Being ALONE... Being ME at 45

Have always heard stories of individuals stepping out into the big bad world when they turn early 20s and have always thought to myself, how does it work? What makes a parent let them to do that, what makes them to choose to face the uncertainty willingly? Who in their sane minds would choose all those difficulties? I remember sitting with Dad in my early 20s, married, with kids but still the young mind wanting answers, asking daddy, why would anybody do that? he would tell me, that the world is anyway, uncertain in every way, there are uncertainty in which ever life we live, so, when someone walks out, they just choose to take a different set of uncertainties for themselves, but I did not believe him then, I laughed at him. I was certain of my life, I was married, happily married, as I think back, with kids, with protective parents, I knew how my life would turn out to be, at least I thought I knew....

Decades past, here I am today writing this blog, writing these thoughts out on paper for the world, for all of you who know me and see me as to what I am, I am 45, I am super ambitious, I am no less than a 25 when it comes to going out there and having fun and making the best of life, I have 3 individuals in my life who are suppose to be my kids but in actual are my guides, my teachers, my motivators and surely my friends, I have 4 BFFs, I have around 40+ close friends, I have around 600+ strong followers who look up to me for every business decision they take and I have around a minimum off 10000 friends and connects who enjoy my existence, yet, I feel the uncertainty in me as I stand in my life at 45, ALONE; thus fearful, nervous and surely sad.

Why is the word, ALONE related to all the negative feelings?? Fearful, Nervous, Sad.. It should not be. ALONE... Means ME, when I see ME, I see so many great people, things, dreams which I have achieved, so who has implanted in us from our childhood that being ALONE, has to be so negative...

So, walking the path in my life, ALONE at 45, I am a PROUD Woman, I am a SUCCESSFUL woman, I am ME....

Love you all for being a part of my journey in finding ME.... 

Dreaming of a great future or building one..

This has been one of the most the most talked about statement, "Dream big things, Coz only if you dream is when you set out to achieve it" it's post Steve Job's statement that dreaming became an even more sexy statement to quote, "only those who dream to change the world, set out to do so" something in those lines but today I understand that there is more to dreaming than just dreaming...

It's exactly 2 years, 9 months, 11 days that I had a dream, a dream which I, along with my co-founder / best friend, Vivek Srinivasan would be these two entities who would reach out to entrepreneurs from across the world, rather, the entrepreneurs from across the world would reach out to us, but yes, it was a dream, if you would have asked me then, I would have had that big smile as I tell you my dream, Coz I really believed that it was a dream, you know what dreams are right, you see them with closed eyes, so here I was seeing a dream with open eyes, so yes, I had that shyness, that, please don't take me to be mad look, when I dreamt this dream. Today, I know a very small portion of entrepreneurs of this world, would do anything to have us talk to them, have us spend an hour with them, have us focus on their startups for just a day and for us to be a small part of their huge growth.. 

So, how did this unbelievable dream become a small reality?? Did I sit on that couch in my small little living room, dreaming and smiling about it?? 

What do you think I did?? 

Yes, I did exactly what you are thinking, I did.. I stopped just dreaming about it and I got these contents of my dream into the real world of mine, which I can assure consisted of evil monsters called - bills, had ugly green beasts called - society, had small but dangerous piranhas called -responsibilities, which could eat me and my dreams along with it with no time, but I dared to bring it out and from that day, it was no more a dream, it was my fight for achieving my dreams, it was my struggle to make Vivek believe it is possible to achieve my dreams, it was the fight which I took on every day. 

Just like an alcoholic fighting hard to stay clean, I fought hard with myself and the monsters around to keep my dream alive in this real world. Every small success, I would jump, I would cheer, I would cry tears of happiness, I would hug my monsters with love, Coz it's them who let my dream grow from a figment of my imagination to this real thing called Startups Club, now I got warriors, an army slowly building within my dream, who would stand by me, when things get rough, who would guard me when I felt scared of these monsters, who would hug me (literally) when I felt lonely, I found my warriors in my Members of Startups Club from across the world. My dream was becoming a reality, a real entity and I was winning it, even today I am. 

So today, sitting in this flight to Pune, writing my blog contents on my phone notes, I have a thought, a day ahead of having 3 events in 3 different locations, 2 different countries and Vivek and I, in a position to reach out to lakhs of entrepreneurs in this world, I think back, is it okay to just dream and only dream? did I know I was practically implementing my dream into a reality? Did the universe play a larger part than I did for this to happen? What is it that has given me, today? 

My monsters, who pushed me to move ahead or else, they would get me down, 

My warriors, whose trust made me to go on? 

My Partner, who stood by me even if he at times did not believe it was possible 

Or ME????

Talking through Mails...

From the time we learned to speak, there has been a constant struggle and yearning in us to make sure the people we speak too, listen to us and remember us too.
- From "Ma, I am hungry" to "Mommmm... I am so very hungry"
- From "You can join me now" to "Hey, lets do it together now"

The story continues even today, with my Clients, my Friends, my Kids, my Co-Founder, my Community Members and so on..

So, what have we learnt from so may years of practice in making people listen to us?

 Today, the platform has changed, everything remains the same and the tactics to make people listen to us also remains the same but still, we just don't seem to get it on how we could make the mails be noticed. So, let us learn to talk through mails.

- Do, what you do best, add your expressions...
- Talk less to be heard more

Expressions through mails.. does matter

Every time we sit down to write mails, especially to a Client, associate or an important connect, the first thing we leave aside, are the expressions. Always remember to put your expressions into the mail. You don't have to send a mail, which just reads out the message, whats a message without an expression.

"Ma, I am hungry" means the same too "Mommmmm I am so very hungry"but the need for your mother to know she has to bring you to eat is more stressed with a little bit of expressions added to it. Said that, for a client, you write a "Would love to meet" and try "Look forward to meeting you eagerly" makes all the difference.

Talk less to be heard more

Take a shape of a blow horn, you must have seen it zillion times, but have you noticed, that the side you speak in is always smaller to the side where it is heard. This is exactly the same. 

Having specific few lines and clear, expressing language leaves behind a very loud, clear and an impressive mail, which can never be ignored. Never ever try to fit in everything into those few lines, a sale pitch, an introduction or an invite, needs to be very specific but definitely not missing out on your feelings, thoughts and passion. 

Try it always and see how magical it is...

How do u know if you're on the way to build the next big Startup?

How do u know if you're on the way to build the next big Startup?

After spending a decade between startups, hearing those beautiful stories of all the Facebooks, Apples, Whats app buy outs, Airbnbs and the list continues, I would always think, whats is it that our startups are missing out on? why does it feel like, it would never be the case with any of our entrepreneurs? There were moments when I would question our mentoring, our approach, our strategy, our suggestions and at times, sit back to consider if even continuing with this as our profiles. 

Then came across these two participants, totally unconnected with each other, for our annual event in Startups Club, DemoDay2014, Khuzema from Chennai & Arjun from Vellore. Both, no way similar to each other. On one side was this young, super aggressive, super naive and super loud and on the other was this young, super clear, super sensible, super passionate, super driven, super experienced in tech and I looked at both of them, as they got mentored to pitch their own ideas to the panel. I noticed them in various mentoring sessions, some together.. some in groups and they really did not look any thing similar.. their attitudes, their approach, their ideas.. The only three things common about them were 1. they both were young 2. they both wanted to be successful entrepreneurs 3. they both loved being associated with us.

Today, 1 year down the road, from those thoughts, long hours of discussions, longer hours of fights, unimaginable hours of working things out, we, the two young entrepreneurs and us, Prudence (Vivek, me and our team) are the three founders on board of this food related startup. Now, as I write this, I can clearly answer my question, will one of our Startups be the next BIG THING? Oh yes.. definitely it is and in fact we can see it happening already...

Lets see how, may be you could get the formula of making a successful one and if you do, don't forget to let me know through comments;

1. Team - not perfect, no way from the same age group, not from the same back ground.. BUT.. a team which is never ready to let go of the reins to make the progress. There is always this one of us who will always ensure the things move ahead. Trust me, we have taken turns.. all of us, at some point of time.

2. Idea - Idea was completely different from what it is today, but what we have today, is what our food lovers wanted & felt was missing, we were able to connect with our users at a very.. VERY early stage of the journey and get their problems, understand their needs, talk to them in person and make them realise that solution is on the way.

3. Fear Factors - Still exists, blogging here, just 1 day to go for the Beta (Soft launch) at 3:15 am, just saying a good night through a whats app message to the Tech Director, who had his whole team in Chennai sitting with him till now working on the website, we fear, his last message to me was.. "I am nervous" and just couple of hours back, my message to him was the same. So this has been on and this will be on.. but we are sure that at times one of us are at that point of time where we fear things ahead, the others will pull us up, so we know and are confident, that we will fight our fears.. that is the reason fears exist right? to fight them out.

4. Investments - Woooo.. this is one word.. which just typing the word out, gives me some crazy thoughts of all the time we have changed our strategy, thanks to this one word. There was a point of time, some 6 months back, the complete initiative had seen a dead end, if it was not for the youngest student founder who pulled us all back together and took this up, maybe this blog would never have been written.. So, yes, Investments has and will be one of the issues but then, do you know what we believe? if there is no need for investments, we would not be going ahead anywhere, the fact that we need funds is a proof in itself that we are progressing.

5. What now?? - We do not know, it is the bloody truth.. You can ask us all together or ask us individually, we would have the same answer to this question, we have no clue whats going to happen, but we are happy at the place we are in, that matters to us. We have our users waiting for the launch, who are joining us for the launch on 15th May at 5 pm, our HomeChefs cooking for all the foodies, we have not come across one person who heard us talk about our Startup, say a WOWWWW.. we are getting stronger by the day as a team and we are progressing, that is all matters to us for now and what lies ahead of us, is left on our hard work and our users, so why break our heads on that.

So, here it is, just 5 things which could come to me for now, but by the end of this, I am so glad to write that I am so sure, clear, confident and aware that we are building the NEXT BIG THING in Startups.. 

Give your thoughts or try our HOME CHEF's yummy foods by being our FOODIE on...

www.kuixine.com 

Journey from a 10th grade to ISB in 25 years

It takes you just that one minute to sign in and still it took me more than two decades to do that. As I sit just 10 days away from the first day when I walk into the gates of the University for my course on Business Management, I look back to see an endless chain of events and circumstances which became the road blocks to stop me from doing this many many years ago.

At this point, many such big and small events come to my mind, which makes me think why it was so impossible for me to do it then and how it is this possible to do it now. The timing could just not be worse. Having a huge family property deal closed, Prudence Advisors (means for my bread n butter, literally) at its best with 3 kids, all eager to grow into successful individuals and my own early 40s mindset of traveling to every place the dart strikes on the map but still here I am preparing for my course and reading up materials at 5 am in the morning. All this sets me to think, why we do not take that moment out and just do what we want to do?

If this means I have some sleepless nights studding, I have some embarrassing moments at the University, have some tough moments at work with clients or have some emotionally tiring moments with kids when I temporary loose focus on them, it must be fine with me and I must be good to go, anyway, in these past years, I have had sleepless night, embarrassing moments, tough moments and emotionally tiring moments and had it zillion number of times and most of it was for someone else, someone close or not, but surely for someone else but I am proud today that I am ready to face these moments for myself.

We as ladies must never give up on ourselves, its never too late for us, its never over for us. We created life, I created life and you created life but then, lets not loose ourselves living this life.

I will write soon and very soon, one of my Blogs will be written by a GRADUATE FROM INDIAN SCHOOL OF BUSINESS..     

Rich people network others look for work...

After 17 years of setting up several companies from the scratch, running few of them and running few down I have come to realise that the biggest lesson of my life. All my years as an entrepreneur, I have had every kind of day on my calendar. Days I am excited of getting business to my firm, days I am down about no projects; gloomy days and bright sunny days but today is an enlightening day for me.

I have had some really tough lessons to learn from the past few years and the reason has been me all the way. In situations of distress, we tend to forget that one important fact, its when we are down that we need to pick ourself up as there is no stopping to hitting the bottom we are about to reach. We just go deeper and deeper down and I was all fuelled up to ensure that my speed down was at its maximum. Its then that I realised that my most closest to heart company, a company in which I had put many years, loads of efforts and even more finances was just about to go down under. This was sure to be the rock bottom and I assured myself that I will bounce back but bounce back on what was lost.

In my final attempt to condense all my experience, my strengths and weaknesses that it hit me on my face. My strengths; something which can over run every weakness, every trouble, every hurdle which stood ahead of me. There were not many to be listed as well, just this one, which kept dancing in front my eyes, as if to yell out for my attention. MY NETWORKING SKILLS.

I could network and network good, I could build relationships and maintain them as well within minutes. I can still remember, I could just wait in a line in a bank ( remember in 1980's, we had a line of 20 people always waiting to deposit cash in banks and many more waiting with tokens to receive the cash) and create friendships which would go down many years. Then, there was this fact which always surprised all my friends, associates and family and that was, that I would never market my company services and we would always get my clients through local helpline leads or word of mouth. But until this moment when I was desperately looking for a string to hold on too, just before we go down under that I realised that in all this, it was very clear that one thing I was good at was Networking and yet, I did nothing to reach people or connect with them.

Surprisingly, few months back I was elected the Secretary of my School's Former Students Association and I was doing a great job; knew this because there were few who were delighted with the work and then there were these very old members who hated my guts, so it was clear, I was doing super great and even then, it never struck me that I need to connect to people for them to know me, my company and my services. But then again, everything has its right time and this was my time and I had to wait. Every individual has to wait for their time to come and I did too but with a lot of pain, restlessness and everything negative which can exist in this world.

Its now, 1 week since I have started my networking and a whole new world has been revealed to me. I now know, its so true when Cafe Coffee Day said - A LOT CAN HAPPEN WITH COFFEE. It did to me. I suddenly am making friends by the minute, I do not have business lined up for me and I actually do not care about it now that it happens because I get to meet with so many people and I get to know that I am not the only one with problems with bottom lines and its fine to have these problems and its only when we have these problems that we work towards getting a solution.

I have been investing in my firm earlier too and I am doing it now but the difference is that there are so many people out here every day that I know with time, my name, my company and my services will be recognised and then business will come looking for us.

It is with this that I have realised why the rich do not speak about their networking efforts and talk about their company's success. They keep this secret to themselves. After all they want to be the very few who are the HNIs and they would not want those numbers to increase. So, they earn money through all the networking for years, all those hours on flight, all those empty beer glasses, all those moments of walking aimlessly trying to put a ball in a hole; a game called GOLF, all those reasonless parties and here we thought that they have worked so hard to earn the money and now they are spending it. But the fact is that they were all working when they were doing everything under the name of networking and getting their businesses through this and then they hire dozens of really well qualified, intelligent, smart,  young and experienced individuals and let them to do their dirty jobs of slogging all the hours at office and yahhhhhh!!!! money is earned. What do they say for others to learn, they worked hard for what they created, BULLSHIT!

Its now that I am clear and I know where the money lies and I am on my way to get it all right and trust me, when I get there, I will not be alone. I will take many of those individuals who worked for these actors called HNIs and make sure that the same HNIs are one of the many and not one of the few.

Are you in?

Hectic Days

Hectic day for a person at a 9 to 5 workplace would be a number of open windows on the desktop which never seem to close, a phone which never seem to stop ringing and a colleague, who just does not seem to stop cribbing about his/her busy schedules. But, a hectic day for a self employed person like me, a person who choose to set up a business entity for herself, is self created business meetings which seem to pop up from all directions, the mails, calls and many times, sudden drop-in at the office. A phone which never stops ringing which, I willingly carry with me every where and willingly answer every call and a set of employees who I have hired with my free will who seem to just not do anything the right way. This hectic day is my own creation.

Have always told my self for many years “Skills pay the bills” but I am yet to understand what kind of Skills actually pay the bills. It is 1 am and I am still working and I am satisfied with it, so what if my day begins at 9 am, Good, but never seem to end. Even at 1 am I feel bad that I could put in some more hours and here I am filling out my journal of the day. So, the Skill which would pay my bill is actually the skill to work my self out endlessly, then, yes, I do not think I need to worry about my bills any more.

Anyway, coming back to my today’s schedule. Something really interesting for all those readers out here, who would have just started in a Self-Employed role or ones who have moved on with it long time back. I, for the first time in my professional life was able to put a point across to a business associate who had all the experience in a line of Hospitality and I am a new born here and I was proved right as well. How was I able to do it? It was complete confidence on myself and nothing else that I did this and won my case as well.

We are in the process of setting up a resort in a hill station and we had our projections ready as well but something bothered me about it, something did not seem right, I wanted it to be more heavy on investments so that we could focus on guest satisfaction, HR training modules and not bog ourselves down for sales from the first year it self. I am happy I took the right decision and put my point across and got it my way too. We are re-structuring the complete financials as per my discussions. My lesson for the day – do not give up on your gut feeling, if you feel you are in the right, then, stand up for it, you would not have the qualifications for it, you would not have the experience but if your business mind tells you to put your foot down, then you do exactly that, the worst that can happen is your decision would slow down the growth of your business a little bit, so be it, it is your business after all, who else would have more rights to screw it up than you, so why fear and always remember, “Every successful business has at least 2 or 3 failed business ideas behind it” – Good Night…