the Incredible banker

Book name The Incredible banker
Author Ravi Subramanian

My first and foremost criteria for any book I read is the type of language and what can be loosely defined as the flow of the narrative
This book scores on both the points although that is something you expect out of a thriller fiction
A basic glance over the reviews of this book tells you that its about the big bad world of banking
The main protagonist in this book is GB2 or great Boston global bank

But what's really well described in the book is workplace politics. As someone who has more than 10 years of experience in industry I can really relate with the incidents described in the book
How people carry grudge in their heart for years due to an out of place promotion. How even in big MNC corporations you don't find good talented persons for a job because everyone is more interested in covering their backs
How sometimes settling personal scores takes higher priority for people than overall well being of the company
Even though the climax of the book is a bit of dampener and you can guess the secret and the culprit fairly easily. Still it's a good smooth read.
Also the word red in incredible in title of the book is highlighted for a reason. You'll understand this after reading the book
To summarise
Pro
1) Good flow
2) easy to understand (no high nosed queen's English that makes a dictionary required for reading)
2) corporate life is indicated in a very realistic manner)

Con
1) suspense is easily give away
2) weak ending
3) tendency of morally righting one person (really a thorn in the flesh as everyone else is shown perfectly in grey shade as everyone is in real life) making a hero out of one person looks unrealistic even after he is wronged. (May be the author wants to make a happy ending)

Goals update 2d) - Job

Now to my Achilles heel, Job search. In my view one of the major reason for lack of my personal growth is that I’m very bad in job searching. Even after around 10+ years of working experience. I’m still in my third job only. The story is very simple.

1)      First job – Campus placement from college itself.  (duration 1.5 yrs)

2)      Second job – Need to come back to my hometown due to family reasons. One of my senior from college was already in that particular company. He called me; arranged an interview which was more of the formality and I was selected. (duration 6 yrs)

3)      Third job – After six years in my second job. I was looking for better growth prospects as my current employer was a small proprietary based company with limited growth opportunities. One of my batch mate was in a company in Gurgaon who was looking for candidates (same story repeated, An interview which was more of a formality and I was in) (duration 4 yrs and still counting)

In both the companies (second and third), I got good recognition. Some training abroad and best employee award as a proof. But my problem lies somewhere else. In today’s scenarios and my friend circle is proof of that. The quickest path of growth is through job hopping. And I’m hopeless as that. My old fashioned method of working very hard at a same company does not bring up required dividends. And that is the reason that I’m lagging behind.

There are some other missing parts of this jigsaw puzzle too like having an unorthodox degree and unorthodox line. But still the major share of blame lies with me only.

My experience shows very clearly that the easiest way of landing very good job is through networking. And due to very shy, sober and introvert nature. I’ve been very bad in this.

Secondly again due to this nature only. I’m not very aggressive in constantly looking out for jobs and also not very confident in facing interviews.

That was one of major reasons for my joining toastmasters.

My last experience shows that If you don’t move out of companies that are not doing great in 3-4 years. Then you can get stuck very badly.

Since I’ve already reached that point and moreover my company is also having some serious issues due to merger. I have to change job lest I’ll be in a very depressing situation.

That sums up why one of my major goals for this year is to find a new job.

As with all my other goals. I’m also going to make and follow a plant to achieve this goal as below.

1)      Competitors

2)      Engineering consultants

3)      Placement consultants

4)      Networking

5)      Entrepreneur

6)      Higher education

7)      Technical skills /3D modeling

8)      Communication – mock interview

Goals update 3g. Books

My fetish for books can be described with the kind of attraction some people have towards food.

Just like some people cannot control themselves against mouthwatering foods, without giving any thought regarding their possible ill effect. In the same manner I’m hungry about books. My reading list includes all sort of opposites. From autobiography of Mahatma Gandhi to books of Khuswant Singh and 50 shades of grey. From Harry Potter to Paul Coelho. From Chetan Bhagat to Mark Twain. From Angles to Ayn Rand.

But what irritates my wife most is that I even read newspaper pieces and brochures etc. used while serving street foods at vendors. My appetite for reading is never ending.

But of late, I’m trying to change this habit.  Two quotes were the reason for this. One was “What you eat / read is what you become.” (I don’t remember exactly where I read this but it stayed in my mind.)

Second I read in the school where I used to go for attending Toastmaster’s meeting. It says “Reading without reflecting is like eating without digesting.

So enough is enough, I thought and decided I’ll be more prudent and selective in deciding what I’ll read.

After digging the internet for quite some time, I came across following illustration for Books (above) everyone should read.

There are a few books in this chart that I have already read.

Namely Harry Potter, Atlas Shrugged, Pride and Prejudice, Kite Runner, Life of PI, The Fountainhead, The Picture of Dorian Grey, The Da Vinci Code.

Some more that I have tried and could not read due to complicated Victorian English or did not like the flow.

Nonetheless the list gave me quite a few options of books to read.

So I started with Siddhartha. One major reason for that is that I’m really feeling inclined towards spiritual books right now.

Have already finished this book at the time of writing this post but the review of this book will be in another post.

PS: Again just missed my deadline with writing a blog post every 2 weeks by just a whisker. From now onward will change it to one blog post every alternate Sunday.