Unusual People Do things Differently - Review

Author : T.G.C.Prasad

Price   : 399/-

Publishers: Penguin Book India

My Rating : 4/5

The description on the back of this book is very apt. So I am pasting here the same :

Unusual people are ordinary people who strive hard to do extraordinary things. They are sensitive to nuances, look to provide lateral solutions, dare to think out of the box, and often end up changing the rules of the game.

T.G.C. Prasad presents the views and experiences of sixty-five individuals, from well-known names like Mike Lawrie, Azim Premji and Mother Teresa to a chef, a masseuse and a service boy, with whom he has had meaningful interactions and who have inspired him. He includes people from a broad professional spectrum; CEOs, doctors, the director general of police, realtors, an attorney, a chartered accountant, a consultant and a sports coach are among those who make his list. Singling out a dominant factor from each person’s story, he outlines the journeys these people undertook and the behaviours they exhibited, and shows how these link up to the results they achieved.

The 65 chapters are aligned into 6 themes:

1.  Strategic and focused on the value creation
2.  Perceptive and derive creative solutions
3.  Driven by business excellence
4.  Deploy professional skills to win
5.  Passionate and lead from the front
6.  Sensitive to people and are customer centric

Though the book is divided into themes, but it doesn’t make any difference even if you read the chapters randomly.

This book is on the management learning mainly from observing people and how they react to real-life situations. Broad areas of management topics are covered - from the global level insights on mergers and acquisitions of the companies to tips on negotiating and real life examples on how to be costumer centric.

Author did a good work by succinctly conveying what he wanted to, in simple language.

There are some informative and inspirational parts that will kick your butt. I particularly liked the topics that focused on negotiating, VC’s, mergers of companies, sales tips and entrepreneurship.

If you have already read a lot of books on management/entrepreneurship then there are only a few chapters that may enlighten you..

But there are take-aways in every chapter to those who are new to this kind of book.

The author, TGC Prasad also wrote a fiction, Along The Way. Rarely we find authors who can deal with both fiction and non-fiction efficiently. Prasad is surely one among them.

Some of the insights from this book:

• Sometimes things don’t go the way we want them to. The best thing to do is to jump in at the right opportunity and make a difference.
• If you want your business to succeed, then you should have a strong desire to make money and really feel bad if you love money.
• Be patient; it’s a long way to the top. Live life as you climb.
• Successful negotiators make the other party feel that they are winning
• Never fear to negotiate and never negotiate in fear.
• People who are employed seek security in their jobs, whereas business people think about generating security.
• Strategy always has to be contextual.
• Happiness is an internal stimulus, irrespective of what happens externally. If you choose to be happy, nobody can stop you.
• Keep your needs basic and life will be peaceful.

Important questions before starting a business : 

• What are you selling ? who is your customer? Why does the customer want to buy your product or service ?
• How long can you sustain yourself and your family without a job ? can you generate business ? do you have any customers right now who are willing to give you assignments?

About the Author: T.G.C. Prasad lives in Bangalore and offers strategic, advisory, general management and HR consulting services to several start-ups, small and medium enterprises, Indian and MNC companies. He also offers executive coaching to senior management.

You can buy this book on Infibeam for 259/- here and for 279/- on Flipkart here

Along The Way - Review

 Author: TGC Prasad

The story starts at NIT Calicut where the protagonist Venkat(who is from AP) gets job in TCS, along with his friends Raj and Adi. During that time Venkat meets Anjali(who is from Coorg), who also got an offer from the same company. She is the daughter of the retired colonel Krishna Cariappa. The love story between Venkat and Anjali starts there. Later the story shifts to TCS, Bangalore office and the rest is about the problems they faced in TCS and how the relation among the friends changed due to various situations. The last few chapters are mostly about how Venkat and Anjali managed their families to agree to their marriage, even though there are cultural and other differences between them.

 The writing style is lucid and elegant. Readers can relate to themselves in many parts of the story especially those working in IT field. If you are not related to this field some terms may appear Greek and Latin. This is not a master piece but is good enough for time-pass on weekends.

What I liked:

• Writing style.
• Description of the life in software field and hilarious witty comments on the managers and HR professionals there. The comments are really funny.
• Interaction scenes of Venkat and Raj with Manikantan Doraiswamy(proj manager) and Amit( HR guy).

What I din’t like:

• The second half of the story is quite predictable and it reminds me of ‘2states’ which has similar situation involving families from two different states. The conversations between Venkat and colonel Krishna, Anjali’s father, are tad boring.
• The book would have been much better if it was restricted to around 280 pages.
• Normal price of this book is Rs.295, which is on the very high end. There are many good books available in similar genre at much lower price. If you buy at discount on Infibeam then it is ok. Even Flipkart’s price is quite high.
• Venkat likes to irritate Raj by hugging him. This hugging act appeared in more situations than needed.

If you like Chetan Bhagat style of books then there is no reason why you wouldn’t like this one. Surely this one will become a bestseller. This book is like a 350 pages of movie script. I heard there could be a movie based on this.

This is the second book by the author after his first one “Unusual people do things differently”..a non-fiction, on the lives of 65 people who did things differently.  

About the Author:   T.G.C. Prasad lives in Bangalore and offers strategic, advisory, general management and HR consulting services to several start-ups, small and medium enterprises, Indian and MNC companies. He also offers executive coaching to senior management.