this post is partially repeated…it had appeared a couple of years ago in this very blog…

I am sure all of you know the cap seller and the monkey story. So why am I telling you the same story again? No this is not the same story, it has a twist.

A cap-seller was looking for a place to rest in a forest. He found a nice big tree and decided to sleep under the tree. He kept his bag full of caps nearby and go to sleep. All the monkeys came down and took a cap each. One small monkey did not get a cap – and was weeping. His grandfather consoled him and said “As soon as he wakes up he will see our caps and to get the caps back, he will throw the cap on his head. At that stage pick up that cap.”

The moral of the story is simple – learning is imperative. Another learning from this twisted story is that the principles for achieving success remain the same, but not the actions.

Sunil Gavaskar could not have copied Vijay Merchant and been as successful, Sachin Tendulkar could not have copied Sunil Gavaskar….similar examples are there in every field. When you look at Sir John Templeton and Warren Buffet their styles are different to a great extent, but both have been successful. You need to create your own path.

http://www.subramoney.com/book-written-by-me/

A friend recently went to State Bank of India to get his PPF passbook updated. He had lost his original passbook, and remembered that he had updated it about 3 years back. He was made to SIT ACROSS a cashier (not stand) and in a jiffy he was issued a duplicate passbook. He was so happy that he pulled a big bar of chocolate and gave it to the SBI staffer.

Private sector banks were doing well on the plank that psu banks cannot give good service, the branches look shabby, attitude of the staff is not helpful etc. and it worked for the past 10 years. However, now some of the roles (if not most) have been reversed. PSU banks are airconditioned, staff is well behaved in many places, rates are more than competitive (if you are planning to take a home loan, SBI is surely the cheapest)…..so hey, things are changing fast!

Having said that SBI is not good uniformly. There are people and branches who give great service, but there are branches and employees who give terrible service. Consistency is not an Indian trait – and it has to be forced upon the people….

Now I am not the only person saying these things….