Great Tips For Managers

Here is a great post on managerial tips, from Business Intelligence Lowdown blog.

Just a curiosity - Which 3 tips you find most important?

1. What goes around comes around [Treat your employees, peers and superiors with respect, from the lowest janitor to the CEO of the company]

2. Basic humaneness pays

3. Know your employees

4. Bring out their hidden potentialon

6. Equality among all

7. Don't be a Jack-of-all-trades

8. Match the right job to the right person

9. Delineate responsibility

10. Trust your employees

11. Pay them well

12. Reward exceptional performances

13. Praise in public, punish in private

14. Loudness does not help

15. Personalization is the key

16. Lend a ear

17. Make them feel they count

18. Family matters

19. Constructive criticism works

20. Be a mentor

21. Don't hold too tight

22. Flattery will get you nowhere

23. Ask and you will receive

24. Mistakes happen

25. Give credit where it's due

26. Group dynamics

27. Feedback matters

28. Share misfortune

29. It's a diverse world

30. Show interest

31. Allow them to complain

32. Different people, different styles

33. No technology needed

34. Equal work, equal pay

35. Judge not

36. No tattletales wanted

37. Time flies

38. Disseminate information

39. Keep your distance

40. No "I" only "We"

Work out work and vacation issues…

41. Do not overburden them with work

42. Vacations are personal

43. Keep the office at the office

44. Avoid last-minute tasks

If you are male…

45. No adult humor

46. Accord respect

47. Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus:

If you are female…

48. No false pretenses

49. Clothes maketh the (wo)man

There's always room for personal improvement…

50. Be the best

51. Manage your time

52. Ethics matter

53. Be proactive, not reactive

54. Admit your mistakes

55. Rudeness does not pay

56. Neither does arrogance

57. Waste not, want not

58. Humor works

59. Focus, focus, focus

60. Avoid the office grapevine

61. Be one of the gang

62. Take love out of the air

63. Watch what you do

64. Don't suck up

65. Practice what you preach

66. Look and learn

67. Stand firm on your beliefs

68. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again

69. Stay firm on terra firma

70. Be approachable

71. Forgive and forget

72. Wisdom pays

73. Be there

What's Special About This Number?

0 is the additive identity.
1 is the multiplicative identity.
2 is the only even prime.
3 is the number of spatial dimensions we live in.
4 is the smallest number of colors sufficient to color all planar maps.
5 is the number of Platonic solids.

read more | digg story

Why Not Say 'We Messed Up Doodle This Time'?

Google for many days was an epitome of simplicity and user-friendly interfaces. But it seems that Google now wants to teach (!) its consumers!

If people don't understand your design, accept your mistake. Don't expect that the user should have poetic sense. Consumer like me would say - 'Go to Hell'

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It seems that nobody in the world has any 'poetry in their soul', because Mr. Dennis Hwang, we really didn't 'see the subtlety' neither 'immediately' nor after reading your...should we say defence?

'World' From New York Times Perspective

What Happened To Google Reader?

Ideas for 2007 from Harvard

Harvard Business Review has published a list of ideas for 2007. The intro to the list goes like this -

"...how nanotechnology will affect commerce, what role hope plays in leadership, and why, in an age that practically enshrines accountability, we need to beware of “accountabalism.”

The complete list of Ideas is worth reading in original. Read it here.

Frustrating Battle With Online Child Porn

This is one story everybody must read & take seriously -

With all the intellectual firepower at society's disposal, why do the good guys forever seem to be playing catch-up to the sleazebags? Why can't they turn the tide? So it's understandable that when it comes to children and pornography, the frustration with the status quo is boiling over...

read more | digg story

Most Popular James Bond - Sean Connery? Nah!

Who is the best bond ever? Is he Sean Connery? or Pierce Brosna? According to Blogpulse trendsearch, Daniel Craig beats earlier two bonds in last 6 months on mentions in blogs.

My Google Reader Trends for Last 30 Days

Good Governance Through Internet

Today i came across a very good post on Digg. It talks about legislation by citizens themselves.

JosephW says -

"Citizens using the Internet to monitor their representatives and the legislation that they draft is nothing novel. But a new Sunlight Foundation project aimed at allowing citizen legislatures to collaboratively script their own legislation, challenging what representative democracy mean"

A good idea indeed. The representative democracy which prevails in most of the democratic countries today is not a full proof democracy where each person has his or her say in the governance. This form of democracy creates a Pyramidal structure where the base is formed by those who don't have powers beyond voting rights. And when you have to choose from 10 thieves, the voting and electing becomes a farce. Thus in the representative democracy, true democracy is non-existant. Here, the meta-decisions (which concern every person's life within the State) are taken by the vertex of Pyramid which is cut off from base. The vertex controls all the information (under the name of secrecy) as also the decision making powers and punitive authority.

In such a scenario, collaborative legislation is really a ray of hope, and that's what the Internet can offer. Various examples on web have that true collaboration and networking is really possible through Internet. Wikipedia is a case in the point. In such scenario, the Citizens can have Information, enforce responsibility & accountability, and decide their own fate.

However, this is only a theoretical possibility. What can hamper this initiative is the Digital Divide. Today there are two classes of digital have's and have not's. We will have to ensure the have not's also have a real say OR the digital divide itself is bridged.

Happy Birthday Edward Munch!

Google Is Upto Something Big With Youtube.

My blogposts related to Youtube got some unexpected hits last week. Actually, it seems that Youtube was down on more than one occassions and the user response I got was rather related to the first 'Youtube still down' post.



Now it has been a deeply discussed question as to why Google would buy Youtube for billions of dollars? Why Google wanted to buy it in the first place when it has a similar service of Google Video?

Though the answer to second question points towards a monopolistic buy-out decision, the answer to first one is really a pointer to the future.

I believe that Content will be the biggest market in coming days. It will envelope the media & communication technology segments to provide an user a rich content. Today the media segment having biggest optentials is Television. Services like IPTV and youtube will provide the best competing platform for companies like Google. The programs of CBS are already being uploaded to youtube for users. Another strength of youtube is the User Generated content and a democratic undertone of whole concept which will media-empower more and more people around the globe in coming days.

In the new 'concoction', Youtube has a new weapon of Youtube videoes on mobile in collaboration with Verizon. This is fantastic. More and more users armed with their Blackberry's and E62's will surely turn to this great video content.



One more feature Youtube has added is the Accounts for Comedians & Musicians. So these are the categories which will attract more users.

Also, continuing with the tradition of Official Google Blog, a new blog for Youtube is also live from 2nd December itself.



So with new Youtube, you can -

• Most importantly WATCH quality user generated video content


• Showcase your talent to the world, and


• Browse youtube videoes on Verizon phones

What is new in youtube?

Nothing Much...

Youtube - Downtime. Wait is still on.

New York Times: Free Access To 'Times Select' section

One of my favourite online dailies, NYT is currently celebrating a Free Access Week for its Times Select Section. Now you can read Maureen Dowd & Thomas Freidman free of cost anywhere in the world (for only one week though). Also available is the access to NYT's archives. Here is one piece from NYT archives. Date is 21st April, 1889- when Eiffel Tower reached to its full height. (Courtsey: NYT, offcourse)

How Bestsellers Are Borne? A Tale of Noam Chomsky

Septuagenarian linguist and the most intelligent man on earth today according to some, Noam Chomsky would be thanking Hugo Chavez from bottom of his heart. Noam Chomsky's book 'Hegemony Or Survival' shot up from dust of obscurity, when the Venezuelan prez, Chavez held the book near his heart at the UN summit and mentioned it in his speech while attacking Bush policies. The book had been on stands since 2004 but never enjoyed such a curiosity and success as it is doing after Chavez's mention.

Noam Chomsky argues in the book that the US policy about Afghanistan and Iraq is not really a shift after 9/11. On the contrary, War On Terror, occupation of Iraq and control of Afghanistan are nothing but continuation of US foreign policy which is a policy of hegemony. USA maintains this hegemony through war, funding tyrants (USA funded even Saddam- see adjacent modified carricated picture of Rumsfeld holding hand with Saddam) .



It is not a secret how USA nurtured Taliban to counter the USSR control over Afghanistan. Nurturing monsters to fight monsters and then creating and nurturing new monsters to fight older ones has been the tale of US policy throughout after WW II. This is what Noam Chomsky tries to convey through his book. (I wonder why doesn't somebody teach USA simple management lessons?)

Want to make your book bestseller? Bring in Chavez.

Sharing Bed? Or Building Sleep?

An interesting study on sharing bed for sleeping is doing rounds currently. Published originally in nytimes.com, this study points to an interesting aspect of sleep or more of a relationship, namely sharing bed during sleep.

Sharing bed for sleeping can be a very uncomfortable job - snatching for the sheet (it goes on for night), sleep breaks, feet on your face and all such things means that you can't have a best sleep. You could have it if you sleep alone.

Interesting thing, however, is that those who share beds for sleeping prefer sleeping together rather than alone, howsoever uncomfortable that sleep is. This is seemingly obvious aspect but is interestingly unnoticed by many who share bed.

What can be reason? I would put intimacy at a much lower rank in the list of reasons. Because I would not sacrifice my sleep of 7 hours for an intimacy which is not much helpful after I sleep off.

Rather it may be feeling of security which we as a species inherited from our ancestors in the jungle. It is on the bed that I forget all other worries; I talk with my partner all my thoughts which I keep back in my mind for whole day. I kind of feel a support in it. If we look at other animals, we will notice the same thing. Sleeping (or sharing bed if that pleases Western minds. I wonder, why 'Sleeping' in English language would also mean having sex? Do they never 'sleep' - mean take a 7-8 hour nap?) (sleeping) in groups is the basic instinct of all gregarious animals, to which we human being also belong. Notice the dog in last frame of picture above. Funny.
It is nice observation (at the most). (I would hate to call it a study.)