Core Competency Revisited

I am sure that among the various jargons which we used and exploited extensively in the past two years in the B-school, “Core Competency” was ahead of most of them. I can safely assume that in the times of an outsourcing boom, it was bound to be. Interestingly, with the passage of time the frequency f its use continuously decreased for “concentrating on the core-competency” became something as a commonsense for the business.
But these past two and a half months in Hyderabad has made me revisit this common notion we used to hold. Among many others, there were three very interesting encounters I had with different companies –

1. For a HUTCH mobile number in Punjab, I deposited 1000 bucks in one of their Hyderabad extensions in Madhopur after confirming the availability of this facility from them. But even today i.e. after 40 days of my payment, the account in Punjab has still not been updated after my repeated requests to them.


2. Riding high on the technology wave, we got ourselves a broadband connection and a wireless router for 4 laptops in the house. After having a very bad experience with the local broadband company, “Beam Cable” we decided to go in for the Brand “Airtel”. At first, it took us two complete weeks after depositing the money to coarse the Technical agent to deliver the connection. Over and above it, when approached for another connection, we were told that not more than one connection could be given in one house. And if a bachelor, forget about the connection at all.


3. ICICI was going to be my default option for the credit card as i have a salary account with them. Almost 2 months have crossed and I am still struggling to know the status of my application after submitting all the required documents 3 times.

There are still many more such incidents which happen day in and day out with us and I can just go on cribbing. But this weekend it became a topic of hot discussion among the four of us.
Towards the end KD very rightly pointed out that the operations of most of the companies have proved to be non scalable. When I get three different calls from three different persons verifying my personal information for the credit card, I am sure there is some major internal communication failure in the company.
I am sure a more practical analysis of the problem that how companies are loosing focus of their “Core Competencies” will serve a much better purpose than evaluating the movie ‘Krish’ as a business case study.

An Update

An update on what happened in the past month –

Good things first –

1. Am working on a wonderful project which ‘if’ successful would definitely give me a lot of experience and boost to my career.


2. I am in love with Hyderabad. The place is picturesque and climate is too lovely for the month of June and July.


3. Have rented a lavish flat and am fully enjoying this stay.


4. Fully utilizing the internet connection(s) at home. Have downloaded 12 wonderful movies in the past 20 days apart from 14 episodes of Lost season 2.


5. Got two pay slips from my new job and both of them lavishly spent. Dad is really happy that his son is earning


6. Am finally buying a Bullet next month. ‘A dream come true’.


7. Have learnt how to play pool and am now trying to expertise it. It’s a beautiful game. Only thing is, it is not a cheap hobby.


8. Watched a Telgu movie ‘Nandanvanam 120 Kms’ last Sunday and am going to watch another one ‘Ashok’ this weekend.


9. Have started building up a taste for good wine.

And now, not so good things –

1. Got too busy with my work and the time now seems to be running mighty fast for me to catch up with.


2. Haven’t been able to read anything. There are 4 half finished books waiting to be done.


3. Haven’t blogged for over a month.


4. Even after coming up with the unique concept of starting a blog – ‘The X-factor’, and discussing it out with lots of guys, have not been able to put up a single post.


5. Am not able to do anything to loose weight in this busy schedule.


6. Haven’t been able to watch the most awaited movies of the year – Da Vinci Code, MI III, X-Men III and Superman returns.

But the best part is that I am back to blogging again.