Why I Started This Newsletter On Substack?

How I think I have found a way to help hundreds of people grow their career & learning, and also a way to grow myself too

When I was 17, I attended a CATC (Combined Army Training Camp) NCC (National Cadet Corps), I was a part of 2-Karnataka Battalion company and its conducted by Indian Army. A pre-army training camp it was and hence pretty damn tough. Very few would last the program. To qualify for the ‘A’ certificate (a very big deal academically, you’d get a college admission just with that or even a job or a place in the army later on) you are expected to have a few camp experiences apart from all the math and science. There was one task given to me, to stand and guard as sentry at the Kitchen gate in the middle of the night for 3 hours after a 14 hour tiring all day physical training under the hot sun. It was extremely hard, but because my partner could not do it and because he was a really nice guy, I would help him despite my fight with my own sleep.

During these nights, I would also get a chance to help out the chef from 5 AM who needed support chopping vegetables for the 7AM breakfast. And I’d be ready for the drill at 6:30 AM, no matter what.

Then I’d help out the barrack with the shovels during gardening, then pickup the garbage, then oil the rifles and so on.

But, in the end, I won a certificate for being a team player. Our training officer, who had noticed this, called me and asked me, why I helped them? I replied that I do so for selfish gains, “I helped the chef as I’d get early breakfast. I helped my teammate, because he made my bed and helped me with my laundry. I loved holding the rifles, although they wouldn’t fire, I was growing muscles so I shoveled and lifted garbage “

Then the officer replied “Helping is always gaining. Remember that you gain 10 times when you help one person”

And then, he said:

“When you can help one person, why not help ten?

When you can help ten, why not help a hundred?

When you can help a hundred”…well this goes on in the multiples of the same order.

I still remember this, even to this day, (close to 2 decades), because I kept going back to that day often.

I have grown several 10x times since and I hence continue to help.

And now, I want to take helping to 10x levels and hence this blog is an attempt in that direction.

Several reasons contribute for this. I will sum them up into the following few:

To exponentially increase the reach of my advice to hundreds of students

After getting hundreds of such emails and messages like this one below from self-motivated, driven and ambitions students, however, I could only respond or do justice to 2 or 3 of them. How can I do better or find the common problems and solve it for them in the form of my content?

The above image welcomes me to start this newsletter. I have taught a few thousands of programmers, entrepreneurs and data scientists over the last few years, and more so I have conducted many interviews to product, infra, data, AI teams and have learn to teach better. My advice did work for some to either build a product in the market or even simply to find a job or a promotion by preparing for an interview. I love teaching because I see it as a way to grow my own learning. And because of this love to teach, I have developed a knack for it. I also do this for charity many a times.

To connect with people better and contribute at a community level

It has to be through creating content, sharing the learnings from perspectives of both industry leaders I interact with and the employees or students who are like the soldiers on foot battling need better armors and equipment to carry out daily activities. I get many invitations like these, however, I am active only on one or two. How can I connect better ?

To find great people to work with at Ambee

I don’t need no social media to network, but I am a part of many hackathons from the ones conducted by the NASA to global hackathons like IndoDataWeek. When we spend time with a few people, you feel like you both together as a team can do something for the greater good. So how can I find such people where our thinking, vision, interest and energy matches? Here is someone amazing whom I met, who we could have him onboard for working with us

Two such interns joined us, we had met at a similar hackathon, they now lead the R&D division as full time data scientists at Ambee. This newsletter is expected to 2x such serendipities.

To be empathetic, to consult and offer directions

You are in the middle of your career that you started a few years ago, you are in a role based on the past decisions, however, that should never define your way forward.

What mindset should you have if you need to change your own role and also create influencers around you who would add to your growth. What should you learn and how can anyone validate it and give directions? This newsletter is here to support that.

There are many such use cases, its all about giving back and reciprocating from the best mentors I have had, the learnings from the best and worst of the bosses, feedback from peers and colleagues, from investors and learnings from all the books I’ve read.

I have promised myself to keep the content honest, informative, actionable, relevant and useful along with all the other values of interest and applicability.

Looking forward to make an impact.