The Fat Lady....

...isn’t singing for the minute. Theoretically this should have been my last day here and I should have taken a flight in the early hours of Saturday morning. However my boss here in India has requested that I stay for a meeting with the Gartner analyst next Tuesday. He will give us our annual feedback which feeds into the “Magic Quadrant” rating we get – this a very important indicator in the industry as to how strong we are, and how we relate to other companies including Accenture and IBM (the other two companies in the top 3). It is certainly an interesting meeting and an excellent opportunity for me to understand what our clients are saying about Wipro, but it does mean another 4 days in India. Whilst my new colleagues are really nice, warm, fun and welcoming, I’m keen to get home to see Sandie and Maxime. The fact that I need to stay longer has also put in jeopardy my chances of attending my little brother’s stag do next weekend. I basically arrive in France on Wednesday night and then have to go to London on the Thursday for 2 days. Whereas I had initially planned to spend the following weekend drinking Guinness in Scotland, I may choose to come home and spend some time with Sandie and Maxime, especially because we need to move house in Pau before the end of that weekend......I’m looking forward to my two weeks holiday at the end of August that’s for sure!

It’s been a very good but long and tiring week. On top of that I have managed to get a touch sick – the cod last night obviously didn’t agree with me. I thought I had done well to survive 15 days in India without any issues, but it was only after I ordered that my colleague told me I shouldn’t order fish in Bangalore because the sea is too far away (we’re 900m above sea level to give you an inexact idea), and that there aren’t really any great ways to transport such food such long distances. I initially mocked such views but as I was being sick at 2AM I rued my confidence in Indian fish.

Two more physical meetings to go and then one conference call before I collapse into bed. No doubt I’ll feel a tinge of loneliness as all the other “induction programme” participants make their way home. At least some of my new Indian colleagues have generously invited me to spend some time with them and their families tomorrow. I’ll be able to have a lie in before being picked up in the afternoon for a trip around some country villages. Naturally I’ll be taking my own packed lunch!

Bangalore Update

Sunday was an interesting day. After doing a fair amount of work on the Saturday I decided to do the tourist thing on Sunday. There was a day trip from the hotel into Bangalore and despite getting stranded for an hour or so in the King’s stables in the presidential palace (true), it was a good day out. We visited a Hindu temple, barefoot, a run-down palace (even worse than our own in Pau J) with 170 horses, and the main shopping district of Bangalore. In the palace I even managed to get within about 20 metres of the king was who having an afternoon nap. I reassured the tour guide that after living with Sandie for 10 years I was pretty good at being quiet so as not to wake people. My overall impression of Bangalore is people, people, people, pollution, dust and smog. That said the people really are very friendly – even after I managed to negotiate a 50% discount on an article that I really didn’t need or want. He was a very nice shopkeeper and it was without doubt the most enjoyable 25 eurocents I have ever spent.

I’ve now completed my first couple of days with the “Information Management” team here in Bangalore. This is basically the offshore engine and the guys who I have been speaking with on the phone for the last 7 weeks since I joined Wipro. It’s great to meet them and they are a really good bunch of guys – I think I am going to enjoy working with them a lot. I’ve also been able to get a good deal of time with the global head of IM for Wipro and we even had lunch together today. Another impressive guy who clearly has his head screwed on right. Another thing that really impressed me was the comprehensive and consolidated way in which they have pooled all of their assets, solutions and R&D – they have a dedicated lab environment will all the assets and demos installed just waiting for the client to be wheeled in. Professionally I am beginning to feel more relaxed about having made the right choice, now we just need to sort out the “brand in Europe” issue and then I think it’s going to be a fun ride.

Although I have been in India for 10 days, it only now feels like I’m now working – last week locked in a room with 30 other middle aged white Europeans, Americans and Australians didn’t really feel like it was the “real Indian deal”. It wasn’t, even if it was quite good fun. Now I’m talking with Indians, eating Indian and even wiggling my head like an Indian every now and again. The Wipro campus is also large and pleasant – a cross between Thames Valley Park in Reading and a US university campus. It’s very green although a few of the buildings could do with a new lick of paint. There is Indian music playing constantly in the lifts and the melodic tones are only interrupted by the voice of an Indian woman declaring that we have arrived at the second floor. There are also a large number of restaurants and coffee shops all over the place and the good news is that I have found one that sells a perfectly acceptable chocolate cake! I also made sure that I took a trip 90 minutes round trip across town to say hello to the Europe Travel Team – even though I only spoke to Nishad, Vinod and Stanley for 10 minutes, I am guessing that it will have been time very well spent given how complicated my travel plans tend to be!

Today is another day full of meetings and I should be going out with a few of the lads who look after our Telco, Media and High Tech clients today. I’m looking forward to that. Theoretically I’m into my last 3 days here but my boss said on Monday that he might want me to stay on for a meeting with Gartner next Tuesday. They will be giving us our annual feedback based on their conversations with our clients so that would certainly be very interesting even though I’m keen to get home. We’ll see how that one works out over the next day or so.

Howzat!!!

A busy day yesterday and more of a relaxed one today. I set off for my morning run yesterday grinning like a Cheshire cat. I got a number of smiles en route but the highlight was most definitely stumbling across my first ever game of street cricket. Apparently something very famous in India, I was most surprised to see 15 odd men and adolescent boys playing the old game at 6.30 in the morning behind an rather pungent shanty town. Most bizarre. I stopped and watched for a few minutes before heading off. Maybe by the end of my trip I’ll have managed to get a game!

The presentations yesterday were another mixed bag. My overall gripe is that you either have content or style in any given presentation but rarely the two together. There were very few people that could glide across the cultural boundaries with the appropriate mix of humour and humility. That said the presentation on the core values of the company, or the “Spirit of Wipro” as it is called, was particularly thought provoking, delivered by an interesting little character that has clearly travelled the world. He brought up a number of ideas, not all of which I am sure I agree with e.g. values underpin culture (agree), values have to change as time passes (not so sure I agree), routine makes you predictable (agree) and that this is a bad thing (not so sure I agree). Machines and screens have taken over our lives (I understand his point but not sure if I buy in completely despite spending Saturday afternoon working on my laptop), and intangibles (such as emotions and feelings) move tangibles (such as mobile phone handsets or other material possessions)....violently agree. The last session of the Global Assimilation Programme (GAP), so called because it was not appropriate to call it “Corporate Sheep Dip Programme”, was the Wipro Meet Me meeting which is a quarterly meeting for the whole corporation. It was hosted in Bangaluru (so we were there “live”), and beamed back to the rest of the world. The whole of the executive team were up on stage fielding questions from the audience and the “question bank”. One thing that struck me was that today’s leadership, rather understandably, is anything but diverse. Whilst that is to be expected, I wonder what Wipro Meet Me will look like 5 years from now....

Last night included a little foray into Bangaluru itself for a few drinks before coming back to the hotel where we managed to sneak our way into the after party for the Bangaluru Fashion Week that is being hosted at our hotel. I have to say I am much less taken with the Indian Liz Hurleys of the world than the western version, but it was interesting to see nonetheless. The best news of the night that for once the person who dived into the swimming pool fully clothed wasn’t me – the paltry sum of 1000 rupees was just not enough.

Smile Power

I am obviously feeling a bit more confident as I decided to leave the secured confines of my plush hotel for my morning run today (a blessing that the hotel gym was late in opening). I ended up running through a number of poor villages and it was another eye opener; the basic nature of everything, the dirt and grime, the lack of shoes, the shoddy sanitation system, the random animals and herds of dogs, the odd smells. It was the herd of dogs that made me most uneasy as I made a mental note to check on Google what to do if bitten by a rabid dog in India. It was also somewhat surreal to listen to this week’s Charlemagne on my iPod as I ran through a shanty town....Charlemagne lamented the reluctance of Europeans to give up some of their benefits and to work a bit harder; they want to spend a couple of weeks over here! That said, I became increasingly relaxed as my run progressed. In the last 2 or 3 minutes I didn’t see any dogs and managed to smile at a few locals. Their reactions to my smile were huge toothy grins – that’s when you see that despite coming from different worlds, there’s nothing more powerful than a smile to break down barriers. I’m already looking forward to tomorrow’s run where I’m going to make even more of an effort to be the happy, but polite, tourist.

The most difficult thing about doing these blog posts while in India is that I can’t make sense of the place. I am no William Hague and I need my frameworks to help me understand things. I just can’t get the measure of the place for the minute. No sooner than I think I have sussed something out, then in the very next breath I can’t help but conclude the complete opposite. Admittedly I have only been here 3.5 days, and I am definitely looking forward to next week when I will get to work directly with my Indian colleagues (I am currently locked in a room all day with lots of white, middle aged Americans and Europeans), but it’s certain that I haven’t got the measure of the place yet.

Still no elephants, but lots of roadside cows

Yep, you guessed it, I'm now in India. I’ve now completed by 26 hour journey to get here and my first day of presentations.

The journey itself was long via Paris, Dubai and then on to Bangalore, but it passed off without any major incidents. During the journey I renewed my love for McDonalds - not because of their food but because of their free wifi at CDG airport. I also took my first ever flight on the super jumbo from Airbus - the new A380. In reality the only time you really know you're on such a large plane is when you are boarding – one because you can see it through the window, and secondly because there are multiple streams of passengers boarding different parts of the plane in parallel. Once aboard it is very similar to many of the other larger types of planes. Whereas I had assumed there would be a swimming pool and running track in the cabin and that it would be some sort of Titanic like experience, in reality it was a normal flight seated next to a normal arguing married couple and in front of a normal screaming baby. Despite what I had heard about Emirates and its cabin crew, the food was very normal and the air hostess even managed to spill a bottle of water over me. Thankfully I was dressed in shorts and flip flops (I really was expecting a swimming pool) so there was no real issue. The one very positive plus point was the entertainment system with over 200 movies and multiple episodes of my favourite TV programme Glee!

The airports at Dubai and Bangalore were quite different. I was at Dubai at around 1AM In the morning and it was a hive of activity and bustling shoppers. I arrived at Bangalore smack bang in the middle of rush hour at 9AM. Despite the first thing I saw in India being a huge bill board advertisement for Accenture (!), the things which I remember most were the fact that it took me under 2 minutes to get through passport control and the quietness of the whole airport apart from a squeaky conveyer belt that delivered our luggage. After 10 years with Accenture I was used to Homeland Security in Chicago, but here in Bangalore it was as if they couldn’t wait to rush me into the country. Whilst I was determined to arrive without any preconceptions about what it was going to be like, the journey itself had already destroyed a number of myths in my mind. I also have to confess I was somewhat reassured to see that the floors in the airport were marble as opposed to mud, and I also was quite relieved to see my suitcase turn up after only an hour of waiting.

The final leg of the journey, a 2.5 hour taxi ride through rush hour Bangalore, was probably the most interesting part of the journey despite my exhaustion. I have never seen anything like it. I struggled to find any parallels and if I were forced to make any comparisons I would have to say it felt like a mix of the outskirts of Budapest in Hungary, the worst parts of Slovakia or Romania, and Morocco. The poverty and randomness of the place is quite clear to see, but there are clearly pockets of wealth and affluence and the place is not complete chaos as I was led to believe it would be. The cows were particularly well behaved and most seemed to be staying on the side of the road rather than actually being in the midst of the traffic. The other journey that was particularly interesting was the 45 minute morning run from the hotel to the Wipro campus on the Tuesday morning. We left our extremely plush hotel at around 7.30AM before crossing through shanty towns on the way to our corporate campus. Seeing hundreds of people (mainly men) just milling around with seemingly nothing to do and more of these sacred cows scavenging in piles of rubbish is something of an eye opener and a far cry from my regular commute in the lavish, moneyed streets of Zurich. When I left Accenture I wanted to see how the other half live and how things are done in the emerging markets. At least I can’t say I have been shielded from that experience.

We were privileged yesterday to have many of the company’s top brass come and talk to us in a series of lectures. Our results are being announced at the end of the week so they are all in India for that. Overall I felt the quality of the speakers and the material was mixed. Rather unsurprisingly the most impressive in my opinion was the head of sales. Whilst I heard a lot of the right messages and I felt people were saying more or less the right thing, and reassuringly they were saying the same things as my direct boss back in Europe, I couldn’t help but get the feeling that reading between the lines and understanding what wasn’t said is going to be especially important here in Wipro.

We’re back in the bus going through the shanty towns for the second day of lectures. I suspect PowerPoint fatigue is going to set in quite quickly, but for the minute it’s been an interesting trip. The other participants are also very interesting – it seems that Wipro is currently following a policy of hiring older, more experienced people to try and improve gravitas in front of the clients, especially in developed markets. As a result people aren’t shy in coming forward and asking difficult questions – for example it was the first time I have ever heard an American complain about his 10 days of statutory leave, the Wipro working culture, and his desire to take things a bit easier at his age (he was turning 30 next week). More anon no doubt over the coming days.

Frameworks and Growing Up

Bagehot's column this week was an interesting read about the UK Foreign Secretary, William Hague. It was essentially a very positive review and a significant part of it focused on his pragmatism and reluctance to focus on any particular ideology. I finished the article thinking what a wonderful approach to politics – common sense reigning supreme.

I then picked up an RfP response we are currently writing. My first review comment – the document does not contain any framework or structure which, in my opinion, meant that it was very difficult to understand our proposed solution. I had no way of “checking” if the proposed solution was exhaustive, and as such I felt somewhat uncomfortable saying whether or not I thought the design would work in that particular company.

Maybe I’m not ready to be Foreign Secretary, but I can’t help but think the solution must be a middle way. The trick must be to not restrict oneself to a single framework, but be able to call upon a variety of frameworks depending on the situation. I always feel more confident when I have a checklist to ensure I’m not missing a “big ticket item”, especially when things are changing rapidly. Maybe when I’m a grown up like William Hague I won’t need those checklists. I’ll let you know in 20 years.

Still no elephants, but 2 goats

That's what I saw on my morning run in the middle of Zurich today. Back here after two days at a "Quarterly Business Review" in London. An interesting two days, interesting for many reasons including seeing how mature my organisation within an organisation really is despite it being a multi million pound business. The good news was that it seemed that they liked my wacky presentation style (I had two presentations to give over the course of the two days). More anon later, for the minute I'm trying to find an ironed shirt to go to work.

No elephants....yet

Back safely from a gloriously hot Zurich. A good day overall but long and tiring. I didn't see any elephants this time, although I did meet with a colleague who I will be travelling to India with at the end of next week. We planned to hire a two seater elephant during the weekend in the middle of our stay in Bangalore. I'm not sure if it will be a right or left hand drive elephant.

I told you so

That's the beauty of having a blog - there is no place to hide when you get your predictions for the World Cup wrong. Germany were hopelessly outclassed by Spain last night; something I didn't expect. I am going to punish myself by getting a 6AM flight from Heathrow to Zurich. Arrrgh. I still have to say that I have enormous respect for the German coach - his humility in the post match press conference was impressive. Don't ask me who I think will win on Sunday.

A Word on the World Cup

It's Germany all the way for me. Admittedly some might say I've been hedging my bets by only proclaiming my views after one of the two semi finals has already been played, but from the little I've seen, they are the only group of highly talented individuals who actually play like a team. The game against Argentina showed me that every player in the team knew exactly what they could and could not do, everybody knew their role; essential in a successful team. The game against England, and the shaming of John Terry and Matthew Upson, showed me that the man they have at the helm, Joachim Loew, is absolutely excellent and very tactically astute. He gets the strategy of the team right game in game out. That's why I don't think they will have too many problems with either Spain tonight or the Dutch on Sunday.

The Week Ahead

A good weekend all in all. I finally got back on a horse (Friday night), jumped a few bars (Saturday morning) and just enjoyed the Guinness soaked atmosphere of the stables (Saturday lunch time and afternoon). We also had a dinner with friends last night which was very enjoyable after fun with Maxime at Mamie and Papy's cleaning a car with a jet hose (simple things). Life is beginning to return to normal.

This week starts off with a scan of the twins this morning and a (hopefully) final x-ray of my arm. Fingers crossed our medical morning goes well. I'll work from home at the start of this week before heading to the UK tomorrow night for the rest of the week. I may have to pop over to Switzerland (Zurich) on Thursday but this has yet to be confirmed. Things are definitely hotting up at work and it's quite clear that time management and ruthless prioritisation are going to be essential skills. I've never even met the guy, but I am glad there is a new person starting next week to help take some of the burden off me!

Ah, Maxime stirring...off to warm a bottle of chocolate milk.

Mothership Calling

I have finally received my dates for going to India. I need to report for duty in Bangalore no later than midday on Monday 19th July. So this is it then, the removal of the Accenture chip and the Wipro corporate sheep dip. I'll be there for 2 weeks returning on the 1st August. Old hands in Wipro have advised that I be sure to pack a course of antibiotics, immodium and soap.....sounds like a great trip already. More anon no doubt.