Thursday, April 06, 2006

OBsession....It is all about OB(OT) session

Mind preoccupied with some thing same all the times,may be kind of work,person or an object.Obsession is another another name to describe this state.Once obsessed, we stop caring about time being spent in the activity or time spent in thinking about that person or object.We always tend to spend whole time on the same work.I can think of few reasons for obsession with some work .It can be due to large interest in the kind of work,your thinking that success in life is fully depndent on the results of this work,reputation in society being at stake,large amount of money invested in the same ,it can be social reponsibility for you or it can be bad time management.
The obsession which our prof. IC has for OT subect was one of its kind.For prof IC the reason was his interest in the subject and he made it also as a part of his long term goal(so do for his better half).

All is fine but how come bad time management cause obsession(frocible obsession).I have to use my grey cells to the extremes to find out that "bad time management" can be one of the prime cause for obsession with work.This obsession is more of physical(i.e. keeping yourself busy with a work for long time,though it required very less time to complete).Whatever may be the reason of obsession it is sure to cause some harm to you.Here my experience speaks that bad performance in other fields,inability to do multitasking,frustration,slow growth and lack of all round development are some the after effects of being obsessed with something. Your mind acts like a 24*7 Call center with only one customer and always replying to calls of only that customer.All the reasons but bad time management are more of psychological in nature.But there are also some positive aspects of same as this can help you become one of its kind in your area of work.

Though many of us would have gained little from those sessions of OT(unlike our senior batch),but we all accept that he was the best faculty in three terms after Mr.K.M. Rajesh(Icall him Kam Marks wale Rajesh coz uexpecting lowest in his subject).I salute Prof ICs obsession for teaching and ofcourse the subject.Learning taken from all sessions is very little academically,but it is not all about academics, there were loads of "hidden benefits" in his sessions.As one of the great learning I had in 3rd term pertains to OB-session.

TIME - This Is Most important Element

I was on dinner table with one of my friend and his parents at their home in Kolkata.We talked about indian railways and improvement in scheduling of eastern zone bound trains(which was supported by his dad).I kept thinking of this during my one hour stay at delhi railway station as I heard umpteen times "Aapko Huyee Asuvidha Ke Liye hamein Khed Hai(We are sorry for trouble caused to you - An announcement made on indian railway stations when a train is delayed).An hour of delay of a train means 60 minutes of train delay,each train on average has 10 compartments, each having 72 seats,but indian trains have occupancy rate of two times(popluation can be reason for same)and hence 1440 people would have travelled by that train and hence 1440 man hours wasted during an hour delay of train.Is this avoidable? Will saving this time help us? Help in growth of country?Time is critical to all of us when it is for our own "Visible Benefit" but when it is for someone else we never care to respect.....'WE' menoned here refers to all of us,many of my colleagues in office,companions in college and includes myself.
It would be good to define here 'Visible benefit' by an example.Mr. X called a meeting of 10 people to discuss a group work in office.Though this would be start of proect or to discuss minor team issue.One of the partcipant(Mr.Y) turned 15minutes late as this was group effort and the effect was going to have was on all 10 rather than that individual.He didnt see any benefit for him in this so never cared about being on time.But if same meeting had been called to discuss performance evaluation of Mr. Y,he would have been surely on time as he is able to see Visible Benefit.
Signficance of fraction of a second is known to a person standing on other side of the toilet,soldier who has been hit by a bullet,a person struck by a speeding train.Though all the examples given are cliche and are well known to all of us, still many of us have not learnt what we should have by now.Land ,labor,capital are the factors of production Cost of land is increasing with the passage of time.Labor is of no use if it cannot complete the work in specified time i.e with required efficiency.Capital looses its value with time. There is common thread amongst the three factors of production. Another factor of production called as TIME(This Is Most important Element).We as a nation won't be able to build other three facotrs until we are able to save the fourth,which actually has priority over others but looses mention in the books. So we seldom learn about that during our academics.We learn only from loss caused by disrespect of this factor.I have observed that a person who comes for meeting on time,completes work on time,delivers the required work on time is called 'professonal'.But I feel this is more about discipline and respect for the system.On rare occasion we find people who respect the system in all ways.Human tendency makes them break the system in one or other way to make the system act for their own "Visible Benfit".They are devoid of foresightedness and miss seeing the hidden benefits of more value than visible benefits.So,whether it is MBA or Phd ,no eduation can make you learn respect for the system,and you cannot be a professional until you learn same as to become professional the first step is respect for any system,system of which we are part of,system which is formed by us,for us and of us, and last but not the least respect for TIME.Respect for time again gets prcedence here as system(if not respected at all TIMES) will be demolished .
Here I quote two of lines i can think of" Yeh lamhein beet jaayenge palak jhapakte hee,in lamhon kee keemat ko pehchaan" Aisa kuch kar jaa jindagee mein, reh jaaye tera ik nishaan".