Anand Nataraj

Posts Tagged ‘experience’

When every i come across places, people or situation it takes me back to the memory lane and these days it is happening too often… So i wanted to see how good i remember things that happened all these years year wise;

1980 : Couldn’t remember much. But it is a special year because that was the year i was born.

1981 : Couldn’t remember anything.

1982 : Vaguely remember walking with my grandpa’s & running round my granny’s house.

1983 : Remember vaguely about the beginning of my schooling & how my mom use to pick me after school hours.

1984 : Same like 1983. But I lost my Father’s father. I lost him at a very young age but I was his favorite. Miss him a lot.

1985 : This time i remember i was in class I and i was changed school after a 3 months in my old school. As a kid it was a the first time i was made to adapt change where culture, people & process everything were different. Since was too small I quickly adapted to the change.

1986 : A very special year. I got a cute little sister who has been my strength till days. We moved to our own house far from my school. Enjoyed going gardening with my mother. My Father use to drop me in school in the morning & my Mom’s father use to pick and drop me from school.

1987 : Lost my Mom’s father. We had to come back to grandma’s home to be with her. Again it was back to the place where I was born.

1988 : Came back to our house at Porur. Again my father use to drop me in school & his colleague will pick me from school. I leave home by 7.30 AM & come back home by 5.30 PM. Too much of a kill for a 8 year old.

1989 : Changed school which is less than a kilo-meter from my house. Got a class mate who was my neighbor Mr.Balaji & I was at cloud 9 as I’ve always studied is school where I didn’t have a class mate to access. In my old school mates use to meet and play at each others home during weekends and my chance came only during this Year.

1990 : Changed another school & I owe full credits to this school for what I’m today A.V.Meiyappan Matriculation Higher Secondary School. My responsibility started here. Use to take my sister for lunch & bring her back to home from School. For the first time I was exposed to football.

1991 : Started a Cricket team in my area.

1992 : Started becoming independent as I started visiting friends who are far from my house. This is the time where studies have started to become a burden on me.

1993 : My father went abroad and started getting lots of new gadgets. Use to play more & yell at studies. Golden year in my sporing career was a de-facto brand for my school. The year marked the beginning lying parents & going to movies with friends.

1994 : Failed in class IX in spite of excelling in sports. That marked the end of my short sporting career. Had to switch school in order to save a year and joined class X. This year was very special because I studied in a school for 3 months and again changed school. This time was the the beginning of golden period in my life. I was the Don in the making & my dream then was to become a big Don. Bunked school to watch movies & stole money from home to watch movies.

1995 : Somehow passed my SSLC (Class X) & rejoined my favorite school AVM. This period was full of studies.

1996 : Again studies was my priority.

1997 : Joined college. Again the start of my second golden period. Went to Bangalore for the first time. For the first time saw girls smoking, roaming with guys & sew a lot o girls drinking. Climate was awesome. Loved this place & even thought of settling there those days.

1998 : Golden period at the peak. Exposed to internet & didn’t realize that this is going change my life for ever. Visiting Bangalore was a routine. My familiarity with Bangalore was mainly because of roaming with my fathers colleagues those days.

1999 : Continued with my golden period. For the first time started doing my own petty jobs.

2000 : College life ended. Started my first Company.

2001 : Struggled & cracked the way to hunt for projects.

2002 : Special year because Business grew, Moved to own office & was the golden period of my Entrepreneur days.

2003 : Start of getting exposed to People problem & for the first time started facing turbulence.

2004 : Attrition was at its peak. Took some gamble of moving to a Cozy office by over-stepping. The move clicked. Got a good friend Mr.Major Karthik (Who has been my strength till date.).

2005 : Beginning of bringing structure into the company. Got a special companion who & was flying high.

2006 : Joined MBA @ Great Lakes Institute of Management & I consider this to the the best choice & investment (I paid my fee for the first time) i’ve ever made. GLIM gave me enlightenment & gave me lot of answers. I transformed from a Blind Entrepreneur to an Entrepreneur with Vision.

2007 : Good business, Good Friends, a Companion and I thought life was settled.

2008 : The year of biggest Turbulence. One fine day I lose most of the thing which made me think I was settled. That is when I came to know True & Fake friends. Major Karthik, Balaji & Bala Murugan were people who Stood by me during those days. Today I’m thankful to god because i felt i was a failure & my life has come to an end. Today i realize with all these friends i can conquer the world. Started Cogzidel this year.

2009 : Developed new hobbies & experimented things I wanted to do. Life has become more meaningful. Got a lot of new friends who filled the Gap for the lost ones.

2010 : I turned 30. Can’t think how days have ran like a jiffy. Particularly from 1994 – 2010. Everything looks like it happened yesterday & it looks like it all ran within minutes.

Over all I must thank God for giving me good & bad experience witch all made me only strong. When I look back all bad / sad situation stood for a better / good future. Let me run couple of more years and will share my new experience and let this blog be a document for my future reference to enrich my mind with the memories of past.

We always learn from past mistakes. We took lot of lessons from Office Warming Experience of CCS which happened by September’09. So this is how it happened and how we were tangled into a new mess;

• Kept all the Pooja things in office the previous evening.
• Kept a key with me as last time we all reached office and we had to wait for a person to come and open the office and it got delayed.
• The morning woke up took my bath and went to office as second person by 4.25 AM following the priest who came by 4 AM.
• To our surprise there was a grill gate for which i didn’t have the keys.
• Had to call the responsible person and falling prey to my parents piece of mind.
• Had to hammer and break the lock.
• Then things started after a delay of one hour.
• Then folks like Kannan, Bala, Vimala & Boopathi joined.

Overall what ever things we learn from experience there are always new things that happens unexpected. Finally everything went fine and we started operations of Cogzidel Technologies Pvt. Ltd. Chennai.

In tamil there is a saying “Patta Kal-liyae Padum Sutta Kai-liae Sudum” (meaning “Hit legs gets re-hittem & Burned hands gets Burned again”). Like that saying lot of challenging things happened to me at the same time. Last week i went out on two day spiritual vacation where in i visited 6 temples in 2 days. After reaching home i wanted to blog the experience and sadly;

• Internet was not working & in spite of giving repeated complaint’s nothing is happening.
• When i thought of using Data Card it didn’t work. Reason “Payment not paid” & thanks to my memory power.
• I settle all my bills online because there was no net i as unable to make payments and i delayed couple of payments from card to data card to insurance policy payment.
• I was unable to come to office as it was Christmas Holiday and also i was tired of driving continuously for 2 days.

The worst is not over. For christmas i got an invitation from a celebrity friend to attend a charity function at Green Park Hotel, Vadapalani. Everything went well until i met someone who is a pain in my a$$ and things turned topsy turvy that night and i fell ill on saturday and unable to reach office on Saturday.

Then Sunday there was a surprise birthday party of my friend organized by her fiancee. Again i was unable to blog the experience because of internet problem at home. Finally i checked all my mails today after a gap of 6 days. I think this must be the longest gap for not using internet in my entrepreneurial life.

Now i feel relaxed to post this blog and i’ve got to post couple of more pending blogs to be posted.

One of my good friend called me and said he has got two proposals. He was happy that a girl proposed him and I was happier than him because I had good reason to ask him a treat. So today we went out for a movie and I thought it would apt to take him to the movie The Proposal.

I don’t want to talk more about that because it is someone’s personal and I didn’t get my friends permission to post even a bit of information he shared him (anyways pal if you read this blog don’t get hot because I didn’t specify your name :d).

Now I’m thinking how it would be if as girl has proposed me. Unfortunately not a single girl proposed me till date and not sure if I’d get that opportunity. I’m sure I’d have cherished if I had such an experience.

Thought I’ve approached girls for date and been successful couple of occasions I still envy people who got proposal from girls and strive to under go the experience.

Anyways let me not leave hope and keep my fingers crossed and wait for the lucky girl.

It is the month of June, on the shores of the Black Sea , it is raining, and the little town looks totally deserted. It is tough times, everybody is in debt, and everybody lives on credit.

Suddenly, a rich tourist comes to town. He enters the only hotel, lays a 100 Euro note on the reception counter, and goes to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one.

The hotel proprietor takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his debt to the butcher.

The Butcher takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the pig grower.

The pig grower takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the supplier of his feed and fuel.

The supplier of feed and fuel takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his debt to the town’s prostitute that in these hard times, gave her services on credit.

The hooker runs to the hotel, and pays off her debt with the 100 Euro note to the hotel proprietor to pay for the rooms that she rented when she brought her clients there.

The hotel proprietor then lays the 100 Euro note back on the counter so that the rich tourist will not suspect anything.

At that moment, the rich tourist comes down after inspecting the rooms, and takes his 100 Euro note, after saying that he d id not like any of the rooms, and leaves town.

No one earned anything. However, the whole town is now without debt, and looks to the future with a lot of optimism.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the business is today…..

Last four days in Madurai has been a different experience than my previous ones. Normally my stay is Madurai was full of discipline as I don’t have any friends here, city is small to cover any distance & there is not much places to hangout.

But this time I was totally out of my routine because; 

• I skipped going to GYM.
• I ate a lot as I found lots of eateries in Madurai which I was not exposed to previously.
• Hanged out in new hangouts as Big Cinemas has opened two new multiplexes and there are two more expected in KK Nagar.
• My friend base is slowly growing here.
• Kudos to Hypersomnia I slept for more than 14 hours a day.

Over all I can’t cherish this moment officially as I think my productivity and work concentration has been severely affected. But personally I really enjoyed staying in Madurai and I started to develop a liking for the city.

So what did I do for last four days? 

• Found a road side eatery which has vast menus for dosas. Its owner has become my good friend and I’m planning to do a coverage with him (The Hindu has already done a coverage on this eatery).
• Then I close my dinner with Jil Jil Jigardhanda as dessert. But to be frank drinking Jigardhanda has become like my second dinner.
• I finish the day by watching second show cinema from Big Cinemas.
• Found a new coffee shop near Apollo Hospital by name Coffee Float which provides nice atmosphere to watch cricket matches and sip coffees.
• My subordinates are doing a good job that they have made my work simple which eventually creates a lot for time for me.
• Then my new mobile phone has a Cricket Game in it and I spent more time playing cricket.

Anyways last four days has given me a new experience and I enjoyed being here and stayed here without complaining for the first time.

So this has been my experience for the trip and I need to hang here as I must go back home to do some cleaning work, take shower and board bus to Kumbakonam to attend a relatives marriage. Kumbakonam must be 6-7 hours of travel from here and I think I need not worry as I’m addicted playing cricket in my mobile.

Oops forgot to charge my mobile let me do that and finish all my work.

Bye Bye Madurai.

I had the opportunity to be a startup twice in my life. My first one started as early as a student and the second was with eight years of entrepreneurial experience. I just wanted to compare how it makes a difference and how I felt on both occasions. So here is a small comparison chart;

Over all it is interesting to be a startup second time also I might think my piece of cake is being like a Serial Entrepreneur so that I always have the excitement of being a Startup. Anyway let me enjoy my second stint of being a startup and run the show until I loose my motivation.

After a tedious drive to Bangalore which lasted for 14 hours (Check this blog post for more) we all were tired and we all took a long nap and all woke up by 4.30 PM, took bath and everyone was ready by 5.15 PM. Then we wanted to goto the spot where Startup City 2009 is scheduled. It was a fulfilling night and we did following things;

·         Reached NIMHANS Convention Center where event is scheduled by 6 o clock in the evening.

·         We pasted a banner which has details of all our services in our booth and we met person who coordinates with us to know schedule for Saturday.

·         Then we straight to Garuda Mall around 8 o clock

·         As everyone was hungry because of skipping our lunch we headed to food court to have our dinner.

·         En route on the entrance of food court I saw this small shop painting temporary tattoos and I was longing for a long to time to have one. I choose my star sign Pieces to be tattooed and it took less than 2 min to get it done. I got it painted on my right hand and this will last for one week with some instructions to be followed.

·         Then we all had our dinner and I had dosa and 4 glasses of sugar cane juice.

·         Then we booked Shinjaku Incident a Jackie Chan’s movie ticket in INOX cinemas.

·         Then we wanted to buy some tray, bowls for the event and we were unable to find our needs in the mall.

·         We thought of going to Bangalore central to buy them, luckily we found Home Shop opposite to Garuda mall where we found all that we needed.

·         Then we returned back and checked our weight in a weighing machine and headed inside the theatre.

·         I really loved the movie and Jackie Chan played a different kind of a role which was way different from his Image and he has really sizzled.

·         Then we returned home and we (myself & Bala) gave a small training to Ramanan & Boopathi on how to handle enquiry in the booth.

·         Then I wrote some blogs before this, then I checked emails, read some days news, checked slides for tomorrow’s presentation.

Now it is 3 o clock early morning and have decided to wake up by 6 o clock and reach the event spot by 7.30 AM so that we can be settled and well prepared when the event starts. So, let me take a short nap and get back to you tomorrow with live tweeting and blogging of my experience when every I find time.

Until then it is Good Bye everyone …

Today I’m driving to Bangalore after a long time. Driving to Bangalore has always been a pleasure and I use to travel to Bangalore at least once in a month till a year back.

We are heading to Bangalore to attend an event called Silicon India event where we are giving a presentation of our business plan to a group of VC’s and visitors. Also we have booked a stall to showcase our services.

Will be blogging about the outcome of the event on Saturday before that we (myself, Bala, Boopathi & Ramanan) are discussing about the plans for Friday and Sunday. En route to Bangalore I’m taking them to Khaja Hotel in Ambur which is famous for biriyani for dinner and I’ll be having roti’s in a Dhaba in Vaniyambadi which is my favorite.

Mostly tomorrow we will be heading to Forum mall and do some window -shopping and will be watching a movie. On Sunday we will be doing the same in Garuda Mall and also itz been long I walked on the streets of Brigade road and M.G.Road which I might give a shot if time permits.

Also I wish to go to 13^th Floor Ebony restaurant and would like try some of their Sindhi dishes. Last time I tried only one dish and was amazed. Probably this time I might go there and will try exclusive Sindhi dishes.

Over all I’ll make a blog post about the entire experience of this Bangalore trip once I wrap it on Monday. Tonight I’ll make a post about the experience we had while driving.

Now let me grab the role of driver from Boopathi as I’ve been longing for this moment for long.

This is how I bootstrapped my first venture which was started during the starting days of Dotcom bubble.

• Shared office space from a Gingelly oil company where they gave us 100 sq ft space, 5 systems, internet connection and a telephone line for $200 a month.
• Provided out of our business model services which helped us sustain till we got a groove into our core business. Services we offered were;
  • Linux installation
  • System Assembling & Trouble shooting
  • Java Training
  • Offering real time projects for college students
  • Sub sourcing resumes to manpower companies

Since we were out of college we had big network of friends who were college pass outs or students which helped in spreading our services and we got decent response to recover our monthly expense.

• Since it was recession there was acute shortage of jobs. We offered jobs for deposit and we got tremendous response for this. We made $2000 from two people which were our six months liquidity with which we stopped all non core activities and concentrated on core business.
• Apart from those two paid resource. We hired talented people who joined us for no pay. This changed our fortunes.

Having generated 6 months cash flow and a team of talented people we were able to win projects with the HELP of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and market places like scriptlance.com and elance.com.