[Psychodementia]

Story so far.....

I apologize for not putting up the minutes of the meeting we had on Saturday. Basically, we had a very productive meeting on Saturday brainstorming on all the facets of the idea just like any Bschool project or a corporate project. We (Saikat, Aditi, Amol, Vishwas, Mitesh and Mrs.PsychoD) came up with some next steps and some generic plan on how to go about the entire business.

Whats up next.......

Expect a slightly longer mail later today where I will articulate what all came out of the meeting. We are still in the process for crystallizing the idea. It is a great time for people to come in and chip in with what could be the begining of an exciting journey. The meetings will be short and crisp and be run on absolute corporate style

We will meet again this week but the date and time needs to be finalized*

Arun

* I have joined Princeton Review as a GMAT tutor and my faculty training workshop begins this Friday for 3 days - till Sunday from 10am to 5pm :(

[Psychodementia]

Originally Posted by morbidkk

@psycho is this on the same lines of resolvequery.com???

The Sundeep Tiberwal thing ? Nope !! This is totally different.

The idea is to have a set of mentors and a set of people who need that mentorship and pair them off. You just have a couple of people who monitor each "relationship" to check for things going in the right direction. Simple as that !!

Now this is an association, a relationship that transcends just reaching out for information. For example, how would a CAT aspirant like to have someone who had a 100%ile BLACKI record ? Would he go to him to get specific questions solved ? Absolutely not. That can be done by posting on PG or say asking his/her TIME/CL/CF/IMS faculty. The questions could be of the nature "How to increase my attempts in quant, everytime I get stuck in at around 10 attempts" or "I always get a poor accuracy in RC, how to improve that" or "Is my study plan good enough" etc. etc. Then maybe for the GD-PI you would ask him stuff like "What would they be looking for" or "Can you take a mock PI for me ?" etc. And once into an IIM, your questions might shift to studies. Then eventually to jobs and campus placements. Get the gist ?

Along similar lines, the same analogy can be extended to any career path you can think of. From music to sports to what not.

Feel free to ask anything about the idea !!

Arun

[morbidkk]

Originally Posted by psycho

I have joined Princeton Review as a GMAT tutor and my faculty training workshop begins this Friday for 3 days - till Sunday from 10am to 5pm

please reflect that on askpsycho blog also ..waiting for that

abt new initiative hmm am on the other side (need mentorship for time management and stick-to-itiveness to work )

[smartkid]

Psychodementia... MOM for earlier meet and sir.. did you guys meet this weekend ?

[omkar]

got my mail

Omkar

[pande_inc]

folks,
sorry for noticing this thread after ur meets.. update us/PM me.. would definitely contribute in some way.. hope to hear from you.

// Nikhil

[rashmi gupta]

Originally Posted by Psychodementia

Questions asked by an "Unknown Indian" (UI) (with no relation to a novel by the same name by Nirad C Choudhary - just some blatant plagiarism ala' Kavya Vishwanathan style) and answered by a charged up character who goes by the name "Rang De Basanti" (RDB) (apparently moved after seeing the movie - moved by the fact that a country lout like DJ can get a girl like Sue)


UI: Bangalore is the hub of IT, the knowledge-centric city, yet the involvement of people, especially in IT, towards social causes is appalling. These are the best-of-the-breed people who have put India on the world map. Yet, they seem so oblivious to changing things around them. We cannot always get a Cambridge educated, daughter of Oxford Univ president to effect a change. Err.......can we?

RDB: It would be great to have Sue, or even a Rakhi Sawant for that matter. But on a more serious note here are the reasons:

(a) After a typical 50-60 hour work week people do not want to travel another few hours in the traffic to go to an NGO or any other place to help out people. Its more important to unwind for the long week ahead, or spent some quality time with friends and family (read as drink beer).

(b) Its hard to see something concrete happening. Most of the "events" are transaction oriented. You raise money or create awareness for a cause without seeing the tangible benefits behind it. Where did the 1000 bucks you put for the good cause of tsunami relief eventually reach ? What is the measurable success you saw after the hours of work you put in for a road safety campaign last year ? Being in IT, the guys want to touch-and-feel the end effect. Even if it does not work. We believe in metrics. Long live project management !

(c) Its not sustainable. The moment project work gets the better of us, we generally drop out. Then it becomes embarrassing to refuse each time. And before you know, and when your bandwidth to contribute increases, its harder to make a come-back to the cause, than Saurav Ganguly coming back to the Indian team (I can see DG shouting Sack-him Tendulkar).

UI: Cool ! So how does one achieve something which (a) easy-to-do in terms of time and travel (b) can see change for one-self and (c) requires no specific time-commitments and hence is flexible

RDB: What is needed is a radically different solution to the whole issue by involving these people to contribute in the ease and convenience of their homes. Occasionally meeting up at MGRoad. Or maybe talking on their cell-phones.

UI: Hmm.........what is it?

RDB: Mentorship!! Everyone has gone through a phase in their life when they were lost and did not know what to do. Times when they needed advice, support or additional information, but didn't know who to go to. I'm sure you too felt that way at some point.

UI: Well, ........err.......there was this girl and.........I read a book by Alex Comfort to know about it.

RDB: No, no UI. I don't think you quite got it. I meant in terms of your professional career. Someone who was a sounding board for all your ideas. Someone who gave you food for thought. Someone who could point out to resources from his personal network. Someone who was always there whenever you had any doubt.

UI: Yea, I can see what you mean. When I was in second year college, I wanted to be in the IAS. We had a neighbourhood bhaiyya who was preparing for his civil services. He explained a lot of things about what I could do to be on the straight and narrow.

RDB: Eggjaactly !! And how much time, money and effort did he devote towards helping you.

UI: Frankly not much. I used to meet him at Ramu's paan shop when he came for his post-dinner smoke, before hitting the books in what was apparently a long night ahead.

RDB: See what I mean ? The neighbourhood bhaiyya probably helped a lot more than if he had forsaken his studies and gone out of his way to teach in a school.

UI: I see what you mean. You are saying you want to start a mentorship program. Where there are a set of mentors and a set of mentos.......ahem I mean people who "need to be mentored".

RDB: Perfect. I could not have put it in a better way.

UI: So who can be a mentor?

RDB: Do you have specific expertise in any domain - any field? Do you think you have skills that can be helpful to others? Do you often find yourself being asked for or giving advice? Do you enjoy sharing your knowledge with people? Did you gather valuable information for years - which can be shared with and save other people precious time, energy and costly mistakes? Are you able to inspire, motivate, encourage and uplift others?
If your answer is YES to the above question then you are eligible.

UI: What about those who want to be mentored ?

RDB: Ideally, the only qualification is the person should have a geniune interest in being more successful, efficient and competent in life. Having said that, there are a lot of things which need to be thrashed out before that happens.

UI: Great, but what is the name of the organization ? How do I join it ?

RDB: I need every ones support to make this come into a reality. Come join me at Barrista on MGRoad at 3pm on Saturday.
PS: Coffee is *not* on me thought: mg:

UI: Sure, but what if I cannot make it then or if I have any additional questions before I come?

RDB: Shoot me a mail, PM me, post on this thread. If you have my number - call me.

UI: One last question - can I expect any pretty girls to be there ?

RDB: Interview over.

hi..can i have ur mail id..

[pande_inc]

hi, emailed you .. // Nikhil

[fera]

i just noticed the thread,can anybody please let me know the next happening on the lines of 6th may, i hope i can participate this time

[akhilkom]

Hi guys, am pretty new to the group , and I really really wanna participate in CS activities in Bangalore......tell me about your activities and how I can contribute ?