The sign says – Free left turn

I was on my way to my office when I saw few cops dressed in white ( it was day time and I mean traffic police) arranging some flashy orange colored cones for a separate drive way. It didn’t strike my mind at first,  then and I took the left lane from the Karachi Bakery @ the Mozamzahi Market and headed towards Lakdi-ka-pul. The scene I saw there was something similar to what I had seen around 3 minutes back (no I don’t drive that fast, I could reach there in 3 minutes only because there was no traffic). Yes, the traffic police were busy arranging these cones again. Then I began to realize that this was regarding the new rule that is being followed from today that ‘Free Left turns’ are available at certain junctions in the city and those who obstruct the drive way will be fined.

                I guess I was the first person to see how it began today with the arrangement of cones and at certain places, written on the road in bright white bold letters – FREE LEFT TURN . Then again on my way back home I also saw some people getting fined because they were obstructing traffic. The traffic that wanted to use the free left. The reason being that they were not aware of the rule because they did not read the newspaper. It had been proven time and again that anything that is free is not always appreciated by some. What was meant to be a boon has now become a bane for others.

Hyderabad Traffic Police have claimed that this will help in smooth flow of traffic during rush hours. Well I hope that it will surely help. Oh, the most important point…did I tell you that I was stuck in a traffic jam for 30 minutes during a non-rush hour because of the congestion caused due to the free left ?? Anyway they’ll find a solution to that too. Cheers and enjoy the free left. And and and please don’t forget to read the newspaper before you leave, because the law says that – IGNORANCE OF THE LAW IS NO EXCUSE . 

Kids today are not what they used to be

It was another fine day and some of us had gathered for a session on Google Adwords at our college, Aurora’s Business School. Our mentor Mr.Gunaranjan had arranged for the session and we were waiting for this gentleman from Google to arrive. As the session began, we began to discuss on how marketing has evolved, right from A to Z…..but we stopped at ‘V’-V for Viral Marketing and then slowly drifted to our main topic for the day. Now, almost 100 words into the article, you must be wondering – how does this relate to the title that I have given ? And there is also a possibility that u must have looked up at the title once again :D .

Sometime in between the session, sometime when we were introducing ourselves to the guest lecturer, we also had to tell him what we wanted to be when we were 8 years old. So, everybody in the room recollected, rephrased and explained what they wanted to be, right from an air force officer to an adventurer like Bear Grylls ( he is also a survival expert and that is how we know him ). Then this guest lecturer ( I am sorry I don’t remember his name – lets call him Mr.A for the time being) told us something that he had experienced in the train, around 8 hours back on his way to Hyderabad.

He met this little kid who was 8 years old and he was busy playing some game in his dad’s mobile phone. Mr.A had already interacted with this kid during the journey and they became friends. Casually, Mr.A asked him , “ What do you want to be when you grow up “ . The answer was something unexpected especially from an 8 year old kid.  He said that he wanted to be an “Application developer for mobile phones” . Something that is way too different from the typical – engineer , doctor, astronaut, pilot kind of careers that we wanted to get into during our childhood. A total paradigm shift. 

Yes, kids today are a lot more bolder and are taking decisions which is clearly evident from the talent shows that are being broadcast on TV.  Ready to take on the world. You must be wondering now, why does this end with out a proper tail ..what is new in it? Well it doesn’t . It was something I wanted to write and you read it J .

Me, myself and the "Troll Face"

The moment you look at it, one can guarantee that it is going to bring a smile or send you ROFL ( Rolling on the floor laughing) . What I am talking about here are the troll face comics that are all over the internet today. No one ever cared to go back to the roots and find out its origins. The name of the person who started this ( I guess ) is Whyne (http://whynne.deviantart.com/ - that is his link ) and that is where it began. I’m not too sure whether you are aware of the fact that there is some serious money being earned out there because of these comics. People tend to post these on their blogs and websites and sign up for Google Ad sense…grab attention and traffic..and that fills up your bank a/c.

               

Just imagine what would have happened if a company had purchased the patents of this comic from the designer. No doubt that he would be spending the rest of his life in Disneyland because would be on cloud 9 in no time.  We had the Zoo zoo ads by Vodafone which were a success, then came out the zoo zoo keychains and soft toys and what not. But imagine an organisation advertising through these troll comics in a digital motion picture format, people would go crazy and it would go viral before others unfolded their sleeves. With advertising reaching new extremes, what is next?

( What are your views and comments ? )

An opportunity is all you need

What made me write this is an incident that took place around 3 weeks back. I had to deliver my bike to a service station and once I did that I had to hire an auto to head back home. This is where the interesting part begins. I was busy reading some sms when the autowalla asked me, “Bhaiyya aap kya karte ho ?" and I replied that I was a student. He threw another question at me, “Graduation ?” and I replied “Nahi, MBA – Post Graduation”. He replied “Accha hain bhaiyya, khoob mehnat karna". It didn’t end there, after a gap of around 3 minutes he started to tell me about himself (maybe he was expecting me to ask a similar question i.e. about him). This person, who was taking me home in his auto was a graduate aged about 27 years, who had completed his B.Com from a reputed college in the city (I do not wish to name the college here). Unfortunately he could not continue his education because his father was poor and old and could not afford it and no bank was ready to give them a loan. That was when he had to don the role of an auto walla, to earn some bread for his family and for himself.

He did not give me a chance to interrupt and neither could I. He continued his story, this auto that I was travelling in was used by this man on a rental basis 2 years ago and today he owns 3 autos which are used by his brothers. How did he do it? I never asked him, he told it himself. Two years back when he took the auto on a rental basis, he had to give away a part of the earnings he had made during the day to his owner and he also had to ensure that there had to be atleast a litre of petrol in the vehicle. So his daily earnings were his share of profits less the amount for 1 liter petrol. So he used to calculate an approximate amount and set that as his target every week and the target would increase every month. In six months time he had saved enough money to purchase the same auto. He would then give this to his younger brother and tell him to use the same strategy that this guy was using. To cut the entire story short, this guy was increasing his daily earnings by 10% every week. Come what may they had to reach that target. Another interesting point that he told me was that they even visited a dealer and asked what the price of this second hand auto would be after 3 months (in a condition as it was now ) because he wanted to sell it and buy a brand new auto. On the basis of the amount that the dealer told him, he considered that it would be appropriate if he does not sell it.

Now, how did he decide that? He calculated how much he would earn in that time of 3 months and the amount was 300% more than the price that the dealer said. In his words – “Bhaiyaa aaj iska daam itna tha toh kal aur bhi gir sakta hain na, toh maine ise rakhna sahi samjha” . In the dictionary of an MBA this would mean that he calculated the future value of that auto and he was considering only the profits that he was earning. “Agar petrol ka daam badta hain toh humara nuksaan hoga aur ek mahine me kamayi 1000 rupiye kam ho sakti hain to main har mahine ke hisaab se 1000 rupiye alag kar deta hun" That for him is the risk that we call “Beta” in Corporate Finance. On the basis of all these factors and immense hard work, this guy had managed to purchase 3 autos in 2 years. Once he gave up on the rental auto, his share of profits increased because he did not have to give away a share to his boss. So much happened in a journey of 30 minutes and the best part was the way he had planned and made targets every week and month and his means to achieve them.

So what is the bottom line? The bottom line is that this person who had started his journey as an auto walla, did not get the opportunity in life to study further like the most of us. But whatever knowledge he had with him, he used it and if he continues to work with the same passion and determination, I am sure that this guy would run an auto agency of his own by renting autos. I gave him the fare and before I entered my house I smiled and said to myself – “I am done with my revision of Corporate Finance”.