Wake up now…

Last few months have exposed the insecurity and instability of ‘the reliable businesses’ like never before. Year 2008 saw giants from Investment, Banking and Capital markets going down in no time. Lehman brothers, Merrill Lynch, Washington Mutual and many more. The wave of crunched economy spread across the globe like an avalanche and affected multiple sectors. Investors and traders witnessed some real tough times when stock exchanges of almost every nation took long lasting downturn. By the end of the year, no matter where you were and which occupation you were in, everyone on the planet felt the heat directly or indirectly.

Economic recession, defined as a decline in the country’s gross domestic product growth for about two or more consecutive quarters in a particular year. Recession is the key word, buzz now a days. There is very close relationship between ‘recession’ and ‘depression’. Wisely put together in words by a gentleman “When your neighbor looses the job, it’s recession. When you lose the job, it’s depression”.

Well, came 2009 with the hopes that this new year will have better to offer. And really what an amazing start. How can I forget that Tuesday night - 7th of January. I reached Chicago around 9pm for a training. From the airport, on my way to hotel, got a call from Hyderabad, had usual talks, everything looked pretty much ok. It was around 11 pm, we just finished our dinner and then one more call from Hyderabad. This time, it wasn’t the usual call and things were definitely not ok. Something that happened in couple of hours, brought forth largest India IT company down to its knees. Drop of 78% on company’s stock value also took entire Sensex down by 749 points and a loss of around INR 10,000 crores to stake holders on that black day. Satyam Computer Services Ltd was all across the news. And that’s the same name that I was carrying on my Identity Card. That night and throughout the training next day, I don’t have the count of calls I got, with one common question ‘what will happen to you now?’ Do you think I had the answer to that question? All I could feel at that point was things were just not in my control. Someone whom I have never met, changed everything in and around me in couple of hours.

Since then, after waking up each day the first thing I was doing - look for the news. News about ‘my company’ that will decide which road I will walk for coming months. And I was following the same routine again on January 22, when I woke up and had my eyes on laptop for the NEWS. I thought I am still asleep when I read the headline saying ‘Microsoft laying off 5000 employees’. By that time, though I was used to start my day with frightful news but this one was alarming. But then, I thought this is just another news and went on to start my day not thinking much about it. There were talks about the news in office too as people looked nervous. And within an hour, we came to know that MS employees have got emails from the corporation stating trueness of the news that I read earlier. That day we had a production release, so I got involved in the work and forgot about all this news. It was just like another busy day of release till evening. At around 5 pm, there came a big shock. There was a list of MS employees laid off, people with whom I have worked. Can you believe MS firing people with just the notice of an hour? And, the people in the list were not new to Microsoft, some of them worked for 7-10 years.

This was totally an eye opener. I always use to think, for employees of Microsoft, it is more than just a job, it is a status symbol too. To put in simple words, employee of MS = Stability. But then, all you own is nothing. It was big time realization that in corporate life, no matter which designation you are in, you do not have the authority to decide your future. Higher paying jobs are exactly like a luxury apartment, you can never own it. This is the fact that most of us hardly realize because we are satisfied with monthly salaries and incentives and feel secured about it. What an irony!!

This all takes me back to the words of Robert Kiyosaki (author of Rich Dad, Poor Dad, the #1 New York Times bestseller) who says “I would rather prefer to earn $100 from 10 sources than to earn $150 from a single source”. Diversification is the key. Look for the ways you can diversify your source of Income. And today, I feel blessed to be a part of the system that gives me the opportunity to grow in an environment which is totally recession and inflation proof. It’s an excellent opportunity to diversify and create a strong secondary income in your non-productive time especially in an economy like this. To know more about it, please browse through http://www.suprworldwide.com/