I’m the guy who’s got Social Recommendations

Today spoke to a friend who’s been getting a lot of job offers lately. See my conversation with him:-

I asked him, “How do you get so much attention from companies and agencies?”

He replied, “Because, I’m a big deal on twitter”

I asked him again, “So what c*****a. You have to get some life or at least recommendations.”

He answered, “No, who get’s recommendations from people nowadays?”

That’s where I yelled, “Yes.. yes, I’m the guy who’s got a few recommendations from my classmates, colleagues, bosses, clients and teachers.”

So, for dummies the real definition of Social Recommendation : is that it is the material which establish’s your reputational power for getting people to believe in your story. 

Time to show you some examples I’ve picked up from my LinkedIn profile and Twitter :-

So, don’t be a balti and remember what matters is not what you do but what you are

Who wrote that song?

Today, as I was listening to a few songs on my iPod (created by late Steve Jobs), the beautiful lyrics of a particular song captured my attention and I asked myself – “Who wrote this song?”.

So, I started my journey to discover the songwriters of my favorite songs. Hope you like them all and appreciate the writing of their songs.

• Irshad Kamil - is an Indian Hindi/Urdu poet and lyricist who has written songs for many Bollywood hits like Jab We Met, Chameli, and Love Aaj Kal.

My favorite line from the below song – “Jo bhi  main kehna chahoon barbaad kare alfaaz mere.”

My favorite line from the below song - “Koi sone sa tole re koi maati sa bole re. Koi bole ke chaandi ka hai chura.”

• Chetan Shashital – is one of Mumbai’s most well-regarded voice over artistes turned lyricist who has also re-sung ‘Sabse Bada Rupaiya’ in Mehmood’s voice for Bluff Master.

My favorite line from the below song - “Is dard ki na hai dawai. Majnu hai ya hai tu kasai?”

• Gulzar - is a popular Indian poet and lyricist who has written songs for many Bollywood hits like Maachis, Omkara, Kaminey, Dil Se, Guru, Slumdog Millionaire, Raavan and many more.

My favorite line from the below song - “Jahaan teri pairo kamal gira karte the. Hase toh do gaalo me bhanwar pada karti the. Chod aaye hum woh galiyan”

My favorite line from the below song – “Aaja aaja jinhe shamiana ke tale. Aaja zariwale neele aasmanon ke tale. Jai Ho!!”

• Tracy Chapman - is an American singer-songwriter who’s written and sung songs like ”Fast Car”, “Talkin’ ’bout a Revolution”, “Baby Can I Hold You”, “Give Me One Reason” and “Telling Stories”.

My favorite line from the below song – “You got a fast car. But is it fast enough so you can fly away. You gotta make a decision. You leave tonight or live and die this way”

• Jason Mraz - is an American singer-songwriter who’s written and sung in albums like Waiting for My Rocket to Come, Mr. A-Z and We Sing. We Dance. We Steal Things.

My favorite line from the below song – “No need to complicate cause our time is short. This is this our fate. I’m Yours!!”

This list has no end and I’ll keep updating it forever

I would love to know your favorite songwriters and their songs.

Do I need a Personal Assistant?

I’ve always desired of someone managing my to-do list and now I get my blessing in disguise as I meet Sonia Samtani who’s the  founder of ‘At Your Service‘ – Mumbai’s only personal assistance service company at Bombay Hub during a networking session.

Let me take you back in time to the year 2009, I was in Chennai with my family for a religious trip (BTW, I’m a roman catholic) and we took some time out to visit a mall. I had recently got hooked on to book reading while travelling so marched towards Crosswords and after scanning through the store landed on an awesome book which could have changed my life if I had followed it - Four Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferris. This book teaches how to outsource your life and do whatever you want for a year, only to return to a bank account 50% larger than before you left (one of the many things one can learn). As I was skimming through the book, I got introduced to the concept of ‘Outsourcing Life‘ which was narrated as a true story by A.J Jacobs (editor-at-large at Esquire magazine). Was I convinced?? Hell yeah, I was convinced enough to start looking up for “remote executive assistants” provided by some companies in India but never had the courage to call up and inquire because over the years of nursing this desire of having a personal assistant, one question always popped in my head- Do I need a Personal Assistant now?

Now after 2 years of first reading the book, I believe that maybe a sexy personal secretary (I so wish)  is not required but a virtual  personal assistant will surely be of a lot of help for few things on top of my head:

1. To remind me to pay my Mobile Bills or pay it for me (paise le lena baba).
2. Go to the Bank and do all my Bank Work (all of it is pending according to my dad)
3. Help me do my Birthday Trip Research and Bookings (this is one of the important trips of the year for me) 
4. Do the research on visual artists to collaborate for creating Music Art products (this is been giving me a tough time recently)
5. To help me send gifts for family, friends and girl friend(s) as and when I feel like (this is important as my track record of gifting people is zero). 

So, do you think I should call up Sonia and hire a personal assistant who will say, “I’m at your service sir.”?

#RIPSteveJobs – The Man behind iPod

Yesterday morning, I woke up to a sad news just like a lot of people. This was the news –> “Apple Chairman Steve Jobs dead at 56“

Steve Jobs was (and will be) a visionary business man, marketing genius, typography expert, designer and just a lovable human being for the world.

But, I’ll always remember him as the man behind iPod. For he and Apple managed to change music experience and accessibility forever simply by releasing the iPod.

Before you leave this blog post, I’m sharing few of my learning’s from the invention of iPod by Steve Jobs:

1. iPod is to Steve Jobs what Music Monday is to me. The inspiration to create a revolutionary product that will change everything related to music experience is a blessing from Steve Jobs.
2. Simple vision to identify a mass market waiting to be introduced to a cool product.
3. Drag something from the future to the present and make it accessible to an audience.
4. Be grateful to be born in a generation where music is an incredibly intimate part of an individual.
5. Design something so beautiful that everything else seems obsolete.
6. Love what you do so bad that nobody can replicate your product of love.
7. Make a good story for your product’s existence for audience connect.

Steve, thank you for introducing the iPod to me and teaching me how to be a change maker. You’ll be missed sir.

Open the Blog of Learning

This explains why this personal blog is created and named the – ‘Blog of Learning’. Last few years, I’ve learned a lot from people, workplace and family but never got a chance to document them to retrospect later.

Now that life is a little more adventurous then yesterday, I’ll be filling up this box with stories of my learning’s from day to day life. Come back for a bit of me every day, a mix of positive/negative learning’s, important events out of my 24 hours of life and much more….