Credibility

I am picking out a very interesting discussion from my Group for an open discussion on our blog.

" What do you answer when a Customer asks this?

How can you commit quality of your service/product when your company is only a month old?

How do you setup your company's credibility in front of a prospective customer, when your company is only a month old and that customer is the first for any given particular industry vertical? "

A few suggestions that came up during that discussion were...

• Let them know you are knowledgale, but you will also do your homework if you dont have the right answer
• Ask for small projects and grow the business with time.
• Strong professional collateral illustrating your products/services benefits and value added preposition.
• Strong sales people who know how to approach prospects, preferrablly with a strong network of contacts and knowledge to the industry specific area you are trying to pentrate, (that will involve serious recruiting efforts or headhunting for at least one or two persons depends on your sales target quota, adding to them at least 1 presales engineer)
• A good product/service that can be positioned in a focused market and has a roadmap that will continue to enhance its benefits inreturn for a reasonable after sales expense the customer will bear later on.
• Market positioning in terms of pricing. if you want to compete, and already have a strong competiton in that specific industry focus, I suggest starting off with small and medium size companies whom are in demand for the product/services you have but are price sensitive to bigger brand names. Thus you would consider targeting the SME with a reasonable price range, target, sell and implement, provide high quality of service and then start expanding to target larger enterprises after you have accumulated the required experience and customer list.

I somehow feel that these things come much later. The basic things one can do at the start are...

1. Inform your entire network of people about what you wish to achieve through this venture.
2. Inform all prospective clients on what principles you would stick by through all times.
3. Inform all prospective clients on how you propose to deliver the product/ service and what milestones to expect in what time frame
4. Ensure complete transparency in all transactions with the prospective client.

At the end of the day the values a business can be built on remain constant...honesty, integrity, trust, quality, people, customers...

What do you guys think...

Six questions for Dr. Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi - L K Advani

I have six questions for the Prime Minister and the Congress president on internal security. The people of India deserve answers to these questions because accountability is the cornerstone of democratic governance.

• Although the Union Home Minister and Maharashtra’s Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister were sacrificed after 26/11, why has no commission of inquiry been set up to probe all aspects of the Mumbai terror attacks? The BJP demands a high-level judicial inquiry that will not only unearth what went wrong but also recommend ways of preventing recurrence of such attacks.

• If the Union Home Minister was removed for incompetence, at whose behest was he retained in that crucial post for four and a half years?

• In the aftermath of 26/11, senior members of the UPA Governments made statements to the effect that “all options are open” in dealing with Pakistan. Why has the Government not used even the mildest of diplomatic options in the past two months to make Islamabad feel the heat for sponsoring terrorism? And why are senior representatives of the Government speaking in multiple voices on Pakistan?

• The UPA Government enacted two anti-terror laws in the wake of the Mumbai terror attacks. The BJP readily supported their passage in Parliament, even though the Congress had stoutly opposed the enactment of POTA in 2002. Will the Prime Minister show the honesty to admit to the nation that it was wrong on the part of his Government to have doggedly maintained for the first four and a half years that no special anti-terror laws were needed and that existing laws were adequate to deal with the menace? And will the Congress president have the honesty to accept that opposition to POTA in 2002 was wrong?

• Now that the term of the UPA Government is coming to an end, will the Prime Minister tell the nation why his Government chose not to implement the Supreme Court’s decision upholding the death sentence on Afzal Guru, the mastermind of the terrorist attack on Parliament? In this context, let me assure the people that a future NDA Government, if elected to power, will recommend Afzal Guru’s execution to the President within the first 100 days. Here is our warning to the merchants of death and their sponsors: “We shall follow a zero-tolerance and zero-compromise approach to dealing with terrorism.”

• Why did the UPA Government deliberately and contemptuously disregard the Supreme Court’s directive with regard to enacting an effective law to curb the influx of Bangladeshis into Assam and other states, which the apex court described as “external aggression”? A future NDA Government will lose no time to implement the apex court’s directive and thereby safeguard the unity and security of India on the eastern front.

Lets Blog Business Development/ Sales

Guys

Lets start blogging articles on Sales/ Biz Dev/ Market Research, etc. You'll can join my group Business Development on Linkedin too. Nice discussions. A snapshot of them...

How do you sell technology at the 'C' Level?

Are you good at Cold Calling? Share your Style and Successes!

What do you consider to be the top 4 or 5 basic steps of any sales process?

The group can be accessed on the following link...

http://www.linkedin.com/groups?about=&gid=25005&trk=anet_ug_grppro

Surjit Nath in his Original Avtar!!

guys!! Surjit was recently caught in his original professional outfit... Here's an exclusive pic just for you..!! Enjoy...

Kitne Aadmit The???

Puzzlezz (?)

Hey Guys,

Hope you all doing good!! I came across few interesting B-School Puzzles. Try and solve them. Leave your answer as comments to the post, but try and be honest!!

• 1st one:

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There is a dragon with three heads, and three tails. And hou have a sword. You can either cut 1 head or 2 head or 1 tail or 2 tails of the dragon. If you cut 1 tail, 2 new tails appear. If you cut 2 tails, one new head appears. If you cut 1 head, one new head appears. And if you cut 2 heads, nothing appears. So in minimum how many strikes can you kill the dragon i.e. cut all its heads and tails.
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• 2nd one:

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Emily writes a list of 10 numbers less than 100. Her list contains number in ascending order (i.e. smaller number appears before the greater one). Few other peculiarities of her list are: The difference between any two adjacent number is also a number in the list and when these number written in words, the total number of alphabets in each number is also is in increasing order. (i.e to say if the previous number has 3 alphabets in its word form, (eg number '2'), then the next number has more than 3 alphabets in its word form.)

Find the sum of all the 10 numbers of the list that Emily has!!
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Well dats two for now. Have one more but for that will have to make a small pictorial presentation, so will add that in this one soon!! Till then try and solve them, especially the second one, which is quite challenging..

Commomwealth Youth Games 2008

Hi All,

This is a great time for all the sports lovers across the company as one of the biggest extravaganza is happening in Pune and that too just couple of miles away from the office. There are about 71 countries participating with a total strength of 1200 athletes. The beautification work done for the games is really good as the main route for the Chatrapati Shivaji Sports Complex passes from the road below the office. However the matter of concern is that "IS THIS GONNO BE MAINTAINED AFTER THE GAMES". Please let me know your views on the same. Hope to see you all at the games.......

Regards,

Sarvesh.

Smoking ban in the office......!!!!!

Hi All,

According to the Government of India , the smoking ban in public places is appreciable. I guess we should have taken this decision out of personal interest. However I am sure there will be people who oppose the very decision of banning smoking in public places, as rightly said by one of my friend, "I have been smoking for 11 years and my parents dint find it out, how on earth will the administration catch me". I have also figured out few more problems to this ban like lot of people will find alternate places like roads, terraces, toilets etc. How will we take care of cleaning and maintaining these properties.

Lets me know your views on the same.

QED Community on Orkut

For all you ardent (and not so ardent) fans of Orkut..please visit and join my QED Community: http://www.orkut.co.in/Community.aspx?cmm=14548011

And here is one created by good 'ol Nilay:
http://www.orkut.co.in/Community.aspx?cmm=29955812

Cheers,
Yadu

QED's Kerala Samaj Community

Hey Guys,

Do you all have any idea that in our QED, a new Kerala Samaj is being formed. This samaj thinks they are in majority and are now looking for members. It has already got 6 members with Santosh, Research Team Head, leading it and are expecting more from rest QEDians. So if any one interested get to him or other members of this Keral Samaj.

In order to compete Shri Sir has also announced Marwadi-Gujarati Bhai Bhai Samaj... You can even apply to this Samaj...!! [;-)]



List of members are as follows: (as per available information)

Kerala Samaj:
1. Santosh Abraham (Head Samaj Member)
2. Sheela ArunKumar
3. Suresh Nair
4. Vainu Sashi
5. Deepa SreeKumar
6. Joes


Marwari Gujarati Bhai-Bhai Samaj
1. Shri Mundada (Head Samaj Member)
2. Nilay Mehta
3. Poonam Agarwal
4. Priyesh Agrawal
5. Mukesh
6. Vishal
7. Atil Chaudhary
8. Chetas Desai
9. Satya (Converted)

Time to change our C3

With two consecutive birthdays (Gurpreet & Priyanka) and three days of consecutive Cake Cutting Ceremony (C Cube) I think most of the QEDians are now bored of cakes. Though most of the times cakes are good yet its time to be innovative and change our C3 Ceremony to something innovative. The month of August has maximum birthdays and each time cake has assumed the "same old story" format and there's nothing new in it. Infact today, even the Birthday Song seemed to be faded with people singing it for the sake of singing.

So what say QEDians?
I think best would be a Pizza Cutting Ceremony!! ;-) I don't know who get these cakes, but if our HR/Management could manage on each occasions & can get something nice as Pizza. Even if its not on each occasion we can wait for few of the birthday treats to accumulate. I don't think many of us would mind accumulating Birthday Treats and having a big bang at one go!! But in that case it is necessary to ensure that these uncelebrated birthdays are counted and recorded properly with their respective budgets.

Your Comments/Compliments are Welcomed.

Great Inventions...compliments from Ashutosh

Discoveries and Inventions by Men And Women
Men discovered COLOURS and invented PAINT,
Women discovered PAINT and invented MAKEUP.

Men discovered the WORD and invented CONVERSATION,
Women discovered CONVERSATION and invented GOSSIP.

Men discovered GAMBLING and invented CARDS,
Women discovered CARDS and invented WITCHERY.

Men discovered AGRICULTURE and invented FOOD,
Women discovered FOOD and invented DIET.

Men discovered FRIENDSHIP and invented LOVE,
Women discovered LOVE and invented MARRIAGE.

Men discovered TRADING and invented MONEY,
Women discovered MONEY and invented SHOPPING.

Thereafter Men have discovered and invented a lot of things...
While Women STUCK to shopping.

Research Cell Outing..!

Here are few pics of Research cell outing...

Theme Friday (Flier)

Relate yourself - With best wishes from Girish...

Hi All,

Work is like that.............

There are 2 people always next to you:

1 - The (Manager), smiling pleasantly to hide evil intentions!

2 - The (Team Leader), busy figuring out what work to dump on you next.....

And, there's YOU, who struggles with it all!

The perfect picture is given below

Wats ur Theme..??

Hey Guys,

Theme Friday is very near(22nd Aug).. And I ve yet not seen any theme pouring in. Come on guys be a sport and post your idea for this Theme Friday. I am looking forward for a great fun this time too. So better than cribbing later for not being able to arrange costume or clothes for this time's theme, its your time to grab the Theme and define it according to your feasibility.

I am fully charged and excited about this coming Theme Friday, hoping the same from you... Its just a week away, guys...!!

Lets set the mood to rock..!!!

Indian Triumph - To all my people

On the 11th August 2008 we witnessed something which is a rare sight in Indian Sport. A billion strong nation got its much awaited chance to rejoice when Abhinav Bindra shot his way to a OLYMPIC GOLD Medal at Beijing, China. The shooter who also holds an MBA degree and is a CEO of a small set up was composed while he was honored. The best part came when the TRICOLOR was unfurled amidst thunderous applause and the National Anthem theme was played in the background.

We have been criticizing our sporting infrastructure and lack of ability of our people to bring back medals but today we need to cast this pessimism deep into the ocean and celebrate. Savor this moment because a champion- AN INDIAN CHAMPION has proved his mettle at the worlds greatest sporting extravaganza. Too little one might argue ,but too significant to be missed. This might well be a breakthrough for a nation starved of real heroes or may be not. What we should celebrate is the spirit and the recognition it brings. Henceforth 10m air rifle shooting will be a well known sport. I am sure everybody remembers double trap shooting.

While we can be proud of our achievement(Abhinav's achievement) spare a thought for those fine men who are playing for people who don't know them, for a nation which for the most part considers their sport far too insignificant. Most of them come from the so called poorer sections of our society and they are trying to beckon in glory. One fine day they will. As a nation we need to throw our weight behind this men and back them to the hilt. They are crying to be watched, be cheered. Lets try and give them their worth. Sport has the uncanny ability to arouse and unite nations. Sport moves people so lets move. I am sure INDIA will get more shots at glory with passing time and such phenomenal efforts.

As a matter of fact this is our first individual OLYMPIC Gold medal. The nation can preserve this moment for a long long time. Celebrate, Dance, Sing and Win. Congratulations!!!

Ten trends Indian IT services cos must catch

Sarvesh had sent across this link to us a few days ago..but for those who missed it:

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Infotech/articlelist/quickiearticleshow/3215674.cms

If you check Trend #8, Language skills will decide who walks away with biz...it says that Indians need to up their language skills to stay ahead of the game. So guys, start learning German, French, Spanish, Italian (the latter 3 are pretty similar anyways). Other good options are Japanese, Chinese and Mandarin. Middle East is emerging as a financial & banking hub, so would be a good idea to try out Arabic too.

For in-house resources, we have experts (ahem!!) in German, French and a bit of Arabic...

Excel Trainer...!

After a week's excitement and fears, the final Day to conduct Excel Training for my Research Cell, came up today. Before going further I want to thank all those who attended it, for bearing up with me that too for one and half hour (or probably more than that).

Wow, its hard to believe that I conducted a training session. I am not a trainer, I can communicate effectively, I can motivate people, I can guide, I can write these long blogs but never thought would be able to do training. But at the end it was nice experience. I believed I did it quite well. The feedback was satisfying but more than that if my training does any value addition in my audience's day to day work, I ll b more happier. Anyways the feeling before the training was very tensed. And I was preparing my material on training since the time I came in office. How I wished that somehow the session could be postponed to next week. However in less than 2 hours I hardly prepared all my training material. I thought that it wont last for anything more than half hour but then it lasted for more than one and half hours.

Wondering how did I end up conducting a training session?

Well it all started with our Research Bay requesting for a proper Excel Training to Shri Sir. And me being the Macro Man(command in Excel) in the team, Shri Sir requested me to conduct this training. Initially it was decided that it will be jointly conducted by me and Shri Sir, as positively we both have somewhat more knowledge of Excel. But gradually Shri Sir got off from the entire training, putting it up to me to conduct it all. Well if you are thinking I am an Excel Geek, then let me tell it very frankly that I am not. I somehow managed to save my soul.

Well I think I ll be conducting more of such sessions in coming weeks. Its a very mixed feeling as yet the fear factor of conducting training prevails and also the success of today's session inspires to go ahead. At the present moment I feel next time I will try and prepare the module a week in advance. So that on the day of training I don't wish to postpone it.

Thanks to Yashaswini, Zabhia, Pawan, Santosh Bhagwant and Research Bay for your encouragement, please do leave me your comments, feedbacks, compliments in comments of this blog. Would definitely want to hear your inputs about the session.

Suddenly Something..!!

Hi friends,

Today in lunch room, at dinner time, Yadu and I were discussing about how most of us at QED have few common set of ideas about things and still we lack communication and concrete efforts.
She with few others were discussing with Gurpreet the idea about some interactive forum kind of thing to communicate with colleagues and simultaneously I was also asking Shri Sir to implement Forum on our server to enable internal sharing of ideas. But however due to technical limitation of server Shri sir could not start forum and incidently this cool idea about group Blogging stuck me. And I believe its a cool idea to be in touch and share everything about you and yourself. Anyways the point I was trying to convey is there is a need to express our ideas, thoughts about our work place. If all of them tapped correctly at right time with proper reasoning can probably lead to worth improvements in our office.

Now I think we have got the right platform all is required is effort. Effort to discuss and effort to lead. Keep rolling guys!! QED is a good place to workin, lets make it BEST!!

Wacky Title Needed..!

Hi,

I am glad that you liked this idea, I was very skeptical about it though. I somehow managed to create this blog site in a hurry. But now as you have liked the whole idea, please suggest some wacky title for the blog site. I suggest do not write a new blog for it, but post it in comments for this post, and later after a week we can create a poll to take consensus.

Also I forgot to mention in my last post that as I don't have email ids of all our colleagues please do promote it as much as you can by inviting or mailing your pals about this blog.

Please go to settings for the blog and go to Permissions to invite directly.

In case of any permissions or requests any one can contact Me at priyesh.agrawal@qedbaton.com

I hope you keep blogging and make this place an interesting one.

Regards