Motivational Speech by N Moorthy

It is a Scintillating speech by Narayana Moorthy at Stern School of Business New york.

http://www.rediff.com/money/2007/may/28bspec.htm

He speaks about lessons he learnt from his life and career.

Storyline1: He met a Computer science scientist in the IIT Kanpur canteen and his interests started to pour towards computer science. He went to library then and there and started reading some of the articles suggested by that scientist. I wonder how a influential leader can turn a young guy.

Storyline2: He was arrested in Bulgaria for his anti-communist talks, which turned him from a confused leftist into pious capitalist. He become compassionate of becoming a capitalist to eradicate poverty and to provide employment opportunities.

Above 2 are fortuitous whereas after starting Infosys, these events started influenced his career trajectory.

Storyline3: Realizing that they r in the darkest hours before the dawn, he opposed when other founders of Infosys decided to sell the company for offer of $1million.

Storyline4: De-risking strategy which leads to Risk Mitigation Council, so that they won’t depend on any one client, technology, country , application and customer.

Life Lessons that these events have taught him:

1. I will begin with the importance of learning from experience. It is less important, I believe, where you start. It is more important how and what you learn. If the quality of the learning is high, the development gradient is steep, and, given time, you can find yourself in a previously unattainable place. I believe the Infosys story is living proof of this.
Learning from experience, however, can be complicated. It can be much more difficult to learn from success than from failure. If we fail, we think carefully about the precise cause. Success can indiscriminately reinforce all our prior actions.

2. A second theme concerns the power of chance events. As I think across a wide variety of settings in my life, I am struck by the incredible role played by the interplay of chance events with intentional choices. While the turning points themselves are indeed often fortuitous, how we respond to them is anything but so. It is this very quality of how we respond systematically to chance events that is crucial.

3. Of course, the mindset one works with is also quite critical. As recent work by the psychologist, Carol Dweck, has shown, it matters greatly whether one believes in ability as inherent or that it can be developed. Put simply, the former view, a fixed mindset, creates a tendency to avoid challenges, to ignore useful negative feedback and leads such people to plateau early and not achieve their full potential.
The latter view, a growth mindset, leads to a tendency to embrace challenges, to learn from criticism and such people reach ever higher levels of achievement (Krakovsky, 2007: page 48).

4. The fourth theme is a cornerstone of the Indian spiritual tradition: self-knowledge. Indeed, the highest form of knowledge, it is said, is self-knowledge. I believe this greater awareness and knowledge of oneself is what ultimately helps develop a more grounded belief in oneself, courage, determination, and, above all, humility, all qualities which enable one to wear one's success with dignity and grace.