"You and Your IBM"

The piece of text, depicted here, are only the perception of the author. The author does not guarantee any truth in it. Though most of it is true, it must be taken with a pinch of salt.
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My Orientation Program in IBM:

IBM's "your IBM" program is an employee training program and it is best of its kind as told by several magazines. I feel fortunate to undergo this program. Surely it will add some values in one's life as well as in one's professional career. It has made me not only a better corporate citizen, but also a better human being.

Our instructor was Miss Manjula, an ex technical person, currently in HR. She has been working in IBM for the last six years and in the industry for almost a decade. She came from Bangalore to conduct this one and half days long workshop. They arranged the workshop in the The Park, Park Street, Kolkata.
1st day:
Morning, lassi, it was fabulous. I can not say you the exact taste but can give you some hint. If someone has experienced the taste of ramuda's lassi in the RK Hall, for you, it was almost of the similar taste with added flavors and it was more smoother.
The session started. She gave us an introduction of that program. She made us clear about some rules, as usual, mobiles to be in the silent mode, punctuality, especially in the 'break' times. If you break the rules, you are going to be prosecuted, well, not physically but socially(!). You will have to entertain others. How do you define the word entertainment? If you ask, "Is that a tricky question?", I must say, "Yes. Very honestly." Let us preserve some other day to explore my insight on the definition of entertainment.
Anyway, if people deny your performance to be claimed as a piece of entertainment, you will have to perform on 'public demand'. She brought those pick-up-and-perform cards for this purpose. I hate HR personnels.
Each table consists of 6 or 7 employees(we are employee now!). They call it a team.(I wonder why the word team is so much popular in the corporate world.) The great Pinki(his actual name is Pinaki.) is in my team. Other teammies were from Bengal mostly except one gentleman from orissa. We had one lady with us as well.
We were asked to decide our team name("What is there in a name !!"), to draw a team logo and to sing (you read it correctly) a song. They call it "team song". We individuals have to decide a punch name e.g. rocky ramesh, confused sam etc. I chose The Ace Anirban. I am so much fascinated with the word Ace.
We chose our team name as AAPiRATION. It came from the initials of our name. We made a very good logo with colorful marker pens and we(except me) sang 'jo jeeta wohi sikandar' title song as our team song.
A small coffee/tea break. Baked sandwich and tea and/or coffee with some cookies were on the menu. I was over conscious to be back on time. I didn't want to be joker in front of everyone. I managed to be on time. Some people was not so fortunate. Let us skip that part of the story. We watched a video about IBM and its history and we were asked to find 3 points from that video. To me, they made sure that you must watch the video rather than to manage some time to sleep. Like others I did watch it carefully, not only because it was a part of the workshop but also the fact that I wanted to know about IBM, the my 'would be' living place for at least a couple of years. The infamous characteristic of IBM that attracted me was that in the 90's IBM ignored the invaluable 'customer feedback' and faced a huge loss. In 92/93 it suffered a 8.1b US$ loss. New York Times printed, "IBM is dead! ".
Its recovery was also phenomenal. Today it is the largest company of its kind. We all remember the TV commercials on "on demand business". It would be very boring if I start describing each and every detail of it. After all I am a very poor story teller.
What was mentionable in the two day workshop was Park's food and beverages. It was simply the best.