one year of transformation at GDS

12 months at GDS

I have been at GDS for one year as a delivery manager, and wanted to write about my experience here. This organisation,The Government Digital Service, in the words of Tim O'Reilly, is 'the bible that all open government should follow'. It is leading the digital transformation of government.

Within GDS I work for the Performance Platform, which is a tool for government to answer the question ‘how are we doing?’. This has been a very special project for me, because it came as close as possible to a perfect agile implementation. Of course there is no such thing as a perfect agile team - instead, it is all about an ever-improving team.

The two critical success factors in my mind that make our team special are culture and process.

Culture

We have a working culture that values its people and embraces experimentation as key to success. For example, we have a regular ‘firebreak’ at the end of 3 months’ roadmap work. During the week-long firebreak, every member of the team is given total freedom to work on a project they are enthusiastic about.

The team decide for themselves what they will be working on, who they are going to work with, and how they are going to do it. Only one rule applies: People who sign up must show the results to the company at the end of the firebreak.

We got some amazing outcomes from our firebreak. We built scripts to automate the creation of 700 dashboards for government transactions. And we created cheapseats, an automated functional testing suite that ensures data integrity across the Performance Platform’s hundreds of dashboards.

We do other small small things well that made our team a fun place to work. There is a team biscuit tin (with a rule that it should never be empty), mission patches for big launches, lego avatars, cakes for every birthday, Friday burritos, etc.

All these things are small but create room for chats within the team. I found myself in a team of self-managing members who shared a vision and were genuinely committed to upholding GDS’s culture and values. They are team players, don't take themselves too seriously, and know how to have fun.

Process

The other thing that I have found makes GDS special is the processes we use.

We always focussed on user needs, constantly seeking feedback from real users. The business understood the benefits of agile and were enablers by constantly removing blockers. The mantra of the whole organisation is ‘show the thing’.

In our team, we used automated and functional test frameworks to reduce the time taken to create a single dashboard from 45 days to 1 day. We used emergent architecture and continuous delivery - the team’s definition of ‘done’ is when a feature is deployed to the live site, not before.

We used other techniques including lean startup approaches (minimal viable product, continuous delivery, continuous feedback), behaviour-driven development, constant refining of the backlog, and design thinking.

To sum up, the team always dreamt big, got things done and had fun at work. At the nexus of these three circles are the people I most enjoy working with. I'm extraordinarily grateful to have had the opportunity to do that every day in my 12 months at GDS. I look forward to do ‘a GDS’ to other organisations :)

Happy to see congress voted to power in India

Indian elections results are out and Election 2009 was an unqualified victory for the Congress. Results prove that for the People of India nation comes first rather than the religion which other leaders were trying to play on.

I am happy with result because the election has led to a stable government that will not have to succumb endlessly to the irritations of coalition politics and the threat of a midterm breakdown.

From my little following I can say Congress played it simple strategy wise ( speaking MBA terms now !!)

> It chose a single leader for PM right from the outset. Manmohan singh able, wise and regarded as a thinking man who could lead India out of the economic turmoil. Contrastingly BJP shot its foot by raising debate of national leader as Modi mid way through elections this confused the voters.

> Focus on youth: India has one of largest youth population in the world. By playing cards on this front gave congress a big boost. In the 1990s, the BJP was the natural party of the youth; today, the Congress is the beneficiary of India’s demographic transformation. The party must ask why the children of BJP voters aren’t comfortable voting for the BJP.

In short people voted for rice dhal rather than a kichdi of BJP or third front!!

In terms of delivering value congress now has less barriers in terms of implementing policies which it faced last time. So road is set for economic development of India lets hope people get benefited by riding once the road is laid !

"The top 10 (techie) people you should follow on Twitter"

Found the list of good twitters from the link below. I especially liked Padmashree's tweets !
"The top 10 (techie) people you should follow on Twitter"
http://tinyurl.com/bjddzq

update from me

Sorry its been a while ( almost more then 2 months) that i have posted. Last 2 months was quite interesting and hectic for me. Month of Jan we had remaining 3 core exams ( Business economics, accounting and Finance) . I got to say accounting was my most dreadful exam of all time i thought i would flunk at it although the results proved otherwise !! Overall I am happy with my results of 6 core courses ( marketing , strategy, Business economics, accounting and Finance).

Based on how i fared in these exams and also my involvment in these courses proved a point that finance is not my cup of tea !! Finance is good for any industry and very useful but it is not what i see myself doing for life. Also the recent recession proves that not many jobs are out there for finance and it is really not a good time to be in there.

So where do you want to be or where do you see yourself in next 10 years i asked myself whilst sipping coffee and looking at beautiful sunshine outside my flat.. My Gut said strategy, marketing and P&O would be my strong areas although i really appreciated economics and accounting. As of now i plan to get into business development or strategy consultant in telecoms or IT. Back up option in this difficult times would be to get into project management in high techs. Time will tell when my MBA ends sept 2009 till then i have few things to enjoy ...electives, IED project ( very interesting expereince till now , and final thesis)

........to be continued

3Iphones make 1 Tata Nano !! Why Iphone is not making grounds in India

Tata Nano or popularily called "people's car" was launched At Rs 1,00,000 ($ 2,500 when announced and $ 2,000 on the launch day thanks to Dollar appreciation against Rupee) Tata Nano is the world’s most inexpensive, yet it is a very modern car that gives 100 Km for a charge of 5 liters of petrol, has a stylish finish and meets the European norms for emission.

It will be interesting to watch Tata Nano unfold in the market over the next couple of years. BBC endorsed it best when it calls Tata Nano a demonstration of Indian ingenuity. !!

The unveiling of Tata Nano, the cheapest car in the world, triggers an important event in the car market. The car cost brings down the cost of ownership of an entry level car in India by 30%

So what does tata nano got to do with my title "3Iphones make 1 nano !!Why Iphone is not making grounds in India". The topic of The fortune at the bottom of the pyramid

By C. K. Prahalad proposes that businesses, governments, and donor agencies stop thinking of the poor as victims and instead start seeing them as resilient and creative entrepreneurs as well as value-demanding consumers. He proposes that there are tremendous benefits to multi-national companies who choose to serve these markets in ways responsive to their needs. After all the poor of today are the middle-class of tomorrow.

Since India has a huge base of middle class families if the products satisfy the needs of those growing middle class indians then product will be a hit.

We all know Iphone was a paradigm shifter in mobile industry as it made most of the manufacturers to focus on

> User interface
> Touch

The phone is doing quite good overall with 30 million sales worldwide but still iphone is not huge sucess in India these are few reasons I could think of

> Pricing needs to be bang on ! The iPhone is also priced far beyond the reach of even many middle-class Indian consumers. Even though market research company, estimates iPhones cost less than $175 to build, both Apple and Airtel stuck to the approximately $700 price for the phone in India, vs. $199 with a two-year AT&T contract in the U.S. In India, then, three iPhones equal one Nano, the $2,000 car that Tata Motors (TTM) launched in India just two weeks ago. If we see why Nokia has been strongest player in India The price tags of every Nokia mobile phone is very reasonable. I mean, I can still get a GSM mobile phone for as less as Rs. 1200 ( 22 $) in India with all the basic features and that will last long enough to pay me back with my dues.

> Functionality : Indians just use their phones differently. With spotty data coverage and slow download speeds on non-3G networks, the iPhone just doesn't dazzle the way it does in the U.S. Also, Indian customers like to forward text messages; Nearly 70% of them do that at least once a day. Until recently, the iPhone didn't allow users to do that. "It's a big functionality issue" solved only recently

> Competition : Nokia the world leader in mobile industry along with other players launch mobile phones which are customised to indian needs for eg Nokia 1100 which is simple and easy to use phone which has a torch light which people can use during nights in India. Over 200 million Nokia 1100 cellphones have been sold since its launch in late 2003, making it the world's best selling phone handset

> 3G: Iphone is best used when we use it with applications !! such as google maps on iphone. This would need data connection which works best on 3g etc. 3g is yet to be rolled in India even after the promised to auctioned by Dec 2008. so hopefully launch of 3g and wimax

Many things happening in India ..polictics, launch of Nano, india gaining ground in G20 west finally understanding that fortune is "truelly at bottom of pyramid"

Year that was in 2008 !

(Appeared in the Education Times Column of Times of India (Bangalore Edition) on January 5, 2008)

General

· Barack Obama getting elected as the first African-American President on November 4, 2008 and his first speech cheered the whole world.

· Chinese demonstrated their extra-ordinary skills in project execution by hosting Summer Olympics 2008 in Beijing and by winning the largest number of medals in the Games; India created a record of winning the first-ever Gold for individual sport, thanks to Abhinav Bindra

· ISRO (Indian Space Research Organization) made India proud by putting Chadrayaan (lunar vehicle) into space on October 22, 2008 and successfully putting MIP (Moon Impact Probe) on to the Moon soil (with Indian tri-color painting on it) on November 14, 2008; they also put ten satellites into orbit in quick succession within tem minutes using an India-made launch vehicle PSLV on August 25, 2008.

· Tate Nano (the $ 2,500 people’s car) that was showcased to the world on January 10, 2008 grabbed global headlines. Singur in West Bengal unfortunately could not house the plant that was set to roll out Tate Nano in 2008, thanks to petty politics; Tate Nano will roll out of Sanand in Gujarat.

· Terror strike takes a heavy toll on India in the year 2008; Bombay terror attack on the “iconic” Taj Mahal Hotel in Bombay on November 26, 2008 (India’s 9/11) and its scar will take years to disappear. This year saw terror attacks in Jaipur (13^th May), Bangalore (25^th July), Hyderabad (26^th July), Delhi (13^th September).

· Major tragedies strike India in 2008; Kosi flood in Bihar (13^th to 27^th September) affects millions; Himachal Naina Devi temple tragedy (2^nd August), Jodhpur temple tragedy (30^th September)

· Chinese earthquake in May, Myanmar cyclone in October, and blasts in Pakistan in October impacted many in the world

· Tripura, Meghalaya & Nagaland in March, Karnataka in May, Delhi, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Mizoram & Jammu-Kashmir get newly elected State Governments in 2008.

· Left parties withdrawing support to Manmohan Singh-led Government, and the support extended by Samajwadi Party made the Government very weak

· Inflation going past 12% in June 2008 hurts the common man most; luckily, it started climbing down by the end of the year.

· Rupee that was at Rs 47 / USD appreciated to Rs 38 /USD in before crashing to Rs 50 / USD by the year-end.

· Tatas did India proud by acquiring Jaguar and Land Rover brands from Ford in May

· Reliance starts pumping oil from Godavari basin and expect to get about 16% of India’s oil needs

· NASA Phoenix lands on Mars surface on June 1, 2008

· Private sector built green-field airports in Bangalore and Hyderabad started operations on 23^rd March and 23^rd May respectively.

· 123 Agreement (Nuclear Agreement) was signed by USA and India on October 10, 2008

· Central Government notifies the Sixth Pay Commission; the salary differentials between private sector and the government to reduce substantially; salaries for academic staff to increase dramatically.

· The “Sub-prime” crisis in the housing sector in the United States causes a global financial tsunami in November 2008 that is set to impact all the countries (including India); US Government nationalizes Freddie and Fannie, bails out AIG and Meryl Lynch; Lehman Brothers declares bankruptcy; the three US auto majors get bailout; Toyota set to declare losses the first time ever in 71 years. USA talks of 750,000 job losses in the year. Indian IT industry too will be affected, though it is too early to assess the impact

· Oil prices that started at $ 60 per barrel in January shoot up to $ 143 in November before crashing to $ 37 in December

Products

· Apple launching iPhone 3G on July 11, 2008 in USA (and August 22, 2008 in India) brought 3G and “Touch” to mart phones in a big way. Blackberry launches “Bold” in September and “Storm” in November; Nokia launches N96 in August, 5800 in October, N97 in November; Samsung launches Innov8 in November and Omnia in December; Sony Ericsson launches Experia in November; Palm launches Centro & Treo 800W; Apple and Blackberry push Palm way down – 8% by year end from 36% earlier) in smart phone sales.

· Ultra-thin notebook computers saw action along with low-cost “Netbooks” (small footprint, low power consumption and less expensive notebooks). Apple launched MacBook Air in January; Lenovo launched x300 in May

· Netbooks enter mainstream; sell more numbers than Apple iPhone; Asus Eee PC and Acer Aspire dominate

· Firefox 3 browser was launched on June 17, 2008; creates history with record downloads within a week

· Intel “Atom” processor (that consumes very low power) enters “Netbook” market and targets mobile users (including smart phones)

· Intel also announces next generation Core i7 processors; Intel engineers do India proud by designing an energy efficient processor for Xeon server

· Google enters mobile phone space by announcing G1 on October 22, 2008 (based on Android operating system); it also launches “Chrome” browser in September

· NVidia launches “Telsa” personal super computer in India

· Titan launches Braille watches for blind at Rs 995 along with National Association for Blind in November

· Microsoft launches Windows 2008, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 in May; also beta versions of Windows 7, Internet Explorer 8 and Azure (cloud computing product); their “Silverlight” platform to counter Adobe Flash during Chinese Olympics gains traction

· DTH (Direct To Home) started gaining momentum with Reliance and Airtel announcing their products during Dasara and Deepavali season respectively (October and November)

Marketplace

· Japanese Daiichi Sankyo acquiring Indian pharma major Ranbaxy for $ 4.6 billion was indeed a big ticket acquisition; Infosys bid to acquire UK-based SAP practice company Axon was nullified by HCL Tech putting a bid for a higher price and winning it for $ 753 million; other acquisitions include Mindtree acquiring Aztec Software, Birla-owned IDEA acquiring the first Indian mobile service provider Spice for Rs 2,720 Crores and Times acquiring job portal “DICE” from Cyber Media. Swan Telecom and Unitech selling off within months of taking GSM license smacks of corruption.

· Globally, IT leader HP acquired EDS for $ 13.9 billion; Oracle acquired BEA for $ 8.5 billion. Verizon acquired Alltel for a whopping $ 28.1 billion; Microsoft bid to acquire Yahoo fails; JDA acquired Supply Chain software vendor i2 for $ 346 million; McAfee acquired Secure Computing for $ 465 million.

· HP annual turnover crosses $118.4 billion as of October 31, 2008 a record by any IT company (including IBM)

Technology

· HP researchers discover the 4^th circuit element (after Resistor, Conductor and Capacitor)

· MIT researchers demonstrate “wireless” electricity (may change power charging for mobile devices), “raw solar” (will help wider adoption of solar energy) and thermoelectric cooling (might help data centers)

· HP and QualComm announce “Gobi” chip for mobile phones

· Blue-ray wins the standard war in DVD storage format

· Lenovo and Apple launch super slim laptop products using advanced technology

· Sony announces “TransferJet” with speeds of up to 375 Mbps

· Zephyr solar plane clocks more than 83 hours of unmanned flying

Indian IT companies

Indian IT companies top the IAOP (International Association of Outsourcing Professionals) list of Top 10 global outsourcing companies with Infosys (3^rd), TCS (6^th), Wipro (7^th), Genpact (9^th) and Tech Mahindra (10^th) in the fray

Indian IT services revenue touches $ 52 billion by March 2008 (NASSCOM); IT services (including ITES) generate 1.6 million jobs; Karnataka benefits with IT /ITES jobs exceeding 500,000 (STPI November 200

Infosys headcount touches 100,000; gets included in “Global Dow” – 150 most innovative global companies

Wipro enters African markets by starting office in Morocco and Ethiopia

HCL acquires Axon for $ 753 million

Airtel (India;s largest mobile service provider) reaches subscriber base of 83 million by November

WNS gets $ 1 billion (over 10 years) contract from Aviva

Reputation Institute in USA puts Tatas in the 6^th position (out of Top 200) globally

TCS starts 1,000 seat facility in Ohio, USA

3i-Infotech turnover crosses Rs 1,000 Crores in 2008

MNC companies in India

· Nokia rolls out its 200 millionth handset out of Sriperumbudur plant (near Chennai) in India

· Motorola plant commences production in April in Sriperumbudur (near Chennai)

· Dell laptops roll out of Chennai factory

· CSC talks of doubling India count from 16,000 to 32,000 (before meltdown)

· Chicago-based Agile software major “Thought Works”, expands in India

· Virtualization major VmWare expands India operations

· Fab-less semiconductor major ARM expand India operations

· Yahoo Labs start in Bangalore

· Juniper Networks increases headcount in India significantly

· Sutherland talks of 10,000 seat BPO in Chennai

· Semiconductor major (earlier part of Motorola) FreeScale

expands India operations

· French IT services major Steria has big plans for India

· Citix to invest $ 200 million,

· Intel 6-core energy efficient Xeon processor for servers is designed in India

· Hyundai starts second car plant in Chennai

Telecom

· Policy muddle in 3G and WiMax licenses, controversy surrounding the sale of Swan & Unitech Telecom stall India’s telecom growth story

· Mobile phone subscriber base to cross 380 million by Dec 31, 2008 (it stood at 374.13 million as of Nov 30, 2008 with monthly additions exceeding 10 million as per TRAI)

· IP telephony becomes legal from August 2008

· Japanese telecom giant DoCoMo enters India thru Tate Telecom

· India’s first 3G phone rings on December 13, 2008 thru MTNL

Education & Research

· Six new IIT’s start at Jaipur, Hyderabad, Bhubaneswar, Patna, Chandigarh and Ahmedabad

· Indian Institute of Science celebrates the century year starting May 27, 2008

· Supreme Court upholds OBC reservation excluding “creamy layer”

· ACM Infosys Foundation Award for computer science takes off – Prof Daphne Koller is the first recipient

· Indian Science & Engineering research Council (on the lines of NSF in USA) gets Parliamentary approval in December

· Government starts 100,000 scholarships for outstanding high school graduates; SBI launches 100,000 merit-cum-means scholarships

Applications

· Reserve Bank of India announces “mobile banking” guidelines

· Airlines shift to 100% e-ticketing from June 1, 2008

· Hughes to provide Internet connectivity across trains using their satellite network

· Electricity Exchange take off in 2008

Infrastructure

· Airtel laying US Japan cable

People

· Barack Obama is the next US President

· Bill Gates steps down from full time Chairman position in Microsoft; Yahoo Founder Chairman Jerry Yang retires

· Nepal monarchy is gone; get its first President, Parliament and a new Prime Minister

· Pakistan gets a new President and a Prime Minister; democracy returns

· IIT Kanpur educated Dr Subba Rao is the new Governor of Reserve Bank of India

· Chandu Bhave is the new SEBI Chairman

· India-born Lakshmi Mittal-controlled Arcelor Mittel has annual revenue exceeding $ 100 billion in 2008

· Bharti Mittal of Airtel joins ITU Board (the first for any Indian)

· Kiran Karnick gives charge of NASSCOM President-ship to Som Mittal

· Former Prime Minister VP Singh, spiritual guru Maharshi Mahesh Yogi and social worker Baba Amte pass away

Visitors to India in 2008 include

· Prime Ministers of UK, Turkey, Nepal, French President, Syrian President and Prince Andrew

· CEOs of IT companies (ARM, FreeScale, Microsoft and RIM), FMCG majors (Coca-Cola, Pepsico, and Unilever), automation major Schneider and defence electronics major Thales

· Rupert Murdoch

· Presidents of Cambridge University, Oxford University, UC Berkeley and Purdue University

· Nobel Laureate Mohammed Yunus

· Presidents of Royal Society, UK and IEEE Computer Society, USA

Interesting numbers

· India’s student population in USA in 2008-09 (94,000)

· Anil Ambani Power IPO subscribed 173 times (Rs 11,760 Crores)

· Foreign Exchange reserves start at $ 240 billion, surge to $ 343 billion, crash to $ 240 billion and rise to $ 250 billion)

· World lost $ 10 trillion in year 2008 stock market crash (the biggest ever)

· SWITCH (Satyam, Wipro, Infosys, TCSm Cognizant and HCL) holds 2.4% of global IT outsourcing ($ 667 billion)

· India’s GSM mobile subscriber base crossed 200 million; overall mobile subscribers crossed 300 million in March and 385 million in December

Happy new year to all my friends and readers

Happy new year to all my friends and readers. I have now more then 2k visitors to my site feel happy to see people from various countries visiting the blog:)
Its been a while that I blogged !! its been a hectic/relaxing month so far. Hectic since exams are going on i am done with 4 out of 6 till and 2 more to go till next friday 23'rd Jan..I am waiting so much for 23'rd :) exams have been good till now. I will pen down details on my experience after exams. Till then bye and have a good time

Ciao
Praveen

My home town Belgaum

I was amazed by this pic taken in Belgaum. It sort of gives new perspective or view to see belgaum :). Coincidentaly the place from where this pic is shot seems to be just meters away from my home sweet home in Belgaum. See the google maps link to my home

Bring it on says Belgaum i am very pleased to see it grow.. Although we hear rumours of tata project or IIT etc to be in Belgaum it has changed its image from pensioner's paradise to creating a niche in education, health industry, wide range industries from IT to hydraluics, Indal etc. I hope the growth continues ! This video shows it all

I am proud to be a Belgaumite and would love to contribute something to its growth sometime in my life.

Vote for it : Belgaum IT company in top 30 of hottest start ups in India !!

Right now it is in 9'th position ...do vote for it by dec 22 in TATA NEN Hottest Startup

Vayavya Labs of Belgaum in top 30 for TATA NEN Hottest Startup Awards

The TATA NEN Hottest Startup Awards are a result of the combined efforts of TATA, a rapidly growing business group in India with significant international operations, and the National Entrepreneurship Network (NEN), a non-profit organization, and India's leader in entrepreneurship education.

Vayavya Labs, (Tata NEN hottest startup details) a Belgaum based IT/ Internet/ Software developer has been nominated in the top 30 hottest startups. Voting lines will open from 25 Nov and will be open until December 22. 5 winners will selected after December 22.

Vayavya Labs offers tools, which target the semiconductor, & design services firms. The flagship product DDGen (US patent pending) attempts to de-mystify the device driver development for embedded platforms.

IF

IF.....

Very nice poem from http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_if.htm very relevant still in our day today life

IF you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated, don't give way to hating, And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise: If you can dream - and not make dreams your master; If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools: If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!' If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, ' Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch, if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds' worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!