Is The Oscar Committee Racist

There has been a lot of talk about Slumdog Millionaire and its run at the Golden Globe as well as the nominations at the Oscars.10 Oscar Nominations including one for best picture. Don’t be surprised if it walks away with the Best Picture Oscar as well, since academy members have been raving about it.

Slumdog released in India last week, and while the reviews in the papers have been the highest I have seen in a while, I am quite surprised at the reaction of the academy towards this movie. For a Hindi movie buff, Slumdog is just another commercial pot-boiler. There are several movies like this release in India every year and none of them make it to the Oscar nominations. Sample this Taare Zameen Par, a movie reviewed on DelhiPlanet earlier, was in the race for the Oscars and never made it to the nomination category. To me this movie was one of the best movies produced and directed in cinema.

Thoughts to ponder over are What if a movie like Taare Zameen Par (TZP), a movie which showcases the story of eight year old Ishaan (Darsheel Safary) who suffers greatly until a teacher (Aamir Khan) identifies him as dyslexic, was directed by a Danny Boyle or a Steven Spielberg. What if a Slumdog Millionaire was directed by an Aamir Khan or a Sanjay Leela Bhansali. Would Taare Zameen Par still have had the same effect on the Oscar commitee or would Slumdog Millionaire still have wowed the audiences at the Golden Globes or Oscars.

Personally I feel that there are at least 5 movies every year which are as good as a Slumdog Millionaire or even better. But they never make it to the Oscars. Then comes along a movie like TZP, which is a movie above all of the regular commercial fare, and that is booted out of the Oscars. Pity!!

Anyways, for now, if you have not seen Slumdog Millionaire, go watch it. It depicts India in a manner which is really a true depiction. Maybe that’s why the audiences in the west are enjoying it, they seldom get to see movies which depict real life so well.

Breaking The Golden Rule – How Should We Incorporate Differences Into The Way We Manage People

The past week in class we spent a lot of time in Self-Reflection. The idea, which I strongly agree with, is that you should know yourself before you try to work with other people, not to say, manage or lead them. We did all sorts of activities aimed at discovering ourselves, including learning about our learning style (Reflector, Theorist, Pragmatist, Activist), Myers-Briggs Type Indicator to discover of types and preferences (I am a INTJ, by the way), etc.

The results were quite extraordinary and very interesting on the personal level. One the group level, I think we discovered how different we are from each other and the facilitators were able to demonstrate our differences in many ways. But I think that this is not the important lesson. If I had asked most of the class before today’s class to predict the results of the class, I think they would have probably described it quite accurately even if the numbers would not have been precise. We all know, in some level, that people are different and that there are different styles and preferences.

But the problem is we are wired in the wrong way to deal with that knowledge. We have difficulties when we see someone who is different than us. More importantly, we have difficulties imagining how he wants to be treated. So if we make an effort, it is usually to treat him like we want to be treated.

We all know the “Golden Rule” because it is widely know across cultures and religions. For example, all Jewish people know that The Sage Hillel formulated the Golden Rule in order to illustrate the underlying principles of Jewish moral law as follows:

That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn

This is a good general concept and at a religious (and maybe political) level it is a smart rule. But the problem is that if you move into the world of management, this well intentioned rule leads you to bad managerial decisions like much conventional wisdom. Because, if we do agree that we are all different it also means that we hate different things. This means, I may hate the way you like to be treated. And if I follow the rule, I will avoid doing just what you wanted me to do.

I know I made this mistake a number of times in my life. I tried to treat my teammates or followers as I wanted to be treated. But each of my teammates was (and is) different and unique. They don’t want to be treated like I want to be treated; they want to get individualized attention. The mad similar mistakes with building classes and presentations the way I wanted to see them. But different people have different learning styles.

In his book, “First, break all the rules“, Markus Buckingham describes what great managers do. One of these things is ignoring the Golden Rule:

The best managers break the Golden Rule every day. They would say don’t treat people as you would like to be treated. This presupposes that everyone breathes the same physiological oxygen as you. For example, if you are competitive, everyone must be similarly competitive. If you like to be praised in public, everyone else must, too. Everyone must share your hatred of micromanagement.

So, next time you get to work in a team or lead one, don’t make the assumption that although everybody is different, by treating them how you would want to be treated will be enough. You need to find out, how they would like to be treated for each and every person. Being a good manager is certainly not easy and whoever thinks so has certainly not been to Business School.

Soft Skills Or Harder Skills – First Weeks At AGSM

So you’ve been working in a particular role for a good organization for a couple of years and have enjoyed it. You’re probably working as a manager or you feel that you have the potential to become a manager. This leads you to start preparing for an MBA, a journey that is quite time consuming, expensive and very often a major step in one’s life and career.

What are the kind of expectations that a person normally has before starting an MBA Program. Lots of hard work, long days, multiple assignments, Banging your head over new subjects would probably be some of the notions that a person would have before beginning the program. Well, many of us here at AGSM, Sydney also had similar notions. But that was before the program started.

We would soon be completing about 2 weeks into the program and I can say without a doubt that if your objective in life is

1. To learn from people of different countries and cultures.
2. Explore and Appreciate Diversity.
3. Interact with people from different fields with varying degrees of experiences.

then the AGSM MBA and the AGSM experience would be perfect for you. Over the course of the past 2 weeks, we have learnt so much about ourselves and our class. At AGSM, you are taught that the first step towards becoming an effective manager is to know yourself and your team. The so called “soft skills” are actually “harder skills“, much harder Economics, Finance or Marketing, because the teach you the art of managing people. As any experienced professional who has lead teams, companies and projects would tell you, “if one can master the art of managing people“, then most things can be taken care of.

At the AGSM MBA, it’s all about enjoying the learning process and the company of your classmates. You can choose to take on the pressure of getting the best grades, but the system encourages you to place more stress on the learning than the grades.

Understanding The “Manager”

When you hear the word “manager”, What do you think about? Which role do you imagine?

Yesterday, I was presented with the following question in class:

From your experience, What specific qualities does it take to be an effective manager ?

Now, I have my own answers, like the ability to listen, to identify strengths and weakness in others and the ability to give specific, constructive and practical feedback. But then someone in our class said: “entrepreneurism”. For a minute I was shocked. I value entrepreneurism, but what does that have to do with managing people?

Then it hit me. He was not talking about managing people; he probably had a different picture of a manager in mind. Because, if you are a product manager or a customer service manager or any other type of role that comes with the word “manager” attached to it, you don’t necessarily manage other people. You might even work alone or directly with clients but with no subordinates under your direct supervision. You might work in as a part of team of very independent people who work as equals.

And if any of those descriptions fit your role, it means that this role requires different “specific qualities” in order to be effective. For example, you might need to have enough confidence to admit that you don’t know everything. Or you might need the ability to make hard decisions in short times. Or you might need to have leadership qualities. And sometimes you might need to have entrepreneurship qualities. But not always. It depends on your role. Because the fact that you have the word ”manager” in your title or on your business card does not mean anything.

So, what is the bottom line? I think that when we discuss the word “manager” or think of hiring someone for a “managerial” role, it is very important to understand and to communicate what exactly this manager is? Because the word “manager” triggers the imagination of people differently and it had become too generic to be understood by its own.

Chandni Chowk To China – From Some Indian Place To Some Chinese Place

The Leader – Manager Dilemma

Today we had a very interesting session in class dealing with leadership. Every person of our 65 people class(at my B-school AGSM, Sydney) had to walk up and talk for about a minute about one important characteristic of a good leader that they think they embody. Now, I know this sounds a bit corny, but the main issue was getting people to speak about themselves and see their presentation skills as well as getting the know everybody.

There were some very interesting presentations and many people talked about important characteristics: Well organized, a good listener, Able to take harsh decision under pressure, passionate, determination, confidence, delegating of authority and more.

But the process and the above mentioned list did get me thinking about the difference between leadership and management. A lot of people mix them. Do leaders really need to be well organized? Or have confidence? I can think of a few leaders who aren’t. I do think it is more important for a manger to have these characteristics.

I was wandering why people mix the two definitions (actually the words are sometimes used as synonyms). I think it is because in too many roles, people are expected to be both. The problem is it is hard to be both.

I think leadership and management are different. I really like Marcus Buckingham’s theory in the book “The one thing you need to know“, claiming that managers’ role is to find the strength of every employee and do what they can to allow him exploit it to excellence while leaders are agent of change, their role is to paint a vivid picture of the future in order to dissipate the our natural fear of the unknown and the uncertain.

Recently, I read Seth Godin’s book Tribes, where he writes:

Management is about manipulating resources to get a known job done… Managers manage a process they’ve seen before, and they react to the outside world, striving to make that process as fast and as cheap as possible. Leadership, on the other hand, is about creating change that you believe in… Leaders have followers. Mangers have employees. Managers make widgets. Leaders make change…

So why is the difference important? If you accept that there is a difference then you accept that there are different talents, skills and knowledge for each group. That means that usually, we cannot expect the same people to do both. But so many roles do. Instead of finding out what is more important to the success of the role, there is an attempt to achieve both, which ends up in an average result. And average, in our society, is just not good enough. So I think this is another conventional wisdom that needs to be broken.

A Journey Back To School – First Day At AGSM

Hi, this is the first in a series of blog posts that I plan to write about my MBA experience at the Australian Graduate School Of Management at Sydney, Australia.

Today 12^th January,2009 was my first day at B-School, a day I have been looking forward to for the past many months and something I was working towards for the past 2 years. An International MBA is truly an enriching experience and quite similar to a roller coaster ride. A full-time MBA is a significant investment in time and resources and is a life-changing decision that pulls people away from the comforts of home, a steady job and carefree weekends with no guarantee of what lies at the end.

Starting out on the MBA can be tough and may involve a lot of after-thought. You may wonder whether you made the right decision, sometimes you may think that you made a big mistake in deciding to do an MBA, because it is an investment in your future and the future is always uncertain. But the MBA is like adventure; one that will give you opportunities for self-development, learning, personal growth and most of all discovery.

Imagine walking into a class having about 64 students coming from 30 different countries right from Honduras to New Zealand. Imagine sitting in a classroom where the youngest person is 25 years old while the oldest is 35+. Imagine a day when you get to meet and interact with all these people for more than 8 hours whilst also learning the fine points about making effective Business Presentations. Such was my first day as B-school, an experience I’ve never had before and one that I’ll cherish for the rest of my life.

Before I end, I would like to share some important points on the art of making effective Business Presentations that I learnt today.

• Always Start Slowly And Clearly: This helps to establish rapport and rhythm
• Pause… And Allow Ideas To Land: It allows your audience to relax
• Breathe: Allows a person to relax and just takes the tension away
• Remember To Smile: Shows that you are relaxed and confident
• Stillness Is Strength: Shows that you are centered and focused

Spice Up Your Love Life With These Simple Yoga Moves

A DelhiPlanet Health And Wellness Exclusive, In Association With Queen Yogini Kristin McGee.

In the last part of our video series with Kristin Mcgee, we bring to you some tips on how one can enhance one’s sex life by practicing some simple yoga moves. As Kristin states,

Yoga is a wonderful thing as it really works to strengthen our pelvic floor muscles. It also releases our inner thighs, groins and lower back and strengthens key areas that make for a great experience.

Catch these simple moves in the video below. You can also checkout our remaining posts in this series here.

The Bangladeshi Taj Mahal

Ahsanullah Moni is a wealthy Bangladeshi film-maker(a well respected figure in Dhaliwood) who aims to be Shah Jahan II. Mr. Moni has over the past 5 years spent a lot of his time and money to construct a copy of the Taj Mahal, considered to be among the new seven wonders of the world.

Mr Moni has spent US$58 million (S$87 million) to build the ‘Bangladeshi Taj Mahal‘ importing marble and granite from Italy, diamonds from Belgium and 160 kilograms of bronze. Mr. Moni said that he wanted his countrymen to experience the beauty of the Indian monument even if they were too poor to travel to see the original (Source). The copy-cat monument is situated in Sonargaon, 30 kilometres north-east of the capital Dhaka. Mr. Moni justifies his intent to build his version of the Taj saying that while it costs 20,000 taka for a Bangladeshi to see the Taj in Agra it only costs 50 taka( recently increased to 100 taka) for them to see his version of the taj.

Well, we sure hope that this doesn’t inspire people in other countries to construct their own versions of the seven wonders, cause when it comes to traveling and sightseeing there is nothing like seeing the original.

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