No one knows for sure!!

It has been a very 'happening' fortnight for me that kept me away from blogging!!

"If you are looking for a change, change the way you are looking'' is what a dear pal of mine advocates. And so, I have tried to pack in a few events as diverse as possible, essentially to get alternative perspectives of how people are reacting to the general economic situation.

I attended the Saturday start up meeting interacting with various (and wannabe) entrepreneurs, a twitters meeting -mostly techie youngsters in town (all of them who hadn't been born when I had finished my management education in 1984!!), then an evening with the denizens of Hyderabad in the TED searching for Indian fellows, followed by a function where a French delegation evangelised the need for Indian SMEs/entrepreneurs to explore acquiring businesses in France. Apparently there is close to 500,000 businessmen close to retiring -and would be more happy to sell their equity-not to French competitors whom they had warded off for decades, but to foreigners-who wish to use the gateway to Europe!!

Well, I tried to read a lot of online stuff, listen to the free podcast from BBC, Deloitte insights, Harvard Business, Wharton School, Business week  and so on-and was treated to some exotic theories to describe the state of the present economic turmoil that we all seem to be in -seeming to make even the weathermen more credible than the economists!! 

One thing is clear though. Most organisations are no longer content 'waiting and watching' for the economy to be better, and taking some bold steps to make some drastic changes. It is any body's guess though which of the lesser evils is going to be more effective- 'employee alignment and optimisation ' or giving a section of one's team a year's sabbatical at one-third the salary, and hope for the best!!

Personally, I think, thanks to the sheer dearth of job opportunities in the near future, we will see more people plunging into entrepreneurship - if not freelance consulting assignments -and make things happen!! Most companies have shrunk by stripping off all those "good to have" frills down to the absolutely 'must have' mode, and are preparing for the the next wave of growth....

While a pessimist might believe"due to the meltdown, the light at the end of the tunnel is being switched off ", the optimist in me would like to be convinced that its always darkest before dawn'. )!!