Rajini, Madhav, and Me

After the question on tagline, the conversation picked up quickly. I relied on my mental tape to record the conversation.

I have stored the essence of the conversation and am trying to put forth what I heard as accurate as my tape has recorded. Since I am not sure of exactly recalling the entire 'One hour and twenty five minute conversation' word-to-word, I would prefer to write this post more in the prose form than an actual interview. I don't want to misquote. :)

Over to the interview...

Opinion on Failure: The question was pretty abstract to both of them. I reframed: If some one does not perform in the team, what will be your move?

Madhav and Rajini share the same opinion on this: They talk to the team member first, find out the problem which stops him from doing the best, give suggestions to the team member, and ensure he is comfortable working on what he is assigned. If the team member still does not perform,he is given a chance to exhibit his skills in any other stream in the office.For all you know, the person might be a good performer in some other stream.

They appreciate this flexibility of moving from one stream to another.Everyone is good at something. All it takes is to identify the plus point.

According to Madhav, Attitude is important to work in a team. No one without Attitude gets through Madhav's interview session.He says 'Even if the skill set of the person does not meet the expectation, Attitude has to'.

Rajini seconds this opinion. He is himself a person with an Attitude that one has to observe and learn from.

Opinion on Success:
The question was reshot back to me. According to me, Success is doing one's best. Madhav wanted to know how I measure it. I said, "I do something, to the best of my ability and satisfaction. If I don't have the luxury of really taking enough time to do my best, I say that it is not upto the mark".

Madhav's turn: Rajini spoke for Madhav. It was nice to see how appreciative Rajini was about his boss Madhav. "He commits a date and that is it. Commitments and Promises are meant to be kept according to his principle.He ensures that the timelines are met come-what-may. That is Success to him". Madhav gave an approving smile.

In Rajini's own opinion, 'Do what you promised to do. In software development, there are usually many phases, each one dependent on the other.Never let some one else skip deadlines because of your bad adherence to your own commitments'.

Their success mantra as I conclude is: Promises are meant to be kept. Never put some one down because of your own flaw.

Number of hours at work determines the success of your work. Yes or No?

Rajini says, he stays long hours at work because there are some unreasonable demands most of the times. Given that he has his principles, he stays late hours to keep them up. According to Madhav, most of the times, it is the imperfect processes that cause this whole 'late sitting' business. He is appreciative of his team who also understand the situation and put in their best. Again he cannot compromise on his principles either.

Every thing boils down to 'Commitment' in Madhav and Rajini's work place.

Define Workaholic. Where do u stand in a scale of 1 to 10 on workaholism?

Madhav defines: On a holiday, where there is no pressurizing work,if some one is in office, then he is a classiied workaholic. He says he stands at 1 or at the max 2 in the scale.

Rajini says, 'I am at 8'. I was taken aback when Madhav said, 'No Rajini is not a workaholic'. Rajini gave him a look which clearly said ' Come on.. don't you know?? or what do u mean?'. Madhav, quickly clarified: 'Rajini is hardworking but not a workaholic. There had been no days when he was at office if there is no work. It just happens that he is loaded enough to work on holidays. That is not workaholism.'

Rajini agrees that he had once been a workaholic when curiosity to know what is happening in the software world took the better of him and his weekend plans. He agreed that he has come out of workaholism according to Madhav's definition.

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