I had several occasions to meet Dr. A. P. J Abdul Kalam; both before and after he became the President of India, many times at ISRO or at C-DAC. But I remember this event of meeting with him just before he became the president, at IIM, Ahmedabad, in 2003.
APJ (as we dearly call him; beyond his Presidential Persona, is affectionate and great person) had come to IIMA to deliver a lecture. That time he was not the President of India; and rather was known as the Space-Man of India; with his success of launching several satellites etc. IIM had invited him for a guest lecture and courtesy to Prof. Anil K. Gupta, I had a chance to interact with him. I was the National Coordinator of National Innovation Foundation that time and it was a great pleasure to meet him with few grassroots innovators.
After that, in fact on two occasions, I had met him in President's house itself. I was the main organizer for the Second National Award Ceremony of NIF where he had given awards to the Grassroots Innovators and he had invited the innovators and the people involved to President’s house. I will describe the experience of that visit separately. Recently I had met him in the CHEP 06 a TIFR, Mumbai and his speech contained a great deal in the NREN work in which I was involved deeply (http://www.tifr.res.in/~chep06/postconf.php and http://garudaindia.in/chep06_workshop.asp; President’s speech on this occasion is at http://presidentofindia.nic.in/scripts/sllatest1.jsp?id=734 )
Meeting him after being the President was a different experience and I had developed the distance between him and myself; partly due to his position. He generally goes beyond the security cordon to meet common man. Still I am a common citizen and he is the First Citizen and the gap will be there; out of fear, respect and regard. I may not have interacted so closely with him in the recent years than I had done on various occasions before.
But he was so humane, so normal and so affectionate, in the meetings before he became the President. The space-man was a scientist and he used carry the in-depth exploring eyes of the scientist, with inquisitiveness and a deep desire to pass on the knowledge to others used to be there.
At the end of the lecture at IIM Ahamedabad, he asked two students of IIM :-
“ what will you become in life ?”
And as usual the students gave the answers – “ We will become great managers..”
APJ asked again – “ Think and answer now..I am asking again”
The students were silent….
And APJ continued “ You want to be a manager or a leader?”
And he went on “ You know how a leader is different than a manager?”
“ The difference being to lead rather than follow, being entrepreneurial rather than being a task-master. Lead the organization, lead the nation, lead creative ideas, and lead innovation and invention”
Recently, Prof. Apfel asked the same question for his class on Public Management and Leadership at School of Public Policy, University of Maryland. “Do you expect to be a manager in the near future? What are your hopes, concerns and expectations about being a manager?”
I remembered APJ and the discussions at IIM in 2003. Three years, not a long time, but the same question, two instances and two places, geographically apart, but so much in relevance; from two great leaders in each country.
Professor Kenneth S. Apfel (http://www.publicpolicy.umd.edu/facstaff/%0bfaculty/Apfel.htm) , is a preacher and practitioner of management principles. He is my favourite for bringing the inside of oneself out in the class. He has served as the Sid Richardson Chair in Public Affairs at the University of Texas, LBJ School of Public Affairs. Prior to that, he served as Commissioner of the Social Security Administration from 1997 until his term ended in January 2001. He was the first Senate-confirmed Commissioner of Social Security after SSA became an independent agency and the new Cabinet-level position was authorized by Congress. Previously, he had served as Associate Director for Human Resources at the Office of Management and Budget, and as Assistant Secretary for Management and Budget at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
I had answered “Rather than a manager, I would like to be a leader – the difference being to lead rather than follow, being entrepreneurial rather than being a task-master.”- I felt APJ saying through my voice….
I am not sure what I will be at this instant. But I am proud of myself that at least the inspirations are alive in me through the thick and thin of work, profession and career.
Saying this, I see a transition in the near future for the mankind involving variety of issues and technology in the fore-front. The technology domain has smoothly transformed to today’s era of Internet and widespread use of wireless mobile. Next generation Technologies such as optical-fibre based high speed networks, distribution computing based Grid Computing providing collaboration tools and problem solving environments offer unmatched opportunities to academic, research, science and engineering community to lead progress in these areas ahead of commercial use. Worldwide this is happening and each and every country or society has to take advantage of this transformation through the rich endowment of human resources, scale up its infrastructural situation and research in these areas at scales comparable to those prevailing worldwide. In his latest book, ‘The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century’, Thomas L. Friedman describes the unplanned cascade of technological and social shifts that effectively leveled the economic world, and “accidentally made Beijing, Bangalore and Bethesda next-door neighbors.” I agree no less with him, and he continues that today individuals and small groups of every color of the rainbow will be able to plug and play. I see myself a tiny-individual-plane in the Flat World, but the creation of this plane was essential to make the World. The promise of this plane therefore, is the complete fulfillment of the perceived role. The road ahead has to be contemplated with better promise to achieve this role towards society.
The concerns are more self-oriented; to keep pace with the changes of the world, technology and the world that emerges. Moving ahead with intactness of human values, culture, ethics and moral insight has to go together with the hope and ambition in the future.
May be I will again hear the same question after some years…and this time I have two great persons to remember….
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