I have moved

Find me at http://puneetsarda.com

Why study?? --II

OK... so assuming we agree on that fact that we go to college to get a job and make a career...let me put forward my other concern. I see this world as a having 2 kinds of people. Those who are good at solving solved problems and those who identify/discover new problems and try to solve them.

Whatever they teach you at school/college is usually aimed at making you a member of the first group. We learn how to do math, science lab work , languages etc...and all the exams/tests etc are around solving the standard set of problems...no wonder people pay so much attention to SAT/GRE scores . Its like how good are you at fitting in...but fitting in the first group of people.

The future cannot be built by solving the same problems again and again...and whether you like it or not...we all know thats a fact you cannot deny.50 years ago having a B.E. meant you were knowledgeable, 30 years ago a M.E/M.S and/or MBA. 10 years ago a PhD. You see that having a particular degree could get you a high paying job depending on what year you are in but it doesn't look like that anymore. So we do need people who can solve the same problems again and again but we don't need them badly, they are disposable and most importantly technology can always substitute them in some way.

What has ruled all the time is creativity and ideas. The 2nd kind of people...the problem identifiers. No matter what domain you are in we all have to work with resource constraints, time constraints and often conflicting needs. Its the smartest solution in such situations that address our needs and help us move forward. This is what is the most important talent that needs to be harnessed, that needs to be brought out in us. Its not uncommon to hear people say "I am not creative" . What they really should be saying is "I was born creative but no one helped me use my creativity. No one told me it was ok to make mistakes, to try to see if things work/break , to be stupid at times"

The only way to make money is a job. Get over this stupid idea!!! This could have been true 20-30 years ago but not any more... not in today's age of high speed connectivity and information at finger tips (felt like using a few buzz words :D). What the dotcom burst showed us was that people we very creative at coming up with new business ideas... ya many were not at all well thought but whatever were lead to dramatic changes in the way we manage information today.No wonder Microsoft faces so much competition in the software world today than what it faced 5 years ago.

Take efforts in enhancing your creativity, your idea generation process. Whether you brainstorm or meditate or find some other way to bring it out but don't think you are not creative. Be willing to make mistakes, think like a kid. What would a 5 year old do in the same situation as you...and you will see how thoughts come in a rush...thoughts you never thought you could think :).

Studying is not important. Knowing why to study is. And then you decide what to study. But no matter what...make sure you do something creative.

Coincidently today's quote of the day: You must do the things you think you cannot do - Eleanor Roosevelt

Why study??

We have been through college...3-5 years of "education" depending on what degree you enrolled for. When you join and while you are at college... everyone talks about how education makes you a better person, get you perspective to things etc... Now look at your course work and this is the last thing you can say about it. Ya we have read a lot and heard a lot about how the education system needs to change, needs to allow us more options etc... I was wondering why did the need for this change come...How did one fine day this same system which has been in place for decades get rusty and outdated.I don't want to talk about "how" the system needs to change, but "why".

The one reason and the only reason why you want to go to college, why your parents want you to go to college and why anyone wants you to go to college is "To Get A JOB". Thats the bottomline whether you accept it or not, whether your dean says it or not on your face. Now look at your course work and see what it tells you about getting a job. Absolutely nothing!! You accumulated books on 30 subjects over your 4 years of education and yet none of them address the primary reason why you went to college. No one taught you how to find a job, what qualities to look for in your employer, what qualities they look for in you. At best , you had an hour long "orientation" about this on the day before your campus recruitment started.

All those books talked about was what all you could do "once you had a job"...in my field you could be a database professional, a systems analyst, a developer etc...but all that is worthless if I miss the primary requirement..rite!!

The fundamental flaw in the system is the assumption that the planet's population is the same as what it was in 1920. What!!!...how are they even remotely related. Let me explain. Our education system took a major leap when the industrial revolution began. Industries were popping up all over the place and suddenly we saw that with machines we could accomplish anything. Soon we saw that we had more work and less skilled people to work those machines. Schools opened up and taught us the skills we need to work machines and let us go to industries with a stamp that we were skilled. If you had skills... you had a job, companies would hunt for people with skills and hire them. The world had less people and far less skilled people.

Everything since 1920 is the same...we have revolution in different domains, schools teach many courses/programs and people study. Except for one thing... now there are numerous skilled people...more on paper than in real but still lots of them. So now if you have a B.E. and an MBA... you are not elite...you are what they call at the restaurant "the usual". No one teaches you how to sell yourself and so you end up buying "Idiots guide to resumes and interviews" etc... Hence education fundamentally fails at what it needs to do today. I was taught "carpentry" and "blacksmithing" when I had enrolled for B.E. in Computer Engineering. And to this day I have found no one who can justify the "torture" done to me. It was like I paid to be realized that I am bad at something. This shows that what was true in 1920 for education is true no more.

Some tell me it builds character. If you do field survey (part of Civil Engineering) as a team then it build teamwork skills. I say that is the side effect. If your aim is to build teamwork skills design a course which addresses that instead of having it as a side effect. Don't try to come up with a stupid excuse when you know teaching civil engineering to a computer engineering candidate is plain stupidity. I believe my engineering was only 3 years not 4, the first year was an utter waste of everything. The only benefit out of it was I made good friends...we all shared the same frustration after all :)

Enough for now... will post more thoughts on the next one. Enjoy Life

One of those days

when I want to go back to sleep and start the day all over again...too bad I can't do it

For christ's sake...let the bad guy win!!

Thats what I loved about Swordfish... the appreciation of smartness. John Travolta was shown as someone who was one step ahead of you all and hence finally he survived as well as everyone got fooled.

I watched The Departed today...and all went well until they ended the movie. The last 10 mins...they messed up everything... Ok she wasn't getting good sex from him...so why still be the girlfriend when you have already cheated on him, why move in with him. Just walk out....whatever.... in here she is the "heroine"...same scene in another movie and she is a whore.

And he pulled his act well enough to fool everyone but no....no we can't leave him alive..he is the bad guy...so we got to kill him....I believe mark wahlberg was in the entire movie just so he could kill the bad guy in the end...otherwise you don't really see his need. Come on... if someone is good at something..whatever be that...show some respect, will ya.

Great acting...predictable and pathetic ending.

Back

No.... this is not another post about how I have been away from blogging and now I will more frequent and all that crap.

Was in Canada in the beginning of the week and came back. Had a grueling 6 hrs drive...raining all the way from Montreal to Rhode Island and it was dark too. Took no breaks and kept the avg speed to 72 as I was like the slower I drive the more I have to stand this weather.

Why was I there.... to get my H1B stamped...so good to be done with it. Got a chance to visit the underground malls in Montreal and enjoy some really spicy thai food...yummy!!!

A Truman show in the making

The generation of internet, wi-fi, tablet pcs and handhelds. Information at your finger tips as they say. You can check your email from 20 different devices while you are on your way from work to home. Stay update to date with whats happening around you, the latest in showbiz, the latest in politics... blah blah blah.

So we all seem to believe this notion of "Information Overload". How do I keep up with all thats going around in this wild wild world.Ya as if I really care who is the next child to be adopted by Pitt and Jolie, where was the last time Paris Hilton was seen with someone, studies showing cheese can help you loose weight etc...

Suffering from information overload...gimme a break. We suffer from "crap" overload. So much of crap constantly being dumped on you. Ya you have 20 different ways to check your email while you are on your way home, but you know and I know...the emails you will get in that span are "SPAM". Some arab wants to share his wealth and someone wants to help you improve your sex life... that pretty much sums up all that I care about, right, ....free money and great sex. I feel bad for the spammers..there is nothing else for them sell. I still wonder don't they know...if they are working so hard to sell you something ( sending billions of email each day)...probably their product isn't good enough. Come on guys..try something a little more challenging than the same old spam...just more of it.

News is no different. It's been a long time I spent more than 2 minutes on a news website. A quick scan of any news site page tells you the amount of crap thats being reported. 1) And the graphics used to demonstrate data. The assumption that user cannot understand plain statistical data leads them to put fancy graphics around "information" to turn it into "glittering crap" does so much help in conveying the right facts. 2) Getting the intricate details of what people are doing in their personal lives is not news, its a truman show in the making. The price you pay for being a celebrity, the price I pay for having a news channel which think you are a celebrity. So they went on a vacation to this farmhouse, the locals greeted them in traditional dress... they went to see this and that...hello is this what I pay $60 a month for...to find out they are on a vacation where I cannot be. Hell NO!!!

Remember, a search engine gives you links and you have to pick "information" out of it. Its not the age of information overload. Its an age where the smart ones have the best chance to separate themselves from the naive and easily fooled. Look beyond the obvious and dig a little more deeper.

Pissed off!!!

So I plan, I plan to the last detail... carry out my plan as I planned it...and I don't know why but end up in a situtation where I AM NO LONGER IN CONTROL. I am so pissed today. I miss one thing and the price I pay for it outrageaous. Make one assumption and everyone except me is fine. I...i am screwed. and ya..I CAN DO NOTHING ABOUT IT.

Someone makes some decision and that never reaches me...why coz I never knew that I should ask for every small thing, i should not make ANY assumptions at all...and now ....now all hell is loose...and m right in the middle of it.

Don't give me hope and patience. It's not about that. It's about being helpless. Hope and patience have nothing to do with helplessness. Say it in my face I screwed up rather than chocolate cover the problem. I am man enough to accept it. Ya I thought if everyone else I know gets it, me too... but nooooooooo..that is the most regretfull assumption I ever made...and now I will pay. Pay by being put back in time....for 2 f@#$ing years.

Man proposes, God disposes...and I am his favourite player in this f@#$ing game with.

Moral Flexibility

It isn't uncommon for us to run into situations where we have to choose between "right" and "wrong". The very basis of the entire society is on the basis of categorizing a particular act in one of the mentioned classes. That is how we judge almost everything around us. And I believe we all agree to disagree on what we consider should be in either classes. That forms the basis of virtually every argument you ever had and every war you ever read about.

Sometimes when we hear disturbing news on the TV or read about it in papers, it makes us wonder "how could someone do that". Sitting in the comfort of our rooms we try to judge/analyze the situation based on the limited and ,often if not always, biased information presented to us in what appears to be a very detailed study. Sometimes we think in today's world we suffer from information overload or is it the case that we are not so tuned to finding "relevant information" from all that is around us.

Moral flexibility is what you are experiencing when your judgement is very much situational. You know about a hedious murder and you believe the criminal should get death penalty. Now you are told the charged person suffers from multiple personality disorder and you feel he should be not in a cell but in a hospital. And what if you now come to know that the charged person faked this disorder.

Moral flexibility is also an expression of personal benefit. It puts you in a lighter more manageable position and allows you to "get away" with something that you could not were you a very principled person. It allows to you create "truth", "right" or atleast the illusion of it, your version of it. It is not a compromise...a compromise will keep you dissatisfied at the back of your mind. This is calm...you know you do it, you agree to do it and you don't complain about it.

You can do because you choose to believe in things in a different way, you gather a new perspective and most importantly because , atleast for you, it solves the problem at hand.

Just a thought :)

Desparate to win

So someone today started an argument....and when I joined in to comment and he had nothing to defend himself what did he do....

1) Bad mouth me
2) Make fun of whomever I am supporting
3) Act Cheap

Nope..all of the above ...cheap bastard