Steve Blank: Launching a start-up and having a family life

It is a hard balance that many of us need to struggle with. Working in a start-up and having a good family life seem to be poles apart. One of my favorite business school professors, Steve Blank published this piece today on VentureBeat. The permalink seems to be broken so I am repeating some of [...]

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TED Commandments

Nipun wrote about what makes TED talks tick. What is it about these talks that makes all of them resonate so deeply? What makes them so consistently good?

Thou shalt not simply trot out thy usual shtick
Thou shalt dream a great dream, or show forth a wondrous new thing, or share something thou hast never shared [...]

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Elegant organization

I loved this short story about Mark Zuckerberg and how to “start” communities. [Taken from "What would Google do?"]
The scene was the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum International Media Council in Davos, Switzerland, as the head of a powerful news organization begged young Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, for his secret. Please, the [...]

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Get to know yourself

What a moment for America! Obama is the 44th president of the USA. A great inaugural speech by Obama which touches everyone on this planet.
One of the readers of Andrew Sullivan’s blog writes about the difficulty that the comedians have in mocking Obama. Interesting read particularly this line – “Obama has the realness that comes [...]

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Gandhian Mindset

What constitutes Gandhian Mindset. I found these words and had to capture them in a brief post. These summarize Gandhian Mindset very well -

Keen observation
Selflessness
Patient Determination
In-Sync Emotions
Critical Thinking
Decisive Persistence

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We Win or We Perish

This is an interesting short-story that gives a perspective for entrepreneurs’ risk taking abilities. 
A long while ago, a great warrior faced a situation which made it necessary for him to make a decision which insured his success on the battlefield. He was about to send his armies against a powerful foe, whose men outnumbered his [...]

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Interview with Bill George (Author of “True North”)

I interviewed Bill George, author of best-seller books “Authentic Leadership” and “True North”. Bill is not just a great author and a leader himself, he is a wonderful coach and a teacher too. Here are the excerpts of this brief interview -
Hitesh: What is “True North” and how does it apply in the context of a business student or [...]

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The MONK and the MONKey

I read Randy Komisar’s “The Monk and the Riddle“. I just could not stop when I started reading it. By the time I finished reading it, the clock struck 4 AM. I think it was a night well spent.
Randy Komisar is a Venture Capitalist with Kleiner Perkins. This book tells Randy’s evolution (thus the word [...]

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Gates and Jobs: Great Show

Gates and Jobs shared a stage and it was quite a show (better than a Bollywood thriller).

One thing that is quickly evident from this – Jobs comes across as a person who still has a lot to prove while Gates looks deeply satisfied like a Sadhu. While Gates looks like entering Sanyas , Jobs is [...]

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My Creative Journey: Part 3

Here is the third post in my series of sketches. The first one was the view from my patio and the second one was Baby Hanuman. This one is a flower vase that I sketched just before it was broken by accident. It was good that I captured it in some form before we lost [...]

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My Evolution As A Sketcher – Part 2

Here is the next sketch that I tried. This is the second one in my series of posted sketches – first one was a view from my patio. This one is a Baby Hauman sketch based on Indian animation film Hanuman. Pardon some of the shade which is because of scanner issues. More sketches to [...]

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My Evolution As A Sketcher

I recently started sketching again (after 18 years). It had been a great experience.
Here is one of the first sketches that I came up with. It is a view from the patio of my townhouse in the University Village. I know it is far from perfect. It is a beginning (restart actually). I will post [...]

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Happiness: How To Find It?

HAPPINESS – It is the single most important goal of human life. All our actions could be traced to “seeking happiness”. While happiness is so important and sought after, it is not properly understood. There is a huge element of subjectivity involved and that makes it hard to define, measure, monitor and fix.
 Uncertain Future: Our [...]

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Harmony in Decision Making and Happiness

We make so many decisions everyday, ranging from as simple as which brand of coffee to drink to as significant decisions as whether to use nuclear weapons against Japan.
How do we make these decisions? What is our personal compass that we use to navigate through this web of decisions? And, Is that compass directing us [...]

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How green is my purchase?

When we ask this question about “How green is this purchase of mine?” – Remember this -
There are no passengers on spaceship earth. We are all crew.

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Discipline fosters creativity

Popular Belief: Discipline hinders creativity.
Reverse: Discipline fosters creativity.

The most prevalent way to depict creativity is Einstein’s photo with his shabby hairstyle and chaotic looks. Creativity does not always come packaged as this confused picture. The other well-behaved gentleman shown above is C.V. Raman – another physics Nobel Prize winner. It is a different face of [...]

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