HR Woes

The major thing with HR in every Organization is that they are very vindictive. I have encountered HR and had major tiffs with them in almost every Organization and the only place where I found them to be accommodating was Macromedia and then later on in Solidcore. Here, the major reason was that all our activities were taken care of either by the Administrative Staff or by our Managers, who went by what we had to offer in our skills and not what we did in our previous companies and why we left and why and why... !!
The basic premise of the HR these days is to find out more on a psychological manner as to what is the nature of the person they wish to recruit. They have forgotten that the person might be more interested in getting his work done than to cater for their regular laments on the person not having a good degree or a good company name behind him. Now, I ask these people, do they think that their own company has such a good brand name? Why most of the companies these days are just coming up in their space and are almost unknown; why then do they go about seeking people who are coming from good brand names? The work being done is and should be the main concern and not the lure of a big brand name.
Then again there are those HR who do not even seem to care about what is going on with the people they have to get recruited. I encountered a similar fate in AMD, where the HR after informing me that I had got through and the offer was ready for me to sign on the dotted line, never got back to me. All he could say was - Oh! I was on leave [ok, you were, but atleast inform the next person that this candidate needs to be informed] or the MD is not available and I have to check with him [even when the last time he had said that the MD was on his way back the same day and he would give me a ring as soon as he came in]. Now this is not what I call professionalism, is it??!!

Then these people ask us as to why we are leaving the previous company, well! you are the guys who are keen on making me leave by offering a new post and better money??!! Why not leave? And then when we want to leave your company, you make all sorts of fuss about it and don't even allow us a decent exit. You want us to join the next day, but while leaving we need to give a thousand days advance notice and even then you create so many hurdles in the way that we are unable to peacefully and amicably exit. Why! That is all I wish to ask you guys!!

Job Interviews - Taking

Today was quite a hectic day. We had gone to Chandigarh for hiring a few people, and I woke up at 3 AM in the morning to get ready and reach Chandigarh at 1030 Hrs. As the interviews were going to start at 11. We had a lovely journey in a Innova with tubeless tires, one of which kept getting depleted of air and there seemed to be no way that it could be repaired until we got back to delhi, except that we had to keep getting air filled every time we saw a petrol station... :-)

The interviews went off well at the Picadilly in Sector 22. We even managed to select a couple, then had a good lunch, courtesy the HR Manager [along with a bottle of beer]. On moving back, just before Panipat, we got caught in a BIG jam, created due to the construction of the road!! Here the road is being widened by L&T and was full of traffic trying to get through the jam and creating more of a Jam in the process.

It was a LONGGGG day when I finally reached home around 2300 Hrs... that constitutes about 3 hours sleep if I sleep at 2300, as last night I slept at 0115 in the morning. But, here I am writing and updating this blog entry and talking to someone special... :-P

Bangalore - What it Holds!!

I had always been fascinated by the lure of Bangalore - A Software Company in every street and every third house housing another small startup, also along with these varied software and IT companies an Engineering/Arts College to match the growing needs of these upcoming companies; at places where even you would not think of.
That was the lure that bought me to Bangalore, when I was offered a job here. That illusion broke down when I arrived in Bangalore. Going everyday to Office from a place called HSR(Hosur-Sarjapur) layout on either the bike or by Bus; the first thing I realized was that it was not going to be anywhere near a easy task. What with having to face the daunting local and corporation buses and to top it all the unruly auto rickshaw drivers; who drove a hard bargain to get you to the destination of your choice at the most exorbitant rates that they could come up with. During one of these sorties after missing my bus that I found that if you ignore them when they say these exorbitant prices they automatically come down to the real rates at which it is reasonable to take an autorikshaw... :-(

The Bangalore that i arrived at was full of people trying to find a place - to park, to drive, to walk, to stop, to enjoy and to generally get on with work and life; the image I had in mind was completely different...
Fortunately for me I had a few like-minded friends with me and they made my first few days enjoyable, before I finally got down to the nitty-gritty gritty of what I had arrived at Bangalore for - Work!!!

Already too much has been said of the excellent traffic and the traffic conditions of our Dear Ole Bengalaru... So I thought I should also add my two bits... :-)

I have been in Bangalore for almost 18 months now and have seen the situation go down to the worst... by nature I am a foot traveler and enjoy the walk through the city where you can get to observe many things which you otherwise miss on. This was my way when I arrived to this city and started with going to my Office on foot. I used to enjoy these walks when I arrived in Bangalore. Those were the days when we used to go from the hostel in which I was staying to the Office building which was in Kormangala industrial area, the walk was a good 1 1/2 to 2 Kms and both used to enjoy the same, with the relatively cleaner air in the morning, when we used to either catch the bus going towards Raheja Arcade or walk it down if we were early enough (early used to be 0845 and late used to be 0900... :-) ). Then while coming back from Office we used to enjoy some time in Forum, which had just about opened up and then walk back, almost always. Then came the days that just after 39 days of coming to Bangalore, I changed the company I was working for and joined another which was just starting operations in India (the first center for development outside of the US). Here too I meet like-minded people who enjoyed the walk (not to the office, as that was in Whitefield area; on the ITPL road). When we got down at the Raheja Arcade, and walked it down a bit to either the Aiwa's or Forum building; 200 yards or so... :-). Here after having a snack or two we used to head back to our homes, me waiting for my friend working a few yards from Forum to join me so that we would then walk it down to the hostel.


Well! now back to the traffic area. The second reason for coming back walking from the location of my first company, was that the inner roads were cleaner and we could easily walk across without hearing the honking of horns and the smoke and smog of the vehicular traffic which used to be coming our way. This usually was the norm, until 2 months down the lane the roads were segregated and some even became 1 ways. The traffic volume increased and so did the problems related to it. We changed routes and went through the more quieter regions of Kormangala, which has some real good architectural beauties which seem to be left empty by their creators. I really enjoyed those days as compared to nowadays when all you hear is the honking and people getting irritated at the people who share the roads with them...

I have a lot more on this and there will be a second edition for this soon... :-)

Work @ Acmet

Well!

Seems like a long time ago I planned to start with this... Anyways, now that I have settled down to this new job, I think I can start planning and doing atleast (if not all) the things I had planned for...

What I actually wanted to start off with is what am I actually doing the whole day... But, now I think I will relate to the incidents and my learning a new computer language (new for me, Oldie for all those who are there or have used it... )

I start with my first experience with the computer language Java. It was first thrusted on me with the advent of a JVM for an Embedded Platform, which was to be built for a normal training project. This project was basically to start the new MCA (Master's in Computer Application) trainees who would come to our Company for a basic 6 months of Course training. My Project Manager thought this would be a great way to teach them about the processes that we are following and also get them into the mold which would be followed, if they were to join the Company. Thus, started the great experience... I thought that I would have to start studying Java language and started off with just that... It was a great time as I started with the Java Language reference and then got on to the Java Code... that is where i drew a blank as till this time I was reading only the Preface and the Introduction... :-)

Well! I think that is enough of my ramblings for today will start again tomorrow...