Published December 20-24, 2022
21
Family
I stay with my parents. My wife is Bhavana. We have been married for 28 years. Our son, Abhishek, will be 18 in April. Bhavana and I have worked together for most of our married life – IndiaWorld and Netcore. Our domains are different and non-overlapping, so that makes it easy! Our “company” has been our life – as is the case with many entrepreneurs. Bhavana has been equally instrumental in building both the ventures. Her versatility and people friendliness more than make up for my narrow focus and aloofness.
What I want to discuss is my approach to building a relationship with Abhishek. In his early years, thanks to advice from Bhavana, I made sure I spent time with him. That helped lay the foundation. As he has grown, I have tried to find intersection points which enable time together and conversations. We find OTT series that we can watch together. We go to Kitab Khana, a bookstore, once every couple weeks. For the past many months, we have been taking long walks after doing our book shopping. Abhishek is always full of questions, and I do my best to answer them.
The past two pandemic years have brought him closer to understanding my life. Pre-pandemic, I was out all day. During the pandemic, with both of us at home, he wanted to know all the conversations I was having. He has full freedom to go through my inbox and WhatsApp. (I don’t yet have the equivalent right with him, but I respect his space and freedom.) So, there are plenty of conversations about my meetings and the decisions I am making. He is very good at making connections, and many times has suggested actions and replies to people that I had not immediately thought of.
Many times, as parents, we think of even our teenage or grown-up children as less than equal partners in decision-making. I think that is a mistake. While we may have more experience, they have a way of looking at things which is refreshingly different. The more we share with them, the more we get. Patience in answering their questions, however trivial it may be, is an essential element to creating an enduring, great relationship. As a friend put it, parenting is about giving roots and wings.
A happy family life is very important for an entrepreneur. Building a new business or even growing an existing one is never easy; there are plenty of daily battles to fight at work. You don’t want to be coming home to have challenges with family. At the same time, growing up children also need time else before you realise it, an unbridgeable chasm develops and then it is too late. Building a balance with being always available at work and sharing quality time with the family is very important.
22
Timepass
“Timepass” is one of those classic Indian words which are so hard to translate and explain! It is about doing nothing – decompressing, idling, sleeping in the day, non-focused browsing, or random reading. But this timepass should be an important part of my life. It is where the mind becomes detached from the present and its problems. It lets the subconscious organise itself. To use another classic Hindi word, it is about being “vela.”
I see too many people with completely packed schedules. Every minute of the day is a meeting or some activity. One has to be busy or else one feels one is wasting time. The constant flow of adrenalin, the continuous hyper-ness, this “always-on” mindset keeps one on the edge through the day, round the year.
This is not something I subscribe to. I feel a day must have empty moments, where one can think about what has happened, or just daydream. Maybe pick up a book and read, and get lost in the world the author has created. Or simply sit, look out of the window or balcony, and let the mind wander. I am not sure of the science, but I find such times extremely helpful. Suddenly, an idea will come, or a solution to a problem will float by.
Here is some advice from Rebecca Renner: “Set aside a few minutes every day for daydreaming. Start each session with brainstorming exercises. Pick the medium that feels most effortless and enjoyable, whether it’s writing, drawing, playing an instrument or something else, and use the task as inspiration to plumb your subconscious for ideas. Pick one idea to focus on as you daydream. You should also record a goal for the session. Your goal might be to enjoy your thoughts for a few minutes. You could use the time to process something that’s making you anxious, or to envision the steps you’ll take toward achieving a goal. The more details you can use, the better.”
Sometimes, I will just sit in a chair, open my spiral book and write out my innermost thoughts. It is time without a meeting, without an agenda. And each of us must have some time through a day to let time just pass – slowly, second by second, minute by minute. It is about letting the mind roam – pulling up past memories or imagining new futures. Whatever it is, “timepass” or the more politically correct “daydreaming” must be part of our lives. It is about freeing our imagination; it is like being a child once again without any cares. It is, for a brief period of time, forgetting about the real world, and creating a parallel universe where we can construct realities the way we want. It is where the breakthroughs happen, and our life’s journey gets elevated.
23
Future
An entrepreneur has to necessarily live in the future. Any new venture one begins is creating solutions for an imagined future because it takes time to get the product to market and then create a scalable growth model. Much of my daydreaming / timepass is about imagining the future. As such, I like to read about new technologies and what tomorrow’s world will be like.
It was this anticipation of the future that helped me recognise the potential of the Internet in 1994 and launch IndiaWorld in 1995. It is the same imagining of tomorrow’s world at Scott Brinker’s 2014 Martech conference that began Netcore’s journey in automation and then towards developing the full stack. In 2011, as I thought about India’s future, I charted a path for the BJP to get a majority on its own in the 2014 elections. In 2015, I wondered about the course India needed to take to become as rich as Singapore and America – but this was a venture which failed.
Every so often, I imagine Netcore 3-5 years in the future, and what it will take to get there. I also imagine myself in the further future, in a world outside of Netcore, creating transformational institutions that will last beyond my lifetime.
A great tool for glimpsing the future is to read and think. There are many authors who take their learnings and discuss the impact innovations will have. At the turn of every year, dozens of individuals, enterprises and think tanks publish their take on what the key trends for the coming year are. Science fiction shows and books help us peer into the long future and ponder the course of humanity.
There is of course not a single future. Every entrepreneur has a view on what it should look like and therefore works to make it happen. In that sense, entrepreneurship is a battle between different futures.
I use vacations, the Diwali holidays, the year-end, my birthday, and long travels to ponder about the future. This gives my daydreaming a specific focus. I use my notebook to write out my ideas, and then over the course of time, refine them. Eventually, I have to carve out a small place in that future to stay relevant and create business and personal success.
Occasionally, I do peer into my past. But I don’t do a lot of it. Because that takes me into the “what-if” game. I see many of my missed opportunities and failures, and start to ponder about what I could have done differently. Since I cannot change the past, I tend to limit the rear view mirror. The future that hasn’t happened and therefore can be shaped is much more exciting!
24
Lists
I live life through lists. To-Do lists. Key priorities. Ideas. Books to read. What to blog about. Discussion points pre- and post-meetings. And so on. I find lists very helpful. Writing things down in my notebook keeps the mind clear. It is something I had read in David Allen’s “Getting Things Done” book many years ago. The idea is not to keep the To-Dos in the mind because they can crowd one’s thinking. Better to have them part of some list and out of the mind. Also, crossing off items as they get done gives a sense of accomplishment.
From The Guardian: “Psychologist and author Dr David Cohen puts our love of to-do lists down to three reasons: they dampen anxiety about the chaos of life; they give us a structure, a plan that we can stick to; and they are proof of what we have achieved that day, week or month.”
The most important list is the To-Do list. We all have an endless list of tasks to accomplish. I have a page in my spiral book to which I keep adding. When I don’t have access to my book, I write it on a folded page that I keep in my pocket temporarily before moving it to my book. At the end of the day, I will create a shorter list of things I need to get done the next day. I don’t use any apps for this. I find the paper-pen combo gives me the most flexibility. I can scribble around a task. I can create sub-lists. Perhaps, much of this can be done digitally also, but in some matters, I am very much an analog person!
Take this series for example. I made a list of topics that I could cover. Then, I typed it up in a Word document. New ideas keep coming which I write down in my book as soon as they emerge, and I add to the Word doc. Word helps me reshuffle the order. I do the same for the Blog themes. These are lists that don’t have to be updated frequently.
The To-Dos are constantly growing. An email or WhatsApp needs some action. Someone at home wants something done. Meetings create many follow-ups. I list them down as they are called out. And then at the end of the day, I scratch out the ones which have been done, and then aggregate the others together. The one thing I have learnt is that it is never possible to do every task. In fact, at times, let some time elapse, and many tasks which appeared important and urgent when they were listed, perhaps don’t even need to get done! The To-Dos list will always be an infinite stream; it is for us to decide which ones to do to move life and relationships forward.
I carry a folded page and pen even when I go walking every morning. I find that the best time for my thinking, and random ideas float across, which I add to the list. Some will eventually get discarded, but by writing them down, I keep the mind clutter-free for new ideas to enter. Also, there are times when something said or read triggers a memory or new idea. By ensuring I capture it in the moment, I am not loading my subconscious to ensure that idea is not missed.
Lists have helped me keep my mind clear and unencumbered, have more productive days knowing there are some key tasks that just have to be done before I sleep, go into meetings and conversations prepared with a clear plan, and ensure that when others expect me to do something I do not disappoint them with an “Oh, I forgot.”
25
Walking – 1
There are two types of walks. One is the daily walk for exercise and me-time. Another is about changing one’s environment and doing something different. For me, the first is a must-do. Mondays through Fridays, 35 minutes daily. What I want to discuss is the second type. Done right, it can be a great source of me-time, ideas and enhancing relationships.
I had recently gone to Four Seasons for a lunch meeting with a friend. Post-lunch, I decided to walk back to the office. The weather was cool and pleasant, very unlike the hot and humid Mumbai weather experiences much of the year. It was an 18-minute walk. While I liked the change from just getting into a car, as I was walking, I realised how little attention we have paid in Mumbai to creating walkable footpaths. For most of the time, I was actually walking on the road because the footpath was either encroached on or non-existent.
As I walked, I realised how much of a contrast this was to New York. When I am in NY whether on work or for a vacation, I walk to as many destinations as possible. Anything in a 2-3 kilometre radius is a walk rather than a subway or cab. The vibrancy of a city cannot be experienced from behind glass in a car. I wish there is an effort to get walkable footpaths in Mumbai.
In recent months, Abhishek (my son) and I have been going out for long walks on weekends. Our routine begins with a visit to Kitab Khana, the bookstore at Fountain. And then we walk around for about 60-90 minutes. There is no specific destination. “Where our feet take us” is our approach. I let Abhishek decide which roads and neighbourhoods he wants to explore. The other day, we ended up in Kalbadevi – still as crowded as ever. It brought back memories from childhood when my mother used to take me there to visit relatives. Many places have associated “blasts from the past” which serve as take-off points for our conversations. Fort and Ballard Estate, for example, make me relive the IndiaWorld days of 25 years ago, when we were doing websites for many companies who had (and perhaps still do) their offices there. The walk is one of the “intersection points” between a questioning son and an answering father.
When I go to new places, my preferred approach is to walk around the neighbourhood or wherever possible. Early mornings are the best. The inner mind has put the ups and downs of yesterday behind, and has a clean slate. The day’s distractions of incoming messages armed with To-Do requests haven’t yet been unleashed. There is a freshness and welcoming pleasantness in the air. The world around me is much more silent. I was reminded of this when I was in Goa recently to give a talk at a conference. When I woke up the next morning, instead of sitting in the hotel room, I got ready and ventured outside. The big hotel property offered many paths for walking around. It was just me and the wonders of nature around.