Credibility Management

Technological advancement has brought in a sea of change in the way world works! Information is the key here, gone are the days when experts spoke technological jargons that customers seldom understood; but now the situation is different. We cannot utter even a singe word that is incorrect or manipulative because people on the other end knows exactly what you are talking about and if you are correct or not! Companies have started investing more and more on "Do it yourselves" tools that require less intervention by any 3rd party consulting company (though this is not the case always). Hence for a consulting company, to survive in this information era,one of the most important tasks is to build the credibility in the minds of the customers. It does not come so easily, it requires lot of hard work and honesty as well as proven results. Credibility if lost, it is very difficult to regain them; anything you do would then be just a compromise. We need to prove our mettle, build the trust and manage them throughout. Hard work always pays, but the honesty factor plays a crucial role as it stays in the minds of the customer longer than the hard work you had put to achieve something. If you do a mistake then accept it honestly and analyse what you can do to make the situation correct rather than trying to hide it uselessly. Being impractical and unrealistic also tarnishes one's credibility. For instance if you work on a value adding activity and provide the benefit to the clients then you need to present what they exactly get out of it rather trying to put irrelevant benefits without putting practicality and realism into picture. There are many reasons why one should kill the credibility in the minds of the customer which in the long run proves to be a big mistake made. So the key words important for maintaining the credibility are hard work, honesty, practicality, honesty and common sense.

My revenue target for the Half Year

I am in a state of extreme confusion after seeing a whopping figure of € 1.8 Million as a target revenue for me to achieve during this half year!! I am currently working on 3 to 4 small projects in a month that generates a revenue of 30 to 40 K Euros plus few proposals that has so far generated 300 K Euros. So for me to achieve the rest of the target I need to work/win at least 20 projects a month and a couple of big proposals!!

I don't this so I can even make it in my dream!! I need to be a super human or a kind of person which I cannot describe in the framework of words to achieve this target!!

I will keep you updated how far I reach!!

Oasis to Mirage - Ideas loaned from my wife!!

I would like to express my transition from real freedom to assumed freedom. I am here talking about my transition from my college to the booming IT industry. I would like to pour my experience of the so called glamorous and fun filled IT industry.

We used to wander those spacious heat filled open grounds and closed class rooms with just 50 rupees in pocket and plan the whole week’s budget with that. But now we wander along the well cleaned, fully air-conditioned corridors with about five to six credit cards in our pocket thinking where to swipe the cards with credit cards eagerly waiting to eat next month’s salary. I can’t believe that it was just few years before that the 50 rupees seemed to be thousands, but now, thousand seems to be nothing.

College canteen, Tea shops were the favorite hot spots where we spent hours together, having a hearty chat with our buddies forgetting the whole world. But now Cafe coffee Day, Quickies, Baristas have taken those places. The money of approx 3 rupess we had spent for coffee has now gone up to 50 rupees.

Those precious days where we used to laugh for nothing, while chatting or while playing or even when you fail in your paper because you have got 30 marks for an empty paper, rarely comes into picture in our so called serious corporate world

Hatred and Ego were the words you haven’t heard in those days. You smash or hit your friend for some reason and the next moment you walk along him with hands on his shoulders. But now you don’t like the guy sitting beside you because he’s getting a salary 10k greater that you or he’s always being appreciated by your PM. True friends are hardly found here!!

Those days, should somebody speak badly about your college, you can find your blood boiling inside even though you don’t like your principal. But here loyalty is the lost word; whenever someone is talking badly about your company you join them to criticize your own company. You join the company with the resignation day in the mind because you’re looking much more for you than you deserve , Don’t mind – Along with us, Tom, Dick & Harry are also planning for the same!!

You have seen the late nights only on the eve of the exam, where you rely on your friend to wake him/ her at night 1 or 2. And how can we forget those last minute tensions in exam, you remember that only just before entering the exam you find that you have forgotten to revise an important question that your friend suggested that it will surely appear on this exam. You rush back and flip those pages with tension.

But today you work at least 2 days a week till 1 or 2 in the night to deliver something to your unknown client who is at US or UK. You are aimlessly typing at the useless word document that your supervisor asked you to finish with his tailor made smile. Loads of tension with calls from home, with your eye lids eager to kiss each other and you promise them to allow it a little later, cursing Bill Gates for inventing MSWord.

We are all in the same desert where I have realized that we are moving from the warmth ness of the Oasis to chase a mirage. A mirage that promises a lot of thing, but still it’s just a mirage. When I turn back I can find thousands chasing that mirage with a ID card around their neck. I wish all the best for them.