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I like the reputation system in stackoverflow.com. It allows one to up vote as much as you like but if we wish to down vote, will reduce the receiver’s reputation, it will also reduce our own reputation hence making it a serious choice. Why I like this system is, this is very much like how someone’s reputation grows or reduces in real life.

Reputation does not show up in numbers in real life, so one can not say whether their reputation is on the rise or fall in the immediate turn of events. Workplaces are getting more and more co-operative. Research also shows that a motivated individual performs lot better than someone working with the guidelines from super efficient processes. Every individual gains powers through position, authority, rank, knowledge, skill etc. One of the powers gained is coercive power, which when used never leaves a positive note.

It is very common in schools, cadet corps, military where reward and punishment is like carrot and a stick. In the office environment it is in the form of hikes, assignments,  promotions. In a co-operative environment where work gets done based on trust and motivation, use of coercive power can provide super quick short term gains. This can make people in power, fall into trap of getting something accomplished when trust and motivation does not get them through. What will not be realized is that the trust on the person in power goes down and the recipient’s motivation level will further go down.

This creates a vicious cycle of usage of coercive power and loss of motivation until the healthy workplace culture turns into an order and serve office. My first hand experience of witnessing this on few teams will never make resort to this power. Let us keep the work place symbiotic.

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Every muscle in the body is able to communicate back to us about what its state is. It is easy to figure out where our hands are placed, it is called proprioception. Every one who has been through personal training would be very familiar with this word. It is one of the key factors in creating a proper sense of balance in the body so that we don’t injure our body. The first time I tried it, I was asked to stand in front of the mirror in the pose shown in the illustration below.

It was way too easy for me to stand that way for more than a minute. Then I was asked to close my eyes and try the same, this time I could not hold for more than 10-15 seconds. Which meant that I was solely relying on the feedback from the eyes but not from the muscles, so I had been ignoring the signals from them as I did not know how to read them. Getting those proprioception exercises helped me in getting trained better than when I did without one.

The situation is very similar when it comes to thoughts, perceptions and impressions. In today’s fast paced world with information overload and ample communication, less time is spent for the individual self. Every one of us rely on the feedback, performance evaluation done by others to assess where we stand and what we do.

We are capable to know more about ourselves than be evaluated by others. All we need is some personal time, good readings and reflections. Feedback from outside world is necessary but it only tells us more about the giver than the one who receives it. We need to learn to listen to our inner voices, understand our priorities, reflect on past and take corrective actions that will propel us forward.

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Whenever I travel to the western countries from India, the one thing that amazes is the standard and quality of living of the people. America with its abundant natural resources and advanced technology provides its people with great creature comforts with nominal price. Cities like London have very well connected and reliable public transport system which can question the existence of cars. Spending money earned in India in US/UK will be hard to digest and may put on the back foot on our spending if we convert the value in exchange rate. I have always used 1:10 conversion rate for dollars which helped me plan my spending.

If I use the conversion rate of 1$ for every 10 Indian rupees; then high speed internet, state of the art gadgets, abundant energy in form of oil and electricity are very cheap. Many luxuries are very much affordable as necessities, like fine dining or vacations. The flip side to getting everything cheap is that lots of things go waste. I hardly find a place without air conditioning even in places where temperature is very pleasant the year throughout, hotels don’t provide incentives for consuming less energy. Every cup of coffee which is consumed within 30 minutes creates good amount of trash, supermarkets encourage you to buy more than what is required by pricing the smaller sized ones very high, super sized meals cost just a dollar more than the regular ones. There seems to be a lot about of awareness in the recent times about green and sustainable planet but the amount of trash is the same except it is more of a eco friendly or bio degradable form. The society consumes non vegetarian food as the staple diet which in my opinion is a severe strain on natural resources. The relatively less density of population and cheaper resources has not put strong dent in the finances of people or the natural resources of the country.

Sadly this style of living is penetrating into the Indian metros where one time use disposables are taking over the place of cutlery, crockery and cloths. With very high density of population, lesser natural resources, inefficient civic bodies and limited technology it is not a sustainable style of living if India does the western style. Non vegetarian food which used to be a delicacy is slowly becoming an every day treat, a co-worker has collected his thoughts on similar lines on why he chose to become a vegan. Some of us can start making difference by reducing dependencies on carry bags, paper towels, disposable cutleries, non veg food and much more. Emulating the inefficiencies should not be seen as a sign of rich economy or growth which the west has been used to. We should strive to leave this place better than how we found it.