Management Lessons
from a 500 rupee note.
Prakash Iyer,
Managing Director, Kimberly-Clark Lever and Executive Coach shares two
important management lessons he learnt from a 500-rupee note. Read on: -
It happened some
years ago but I can recall the evening like it happened just last week.
I was in an
audience listening to a motivational guru. The speaker whipped out his
wallet and pulled out a five hundred-rupee note. Holding it up, he asked,
"Who wants this five hundred rupee note?" Lots of hands went
up. Including mine.
A slow chorus
began to build as people began to shout "Me!" "Me!" I
began to wonder who the lucky one would be who the speaker would choose. And I
also secretly wondered - and I am sure others did too - why he would simply
give away five hundred rupees.
Even as the shouts
of "I want it" grew louder, I noticed a young woman running down the
aisle. She ran up onto the stage, went up to the speaker, and grabbed the
five hundred-rupee note from his hand.
"Well done,
young lady," said the speaker into the microphone. "Most of us
just wait for good things to happen. That's of no use. You've got to make
things happen." The speaker's words have stayed with me ever since.
'Simply thinking about doing something is of no use' Our lives are like
that. We all see opportunities around us. We all want the good things.
But the
problem is we don't take action. We all want the five hundred rupee notes
on offer. But we don't make the move. We look at it longingly . Get up, and do
something about it. Don't worry about what other people might think. Take
action. Several years later, it was another day, another time. And
another motivational guru. As I watched him pull out a five hundred rupee
note and hold it up for all to see, I thought I knew what he was going to do
next.
But he just asked
a simple question. "How much is this worth?" "Five Hundred
rupees!" the crowd yelled in unison.
"Right,"
said the speaker. He then took the note and crumpled it into a ball and asked
"How much is it worth now?" "Five Hundred rupees!"
screamed the audience. He then threw the note on the ground, stamped all
over it and picked up the note and asked one more time: "And how much is
it worth now?" "Five Hundred rupees!" was the
response.
"I want you
to remember this," said the speaker. "Just because someone
crumples it, or stamps on it, the value of the note does not diminish.
All of you should
all be like the five hundred rupee note.
In our lives, there will be times when we feel crushed, stamped over, beaten. But never let your self-worth diminish. Just because someone chooses to crush you - that doesn't change your worth one bit!
Don't allow your
self-worth to diminish because someone says something nasty -- or does
something dirty -- to you."
