One vendor has a team in India. As this was a very skilled team and as the team on site was sort of struggling with the load, I insisted on getting the offshore team more involved. On visiting the offshore team in India, I found that the offshore team was very keen on more direct involvement. The management of the vendor agreed on the idea.
First, they ran into issues of communication whereby the offshore could not connect to Riyadh through direct internal telephone connection. As they could only connect through making International calls and as this was extremely expensive for attending meetings, the team continued to stay disconnected.
More recently, the vendor’s management told me that they have decided to get the members of the team to Riyadh for SHORT BURSTS for them to be able to “FEEL THE HEAT”. I confirmed with the vendor that I have not seen any High Explosive Anti-Tank warhead in our Company. And as fas as I knew, for Telecom Business, this was still not required. The vendor told me that they are experiencing very high temperatures. I agreed as I have experienced up to 55 degree centigrade temperature in Riyadh.
Anyway, we now have some dates as well. I thought of clarifying that I was not talking about dates which I buy from Bateel. When I saw something from the Gregorian Calendar, I kept my mouth shut.
When I was checking the proposed dates, I was now wondering how these guys will “FEEL THE HEAT”. This is because by the time these guys will be in Riyadh, Winters would have set in Riyadh and we would soon be struggling with temperature between 5 degree centigrade and 10 degree centigrade.
For a Manager, it is so important knowing Geography. This is near impossible as most Managers like me study Engineering and Management. I will look for a course on Geography and Climate Sciences from Harvard or MIT.
English: Faisaliyah Centre in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Experiences of Partha Majumdar 