Entries from December 2006 ↓

The Starfish & The Spider

This is the title of Ori Brafman & Rod Beckstrom’s recent book. I was enthused reading about a centralized and a decentralized management system.What I enjoyed most was the characteristic of a catalyst!

I include herewith a brief summary of the book which should wet your appetite to reading the book.The path line and experiences of both authors is very interesting too.
A spider is a creature with eight legs coming out of a central body. It
has a tiny head and usually eight eyes. If you chop off the spider’s head, it
dies. That’s exactly what happens with a centralized organization. A centralized
organization has a clear leader who’s in charge, and there’s a specific
place where decisions are made. Get rid of the leader and you paralyze
the organization.
A decentralized organization is a different animal –– it is actually a
starfish. At first glance, a starfish is similar to a spider in appearance. But
the starfish is decentralized. The starfish doesn’t have a head. The major
organs are replicated throughout each and every arm. In reality, a starfish
is a neural network –– basically a network of cells. Instead of having a
head, like a spider, the starfish functions as a decentralized network.
In The Starfish and the Spider, Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom
address the fundamental differences between the starfish organization and
the spider organization. They demonstrate with examples why starfish organizations
are sometimes confused with spiders, how difficult it is to attack
or destroy a starfish organization and why a smart business model for the
future is a hybrid organization –– part starfish, part spider.
In addition, this summary will address:
✓ The right questions to ask when distinguishing a starfish organization
from a spider organization.
✓ The rise of successful starfish organizations, such as Skype, craigslist
and Wikipedia.
✓ The importance of circles, catalysts and ideology to the starfish
organization.
✓ The key differences between catalysts and CEOs.
✓ Specific strategies to defeat starfish organizations.
✓ Rules for living in the new world of decentralization.

Entrepreneurs might look up to take on board this type of management, which is very much in the line of today’s development network style. Wiki! Ebay!Apache!Neural networks!

Angel Guardian

moncy-guardian-angel.jpg

Ever since the departure of Marie Anne, Dr Muralidhar insisted that I have somebody with me day and night. What a service!These few days were assigned to me Moncy, a young lad who recently joined the organization.Boy of 18 years, Moncy came from Punalur of the state of Kerala. He only got another sister who is now 22years old and presently working in Kuwait as a nurse.He misses his parents being 16 hours away from home, some 600 kms afar. His Mom is the most affected of his absence as she all so often phones him on his friend’s mobile phone.She is a staunch Christian and spends daily more than 3 hours praying and reading the bible.She finds solace in Christ her Saviour. Moncy is determined to learn and be trained as a ayurveda therapist.

Meanwhile I am so pleased and pampered to have an angel guardian to look after me.

Nostalgia Photos of Mauritius

From my remote den in Mysore,I wanted to show the people I met pictures of our beautiful Mauritius. I recalled that I had in my hard disk memory through my del.icio.us tag the wonderful slide shows of my dear old friend Robert Li Pi Shan and that of Philip Lim’s and Sylviane Rochecouste’s. My public was stunned with the beauty!

Thanks to these wonderful Mauritian artists,who publish their work for the world to see,I made my night!

A Hakka in Mysore

Last night for the first night,we got a night off from our golden den. They are so caring here in IVAC when the Medical Doctor heard that we are eating out, he immediately wanted to make sure that the food that we were eating would be compatible with the diet prescribed. He also made recommendations on the type of food we should keep away from.

Through the Administrative Manager,Pramilla I got the phone number of the owner of the Chinese restaurant. I was told that they served Hakka noodles and it was ran by Indian born Chinese. I try my luck and got Mr.Yung on the telephone.I struck gold, Mr. Yung spoken Moyen hak, my mother tongue. He immediately told me that he would prepare food for home Hakka eating. Yoopi! that made my day. He had red rice(tsao) ginger chicken soup, followed by a pork dish, fish , Hakka crispy chicken and Pipangaille stir fried with chicken breast and tung choy. A feast it was!

The Indian couple who accompanied us for the occasion said that they had eaten several times at the same restaurant but never ever before they had such dishes.

I was told that the owner’s wife also ran a beauty saloon. As it is the case in India, most chinese mostly hakka oirigin were, in the past, only allowed to open businesses in leather, more precisely in cowhide and allied industries, restaurants and Beauty Saloons.

Well I would sum up and say that I felt great to have eaten this meal in Mysore and be connected to a brother of the Hakka Diaspora. 

It was also to thank Pramilla  for the kindness she extended to us, to meet her husband and finally to fete Marie Anne’s departure today to Mumbai on her way to Canada.

Wireless Internet connection in Mysore

From my chalet next to one of the sacred hill of Mysore, I am enjoying the view of the most beautiful Lathila palace against a blue sky in the background, whilst in the foreground an array of coconuts trees filled with a lush vegetation completes my panorama. Believe you me with the sound of Radio one blasting from the speakers of my laptop!This is the world on internet today!

A fortnight, ago on the advice of Dr. Tavane Krishna, I bought the services provided by Reliance Company for wireless internet connection through CDMA. The cost was an initial one time fee of INR. 5000 for the card and registration and a charge of INR 50 daily payable on monthly basis for illimited internet services. The service speed,I have experienced is faster that MyT back home although the cut off time for non utilisation seems to be very short. After a non activity of 2 hours the net connection cuts off when you are asked to reconnect.

I am really pleased to have the service on the desk in my room without having to go to the front office where internet service on ADSL at a much slower speed is offered. The savings made on international calls with the use of SKYPE is well worth it!
Out of the country but still connected with Radio One!for a couple of INR. I am happy. The BBC world service is perfect though RFI has been erratic.

Centre de Massage ayurvedique en Suisse

Marlyse Grossenbacher, who I mentioned in my blog of the 12th is now spending more time at the centre to deepen her knowledge in Ayurveda massage and treatments. She is a very well versed lady in the subject and has studies years  to tune her up to run a reputable centre in Switzerland, not so many of its kind!Her web site is well worth a visit. I found  that the Vedic chanting  provided thereon  to be exceptionally soothing for relaxation and meditation. Bravo Marlyse!Marie Anne got to know her a little better. “Marlyse degage un air de serenite!”
Her set up in Switzerland is in association with the well known French institution dispensing Ayurvedic treatment in Normandie and Paris directed by Kiran Vyas who has published several books in french on Yoga and related subject.

Dr Muralidhar

Through the weeks, my daily encounter with the chief medical officer got me to know him a little bit better. A person of some 50 years of age, he has been practicing ayurvedic medicine for many years, after having qualified as a doctor. He has been blessed with 2 children, a boy and a girl, who are already in their early twenties and starting up their professional lives.

He is a very dedicated doctor, well known in this province of Karnataka. Before taking up his present position, he had been a professor of ayurvedic medecine in various institutes and tought at the ayurveda training school. One of his hobby is to perform as a vocalist in Karnatak classical music. Indeed, a man of many talents! I was struck by his great modesty,knowledge,kindness and understanding of people. He is jovial, warm and affectionate. What drives him is to get the best out of people, and he’s always listening, to improve himself and the others. I had the opportunity to listen to the weekly lectures that he gives to guests on ayurveda.  His demeanor was very much that of a university professor, where timing, precision  and  imparting of knowledge were of essence. I, and most of the people present really enjoyed the 30 mins talk where unusual eastern concepts were made simple to us westerners. I have now a better knowledge of vata, pitta and kapha.

Guests at IVAC

We are now in our 3rd week of stay at IVAC Mysore.  Judging by the amount of people we have met, it would appear that this centre is one of the choicest of its kind. We understand that it is featured as a premium ayurvedic centre in the Lonely Planet and other tourist guides. Marlise, who is herself a proud owner of an ayurvedic centre in Switzerland, agrees with us that the quality of cure given by the centre is outstanding, compared to those she had experienced elsewhere in India, where she has travelled extensively.  This morning, we got an email from Eric, another Swiss, with whom we exchanged during the last week. The owner of a lithographic company, he told us that he arrived home near Geneva safely, happy and refreshed from his Indian escapade. We had a chance to meet a flamboyant Catalan wonderful lady. Mind you, she is a great Barcelona football fan, as she works for  FC Barcelone! Just imagine to be in Mysore and to talk about Ronaldo and Ronaldino and european football!  Last night, Marie Anne had to pull me from the dinner table, as I was engaged in a very interesting conversation with my neighbours, an Italian couple, who live in Venice. He was a very well known businessman, who was the president of the the association of industrialists in his city. The conversation was about Italian culinary likes and dislikes. He told us how he loves Ravi Shankar who gave a concert 200 meters away from his home! Yes, the world is becoming a small village!

Until then, we shall have more stories of wonderful people that we are meeting.

Reverence to God

During the past week ending on Friday, I underwent for 7 days a very special treatment practised by Ayurvedic specialists from Onkola, which is a village in the far north of Karnataka state near Goa, on persons in my condition. I am back to a normal diet today having only lost 1.5 kilos, after being fed only on rice and mung Dhal water and no solid.

I really enjoyed this morning the papaya, doss (Indian salty crispy wafers) and stir fried broken wheat with vegetables. A very festive meal for me.

A particular aspect which impressed me most was the constant prayer to God by the therapists before every treatment. During their prayer, looking at them, and hearing them sing the prayer, I could sense their deep reverence to God as God-fearing people.

Is it particular to these people of the centre, is it because they have been trained this way, is it part of ayurveda treatment which combines body, mind and soul?

I had a similar experience way back in 1996, when I visited the Madras, now Chennai, airport set up of the budding of Jet Airways, the most prestigious Indian airline for the present. Already in those days, each shift of staff taking up their duty, would get together as a team and hold hands to pray God to help them in their tour of duty. Thereafter, they would religiously recite the company’s mission statement as a mantra. The supervising manager would then ask each one what is the particular point he would watch out for the day. In turn, each individual will come up with his main objective for the day. Though I did not see first hand the break up of the shift, I was told similar ritual took place, where they all got together again to thank God for their work and would in turn, tell the assembly whether they succeeded in attaining the objective which they l have set out to accomplish.

I am in awe with such reverence to God and to the living up to their mission. This might be a lesson to learn from.

Bravo CMT!

I’ve been reading the Mauritian newspapers the last few days, wherein was reported the wonderful story of CMT and more importantly, the challenge they are taking on to become the 10 biggest textile companies of the world! Hats off to Francois Woo and his team for what they have achieved from humble beginnings in St Pierre to the notoriety they have risen to.

The vision of the CMT team to look forward to play in the world class field and to equip their factories with state of the art machineries and to  train the whole of the  personnel to meet the challenges of tomorrow. Isn’t it a lesson to learn from? What better proof of entrepreneurship?

I wish them big success they deserve.