who is not in favor of giving equal chance to deserving but deprived section of society, what I am opposed to is the wastage of these chances over people who are neither deserving nor deprived. Economic reservation is justified but I am totally against the concept of caste based reservation. Somebody doesn’t become eligible to sit and talk with an intelligent person just because he/she is from a particular caste or tribe. This system has been grossly misused. First, the father was given reservation and he became an IAS officer, then the elder son became a doctor based on his caste and now his younger brother wants to reuse this to get into an IIM after wasting an engineering seat at IIT. By no means does he or his brother deserve this since they were given all possible facilities to study during their schooling. But they are given the chance and the seeds of mediocrity are sown which promise to pollute the entire system in the long run.

The second factor for mediocrity comes from the shoddy and “chalta-hai” attitude of people around. People are not ready to take responsibility for their actions. But they all want equal rewards as if the person who puts in efforts and takes responsibility is a fool. When somebody deserving wants to assert his/her right, beautiful words like selfish, perverse and self-centered etc etc are used. I want to ask one question, who stopped you from following the paths of the so-called selfish person at the first place? If he/she can do it, why can’t you? Are you not capable enough? Or were you so lazy that you didn’t care to think about the outcome in advance? If yes, then you are neither lazy nor casual, you are simply a fool fooling yourself and none else. You may get a second chance here since it’s just a training ground, but believe me mate, life doesn’t give second chances. A person who is better will always be better than you, he will always think ahead and foresee the consequences while you may be busy boozing around living in your own sweet dream world where everything works as you want. It doesn’t happen this way, and I pray to God for it to never happen this way.

Third factor is over emphasized love for social service, society and feeling of benevolence. These are noble feelings and should not be used for the sake of using them. Be benevolent to old, be kind to those who are hurt, be generous to the needy ones but be equally harsh to undeserving people. I don’t believe in the theory of “God made all equal in terms of thinking power and self control and deserve equally”, even if He did, the chaff is separated from the wheat very early in the life. People going to same school end up very differently, one may be a billionaire industrialist while the other may just end being his employee. What caused the difference, they both started together? The difference lies in their dedication, commitment and self regulation. One of them took responsibility of what he did while the other waited for somebody to feed him thinking that it’s the other person’s duty to feed him. Again, this doesn’t happen in real life. A person who feeds always remains superior to the person being fed.

I don’t know why people are so averse to hearing that whatever somebody does is for himself and for no one else, however disguised the actions maybe. Somebody who has put in many nights and days’ hard-work to setup a factory wants returns. He doesn’t care about the employment generated or the contribution to the nation a bit. Go and ask Ambani or Tata about why they started their empires, I bet on my life if they give the answer you want to hear. Nobody does anything for others for free. I am not talking about saints or God who are different; I am talking about poor mortals who are driven by desires of food, love and power. If somebody is in the illusion that the world will be generous to a lazy, irresponsible and undeserving bum, he is doomed for his life today or tomorrow.

I don’t know how many of you have read Ayn Rand but will like to say that thinking about yourself and your good is not perverse. What is bad is doing the same on someone else’s expense. Putting in hard-work to achieve what you aspire for is not being selfish; in fact it is the other way around. If you believe that someone else should come and give you what you want, then it is being selfish (you are living in a fool’s paradise is a different matter altogether).

My sincere request to everyone; think about what you want, try hard to achieve it and most importantly learn to take responsibility for your actions accepting failures on the way. And, there is no harm in thinking about you first!!!

Disclaimer: All the views are personal and not meant for anyone specific. It would be an utter misfortune if some people take it personally and feel offended.  

End of a Dream

Disclaimer: All characters in the story are real to the best possible extent. Any mistake in assigning the characters with the real life is totally regretted. The case is about a consulting firm based in NY with an office in Gurgaon and having its name starting with I. Read through the case, the name of the firm is given somewhere in the case. Spotters get a box of peanuts as bonus.

How do you react when something you deserve is taken from you in front of your eyes? How do you react to some gross injustice perpetrated on you? How do you react when someone is unable to justify his/her non-sense actions? And how do you react when you face something you never expected can happen to you? Maybe you are confused as to why I am asking you all this. There’s a reason for this. And let me narrate you a story to help you.

Imagine a situation that you are working in a company which is supposed to be very people oriented, very open in its policies and very fair in its review and rewards process. It entices you to work hard, put in everything you have got, think about nothing work etc etc. All this with the carrot that in the end you will be rewarded suitably. So you  being a lesser mortal fresh out of a graduate school you fall into the mousetrap and make office your second home and work your religion. This game continues happily for almost 2 years and I must confess that the company does keep its promise till the end of first year (atleast for some employess). This would be fair and just to add here that all this is done when the company is doing phenomenally fantastic, achieving over 100% growth. Everything and everyone around you is happy, picture is merry and there are all indications that the joy ride will continue.

Then suddenly one day the company is taken over by a BPO giant. You are told that this is the best thing which could happen at this point of time. We will get more clients and more sales and blah blah. Again you being a slave for 30K INR don’t have a choice but to accept and be happy and hope for the best. You continue to slog. You have a hidden desire to become an MBA after seeing your bosses. You try and this time you get admission into one of the IIMs. In the mean time the company has failed to get any clients and 90% of junta is on bench. But you being a senior member, who considers the company as your own, still continue to put in your best. You slog in late nights with no special expectations, expect the fact that you expect recognition of your efforts. Finally you resign and leave for MBA hoping that people at your company will continue to take you in the same spirit as they did when things were good. Then comes the time when your dreams are shattered and reality dawns on you.  It’s the time when things are declared and you are brought to hard truth. You did not complete 2 weeks in the year and hence you do not become eligible for getting the full bonus. Moreover you don’t even get the deserved performance rating. Just because the f***king company doesn’t has the funds to pay you some 20K extra (considering the fact that you were billed at $125/hr when you were there), you are told that this is what you deserve.

You are a person who has always wanted the best for the firm. You are the one who saw the firm grow from 15 to 150, you are the one who is respected most among the juniors, you are the one whose professionalism and commitment to work is unquestionable, you are the one who believed in pure meritocracy and raised your voice against any unethical thing. But in the end, people who cheated in the tests are revered, people who defy their roles and responsibilities are promoted, people who lick the ass of their superiors move ahead and you, the ideal, moral, ethical employee are left with peanuts to satisfy your values.  Just because the company knows you will never come back again they do this to you and on top of it have the guts to say bullshit to explain this.

So in the end, you are an employee who is still respected in eyes of your peers and juniors, who is still talked about, who has an unblemished track record, who finally reach those a**holes can never reach. But you are told that how much ever you may be good, you are not the employee whom the management dreamt about. You just spent 2 years with the firm called Inductis where the average period is less than 12 months, u multitasked between client projects and training people thereby screwing your life, you did what other people can only dream about but in the end you are one who is left wondering what exactly you got from all this. Nothing tangible. Some people may call you selfish but asking for what you deserve is not being selfish. Some may say that you are demanding too much but you also gave too much to a lost cause. And this blame game will continue.

So what do you learn from the story. Never trust a bunch of arrogant MBAs from one of the IIMs who believe that the only to get ahead is via someone else’s head. Never be emotionally attached to you work place. Just do whatever is expected from you. Because in the end, “It doesn’t even matter and it shouldn’t.”

PS: If you are still unable to comprehend the name of the firm, read again. Don’t ask me the meaning of the name of the firm, check wikipedia, afterall people should take initiative and put effort on their own.