writerraj

[writerraj]

Quotients

Our Company President when talks in a meeting, mesmerises the audience with his fluency in English. He impresses all with his super word power & knowledge - Man with a great L(Language) Q(Quotient).

Marathi community seniors who all have had enough of Holy Dnyaneshwari reads, will know how proficient such a young Saint Dnyaneshwar could be in Marathi & et al who are non-Marathi speakers, will be bristling with perplexities for his supreme poetic proficiency – Godly human being with an all-time high LQ & S (Spiritual) Q (Quotient). Stephen Hawking & Albert Einstein had an I (Intelligence) Q(Quotient) of 160, one of the all-time high. Parents of an eleven year old girl Kashmea Wahi in London buzzing with excitement boast: My kid is smarter than Albert Einstein because she clocked IQ of 162, officially. Just do note here the use of word smarter. (*) Owner of a grocery shop in the area where I stay, is a Gujarati baniya. Although he looks insane, he is a Crorepati – know why? His has mastered money management & proliferation techniques and has an inclement business focus. He has three flats in Mumbai & a couple of more in Gujarat. His F (Financial) Q (Quotient) and B(Business) Q (Quotient) are phenomenal. One celebrity, we all know – Amitabh Bachchan. Whatever his attire, anything suits him. Undoubtedly, he has a good F(Fashion) Q (Quotient) and of course a unique personality with a magnetic & obsessive voice. Some may recall Hollywood star Morgan Freeman for such a similitude. Nidhi is very blunt & cannot get along with people, even with her mother, easily. Why? Just because her E(Emotional) Q (Quotient) is very low. Two brothers Viraj & Anuj, both are diametrically opposite in nature. Viraj likes to associate with people & socialise. Not the case with Anuj though. Both have extremes of S (Social) Q (Quotient), Viraj finds himself on the top & Anuj finds himself at the bottom of SQ count. Music is synonymous with Salil. He has such a commendable grasping & ear for Music that just one hearing of a piece of music is enough for him to replicate. Music is in his blood & genes. He has a terrific M(Music) Q(Quotient). Now we all have a new Bravery milestone set up by Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman (great BQ – Bravery Quotient). He is being aptly recommended by Tamil Nadu Government for Param Veer Chakra. All such tête-à-tête and sprinkles of word Quotient for Language, Intelligence, Finance, Fashion, Emotional, Social, Spiritual & Music etc. are a part of routine jargon for all of us. We may as well coin some more such (A to Z) quotients as trait indicators e.g.  Bravery quotient (BQ), Risk quotient (RQ), Common-sense quotient (CQ), Acting quotient (AQ) etc. It is worth mentioning here about one of our Machine Design Professor who always used to ask us some simple (to him) questions during his lecture. On not getting the expected answer from all of us, he used to frown & say, “Do you see how common sense is so very uncommon.” So don’t ever underestimate CQ as it is that rare.

We often use this word, ‘quotient’ seamlessly and seldom condemn all the other people in the race who are low at that. These quotients that we presume indicate completeness of a person, do not necessarily indicate smartness (*) and often misguide to believe that one is not up to the mark. Management thinker Peter Drucker says that “you can’t manage what you can’t measure.” In other words, if anything is to be improved, it must be measured. Measuring quotients will indicate current level of a person in that area & also help to some extent which area he is good at.

One of my friend’s daughter got admitted to 11 th Grade science stream after a good score at SSCE in Science subjects, much obviously (?) so as thought & insisted by her parents. The girl kept on convincing her parents that she is not interested in science at all & wants to pursue fine arts. But nothing struck the parents right. Post her admission, she had a lot of academic struggle over subjects like Physics, Chemistry, Math etc. Unfortunately, parents thought this to be a recovering period for her due to her vernacular medium till tenth. The result was, she passed at 11 th but miserably failed at 12 th . The girl kept on insisting her earlier argument only. The parents now were furious but eventually gave up & succumbed to her choice of Fine arts. The girl had such a great flare for art that she stood first in the college & completed her B.F.A. with a University rank. A girl struggling to pass at Science stood first at BFA. Why & how did this happen? Did she not find her passion? Rajiv took a learning from this & sent his daughter to a stream of her choice – foreign languages like Japanese & Chinese despite her great score in Science & Math at SSCE. Although this is a perpetual conundrum, as a parent we all need to be assiduous while taking such life impacting decisions for our wards. If you recollect, that’s what the milestone movie “Three Idiots” (one of my all-time favourite) was all about, isn’t it? It’s all about pursuing our passion. Our low LQ, IQ, FQ, EQ, MQ or SQ do not necessarily indicate success in life and vis- e-versa. It only matters whether you like and enjoy your education or work. Success & money will follow, by default as a by-product: if you enjoy your education and work. More so that money plays second fiddle when you enjoy what you do. Money becomes secondary in the pursuit for happiness, enjoyment of our passion. Now passion becomes the target or even the path of pursuit is also a great rewarding experience. It is equally important to enjoy the path towards target as said by Robert Kiyosaki in his famous best seller ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’.

All our Grocers are excellent at business but no good at academics. Does it really matter? No, neither to them nor to their families and even to the society. I strongly believe that every person is smart (*) in some or the other area. The Almighty has bestowed each one of us with at least one boon - one area in which we score good, for sure. No one in the universe, is dumb. Each one excels in some or the other quotients. All College drop outs like Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Michael Dell, Sachin Tendulkar etc.(the list is endless) are the most successful business tycoons & the most impacting geniuses world knows. What does this indicate? Do we need to contemplate upon the importance given by us to academic excellence criteria and absurdly co-relating them to the future (would be) accomplishments of a person? Absolute zero, absolute positive or absolute negative do not exist – by default: that’s Nature’s law. So do the dumbness, idiocy in absolute terms never ever exist and that’s what needs to be acknowledged by all. Sounds rational? Hence, I feel it would greatly help to measure these quotients for each person just to have a fair idea about his potential strengths, probable area of studies & further career in the same stream. How would a young boy choose a career in defence? Will his BQ or RQ help? Probably, yes. Similarly, anyone good at acting can choose the same post measuring his AQ; so, on & so forth. What we understand from these quotients is not whether a person is brilliant or not. As I mentioned each person is brilliant in his area of choice. The quotients are indeed intended to indicate & guide one to identify potential strengths & choose career path. One may be good at Math while other may be good at finance or language. Quotient is a definitive measure for one’s area of inclination, strength or choice of career. Thus chances of being successful and contributing to the mankind will enhance certainly significantly for one who gets his choice right through the right quotient computation at the right time.

So now let’s use the word quotient in our routine responsibly & not conclude anything negative about anybody for his/her lower quotient scores. Techniques of measuring these quotients may be a little away from us presently but the day is not far when these will be quantified scientifically for each one of us and the generations to follow will supposedly take full advantage of it. They will pursue a rewarding career in the field & mother earth will be full of accomplished people; her own progeny – a planet of Ultimate Evolution.