A valuable lesson revisited

This Sunday a group of 13-14 guys (read ex IT-BHUites) met at the Moti Mahal restaurant in Bandra.The attendance was as expected mostly limited to 2005-2008 pass outs, with a couple of alumni from 98 batch, one from a batch from the 80's,along with a 2003 pass out being the only exceptions.

The luncheon started with the usual formalities, exchange of current location, year of passing out and stuff like that.After around 15-20 minutes walked in a man in his late forties, simply dressed who introduced himself as an alumni of a batch from the 80's.From then on it was him recalling his memories of BHU days as well as his last visit to BHU, which was in 2003 (if I recall correctly).

25-30 minutes into the conversation, he got casual with us, narrating his stories, enquiring about the professors and bakar in general.Till then we had not asked him where he worked, I think one of us just asked him in passing as to where he was working currently.To which, he replied that he had started his career with a PSU oil firm and then moved on to do his MBA ,then worked for a leading business daily as a VP, then the CEO of a business news channel before quitting to start his own consultancy. This final piece of information came as a shocker(at least to me).

Here was an ex-CEO of one of India's leading news channel,who has walked in 25-30 minutes ago dressed as simply as you can imagine, narrating his college experiences, using the choicest expletives without an iota of attitude. I have seen and worked with people who won't reach anywhere near his achievements but behave no less than an oracle.I think thats the magic of simplicity.Whatever may have been the objective with which I had gone into the informal meet,I know all of us go there for "networking".....I got a revision of a most valuable lesson which we often tend to forget in life.