Somewhere Sun, Somewhere Dark

I too am invited in MehraJi's only daughter's wedding . It's going to be one of the memorable moment. Civil lines of the city is exquisitely decorated. After all, Such much-awaited weddings are not the part of daily, or to say yearly, routine.
Allahabad- the historical city of Kumbh- always puffs its chest for the gems such as Amitabh Bachchan and first PM Jawaharlal Nehru. Besides the quiet city speaks a lot when it comes to delicious ambrosia.

Mr Vishwas Mehra does not need any formal introduction - at-least in Civil lines region of the city. His sangfroid but savoir-Fair ability undoubtedly justifies his position of a jury.
And Renuka- I believe- will be unmatched bride. I saw her last time 3 years back before she departed to US for her masters. ' Time Flies' I mutter.
'What should I wear? ' Actually I am wee bit concerned to my own esteem - I am just a teacher indeed- but I should be wary of Mehraji's reputation . Of all but not-so-many options , I doubtfully pick the blue suit .

With variegated imaginations in my mind - as colorful are the horticultural plants in front of Mehraji's bungalow - I reach the rendezvous. Eau de Cologne has strong smell . I can't figure out the provenance though, perhaps it was many-where excluding my own wardrobe. 
Acquaintances are willing to be friends and friends have already inextricably blended into the family kin , that is -more closer , more good- is the idea. And, Such is the beauty of these parties. 

I am happy, I should be happy . Anyone who is invited on such special parties are special . Ain't? 
Happiness is a kind of communicable disease . It imprints everything around its provenance . 
I am sipping a expensive-in-first-sight  liquor. It's expensive and so is essentially tasty . I don't want to know what it is. I am trying my best to camouflage myself in the dignitaries. We are being photographed , I am being photographed.  
Dayal is feverish, but is content. He didn't demarcated days and night for this wedding's preparation.  The razzle-dazzle  of Mehra's house are reaching to his red bricked hut too - house is  big and inapt word for his  residence. He is one of the neighbors of Mehra and his ancestors have proven their loyalty while working in Mehra's Bungalow. Renuka is like her own sister, in case if he had his own. Who will not be happy when his sister is getting married? His entire family is busy since many days  for the wedding preparation - The feverish Dayal, his wife and his mother.  
Groom fraternity has arrived with full band and music. Euphoria is in air,Curiosity is  in the eyes and strands of lips are moving- of course the words of formalities are being thrown and accepted. So, all mouths have got either of the two business - wine or grapevine. 
Amid all the inexorability, the connoisseurs are arriving to the dining hall. It's an integrated part of wedding. It's hard to notice who is from bride's side and who is from groom's. Such is the camaraderie of this wedding. Among the countless ambrosia, one made up of sesame is making people lick their fingers . I too am appreciating it very much . Everyone is hovered near the table . Now when party is full fledged , I surmise that this particular delicious item is not in everyone's luck, it will short. But, I know Mehraji won't let it happen. I am sure.

Bad luck and good luck don't share the equal probability of occurrence, and former between the step-brothers arrives more sooner.  

 
The sesame sweet could not bear the demand. The irony is that it requires manual crushing of the warmed sesame seeds to refine powder . Dayal's family had done this for many days . Who knew that this will get short? Mehra ji is worried. After all , how can a daughter's father like him can compromise his reputation for such a trifle thing? I see him sending his mercenary for Dayal to wake and start powdering the sesame. I feel pity - both for Mehraji and for Dayal.

I surrender the gift to the busiest Mehra Ji and exchange a beam - not sure of its authenticity though- before I return. As I come out , I listen some unfamiliar sound from Dayal's hut. I sneak through. I am flabbergasted.
Mehra's men are beating Dayal- the sick loyal Dayal. Perhaps he could not make the sesame powder because of his sickness. I know he wouldn't have refused. But , who wants to know the reason?
There is no cursing, no screaming, no pleading, no surprised yelps, only the systematic business of beating and being beaten, the thump, thump of something solid repeatedly striking flesh, something, someone, hitting a wall with a thud, cloth ripping. 
They showed their manhood and Dayal is lying in the arms of his old mother- when the former couldn't even cry .  It's blood all around on  the floor  Now that I have seen the situation, my morality pushes me to go inside the hut. While bringing water for him and making phony consolations, I mutter 'Too much loyalty is dangerous'.  He tries to guzzle the water . An hiccup and a good amount of flesh comes out of his mouth. Dayal heaves his last sigh with a burp.
It's dawn . I am sleepy but my left morality is pushing me out to arrange for Dayal's funeral . 
I see in the dogs surrounded near the garbage to eat the left over - it seems they have got a good feast as this was a grand party .
I can see Renuka - a bride looks fairy in her sapphire gown- bereaving her parents and leaving to the groom's  home. All eyes are watery with mixed feeling of happiness of wedding and pain of bereavement. 
Another two pairs of eyes are watery - one for her lost son and another for her husband. 
I look into the sky and ask the God,  whoever and wherever He might be- Why? Why did you make me such an eunuch? 

 Disclaimer : I am learning to put my imaginations in words . The  metaphors might not have reflected the background of the incidents as apt as they should.

           ~ Sumit

The Google Story

Brevity  |Author : David A. Vise.                                                                   Rate : ****/5
  Though the book is mild in pace and is repeating along with too many supporting citations , but if one remembers that this is not a novel rather biography or instead success saga of Google , one can easily give up annoyance faced in reading the book. Moreover, if one is techno geek, or is looking for some business strategy – Like Google, this book too, is not going to give any clue.

The two Stanford’s Ph.D students -Sergey Brin and Larry Page , faced trouble to search the related contents (on newbie internet) during their pedagogies; and motivation imbued thereafter  to garner all the related information together. Unlike Yahoo, famous AltaVista and other search engine , that were based on  alphabetized directory edited by people . they devised PageRank model, whereby a search returns web pages in order of their popularity (based on how many other pages linked to it and value is sum of all pointing) . They believed from the start that better organization of information is a public good, and any commercial gain was secondary at best, a distraction at worst.  Google epitomize its motto “ Do not evil “

Google means a very large number.It is the number 5 followed by 100 zeros. It’s wrongly pronounced for mathematical term ‘g-o-o-g-o-l.'

They started with self assembled rack of PCs to 2 lacs inexpensive PCs , and then to small super computer.  On Bechtolsheim funding, Google devised two data center equipped with 500 million variables and two billion terms. Google worked on keyword targeted text ads to the target users only in right side of page.

Google cares a lot for innovations and free thoughts, being only company to provide 1 day a week  to employee for pursuing their interest , regardless of its commercial viability.

The founder duo did not want any one to interfere but on Bechtolsheim, Moritz and other venture capitalist’s emphasis and later on Eric Schmid’s experience made them to assign CEO post to him. However, the duo kept all important keys to them. Brin , Page and  their CEO Eric Schmid faced a lot of troubles to get make Google Public into IPO and to Wall Street.

 After Sun Microsystem has challenged Microsoft by leading the development of Java, an independent programming language – Google turned next to challenge Microsoft in browsing (Windows associated Internet Browser) and email system (MSN).

 Like all successes,the journey was not rosy to Google’s success too.

The new Gmail service faced a lot of controversies even though it was providing 1 GB database to each user, because Google was looking for targeted users ads in the mail service and people were concerned with their privacy while scanning (happens in any mail service) the mails for related ads .  

Google emphasized initially to block all porns , but could not do absolutely as it was hampering the search result too. Instead they preferred to give ‘ Safe search ‘option to users.

They faced a lot to beat Yahoo to get ads contract for AOL (American Online Internet SErvice) Europe users. And finally grabbed it , later they got ads contract for AOL US too.

 They had to visit courts for complaints against trademark infringement and Click crowding of ads without purchases(driving up ads cost).

They invested hefty for digitization of 7 millions books of University of  Michigan.

They had to bow down against their ‘no evil’ motto and to go for Censored search results (with notification to users) in socialist China – a big growing market in Asia.

Starting with 85$ per share at the time of IPO August 2004, now Google share is 300$. Google has 8 billion indexes almost twice of Microsoft’s. Google is growing with the same pace , but one thing is still a mystery to most of people that what funds it so much when browsing is free and ads per click revenue are just in cents.

Google does not unveil its marketing strategy. We can simply guess it as :

Youth + freedom + transparency + new model + the general public’s benefit + belief in trust = The Miracle of Google.

Fooled by Randomness

Book Review | Author : Nassim Nicholas Taleb                                         Rate : **.5 /5

The first thing that I would say,  I did not like the authors style of writing. The things could have been interpreted in much better way.  One should not write anything didactic in first person pronoun provided it’s mandated. The inconceivable use of author’s own words of wisdom, his boasts of qualifications, ideologies etc present wrong notion and ask for more patience to go through.  

The author calls ‘ the black swan event’  i.e that deviates beyond what is normally expected of a situation and that would be extremely difficult to predict. This randomness in situation play extremely important role in our life wielded with luck factor. It’s weird to see that most of us attribute the success obtained in this randomness to our skill. People don’t understand randomness and probability. Besides, people who continues to be successful out of this randomness , act (due to wrong way of understanding probability) if something really big and unusual (devastating) will never happen to their strategy.

The author has tried his best to support his points by numerous examples excerpted from daily life. However, sometimes the ideology becomes so much stringent and imposed that it becomes hard to gulp in.

Overall, the book hardly copes to draw reader’s interest throughout the pages and present the point vividly.

Exclusive of mine : क्या क्या गँवाया , यहाँ आते आते

                    Concluding ......

आम की टहनियों में झूले लगाना ,
मिट्टी के मूरत , वो घिरनी बनाना
अंतहीन अंताक्षरी , गाने गाना
घंटी बजने पर ही स्कूल जाना |

गुरुजी की वो टेढ़ी लाठी
सरसों साग संग मक्‍के की रोटी
लंगड़ी कबड्डी , वो गुल्ली डंडा
कच्ची आम और मिर्ची का तीखा |

दोस्ती दुस्मनी , वो बेफ़िक्र रातें
क्या क्या गँवाया , यहाँ आते आते |

नये चेहरों में दोस्ती का फसाना
स्याही से खुद की मुच्चें बनाना
जेठ की दुपहर मे चौके-छक्के लगाना
घर आते नये नये उलाहना |

होली के 'भूत' ना पहचाने जाते
बुझते दीयों को , जलते जलाते
रज़ाईवाली सर्दी में बर्फ़े बनाते
नागराज-शेख़चिल्ली ना भूले जाते
लगते थे अच्छे , वो रिस्ते नाते |

गये दिन वो भी हँसते मुस्काते
क्या क्या गँवाया यहाँ आते आते

शुरू हुई फिर एक अलग ही कहानी
मर गये थे जब सब राजा रानी |
अँगरेज़ी गीटपिटाते वो नये चेहरे
नंबर की रेस , अनुशासन के पहरे
हिस्टरी की क्लास मे ज्योमिति का क्वेस्चन
खूबसूरत थीं वो बायो वाली मैडम  |

अल्फ़ा बीटा तो कभी पल्ले ना आते
थक गये , न्यूटन अंकल को रट्टा लगाते |

उब गये थे हम भी मार खाते खाते '
क्या क्या गँवाया , यहाँ आते आते  |

 इंजिनियरिंग के वो शुरुआती रैगिंग
फर्स्ट सेमेस्टर , जिंदगी के बुरे दिन |
ओर्कूट फ़ेसबुक की वो महामारी
निपटे इनसे भी बारी बारी |
'ग्रेड' और ' गर्लफ्रेंड' की स्वाभाविक लालच
मिले ना दोनो , अपनी फूटी किस्मत |

उड़न छू  हो गये दो साल , समझते समझाते |
क्या क्या गँवाया यहाँ आते आते |

फ़िल्मो का वो 'रिविजन' लगाना
मेस का वो 'सात्विक' खाना |
वो क्लब, वो फेस्ट, वो मुफ़्त का नेट
रास नहीं आती कोई क्लासमेट |

ख़त्म दिन चैटिंग के , भूले बर्थडे पार्टी
प्रॉजेक्ट, प्लेसमेंट और अंतिम दिन | 
हँसें या रोयें , कभी समझ नहीं पाते
क्या क्या गँवाया यहाँ आते आते |

Letter to anonymous olympian

प्यारे दोस्त,
तुम वहाँ अपने तंन-मन से सर्वश्रेष्ट की अपेक्षा कर रहे थे | प्रयाश प्रशंसनीय था , पर कुछ तथ्य जिससे तुम अग्यात होगे - जो जेयैवनिक और पर्यावर्णी आधारों से निर्धारित होते हैं - तुम उन लोगों के समीप आने से चूक गये , जो ओलिंपिक पूर्व-निर्धारित मुस्कानो के साथ ओलिंपिक पदकों से सुसज्जीत हो रहे थे |
जब तुम दौड़ रहे थे, तुम्हे ये अंदेशा भी नहीं रहा होगा कि कितने जोड़े आँख तुम्हे स्टेडियम या दूरदर्शन के मध्यम से तुम्हे देख रहे थे | मैं समझता हूँ - वे बहुत नहीं थे, जिनमे मेरी आँखे भी शामिल थीं |

मैने तुम्हे रेस के बाद देखा , तुम्हारे हताश चेहरे खोज रहें थे - आख़िर कहाँ चूक गये ? लंबे अभ्यास , अनुशासन , और खानपान के पश्चात - अब वो समय था जब तुम खेलगाँव को अलविदा कह रहे थे, मायूसी साथ थी|
उसके बाद तो ना मैने तुम्हे पहचानने की कोशिश की , ना ही वो कार ड्राइवर , जो तुम्हे हवाई अड्डे तक पहुँचाया, और ना ही वो ऑफीसर जो तुम्हारे पासपोर्ट जाँच कर तुम्हे अलविदा कर रहे थे |
और तुम्हारे टूटे मन को - क्या हुआ, क्या होता अगर... मगर.. - और जाने ऐसे दर्जनों नकारात्मक भाव अकेली यात्रा में परेशान कर रहे थे | टूटे सपनो के दर्द तुम्हे सोने भी कहाँ दे रहे थे ?
ऐसा भी क्या किया बोल्ट और फेल्प्स ने, जो मैं ना कर सका? मैने भी तो उतना ही प्रयाश किया था , जितना शायद उनलोगों ने किया था | फिर ..... फिर , मैं क्यूँ?  तुम सोच रहे थे |

पर मेरे प्यारे अग्यात दोस्त- मैं कहूँगा - क्या हुआ जो तुम पदक के बिन घर आए - तुम तो स्वयं ही विजयी थे | तुम्हारे बिन और तुम्हारे तरह उन हज़ारों के बिन - ना कोई बोल्ट होता ना ही कोई फेल्प्स |
क्योंकि तुमने अपनी बेहतरीन कोशिश की , पर असफल हो गये - वो वे बन सके जो आज हैं | ज़रा सोचो, किसी प्रति-स्फर्धा में सिर्फ़ तीन लोग लड़ रहें हों - स्वर्ण, रजत, और कान्श्य के लिए | क्या माजरा होगा- कौन दर्शक ठहरेगा वहाँ?
तुम्हारे प्रयास - और असफलता - वास्तव में ये ही तो सफलता को परिभाषित करते हैं| 'जीत सबकुछ है' - ये सत्य नहीं है | ख़ासकर खेल में नहीं, और ओलिंपिक में तो कदापि नहीं| हाँ, मानव कर्म के कुछ पहलू में जीत की अहमियत इस लिए है क्यूंकी कुछ लोगों के जिंदगी के मायने इस बात पर ही आधारित होते हैं |

याद करता हूँ Louis Borges के कथन को -" हार की प्रतिष्ठा को कभी-कभी सुनहरी विजय भी नही छू पाती | मेरे दोस्त , तुम लड़े, और हारे - क्या यह वही प्रतिष्ठा नहीं है ?
तो फिर ओलिंपिक में सिर्फ़ बोल्ट और फ्लेप्स ही कैसे हैं? यह तुम जैसे हज़ारों प्रतिस्परद्धियों का है - जो लड़े, और फिर चुपचाप चल दिए | और फिर , तुम सम्मानित भी हुए हो- पदकों के सम्मान से कहीं ज़्यादा | क्या हुआ , किसी ने देखा या नही - पर तुमने अपना सर्वश्रेष्ट कोशिश की- ये आत्मसंतुष्टि क्या किसी पदक जी मुहताज है ? मुझे नहीं लगता |
मैं जानता हूँ , मैं इतने अच्छा भी नहीं लिख पाता कि वो इतिहास मे निशान छोड़ जाए | पर यह मुझे अपने भावों को रखने से नही रोक सकता, और तुम्हारे 'हार-जीत' वाले घावों को साफ करने से भी हरगिज़ नहीं | तुम्हारे बिना , कोई ओलिंपिक हो ही नहीं सकता - यह एक सहज सत्य है |
जब स्कूल में था, पढ़ा था-'हार की जीत' | तुम वही बाबा भारती हो, जिससे कोई भी उसका आत्मविश्वास का घोड़ा नहीं छीन सकता |
फिर मिलेंगे Rio de Jenario में दोस्त, जहाँ मुझे विश्वास है , दिन तुम्हारे होंगे - तुम्हारे हाथ पदकों से भरे होंगे| अगर ऐसा नहीं भी हो सका , तो भी तुम सपने देखना मत छोड़ना | तुम कह सकते हो -' मैं सपने देखता हूँ, पर ऐसा करने वाला मैं अकेला नहीं हूँ | ' तुम हमेशा और हमेशा हमारे लिए विजयी थे, हो और रहोगे |

- तुम्हारा प्रशंसक

Goal -2 : It's not luck

Brevity | Goal -2 | EM Goldratt                                                     Rate ***** 5/5

Further to his first book , the author has explained behavioral  management and market in this book rather than physical constraints.

Alex is now executive VP in diversified group. He has to handle the constraints of not a single plant but conglomerates of them.. The biggest worry is that the credit rating of the UniCo continues to drop , and decision is being made to sell off the lurid performer diversified group; and concentrate at core business of UniCo.Obviously, they don't want to invest a single penny for improvement now.

Graby , the CEO is retiring next year- so , Peach and Smith are in row for his position, themselves beingexecutive CEO of two main groups.

Julie, used to be complaint wife of Alex, for not caring of family- is now a marriage counselor, and insists and help Alex very much in decision making- using the Thinking Process they learnt from Jonah, the scientist. Alex is trying to save diversified group from being sold off; tries to find out constraints out of behavioral patterns.

Don assists Alex now. Pete is the president of a small printing company, in diversified group - a barely profitable. Bob is president of I Cosmetics and Stacey as president of Pressure Stream in diversified group of UniCo.

Alex sees that reduction in price has wiped out increased sales and improvement in technology, shorter lead times are just entry fee in market.

The issue in Printing company is candy wrapper- low runners and more losses. Pete's printing presses have small set up time and give 3 times more output per hour at small scale,but lags in large quantity business of sophisticated techniques. Besides, clients are have become habitual of on time delivery and quality- and always seek low cost to pay.

Only option is left to Alex - Selling Pete's company with a profit, removing black spot on his own head, and thus new owner would not interfere in operation in that case.

Alex worries about the depreciating value of printers to peanuts.  What a dubious situation: To increase Profit - ‘Close the wrapper department.’ While as the value of asset determines the ' Selling Price' .So  to protect the asset value -'Keep wrapper department operational'. Don reminds him of the advantage of Pete's presses to compete at small scale, but at large scale , advantage was wiped out by the speed of the competitors.

Hilton Smyth is reiterating to sell the printer company- Alex feels bad with the idea if Hilton would become next CEO after Granby. Traumaan and Doughty are two top managers in divestment.

Julie insists him to go for cloud " Before we write them it looks as if there are infinite negatives, but when we verbalize and examine, it turns out that there are relatively few, and most of them are pitiful excuses.”

There was only 3 months to switch the ownership when Alex called his fellows for a move to examine.

Commend Bob with his  I Cosmetic company - Engineering said it complete while Production said it not. Plant managers had local optima and once they shipped that too 3 months of consumption , the headache became of distribution.

Without taking the account of what shops were holding, plant launched a new product, somewhere more and somewhere much less.  What Bob did that to wipe local consideration, hold the stock at the origin (plant). He made 20 regional stocks to respond quickly to shops and cut shipping cost. The size of each region's buffer was decided by local consumption and expected replenishment by shops. To avert the damage of not having stock in a region in fluctuating demand, he kept 20 days average sales in each region.

This resulted an increase in on time delivery from 30% to 90%, lowering inventories from 90 to 40 days. Also, as he replenished local stocks with full trucks- transportation cost came down.

Alex smelled a vast lacuna in Bob's distribution system. As per cost accounting , finished goods inventory is registered as raw material cost plus added value- labor cost and overheads. When the finished goods were reduced, the added values of the reduced portion turns out as LOSS.

For Bob, inventory reduced by 50% figured out easily when stocked rather spread across the country , but...... So, Cost method would count much more loss than Bob figured out. What a illusion more you don't sale, better you are.

Difficult to explain to Prospective buyer. The positives are disguised as low obsolescence and new product need not to mandate with old stock write-offs. Should Bob inflate the central stock rather than regional ti improve it ?

Now it was Pete's Printing Company turn. Because of fierce competition, the shops allured their customers with campaigns and posses large stock to reduce per unit cost- even if the risk was there to shop that a slight change in gradients (of wrapper) would obsolete entire their stock.

As Pete's presses had low set up time, they were cheaper for small scale and shops wanted low per unit cost. To sack competitors out, they devised new offer to shops. The quantities would be supplied at interval of two month, but cost would remain as per the large stock deal.

Also, Shops could cancel the deal anytime (for if any change in wrapper in future) without penalty. This saved shops many ways- They refrained from losses due to change in wrapper between the deal - low obsolescence, low risk of holding inventory and advantage of same low per unit cost.

For Pete, he could deliver fast at low cost in small scale, risk of holding inventory to him was not much, and edge over competitors.

Alex went to Europe with  Brandon Traumaan and  Jim Doughty , experts in selling companies- to get prospective buyers to diversified group. Pete went on to deal with the buyers for printing company.

 Alex firmly believed that companies must protect the interest of employees and that managers are watching only local optima. Pete showed them his cloud technique he learnt -" This technique claims that you

should not attempt to strive for a compromise , rather examining the assumptions under the arrows in order to break the conflict.” He informed that Pete would work best with any buyer ; and persuaded Jim and Doughty to believe that with logic and intuition , one can break cause-effect cloud- what he called Current reality Tree to get the one or two -the main causes.

For the spare time, Jim and Doughty - started counting undesirable effects (UDE) , when Alex said confidently that he would be able to find out the root cause associating them via Curent Reality Tree.

While in the meeting with wheeler-dealers for the sale of Pressure Steam, they calculated the value on how much one will get on selling rather than Cost minus depreciation, and expected  100 millions USD for Stacey's company.

Before the negotiation of Bob's company, Alex explained the new distribution system of it to Traumann and Jim , hiding the impact of reduction of inventory in cost system method. But they sneaked that, and despite of loss illusion, they were forced to appreciate. On hearing Pete's Sales policy, they got more belief on Thinking Process enabled common sense based Current reality Tree. With the figured UDEs he was told to probe the root cause via clouds.

While doing so, Alex went on describing how most mangers perceive value of product based on local efforts to design i.e product cost plus reasonable margin. Prices and quantities sold are determined by market's perception of value and much less by suppliers perception of value (a clash).

Also, most of mangers believe that selling below product cost (market perception) results losses in long run. but doing so, you lose the money from the client who were buying, and still saving does NOT comes more than the amount, as you hardly cut variable cost but not at all fixed cost.

Alex proceeded- Most of mangers believe in unique, single product based price; If ‘Different market sections might have different needs,’ then ‘Different market sections might have different perceptions of value for even the same product.’

Alex explained the segmentation of market (two section of market where change in prices in one section does not affects that in other); and that imposing single price may cause customer to pay very less than his perception or very high to his reluctance.

Managers are trying to achieve local optima, by segmentation we can minimize the effect of entry of new product on existing ones. In segmented market, Orders are accepted only according to their impact

on the overall throughput and overall operating expense. Managers need to take action that increases the perception of value the market has for company product - acquire dominant competitive edge, that becomes difficult to emulate over considerable duration and sell all the capacity at full price this way.

Seeing Jim still unturned to his decision of selling the companies, Alex unveiled further-Usually we misunderstand that increased perception of values comes with "improved Product". actually it is just derieving benefit of existing product not upgrading it. Like Pete did, he concentrated to rule out the negatives of customer from core and not from UDEs. He continued-look at the UDEs of customer, look at the negative branches that can be trimmed with best option of offering. As we don't change our physical product and clients negative UDEs trimmed off , they will pay more.

Now, in order to get objective of sale capacity at full price and dominant competitive edge - Alex bashes on something called Future Reality Tree, where start with wishful thinking and via if-then communicate to objective (no UDE known).

If ‘The perception of value the market has for the company’s products is higher than the perception it has for the competitors’ products.’ -prices,’ then ‘The company increases its market share.’ Thus customers Prefer you .

To avoid being copied by competitors, use power of FRT- Negative Reservation. We cannot afford new investment, so introduce small change that brings high benefit to market addressing NOT the UDE but the core problem of market using Current reality tree.

He revealed " whenever there is a deal write all the negatives, and connect to them with if-then logic. Don’t leave them just hanging there .If you don't get way to trim the negatives. Show it to your partner without any suggestion or bias. if is able to trim it-okay for both, if not-it is not you against him rather you both against the problem- relations remain intact."

Don implemented the same method to a almost ruined deal where he did NOT start with his great offer and letting buyer to 'object', rather start (when buyer has not much trust or pretends so to reduce price) from the buyers own problem , he won't be able to object, now show them policies concerned to their problems. Then, give them FRT - negative branches - possibilities that buyer can reject the offer, small order as big order per unit cost etc. Finally, give buyer time to decide.

How did Bob stopped competitors to emulate in ICosmetics? He analyzed the large inventories possess by shops to get low per unit costs, high operation cost, huge cash pressure or debt, and shortage in spite of large inventories due to mismatch with customers' demand  - these all resulting obsolescence and low profitability . The new distribution system could increase sales by 30% in long term and sales will drop due to prior stocks with shop to replenish (two months),while average order cycle was 4 -5 months.Really a tough time with two month of loss for the ongoing situation! . Seeing the lousy credit rating of UniCo and temptation to sell the companies, the long term is not permitted.

Julie reminded him what jonah said in this context -" when the injections for FTR leads to new negative effects, people should not regard the injections 'Impractical' and ignore " . With a beginning of impractical injections, Alex and Bob reached that they can merchandise to shops on  consignment term, Shops didn't require to invest and they could pay back after sale. This would save them from hefty loan and pressure to buy large stocks of same product rather small consignments of many products- which in turn increased profitability. While the company would get more display space in shops and the sales should be reported to company on daily basis before next consignment (control for the company turns easier this way)- a competitive edge in market. Company had almost enough receivables to pay back to UniCo for 45 days for this initial release of finished inventories on consignment.

Seeing an example how his son tackled to purchase a costly BMW in share with his friend taking loans from his car fascinated father on the term to sell him only when it would be (loan from future buyer only) - Alex understood the edge of each company over competitors in the perception of buyers.

Printing press could be a model company to buyer -to schedule and control operations. In this way , He could get hefty amount and also no prospective buyer will interfere his model company.Stacy's pressure steam could get more than 4 times what it was getting on financials.

Alex showed to Trumann and  Doughty that Bob's solution will bring profit of 18% in ICosmetics.They were impressed because waiting 3-4 months cloud give  a very high price for ICosmetics, expected to deliver  such a high Profit. Similar could be done with Stacey's company too.

Alex got  a much required time of 4 months for Bob's and 6 weeks for Stacey's company.

In a meeting with plant managers, team Alex concluded that to increase sale at Pressure steam without investment and when customers want to pay less, could be done when they deliver directly the end product - Steam and not the machinery parts for the maintenance at their steam plant.

They went on FTR and response to prospect's need (including financial) to get this. This was above to consignment based approach. In this system, they need not to carry maintenance part to client site and can easily get all parts at own site. They introduced that they would pay penalty if fail to deliver in 24 hours -

based on the reliability they expect on concentrated maintenance part and their experts.  This was really an edge over competitors who try to follow.

After the sale of Bob's company and Pete's Press (as model) - UniCo got many times more than once they had expected. Alex is reluctant to sell ICosmetics (Pressure steam) and counted three reasons.

First, They had got 438 million USD against expected 150 millions. Second, Stacy's company is core to UniCo 's business of mechanics-so there needs an internal model, a catalyst for change .And , The credit rating of UniCo is fine.

When asked of the investment plan and strategy to increase productivity, he showed his eagerness to be executive vice president  of strategic planning. Granby remained silent.

Alex comes with his idea- the goal of a company is to make money not only now but future. We protect the interests of shareholders, but not of employees. So, summed up necessary conditions are

- Make money for now and in future.

-Provide a secure and satisfying environment for employees now as well as in the future.

-Provide satisfaction to the market now as well as in the future

So, goals always come with limitations. whatever of the three one chooses as goal remaining two become necessary conditions to achieve it, even though money is measured and rest two are not as a part of coincidence.

Also, don't make strategy based on a market forecast as it fluctuates. Develop a decisive competitive edge even if the company is not capable to invest for technology, make small changes to trim off market negatives.

He showed the example of Pressure-Steam, and continued -there is no absolute competitive edge that competitors would not emulate, but is just a matter of opportunity.

He blamed mangers for shortsightedness and said- Most of managers lay off employees when market drops below capacity. They should be responsible for employees security. Laying off to cut the cost and improve bottom line does not work.

Employees being insecure will not deliver best , productivity goes down further. Also, when market goes down, initially only profit goes down and not the cash reserve of company.  The manger must have precautionary step to develop enough flexibility among employee - for this segment the market. Even when Even when the market naturally segments for them, a new market opens up, the idiots immediately open a new plant. They segment the resources. The exact opposite of what should be done under a sensible.

strategy. As they are flexible -when a lucrative segment is up, the company shifts their focus away from some less lucrative segments, but don't stop any segment.

Alex was offered as CEO of UniCo after Granby.

The Goal -1 : A process of ongoing Improvement

Brevity | Goal -1 | EM Goldratt                                                            Rate *****  

What a darling book for management freaks . No dithering to give 5/5 to this bestseller book .

This story is about Alex and his fellows managers at UniCO. Bearington.
Bill Peach ,once a good friend of his , threatened him that he was going to close the plant if he is not able to  turn around the plant's performance and drowning shipment. Alex was newly joined. The responsible in the Plant were Bob (production manager since 9 yrs), Stacey (inventory Control manger),  Smyth Hilton(division productivity manger)
Like everyone in plant, Alex unleashed his pride for the experienced robots resulted productivity of the plant and they could lay off people , when once he happened to meet to his Alma-mater project guide, Jonah - a scientist, working on management science in particular.
Jonah, in-arguably concluded that if inventories hadn't down, employee expense was not reduced, company was not selling more product(no increase in shipping), noway plant robots increased his plant's productivity.
With a blame to accept so many things without question like others do and not thinking at all to astonished Alex, he asked the goal of his company. He bereaved saying that productivity was to accomplish something in terms of goals and " Every action that brings a company closer to its goal is productive"

Alex discussed a lot with many in the plant and found that supplying jobs, cost-effective purchasing, manufacture quality product , Technology, having big share of market to unload inventories (even at loss) - these all were reasons for plant existence and NOT the goals. Keeping employee busy when no work , was not going to make any money.
He concluded the goals as - Net Profit, ROI and Cash Flow. Jonah coined the terms as -Throughput, Inventory and Operational Cost.
"Throughput," he said, " the rate at which the system generates money through sales." 

 "Inventory is all the money that the system has invested in purchasing things which it intends to sell."
"Operational expense is all the money the system spends in order to turn inventory into throughput."
So, the goal of company was - Increase throughput while simultaneously reducing both inventory and operating expense.

Inspite of new robots, shipment and sales were not increased , rather inventories went up. Why? 

 
They kept on releasing more materials to the floor to feed robots (just as Peach wanted higher efficiency), letting them to produce at their efficiency, and hence they kept on producing parts that were not required in surplus, while lacked certain parts to assemble - this mounted the inventory. In first glance, it appeared that cost of production being in bulk when down, but perhaps they forgotten the added carrying cost in inventory (an OC).

Jonah explained- As we ' buy' time from employee,and don't sell time to customer (except services)- we should not include direct labor in inventory but in OC. The price we charge should be greater than (combination of inventory + operational expense per unit) in comparison to the value market determines.
Money lost is OC. Any investment that is being sold is inventory.
Knowledge for new manufacturing Process -> OC
Knowledge for sale, under patent or pertaining to a product in the firm (which depreciates) -> Inventory.

Jonah concluded that struggle for higher efficiencies took them in opposite direction and "A plant in which everyone is working all the time is very inefficient."
Excess manpower, excess capacity -raising inventory -increasing OC. He pointed that there is a large market demand for what we produce and we have large capacity as well, only some thought is missing.
"The tendency for most managers is to trim capacity wherever they can, so no resource is idle, and everybody has something to work on." Trimming capacity by laying off - neither increases sales, nor reduces
inventory and improves only one measurement OC. But factually, against the assumptions-throughput goes down, inventory goes up and so is OC.
This happens based on dependent events together with  'statistical fluctuations''. Let us understand this based on a row of boys walking : 

 

Hilton, in his new role, where mangers reported him -emphasized on cost reduction.

" In case of linear dependency, the fluctuations of the variables down the line will fluctuate around the maximum deviation established by any preceding variables."
The proof is Pete's company (link)

 
A bottleneck, is any resource whose capacity is equal to or less than the demand placed upon it , else it  is non-bottleneck.And, one need not to balance demand with capacity but with flow of product. So, bottlenecks can be used to control the flow through a system.
How to find Bottleneck?  First estimate the market average demand (in terms of hours ) .If number of available hours per resource (excluding breaks) is less than demand hours- that is bottleneck.
Symptoms : The parts (inventory) lacking in supply will be accumulated in front of bottleneck. In a company, Sequence of operation cannot be change (unlike a queue).

Alex and his people found that surprisingly their most advanced robot was a bottleneck. It had low set up time and low per unit cost, but on removing old machines - increased production of unwanted parts and lingered desired once. This reduced assembly and shipping.
So, Some percent of non-bottleneck should be idle, but for bottle neck it should NOT. Idle bottleneck means lesser throughput of the organization. Means loss in bottleneck processing is not only the loss at that point but many a times more in the throughput - due to inability to assemble the product. Simultaneous hazard happens when bottleneck's time is wasted on unwanted work or future work - cash flow remains not sustained.
What to do ? Enhance bottleneck productivity with siblings (irrespective of cost rise) and wise opt in its feed.

Alex team tagged the parts which were reaching to bottleneck - red and green . Red, lack of which, the assembling was delayed, were prioritized to reach to bottleneck. Also , they put Quality Control in front of (usually they had it after) bottleneck, so that inferior qualities shouldn't reach to bottleneck, causing wastage of its time, ensured availability of trained operators all the time, activating the three machines to supplement the bottleneck; increased the batch size.

Throughput increased initially , but soon inventories heaped at the end, both in form of excess finished good , and with work-in-progress those of green tagged. Why? See .

 
What to do ? Team Alex decided to have a three-day stock of work-in-process in front of each bottleneck, so that non-bottlenecks are not clogged too.

In order to increase more sale, Alex took shipping orders ahead of schedule. He studied various times of operation :

Set up time - resource is ready to work on the part initially, part waiting its turn.
Process Time - time spent to increase the value of part.
Queue Time - Part in line waiting for resourse, while resource is working on something else .
Wait Time - Part waits not for resource, but another part for assembly.

 
Alex said to cut the batch size in half - this reduces inventories to half, reduces the cash tied at one time, eases the cash flow pressure. Also, half was the process time so more costumers could be served at a time. Seemingly, Set-up cost increases, but Saving set- ups at a non-bottleneck doesn't make the system one bit more productive as they have high idle time already. This ensured more order, more shipping.

But , now raised Cost measurement issue . Mostly cost is measured on direct labor cost . Let us say, we reduced the batch size from 100 to 50. Actually, set up time remained same (as non-bottlenecks have lot of idle time), but it is spread over 50 parts instead of 100. so  per-unit set up time seems double(illusion).
So per unit setup time + Process time = Cost . This high cost appears because of  measurement assumption that all of the workers in the plant are always going to be fully occupied, and therefore, in order to do more set-ups, one has to hire more people.

Somehow, Alex managed to keep his point to Granby (CEO) and got appreciations for his bright idea from mangers and customers as well for on time delivery. Hilton still believed that an hour saved at a non-bottleneck was an hour saved at that resource.
Alex got promoted to division manager and Bob to his place of plant manager. With a new responsibility , they concluded new scale  -
Throughput is most important, then inventory—due to its impact on throughput and only then, at the tail, comes operating expenses.
But , after some smooth time, there emerged a number of holes in front of assembly than in front of bottle neck. Stacy emphasized to remove tags. Why?
Let us See.
Alex accepted more order for plant for 10% below cost (to increase sale and let not to divest the companies). Note that cost was still determined by labor cost. To rule the market, he nodded for this as there was extra capacity in plants, actually only out of pocket cost was that of raw materials. 
Then , there emerged many traveling bottlenecks, difficult to analyze and Control each one. Tasks got stuck. Alex concluded-Let Murphy hits before a bottleneck X. the stream of tasks to the bottleneck is temporarily stopped and the bottleneck is starved, and eats the 3 days stock as well before it goes down.
 When the stoppage is overcome , the upstream resources not only have to supply the current consumption of the bottleneck, at the same time they have
to rebuild the inventory. This also happens when bottlenecks have more capacity than upstream non bottlenecks.  So, to utilize resources to maximum, the upstream resources must have spare capacity.
Taking more order in such case , turned low capacity non-bottleneck to bottleneck due to reduction of spare capacity of bottleneck.
Alex and his fellows had to care entire division now (not only a plant). Identification of constraints in behavioral (not physical) patterns viz.  lack of sensible long-term strategy, the measurement issues,  the general attitude of passing the ball was mandatory , seeing no dearth of market.
Required was a thought process for the ability to answer three simple questions: 'what to change?', 'what to change to?', and 'how to cause the change?'
  If a manager doesn't know how to answer those three questions, is he or she entitled to be called manager?"
 

The Satanic Verses: What is offensive?

 My perception                                                                                           Rate : ***
This post of mine is not to vindicate or justify what is right and what is wrong. I happened to go through Salman Rushdie's this novel, that brought jinx in his life. Being accused of blasphemy , some Muslims resulted in a fatwa calling for Rushdie's death issued by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The book is public-ally banned hitherto.
The story shrouds two protagonist indian actors and dwindles between Mumbai and London. Having gone through the book with acute nuances , I personally feel there is nothing in this book which caused lot of pooh-pooh barring the few circumstances :
Firstly, the book is chocked with labyrinth and complex words along with very large sentences. This may become herculean to many people (specially belonging to Middle_East, noted that fatwa emerged there only) to conceive the exact theme.
Secondly, Few actors are there in two parallel stories with same name plsying different roles. Gabreel , the actor , is ruminating in dream a parallel story , where he acts as archangel Gabreel. Besides, Mishal (lover of Jumpy and Sayed's wife together) , Ayesha (divine girl in Titlipur and Mahound's last wife) are confusing.

Lastly.  the story minnow-ed the three goddesses power and showed Mahound, the prophet to die because of black magic of a lady. But surprisingly , No one spoke against the very often lascivious and frequent illicit relations. Consternating to say that not only female power is minnow-ed rather is shown minute respect for them. But, this appears in many novel and is true to an extent in contemporary Islamic cult.

Here is the story :

Casts:

 Gabreel Farishta : Smelling mouth for fifteen years the biggest star in the history of the Indian movies, 40. Her affectionate mother called him ‘ Farishta’ Gabreel was twenty, his father was dead, while mother in a bus accident. Started his career as Ganapati and Hanuman plays , turned super star. He had a avalanche of illicit relations. He dreams a lot and is archangel Gabreel in his dream story.

Saladin Chamcha : Affectionate son of mother but mutinous to father Changez Chamchawala, studied in London . English education , Chocking imposition of father, death of mather and Changez’s remarriage worked as bonfire to segregate them.

Mrs. Rekha Merchant – Married but infidel , Independent, her carpet and antique showrooms . Rekhs accused him forever for numerous murders and sins, abortions etc, but use to forgive him always.

Zeeny Vakil :  A doctor, a singer . loved Saladin

Babasaheb Mhatre. : adopted Farishta, despite half-hearted will of his childless wife.

Pamela Lovelace : Parents committed suicide in her early age due to surmounting debt overhead.

Mimi Mamoulian : Gabreel’s female counterpart in acting in London.

Alleluia Cone  : Gabreel’s beloved.

Karim Abu Simbel, Grandee of Jahilia , Husband of Hind (dream)

Rosa Diamond : 80 year old lady in Norman Fleet.

Baal: aka Bilal , a poet in Jahilla , prominent of Abu’s Grandee.

Khalid : a water Career

Mirza Saeed Akhtar  : Zamindar, husband of Mishal Akhatar (who had cancer)

Ayesha : Mahound’s last wife, a divine girl in Titlipur (dream)

1. Gabreel and Saladin-Fell out of the clouds over the English Channel – acquired reincarnation
2. Gabreel injured in a shooting till hemorrhaged and his blasphemy eked out first time while he got a bit relief in pain.
3. Gabreel Left Mumbai, Left Rekha for good and fled to London letting 7 movies in dump

            Against the God’s  act of retribution and to prove God’s non-existence , he ate pork.

4. Rekha Merchant read Gabreel Farishta's farewell note in the newspapers.
5. Rekha, gathered her children summoned in elevator and all jumped from Everest Villa apartment of her to death.
6. Saladin Chamcha met Pamela– an endearing orphane. He married her.
7. Saladin went in affection to  Zeeny Vakil, met her in Bombay once.
8. With his female equivalent, Mimi Mamoulian, Gibreel ruled the airwaves of Britain.
9. Saladin , being nostalgic , returned to home in forgiveness  with Zeeny (now married).

He found Changez’ still the same hoarse and lustful not only to his step mother Nasreen_2 but to Housemaid Vallabh’s wife Kasturba too. Vallabh was silent in greeed of money. Saladin being furious left .

10.  Chamcha met Gabreel, the actor in flight . The aircraft was later hijacked and was marooned on a shimmering runway for hundred and eleven days. The old Farishta with smelling mouth was dreaming, blabbering all these days, leaving Chamcha no option rather to listen. Farishta’s obsessive remind of the mountain--climber Alleluia Cone , conjured the memory of Pamela to Chamcha too.

Gabreel dreams : 

In Jahilla,  the businessman-turned-prophet, Mahound, is founding one of the world's great religions.  People are celebrating visit of Ibrahim who had visited with his sons and abandoned them (Later Gibreel saved them). Out of 360 stones clustered around God’s place, one is called allah, which is having not much importance here.  Abu visits the shrine with 3 beloved goddesses – Lat, Manat and Uzza.

Abu is accused for gang organization. Mahound, the messenger begs for peace and insists     that Allah can’t accept the 3 goddesses as his equal as they are not God’s daughters.

Hind supports Abu’s decision and says if Mahound is for Allah , she is for Al-Lat and Al-Lat is equals to Alalh and not daughter. 

Mahound backs to Jahilla, this time not with the maessage of Archangel Gibreel , rather of Shaitan –  satanic verses of disaster.

11. Accidently , after falling from the plane, both Chamcha and Gibreel meet at    Norman Fleet  . The English police catches Saladin (accused of spying) at Rosy Diamond’s home , but Gibreel deceives him , saved himself introducing as Rosy’s friend. Rosy died later and Gibreel escapes.

12 . Saladin calls at his home , but his wife considering herself widow (after the news of Bostan’s Flight accident) remarriaged perhaps. Chamcha was assaulted ruthlessly by polish and was brought in detention centre . He manged to escape somehow with the help of Hyacinth Phillips , a nurse.

13 . Jumpa Joshi came in life of Pamela Chamcha, and even after he said later thater that Chamcha is alive She did not believe . Later they decided to live together.

14. Gibreel meets Allie Cone and tried to revive of Rekha’s memory.

15 .  Gibreel dreams :  In a village Titlipur, a girl called  Ayesha (always remain surrounded by butterflies) appear as messenger to  Archangel Gibreel, who has told that all villagers should visit Mecca and that Arbian sea will tear apart to give them path if they will go opening their heart.

 16. Jumpy, still friend of Saladin manages to stay him at Sufiyan house , whose wife was  rude and owner of Shanadar café. The daughter Mishal and Anahita were closer to Saladin . Mishal had a lawyer boyfriend called Hanif Johnson, who was friend of Jumpy Joshi.

17. Gabreel meets Allie for whom her mother Alicija had always not agood opinion for being daughter’s boygriend. He returned to her after survival from Boston explosion again.

18. With the help of Sisodia and Billy Batuta , Gibreel revived his stardom again.

Gabreel dreams :  

Mahound returned to Jaheela after 25 years of exile and the city was decayed . Hind and not her husband Abu was Grandee. Hind had killed Mahound’s uncle Hmaza too.

Hind has discovered that in spite of all her efforts she has not been able to prevent the Grandee from surrendering the city to Mahound. With no compromise with Mahound, She commands people to fight in the name of Al-Lat. But the people begin to leave as they recognized the grey intenstion of  her. Mahound says “God but Al-Lah, and Mahound is his Prophet."

Mahound did not punished Salman too – a blasphemous Persian , and Baal who escaped into a brothel.

Baal became convinced by Salman that Al-Lat's fall meant that his own end was not far away.

Mahound had returned to Yathrib, preferring the cool oasis climate of the north to Jahilia's heat with his twelve wives.  Seeking the advantage, Baal married twelve prostitutes in the brothel and named them as the names of twelve wives of Mahound, younger one being Ayesha to breach Prophet’s respect among people.

After two years, Salman left the place for good and searching Baal ,  police seized the brothel but could not recognize Baal in his eunuch attire.

Baal, the poet used to scribe some weird songs on the wall of jail and hence was recognized and was sentenced to death for vindicating Al-Lat.

Hind, with the help of black magic she learnt in revenge, made Mahound sick and finally Mahound died.

19.    Saladin reached home . He and Jumpy decided that Saladin will live in the same house upper floor, though Pregnant Pamela (former wife of Saladin) was not liking this.

20.    Pamela and Jumpy were protesting against the arrest of a black American in a murder case. Hanif was the advocate in this case from accused side .

21.    Allie Cone (beloved of Gabreel) and Pamela met and with the assistance of Sisodia, they managed to invite Gabreel and Saladin in the same party.

22.    In the Party, though Saladin was revengeful for his betrayal in Norman Fleet , but the wealthy and famous actor Gabreel  has forgotten all and treated Saladin very friendly.

23.    In another meet in Shandaar café, there caught a fire from no clue source. Saldin rushed to save his friend Hanif and Mishal (who had already come out) and himself caught in fire.  It was Gabreel, who ventured risk on his life and saved Saladin and won his respect too.

 Gabreel dreams last time : 

The villagers of Titlipur arrived to Mecca being encouraged by Ayesha (butterfly shrouded girl) and Mishal (cancer victim wife of zamindar Mirza Sayed). With the passage of time and increasing difficulties Mirza Sayed, Mrs Mrs. Qureishi, Sarpanch Srinivas – all disbelieved them and mocked over. Archangel Gabreel appeared in clouds when people reached Arbian sea. Only those who could open their heart in belief were allowed to pass when the sea opened itself , and rest remained as witnesses .

 

After 18 months, Saladin listens the news of his dying father Changez. He returned home and forgetting all the cussedness he served his father , who finally died with the properties (to be shared equally with the his step-mother and maid’s wife Kasturba) in bequest .

Saladin had develoved respect for Gabreel, who suffered not less than him in life and was the one whom met him at every turn. Allie Cone dropped Gabreel and Rekha’s memory still haunted him , warned him. He reached to late Changez’s room  and committed suicide, leaving Saladin crying.

Saldin accepted the offer of Zeeny Vakil to begin a new life.

The Tipping Point : How little things make big difference

Book Review | The Tipping Point : Malcomm Gladwell.                              Rate : ****

The fabulous writing , untamed intelligence and acute nuances - though don't suffice to mention this book but yes strive to.
This  thought turning book says that the indiscriminate application of effort is something that is not always possible. There are times when we need a convenient shortcut, a way to make a lot out of a little, and that is what Tipping Point.
Change to make an idea or attitude in avalanche (calls Epidemics), we're trying to infect people.This is done through the influence of special kinds of people, people of extraordinary personal connection. That's the Law of the Few.
Law of Few assimilates : Mavens, Connectors and Salesmen.
Mavens are data banks.and message provider and gather information from every possible means.
Connectors are social glue: they spread it. based on their ability  intrinsic to their personality, curiosity, selfconfidence,sociability, and energy.   The closer an idea or a product comes to a Connector, the more power and opportunity it has.
Connectors don't necessarily have close friends but weak ties too. Actually , "weak ties" are always more important than strong ties, because weak ties posses more distinguish information being in different parts compared to close friends who belong to same contigent.
The essence of Salesmen is that, on some level, they cannot be resisted to synchronize with them and they rule our thought slowly.

The author mentions anthor factor for tipping a big change - Stickiness Factor.
It can be done by changing the content of communication, by making a message so memorable that it sticks in someone's mind and compels them to action.   Stickiness is more of message and less of messenger.

The last but not least factor is Power of Context.
Commencing with a very good example of Broken Windows theory (If a window is broken and left unrepaired, people walking by will conclude that no one cares . Soon, more windows will be broken, and the sense of anarchy will spread) , and another of a prision (shows that Not always prisions are full of nasty people , but also  prisons are such nasty environments that they make people nasty) - the author says that Contexts are so powerful that they can overwhelm our inherent predispositions.
The honesty isn't a fundamental trait. This is a mistake, that when we think only in terms of inherent traits and forget the role of situations.  When it comes to interpreting other people's behavior, human make the mistake of overestimating the importance of fundamental character traits and underestimating the importance of the situation and context.  Actually, The reason that most of us seem to have a consistent character most of times ,  is that most of us are really good at controlling our environment.
He talks of Peer Pressure in another part of Power of context stating that People make very different conclusion under Peer pressure than what they actually make individually. This peer pressure influences the  beginnings of an epidemic many a times.  People want to live up to what is expected of them.

Divulging from the main theme for a while , the author underlines the theory of 150 . As  the size of the neocortex (inner part of brain) relative to the size of the brain . The ratio of the number of people we are in direct fraternity to the neocortex size for Homo sapiens -comes out to 147.8  — or roughly 150. So, a group of 150 is best to communicate , control and understand (as in army) exceeding which raises extra complexity for the brain.

Innovators, the adventurous ones, they try something new. The slightly larger group who were infected by them were the Early Adopters (include Maven or a Connector or a Salesman). They were the opinion leaders in the community.To reach these ideas to mainstream and tip an epidemics , these Mavens, connectors and Salesman are inevitable , else the idea dies.

With a good blend of terms coined and justified for contingents and states,  along with incidental examples the books has refrained to be yawning even though it is presenting the sermonizing subject, and author has magnificently  endorsed his idea in his words.