It’s all out there in open. The media is going gaga about it. Everyone is talking about it. It’s an open secret. Some obnoxious figures are floating out in open, and many of our so called ‘Netas’ in white clothes are busy collecting all the black money they can, in these next few days. Someone’s father is being laid on the tarmac so ‘Nawabs’ can fly off and on from his holy name.

I wouldn’t be surprised, if tomorrow Mr. Musharaff would be projected as our Prime Minister! Yahan par sab Maya hain, mere bhai! But actually, when I come to think of it, it is actually not a bad idea to have Mush as our Prime Minister. His initials are PM. Almost everyone of the pseudo-secularist brigade would be very happy and yes the most important part is that N-deal or No-deal they would be able to solve many critical issues of national interests – 1) they will help us get rid of the government which has just few months to serve (oops! Sorry rule) the country before we have our general elections. 2) We may not get much needed power due to some power hungry or powerful politicians. 3) We will lose faith in democracy and turn many youngsters away from voting. Are you listening Mr. Karat? Mr. Bardhan? Mr. Ajit Singh? You may win, but we all are going to lose and you are going to be responsible for it.

Well, what’s the connection between all these madness and PR?

The insiders know it very well, that how well-oiled PR machinery is working overtime to make or break the government. The media contacts are being used to the maximum. The buying & selling is taking place. The stories are being planned and planted. Dinners are being hosted and lunches are being thrown upon. It’s a time now when everyone worth their salt in political journalism is high on ecstasy and enjoying every moment of their lives. Many business houses are playing their cards and using all their power to stabilize or destabilize the government according to their comfort levels.

PR is playing its role and whether you like it or not it is affecting your life for better or worst. Everything is fair in business and politics. My grandpa always said that if you have to be happy in life you have to stay away from four Ps: Press, Police, Politicians and Prostitutes. Well, the old man died before I came into PR, otherwise he would have added it also to this list.

Grandpa, I have a confession to make. I dealt with everyone on the list. Hang on guys – before you jump the gun, the last community in the list was part of an NGO I serviced as a client. And yes, I have one more confession to make – I found some humans in each of these communities! In PR as well, we still have few humans left.

After investing many years in the field of communication and dealing with brand owners and managers for ages I have seen the gradual change happening in the field of marketing communications. Be it a PR or advertising or any other medium of communication, every domain has seen the shift happening from product driven communication to consumer driven communication.

Let’s see, what we have seen in the past and what we are witnessing now. If we have look at ads in the past, they were full of product attributes and tangible benefits (some of them are even today following the same beaten path) – about size, shape, price, and shouted sabse sasta, yeh to jhaag wala hain and so on…

Come to 21st century and we are bombarded with extremely talented mothers, super kids, rich dads and a grand pa who go for jogging every day! All of them trying to sell some or the other service or product to you with emotions. Kyonki kabhi pyaar ke beech duriya na aaye…

Welcome to the ‘emotional economy’. This is nothing new and many of the management experts have spoken about it so many times. Many books have been written on the subject. The benefit of developing and demonstrating a personality of a brand has become a key element of strategy in every marketer’s workbook. Many of the successful brands have created a personality with which consumers are connecting themselves emotionally.

Now the billion dollar question is not whether Singh will remain king with support from another Singh who claims to be King as of now, but whether we as PR professionals have been able to embrace the same shift in our strategy or not.

Does PR as we know it and practice is today allow us to establish the emotional connect with the consumers the way advertising does. Do we have the same creative liberty to express ourselves? The answer is both, No & Yes!

No, because in traditional media relations model of PR where you are dependent upon the journalist (well some people would disagree to this statement, but it’s a politically correct perception) to share your story, he or she may speak the way he or she wants. There is no message control. There may be several other ‘NO’ as well, which I want my readers to suggest as part of their comments.

Yes, because the PR offers many more avenues than traditional media relations model. You have the opportunity to directly reach out to your consumers (prosumers, participants, partners, co-creators – many such jargons for people like you and me who spend hard earned money to buy many unwanted things throughout our lives). Social Technologies are really social in nature, which allows us to reach out to the real people in the virtual world and connect with them emotionally. I am sure there would be many more ‘YES’ to this which would come from you.

Until we meet next Thursday, take care and God Bless!

Image Courtesy: AMA Japan (http://www.amajapan.co.jp/e/)

Please accept my sincere apologies for missing out an opportunity to be with you last Thursday. But I am extremely happy that the newly win friends Hemant and Renu are really writing some amazing stuff on the blog. Some original and refreshing thoughts are being shared by every one of us on the blog. But unfortunately not many people are like us and today I want to share a small story about how to lose respect and become fool in front of 1,000 IPRB readers.

My friends who read my column regularly must be remembering my ‘Thursdays with Tushar’ of May 2 9, 2008 wherein I wrote about ‘How to win votes and influence people’. Last morning I received a copy of June issue of ‘(Name deleted on request)’ – a house journal of PR Body (Name deleted on request) . I was reading it and I discovered one article by a known PR person (Name deleted on request) with a headline ‘Political public relations making emphatic inroads into India’. The objective was to know more about how people are looking at political PR but within first few lines I got a real shock!

The article I was reading in ‘(Name removed on request)’ by distinguished (Name deleted on request) was totally inspired (Sorry Anu Mallik & Pritam for using your copyrighted language, but can’t help it – mentioning that it is lifted is so uninspiring!) from my article. I am uploading a scanned copy of the article for your reading pleasure. If you feel that you have read it before – don’t blame me, you can write directly to (text removed on request) and thank him for such wonderful originality and inspiration. This is an absolute insult to my readers.

(Please note: We have removed the scanned image of the article from the post but IPRB has kept it in its archieves for internal use & refernece purposes. It is not for public viewing any more - sorry for inconvenience)

I have nothing personal against (Name removed on request) and I don’t care about him. What hurts me the most is that faking has not remained limited to porn movies but it has reached our profession as well! I am sorry (Name removed on request) , I wouldn’t have written this post today and might have given you an opportunity to lift someone else’s article from my blog and print it as yours in some other magazine but I had to do this as, you didn’t even bother to respond to my private mail sent to you. Now, do you want me to print that mail here as well?

Friends, let me sum it up today’s post with just two jewels of wisdom from me. It is for you (Name removed on request)

“If you don’t have it, you don’t have it. Stop being a pirate”

“Being original is difficult, copying and not being caught is even more difficult”

God Bless and Take care!

Hope to meet all of you my friends {(Name removed on request) not included} in my journey of life and searching its meaning.

Recently I picked up a book called “Why So Stupid?” by Edward De Bono and this post is inspired by it. In fact, I wanted to write about why we stopped thinking about PR in our business but ended up writing something else courtesy a copy of a magazine landing on my desk.

Well, to be very honest I haven’t finished reading the book yet, but it seems that it would be fascinating to read through it. In the first few pages only, I disovered many things. One quote fetched my attention beyond doubt and I would like to share it with you. It helped me to put headline for today’s post as well. It reads and I write, “You can analyze the past but you have to design the future.”

Now coming back to the recently published report about “The Future of Public Relations” in one of the marketing magazines, I have few observations which I want to express for you lovely friends. While it did mention about the future of PR but the irony was that I haven’t seen any of the future leaders of PR talking about the future. I saw the same old faces trying to analyze the past without realising the present situation in many of their businesses or agencies and pretended to be designers of the future. I am sure many of you guys must have had a good laugh reading through it and some of their views must have been swallowed by many of us with a pinch of salt, some pepper and cold water.

The thinking in the industry has been stale and stopped somewhere. I was discussing the same with my wife and she said that it is happening probabbly because in earlier days leaders were born and born leaders are great thinkers, but today leaders are made, and they expect some reference as they are made like that. I think she has a point here. Most of our leaders are coming from ‘recoginition’ background and they always need a reference point to begin. The recongnition here is the worldview they have been living with since 70s and trying to impose the same upon their people. Do you have a high attrition rate - stop blaming the new generation, please. I have had the luck of meeting many of the agency heads and since I have to be politically correct here on this blog and have to remain in the industry where I belong to, I have to say a big lie that almost all of them have inspired me. (sigh!!) But, I am sure almost everyone who is reading my blog today knows ‘who is who?’ in the business and I do not have to give you any recognition or refernece point to think outside the box to arrive at any conclusion. I am sure you are smarter than me.

By the way, who am I to pass on any judgment on the industry or some of our so called leaders. After all, some of them have created the industry we are all working in now. They are the ones who are driving growth of their agencies and dipping the fees. They are the ones how are corrupting the business eco system and doing things which are not required in the name of building and maintaining relationships. They are the ones who are not willing to let their people grwo and try harder to make them feel inferior. After all, they are the ones who are drving the industry, where the accelerator is on a left hand side and brake is faulty with a gear lever lost somewhere on the way.

Why am I behaving so stupid and writing such a post? May be because I am like that only. I care for each one of us. I love what I do and it really hurts when I see my love being treated the way it is being now by many of them. SOS! Please respond, before its too late.

Take care friends and wake up! Jaago re… Jaago re… Jaago re…

PS: I wrote this heartfelt post with complete honesty and with an intention to hurt few of them in the process. If you are one of them and felt hurt, please accept my apologies and look into the mirror. Do you see the horns emerging from sides… ??!!!???

But I am here. Or not? It is still Thursday, so I am here. I wanted to be here early. I promised that I am going to be here every Thursday morning without fail, but I wasn’t there as promised. I did receive few messages and calls from many of you my friends. One of them even said, write whatever it is even if it’s just ‘Hello’ or ‘Hi’ or why not just create a blank post with ’smiley’ in it but she should see ‘Thursdays with Tushar’ in her mailbox every Thursday without fail! It’s an addiction for her. Now, that was too much but it did happen. And I don’t have any words to express but to say thank you to her and many such wonderful friends. I am blessed!

I am writing this small post just to say ‘Hi’ to all those who called and to all those who did not call but missed my column. I reiterate my promise that we will have more meaningful discussion next time around. This time, I am leaving you with a wonderful forward, I received this morning…

Don’t compare yourself with anyone in this world. If you compare, you are insulting yourself.

No one will manufacture a lock without a key. Similarly God won’t give problems without solutions.

Life laughs at you when you are unhappy… Life smiles at you when you are happy… Life salutes you when you make others happy…

Every successful person has a painful story. Every painful story has a successful ending. Accept the pain and get ready for success.

Easy is to judge the mistakes of others. Difficult is to recognize our own mistakes. It is easier to protect your feet with slippers than to cover the earth with carpet.

No one can go back and change a bad beginning; But anyone can start now and create a successful ending.

If a problem can be solved, no need to worry about it. If a problem cannot be solved what is the use of worrying?

If you miss an opportunity don’t fill the eyes with tears. It will hide another better opportunity in front of you.

“Changing the Face” can change nothing. But “Facing the Change” can change everything.

Don’t complain about others; Change yourself if you want peace.

Mistakes are painful when they happen. But years later collection of mistakes is called experience, which leads to success.

Be bold when you lose and be calm when you win.

Heated gold becomes ornament.  Beaten copper becomes wires. Depleted stone becomes statue.  So the more pain you get in life you become more valuable.

I am sure many of us have heard about ‘Art of Living’ and the difference they are making in many peoples’ lives. Today, I am introducing ‘Art of Leaving’ and trying to leave a thought so even while you leave, you can live forever in minds of organization and its people. It is said by some unknown (at least to me…) poet that, “Jahan jahan se guzare hum, na mitane wale kadmo ke nishan chhodate chale aaye hum…” Effective leader or manager is one who leaves a legacy of great work and capacity to produce better results.

My post is not original and it is inspired by couple of instances I have come across in recent times. It is also inspired by couple of books I have been reading in recent times. Timing of this post may lead to few possible thoughts in many peoples’ minds but that’s ok! We do not wish to comment on speculations. Change is inevitable and people who are on my ‘Google Talk’ list already know that I am busy carving dreams with my force. We will talk about it in next few weeks.

Any management job is quite a thankless job. Not all successful management guys are earning bunch and bunch of money and getting rims and rims of newsprint. There are many people like us who are quietly making a difference to a business, to a profession or to a society by becoming engines of growth or change. If you want to leave and still live forever, the first thing you should be doing is leave when you are not required to. Don’t leave because you are tired for burned out. Look at Arun Sarin; he’s leaving at right moment. When everything is going for him, he’s leaving and in the process he is surely going to leave a legacy and a vision for the organization which will surely shape future of Vodafone across the globe.

When you are ready to leave, take your team in confidence. Share your vision with them. Show them the change and lead from front. It is important for them to know that even if you are not going to be around they have to carry forward the good work and foundation created by you and make you feel proud. I always carry this wonderful quote in my mind with me, which I don’t remember verbatim but it goes something like this – “A manager is not known by the work team does when he’s around but he’s known by the work the team does when he is not around.” I always believed in that and this is a time when I wish to thank each and every individual who has worked with me in my past 15 years and carried forward the legacy of change we have envisaged together. A big thank you to all of you my friends!

Leaving in style is something I have always enjoyed. I have left organizations or offices when they were in better shape than when I joined them. People who have worked with me or know me will vouch for this statement and they have seen how I enjoyed legacy of creating many offices/organizations from scratch and turning them into profitable business ventures. Leave in style, so your style lives forever. I still receive calls from many of my past clients saying that they miss me and I feel really proud about it.

Leaving a job or organization is not bad but leaving when things are bad is bad. So, if you are planning to leave because you didn’t get a raise this year – don’t leave. If you are planning to leave because you shifted your office and you didn’t get a desk you always wanted – don’t leave. If you are planning to leave because you are not satisfied with your team’s performance – don’t leave. Leave when you get your raise. Leave when you get your desk. Leave when your team is at its best and delivering a peak performance. Winners do not quit. Be a winner, leave but always live in heart and soul of the organization. I repeat my last week’s question – do you have it in you?

PS: This should act as an eye opener for few of so called leaders in our industry about whom I wrote in one of my early posts. You may read it here.

Though I am not a politician, politics fascinates me. I am one of the very few fortunate PR professionals in the country, who did political communication before and I still enjoy doing it as much as I enjoy watching the mysteries of Indian voters unfold in uncanny manner. I find elections more exciting than T20 cricket. The war is more intense than that of any form of sports. We have been seeing some never seen before use of communication tactics & tools in the race for Presidency in US. But, I am going to talk about BJP’s recent Karnataka win and how they went about crafting the victory using the most potent weapon of mass awareness.

I don’t want to analyse the win or the strategy they have adopted. Our friends in the media have already done enormous stories on it. We are going to discuss about how to know what to do and what not to do and how really one does effectively to win consumers or voters. And that’s what is called strategy.

It’s all about common sense and gut feeling…

Opinions polls painting different pictures, various researches showing some funny trends but you know what is right. You apply common sense to connect with common men and understand their wish. Do your own research to find out whether what you are saying is making sense or not. Above all, believe in what you are doing and do it well.

Identify the need…

Know your consumers. It is always said that once you know your consumer, you don’t need to know anything else. Identify what connects you with your consumer, what she needs and how can you fulfill her demandments (I had a book ‘The 10 Demandments’ – someone borrowed it forever. If anyone of you have a copy, please allow me to borrow and never return!)

Be independent in your thinking…

One of the biggest mistakes we make is compromise and never does business on our own terms. We follow industry trends, try to benchmark against someone and so on… Hey, c’mon guys God has given you a brain to use it and create something of your own and not to become Annu Mallik or Pritam or Mahesh Bhatt. Chart your own way and if I have to use management jargon here, develop Blue Oceans and enjoy the splash.

Choose your team carefully…

If everything goes well, Rajasthan Royals will be the champs of first IPL series. I have heard a RJ of one of the FM stations in Mumbai making a mockery of team at the beginning of IPL and now I am sure that RJ or the person who wrote the script must be feeling like hiding his face in the sand like an ostrich!

Great team is a team where every member of the team contributes towards the success and that forms a winning habit.

Know your competition…

This is another KYC - as important as knowing your consumers. Know as much as possible and do your homework right. Find out gaps and fill those gaps. Find out defecting consumers and grab them. Find out traitors and stay away from them. Know when and how they dance and what the platform they dance on is made of.

Learn the art of deception…

If you have read the Art of War by Sun Tzu, you know what I am talking about. It reads, “When able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe that we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near.” I rest my case, your honour! Now, it’s up to you to write the judgment!

Leaders lead to serve people…

Leader should inspire trust. You should know who the leader is and he or she should be able to take his/her people along. Leaders do not get created by high command’s whims and fancies. Leaders emerge from within. They show the path, take responsibility for defeats and share fruits of winning. Lead from the front and again pardon me for going back to Sun Tzu but as he wrote and I quote, “The Commander stands for the virtues of wisdom, sincerity, benevolence, courage and strictness”.

Mission & Vision…

Share your manifesto, based on needs of your stakeholders. Connect with everyone emotionally and lead with passion. Success if yours to be taken. Winning will surely become habit and never fail to deliver on what you promised. Otherwise, as one of the old Bollywood song sings, “Yeh public hain, yeh sab jaanti hain… Andar kya hain, Bahar kya hain… yeh sab kuch pehchanti hain…”

Politics can be dirty but learning something from it, is not.

Take care my friends and don’t stay away from politics! Our country needs good servant leaders. Do you have it in you?

I wrote about ‘The Power of Invisible Force’ and followed up with few heartfelt stories. My Friend Palin even suggested that I am heading towards Himalayas and may be on my path to attain nirvana or sainthood. But my dear friends, I am not. Today, I am going to share a never ending love story of my life. I told my wife that it all started in our past life and still continuing…

Well, what a love story has got to do with PR blog? To be very honest, I am yet to figure that out as I have just started writing this post and may be by the time we finish our dialogue, we will discover that. Somehow I feel that there’s a strong connection. Okay, let’s try and see how a love story develops…

You like someone, starts missing her whenever she is not around (people please change your gender accordingly!)

I have experienced it. I am sure many of you have. You start wondering why the hell I didn’t feel this way before for anybody else. But hey my friend, realise that the person whom you miss is not just anybody else – she is special. You start praying.

In PR, we need to offer something that our clients need the most – clear advice and clear understanding. It is not about the formatting the release and changing fonts but giving a whole new meaning to the communication process, bring out a point which they never thought existed in news or suggest that you throw the release in a bin. In short, they should like you. They should miss you, if you are not around. You are so special. They start praying.

To say it or not – to be or not to be…

I have experienced many butterflies flying all around in my stomach. I am sure many of you have. Whether to make that first move or not? Can I express myself openly or send subtle hints. Can I just say as it is, or weave in the discussion? What if I get rejected? Thousands of questions cross your mind…

In PR, we face similar situations in slightly different context. Can I tell the client that the news release you are going to issue is going to be in trash bin and don’t waste paper? Can I say to the CEO of the company that when it comes to human touch and interaction with people, my dhobi is much better than you? Somewhere, somehow one has to start saying the truth to client, if you want to be true to yourself and your profession; you have to move away from the fear of rejection. If the truth is with you, there will never be rejection. True love conquers all obstacles.

Commit – I do…

It’s that time to say ‘I Do’… Those 2 words express so much of my feeling, it expresses what I want to tell my wife; that I am there with her always, in good and bad, in happiness and sad, in success and failure, in life and death. It says; I do stand in front of you in adversities, I do stand behind you in your success, I do stand with you in your hour of need.

In PR, we always have to remind the client that we are there. We need to express it. We need to prepare ourselves, understand client’s requirements, guide them through the maze, be with them during tough times, be friend and you have a client for life. Sounds like marriage made in heaven isn’t it?

Together – we grow.

My love for you is growing, it’s growing with time and age; it’s getting intense and deep with time, it’s getting matured and complete with age. We grow together, build dream together and let’s achieve it together, because there cannot be a life without you…

In PR, we grow together. We start understanding each other and share same passion to build brands, sell products or market services. We build team together, we build dream together and achieve it together, and we live in complete peace and harmony, we have to be together for life as no one understands you better than I do.

Love sets you free!

There are always you, me and then hum! You know it. You need space. You need your personal moments. You need to be you, so does your partner. If your love is true, your love never going to go away from you.

In PR, we always have to remember that we are also like that. We also need to have our own space. Clients also need their own moments. Your creativity to grow and think independently will obviously help you decide what is best for the team. If you are true and honest in your approach, the client is never going to go away from you.

Love will find a way…

I am sure about this. I know for sure that love will find a way…

In PR, you never say goodbye. All roads lead to Rome.

Take care friends. Never stop loving your work. God bless!

PS: This post wouldn’t have been complete without my wife being there for me, always. She is my biggest inspiration and my invisible force.

I assume you know why I am late in posting this post today.

I assume you know by now what I am going to write today.

I assume that you must have got decent increment this time and your CV is not floating in the market.

I assume that you have been reading and will keep on reading whatever I write in my post.

We all assume. We all assume lot of things. Imagine a world without assumptions. Would you be able to live in this kind of world, where everything is non-politically correct and being expressed as it is? Yes, one such world exists but it may be too personal to involve anybody else than me and my wife! :) But, please don’t assume anything yet. She is the one who taught me the power of expression and she’s my biggest inspiration to continue expressing whatever I feel like with you guys without really bothering to think about whether it is politically correct, whether is this the right platform to talk about everything I have been speaking to you or whether I should just stick to whatever I learnt in my B-school or on the job. She knows quite a few things but doesn’t want to assume those and wants me to express it again and again in many ways. This is getting really interesting and I can write endlessly about my wife and what I learn from her but I have to do a justice to the platform and do not talk too much about my personal assumptions and expressions. So, shhh!!

I had a review meeting with some clients. As usual, they assumed that agency did not do any work as per their wish and command. They expressed their unhappiness to my colleagues as well. They assumed that journalists know everything about them. They spoke to journalists on the false assumption they know the business and the company they are speaking to and made lots of mistakes in the process. They assumed agency will take it easy and say ‘yes’ to whenever they will express their unhappiness.

Unfortunately, they had to deal with me and only thing they might have not assumed is my agency’s ability to express in a manner, which probably not many from service industry are capable of doing it.

To cut the long story short, I walked out on the CEO of the organization and demonstrated extreme displeasure to him about the way they are not listening to the team and agency. After a while, I went back to the CEO and obliged him by talking to them about why they don’t know how to express and living in the world full of assumptions. Told him about his inability to live the brand, informed him about how he’s losing money to us without really utilising the brain my agency has and in the process enlightened him on the power of communication.

In the end, he expressed his pleasure in one line – saying that for the first time in his long career as a CEO someone has really walked out on him to prove a point and he’s convinced that expressing it is always better than assuming it.

Anyways, the objective of the post is to let you know my friends that if you are convinced about what you are doing is right. Just go ahead and do it. Don’t assume anything, express everything and express it effectively.

So, my dear wife, when you want me to express my feelings, I know what you are talking about… I am learning and I am happy to express and admit in front of my readers that I am learning it all from you and only you.

Express yourself! Phir pata nahi kal ho na ho…

Interesting isn’t it? I am Tushar - a small time PR guy trying to find some common ground to be in the league of these two extra ordinary gentlemen. But, whoever has seen all three of us telling stories they might agree to what I am going to say. We all are great entertainers. We all love telling stories. We all love what we do. We all go all out to woo the people whom we love – customers, clients, consumers, teammates and so many other people who matter to us. Well, this story is not about me trying to prove that I am as great a personality as SRK or Steve Jobs is, but this is a story about what makes them what they are today and why I am like them or why you should be like them…

Well, what these guys do? One is the most successful CEO of corporate world and other one is the most successful actor of the Indian film industry. But, both of them have only one job, and the job is to create aspirations.

Look at them. Have you ever seen both these guys making a presentation? I have seen both of them and have learnt a lot from them. And yes, I am reaching somewhere close to them as far as my presentations are concerned… or at least, I would like to pretend that I am in the same league.

When they start, they set the tone right from the beginning itself. They start a story with a gripping headline which grabs your attention from the very first sentence itself. They create larger than life image. The words they use make you feel demanding more and you are in their grip. Steve likes to use superlatives at any given opportunity, so does SRK – excellent, path breaking, amazing, redefining and these metaphors sound so nice when they are used properly (obviously not in our press releases!), so use them…

They make meaningful dialogue with the audience, which reflects their true personality. They don’t hide emotions, they even show their arrogance. They convincingly involve you with their passion for the profession using the great sense of humour and perfect timing of delivering the story with proper voice modulation. The complete showman style – for us our presentations are our movies and we need to live those moments. Even if there are numbers, we have to make it more meaningful so that client doesn’t have to look for a calculator or Dr. Math’s book. If you are using power point – learn the art of Zen, which makes you realise the best known principle of life to live with is minimum is maximum!

The passion and experience combined with in-depth knowledge of what you do is a lethal combination for any presenter. But conditions apply. Use it wisely. When you can kill an elephant with a small needle why to use F-16!? Use everything in right quantity. Focus on quality and enjoy every moment of your interaction with the audience. Laugh with them. Dance with them. Do something they never expected – I remember in one of the presentations, I went with ‘Manjira’ (I am sorry but I don’t know what is it called in English!) and in middle of the presentation I removed them from my jacket’s pocket and played music! Well, it was to prove a certain point and to wake up few of them. Many of the participants whom I am still in touch with remember me as the “Manjira man!” :) and I achieved what I wanted…

Many a times, I won pitches even without opening up my laptop for creds! And it is possible. If I can do it, you can also do it. It’s not a rocket science. It is even easier than participating in “Kya Aap Paanchvi Pass Se Tez Hain?” and winning few lakhs of rupees.

And finally before I end this post, I want to share an open secret of success. Winning is important and losing is even more important. Collaborate every win and celebrate every loss. As the SRK said in one of his movies… Kabhi kabhi kuch pane ke liye kuch khona bhi padta hain, Aur haar ke jeetane wale ko baazigar kehte hain… So my dear friends, sometimes you can even learn few good things from the people you never met and I don’t mind accepting the fact that I have learnt a lot from each one of them – the Eklavya way!

Make winning a habit. Just do it! And do it in style… who you want to follow SRK, Steve or me! Choice is yours…

God Bless! Take care and see you soon.