The Best!

21 years have passed by and this small little story is etched in my mind like it happened yesterday and the learning has been so great that I will never forget it ever in my lifetime

In the year 1999, I had just passed out of 12th and was still unsure of what am I going to take up as further studies because I was not the studious types to take up CA or ICWA. I wasn't interested in doing BCom as well. Mumbai University had just launched a new course on the lines of BBA in Pune and Bangalore University and I decided to take up that.

Through the admission procedure I got admission to a college in Mulund, a premiere institute in the Suburbs - with some awesome professors to its credit. In the first semester we had a subject - Principles of Management. We had a young dashing professor teaching us the subject - Prof. Anil Menon. He was a great guy with a great sense of humour, gift of gab and ability to keep the students hooked on to the subject.

After the stipulated quota of lectures was over - exams were announced. This was the first batch of the course and we had nothing to look back on. The air in the campus was a little tensed. Everyone was studying to ensure that they cleared with decent marks - first impression after all.

Most of the professors had announced that we had to make presentations for 40 marks and rest will be a written test. Except Prof. Anil Menon. He was the only one who announced - there will be a viva for 20 marks, 20 marks for participation and 60 marks exam.

We studied all concepts for the subject - Span of control, Motivation theories etc etc in the anticipation of the Viva.

The D-Day arrived and we all were asked to come one after the other in sequence of our Roll Numbers. The first guy went in and didn't come out for 15 minutes. We were all eagerly waiting for Akshay to come back so that we could ask what was asked.

After 15 minutes - which felt like eternity when Akshay came back the expressions were very sad and all he said to us was "Vat laga diya bhai. All the best!" Those words fell like Atom Bombs in Nagasaki and Hiroshima in the classroom. Everyone got extremely nervous to go for the one to one viva with the professor.

Each time when the students came out of the meeting room - the expression was of complete disaster. No one came out happy. My roll number was 26 out of the 42 students in the class. It was crazy waiting for the turn to come.

Eventually, after waiting for a good 4 hours, my turn came and I entered the meeting room. After the cursory good afternoon and smiles, Prof asked me a question - "What did the other students tell you when they came out?" I thought it was a trick question. My response was - "Nothing sir." 

Professor - Mane. Mujhe pata hai logo ne kya bola bahar... All of them told that it was a tough. Vat lag gaya - Aise bola na?

Me - (Sheepishly smiling) - Yes Sir!

Professor - Laughed loudly and said - Dekh - When you step out, you have to tell the same thing to all your friends. Keep a sad face - as sad as you can and tell them that you are going to fail. But tension mat le, Aisa kuch nahi hoga.

Me - Hush! Kya sir, dara diya!

Professor - Arre! It is ok to have some fun! Chal, let me ask you the question that I have asked everyone else and let me see what is your response. This is the only question that you have to answer and you will not tell the question to anyone else.

Me - OK Sir

Professor - According to you who is the best manager? OR who is your management idol?

Me - After thinking for sometime - Sir, Narayanmurthy of Infosys

Professor - OK Great. Why? I gave a long justification to my answer. Professor heard me with a lot of attention, scribbled something in the mark sheet and at the end smiled and said - Great. Thank you. You may go and ask the next person to come. However, remember our deal.

Me - Yes Sir

After coming out of the meeting room, I followed the instructions to the T and didn't let anyone know what to expect inside and what was the question that was asked. I wasn't sure whether everyone was asked the same question.So kept quite and just waited for others to complete their viva.

After competing the marathon Viva session with 42 students Professor Anil came out of the meeting room and addressed us.

His first question - "How was it?" To it everyone joyously answered - Superb sir! He continued - "Let me tell you one thing. I asked all of you the same question. - According to you who is the best manager? OR who is your management idol? To which I received varied responses - none of them were wrong. All of you scored well. But the one who scored full marks is - ANUYA. Anuya can you stand up and just give your answer in one word."

Anuya gladly stood up and answered - "My Mother."

It suddenly struck all of us. Yes! The answer has to be Mother.

Professor continued to explain - Moms are the best managers because parenthood is one of the most basic forms of leadership. Tons of patience, empathy, planning, organising, innovation, and negotiation gets added to your personality with a child in your life. The level of multi-tasking a mother does is just outstanding. The task of keeping everyone motivated, bringing in discipline when required is performed so well by them all the time. 

He helped us write down some points which put all our theory in perspective.

1. Mothers are great at multi-tasking 

2. They are extremely empathetic in their approach towards any situation

3. They are contingency planning experts

4. They are great at negotiating

5. Brilliant at innovating

6. They know what motivates each one in the family

7. Finally - most important - they never do all of this for popularity

Mothers will teach you one lesson always - Parenthood, like leadership, is not a popularity contest. 

Hence Mothers are the Best Managers and Leaders

21 years have passed by to this small little incident and from then, till date - any of the 42 students are asked the question again - the answer is unanimous - "Mothers"!