Entrepreneur

Today in one of my WhatsApp groups i noticed a passionate discussion on the definition of entrepreneurship and related topics.. I shared my two cents for this weekend discussion as below

Entrepreneur is basically someone who shows initiative and resourcefulness to set up a business or businesses, taking on financial risks with the aim to create value to stakeholders (profits, shareholder wealth or social benefit).

Entrepreneur, Intrapreneur, businessperson, social entrepreneur are all tweaks of the parameters mentioned above in terms of identity of stakeholders, kind of expected value creation etc..

As we all know, these terminology has been and continue to be debated till cows come home with different tweaks.

Atleast i have been part of such debates over the past couple of decades from World Economic Forum to Academic and Industry conferences in both US and India. These are good discussions for an academic research and writing books. The entrepreneur on the street is oblivious to such debates and busy creating value to the stakeholders

Holy Day

Today is the ekadashi (11th day) in the month of Ashada ( name of the month in the sanatana bharata varsha calendar). It is considered as holy by many people living in this holy land of India (Jambu dweepe, bharata varshe bharata khande).



Apart from the religious significance associated, it is also interesting to understand that many of these holy days of India are not just of simple religious importance.

These holy days observed signify a lot more dimensions – material, social, religious, and higher spiritual pursuits.

They align with local weather patterns, environment, being concious of personal health needs, avoid seasonal disease associated with the changing weather conditions etc. There is a significant scientific basis for each of these holy days which are observed in this bharata varsha. Ofcourse they are important for religious and spiritual pursuits as well.

Maslow hierarchy of needs informs us of how a human being progress from satisfying the basic phisiological needs to that of self actualization. Much earlier human sciences of Patanjali ashtanga yoga is another example of satisfying physical needs (yama, niyama, asana) progressing towards the self actualization(dharana, dhyana, samaadhi).

The holy days that are observed in this land of Bharat is also satisfying aspects of human needs aligning both with prakriti(the environment in which we exist) and paramatma (the universal spirit who is present in each atom of this infinite cosmos as an inner dwelling antaryami).

The observance of the holy days of this land also teaches us about how to be one with the environment around us, appreciate it, adopt to it and reach oneness with it.

We don’t need different social activism to save environment if we can be one with the environment. By following these different holy days in accordance with the local customs that our ancestors with wisdom (in every part of the world) have suggested based on the local needs of that particular geography.

Understand to make sure why each geography of the world had its festivals and observance to be one with local nature. These holy days helped to be one with local environment, improve personal health and help reach a higher spiritual pursuit in their blissful journey in search of truth.

Today in India, devotees pray to Lord Vitthala , many fast for the day, many pray as deva sayana ekadasi, few start their observance of chaturmasa(holy life of 4 months). Each of these topics have a deeper meaning and require interest and study to understand and experience.

Yad bhavam tad bhavathi. Whats in your heart is what you experience. This journey is to understand our true self.

Wishing all a blissful day

Sarve jana sukhino bhavantu
Sarva Sanmangalani santhu
Samasta loka sukhino bhavantu

Today, there was a healthy discussion amongst some friends about the character of rich and poor. This got triggered by an elon musk(supposedly) quote about his perspective on rich and poor.

Shared my thoughts on the topic as well for people to look at it another perspective..

👇

Interestingly in today’s world, rich and poor has become synonymous with a person’s bank(stock 😂) balance.

Rich and poor also can have many other dimensions?

One can be money rich but happiness wise poor and vice versa.

Also one can be knowledge rich and money poor and vice versa.

Knowledge itself has so many dimensions in itself. It can be spiritual, it can be traditional..a tribal woman having knowledge of herbs to help her society of health calamities is also equally rich with her knowledge.

Obviously since everything we count these days based on material purchasing power and bank balances, none of these other people considered rich.

Everyone is forced these days to pursue the exact same RICHNESS in the world. and hence society lacking good harmony amongst its citizen and driving up dissatisfaction levels.

Ultimately much of it is personal. None of the billionaires from two last millenium exist today and so will none of this generation in future.

The character of a person cannot be decided by the pocession of wealth, whether it’s material or otherwise. 🙏

Birthday Wishes

🙏

Wishing you all blissful time as well.

Deeply appreciate your friendly love to remind of this finite point: One such finite point on the continuum in soul’s journey of realisation.

🙏

“I do not want my house to be walled in on all sides and my windows to be stuffed. I want the culture of all lands to be blown about my house as freely as possible. But I refuse to be blown off my feet by any”🙏 – Mahatma??

Workplace Transformation – 2

Future of workplaces are being redefined..

Another peice of excellent thought leadership on this topic.. this one is from Tracey Racette Fritcher, HCS of ServiceNow

Stay focused. Stay productive.. Stay tuned for innovation..

#vcubez #employeeexperience #collaboration #productivity #teams #alignment #profitability #costoptimization #facilities #businessoperations

https://www.reworked.co/employee-experience/how-remote-work-will-impact-the-management-of-employee-experience/

Workplace Transformation – 1

It is here and now. Even as we read this message, the way we work is rapidly changing in a big way…

Changing the way we work, live, play and learn..This is the Vision statement of one of the best companies and the leadership team i had the opportunity to work for early on in my career.

The vision is now fast becoming a reality..

World is starting to realise and even expedite this change in the way we work, albeit pushed by an unfortunate pandemic situation.

We will have an innovative platform released soon to help  manage this change. The platform and solutions will not only improve employee and customer delight, but also better shareholder value and societal impact.

Joining our human spirit and the innovative platforms, together the world will come out of the current challenging situation in a much better way than it entered into it..

Stay focused.Stay productive..Stay Tuned for Innovation…
 
#vcubez #transformation #change #work #life #learn #play

https://www-marketwatch-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/guid/B436CAFC-953A-11EA-8340-95FDE6EE78E0

Green Eyes, Brown Skin, Broad Nose.. Time to think outside the circles?

As a person who gives lot of importance in life to harmony, it is painful to hear  the social disturbances in USA these days.

I personally experienced the warmth that the great Indian monk, Swami Vivekananda famously said at a Chicago conference more than 100 years ago “brothers and sisters of america”. A land of freedom – life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

I always had beautiful experiences making friendships with people during my stay in USA.

The colour of the skin, eyes, hair or any other physical attribute neither hindered nor entered our minds.

Continue reading “Green Eyes, Brown Skin, Broad Nose.. Time to think outside the circles?”

Nature’s Fury

nature’s fury…

it is tough to handle when people mess too much with it.

No personal wealth, health or the nations GDP, economy, borders and military can save.

It knows no boundaries and has no partiality towards any social status, region, religion, caste, creed, gender and other..

It respects no political boundaries and doesn’t need to be politically correct.

Too much credence we give to the human progress (scientific or social) is an eyewash when the nature is furious and it will do what it does…

All it takes is one invisible new virus and/or microorganism to shake the entire humanity around the world rendering the entire social and scientific leadership helpless..

Times like this perhaps are a reminder to spend sometime going beyond physical sciences and understand the metaphysics and the philosophy of nature and our existence..

Crime,. Policing and suggestions for improvement – part 2

We also as society needs to evolve. Media, social service organisations and civic leaders all have to play a role in this.

Everytime such incidents happen‌, unfortunately populist focus is more on punishment of culprits alone. Punishment is very much needed but it is only reactionary and doesn’t address the real issue.

Even if unfortunate, the public outpouring of sentiment at such times of crime should be funneled to shake the 3 wings (legislative, executive and judiciary) from lethargy for taking some proactive measures.

Continue reading “Crime,. Policing and suggestions for improvement – part 2”

Crime, Policing and a few suggestions for improvement

Deeply saddened with yesterday’s rape and murder incident of a young doctor in Hyderabad. Police should certainly focus on nabbing the culprits and taking them to court to give them the most appropriate punishment for criminals of such a henious crime.

Unfortunately the punishment, candle light marches, introduction of additional legal laws alone will not necessarily stop the next incident to happen.

Nirbhaya incident in Delhi a few years ago and all the activities afterwards didn’t stop yet another similar incident by another set of young, drunk, illiterate truck drivers.

We need to address the root cause and not just the immediate postmartem and focusing on very similar activities. Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is insanity.

I think there should be some crowd sourcing of ideas on this topic and then create a focused group of experts for implementation to address the root cause.

Some of my quick thoughts in my blog here as well as series of tweets this morning.

Iam sure there are many other good ideas, please share yours as well.

Continue reading “Crime, Policing and a few suggestions for improvement”

Remembering Mahatma

Remembering Mahatma Gandhi on his birth anniversary. Mahatma is the father of the nation but also one of the key architects of this eternal land, Bharat i.e. India.

Few are destined and mandated to shape a nations history.

1. Mahatma Gandhi – Architect of Independent India

2. Sardar Patel – Architect of United India (living in Hyderabad, always indebted)

3. PV Narsimha Rao – Architect of Modern India

4. Narendra Modi – Architect

Continue reading “Remembering Mahatma”

Howdy, Modi

USA and India, two major democracies of the world, complement well.

India is a land of spirituality – eternal, energetic, and the pursuit of bliss

&

USA is a land of freedom – life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness

No better time than the leadership today to further it.

Howdy, Modi. wishing the event @ Houston, TX all the best.

waves of transformation in the world

Notwithstanding debates about future of automobile industry (uber/ola vs own-car), world economy will certainly be dictated by following:

– Generational/Aspirational Shift
– Business Model Shift
– Technology Shift
– Consumer Awareness Shift

Policy makers of all the major countries should be willing to address them in order to recalibrate for the new world.

Venky Rao #economy #catchthewave #transitions #aspirational #consumerawareness

Search party

Many times we don’t know ourselves.

We assume our identity to be the new clothes (new body for our soul) that we put on and forget our true self.

Then we keep searching everywhere to get self realisation.

We need to take a step back, reflect and look inside and we will be able to realise the self.

In search of truth – Blissful journeys of Venky Rao

http://www.venkyrao.com

keyūrāṇi na bhūṣayanti puruṣaṁ

केयूराणि न भूषयन्ति पुरुषं हारा न चन्द्रोज्ज्वलाः
न स्नानं न विलेपनं न कुसुमं नालङ्कृता मूर्धजाः ।
वाण्येका समलङ्करोति पुरुषं या संस्कृता धार्यते
क्षीयन्ते खलु भूषणानि सततं वाग्भूषणं भूषणम् ।।

नीति शतकम्

కేయూరాణి న భూషయంతి పురుషం హారా న చంద్రోజ్వలా

న స్నానం న విలేపనం న కుసుమం నాలంకృతా మూర్దజా

వాణ్యేకా సమలంకరోతి పురుషం యా సంస్కృతా ధార్యతే

క్షీయంతే ఖలు భూషణాని సతతం వాగ్భూషణం భూషణం

– నీతి శతకం

keyūrāi na bhūayanti purua hārā na candrojjvalā
na snāna na vilepana na kusuma nālaktā mūrdhajā |
yekā samalakaroti purua yā sasktā dhāryate
kīyante khalu bhūaāni satata vāgbhūaabhūaam ||

– Nīti Śatakam

Translation:

Bracelets do not decorate a person, nor do necklaces glittering like the moon.Nor bath, nor smearing the body with fragrance, nor flowers, and nor decorated hair.

Nor bath, nor smearing the body with fragrance, nor flowers, and nor decorated hair.

Only that speech embellishes a person, which has been upheld with cultural refinement.

Indeed, all ornaments decay. Ornament of speech is always the real ornament.

Find your game

Recently a young student shared this with me. Not just the young graduates but most of us face this at different stages of life and feel stuck. Isn’t it?

If we can’t win a stupid game, it is time to change the rules.

If we can’t change the rules, change to a better game for us.

Let that monkey and bird play that game.

There is enough water in the world for seal and fish to not only survive but have fun and live a blissful life.

Penguin will find its habitat, so are the dog and elephant and will find their strengths to blissfully live their lives rather than feeling lost and failed.

Monkey will succeed in that monkey business since even the bird will soon leave it and soar high in the skies.

Trash

The plastic and styrofoam trash at the restaurants is a man made problem that should be addressable.

If we created the mess, we should be able to get out of it, atleast we hope.

In the name of progress, many times our civilization created short term band-aid solutions. We later understand that they are more messier than the problems they were supposed to address, if any.

Iam sure the better sense will prevail in the society and we realize some simpler solutions used earlier were better and we re”search” and innovate again 😅

The mother earth must be laughing. She has seen many civilization in its history over millennia biting to dust when the so-called progress was not inline with the greater good.

Its a cycle and we will also either get out of this junk pile or the mother knows how to discipline its children.

Artificial general intelligence

https://openai.com/blog/microsoft/

Microsoft
Invests In
and Partners
with OpenAI
to Support
Building
Beneficial AGI

I would like to believe these types of deals will focus more on creating the practical aspects of stitching together disperate narrow AI together for a greater good.

I don’t think AGI as the theoretical general intelligence platform will be a reality in any foreseeable future. The concept of AGI needs new paradigm in science and technology for it ever to be a reality.

However it is realistic to expect that over the next few years, we will move towards stitching together different pieces of augmented / narrow AI systems. These will mimic a professional and not a person. AI based Medical and legal professionals that use multiple narrow AI is what we may have that can replace these professionals.

But to create AGI with personality is no where in near future. It however provides for a good theoretical discussion and media coverage.

#AI #AGI #ML #computervision #articialintelligence #artificialgeneralintelligence #neuralnetworks #chatbots #venkyrao #iamvenkyrao

Fearlessness and Decision making – part 1

Fearlessness and decision making are part of a closed loop system feeding eachother.

Fear is a natural feature built into all the species to manage risk. Managing that fear for the best next course of action aka “decision making” is what most of the personality, leadership development that we develop over time.

Each of us make decisions all the time in our daily lives.

Postponing a decision aka “procrastination” is also a decision based on the circumstantial evidence and considered to be best course of action at that time.

Sometimes delayed decisions can lead to catastrophe similar to hasty decisions.

We need to strike that correct “balance” in this decision making. It seems even more important when it impacts larger good beyond self; e.g. teams, organisation, society and countries..

Several ways we continue to learn and enhance these as we journey along..

Few things that help us in this journey include

  • personal development like yoga
  • having a good set of advisors and boards

Some of these enhance our ability to deal with the two important things – fearlessness and decision making.

More details in the next post..

please share your thoughts as well..

#decisionmaking #fearlessness #entrepreneurship #leadership #venkyrao #iamvenkyrao #boards

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