Tryst with Destiny!

It’s been almost a decade since my 12th exams. But every year when I read about the exam dates or about the results being declared, I’m gripped by a sense of fear. I would then have to wait for my mind to register the fact that I’ve successfully (I’d like to say so), completed my 12th and I’m far away from schools and exams.

The 12th standard exams are the most hyped-affair throughout our childhood. Even if our parents are cool about it, those around us ensure we are constantly reminded of how “life-altering” they are similar to the become-a-millionaire-in-one-song phenomenon. At school, anything and everything you do (even if your white canvas shoes aren’t that white on a Monday morning) is somehow linked to the final exams. I do agree that these exams are important as the right scores are necessary, in many cases, for us to proceed with our choice of course in a college. But I wouldn't agree that this is a make-or-break event, which if not carefully tackled would meddle with our lives forever.

There is a popular saying that people around the world decide what they want to do in high school, whereas in India people finish their high school and college (mostly engineering) and then decide what to do. I guess people who opt for other streams at college are pretty much focussed on what they want to do. I, like thousand others, did follow the School-> Engineering College-> IT routine, but 2 years after spending days and nights furiously typing code, one fine day I just decided to throw it all away and I told myself I would never touch a piece of code again. I thought I’d have to take my words after a week or so, but then thanks to a few good samaritans, I found work that was remotely related to what I liked doing and what started as, I-will-do-anything-but-coding turned into something more than just a temporary escape route. Luckily for me, it wasn't that difficult to start all over again and I knew that in the long run, the two years spent following a boring routine wouldn't matter. But for many streams one has to start very early because switching midway might not be a viable option.

Being a Passive Observer!

Last month, I got to meet a lot of people at work as a part of a user research activity for a product. I was facilitating this and had to ensure we picked random people from different experience groups and units so that we had a diverse crowd and more importantly, a more diverse feedback. I’d spoken to all these people just once through phone to introduce myself and tell them what exactly I wanted. They all seemed the same over phone but when I met them in person they were so different from each other. 

It was an interesting activity for me, personally, because I’ve never met and spoken to so many different people in just over a week and the observations were interesting!

The ones who got my attention the most were those who had very little to speak. It was like expecting a detailed answer and getting a yes or no reply. It was a challenge indeed to get them to speak without it sounding like a Q&A session. Some did get into a comfort zone and started expressing their thoughts without inhibitions, while for some it still proved difficult to get them talking. It was not that people were being careful about what they were speaking, it looked like they were just not comfortable speaking more than a sentence per minute.