(I would like to thank Pragya for giving the chance to contribute to the Comp Sc PG Department Newsletter)
Published in INFOBAHN, Christ University
I will survive
- Because challenges cannot break me
- Vultures of gloom cannot take me
- Fire cannot consume me,
- Rejection cannot drown me
Not only will I survive but
- Challenges will mold and let me grow roots
- Gloom will teach me to happy in little things and still bear fruits
- Fire will make me stronger
- Failure will make me strive higher
Because when going gets tough, the tough get tougher
Perspective
We only see the plane flying in the sky and we strive to be one. Little do we ponder as to how much time it waited patiently in the imagination of early man in the drawings of Da Vinci to the ideas of numerous others to the belief of Wright Brothers and finally to the opportunity of aviation fuel …….. that today a thing which more than 1000 kilogram can fly.
When we compare man’s achievement of flying a plane and the need to get a job to make ends meet we may come to perspective. When we were young we dreamt of greatness like being a sports star, artist or scientist and here we are at the very onset of our adult life and we are choking at the very thought of failing.
· We will need to be patient (and not expect a job 6 months before)
· We will need to be disciplined and diligent (to drop a 100 CV’s in different companies)+
· We will need to maintain a positive attitude (then only company number 101 will recruit us)
· We will need to make allowance in our expectation (salary, location, profile)
· We should manage our time well and make sure our fundamentals our strong and our key skills are honed
· We need to be realistic as we may need to work in an NGO,BPO or as a Salesman
And in spite of all this we still may not get a job THEN we need to have the wisdom to see that we are jobless not because of our own limitation.
Then and only then will we have the hope that when the time comes we will get our break. Any organization would like to recruit a mind who is patient, disciplined, flexible and has a good attitude. A mind with ability to learn on his own, realistic and wise. A person whose mind, heart and soul has been molded in the fire of challenges.
Success is not dependent on IQ, it needs a brain alright but it clearly needs the head its inside should be screwed on right. And trust a challenging situation like recession to get any fault we have collected in the early years’ right.
Just like recession is temporary slump, so was the ridiculous high salary some people got at boom time a temporary jump! So do not be lamenting on the spilt milk ….. the milk which you were about to buy with the money you were about to get from the lottery you were about to win.
Recession 2001
In 2001 a whopping 2.7 million jobs were lost.
A good friend of mine was fresh out of college in that year. He dropped more than a hundred CV’s in Electronic City, ITPL, Koramangala and Jayanagar. His first salary was a paltry Rs 1500. He worked extra long working hours for more than a year. Today he has a very good pay package but does he look back and curse those time, no my friends he looks at it with nostalgia. My NCERT scholarship holding sister who lost her job in recession today earns 3 times her otherwise would be salary. CFA and MBA are feathers in her cap she added (apart from the MTech she already had before recession).
These are not exceptions as I do not know a single person who did not have a job in 2001 and who still does not have a job
Growing Roots
The biggest challenges many of the IT Companies have when they recruit from campus is that they need to arrange a training program to assimilate the new joinees. This assimilation program ideally just needs to cover the organization culture, processes and best practices. But this is far from what it is today in India. Campus program are quiet extensive. A lot of time is spent teaching programming basics, SQL and some key fundamentals. Some organizations spend considerable time also on behavioral skills.
It is the prime responsibility of each job seeker to be honing their skills, not just to clear the interview and get a job but to do well on the job. So if challenges come grow your roots deep and spread them far. Bamboo is one of the fastest growing grass at a tremendous rate of 2 feet a day but what many people do not know is that the first 4 years it does not show any outward sign of growth as it spreading its rhizome system of roots deep and wide.
So aspire to be a bamboo in the tough times ahead and success will find you. Do not become like seeds caged up in a box in a cozy kitchen but bury yourself and build your roots so that one day you may become a mighty tree.
Conclusion
O Recession, I am like champagne,
Shaking me would be in vain
I WILL shoot up without disdain
Footnotes
· Why Aviation Fuel: Leonardo Da Vince was living 500 yeas ago, pedaling up the hill is tough enough taking off like a plane !
· Heaviest plane AN225 loading capacity is around 500,000 kgs !
· 2.7 million jobs were lost according to one study in the recession of 2001
· “Mighty Oak tree” and “tough get tougher” are not my original quotes
· Check out Bamboo on Wiki, some have grown at 4 feet a day
