The pain of "Accedd Denied !!!" is all to well know to employees of companies who are paranoid about security and who like to monitor the movements of the employees. These companies believe that restricting an employee from a few handful of sites is the best thing it can do to increase productivity.
Productivity ! - Well here is an oft used word. I am not sure the employees actually know the meaning of it. Like all that is said about convincing a person here to the Carrot and the Stick ideology will hold. How can a persons productivity incerase. The first method is to understand at an employee level what is his most cherished thing and what will he get out of the same. It could be Modey , Big bonus, travel , lax work timings , the role responsibility he is looking for. But who decides what is fair and what is implementable. Well a manager could try to employee better and accordingly put it across and get it implemented. Because if a person dosent get whats he believes he is ment to have then in effect he becomes a process runner and productivity gets affected.
Hence let the person be free. See what really drives a person .Instead of denying access to certain websites track usage on what are the type of sites he is visiting or keeping open for a long time. This could give a topic of conversation to managers and could also make them more atuned to the subordinates. But the eternal question remains that what do you do with a gamer ? i.e. a person who is clever /intutive enough to understand the system and then play it towards his advantage. Ahh! but this to is an indicator to what the person wantes. Hence dont Deny access.
Access Granted ! Proceed with caution.!
HR Tips - woah i should be involved wit hsome of this non-implementables.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Monday, February 05, 2007
Car Hunting - New Vs Old ??
Today after a long break i an my brother decided to do some car hunting. Well the initial thinking was that we would like to look at an old 2nd hand vehicle and then resell / trash it after 2 years of usage.
Following the thought we visited several 2nd hand car vendors around the indiranagar area. Visited 1 in CMH road, 1 in 100ft road , 1 in Old madras road and 1 in Double road. We found that the bangalore market has a thriving 2nd hand car market base, if you have 4-5 prospering vendors in a 2 kms radius then the scene for the new car market should be really good.
Comming back to the car itself. I had test driven a Honda city a few days earlier was good but done quite a few kilometers. Then yesterday i had a look in at a Cielo . The cielo was in great shpe looks wise and the ride was also reasonably comfortable but the thought that it may crash anytime was in our minds. The greatest motivator was the cost of the vehicle, at sub-1 lakh unbelievable. This apart from the numerous indicas and santros we rejected. Didnt even look at the smaller varieties of Santro.
We then were by then quite exhausted by the older cars. We then went to the Maruthi showroom and Test drove both the New Zen Estilo and the Wagon R . The drive quality and ambience of the Estillo was far greater , but it seemed that the Wagon-R may have more space in-car. We the most negative aspect of both the offerings was the on-road cost, at greater than 4 Lakhs for the LXi they were pretty expensive. But i guess that is the market premium for a trouble free vehicle for atleast 5 years.
Depreciation. The greatest enemy of a new car is the depreciation. You tend to loose upward of a lakh in a year and after 2 years babout 1.3 lakh for a 4 lakh car i.e 35 % of its value. The cost of the music system and other accessories aspect of the car have not even come in.
Cost of ownership of a new car (not considering Interest of any loan that you might take).
1.3 lakhs - depreciation
0.1 lakhs - Maintainance
0.1 Lakhs - 2nd year insurance
0.1 lakh - loss in value of accessories
--------
1.6 lakhs - for a 24 month period
--------
i.e 6700 rs / - per month apart from the petrol cost. i.e. a high percent of your monthly salary. Will need to throw in an additional 3000rs for the petrol that you will use.
So a 10,000/- per month of usage of car is a relistic estimate.
Well not lets look at getting a beat up Cielo (hoping it works)
Cost 100,000 rs. + 20,000 Maintainance + 10,000 sundry expence (old car na)
resale value - locky if you get a buyer. ha ha. But junk value at least say 30000rs. So you spend nearly 4000/- p.m. if you scrap it after 2 years. Well might as well use it till it lasts.
Cost of fuel may work out to a little more , but if you have gas the same.
so you are capping your expense at arond 7000/- Rs p.m. considering decent driving.
Quality of ride and other aspects:
- The new car being new will feel great.
- But the space is lesser and cannot have an option of a driver in the future.
- The accelaration and feel of a new car will definately be good. The old car will be a little sluggish
- The boot of an old big car cannot be reached.
- Manuverability of the smaller car is much better but the Power stearing (ps) of the old car will compensate for it in some measure.
- finally the peace and assurity of working of a new car. The main reason for paying the premium.
There is another interesting twist to the whole cost and pricing aspect of the vehichle that can change the dynamics on the head. The "depreciation" benifits of a self employed person. If you can charge of 40% of the value of the vehicle as expense and in a5 year period get backthe entire cost of the vehicle as expence including the cost of running it. Then you get a 30.2% benifit on the entire cost by way of saving s on tax. Hence a 4 lakh car will cost 2.7 laks. That change the entire cost landscape.
now:
cost of new vehicle Rs 7000 / -(effective) = cost of old vehicle rs 7000/- (assuming nbo depreciation allowed as the vehicle is already 7 years of old. , will have to look into the IT rile book for the same.)
Well the decition is finally at the same place.
i.e. Cost (downpayment + ownership) VS Comfort (size + ease of use)
Am yet to decide if you can get closer to yours that will be great.
Following the thought we visited several 2nd hand car vendors around the indiranagar area. Visited 1 in CMH road, 1 in 100ft road , 1 in Old madras road and 1 in Double road. We found that the bangalore market has a thriving 2nd hand car market base, if you have 4-5 prospering vendors in a 2 kms radius then the scene for the new car market should be really good.
Comming back to the car itself. I had test driven a Honda city a few days earlier was good but done quite a few kilometers. Then yesterday i had a look in at a Cielo . The cielo was in great shpe looks wise and the ride was also reasonably comfortable but the thought that it may crash anytime was in our minds. The greatest motivator was the cost of the vehicle, at sub-1 lakh unbelievable. This apart from the numerous indicas and santros we rejected. Didnt even look at the smaller varieties of Santro.
We then were by then quite exhausted by the older cars. We then went to the Maruthi showroom and Test drove both the New Zen Estilo and the Wagon R . The drive quality and ambience of the Estillo was far greater , but it seemed that the Wagon-R may have more space in-car. We the most negative aspect of both the offerings was the on-road cost, at greater than 4 Lakhs for the LXi they were pretty expensive. But i guess that is the market premium for a trouble free vehicle for atleast 5 years.
Depreciation. The greatest enemy of a new car is the depreciation. You tend to loose upward of a lakh in a year and after 2 years babout 1.3 lakh for a 4 lakh car i.e 35 % of its value. The cost of the music system and other accessories aspect of the car have not even come in.
Cost of ownership of a new car (not considering Interest of any loan that you might take).
1.3 lakhs - depreciation
0.1 lakhs - Maintainance
0.1 Lakhs - 2nd year insurance
0.1 lakh - loss in value of accessories
--------
1.6 lakhs - for a 24 month period
--------
i.e 6700 rs / - per month apart from the petrol cost. i.e. a high percent of your monthly salary. Will need to throw in an additional 3000rs for the petrol that you will use.
So a 10,000/- per month of usage of car is a relistic estimate.
Well not lets look at getting a beat up Cielo (hoping it works)
Cost 100,000 rs. + 20,000 Maintainance + 10,000 sundry expence (old car na)
resale value - locky if you get a buyer. ha ha. But junk value at least say 30000rs. So you spend nearly 4000/- p.m. if you scrap it after 2 years. Well might as well use it till it lasts.
Cost of fuel may work out to a little more , but if you have gas the same.
so you are capping your expense at arond 7000/- Rs p.m. considering decent driving.
Quality of ride and other aspects:
- The new car being new will feel great.
- But the space is lesser and cannot have an option of a driver in the future.
- The accelaration and feel of a new car will definately be good. The old car will be a little sluggish
- The boot of an old big car cannot be reached.
- Manuverability of the smaller car is much better but the Power stearing (ps) of the old car will compensate for it in some measure.
- finally the peace and assurity of working of a new car. The main reason for paying the premium.
There is another interesting twist to the whole cost and pricing aspect of the vehichle that can change the dynamics on the head. The "depreciation" benifits of a self employed person. If you can charge of 40% of the value of the vehicle as expense and in a5 year period get backthe entire cost of the vehicle as expence including the cost of running it. Then you get a 30.2% benifit on the entire cost by way of saving s on tax. Hence a 4 lakh car will cost 2.7 laks. That change the entire cost landscape.
now:
cost of new vehicle Rs 7000 / -(effective) = cost of old vehicle rs 7000/- (assuming nbo depreciation allowed as the vehicle is already 7 years of old. , will have to look into the IT rile book for the same.)
Well the decition is finally at the same place.
i.e. Cost (downpayment + ownership) VS Comfort (size + ease of use)
Am yet to decide if you can get closer to yours that will be great.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Mumbai - Kaleidoscope of Relatives
28th thru 30th Jan, was a hugely eventful , tiring and an interactive experience.
Why ? What happened !! .... Well i had been to Mumbai after a gap of 5 years and was met by a plethora of relatives.
The main reason was Umesh's marraige (look at the post below) , but apart from this Amma, had come along and it was a time for networking with all the relatives , it had been a while.
Day 1 :
Myself and Ravi (bro.) flew in together to the mumbai airport. There we waited for an hour before amma and patti (we call her perrima) came along from chennai. As we stepped outside we met Radha Perrima and Ganesh (Umesh's brother , who had come all the way from london). After this closely nit gang met, we split into 2 groups , 2 taxis, and went to chembur to char ammai's home. Here Santosh (younger one) had come from his Naval classes and was asleep , we also met Geetha chitti and Ramdas. Laxmi (ramdas's wife) had cooked food for us. Rasam and keeria molakutal , was a nice change of food for me. Indira Mami from Bangalore was already present there. After all the chating we headed for Deepam, with ganesh.
At deepam we met up with Tangumani (the grooms mom) and kanna na (appa there). Also present was umeshs cousin from Chennai , Annupama, with her parents. Were chatting away. Here Umesh who was out for a friends marriage was back and we met him. Later in the day Sindhu (ganesh's wife) and Sxxxxxxxx (his daughter) came back from her chittis house and we were a full house here too.
That evening after 11 PM a small gang went to the kalyana mandapam and took care of the cleaning, kolam and other mandapam related arrangements; as it was being cleared by another party. Returned around midnight. Talked away listned to perspectives etc.. In the night spent some time on the computer sending mails and also trying to speed up the computer...
Why ? What happened !! .... Well i had been to Mumbai after a gap of 5 years and was met by a plethora of relatives.
The main reason was Umesh's marraige (look at the post below) , but apart from this Amma, had come along and it was a time for networking with all the relatives , it had been a while.
Day 1 :
Myself and Ravi (bro.) flew in together to the mumbai airport. There we waited for an hour before amma and patti (we call her perrima) came along from chennai. As we stepped outside we met Radha Perrima and Ganesh (Umesh's brother , who had come all the way from london). After this closely nit gang met, we split into 2 groups , 2 taxis, and went to chembur to char ammai's home. Here Santosh (younger one) had come from his Naval classes and was asleep , we also met Geetha chitti and Ramdas. Laxmi (ramdas's wife) had cooked food for us. Rasam and keeria molakutal , was a nice change of food for me. Indira Mami from Bangalore was already present there. After all the chating we headed for Deepam, with ganesh.
At deepam we met up with Tangumani (the grooms mom) and kanna na (appa there). Also present was umeshs cousin from Chennai , Annupama, with her parents. Were chatting away. Here Umesh who was out for a friends marriage was back and we met him. Later in the day Sindhu (ganesh's wife) and Sxxxxxxxx (his daughter) came back from her chittis house and we were a full house here too.
That evening after 11 PM a small gang went to the kalyana mandapam and took care of the cleaning, kolam and other mandapam related arrangements; as it was being cleared by another party. Returned around midnight. Talked away listned to perspectives etc.. In the night spent some time on the computer sending mails and also trying to speed up the computer...
Umesh's Marraige
Hey umesh got married. He is a cousin in Bombay always been there and seldom left the comforts of those environs. Finally met up with a colleague from his workplace. A gujju girl , Sapna, mind you. But in these times when people are not sure if you are gonna get married to the same person from your country , him marrying a girl from a nearby state is not bad. Hey though he is a tamil iyer , being in mumbai all his life makes him a hard core mumbaikar.
But the process was not smooth. They were going around for a few years now. A Yes here a 'no' there, there was a certain degree of uncertainity behind it all. But as it is known that time is the eternal healer , also age caught on, and finally both ties the knot. But all that after a zappily decided date and virtually no time for people plan and comment about. But all is well that ends well . decided on the 15th and married off on the 29th, man that was fast.
The time was also good for a few cousins like me who were totally out of the Bombay scene. I Hadnt been there for nearly 5 years, also the 5 day vacation that came along provided the opportune moment for all the cousins and relatives to congregate. Apart from this there were a beavy of parents who were busily trying to look at young adults of maraigable age and trying to pair them off with there children or to someone in the family.
Well wishing them a good time and life together.
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