My message to engineering graduates during the convocation ceremony

My message to engineering graduates during the convocation ceremony of SVPM’s College of Engineering Malegaon (Bk), Baramati on 8^th Feb 2020.

Principal of SVPS's COE, Dr. Mukane, CEO, of SVPM, Mr. Patil, dignitaries of the dais, on the dais, professors and dear students,

This day is important day in your life. You are going to start the new chapter. On the occasion, I congratulate you all. I would like to share few tips based on my experience to make the life better. 

(following is the excerpt from the speech)
  
Create Knowledge: You learnt the knowledge during your education. You learnt fundamental concepts, Principles and theories. Time has come to apply that, but most importantly before application, comes creation. Based on the fundamental knowledge, you should learn to create different concepts, models. You need to create the knowledge for the society, industries and ecosystem where you are living. Learn, Create and apply is the right sequence in knowledge management.

You are unique: Be the best you. Be confident and think that nobody is better than you. Your competition is not with others, it is with you. Always try to be better every day. Be open and always learn.    

Break invisible fences: You must have read the story of elephants. When they are very young and much smaller mahout uses the same size rope to tie them and, at that age, it’s enough to hold them. As they grow up, they are conditioned to believe they cannot break away. They believe the rope can still hold them, so they never try to break free. These animals could at any time break free from their bonds but because they believed they couldn’t, they were stuck right where they were. We also have conditioned our mind to play safe and we create invisible fences and strong chains which we don’t want to cross or break. That fences are like ‘I can’t do this, it is difficult, I have never done this, etc etc. All these are excuses we give for not doing something. This mindset is dangerous. We need to break those fences and remove negative beliefs, false assumptions and unnecessary fear.        

Success will come from simplicity: You are now engineers and understand complex theories and concepts, doesn’t mean you make life complicated. Engineers have the tendency to make things more complicated. Make things simple and the life of others. Your success will come from simplicity. Complex problems don’t mean that you have the complex solution. Find out simple solutions for complex problems.     

Life is always fair: Believe that life is always fair. There will be a lot of struggle, failures, frustrations but trust that every situation has some remedy. People around you may be unfair but life will always be fair for you. Something better will always be there.

Be a leader: Leadership doesn’t mean that you should have followers. Be the leader of yourself. Leadership comes through position and power which is not long lasting. But leadership which comes through your credibility, knowledge, wisdom is always long lasting. Create that credibility by your expertise, knowledge and wisdom.

You can curse the darkness, or you can light the candle, choose right option.

Don’t scare to do mistakes and failures: If you have the fear of doing mistakes, you will not do anything. Don’t be scared what will happen. Failures and mistakes will teach you lot of lessons. If you don’t try, you will never know what you can do. You are amazing person and you can do anything. Go ahead.

It must be a proud moment for all of you but don’t forget your parents. They must be prouder on your success. Recognize their contribution in your successes. I congratulate you and wish you all the best luck. I am sure you will rock going forward.

At the end, I would like to say that keep alive your dreams and aspirations. Don’t let it go away. I would like to recite my poem here…

Convocation speech by Vinod Bidwaik at SBIIMS

Dear Friends,

You are starting the new journey of your life. This journey is not simple, it is not easy & definitely not as you expect. This journey of the life will have full bumpy rides. You are qualified to be independent and take your own decisions about your life, your career and your future. Whatsoever you will decide will have the impact on the future. Your actions will have the consequences on your future.

And one important thing is that you and only you will be responsible for your actions. It is you who makes the difference.

You have to navigate very smartly during this journey, understand the proper navigation system and of course Google is not yet come up with such smart system yet.

I have few tips to make this journey beautiful, meaningful and productive.

Perspective

I will start with my story. When I was in the school, I had to cross the river to go at another side of the river. As the river was not much big, there was no bridge built on the river for commuting, we had to cross through the water, this was fun. However, in monsoon we had to worry because due to heavy rains, river used to swell & sometimes with full flood. and we had to wait to cross it till the water subsides. During one day of the monsoon, after heavy flood, water stared to subsides. I wanted to cross the river to go home immediately, but I was scared as still water was flowing. Few of my friends were courageous and they crossed the river.

I asked them from the other side of the river bank, “Hay, how you did it? How do I get the other side?”

One of the friends, laughed and yelled back, “You are already on the other side.”

In life, there are perspectives. There is always another side, other side and we have to understand that other side, other perceptive in life. Please understand that you may be right, but others are also right.

Now necessary everybody understands what you say:    

Once a woman living in our society dashed a biker while going out from the colony. All blamed her for causing the accident without looking on the road while making a turn. She angrily said, “Everybody knows that I turn left here during this time of every morning.”

This is called as everybody know syndrome & we believe that people know all our actions and they understand everything. This assumption is dangerous and perhaps you may spoil the relationship.  

Purpose

Find out the purpose in life. Always ask the why. Why you did specific course? Why you want to make the career in specific area? Why/ Why? Why? This will crystallise your thought process. Find out the Purpose of your job career, life. Your purpose may change after fulfilling the same. For time, your purpose can be simple, but work on this. I realised that purpose is very important, but I had to spend almost 10 years to understand the purpose of my career.

What is your core?

Being generalists is good, but you need to be specialist in one. Find out that special skill? Special capability, special competency of yours’. Find out what is your core. Focus on core, nourish the core. You core can be anything. You will realise that you have more than one core and you can nourish that. The cores will help you to build the better career and better life. You may have different cores in career and for living a happy life.  

Take calculated risk

I took so many calculated risks in my life. I left the stable job which I got in Mahindra & Mahindra. Perhaps it was the dream of everyone to work in M&M that time. I joined the media company, Sakaal Media Group, different sector, differ culture. I learnt a lot in this process and my all experiences are enriching. I am here todays because I took risks in life, I took risks in profession.

Don’t avoid conflicts

We tend to avoid conflicts. Healthy conflicts are necessary. Be courageous to take confrontations and conflicts. This does not mean that you fight or quarrel. Go for positive conflicts, healthy conflicts, challenge and put your opinion. Be assertive and don’t take everything.

IQ is important but also focus on EQ/Cultural Q/Social Q

   

We can’t survive alone. We need people, allies, enemies, critics, friends, families to support you. They are integral part of the eco system.

While dealing with different types of people you need to have interpersonal skills.

What is EQ:

You understand emotions,

You control or use when and for what reasons,  

You understand other emotions,

You put yourselves in their shoes, show empathy,

You deal it with positively with right strategy.

What is CQ

You study different cultures,

You are inclusive, recognise & respect differences

You understand “why” in behaviour

What is SQ:

You understand the norms of the society,

Challenge negative norms but recognise that regularly that it is a part of society,

Educate and respect different norms but don’t get influenced.

Make yourself redundant

 World is changing very fast. You don’t know what is in the future, but at least we can predict the future. There are new trends, new challenges, new opportunities too. If you want to grow in your career, make yourself redundant. Yes, allow to grow others and imagine, your skills today are not at all useful, what will you do? You will learn new skills to survive. Exactly so don’t wait for redundancy, instead make yourself redundant and try something new.

Believe on intuition

Tim Cook once said, “For the most important decisions in your life, trust your intuition, and then work with everyone you have to prove it right.”

Sometimes, we have to believe on our intuition and take a decision in life, however it is you to make it work.

Besides this

Focus on learning

Focus on behavioural skills along with functional skills

Be aligned with your Vale system

Network & influence

And finally Enjoy the journey.

I wish you all the best and I am sure that you will create your own footprints and help others to create their own.

Cheers & enjoy the moment.

Vinod Bidwaik

Date: 08/12/2018