Pages

Friday, July 28, 2006

It is back

Thanks to the indian govt for bringing back the blogger site.
i am really happy about it, folks it is good to share that the site is working fine,
DEXTER.................

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Indian Govt to block Bloggers.com and few others

Indian Govt blocks blogspot, typepad and geocities
Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Govt of India has banned blogs that are hosted at blogger.com's service (blogspot.com).
Two more services Typepad.com and Geocities.com are also blocked by the Indian Govt.

India's Department of Telecommunications (DoT) passed an order to ISPs Friday to block several websites.

An Indian political blog is reporting that the ban was initiated by the Indian intelligence service to stop terrorism. According totheir source, the terrorists are using blogs to communicate. It ia useless (because the terrorists can simply use proxies),and it's similar to shutting off the country's telephone service because terrorists talk to each other through phones.

So, whats the solution now?
For serious users of blogger.com, i suggest moving your website to some other server instead of hosting at blogspot.com
Here's the procedure (its what i did minutes back)

1.Log in into " blogger.com "
2.Go to your blog's settings
3.Select "Publishing"
4.Click on a small link called "Switch To: FTP "
5.Enter FTP details of your website there and click on "Save Settings"
6.Republish your Entire Blog
7.Your blog will be hosted on the server of your choice now.

Thats for users with access to a FTP server, for others, create a FTP account in any of the freely available webhosting solutions such as www.50webs.com
50webs provides free FTP access and subdomain based hosting, so you can have
http://yourblogname.50webs.com instead of http://yourblogname.blogspot.com

If any users want detailed information about hosting with 50webs or with configuring blogger, submit comment on my site, so that i can put up an elaborate tutorial on my site.

Lets hope that Indian Govt doesn't block blogger.com and 50webs.com !
Tutorials over, now for the technical part.
The Indian Govt is not correct on its part to block these websites.
If India is worried about terrorists, let it track suspicious blogs or block selective blogs.
Its insane to block out such premiere websites such as blogger and geocities.
Technically, terrorists can have thousands of ways to communicate online, if so, will the Indian Govt block the entire Internet?
So much for all the speeches about India shining in IT sector.
Setbacks such as these can have the potential to erase the IT future of India and spoil the reputation of Indians online.

All said, is the Govt Listening???

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

Working at US

I came across a super story, that really bangs ppl who are looking for a job in US. Please read this story.

Don't forget to read the moral of the story.

This one really cracked me up!

In a poor zoo of India, a lion was frustrated as he was offered not more
than 1 kg meat a day. The lion thought its prayers were answered when one US
Zoo Manager visited the zoo and requested the zoo management to shift the
lion to the US Zoo.

The lion was so happy and started thinking of a central A/c environment, a
goat or two every day and a US Green Card also.

On its first day after arrival, the lion was offered a big bag, sealed very
nicely for breakfast. The lion opened it quickly but was shocked to see that
it contained few bananas. Then the lion thought that may be they cared too
much for him as they were worried about his stomach as he had recently
shifted from India. The next day the same thing happened. On the third day
again the same food bag of bananas was delivered.

The lion was so furious, he blasted at delivery boy, 'Don't you know I am
the Lion...king of the Jungle..., what's wrong with your management?, what
nonsense is this?, why are you delivering bananas to me?'

The delivery boy politely said, 'Sir, I know you are the king of the jungle
....but you have been brought here on a monkey's visa!!!

Moral of the story :
Better to be a Lion in India than a Monkey
elsewhere!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Monday, July 10, 2006

Leadership

What Every Company Should Know
by Ram Charan

The 10 Qualities of Great Growth Leaders
by Ram Charan

Thursday, July 6, 2006
[Ram Charan]

Are you a growth leader? This isn't a question that's just for CEOs and business-unit presidents, and making sure you can answer "yes" to it is vitally important to your career advancement.

Every company needs to grow, and it takes leaders at many organizational levels to achieve it -- no matter what department you're in. In the years ahead, leaders who can truly help their organizations produce profitable growth are the ones who will find themselves moving up the corporate ladder. You can propel your career forward by adopting the skills and habits growth leaders possess, thus making growth part of your personal brand.

Over many years, I've observed leaders who are great at creating profitable growth. As a result, I've identified certain skills and habits that contribute to the creation, development, and implementation of ideas to help their organizations grow. They fall into two categories: What growth leaders do personally, and what they accomplish through others.

What the Best Growth Leaders Do Personally

* Gain first-hand knowledge. They get out of their office and are keen observers of consumers. They pay special attention to the moments of truth, when a customer either makes a purchase (or repeat purchase) or walks away. But they do more than just observe. They talk to these customers to find out why they did or didn't make a purchase.

Sam Walton built the Wal-Mart empire this way. Even as the company became huge, he stayed close to customers and made sure other leaders were exercising the same observational acuity. Apple CEO Steve Jobs is another leader who stays closely attuned to consumer behavior. Growth leaders supplement this first-hand knowledge with other tools, such as market research and focus groups, but seeing for themselves what's going on is essential.

* Head a growth project. Growth projects are different. They require a different orientation and different kinds of information. Leading one hones your mental faculties to be alert to new opportunities and issues.

But there's another key reason for being involved personally. All growth projects require interaction between departments. Do the departments cooperate, or does infighting slow progress? Are certain individuals or departments unresponsive to growth initiatives? The easiest way to find out about such issues is by running or participating in a growth project yourself. Sure, we're all busy. But being involved in a growth project should be part of your job. If you don't have the opportunity to lead one, at least be a participant.

* Are Focused. You have only a finite amount of time and resources. The best leaders concentrate them on a limited number of growth targets.

* Have a handle on risk. Good leaders realize that growth projects have much higher levels of uncertainty compared to cost-cutting initiatives. Customers may not like your new offering; the competition can come out of left field with a product that makes yours obsolete. In short, there's no guarantee that a growth project will work.

Not only have good leaders developed a methodology for evaluating risk, they have accepted the possibility that failure can occur -- even when everyone has made their best efforts. Still, growth initiators are more than willing to take calculated risks, and they have the psychology and temperament to deal with this uncertainty.

* Are Clear. They can articulate in plain, unambiguous language what the final user of the new product needs and really wants. They're also very specific as to what's to be done to create such an offering. And these leaders present this information from the consumer's perspective, not the company's. Clarity is important because their direct reports can't buy into a plan unless they understand it.

Often, growth leaders are visionaries, but if they cannot explain their vision, the people who work for them end up wasting time, money, and resources. Clarity creates accomplishment.

Getting It Done Through Others

As you can see, growth leaders are personally committed to profitably increasing the company's revenues. With that as the base, they then get their direct reports as engaged about growth as they are.

To do that they are:

* Realistic. If an objective appears unobtainable, many of your direct reports will disengage and simply go through the motions.

While the best leaders often establish challenging goals, those objectives are obtainable. Invariably, people committed to a growth project will exceed even optimistic expectations by a wide margin. For example, Motorola charged one team with developing the thinnest cell phone ever, and to do so within a year. The team not only met the deadline but created the must-have RAZR.

Your direct reports need to believe in the destination you have in mind, and you should work with your team members to bring the destination into clearer focus for them, helping them see it more clearly.

* Are extremely good listeners. Both in staff meetings and in one-on-one conversations, growth leaders detect ideas they've never heard before. The idea may not be fully formed, but they sense the kernel of something new, and then help its creator to both shape and implement it.

For example, according to a source at Time Inc., managers within the magazine group heard their direct reports say women readers were constantly complaining about how they were under extreme time pressure trying to balance their jobs and family. This insight led to a magazine, now in development, called Simplicity.

* Make sure their people are in some way participating in a growth project. No matter what the employee's job description is, the best leaders make sure each of their direct reports is also doing something that will help the company grow. This is possible no matter where you work in the organization.

For example, someone from the human resources department working in a growth project can help that team by contributing his or her specialized set of skills, assessing team members' growth mindset and helping them think out of the box. The HR staffer can also boost the growth team by assessing how creative the members are and what tools are needed for brainstorming. This results in the team being strengthened -- as well as the HR staffer's skills and knowledge growing through his or her participation in the key project.

* Celebrate failures. It's one thing to know intellectually that a certain percentage of growth initiatives won't work out, it's quite another to hold a party when a project fails. This counter-intuitive move sends a message to your direct reports that risk-taking is to be encouraged, even when it doesn't work out sometimes.

But these leaders do more than celebrate failures. They learn from them by conducting extensive post-mortems to discover what worked, what didn't, and why.

* Take risks on people. Good managers are willing to take some chances with people. They put them in stretch assignments and then help them implement the ideas they come up with. This nurturing fosters creativity and inspires their people. Who wouldn't want to see one of their ideas implemented company-wide?

And that underscores an important point. The best growth leaders work through their people. While they're personally leading or participating in a growth project, they're also leveraging themselves by having each of their direct reports involved in such key projects as well. Your Nobel Prize as a manager will come from how well you turn your direct reports into growth leaders in their own right.

Build your track record as someone who generates profitable growth. Be a leader.
A man dies and goes to hell. There he finds that there is a
different hell for each country. He goes to the German hell and
asks " What do they do here ?" He was told, " First they put you
in an electric chair for an hour. Then they lay you on a bed of
nails for another hour. Then the German devil comes in and
beats you for the rest of the day "

The man does not like the sound of that at all, so he moves on
and checks out the USA hell as well as the Russian hell and many
more countries...

He discovers that they are all more or less the
same as the German hell...
Then he comes to the Indian hell and finds that there is a long
line of people waiting to get in. Amazed, he asks, " What do
they do here ?"{

He was told, " First they put you in an electric chair for an
hour..Then they lay you on a bed of nails for another hour.
Then the Indian devil comes and beats you for the rest of the
day."
" But that is exactly the same as all the other hells---so why are
so many people waiting to get in here ?" asked the man.
" Because maintenance is so bad that the electric chair does not
work,,--someone has stolen all the nails from the bed-- and the
Indian devil is a former Govt. servant, so he comes in and signs
the register and then goes to the canteen !