"I am webby and I think webby" - AjiNIMC aka Aji Issac Mathew - "I thought and I wrote".
I am Aji Issac Mathew also known as AjiNIMC at various forums. I am webby and I think webby, being a part time blogger, this blog is a documentation of my experiences and my learning. Blog Stats (22 June 2007): There are currently 242 posts and 679 comments (and 40267 spam comments), contained within 17 categories.
Ok, this is a post that will humble me even further. God was so good to me that for last 5 years I was able to live a life worth looking back and thanking God. We all work, we all create quality products and services but I am happy that I with the help of many were able to help many do their work smartly and create better products.
(Last 5 years of professionalism)
After leaving Grmtech these are some of the comments (in random order) that really kept me motivated:
” Wish you all the best. I have learnt so many things from you rather from your blog. Today I can’t stop myself from writing this comment. May god bless you all the time and be the best again.”
- Susmita Chatterjee (She worked with me for some months. Thanks for the comment and thanks for reading my blog regularly.)
“I came to know this from your blog only. I read your blog regularly because I find it interesting and informative. Sorry for being so late in posting comments. I hope its never too late to begin.”
- Manjit (She worked with me for very few months, we enjoyed the work but it was a big surprise to hear from her. Thanks for remembering me)
sometimes people make a huge difference in the environment surrounding you… and you are one who does that Sir… i am sure those guys in your new company would realize your true worth very soon… U ROCK SIR!!
Sir, you made GrmTech the place what it is today. Without you it would have not been the same innovation oriented group of people. Personally you have made me what I am today. I owe a lot to you Sir. I have learned many things from you.
YOU ARE STILL MY ROLE MODEL ALONG WITH ONE SPECIAL PERSON IN MY LIFE.
- Anand Kedia - [He joined as a very young team member and how he is handling a lot of things now. Many hate him and rightly so he sometimes is irritating too, I respect him for his initiatives (very few people have this quality) and I wish I could have shared some unwanted experiences with him. Never too late for it. Here I go: "The spirit of communication is not the spirit in which you speak/write but the spirit in which the other person hears/reads you. So always thing of the impact that it will have on others by thinking like others. Thats the only change you need, rest everything rocks except your knowledge level. People respect you for your knowledge, so read read and read and then apply apply and apply and then read read and read and then reapply reapply and reapply" :), he is a great guy to work with)
When I started my career in SEO people use to ask me WHY? Why are you choosing this field, while you are an ETC Engg. and you can get a good job, but when I joined my first job that time I was completely fresher. It was you who taught me the real taste of web and now almost 20 hours of my day goes to web and I am really enjoying it. There are lots of stuff associated with web, and it is also true that you are going to learn every moment of your life. Thanks Aji.
- By Alok (Currently heading a company as CEO, He worked with me on one of the projects. It is great to know that people are creating more jobs for India).
If I look back at those 3 years, Grmtech has been more of an institute rather than a company for me (Thanks to Aji and Sourav Da).
- by Anirudh - It reminded me of some early days of Grmtech where we wanted to make it more like a university to do a very highly work and research. Congrats dude for completing 3 years at Grmtech.
Wish you all the luck and success sir…m sure whrevr u go…u will keep on inspiring people as always
- by Vasudha (We worked together for just few months. People inspired me and some say that I also inspired many :). Great to see your comment).
I know that you have the ability to change the environment when you do not like it…keep it up…my best wishes are always with you [:D]
- by Saikat (he is one of the best lot with whom I am associated with. There was a time when my first 30 mins in office was scheduled for a meeting with Saikat and the topic of discussion was INNOVATION. We worked on many new stuffs. Soon looking to work with you.)
good decision. Sometimes we need to deconstruct and reconstruct certain things in our life. I am happy that u have done so. I believe right now u r quite confident with ur new venture. Carry on, all the best.
Nice seeing you growing up. Best of luck in ur life. hope things will turn in ur favour.
It was great pleasure working with you. I always remember you.
- by Subikar
[This was truly motivating as I never expected that Subikar and Susenjit will comment on it. I am very very happy they did. Towards the end we did not share very good professional terms. We departed very sadly or in a very unusual way, very rarest moments in my professional career. There comments gave me a lot of energy. Subikar proved that any person if dedicated enough can prove his worth. I recruited him on my own risk, many laughed at him and on me (for my recruitment) as he could not even talk properly. Things changed very, he believed in himself and I in him. He became one of the good performing team members. Ended up doing many work on his own. It was big learning in my life. Best of luck to both of you and thanks for dropping in.
Its great move and we should not keep us away from changes that happen around us. It was great time working with you. Now surely some more people will enjoy your experience and knowledge.
- by Mithilesh [It was good working with him. He codes like an artist, never happy with the perfection of code ... we have learned a lot together. I will remember him whenever I see a complex regular expression :)]
Wish you a very best of luck for your future. I will always remember your humble support and advise. The knowledge you gave me in last 11 months (not only technical) will surely help me to grow my career graph. keep in touch
- Shyama Kant [It was very emotional moment when I left Grmtech. I was helping him to fight the odds in his career. He was improving amazingly. I liked him because of his attitude towards work. He worked very hard to complete things. Soon he will be in different trajectory creating greater products. He was the only person who sat with me when I was a new driver, he is a risk taking guy :), wishing all the best. ]
This is Jayangshu from Kolkata. I came by your blog by chance few days ago and quite liked the post titled “How to decide your new employer”. After that I saw few of your new post.
But today I ended up reading a huge no. of your old post tooo ( Despite of having my xams tomorrow, writing my last B.tech xam ). And they are really great. Liked some of ur stories too. Keep blogging Aji
- by Jayangshu Saha [through email.... I should blog more :), thanks for dropping in]
There are plenty more (thanks for all great comments, emails and scraps). I will keep on adding comments from emails and blog posts here. A very special blog post for me. Whenever I will feel down I will read this post.
What did you achieve in last 5 professional years?
It’s people, It’s people who creates. It’s not the Idea but the people behind the Idea. I have always believed in people and got very good returns. When many ask me that “What did you achieve in last 5 professional years?”, I will use this blog post to tell them, “A small group of people who trusted me and helped me grow the products and companies”. This blog comes very handy in expressing your emotions too.
I was on a look for a good employer for the last 6 to 7 months. Met and talked with many, even took an off to disturb yahoo’s interview at Park Hotel for a good job. I did not like many, many did not call me, many did not value me enough and nothing worked out for several months but ……
For last one week, things have changed. After announcing my resignation on my blog and alumni list, I started getting hell lot of calls and mails. I already got committed to DigitalAvenues with good perks and more importantly good culture and quality work but people are still trying to lure me with better perks. The highest offer been close to 125k per month, Gosh! where were you all these 7 months? Thats why I still call life stranger than fiction. Anyway I appreciated and enjoyed all these offers and talks. I am on the track to shrink my CV and enjoy the journey.
All happened really quick, on 25th Apr got a call from DigitalAvenues for an interview, on 29th Apr I took a leave and went for the interview. Reached there at 12:40 (instead of 12:30 because of huge traffic jam) and started interview in next 15 minutes. Partners after partners talked, we liked each other, thought of getting married and DONE. They prepared the paper, I signed it and I was in. On 30th Apr, I served a one month notice period to Grmtech and somehow that day became my last day there. I called up DigitalAvenues and asked them for an early join and they agreed. Took a day off yesterday (1st May) and I was in office today (2 may), my first day at office.
I reached there before 9, called up the guys and they were surprised since they were not prepared as I was going to join them officially on Tuesday (6th May). I was in t-shirt and jeans, so I asked them about the company dress code. I heard this back, “Wearing something is important, what you wear is not” (We laughed and carried on). Within minutes I was in the conference room going through some ppts about their new product line. When I saw the product, I was forced to say “WOW!!!!!“. Then I met another partner, he explained to me about the service part of the business and the whole model. I will be taking care of the web marketing department from Tuesday. We did a lot of official talks including an introduction to the pillars of DigitalAvenues (the core team leaders). It was more fun (amazingly fun) than work. My first day at DigitalAvenues was really great.
I was amazed at:
Their ability to think and deliver big.
Their achievement in short span of time.
Their colorful PPTs, it looked so amazingly professional.
Their crystal clear strategies.
Their pristine clear mission and commitment towards delegating their vision to the bottom of the company. The management layer was into the business strategies rather than work.
After spending some 4 years and 9 months at Grmtech, I am leaving for my new ventures (Today was my last official day at Grmtech). (After a day break) I will be joining digitalavenues and will be working with two departments, one is a service of my own choice (Web marketing) and the other one is a product (my passion to shrink my cv is still alive).
I am looking forward to meet some of my new team members, I am sure it will be a lot fun. At this time I want to thank all of my team members at Grmtech (and ex-Grmtechians) and want to wish them a very big success in life. I have been a people-oriented leader and I have believed in what I have done so far, I will continue to do so. Keep smiling, take Grmtech to next level and I will work with my new team at DAve in taking DAve to next level.
I will start blogging at webkotler.com (My new avatar, changing it from 5 year long AjiNIMC to Web Kotler). Also I will be consolidating my experiences at http://www.99smallsteps.com.
Had a mixed day today, missed my most loved afternoon Sunday 3-5 hr sleep (due to dad’s committee meetings and forced shopping call) and Navartna Oil massage. Shopping went really horrible as we were trying to buy something different for a new born baby (and some other relatives). As usual we were late for shopping and the shops were closing, could not buy the wanted items. We managed to shop few unplanned items for our satisfaction.
I was tempted (but I am not supposed to) to see the old streets and the memories of special cheese filled mayonnaise chicken burgers from NV BUT after reaching there we found it closed (Bad, really bad). Thought of buying some cookies and brownies from Nahums but it was closed too (two bads in a row). Pushed ourselves to the special juice center to try our luck and thanks, IT WAS OPEN. To compensate for the unluck, after having a mango juice (it has 3 layers, A layer of curd, A layer of sweets and the top layer of dry fruits) I had one grape juice too. What a odd combination to have but chaltha hai, we will see it tomorrow morning, jo hoga deka jayega. Then came the real inhuman uncivilized diet killer at park street (the evidence):
This week is going to be a complete diet killer, tomorrow starts the Onam week. I will miss the real Sadya tomorrow but I will surely have a special dinner with some 20+ items.
These are the items I know (to eat and not to cook):
Special red rice - I don’t know how do I explain it, a little fatty stuff
Avial - Veg mix done is a very different way, my mom makes it really well, sorry for making these temptations.
Sambar
Parippu Curry (Special Dal with coconut and all, very tasty, I love this one)
There are few more items but I have no clue about the names
“Kanam Vittu Onam Unnanam” which means “We should have the Thiruonam lunch even if we have to sell all our properties for that”. So much to eat and I AM Suppose to keep my promise written on a diet Pepsi box. Onam hai, sab chalta hai ……….. Happy Onam to all, eat .. eat and eat this week!
Onam aashwansagal
(This is how we say in Malayalam, it means Onam wishes, so try it in Malu style)
Oh! I have discover many expressions though this board, which is also known as white board across our teams. My white-green-red-black board is the most used and abused board in company, just imagine the condition of the duster (Once it was white now it is of no but all color). I caught some new expressions when a new recruit looked at my office white board. If I am allowed to enter his mind to blog his thoughts then here they are:
“I think this guy is given a second-hand much-used white-board, poor fellow”, or may be “Is it a white board or a modern art, may be this guy is like MF Hussian” or may be ….. (You can fill in your own experience …..)
NPER calculations for debt management decision making tree.
Some Google algorithm explanations.
Team structures.
And the latest one “How to build stronger/successful architectures?“
Here is a small tip to end this not so unwanted blog post. When you are busy in making improvements to your architecture (it can be tech, career, personal, company or any other architecture), you keep on moving ahead and building more structures with smaller and modular additions. In order to build a stronger and successful architecture, you need to take some backward steps to see a better/wider view in order to understand the need of bigger changes/arrangements. Such complex tips like this can only be explained using a white-board, so do drop in an appreciative sentence for this ugly looking flat board :). Happy new week!
Happy Friendship day! Am I late for it? I guess no. Friendship cards, friendship shayerri, stolen messages, common message, smses and emails. Oops! blog posts as well. Everything is happening on the F day. Thats so great and here is my post for THE day.
How many friends do you have? One, two, three, ….
Do you remember one of the most frequently asked childhood question, “Johny Johny(change it with your name for personalization), how many friends do you have?” and then you started counting on your fingers, one - Tommy, two - harry, four - popy and ……Also jane and pinky … uncle, I have so many friends!
Get into the time machine and ask this question at different phases of your life, when you were not so moma’s kid, when you were not so young, when you were really young and now when you want to stay young. What would have been your answer?
In past had problems in counting friends? Don’t worry if you haven’t counted your friends in past, here is a way to do it (and once again it is by Google):
Wow, it is even arranged further like best friend and so. Great, not bad at all. I think undoubtedly orkut can be voted as the best friendship tool for the era. Does the count matters? Does the intensity matters? Hey, I don’t know, neither did I ever bought a friendship barometer to measure the intensity nor did I ever borrow an abacus for the count. I have some wonderful friends and I thank life for being so kind to me. Life is so short and don’t bother to categorize, count or measure friendship. Don’t define friendship and let it happen its own way with:
One unplanned smile.
One eye accident.
One unwanted fight.
Many years of silence.
………….
Life is so short, so be happy with undefined friends and live friendship to its fullest. To be a friend a mine ignore all the above para with one sentence “Be yourself, Be imperfect for a perfect friendship“.
Happy friendship day, happy friendship week and happy friendship year!
It is Aug knocking again. SOCH is over and I have no other additional responsibility for Aug 15 except preparing the themes and quiz. This year I am planning to take up a serious role in skit. I used to do guest appearance so far, either a malu in English skit or a weird villager confusing people (I think it was fun).
I met our Assistant director yesterday (at 10 pm) and discussed a little more about the skits. We will have the alpha meeting this Sunday and I might take 2 roles. After the camps this is Rocking time again! I will keep you all updated.
It was 19th May again, the time to celebrate Grmtech Bday. Got busy after that with all the server audits, better late than never. So here we go with the reports of Grmtech’s 4th Anniversary. This year we had more space to arrange the party as we are shifted to our own office at AE665.
I need to rush to office, so here is a summary of overall party:-
There were 10 Maharaj’s (Cooks) for the day.
A local music band was there too, singing a mix of Bengali and Hindi songs. I liked most of the songs except the Himesh’s songs, you certainly need special talent to sing his songs.
A cake worth a cake, full of chocolate. It was specially made with Grmtech Logo on it.
A series of games including treasure hunt, musical chair and so on.
A special dance party, I did a Google dance too.
Then there was chocolates for winners and Khanna for lossers.
Here are some of pics (and some nostalgic moments) (more…)
A blog list compiled by the top Indian blogger (thanks Amit for compiling the list). I saw my blog under HR/Marketing/Finance category. I was happy to see that and also a very nostalgic moment, I just looked back for once. to recap the journey I had so far.
My expertise is Technology (Web Technology mainly), I always loved to handle the toughest Technical challenges, from Kerberos, RSA encryption to backward reservation protocol, from htaccess to making a single-user wordpress a multi-user wordpress I loved the journey.
I then shifted to Crowdsourcing (now the world is talking about it, wisdom of crowd. We started this journey almost three years back, a true learning experience. Now we know the mistakes GOG TV guys are making or the biggest thing naukri.com is missing, we had made these mistakes too).
From Crowdsourcing I then shifted to HR Management, there is nothing as great as having a great team. Motivating, Mentoring and everything to get the right company climate (This article has few points that I agree to, not all though).
Few years back our VC (who happens to be a co-founder of a multi-billion company) said, “The most experienced people in the company should handle HR“. (Even Google does the same, after the final interview, but before an offer is extended, every Google hire, all 10,000-plus through 2006, is approved by one of Google’s founders, Sergey Brin or Michigan native and U-M graduate Larry Page.) Job as a recruiter is challenging and important. Currently I am serving Grmtech as a Leader (a mix of all, tech, markeing, HR).
Did anyone know that I have learned US credit system. From FICO score simulation to new Vantage score, from state-wise SOL to debt solution options, mortgages to insurances, payday loan sad stories to Grameen bank smiles and everything that comes in the way. I have handled few financial forums as moderator (now I hardly do, I am helping our team with our new mortgage book), surprising but true.
There is no fun in being perfect but there is much fun in trying. I am glad to see my blog under the top Indian HR/Management blogs. I hardly get time to blog a proper post. As of now I have almost 5 post in draft stage, hoping to finish it this weekend.
What is that I want to do now?
I want to beat Google, the adsense and adwords (The search world). (Is that possible, beating Google??????????) You can call me crazy but I am working towards it. My Philosophy behind this mission, “People want information not sites”. Look at this, I am searching for “Auto loan”, I get ten websites which will explain me “what an auto loan is about”. I do not think I am satisfied by reading ten sites with 1,00,000 of links to understand the same thing. I am designing one search engine which will not have duplicate information in search result, it will have the ever missing Human Intelligence Layer. Google tried it with co-op but its not the way for sure. Success is not guaranteed else it won’t have been so interesting. Lets see. Adsense and Adwords (similar feature) to have the distributed Human Intelligence layer. Its going to be fun.
and forced shopping call) and Navartna Oil massage. Shopping went really horrible as we were trying to buy something different for a new born baby (and some other relatives). As usual we were late for shopping and the shops were closing, could not buy the wanted items. We managed to shop few unplanned items for our satisfaction.
