9th July - 9th Year

Pic of 2nd Golive - after 36 hrs

Today I have completed my 9th year in IBM and started the 10th.

Now I am sitting in a customer Go-live room for local plant roll outs with my team. It will be successful. The CIO is next to me, chatting with other directors in a relaxed way. So, I got some spare time and thought to use it in a better way (by writing this blog post, as I neither can surf internet in front of him, nor can gossip in the war room).

It was a long day, I slept last night after 2am (had to prepare couple of status and transport list for go-live) and then started working in the morning, have to be in office tonight, but was feeling sleepy a little while ago. Had couple of raw coffee and diet coke to keep me awake. It reminds me of the 2nd go-live (in last Feb) where few of us (Satya, Saby and I) were awake for 36hrs straight and slept 10hrs in a slot of 72 hrs. But this one is not that tough, its simple roll-outs to local sites, no conversions, no mass move of config and codes, no legacy activity. Only few activities like setting up batch jobs for those sites which are going live so that they can operate in the new business transformation mechanism.

These are official information, sometime sensitive and confidential. So, I can not write everything here. I can reveal a half of it in my “Half Life Unfolded”.

But today I am really feeling to express couple of viewpoints of our career. These may be biased, evaluated from my viewpoint and my own perception, but this is what I felt during my tenure of almost a decade in IT industry.

When I joined IT, I was little scared about whether I could survive, the constant learning, the technological challenges, the dynamic demands of customers and services.

But I was gradually confident and took charge of my career in a short while, started achieving the milestones, But I lost the pace afterwards due to many reasons. Now, I regained the pace and position, but lost the progress to some extent.

I am being personal here; I should write from a generic viewpoint on what I think about IT career.
IT career is never safe, if you want to grow in project management.
At the same time it is neither safe being a technical/functional consultant, if you do not update your core skills or you are a real techie.


One might find my views contradictory. So it needs better explanations.
I was in touch with two top IT leaders of India. They were the ideal role model for many of us and all project managers of today’s industry. But unfortunately they didn’t survive long in IT.

The situation is even worse in US. Our project manager of last project lost the job in middle of the project; same happened with many big shots of US MNCs. The reason is simpler, the higher the position we are in; more is our cost to client and responsibilities to organization. We might fail to deliver because of many reasons or the rate we charge may not always be acceptable by clients. The common factor I have observed is the age. All who left IT were around 45.


Last year one of my US colleagues made me realize a different perspective. He was reluctant to opt for higher band and still working in lower band. When I asked the reason – he told “I want to keep my self employed as long as possible”. That means we can survive more as long as we are close to the technology and work in core requirements. If we grow in the management path, we can never come back to technology, its just one way. But in India we always opt for bigger position and roles without thinking about the side effects.

Am I trying to establish the fact that - 45 is the age when IT life ends or Career is not sustainable in management path?

No, I am wrong. It all depends on what we want and what is good for the IT giants.

Let’s take a different perspective of the equation. Why we work in IT? I am rephrasing the question, why I worked in IT?

For faster growth in terms of money and position.
For white collar job in elite industry.
For abroad trips to work in different culture and visit different countries.

And I achieved almost all of these to some extent. But, at the same time it took us to the saturation level very fast. We need to think and justify why we are working in this industry time and again. Does this industry give the value for our time and efforts? So, it automatically raises another question - What do we want, what should be our call?

I have to keep myself employed as long as possible for my family and steady career.
OR.
I have to reach to the top to feel the dynamics as I am capable of being a true leader.
OR.
This job is worthy of me and I want to keep doing it in the same way, this is my place; so sometimes I may like it or not, I have to work here. I can switch my job but not my profession.
Sometime ORs can be ANDs by our confused minds.

Which category is more risky? The second one. As the industry is getting more mature, more and more people are getting redundant. That’s causing trouble for the people who want to grow at the same time for those who are not that capable in those positions.
Again, I am not telling that the management role always has risk, there are many steady leaders/managers who are working for long time in a steady career, but it may happen that your fast growth may not be good for organization or your growth is not good enough.

What about the age 45? That is when people get a little slow and cannot take the client pressure or delivery pressure; but can very well leverage the experiences in different way. It depends on us and the company on whether we want to continue this job.


This analysis leaves me to a basic question. What should we do in this industry now, after few years of experience?

I have some simple answers. If you like this job, keep doing – whatever you are doing now. If you do not like – find out a role you will like. If you have other dreams bigger than this, make and shape your career in a way which can help you to fulfill your dreams. If you have an ambition to reach the top, keep trying, but do not keep the expectation people had from IT few years ago, it’s no longer booming and fast growing. If you feel you are not a good leader, keep in touch with technology. If you are scared about your future, travel abroad and make money to be in safer side. If you want to contribute to the technology, shift to product industry. If you think this is not something you should do, change your profession. If you do feel your expectation is not fulfilled in your company, you might think about a switch, but do not keep the same expectation as all IT companies are the same.

At the end, my conclusion is, no matter whether you retire (or have been fired) as Country Lead, Partner, Director, Project Manager, Team Leader etc. its all the same for everyone after that, so enjoy your role as long as you can - believe me survival will be much tougher in the coming days and if you wish to retire from the IT industry at the age of 60, your growth has to be very slow or you have to be real smart. The trick of the smartness is to keep yourself aware with the changing trends of the industry and keep doing other work (apart from IT job) to keep yourself inspired.

Back Again

I have not blogged for long time. Life changed a lot, project pressure, tough timeline, big implementation were an integration part of our profession, but life changed and has taken a new shape during these days, Ani came to my life and filled it with joy.

As this is my half life, I cant share everything online, but the only conclusion is “All is Well”. Yes 3 Idiots left a big impact during these days and so as the Avatar. Both the movies impressed me, watched many times. IPL, Anand Viswanathan cherished us but World Cup T20 and Hockey World Cup were sheer disappointments, now I am enjoying World Cup Football.

Today I was in a long meeting and was capturing the progress in the above pic during that meeting, our career is something like this, very unpredictable, but have to “hit the bulls eye in the bumpy road, we grow & fall”. Irrespective of the client and technology we have to design and develop solution, we have to grow and the same time there will be falls in career, no matter how capable we are. It’s the journey of sustainability with consistency but failure will come always, we have to overcome to sustain in the race. I liked one quote from one of my colleagues 'A winner is NOT one who NEVER FAILS......but one who NEVER QUITS!!!'

Antel

Finally got some break from the project, due to the long weekend. Chicago started getting cold, mild breeze with rain are common these days, I forgot to switch on the heater and got cold last week.

Last night saw a Bengali movie Antohin, and now feeling to be little Antel. I started writing “Bengali Poem” in my early age, probably at class II, but discontinued sometime after class X. I think my feelings can be best expressed by my mother tongue. The choice of words, the depth of the feeling, the vibrations of my thoughts are still replicated by Bengali poem, that I got to know when I was chatting with someone over net.

I am feeling a change in my life, someone told I can be influenced by anyone easily, but I really don’t think so. The only fact is I listen to everyone, try to think from their view point, but I don’t khow whether this is fact unless I am not seating in “Saach Ka Samnaa”; the reality TV show has blown the Indian crowd, I enjoy it too.

Planning to have chotasa party in Saby’s place today. These project guys are very jolly and each of them are unique in their own way. I love to spent time with them, not as a lead, but more like friends. I am feeling relaxed these days and enjoying life despite of project escalations. The fall will come soon, summer are almost at an end, but feeling to paint green top valleys, thinking to write some lines to cherish these days.

Back to the Windy City

Moved to Chicago again and now all set. I am little tired of moving, from one place to other, was in Chicago last year in Alberto Culver Project, then moved to Colorado for Amgen project and upon completion that assignment I came back to Chicago again in Ace Hardware Project. Moved in couple of days notice, I travelled the distance of 1300 Miles with my old Toyota which was loaded with all existing luggage bags of Longmont.

Its unique experience as I got to know many things about US. The garage sale, the move in options, lease break etc. The US life is quite challenging, people move very often specially in Aug when school year starts. It’s a pain though people are habituated.

This weekend bought some furniture from garage sell. I bought couple of antic things including a old telephone. It may be decades old, but I though it will be something interesting to collect. Now the drawing and dinning is well decorated with the LCD on stand, Light stand, two tea tables, one sofa couch with bad, one dinning table with four chairs. It should be enough for me as of now until Pabitra-Priyanka or Baba-ma join me.

I Bought a Sony Bravia XBR7 40inch couple of weeks back and this is something I am enjoying lot these days. With Comcast HD, pictures in some of the channels are exceptional and divine. I can’t think of a better picture in any television. XBR is one of the best qualities and I can vouch for its credibility.

The project is challenging here, I got a good role but work pressure is incredible here, if I say crazy, I mean crazy. Working for last 15 days consecutive I got break in this weekend and watched couple of movies in my new Home theatre. Now getting ready for tomorrow for another crazy week.

Career Anniversary in IBM

Yesterday it was 8th Anniversary in IBM. This is a long journey in IT industry. People generally try to switch jobs frequently to get good hike or position, but fortunately or unfortunately I haven’t done that. Its maybe I am too secure here or maybe because I got ample opportunity or good support from this organization. I good varied roles with many abroad projects, got a steady success. For sure all was not good, definitely I thought couple of times to look for new opportunities, but it never worked out.

I learnt a lot during these years, got exposure to different exposures to different projects, people and work culture. Now I am so secure in the umbrella of IBM, I hardly think to quit. I am quite used to with the pros and cons of my organization and its almost a government job for me. I don’t want to talk about my growth, but yes miles to go from here. Somehow I think my professional life got impacted by my personal problems, though I continued the journey and hanging on. That’s the success may be.

Projects are always challenging, in terms of customer specific business logic, technical solutions, tools, clients demand and work atmosphere. Different teams have different compositions and also its pros and cons. Specially client handling is a tough part. To gain the client confidence, client communications, client satisfaction, are challenging areas. Overall completion of projects is also another aspect where you need to have a broad mindset with a sense of huge ownership. I used to play many different roles, starting from developer to project manager. So its all learning curve for me. Learning never stops, once you stop learning, you are not solicited in this industry.

Its not like I am fond of this job, rather its now my habit. Initially I enjoyed those days of PwC, I loved to stay in office. I was addicted to work and took the projects by heart. Later on I encounter many upheavals and lost the pace. Team changes and new people in every project make it a new experience. New location always excites me and now I feel bored to work in a place more than a year.

Sometime I think, I am just dragging my career in onsite as I don’t get proper role always. But after certain years in IT, we are really option less. We have to continue the job be it innovative or boring. Not sure how long I would like to continue in SAP or IT; but as long I am in this field, I would prefer to be with IBM unless some unavoidable circumstances happens.

Five Points to mention

Five consequential events happened in one day, jotting down randomly

1) No more Spring this year. Its summer here. The temperature is suddenly cross 30C. It was snowing last week, and we were expecting few more colds days. It may be because of Global Worming, may be because of extreme weather of Colorado, but I was literally sweating today. It will help me to cope up with Indian heat next to next week.

2) Kolkata Knight Rider lost in Super Over after tying the match with Rajasthan Royals in IPL. We were watching the match in a close door meeting room in internet. We all are hurt as it was an obvious win of KKR, specially the heroic effort of Dada is in vain. I will write separate post on this as there are many things to cover, like the FAKE IPL Blogger Story, dada factor etc. I was reading the Fake Blog yesterday night. It is impressive and I got addicted now, So added in my blog.

3) Second round of Indian National election took place in India yesterday and the leaders started making their unscrupulous political groups with their vested interest keeping the veil of secularism (to stop the communal forces). Again separate post will come soon once the result will be declared.

4) Started packing yesterday, I am going to India for 2 weeks in first part of May. I have to finish many personal commitments. Need to shift in my new Rajarhat flat, close to DLF, some work on Kharagpur Online, some more personal stuff.. lol.. nothing serious, but as I told in the blog header I can only unfold half of my life, the other half will come in new form in coming future.

5) The funny stuff now. I put up couple of pics in orkut on my new look yesterday. I was enjoying the comments of friends. The blackly look with US Cap and Sunglass was compared with James Bond, Sherlock Homes , Mr. Anthony Gonzales, Killer, DON and many more personalities. I was flabbergasted and of course it was a new experience to be in new looks.

Forgot to mention, last weekend the whole team went to Pinewood Lake in Longmont. It was mesmerizing; something likes Manos Sarobor, covered by ice everywhere. We had good fun. My new cap was so cool that everyone took a pic with that. Longmont is really enriched with natural beauty. I feel lucky to be here.

Pabitra - Gone back

It is snowing again. Its mid April and sometime the temperature is more than 25C, but the nest day it can be snow storm. Tomorrow the prediction is heavy snow storm here in Colorado. The weather is quite extreme here, summer is quite hot and winter is cold enough. The lands are mostly barren, but there are also few types of greeneries.

In US if you are not in East or West Cost, you may have to face extreme weather. The weather in Longmont is very dry and the sunshine is quite intense in summer. But now-a-days weather is playing topsy-turvy with its random combinations.

Last week it was Easter. First time in my corporate life I worked in Easter (Good Friday). It was a surprise to me when I came to know we don’t have any vacation in Easter. Thanks God, I haven’t planned in advance assuming this one a default vacation. We used to have long vacation during these days, in other countries like Greece. But yes we had at least one official party last week. IBM senior executive team like Global SAP head, USA sector lead and Partners came to sign billion dollar contract with the customer.

One significant event this week, my bro has gone back to India. That’s why we are little busy in shopping last weekend. We have gone to almost every chain possible, K-mart, King Scooper, Jecy penny, Ross, Marshall, Office depot, Michaels, Barnes n nobles and many more.

Sunday we had lunch in an Indian restaurant “Maharaja” in Boulder. Boulder is one a university town (University of Colorado) in the lap of the mountains very close to Longmont city. We have been there many times and with no exception this one has became our main haunting spot for last few days.

We haven’t seen a big book store like “Barnes and nobles” in West minister city. It was huge, so big that it may consume the whole day. We didn’t have much time, so had to come back after having a cup of coffee in Star bucks.

We did extensive shopping these days. We bought a Laptop with 17inch Monitor, many electronics equipments like SD card, HDD, many cloths, bags, and shoes, jewelries for family members, chocolates, photo frames, and small decorative stuff for everyone.

Finally I dropped Pabitra in Denver Airport on Tuesday. I am missing him. We stayed 3 months together and had a fun. We have been to many places and undoubtedly had a wonderful time which we had dreamt for. He was struggling for projects these days in recession market and now looking for options in India, which is good for him. I am planning to take a fly back of 2 weeks in India, beginning of May, so I am exited too.

Election: Some thoughts

My Sunday morning started with snow and NDTV again. Its almost Easter and Spring should come by this time, but surprisingly its snowing once a week. Is it Global Warming which has started the topsy-turvy of nature and weather? The seasons are overlapping like nothing. We have to take some action to save our dear planet and next generation.

I am watching NDTV news everyday especially for National Election. I haven’t voted in last 10 years, to be precise I only voted twice while I was in Kharagpur. I neither felt to vote nor am I registered in any Kolkata constituency. But I never lost interest in Indian Political equations and elections.

Unlike last few elections, this election is no longer an exception of racism, religious fanaticism and provincialism. Left and Congress continues their minority influence, while BJP is playing the Hinduism card again, BSP is vouching for datils where as Yadav politics is still very much in action.

We have seen politics of hate everywhere. The reason is we still care for them. The parochialism of “politics of hate” has been taken into consideration again and again by media, oppositions and people. We the people of India still do not care for actual developments. We are driven by emotions, theoretical secularism, and idolism. These are not bad at all, but the problem is these forces deviates us from the real issues, developments, progress and promises.

How many central Govt able to keep their promises? How many leaders actually contributed to the growth? How many parties implemented something beyond their political agenda? Probably none. As majority of our populations least bother about it, the political parties continue to peruse the card play.

Now the time has came when we the people of India has to be very conscience on actual development. We need to be focused on the deliverable, have to measure them based on their performance, not by the lectures or trump cards. Personally I do not belief BJP is communal or Congress is secular. They did what they had to do to come into power. But, yes, I do evaluate the parties on the basis of performance.

I fell hopeless when I have to vote for some party in WB. Whom should I vote? Any vote will go to UPA, then why this virtual fight. Had I been given the option, I would like to vote for Lalu Prasad Yadav of RJD, who tried to reform the Railways and not Mamata Banerjee of TMC, who sopiled the emerging chance of industrialization by Tata. I would like to vote for Chandrababu Naidu of TDP, who set up the IT hub in HYD, rather than Buddhadev Bhattacharya of CPM, who failed again and again of the issue of development. To me Narendra Modi is a hero, as he has shown how to reform a state. Starting from Industrialization to Infrastructures, Gujrat is one of the leading states of India, but unfortunately he is remembered always for communal conflicts in Godhra. I am not backing up Modi, but the days have gone where we have to be indifferent on actual development. The National Highway infrastructures were implemented in 6 years of NDA govt, why can’t Congress do it in 50years of their rule.

I have no problem with dynasty of Congress party, but they have to convince us that they are capable. Do we think Rahul Gandhi is as good as Pranab Mukherjee? The answer is No. I beg your pardon if I hurt your sentiment in someway or other by my thoughts, but still I belief before voting one should consider the pros and cons of the Candidates and of course the Party agenda regarding the development issue.

Enough of Politics, I sometime get tired, but never can avoid it. Coming back to our Sunday activities, it was good and hectic. We had a chain of shopping in different malls. I hate shopping, its not something I want to do for hours, but sometime I had to, as Pabitra is going back, we have to buy gift for each and every family members.

We went to Super Target and Big K Mart where some deals were going on. These stores are really big, bigger than any store I have seen in India. Yesterday we went to Sams club which is even more bigger, in Loveland a city nearby. The natural beauty of the place is captivating, the lake by the mountain range was wonderful, but we could not able to enjoy the beauty in the cold, the wind-chill effect made it even more intolerable. But it was a good trip.

So it is the season of shopping and final side seeing before Pabitra departs from US.

Dental Pain & US Hospital

I was feeling sleepy today morning. After longtime, it was a relaxed day with minimum mails and work. So, I got some time to browse through net in office http://www.ndtv.com/ to update myself on news of terrorism and election campaigns.

But one of the problems was my dental pain. Last to last night I haven’t had a sleep and pain killer was not working. It was severe, so yesterday after lunch I had to go to Hospital. Pabitra was with me. We went to Longmont United Hospital and they send me to emergency.

So I thought it might be a good move. I was suffering from excruciating agony and urgent attention was needed that time. Before the final doctor asked me what happened, 5 more specialist, Nurse to receptionist everyone asked me about my medical background, present feeling, what medicine I took, do I take drugs etc etc. I was almost fed up. I was even more surprised when a general physician came to me for Dental check up.

She told that I have no visible infection and she will put a pain reliever injection, to my utter surprise she injected in wrong place. I would have been sued her, if she not she is good looking, I granted her the fault.

But I was terribly offended with the medical system. I had medical insurance so I escaped majority of the fee, but the intolerable pain was still there before I called a dentist and took antibiotic course. But the remedy is still not complete as I neither did any filling or root canal. I am afraid to do it here.

Had it been India, it would have been much easier. Neither I had to visit emergency for dental pain, nor had I minimize it without proper treatment. We have many ready-made facilities back home. We can reach to dentist any time, we don’t have to maintain costly insurance, and health is free to certain extent. Even when I was in EU, it was absolutely free of cost. Health is absolute necessity, which should come free, but alas, developed countries like US don’t have it. During these recession 50% people are not able to maintain it properly, so they have no medical coverage. I wonder how this can be the best country of the World.

But the hospital was quite good. The infrastructure was excellent and they made all possible investigations of not to make any serious mistake. I liked one of the funny question of one nurse “Had you been asked to admit in our Hospital, Do you like to be visited by any religious leader? If yes, what is your choice”. I told though I am Hindu, I am open to all religion. I go to Church also. She laughed.

Now I am quite ok and looking forward to go to India next month to permanent cure.

Lazy Sunday

It was a lazy Sunday. I am late riser in general, but in weekend I wake up beyond anyone’s imaginations. Yes, I said “Hello” to the Sun sometime after noon. We gossiped last night and as usual went to bed late.

With the breakfast tea we watched “MTv Roadies” a popular reality show in M TV. It is not for everyone, initially I disliked the show for little vulgarism but there is a positive aspect of every game. So I started liking this show.

I liked the auditions more than the game. Raghu-Rajeev, the dominating hyper twins, made this game real interesting. The roughness of the youth of today’s India is reflected in this show, they are selfish and intolerable to certain extent, which pissed me of one point of time.

In afternoon we went to “Fort Collins” a nearby city for shopping. Pabitra is going back to India, so he has to do some shopping. Went to “Michaels” “Good Will” “WalGreen” and “Big Lot”, picked up few things, among them most interesting is the Canvas. I want to start canvas painting, lets see, whether I can do justice with them.

Before leaving the city, we had our evening snack in “McDonalds” with “chicken wrap” and “mocha” (coffee). I have not seen such a well decorated Mcdi in US before. So we took some pics and one of them is attached here.

On the way to Longmont, in the dark US highway we had a long conversation on Mr Pervag Musharof and Pakistan. We must say Mr Musharof is a smart politician, who managed to maintain the image of a weak nation for long time. He fooled Mr Bush, he played blame game in a way which always benefited his nation. But the truth has to be revealed one day and it happened. This month he came to attend one Open House in New Delhi organized by “India Today”. I was watching it on net today. As usual he failed to convince people on the emerging issues. Personally I dislike Musharof, for his hypocrisy. But he had to take a double stand for betterment of Pakistan.
I was literally hated our neighboring nation at the time of Kargil War when I started analyzing the political scenarios as an adult. But with time my thoughts has changed. I really feel sorry now for the state of affairs of Pakistan. They patronized Taliban and Muzahidins of Kashmir and now their existence is in danger. We want a stable and economically enriched Pakistan as Talibanizasion of Pak will not only destroy them, it will impact us as well.

Few years back these kinds of topics are hush-hush as people hardly used to comment on controversial things openly. But things have really changed in last few years. Especially after 26/11(Mumbai Attack) Indian people are more conscience and much open in addressing issues of cross boarder terrorism as it is affecting the common man. The preventive actions have to be taken now, in order to eradicate the menace, so that common people can heave a sigh of relief.

Sunday night ended with India’s magical test draw against NZ. Despite forced to follow on; Indian came back to the game in a commanding tone and lost only 3 wickets in last 2 days of the game. This Indian squad has a “Never to die” attitude. That’s what we need in every Indians. “Zeed karo Duniya Badlo”.

Snow Everywhere

Snow infront of my apartment

It was snowing heavily for last two days, but today it was a bright sunny day. I haven’t seen so much of snowfall (Thursday 14 inch snowfall) in one day in US in last 2 years, caused by an uninterrupted snow storm over the night.

I was driving a blind car, as hardly something were visible from the mirrors, I tried to clean but once I removed the deposited snow from one side, other side was fully covered again. The roads were full of snow as the corporation was not able to clean it that quick. As usual the presence in office was minimal with the exception of IBM India guys and despite of heavy work pressure most of the AMGEN employees ended up either unofficial holiday or working from home.

IBM US sack 5000 employees a day before and it caused tension in the air. Wall Street is blaming big blue for switching job to India while employees asking for justification why job cut happened in spite of excellent fourth quarter and last year. But recession is now in its pick and things are getting worse day by day.

We ended development work of April release with a high note and phenomenal client appreciation. One things is very clear that the commitment of Indian guys (specially offshore team) is always more than the local guys here, they never complain for late hours and additional work in general. In lieu of economic recession people are not putting additional effort as they are habituated of enjoying the luxury. But there are always some exceptions.

In India we are brought up in a way that whatever assigned to us, we try to solve. That’s why we are so flexible, but our missing part are the discipline, consistency and the planning/ strategic/ management skills as we often try to evaluate things beyond our boundaries. We should improve in these areas. The old childhood traits are bound to reflect in corporate life. If you were not organized and consistent in your day to day work be it study or anything else, will retardate your corporate life. But there are again some exceptions; but exceptions prove the rule.

Timely communication can always make things much better, but small strategic moves and planning can make a sea change in the nature of projects or career and sometime in Organizations too. General Indian people (including me) has this problem, which we can work on, specially try to prepare our next generation with that mentality. There are many entrepreneurs who started changing India, but miles to go yet.

Whereas in USA, the mathematical base of general student is not like us, but they are far more ahead in discipline. Regular class project works make them far more consistent than us. Innovative assignments from school set their trends for out of the box ideas, which is why average American managers are better planner and strategy implementer.

Let me come back to my dairy again. As mentioned we gained client confidence by our quality deliverable, we all are happy. Some of the people who are burned out by working day in and day out in this strenuous environment are overwhelmed by the appreciation. We went to office though it is Saturday and then went to Dollar Tree and Big Lot for shopping with Pabitra. In the driveway Pabitra was hypnotize by the icy beauty of Longmont. Every place is covered by thick later of ice and probably we hardly get chance to experience this kind of nature. We captured few pictures of snow; one of them is here attached. It is indeed our unique experience and that delighted us.

We watched Dance India Dance in our apartment. This reality show made our day, Mithunda, who is the grand master of the show, danced with Prabhudeva, which delighted us, as we are big fan of both of them. After that we have seen some of the youtube videos of Prabhudeva like “Urvashi”. I am a big fan of reality show, like SaReGaMaPa, and now Dance India Dance.

Among all happenings the only problem is my dental pain, which is somehow relieved by pain killers, but I think, I have to see set up a doctor appointment next week.

Identity

Second post of my Online Dairy. Nothing much happened today, except same regular hectic office hours, fighting with manager, planning work and attending meetings.

Made couple of changes in my Googlepage and posted in Orkut about me, so that people can know me from my blogs. Sometime I think why people always try to create identity, is it something comes from the self-confidence or proud, are they suffering from identity crisis. Why we need to have own identity in the crowd?

I would say, everyone should have individual identity. The basic education is nothing, it really does not matters whether you are from IIT or JU, MBBS or CA, School teacher or Journalist, what matters is how you distinguish yourself by contributing significantly in any area, the quality of your journey, the innovation you make, the achievements and accountability of your duty. I know, many of us think whether identity at all needed? It will be much better to be with family, have a good job, healthy life and earn money. I beg to defer from this concept. Personally I think we all are here in this World to continue in certain path, the only tough challenge is to find your path and then it will be a golden journey where mind and soul merges.

I also think everyone should have their own blog to reflect his or her own thoughts. Each of our thoughts is unique, elementary and our life is also different. The myriad Brownian thoughts has be captured somewhere and there can’t be a better options than blog.

Again some of IPL news disappointed me. Bukanon, Coach of Kolkata Night Riders, wants 4 Captains in our team. Sourav and 3 other international players will lead team in different areas. Being a hardcore “Dada” fan, I am literally disappointed. I haven’t seen a leader like him, a strong fighter in the field with enormous mental strength. I have no idea how this innovative idea of having multiple captains will integrate the team. Lets see, what happens.

Its 9pm in night and someone is playing music system loudly in our Legacy Campus. The floor is vibrating and I hope someone will call 911 soon. Police will come and that guy may have to pay heavy penalty. Its US, no way to escape, you have to follow the rule, after all discipline makes a nation great.

First post of my online dairy

This is the first post of my online dairy. Though I think personal thoughts should not be published to the open World, but still there is a version which can be shared. The only problem is my emotion. I am highly emotional and sometime quite extremists in some concepts, which may come into play while writing my day to day life.

The another aspect is, I am not a pessimist guy, I cant think negative, if I do so, I go into depression, which is not again my trait, though in my half life I have gone through some emotional trauma. So when I am depressed and down, I can’t write, as negative words never give me hope, the urge to live normal life. I purposely avoid those topics which do not give me confidence, but as I am emotional it comes to picture always.

I know some of my words are contradictory asI am not a simple guy. I can think beyond boundaries, but there is again no doubt that I am quite honest. I am what I am, either you have to like me or dislike me, you can’t ignore me.

Let’s come back to the online dairy post. Today’s morning was no exception than the other day, hurried as I am a late riser, anxiety to miss the meetings and the unforeseen outcomes of the meetings in my client Office where I work as a development lead from IBM. The client is not bad, but the schedule here is quite hectic. It is one of the leading biomedical companies in the World, AMGEN.

So it was a mixed day, mostly good as we made some good progress from development side. I prepared few slides for morning presentation, provided some suggestions and improving points for next release and as usual did some development coordination with offshore team back in India.

I am working for 8 long years in SAP, mostly in technical area, but I lost the charm of working with this ERP package, though its quite challenging and demanding software in today’s IT industry. But I like the lead role, where the management skill comes into play.

Slowly I am avoiding technical challenges these days and involving myself in management activities as I am pretty good in this role and got IBM Bravo award last year for leading the onsite team in Alberto Project, Chicago.

Initially not, but now I am of the opinion that if you are a technocrat after 7 years of your career, you will not be a good manager. It depends on our view of handling things. I have seen in IBM many managers who are technically brilliant, are very average in managing project, where as people from non-technical background managing project quite well. But again there are many exceptions of this rule.

Last one and half month were quite hectic in this project. We all have to work 10-12 hrs average, night calls, weekend work, challenging deadlines with very minimal sleep. Last week we met our milestone and now little off-load, though not totally relaxed.

In this one month, I hardly had chance to blog or write something for my website. I missed to wish some of my close friends in their birthday, especially Samiran, who is one of my close colleagues in IBM India. I am feeling bad for this.

But today Avimanyu’s (IBM US colleague) word made my day. He and his wife follow my blogs and photography and like it very much. Some of his words in chat inspired me to start posting again. I believe in making interpersonal relations in my corporate World and I have quite a few good friends in this World.

Some of the news disappointed me like IPL moved out of India and SA will host this year. Due to conflicts with national election, we can’t launch the prestigious national sporting event. It is shame on us. Though national election is one of the important activities of our nation, I personally believe we as a country should able to manage both the events. Cricket is the largest entertainment of out Nation, its more than a sport and sometime the craze is so immense, its almost a religion to a part of our population. Not only that, it could have been one of the economic boost in these critical days of economic recession. But as usual our national leaders are busy in their self interest.

After office hours went to shopping with Pabitra in the evening, went to Boarders (the book store chain). Sometime I like to find me in the world of books. Had a cup of Cappuchino and came back to prepare dinner.

Have night call with offshore team (India) from 10:30, so have to take dinner before that.

Before I close this post, like to mention one thing that gives me immense peace everyday is the tranquility of Longmont. Its really cool, where I can breath gently, live peacefully. No traffic Jam, no congestion, no unsocial activities; what can be better than this, that to we have a wonderful mountain view from apartment window.

Feelings

The first light of Sunshine
And dark knights of mine
Always fights.

The first drop of rain
And the deepest pain
Always coincides

The snow storm
And my dad n mom
Always delights

The agony n ecstasies
And my few fantasies
Always smiles


-- PRG Dec08

KharagpurOnline

Finally our very own town, Kharagpur is Online. The link is www.kharagpuronline.com

Welcome to Home Page of Pijush Ranjan Ghosh

I am Pijush Ranjan Ghosh, an Indian, born in Kharagpur (West Bengal), studied Computer Science in Jadavpur University (Kolkata), working in IT Industry(IBM). By religion I am a Hindu. This is my Home page and this covers mostly my family and travel and likings. For free thought and general writing I have one for Blog. This is the link.

Travel
Travel being one of my favorite thing, I have created lot of blogs regarding this and here goes the list in right column.Norway is so far my best place to be seen. The blog for Land of mid night sun goes here.
I have been to Denmark for quite a long time and enjoyed my life thoroughly. Even I can say my best days of corporate life was in Copenhagen. So there are two blogs capturing the memories of Denmark. See in right hand side Travel links and here is my main travel blog which I started in Greece.
Please see the Travel related Blogs in right side.

Family
I am very proud to be a part of a traditional Bengali family. My grand parents are from East Bengal, now known as Bangladesh. My Father is Railway Health Inspector in our home town, Kharagpur and My Mother is house wife. I have a twin brother and a sister.

University and Corporate Life
I have been graduated from Jadavpur University on 2001, in Computer Science and the dream years of my life was undoubtedly those 4 years.
I started my career with PwC in 2001 with SAP technology and gradually become a part of IT global gaint, IBM after the merge from PwC in 2002. I am a SAP consultant working in US as Project development lead of IBM India and IBM US.
In my Corporate life, I have got opportunity to work for more than 10 SAP projects. First onsite assignment was in London, UK. It was a dream assignment with my IBM friends who were basically friends from my university life.
I have been to many countries in different International Assignment. My Travel Blog captures those countries. The link is here.