Technical Musings of a 30th Batch MITian – Why Not Think World Class?

(This is a short essay written for a souvenir that is being released on the August occasion of the golden jubilee celebrations of my alma mater "Madras Institute of Technology Alumni Association". Those of you, who may not be familiar with Madras Institute of Technology, aka MIT, Chromepet, India, it was a premier institution for engineering in Chennai, India as it is currently known. This souvenir is being released to commemorate the Golden Jubilee celebrations of the Alumni Association in August 22nd and 23rd.  However, while I was talking to my younger brother (Dr. Mani Vadari), who is a recognized expert in Smart Grid Systems, felt that the message that I am conveying in this short essay is quite powerful, brief and succinct, and useful to pretty much any body. Since world class is not only for engineers, it should be a desir for anybody) 

Dedication:

This short essay is a result of my experiences, some general and some very specific, describing how some of those experiences shaped my thought process to think “World Class”. This shaping of my thought process did not happen overnight. Those seeds of inspiration no doubt existed during those awesome MIT days. They were there in hibernation while doing those silly, ill defined projects in Standard Motors. Personally, there was no thought in my mind set to develop strategies of excellence, nor was there an atmosphere to grow and germinate. However, we were learning and growing, attributing that atmosphere to purity and naivety. We kept growing.

Personally, I had no clue about either excelling in a particular domain, or even remotely developing the ability to think excellence. However, my travels around the world, while completing my MS and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering, put me in contact with some good people: some were highly qualified machinists, welders and glass blowers and some were highly qualified individuals. Later, had the good fortune to travel around the world for 11 years, consulting in the various fields, as varied, such as machine tool vibrations, acoustics, non-linear control systems and of course applied mechanics. I had the luck and experience to meet some great minds from many countries: from Germany (for some great learning in Advanced Continuum Mechanics), from the Czech republic (some learning about the old “Bohler Standards” and some great information on cold formed steels and precision dies and molds), Finally, to work with an advisor during Masters (three years of my life) and during my Ph.D. (eight years of grueling work) was like working closely with a mentor with total master mind alliance. It was fun for two reasons: 1) Learnt how to develop a great work ethic second to none, and 2) how to be a good self-critic. To be your own critic, developing the building block for criticizing one’s own work was the best outcome of my experiences and endeavors. The greatest common factor that I found from amongst all the interesting people that I had met and interacted with was that they had a feeling of being excellent and wanted to be the best in whatever they do. All of them (including an arc welder from Eastern Europe) were tremendously proud of their work. It is truly a gratifying feeling, when I reflect back on all the years in the past. I do not have a Nobel Prize yet, I have not headed a corporation yet, and I have not been a faculty of significance in a leading institution yet, but slowly and surely, some great and beautiful thoughts started taking control of me and started shaping me. The belief and the thought process of doing things perfect took its birth.

The simple answer is, WHY NOT? Everything originates from a that thought process.   Of course, this write up is a reflection, resulting from my entire journey since my days at MIT and all that I have personally taken away from it’s staff, the buildings, those “Malgudi” days, the fruit salad on Fridays, the fight to get a seat in front of the small TV to get a glimpse of the favorite cine actress’s of those days.  Oh! My God, the aura, the flora, the plethora of memories that I specifically have taken with me and travelled the world over is not describable at all.  It is my sincere prayer that this article is like a “pushpanjali” to MIT, its founding fathers, current leadership, the over powering alumni all over the world for all the inspiration that I have derived knowingly and unknowingly.  I sincerely hope that if this article would inspire one person, to think “World Class”, it will indeed be a great accomplishment

Life is no day at the beach. Each one of us have undergone, at various stages of our life, several tests of human endeavor – to which the right answer is always the hard answer. Again, there is no promise of any material payoff.  There is just the state of being, one will eventually attain.  What should that be? Ultimately, the real payoff for class comes down to self-respect.  People with class know they are people with class, even if no one else is paying attention or watching. As someone once said, “Who are you when no one is looking? ”OR “what you do when you are stopping on a traffic light, when the lights are red and there is no police watching”?.  When from the bottom of your heart, you can answer, “I’m the person I really hope and I want to be World Class”. So can we all be world’s class engineers and Technologists coming out of MIT. I am Proud to be an MITian; Are you?

Creating a Belief of Being World Class:

It has always been my firm belief that any great nation is great because of the individual that makes up the nation. If we can plant some seeds of “Belief”, leading into thoughts, and some pure but focused actions. As they say, if the individual can practice actions for 21 days, it becomes a habit. Developing good habits forms good values and good values shapes ones character. Finally, it is the character that creates destiny for the individual and for the nation

Remember readers, attributes like being truthful, honest, a person of integrity, loyalty etc etc is important and is part of this package of being “World Class”. So my goal is not to get into trivial arguments of what is more important and what is less important than others. This essay is just a message to graduating class in MIT and those who are still undergoing training to be “World Class” engineers, technologist in their own right.  Everything starts from a seed, from that belief: “Can I be a world class engineer?”, “Can I be the best mechanical engineer out there?”, “Can I be the best in whatever I do? My firm belief after travelling the world over is that this can become a simple belief system. Can we get consumed? When does it have to start? The answer is NOW. Where does it have to start? The answer is it can start here. Who has to start it first? The answer is, it better start from me, myself.  Can we all start off with that all pervading belief system?

Thought, Actions and Habit leading to Character:

Your belief system create a thought process. A persistent and a consistent belief system will lead to an elevated thought process of generating consistent actions. Such a habit in every endeavor in life creates “World Class” citizens. So what does this mean? Unless and until the belief system and the thought process are linked to a purpose that is the destiny of wanting to be world class, the intelligent accomplishment does not happen. So what does this really mean? Can I fix my thoughts upon the faultless performance of performing my duty, no matter how insignificant the task may appear to be? So what does this truly translate to? If an electrician aspires to be world class, or a plumber aspires to have the best workmanship, or the carpenter and the road repair guy develop world class pride at what they do at the end of the day. My personal belief is a combination of these creates World Class engineering, and technology at its purest and highest levels of achievement. It is about showing character no matter who you are in the society. Each one of us is a building block for reaching that destiny of becoming “World Class” and each block is as important as the other.

Value System

So whatever a person achieves or not, is a direct result of his own thoughts. In a justly ordered universe, where a loss of equipoise would mean total destruction, individual responsibility must be absolute.  Hmm...some food for thought is’nt it?  Whom do we want to compare with? We can compare ourselves to people who have no character and comfort ourselves that we are better than them or should we compare ourselves to those who have character or not worry about comparisons at al. Can we learn to be just absolute and learn to be 100% develop a code of ethics that is simply exemplary that other people and countries would like to emulate. Now we are talking about building an absolute basis for a value system that will be second to none. Takes us back to what Rudyard Kipling has to say about what does it take to being “A Man”.  “So what you do when you are stopping on a traffic light, when the lights are red and there is no police watching you”? If each one of us reading this essay can do it, this group has developed a high level of value system

Personal Destiny

Personal destiny and the destiny of a nation are like two sides of a coin. Take care of the personal destiny, take care of the self: the destiny of the nation will fall in place. Can we stop complaining and be thankful for the oxygen we breathe? Can we show respect and love for the leaders and teachers? Without them the value system will get eroded. Can we spend more time in orchestrating our personal destiny? As they say dreamers are schemers. The dreamers are ultimately the saviors of the world.  Can we dream to be world class? Ultimately, wanting to be world class is as absolute one can aspire to be.

Being World Class:

Finally, wanting to be world class is inherently a belief system. There are always three questions one would like to ask. A) Why should I want to be ‘World Class”?, B) What should I do to become ‘World Class?”, and finally C) How should I do it once I understand What to do?  Of all these three questions, the most important one is the very first one. The “WHY” to become world class is the most important one. Do we feel the need to become? Do we have that passion to become world class? Because, if the “WHY” is not strong enough, the “WHAT?” and the “HOW?” do not matter at all. If the “WHY?” is not clear, if there is no clarity in our minds, then we will begin to cut corners and look for short cuts. My firm belief system is that in this great world of ours, there is no short cut for excellence.

NOTES:

1) "Malgudi" is a fictitious little town in books written by R. K. Narayan. Read "Swami and Friends"

2) "Pushpanjali" means an offering of flowers