I was invited to be the Guest of Honour at the Graduation Day for the Class of 2022 of HITAM (Hyderabad Institute of Technology and Management). This was my first time playing this role and should thank Ms Sheenam Ohrie, Broadridge India MD for providing this opportunity. A special thanks to Mr Vamsi Koka, Dean – Strategy & Operations and the leadership at HITAM for making it a memorable experience. It was a great honour to be at the stage with Padmashri Prof Sanjay Dhande, Former Director of IIT Kanpur and the Chairman of the Governing Body of HITAM who graced the occasion as the Chief Guest.
I have heard some legendary speeches from great leaders addressing students during their commencement or graduation ceremonies and wanted to make some sense during my five-minute message to the students. It was about six months since these students completed their engineering curriculum and all of them should have started their career as a professional or an entrepreneur or should be pursuing higher studies. So, I shared three essential qualities that have served me well throughout my professional career over the years. I strongly believe they will help anyone who want to succeed in their life:
- Aspiration: A strong hope and ambition of achieving something has differentiated humans from other animals. It is the aspiration of humanity that led to agricultural, scientific, industrial and information technology revolutions over the last ten thousand years. As Sir Isaac Newton said “If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants”. Each one of us have the opportunity to be such a giant for our posterity if we are aspirational with a meaningful purpose and vision.
- Inspiration is the urge to do something and can trigger an aspiration or at times can also help achieve an ambition. As we grow up, we are inspired by several people and some of them also become role models. Personally for me, my parents have been an inspiration, a number of sports people and exceptional achievers in several fields have inspired me. We get inspired by nature as well, remember the legendary story of Robert Bruce being inspired by a spider and just imagine the sheer beauty of the world around us. We all are inspired by different things, but is it most important to follow that urge and strive to become an inspiration for others through our success.
- Relentless perseverance: Once we are inspired and commit to be aspirational, the next step is relentless perseverance towards our goal. Many of us dream of luxury and expect it to make us happy. But try to remember the moments that you cherish the most in life and the ones that you are most proud of. Are they the time you spent in luxurious comfort or your achievements overcoming massive difficulties through hard work with sustained intensity and enduring pain towards a meaningful purpose? It is usually the latter.
I strongly encourage you to aspire, inspire and perspire towards your goals. We all have limited time in this world and every day, hour and minute is precious. Before you decide on how to spend this precious time, think how you will feel about your choice ten years from now. We are fortunate to be living at a time when knowledge is democratized and each one of us have numerous opportunities to make a difference. Please make it count to take yourself and your community forward.
I jotted this down as a blogpost so that I can see for myself ten years from now on how I feel about this!