Career Growth Plan

Every individual has distinct career expectations. It’s not that every one wants to be highly competitive and always looking for jump or promotion in their career path. Some people are happy with what they are or what comes up naturally.  Not necessarily every one must reach the peak of their profession. Every doctor can not be a national figure or the head of a national hospital. Every judge can not be a chief justice of an apex court. Every professor can not be a VC of a university. Every investor can not be billionaire. Every mechanic can not be a machine designer. Every astronaut can not go to the moon or the mars. Every staff or employee can not be a CEO of the same/similar or some other business organization. It’s not always they can not be on top of the trade it may, some times, be that they are happy with what they are or they do not at all want to reach the peak. Human beings live with two contradictory psychology, one they feel comfortable living with status quo and another they always want to do better in everything as time passes our career growth depends up on which element has more role to play in our career. Those who are happy with status quo do not need much career growth plan where as those who want to progress definitely need ones. Whether it is an employment, self employment, business or investment we see our career there. In case of business, as an example, we do business plans and also an individual’s career plan who manages that business. Both the plans must coincide or match. If not, there will be a gap and one or both of them will crash in the course of time. Lets’ take a simple example where a person invests his money, sets up a business and also manages the same. Fortunately, the market supports the business and the business grows very fast intensively and extensively. Now, the person must upgrade himself by way of training and education to meet up the expected knowledge, expertise, skill etc for the company. In case of employment and self employment, career growth plan is still more important than in the above case. Human beings are their own masters in choosing their career. Though there are internal and external factors affecting the career development, they can opt and probably reach the career they like to. However, it makes sense if we can do our self assessment and also fairly evaluate and analyze national and international markets before setting up or reviewing our career plans. At the same time, we must consider our inherent limitation, may be of physical or mental status, interest, personality type, priority, value system, economic condition etc. before selecting any career and also making a career plan. If an extremely introvert person enters a career in sales or legal profession, only destination will be the disaster, nothing less nothing more.   Once we enter any career we need to make our growth plan. As such there are basically, two growth models - namely vertical and horizontal. There are no such absolute types of career growth plan as vertical or horizontal, however. Rather, there could be a mix of both. More vertical growth is believed to be fickle meaning it comes and goes so quickly. On the other hand overall career with combination of both lasts and sustains. Basically, vertical plans means developing the competencies that are required for the ‘role’ we are playing or are going to play. On the other side, horizontal is the plan that develops the competencies required for a role model. There are many internal and external variables of any individual career. However, the foundation of any career is nothing but knowledge. Here, knowledge also covers information, skill etc.  It has more to do with rational intelligence.  How an individuals’ career grows and differs from another individual is based upon his/her rational intelligence provided they are fairly good at emotional intelligence. Meaning, if they are not good at managing emotions, however good they may be in skill and knowledge they can not succeed. There could be four main types of individual career growth plan if we see it from the view point of level and types of knowledge. All of them have their own merits and demerits. Some of us knowingly chose one of the types and develop the same in that pattern. Some others do follow it without knowing what their own career growth pattern type is. The main four of them are as follows:     (a) HORIZONTAL: This is a type where an individual believes to gain not one not two but many fields of knowledge right from the very beginning. After completing formal university education or vocational training he/she step in to work and career. Instead of focusing and investing time and money into the field of work, he/she rather attempts to gain more knowledge, education, and training and may work on the other field (s). He/she feels there is a growth in the career but it is infelt a horizontal one. It might give an individual a feeing of satisfaction which is good from spiritual point of view. However, it will lead to a situation called “jack of many things master of none” which is dangerous phenomenon. (b) VERTICAL: Vertical growth is a very common type where the individual gets into a trade/ profession/   vocation and goes on building more blocks on the same. An engineer keeps doing engineering work and also joins any training workshops, writes papers etc. all in the same area. He/she will reach the peak provided everything favors him/her. However this kind of career looks more like a black and white, no color. By this pattern people can not reach a stage of self actualization as projected by Abraham Maslow. (c) HORITICAL: Another type of  career growth pattern  is ‘ HORITICAL’ this very word is a mix of ‘horizontal’ and ‘vertical’ where one’s career grows horizontally in the beginning for the first few years, may be half of the productive years and subsequently changes to vertical. Generally, individuals who believe in gaining in due course of time diverse knowledge right from the beginning of the career may face consequences of not specializing in or focusing on one are. When they realize this fact they will decide to focus on one of the areas they are into and develop the same vertically. Since they are already fed up of ding many things they now probably will do only one or may be two things till the end of their career. (d) VERIZONTAL: This type of career development pattern is exactly opposite of the type (c) above. Here, individuals develop themselves steep vertical in the beginning for half or more of the career period. They all focus in one or two things what they believe is their future. And also enjoy doing this. As time passes, their priority changes or they get bored doing all the time same thing and then they decide to diversify or add more items to their career menu. It may not always be diversifying but also adding more portfolios. For example, an engineer starts project management an actor starts film direction kind of thing. This pattern is close to the theory of Maslow’s need hierarchy. With the passage of time need changes. Human beings start moving towards self- actualization.  That leads them to horizontal pattern from vertical pattern. This will give rise to a situation called, ’jack of many things master of one.’ We have discussed, above, about four simple career growth patterns. Not necessarily there are only those smooth four patterns. There may be many others. These four models are not the standard prescriptions that fit to every one. Any individual may opt for any one of the four or may even jump from one to another. There is nothing like amongst the four, as above, any one is the best and another one is the worst. It all depends’ up on one’s choice. My experience says ‘most enjoying one is’ ‘VERZONTAL’ and most difficult one is ‘HORITICAL’. Now you can evaluate your own pattern and make sure which one you fall in to then redesign the same with purpose and choice.

China (2010 – 2020): What Will China Look Like in the Future?

China (2010 – 2020):  What Will China Look Like in the Future?

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Shape Perceptions of Your Work, Early and Often

This election season, like every politically fraught time, offers many lessons in the getting and wielding of power. What you may not appreciate is that the lessons apply not only to politicians but to people in every career situation. Here's a big one: what matters is not so much what you do, but what people think you have done.

I was reminded of this by a New York Times article pointing out that during President Obama's term, Americans' income taxes went down by $116 billion, but that's a little recognized fact. About half of those responding to recent public opinion poll thought their taxes had remained the same, a third thought they had gone up, and about one in ten said they did not know.

There is an obvious lesson for you in this: don't assume that anyone — your boss, your peer, or your subordinate — knows the good work you are doing. They are all probably focused on their own jobs and concerns. Do things to let them know.

Yes, I know this smacks of self-promotion, and self-promoters are not only disliked for blowing their own horns but not particularly credible in doing so. But there is a way around the dilemma. Research by social psychologist Robert Cialdini, two doctoral students, and myself shows that when you get someone else to sing your praises — even if that individual is hired by you, under your control, and the audience knows these facts — you receive attributions of competence without being tarred by the brush of behaving inappropriately.(Here's the pdf.) If hiring someone is not an option for you, then start relying on the norm of reciprocity. Praise one of your colleagues for her good work and chances are, she will feel obligated to return the favor. When others talk about your great works, those works will garner the attention they deserve.

There is also a second, more subtle, lesson: When it comes to job performance, be it in politics or in a company, perception becomes reality. This implies that you ought to manage your image and reputation as well as your actual work.

It's important to get started early on this, because perceptions become self-sustaining. This happens, first, because people tend to assimilate new information in ways consistent with their initial perception. John Browne, the former CEO of BP, was smart and hard-working and made sure everyone knew that. He was also shy and ill at ease in social situations, characteristics that might have impeded his rise to the top. But given the image of intelligence he projected in meetings and his willingness to move all over the world and work long hours, social reticence became interpreted as a result of his brilliance and intense concentration.
Perceptions are also self-sustaining because, once people have formed an impression of another, they stop actively gathering new information. Once I know you are smart, I won't attend as much to every little thing you do — which means you can more easily get away with being not so brilliant and I won't notice.

The old saw, then, that first impressions are lasting has real psychological basis. And the implication is clear: the most important time to focus on the image you are projecting is when you first enter an organization or a new job. That's when people are going to be forming their judgments. Get off on the right foot by doing a lot of good work early and also interacting with others in a style that conveys the sort of personal brand you are seeking to build — brilliant, sociable, humorous, serious or whatever image suits you.

And here's the corollary: if bosses and colleagues have formed some unfavorable impression of you in your current setting, then find another one. Many people want to "prove" that others are wrong about them — and they may be. But it's a waste of precious time to fight that uphill battle. Why make heroic efforts to dig out of a hole when the same energy spent elsewhere could make you a star?

I'll end with a last piece of advice: do consider having an intentional, strategic, public relations strategy. Cultivate the media, write stories and blogs, give speeches relevant to your industry and area of expertise — in short, become known. When Marcelo Miranda, now the CEO of Brazilian real estate and pre-fabricated housing manufacturer Precon, was named by one of the leading Brazilian business magazines one of the 10 CEOs of the future a few years ago, his future career success was assured. Miranda, a talented and hard working individual, ensured his media exposure — and continues to do so — by reaching out to the business press in numerous ways. As he so perceptively noted when I saw him in Sao Paulo recently, "I now run a private company. If I want people to appreciate how we are growing revenues by a factor of ten in one year, I have to let them know." That's good advice for everyone seeking to rise up the corporate ladder.

The LTE Band Challenge

The LTE Band Challenge

With LTE, the complexity of including a reasonable number of different frequency bands in a mobile device not only for LTE but also for GSM and UMTS is once again getting trickier. Here's a how I see things from a historical point of view and where I think we are heading:

Once upon a time the wireless frequency landscape was quite simple. When GSM started in Europe, there was only a single frequency band in the 900 MHz band which all network operators used. Sure there was the legacy analog network in the 450 MHz band but nobody seriously thought about working on dual mode devices. GSM or bust! Things got a bit more complicated when the second band in the 1800 MHz range was opened for GSM at the end of the 90's and but it didn't take take device manufacturers long to come up with dual mode devices. In the US things were pretty similar but the remainder of this post continues with a Europe point of view.

Since then, things have gotten much more complicated. With UMTS, things started well for some time with 2100 MHz being 'the' 3G band around the world, except for the US. In the US, UMTS and GSM are used in the 850 and 1900 MHz ranges and these days also on the 1700/2100 MHz band combination. In Europe in the meantime, UMTS in the 900 MHz band has also taken off in some countries. I guess this was the point where the number of bands used around the world and the number of bands supported in a single mobile device really started to diverge. Today, the state of the art from a European point of view is the following combination:

• Quad band GSM support (850, 900, 1800 and 1900 MHz)

• UMTS tri-band (2100, 900 and one of the US bands)

And now with LTE just around the corner things are about to get even more complicated. Here's the bands where I think LTE will see the day of light in the next two to three years:

• In Europe LTE will likely start on 2600 MHz and potentially also on 1800 MHz and 2100 MHz

• And then there's the digital dividend band in the 800 MHz range which is likely to be used in some countries to bring broadband connectivity with LTE to rural areas.

• In Japan, LTE will be used on 2100 MHz with an additional band likely to follow.

• In the US, the situation is even more divergent. Each network operator seems to have its own band. Verizon uses a 10 MHz block in the 700 MHz range and another operator has another block in the same range but with exchanged uplink/downlink assignments. Some operators might launch LTE in the 1700/2100 MHz band combination and there are speculations of a satellite backhaul based LTE network with its own frequency range. Finally, there are rumors of Clearwire jumping from WiMAX to LTE in the 2600 MHz band but with TD-LTE.

From my point of view, this frequency diversity is far from ideal for everyone involved. For users it's an issue as global roaming capabilities of devices will get worse and worse. Also, especially in the US, it will be difficult for users to switch between networks by changing SIM cards and subscriptions while keeping the device. For network operators and device manufacturers it's also far from ideal as some will have trouble getting good devices as volumes are just too low to reach good prices. There might be multi-frequency LTE devices tailored for the US market but since almost every operator uses different legacy network technologies and frequency ranges the potential band and technology combinations for GSM, CDMA, UMTS and LTE are huge.

So what's the way out of this? To me it looks like it's in the hand of device manufacturers as the number of frequency bands will not shrink anytime soon. The question is if the ever growing number of bands and backwards compatibility combinations change the device design?

• Is it physically possible today to support so many bands? Software defined radios have been discussed for many years but as far as I know antennas and filters are not so easily to be adapted to different frequency ranges with software only.
• Or could the radio part of the device in the future be built in a way that it can easily be interchanged?

• How about exchangeable radio modules? With this approach I would in the future select a SIM, a mobile device and an RF module and maybe one or two extra for international roaming? Or will we just have to live with the situation as it grows worse?

• And then, there's still Wi-Fi which, at least so far, can be used universally around the world. Most smartphones today have Wi-Fi built there's no ubiquitous coverage and logging into foreign Wi-Fi networks automatically is still a dream.
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India Gets its 13th Mobile Phone Network

The Videocon Group, on Thursday, announced the launch of its GSM mobile services for the Tamilnadu circle.

Videocon Telecommunications Limited, a group company, has planned roll-outs covering 100 key cities over the next 100 days including Punjab, Haryana, Gujarat, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh and Mumbai circle in the next fortnight. It envisages investments of around Rs 14,000 crore over the next 3 years. Videocon Group Chairman Venugopal Dhoot said, “The launch is a decisive step forward in Videocon’s vision of enabling convergence right from within ‘Homes to Outside’, from a television’s large screen to a handset’s small screen.” On revenues from mobile services, Dhoot said the company expects to raise $3.8 billion to 4 billion by 2013 with an ARPU (Average Revenue Per User) of $1.6 billion.

AKTEL rebrands itself as focus shifts to rural mark

AKTEL rebrands itself as focus shifts to rural market
Robi is new brand name


Axiata (Bangladesh) Ltd has rebranded itself with a new look by introducing Robi, the new brand name for the company, to take its products to the mostly untapped rural market.

'Robi' replaces the earlier brand name of 'AKTEL'. The company launched branding campaigns -- Bangladesh Mela -- at more than 70 spots across the country on Saturday, where local singers performed until yesterday. It also introduced a new brand logo.

AKTEL, initially a joint venture between Telekom Malaysia and the local AK Khan Group, launched services in 1997 in Bangladesh. Later, the company was renamed Axiata (Bangladesh) Ltd after Japanese NTT DoCoMo bought AK Khan's 30 percent share in AKTEL in 2008.

Axiata is now aiming to localise all of its branding. The word Robi has been chosen as it carries a range of meanings representing the emotional and cultural bonds of Bangladeshis.

"We aim to develop an emotional link with the culture and roots of this nation," said Michael Kuehner, managing director and chief executive of Axiata (Bangladesh) Ltd, at a press meet at Suhrawardi Udyan in Dhaka.

The mobile operator launched the brand at sunrise .

"As Bangladesh's future telecom market will be rural-based, identification with a Bengali word is expected to add value," said Biddyut Kumar Basu, chief commercial officer of Axiata Bangladesh.

He said under the new brand name, Axiata is going to offer a wide range of affordable services, including minute call rates between Tk 0.40 and Tk 1.48 for different customer segments.

Axiata launched its re-branding activities at a time when other operators in the market quietly began a price war.

The entry of Indian Airtel has possibly prompted operators to concentrate on the rural market.

The market's top operator Grameenphone announced new price plans and unveiled three new packages, charging between Tk 0.49 and Tk 0.99 a minute.

Banglalink also lowered call charges to Tk 0.68 a minute. Axiata presently offers calls at prices between Tk 0.68 and Tk 1.48 a minute.

Bangladesh's total mobile subscriber base was 54.15 million as of February 2010. Grameenphone is the market leader with 23.75 million customers, followed by Banglalink with 14.13 million and Robi with 10.31 million.

Meanwhile, in Chittagong, a daylong programme to unveil the new logo was also held on DC Hill premises.

Strategic Thinking: Strategy's Orphan

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Strategic Thinking: Strategy's Orphan

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