It has been more than 4 months that I turned in my badge at Tesla. By now, I have mostly gotten over the constant tick to check ercot.com for the latest market price spikes, upcoming scarcity days and check internal dashboards to track how VPP dispatched. Elasticity of brain to adapt to new work rhythms is amazing.. and so is its capacity to forget. So before I forget the lessons I learnt and cultural patterns that made Tesla hum, thought of writing those down, in order to preserve and grow them. I sincerely believe some aspects of Tesla's culture are worth emulating. This is an effort to list them without disclosing any non-public information, and capture the emotions and quiet integrity of engineers that used to run the small sliver of Tesla I had the honor to work within. I tried to organize the post below around cultural building blocks to make it easy to read. Joining Tesla I have been following Tesla since 2009, including listening in on most investor calls. The grit and sac...
Recently had a very 'memorable' experience with Indian customs, which I was planning to blog about. This was my first firsthand experience with public corruption & bureaucracy, hence quite a learning experience. So this happened, when on my India trip, I naively carried two laptops (one for a friend & one for my work, as I needed both) without thinking twice about the custom trouble it might create :-) I was vaguely aware of 25000Rs limit, was foolishly optimistic of my falling below the custom radar or overly confident of dealing with any eventuality. Alas, on my way out of Mumbai terminal, when asked forthright, I declared the same, and was promptly asked to come to side & open my luggage. The officer, Mr.B was way too good for his job. The free & black market prices of all electronic valuables & accessories were on his fingertips. His knowledge of dell, hp, toshiba, ibm brands alongwith innards of chipsets, ram, dvd specs would compete with authorized sa...
Last week, I attended a week long course called YES+! It stands for Youth Empowerment Seminar, and is designed by Art of Living Foundation. It was such fun! Full of energy, dancing, music, meditation, exercise and breathing techniques designed to calm the mind, improve focus, get rid of negative emotions, find joy & peace in the present moment, feel connection and sense of belonging with others. I recommend it to everybody! It was taught by Natalie, a sweet young american girl who has conducted many many trauma relief workshops in New Orleans for Katrina affected people, inner city youth, prisons. I have always been overawed by all Art of Living teachers I have met. They really 'know' what they are talking about! Lets hope my discipline gets better of my inertia in practicing these techniques :-) Below is a music video made in Montreal YES+ course, which captures beautifully the essence of YES+.
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