In Pursuit of Wisdom

Similar to   last year , we had a great Marqeta Talent Show this year as well. I participated in 2 sessions this time – one solo and another in a group performance. As I have been reading lots of leadership and management books, I came up with an idea to promote some of the very best books I read and am about to read. Hence I wrote a fictional letter to our CEO using many of the name of books as a building block to compose the sentences of the letter. I also put the image of the book after the names of each book so that its easier for the audience to visualize. I hope you will enjoy it. For my group performance I read out loud the following quote in English, Bengali and Hindi. The one who plants trees, knowing that he will never sit in their shade, has at least started to understand the meaning of life. –  Rabindranath Tagore যে গাছ লাগায়, সে জানে যে সে কখনো তাদের ছায়ায় বসবে না, সে অন্তত জীবনের অর্থ বুঝতে শুরু করেছে।

  My friend  Suman Hossain (Ashfaq) came with excitement last weekend after finishing this book and asked us that we must give him a pen and paper and listen to him. He explained  The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity  by Carlo M. Cipolla which he just finished! He even bought few copies of this book and gifted me one to read quickly (tiny book, you can finish in half an hour). I finished it and am equally excited to share with you fo what I understood about intelligent, helpless, bandit and stupid people across any population and time. The Five basic laws of human stupidity described are -  Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation. The probability that a certain person is stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person. A stupid person is one who causes losses to another person or a group of people while they gain nothing or may even suffer losses. Non-stupid people always underestimate the ...

I got to know  Shahed Islam  via LinkedIn when he commented on some of my leadership posts that I shared in my wall. We found common interest and enthusiasm in the area of leadership and management theories and practices. Hence we synced up in a zoom call one day and talked about why we are so fond of Patrick Lencioni, John Maxwell, Simon Sinek, Malcolm Gladwell, Gary Vaynerchuk et al. Since then we have been discussing several topics in a monthly basis taking break from our busy time of work and life. He demonstrates what we very well know as servant leadership and is keen to help out people both here in USA as well as in Bangladesh. So when he came up with a plan for a series of interviews with different leaders and picked me to talk about a topic I was happy to participate. As a result here is my half an hour talk on his site the  Managed Coder .

স্কুল জীবন থেকেই আমি একটু আড্ডাবাজ ছিলাম। বিভিন্ন সময়ে বিভিন্ন হোস্টেলে থাকার কারণে এ জিনিসটি যেন আমার রক্তের সাথেই মিশে গেছে। বিস্ববিদ্যালয় জীবনের শুরুতেই এ জিনিসটি আরো প্রগাঢ় হয়ে দেখা দেয়। আড্ডার কারণেই পরিচয় হয় আরিফ, রাসেল, তামজিদ, কিশোর, শামীম, ফয়সাল, ফাহিম ও পাভেলের সাথে। আমরা নয় জন প্রতিম বর্ষ থেকেই যেন হয়ে যাই এক প্রাণ। এমন কোনো দিন নেই যে, আমরা অর্থনীতি বিভাগের চায়ের দোকান কিংবা সেমিনার অথবা ক্লাস শেষে ক্লাস রুমে বসেই ২/৩ ঘন্টা আড্ডা না মেরেছি। অনার্স পরীক্ষার শেষে ক্লাস বন্ধ ছিল বিধায় (অনার্সের রেজাল্ট না হলে মাস্টার্সের ক্লাস শুরু হয় না) , আমরা সপ্তাহের নির্দিষ্ট দুটো দিনে টিএসসির স্বপনের দোকানে আড্ডা মারতাম। সেদিন ছিল ১৯ এ আগস্ট বৃহস্পতিবার। ক্লাস শেষে আমরা বিভাগীয় সেমিনারে বসে প্রায় দু'ঘন্টার মতো বিভিন্ন বিষয়ে গল্প ও একটি বিষয় নিয়ে তর্কও করি। তারপর সবাই যার যার বাসার দিকে রওনা হই। সবাই চলে যাওয়ার পরও আরিফ, রাসেল ও আমি যাই টিএসসিতে স্বপনের দোকানে চা খেতে। সেখানে প্রায় ১ ঘন্টা থাকি। শনিবারে দেখা হবে বলে (বিদায় বেলায় সব সময়ই আমরা পরে কবে দেখা হবে সেই দিনটি স্মরণ করিয়ে...

  Last weekend I finished  Beyond Order: 12 More Rules for Life  by Jordan B. Peterson. This was a much anticipated book for me as I have been a big fan of Jordan's talks after reading his earlier book  12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos . I have not been able to make up my mind which book I liked more and have given 5 stars to both in my goodreads reviews. Unlike traditional self-help writers, the writing style of Jordan is distinct as combination of scholarly, dense, profound, and filled with allusion. As was the case with the earlier book, Peterson starts each chapter with a broad life rule, meanders off onto a somewhat long-winded but very well-backed dialogue about said rule and why we should implement it, then finally, finishes by stating the said rule again. Peterson’s personal style and philosophy are on full display here, and he has cultivated them almost perfectly in the years since his last release. His ability to willingly take the inevitable darknes...

I have been waiting eagerly for Godzilla vs Kong  for the last several months. It's finally going to be available in HBO Max and US Theatres simultaneously tomorrow. I anticipate it will be the biggest hit film after the pandemic broke out. I won't be surprised if it crossed a billion dollars in revenue.  Needless to say that I am in the camp of Team Kong!  I have asked Wali bhai to come to my house after office so that we can watch the movie together in my projector-based home theatre. Some of the memes and buzzes around this film are noted below. What is KING to a GOD? - #teamgodzilla Kong bows to one. - #teamkong We need Kong. The world needs him to stop what's coming. One will fall.