Back in the year 1996, another intellectual boy from the streets of Kolkata emerged amidst the confusion of the two biggest career choices people had: Doctor or Engineer! Now, I had seen some of my friends’ siblings studying for Medical. The size of the books and the number of years they studied scared the crap out of me. There was NO WAY I was going to study for 7-8 years and then try to find a good place to practice. It is a noble profession no doubt, but definitely not for me. So the obvious choice was to derive and integrate my way through the Joint Entrance Exams for Engineering. I still don’t know why I did all that calculus and trigonometry in my life. I mean who cares to solve 3√∫tanx. Well, as it happened, I made it as rank 834 in WB JEE, which was not a big deal, but it became a big deal because I finally made it to a good (?) branch in a great engineering college. We did have occasional debates about whether our college was #1 or #2 in the country, after the IITs. We Indians have such a fascination for not going for the best. IITs k baad #1 college apna hai. It is an amazing attitude that drives the chalta hai life in the country. Anyway, getting through was not big deal, I didn’t have to do much there because we are a family of 3 Idiots, me being the youngest i.e. 3 brothers, all 3 engineers. Great talent, right? WRONG! I was frikking clueless of why I landed up in engineering. My only incentives to go for engineering were

(i)                 Get out of my home town Kolkata (don’t ask me why, I just wanted to, and I am entitled to that thought)

(ii)               Stay in a hostel because all my two brothers used to do during their semester holidays was to share fascinating stories from the hostels. Dammit, I also had a right to all that.

That was the #1 Big Decision in life that a 19 yr old boy had to take. Professional education. A decision made, not by choice, but by the dislike towards other choices in life and powered by public opinion.

Now, Electrical and Electronics Engineering is not exactly a very stimulating subject for most people. It is, in fact, pretty “shocking” as a subject, pun intended. It was all about circuits and alternators and motors and generators. It was torture. The only circuit that I now relate to in life is the circuit from Munnabhai MBBS. Added to all this was the woe of relatives and family friends having a hearty laugh, “Arey electrical engineer! Very good. Ab ghar ke light badalne mey koi tension nahi hai”. Now, WTF was that? There came a very important learning in life, which I now realise that I had sailed through. And that is:

People who are clueless about what you are doing will talk random stuff. It doesn’t even matter if you are clueless, if you feel it is the right thing to do, just do it!

While academics did not interest me much, nor was I a great sportsman, I just happened to participate in a few literary events. Being a fun loving and animated guy, I was fond of dumb charades and we did something and won in the first year. I was so bad at GK, I had to even ask the guys who Boutros Boutros Ghali was, or what Shawshank Redemption was. But I got noticed and then got introduced to the Lit circuit of the college, for my miming skills. The Lit circuit was called Balls by Picasso. Seen as snobs and hated by most, we were quite a handful for some of the best colleges back then, winning a series of events. Being part of this kept me in the company of “different” people and kept me in elevated company. Now, when I say elevated company in engineering hostels, I know that has an entire different meaning to it, but I do not mean that. That was also part of my company as I balanced everything. I was an ITC, intellectually talented chamaar, a rare breed. Learning number two in life, now that I look back:

When you walk with the “different” people, there will be animosity and hatred. They will call you cocky, but if you maintain your relationships right and not let the talent get into your brain, you will maintain both. And you need both kinds of elevation in life!

And so it happened, the placement season started. I was like Venkatesh Prasad in the dressing room when India is batting. Not even bothered to pad up because it was obvious that I was not needed in the initial part of the game and whatever is left over when it is time for me to come, we will have to live with that. Being an average student, the big names were not for me. I realized that the only profession engineering colleges keep you ready for is IT. And my biggest achievement in programming in college has been to get the screen shout out “Hello World” at me. That gave me the kicks! Pointers and linked lists scared the crap out of me. I never understood it. But, as luck would have it, I got recruited somewhere around day 50 by a company from Bangalore. I was damn thrilled to have got a job and was even more elated when I learnt that the owner of the company was the Founder of the Bangalore chapter of the Beer Drinkers Association. I said while the others would fiercely feed codes to their machines, I would be chilling out in pubs. Damn good incentive, what say?

Life went on as a typical bachelor in Bangalore, hitting the Guzzlers and Purple Hazes on weekends, happy in the happy hours and even outside the happy hours! And then struck the thunderbolt. The dot com bubble had burst! 9/11 happened and suddenly the company realized that they were overstaffed and had no projects. Till that day it was proudly being tom tommed as the first company to have dot com to its name! 75 people lost their jobs, and, for the first time in my life, I figured in the first shortlist of any important list! The layoff list! The months that followed were one of the most humbling days of my life. Trust me, when you wake up in a bachelors apartment with 5 people and at 9 AM you are the only one waking up to the rumbling of the bikes of your roommates going to office, you feel worthless. I knocked doors, went to all sorts of companies, only to be politely told that I am overqualified for the job. For the first time, I was on the streets, literally begging to be employed but keeping a straight face. There is nothing pleasant about it. But then came a calling from my heart on one of those days in the flat, alone. Gear up. You cannot be defeated Raghu. If you keep doing what others of the same plight are doing, you will end up only where others will end up. Why not get into things that you can control? And then the second biggest decision in my life came up.

#2 Big decision in life: Prepare for my MBA and study the craziest I have ever done. Wrote all the exams and finally made it to XLRI Jamshedpur, one of the most prestigious institutions in the country. Like a normal Indian, I had to settle for the 2nd best and not the IIMs because I had no choice but to make best of what I got. Till date, I look at the layoff incident as the BIGGEST BLESSING in disguise, in my life because that catapulted my life to a whole new level. Today I feel heartfelt gratitude to the folks in HR who put up my name on that list. Because if that had not happened, I would have been on Facebook flashing photographs of travelling to various countries (mainly the USA), at company expenses, having a great Facebook life and a miserable passbook life. Looking back into the mirror, I now realize that Some things in life happen for a reason. When they happen, you have no explanation of why they happened but, for sure, guaranteed, WITHOUT EXCEPTION, they happen to build a better person out of you. I could have told myself that I am screwed and lost my self worth, but I chose to trust life and see what is in store instead.

This phase of my life have been pivotal for the next phase of my life, now that I look back and try connecting the dots. The dots now make a lot of sense in my life today as an entrepreneur. The next phase of life prepared me for something even better. What phase 1 of my life gave me to my entrepreneurial journey are:

-         Failure is absolutely essential and this is the SINGLE BIGGEST THING people fear. Come to think of it. You may be the topper in your college and you could be the best performing guy in your function and be the blue eyed guy of the boss or your clients. BUT……. When it comes to taking control of your own lives, you start doubting. Worst, you start doubting yourself. Most people forget the journey they have been through and look only at what they are today. You were NOT what you are today, when you started. You faltered, I bet you on that one. You screwed up on more than one occasion, I bet on that too. If you have not faltered EVER in your profession, then I am sorry to say, you have not done even a single value add to the system you have worked for. I have a friend who asked me about my journey and wanted a fool proof or failure proof mechanism. My question to him was this: When I was in college, you were the topper and I was in the bottom rung. Did it ever occur to you to walk up to me and ask “Raghu, what are the things that are making you fail so that I can understand what I should not do so that I don’t fail?” Failure WILL and MUST happen and be glad that you have been knocked down. In fact, the Australian Army, when they build their elite core team, they look at your career record and look for failure. If you have not failed, you are NOT recruited.

-         Loneliness gets the best out of you a lot of times: The journey can be extremely lonely and the irony is, some of the best decisions come that way. That gives you complete silence and you are with yourself and literally talking to yourself. My decision to go part with the crowd looking for jobs and study for my MBA came from my moments of silence, with myself. A lot of decisions in my business, have also come that way. Spend time with yourself and be your own best critic. No point asking others for their opinions, because that is all they are… Opinions. You decide what works better… Opinions or Decisions?

-         â€œI want to do what I love to do” is a BIG BIG LIE: Now this might shock a lot of you who are waiting for the right idea and waiting for your passion as if it will suddenly come up as a genie from the lamp. Sorry to say, it wont. Let us look at it a bit more deeply. Whatever you have done in life and have a passion for, you started doing it first and then found passion in it.

o  Dhoni started playing cricket and then found his passion.

o  You started programming and THEN developed a love for it.

o  You started researching and THEN fell in love with it.

o  You started marketing and sales and THEN could never get out of the passion of it.

o  You spent time with that guy/girl and THEN fell in love.

o  You started reading and THEN fell in love with books

Take anything in life and I bet you, when you trace it backwards, you will trace your passion to a start… always.. without fail. Why then this lie about I want to do something I am passionate about. If you were PASSIONATE about it, you would have done something already, wouldn’t you? Entrepreneurship taught me to go with the flow with belief and conviction and then put out your heart to build that connect.

Yes, the dots make sense.. a LOT of sense…. I would really urge you readers to take a dig at your life so far and find those dots and figure where they make a lot of sense. More coming up in my next article on the next phase of life!