The other day I got an email from a person representing Startup Saturday inviting me to do a talk @ IIT Madras Department of Management Studies. On a follow-up phone call, Mr.Mani Parthasarathy (one of the organizers) explained to me that Startup Saturday is a forum (yet another) for entrepreneurial community and they do monthly events in many cities across India.

I didn’t want to give yet another talk on Entrepreneurship which no one wants to hear & many are already aware :: covering the familiar – on how to raise funds, write a business plan, how to hire, management techniques, branding & so on. Instead I asked for an interactive talk, “Motivating budding Entrepreneurs” (Slidedeck here, PDF here – slides are few & brief). I dropped few hints & nudged the audience into discussing the social & economic ground reality of doing business today in India. The abundance of opportunity in Indian Job market that is available today for a fresh graduate, the peer-pressure for getting into a secure job, a risk-averse culture in the society & lack of governmental/financial support. Though India has come a long way from 1990s when I started, it still has miles to go. Finally I shared what I learnt in my journey & wished them all success in their individual travels. Overall I felt it was a pretty lively session with plenty of interesting questions that I enjoyed discussing.

Startup-Saturday-Motivation-1

Startup-Saturday-Motivation-2

IIT Madras Campus

When Mr.Mani approached me I readily agreed for the talk as the venue was IIT Madras. I love visiting IIT Madras campus at any given opportunity, the place feels to me so peaceful & serene. Knowing my academic strengths, I never aspired to get into IIT. But I did take the IIT-JEE entrance exam just for peer-pressure, but that’s a story for a different day. Still I carry fond memories for this campus. During my school days my maternal Uncle was doing his Doctorate research in Economics in IIT Madras and he used to bring me every weekend for “Charlie Chaplin” movies. After the movie I will stay for the night in his dormitory & in the morning catch through the window glimpses of Deers & Monkeys roaming freely. In my recent visits to the campus I haven’t seen any of the animals. Today while going to the event and returning both times (evening time say 3PM & 5PM) I saw plenty of Monkeys and Deers in the campus and it was so nice. I cursed myself that I didn’t have my DSLR with me during the visit. Next time…

Monkeys-in-IIT-Madras-Campus
(Monkeys roaming free near Department of management studies, IIT Madras)

Deers-in-IIT-Madras-Campus
(Happy to see Deers still in IIT Madras, near Shiva Temple in the campus)

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