Changing Lives » Business

ICBC 2010 at Queen's University – 5 Years Later

Ian Selvarajah — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 16:22:07 +0000

This post is coming to you exactly 5 years (and 2 days) after I competed waaay back in the day at ICBC 2005. I’m so amazed at how quickly time flies, but really happy to be able to look back on events from so long ago!!

I’ve told several people I have a really good feeling about 2010 and the year got off to an amazing start! I had the privilege of joining the JMSB team at Queen’s University for this year’s ICBC case competition. Being surrounded by so much energy, enthusiasm and fun was exactly what I needed to kick start the year!

I’m going to cheat and copy/paste some of what I wrote to the students, but it’s a good summary of how I felt about them:

Now for the cheesy (hopefully, inspirational) stuff: You guys are truly the best of the best that JMSB has to offer. I was so proud watching all of you present, network (and party!) this weekend. I was especially impressed with how young some of you are and I’m really looking forward to when you’re all business leaders! JMSB’s reputation continues to excel and improve because of individuals like you. You make us proud!!

I truly hope we’ll have a chance to work together in “the real world” one day!

I just went back and read the entry from 5 years ago! Here are 2 things that stood out to me that are still very relevant today:

2010: Our MIS team, despite an amazing performance, didn’t podium. I’m sure they were a little disappointed and that’s perfectly normal.

2005: I was quite disappointed that my team didn’t podium and Mark (the head coach) said: “If you always want to win, stay home.” Blunt, but very true.

2010: On the “Board Game” theme night, after walking around for a few minutes, I said to Val: “I’ve looked around quite carefully and there is no doubt that you guys are the best looking delegation here. No question.”

2005: Our team ambassador said the following to me: “Hey man, no matter what anyone says, the one thing that can’t be disputed is that you guys are still the best looking group here. And that’s what really matters!” Hilarious.

Here are some pictures that summarize the fun pretty well:

ICBC 2010 slideshow – click the little bubble to see the captions.

Thanks to everyone for a really fun weekend and congratulations to all the teams!!

Here’s a link to the official press release: JMSB Returns from ICBC with 2 Podiums

"Social Entrepreneurship is stupid." according to Penelope Trunk

Ian Selvarajah — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 21:07:27 +0000

I was quite surprised to read this statement from Penelope Trunk, founder of Brazen Careerist today. Let’s skip the fact that it’s really stupid to assume a company’s corporate citizenship level simply by looking at a single factor (the presence of a ‘green initiative’) and jump straight into the comment about social entrepreneurship.

The heart of her argument is in this post. The general idea makes sense: You can no longer separate the world into the “non-profit do-gooders” and the “for-profit money-grubbers”. This is an obvious oversimplification, but as we know, the world is rarely that black and white. A commenter gave a great example about Nike vs. Tom’s Shoes.

Nike vs. Tom’s Shoes

Nike does a lot of good work for the world. In fact, one of my favourite development campaigns is from Nike: The Girl Effect (make sure to check it out if you haven’t already!). Tom’s Shoes on the other hand, was founded on the “one for one” premise.

Do you see the difference? It’s in the authenticity; it’s in the priorities. Even if you don’t see a difference, I think it’s quite harsh to say one of them is stupid. I think a much more interesting evaluation would be to see what percentage of a company’s revenues (or products/services) are fed back into making the world a better place vs. the shareholder’s pockets. Perhaps that’s a better approach?

Profit isn’t the Top Priority

At the end of the day, the key distinction is that for a social enterprise, money/profit is seen as a means- not the end. The resources acquired are used to enrich the lives of yourself and others.

If you think Social Entrepreneurship is stupid, I’d love to know why.

Update (17/12/09): A well-written comment by @AkhilaK who blogs at Justice for All

$50M Social Innovation Fund Approved

Ian Selvarajah — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 03:47:07 +0000

Good news for social entrepreneurship and the development world last week; the US House-Senate has approved $50M of funding for the very first social innovation fund!

Looking at some of the comments on the Chronicle of Philanthropy site it seems that people are disappointed that funding for volunteer and non-profit capacity building programs has been cut to support this. While I can sympathize, I’m glad that there’s more of a market approach to social development now and at the very least, this shows that governments are interested in social innovation rather than simply giving away money to non-profits.

Hat tip: Change.org’s Social Entrepreneurship Blog

Speed Dating Take 2

Ian Selvarajah — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 00:09:00 +0000

Me: I mean, come on, no one really comes here expecting to meet their future boyfriend/girlfriend right?
Girl#1 (surprised): So you’re just here to make friends???
Me: …Ooohhhh…I guess you did…

A couple of friends and I are working on a new business concept dealing with singles/dating, so yesterday afternoon we were doing some research on the competition. It turned out that one of our potential competitors was having an event that night, so I said: “Is anyone up for some market research?” and the rest is history. I had already been speed dating about 3 years ago, but I have to admit that I was pleasantly surprised this time…

3 Years Ago

When I went 3 years ago, I had prepared several characters/personalities that I was going to use with the various women: an immigrant who arrived the day before, an alcoholic, a religious nut, someone still hung up on his ex, Borat, someone who was hearing voices, etc. I was extremely disappointed when I arrived and noticed that A) the layout had all the girls sitting next to each other so they would be able to hear all my bizarre conversations and B) they were all French-speaking, so the jokes wouldn’t really work! My fun idea was ruined, but in the end, I still had a few good stories come out of that night.

Yesterday

Since this was more for research purposes, my buddy and I were able to have a bit more fun with it. The downside, again, was that although some of them were bilingual, out of the ~16 girls, only 3 really spoke English. My humour is of the witty/clever variety, so most of the conversations in French were, unfortunately, pretty generic. My buddy (who is French, but usually speaks English) even said it was awkward trying to explain what he did and to be smooth in French.

The upside, was that the venue was cooler, so now we know how much of a difference the venue can make and the majority of the girls were half decent and were capable of handling a conversation for 5 minutes. We also found out that engineers make up the bulk of speed daters… interesting! Overall, I’d say it was definitely a productive evening!

What Surprised Me

3 years ago, the majority of people (men and women) at the event seemed very awkward. At yesterday’s event, most of them appeared to be intelligent and decent looking, so I wondered: “Similar to online dating, has speed dating now become more mainstream and “normal” people are giving it a shot?”

Assuming that people are ever-willing to experiment with new dating concepts/methods, I believe my idea should work well, but I’ll explain it in further detail later on.

If you’ve never been speed dating, I definitely recommend it as a fun evening experience. This is what I told a guy who seemed pretty nervous before the event: “Worst case scenario: you come out with a few funny stories to tell. Best case scenario: you meet someone amazing. Hopefully you fall somewhere in the middle!!”

Have you ever been speed dating? Would you try it?

Profiled on the Deloitte Recruitment Website

Ian Selvarajah — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 02:43:00 +0000

A couple of months ago I was asked to complete a profile about the experience I’ve had at my firm so far. While I answered the whole questionnaire honestly, I made sure to give them enough to work with!

I’m not a fan of the picture, but I guess they wanted someone who looks REALLY happy!! ha ha The profile, however, is quite well done and I especially like the tag line they came up with: “Tackles humanitarian work abroad…and client challenges at home.”

Here’s the full profile: Find yourself among our people

Quoted in the Globe and Mail

Ian Selvarajah — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 16:46:00 +0000

A partner and I did an interview with Globe and Mail reporter Kira Vermond last week. I was a little disappointed that I wasn’t quoted in the actual newspaper, but my pic and a quote is in the online version.

Count on me to get quoted saying something about relationships/dating although it was a business article!!

Ian Selvarajah, business technology analyst for Deloitte & Touche LLP, who works in the Montreal office, likes to refer old colleagues with a proven track record. He does not refer friends or people he has never worked with, though.

“Any time you’re referring anybody, whether you’re referring them for a job or trying to set friends of yours up on a blind date, you know it’s going to come back to you, right?” he said.

Here’s the full article: Is it worth paying cash for colleagues?

How to Get a Free Dinner…AND Lunch

Ian Selvarajah — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:44:00 +0000

I’m constantly amazed at how quickly time flies!! I can’t believe it’s almost the end of May already! Anyhow, here’s another story from my latest trip to Toronto…

We went out for dinner to East Side Mario’s for my cousin’s birthday. Very long story short (no exaggeration whatsoever): the service was the worst I’d ever seen in my life. Everything that could possibly go wrong, went wrong and the “manager” who looked like she was 20, was unapologetic throughout.

Before the bill arrived, my cousin’s fiancée, also named Ian, told us we weren’t paying for any of this. Most of us were surprised and although we knew the service was terrible, we didn’t think he was being serious. He was. Before the waiter arrived with the bill, he said: “Bring your manager with the bill.” After another 15 minutes, the waiter and manager showed up…

“I’ve taken the items you didn’t order or receive off the bill [gee, thanks?] and I’ve given you 15% off the order.”, the young manager said.
- That’s not good enough.
- Well, what do you want? [she had a slight smirk]
- I want you to say: “I apologize for the terrible service, the meal is on the house and we hope you’ll consider coming back someday.”
- I’m sorry, I can’t do that. [Fair enough, I'm sure she couldn't]
- Well, get me the person who can.
- That’s my boss and he’s not here now.
- Get him on the phone then.

It was only at this point that she realized Ian wasn’t messing around and she started apologizing profusely and using words like “empathize”. She was kinda’ cute, but I figured this was a bad time to ask if she was on Facebook; she looked like she was about to cry. In the end, Ian gave her his business card and said: “Tell your boss to call me tomorrow and I’ll sort it out with him.”. Ian didn’t think the boss would call back, but he did…

The real manager apologized and said that he realized that running a restaurant is like running a baby sitting service and that he has to keep closer tabs on his employees. He even invited him to a complimentary lunch to discuss how to improve business operations!!!

I was quite impressed with how Ian handled the situation, but I’m not sure if I’d have the guts to pull off what he did. However, if I experience service THAT terrible again, I’ll probably give it a shot!

Announcing: Generation Y Consultant

Ian Selvarajah — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 20:32:00 +0000

My blog has always been a mixed bag of random stuff. Since my personality is also quite random, I wanted to keep it that way as this blog is a fairly accurate reflection of who I am. However, I realize that this can become tedious for certain visitors because they never know what to expect. For instance, some of the top Google searches that bring people here are: age differences in relationships, inflamed liver, confidence vs. arrogance and life changing decisions. Very different topics; all on the same blog.

A few weeks ago, I was asked to be part of the blogger community at BrazenCareerist.com; see my profile here. I have ~~quite a bit of~~ more experience than the average 25yr old in dealing with a variety of corporate topics, so I might as well share my lessons learned! After much deliberation, I’ve finally decided to target a specific niche: Young Professionals and Recent Graduates.

Before you think: “Oh great, this is going to turn into another boring business blog…”, I have good news: I have an obvious personal attachment to this blog, so I’ve decided I’ll keep it going. This one will track my day to day (well, most likely weekend) shenanigans and I hope to maintain the randomness that I (and hopefully you) have come to love.

For those of you who want a little more focus and might be more interested in my professional side, I’ve launched a new blog:

Generation Y Consultant

That’s the blog where I’ll share things about what an IT [SAP] consultant does and general business/professional advice.

Needless to say, maintaining 2 blogs will probably be somewhat challenging, so I’ll probably “cheat” by pointing readers over there (or vice versa) every once in a while! I always value your feedback whether it’s positive or critical, so please share your thoughts! Thanks!

Time is Not Always Correlated to Value

Ian Selvarajah — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 23:30:00 +0000

“We live in a world that assumes that the quality of a decision is directly related to the time and effort that went into making it.”
-Malcolm Gladwell in Blink

Funny thing is that we live in a world where many people assume the quality/value of most things (not just decisions) is directly correlated to the time and effort put into creating them. Why do people assume that it takes a long time to create value?

I loved the intensive summer courses my university offered. They required more effort, but those classes were often my best grades! Are intensive classes worth less because we get through them in 5 weeks instead of 15? Certainly not.

T (Time) * E (Effort) = Q (Quality)

For argument’s sake let’s say that the max quality for a task is 100 units. This can be broken down in several ways:

A) 10 * 10 = 100
B) 5 * 20 = 100
C) 20 * 5 = 100
D) 1 * 100 = 100

Obviously, by increasing effort, you reduce time. When it comes to products, companies are always trying to increase efficiency (effort) to save time/production costs. Unfortunately, when it comes to employees, it appears that because of ideas like face time and the perception that working long hours means you’re working hard, many employees choose option C leading them to Boreout. How is D even possible? Maybe you’re tech-savvy enough to create something that automates the task!

Something to think about: Does something automatically become more (or less) valuable because of the time it took to create it?

“Do you really care how long it took me to write this article? Would you pay me twice as much if it took me 6 hours vs. only 3?”
-Steve Pavlina in 10 Reasons You Should Never Get a Job

Value shouldn’t be decided as a function of time…unless we’re talking about wine and cheese I suppose? Or Not?

How do YOU Define "Work"?

Ian Selvarajah — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 03:18:00 +0000

Overworked photo from Nuvate Solutions

With today’s networked, “always-on” technology and virtual workplaces, I feel like the term “work” has become very fluid and vague when it comes to white collar jobs. This is why I find it curious whenever someone says: “Dude! I work like 70 hours a week, EVERY week!” Really? Every week? What do you do? Is it really value-added? Or are you counting hours that I wouldn’t consider work?

How do you define work? Is it work if you…
…roll out of bed, check your BB and proceed to respond?
…take a 4 hour flight to get to your client?
…sit in the office surfing the web?
…surf the web, while waiting for your boss to get back to you?
…surf the web, while waiting for the system to load?
…sit in a 3 hour meeting but aren’t contributing/learning anything?
…spend 2 hours talking to your colleague about the latest sports trades?

I often see people who are in the office until 21:00, but during the day, they have time to take 2 hour lunches and enough time to come talk to me about what they did last weekend for another hour. You can bet that if I’m going to claim I’m “soooo busy” that I don’t have time to come talk to you for an hour in the middle of the day.

When I say “work”, I mean full intensity, focused, value-added work. Yes, I understand someone needs to do the grunt work, but get that done well and move on to more important things.

When I say “work” I don’t mean just being physically in the office. I don’t mean all the time one might consider “on business”. If you count my travel time (I just got back from the airport), time spent in the office and time spent checking/responding to work emails on weekends, of course I clock well over 60 hours/week consistently. However, I don’t count a lot of that.

I understand there are certain “crunch times“, for instance: when deliverables are due, a new system goes live, month-end closes, etc., but when someone tells me that they’re consistently working 70-80 hour weeks and they’re in a white collar job, I feel like something is wrong, but more on that later…

Do you consistently work more than 60 hours/week (12 hours/day)? What exactly do you do?