kNOwledge TRANSFER

Working for an MNC requires that the employees are up-to-date with the aspects of their respective working domains. This is ensured by the organization of various Knowledge Transfer (here people call it KT) sessions. Now these KT sessions aim to develop an in-depth understanding of the system to its underneath working employees. Interestingly one such KT session happened for our department. What was more interesting was that it was to be taken by the sales people (some weird aliens called MBA’s) and was about the banking sector. It had nothing technical in it.

Anyways we reached the lecture hall at the given time. In the hall there was a great rush. Everyone wanted to occupy the most strategically well placed seat i.e. the back seat. The hierarchy didn’t matter here as anyone who occupied the ‘sought after’ seats was not willing to leave it. The entire KT session was to be presided over by management people so obviously the techies of the deptt. (Which constitute more than 90% of the team) seemed uninterested. Once occupied the seats, everyone waited for the presenters to begin. The ‘managers’ were having a discussion among themselves as if deciding the final layout for a mass crusade. We, the techies, were busy playing pranks and laughing out as it was a well deserved respite from the daily humdrums of software development. The ML mixed well with the juniors (that’s us) and we made fun of all the things around. The managers were not able to start the presentation as there was a problem with the laptop or the LCD projector. They tried their hands on it but it simply refused to run. After giving two or three shots, they mutely requested the PL and PM to come up and help. They went there and started fidgeting with the systems themselves. In the meanwhile, one of the members amongst us stood up and asked if anyone could sing a song? This was well returned by an emerging singer from our team as he sportingly sang a song. The managers did liked this ‘well utilization’ of free time but I think I saw them giving fast red looks to the other managers. After two songs and a lot of practical jokes, the laptop had yet not started. I could see all the top notch members of our team- the PL, PM, managers in sales and marketing all standing together in one frame. This was a ‘Kodak Moment’ seeing the Giants of our project together. What really hit me was that they all were standing ‘helplessly’ as a local guy (not even an engineer) from the IDM fixed up the system. With an experience of over 5-10 years, which include myriad trips round the world, one can expect great people to forget such trivial thing such as cabling and configuration!!

So after a long epoch, the presentation finally started. It was something about banking and ..I don’t know?!?...Ten minutes down I can see people, techies, around with their eyes fixed on the speakers whilst they tapped the tip of their pen on the front part of their raised legs or typing messages in phones or smiling aimlessly etc.no one actually seem to pay any attention. The talk…well to me, a course on the history of Americans scholars and poets would have been more interesting!! It was a 48 page presentation and went for about one and a half hours. Superfluous with financial jargons, by the time it ended most of us were fighting hard to avoid the sleep. After two hours, there was more to come but the time for bus departure adjourned the session. We were releases with a humble apology for not completing the session and a promise that it would be continued next day!!