Twilight Executives: The one who screamed at 13000 ft

HOW long can conversations be fuelled by coffee - is a question that no mathematician should ever ponder. Theory of Relativity will always interfere here. The length can be infinite unless people around you are not measuring pasta in Thai sauce. The basil wafted to our noses in no time. What travels faster- lightning or thunder? Huh! I say, the smell of freshly baked doughnuts, any day. 

I suggested taking a quick-gulp-and-get-over-with-it-dinner break, and did not give him even a second to accept or deny. Reluctantly, he followed. 

The sight of a ballroom full of high-flying executives offered a picturesque moment while we invisibly chewed each other’s brains in a corner.

“You never serve them Golgappas right?” he grinned.

“Shut up and eat, smart aleck.” I swallowed the sarcasm.

“No seriously. Everyone has this fixed view about them. The kind of questions they are asked, the kind of conversations they go through, even the choice of magazines the air hostess would offer. Be it you, those analysts, call centre associates, or vendors. The box travels everywhere.” He was not going to relent after the renewed calorie count.

“What’s your point Mr. you-fools-eat-it-but-I-see-the-apple-falling Newton.” I spurned.

“I guess that’s why the industry is the way it is.” He remarked like one.

“Oh, now you have theories about that too?” I mumbled through a mouthful of lettuce.

“The box stays and grows all around. Like a mulish vine on a window facing the sun. That’s why it’s so rare that one dares to try out a new breakthrough. That’s why lighthouse customers are rarer than tigers. That’s why people would rather prefer to stay stuck in licenses and legacy hairballs than breaking the rut. That’s why even vendors do not dare. In fact, may be they are the ones who prefer and maintain the status quo.” He was getting serious and melancholic now. May be the bland spinach lasagna was working its wonders already.

“Hey, that’s the exact illustration of the word ‘stereotyping’ and also of being too ‘quixotic’. Practically, things can be different.” I argued and continued before he trampled on my sentences.

“Not everyone is like that. There are many people in this very room who know that freshness means more than those candies on these tables. You can smell mint in their arguments.” 

He interrupted rudely after all. “Yeah, yeah, like those hard-nosed presentations we see every time. Spools of number yarns, and spiels about try-my-ware.  They look like an astronaut’s journal for God’s sake. The only thing different about this from the next one’s is their name and logo.” He had picked a weak spot to stab now.

“Again, not all the time. This very morning I saw a presentation start with a sky diver’s shot. In fact, when I spoke to the presenter, he told me it was not a canned shot but his very own moment captured live.” I continued the combat.

“Yeah, and I just saw a waiter levitate.” He shrugged it off and sallied out with a glass of soda.

“Please spare me the fizz at least. Save them for your meetings.” He grumbled. “Even if I believe the skydiving tale, am sure it must be a publicity blitzkrieg for a new launch.”

I was smiling at my serendipitous victory. 

“What!” he sat down with a baffled look

{#PageBreak#}.

“Have the courtesy to get this lady a drink first.” I could grovel for an hour now.

He knew I was up to something. Or may be he was a gentleman after all.  Having served my meed of beverages, he hastily nagged.“Ok what is it? What’s this breaking news you are suddenly admiring-your-feathers about?”

 

“The shepherd meets Ralph Lauren. But alas, he missed a sheep.” I mocked him in all delight.

“What do you mean?”

“So you think you have the unheard-unseen stuff about CIOs stashed away in your camera? Plus, you think that their counterparts on the other side of the fence are as culpable of monotony as their customers? But worst of all, you think all I can write and rave about is data centres and ERPs right?” 

He hardly blinked.

“But Mr. I-am-a-smart-geek, for a change, you sit and stare as a child while I read you an equally thrilling bed-time fairytale. This one is about a VP from a Cloud-solution-provider. It’s only apt that his tale entails skydive.” And thus I rewinded to the morning interview with Sanjay Deskhmukh.

He listened. He had to.

{#PageBreak#}

Nothing of the page-turner drama about it. I will start rather with the last line. 

Sanjay sky-dived.

The interview with him had traversed all the valleys and precipices of cloud-related territories, winding through competitive landscapes and treading carefully around the contours of a future still uncertain. Somewhere, along the way, the conversation veered towards planes and sky-divers. It was an irresistible topic and that’s where I discovered Sanjay’s most interesting dimension. 

Sanjay K Deshmukh, better known as Area Vice President - India Subcontinent, Citrix Systems India Pvt Ltd is anyways any tech-journo’s delight. His answers are more than the atypical sales pitch and his excitement and understanding go beyond the wallet-myopia. But when you find out that he is not a veep who on a vacation sits soaking the sun on a beach or a yacht twiddling his thumbs for the next quarter’s graphs, you feel better for the world.

He is the antonym here. He is the kind who jumps inside the water and measures his holidays by the number of dives he makes and not the number of photos he clicked for social network updates.

Snorkeling, scuba diving, deep sea diving are more than someday-one day fascinations for him. Having been a sports enthusiast since childhood days, the word adventure stays with him like a loyal Jeeves.

That’s the thing about him. He will convince you that you don’t have to plan adventure around a six-day trip. You have to be open to adventure everywhere. It can strike anytime. At office, on road, on a train, in a conference, you just have to be ready.

That’s what took him to the skies, literally and metaphorically.

So that day in California when everyone was packing up after a hectic conference, someone casually mentioned about how the weather was perfect for a sky-dive. Sanjay looked at that colleague and in an instant; they knew that the weather report was going to bookmark their life’s story for years to come. But again, there are things one can do on a lark, and then there are other things which just do not belong to the adjective ‘spontaneous’.

It takes a few hours of training, it takes a few hours to prepare and then actually do it. No one in their sane mind takes that risk especially when you have a flight to board for India that very afternoon.

No one, except people like Sanjay.

He did not need an appointment with adventure like always. They packed as fast they could, rushed out of the hotel, made their way to the dive base in time and were ready to fasten the gears.

“We did not know what to expect.” Was Sanjay’s recollection of that moment. “But that was the whole fun and daring about it.” Thankfully, being in US, there was a confidence on the level of professional guidance, equipment quality, training efficacy, personnel involved etc. He took the training, strapped himself with all paraphernalia and boarded a plane that would drop him from about 13,000 feet. It was a tandem jump, and that too with a videographer jumping before you, he underscored. That supposedly helps the pulse of an all-jittery-and-jumpy heart.

But when the moment of standing on the edge arrives, nothing helps.

It’s either shutting up your mind and taking the big leap, or standing and wondering, as you gasp at the vast stretch of land and clouds mingled together miles down.

Sanjay of course, chose the former way.

The very thought of ‘what might go wrong’ can trigger a vicious chain of thoughts that will chain your feet. Sanjay remembers he was lucky enough not to freak out. One deep breath was all it took to prepare himself.

And then, he jumped. Just like that!

The next two minutes of free fall where divers are sucked down at speeds varying between 120 kmph to 180 kmph, as expected, just can not be described. I didn’t bother asking. Sanjay didn’t attempt to explain either. It is something that is probably one of those few experiences that can never be enjoyed through another's account no matter how much technology, money or agents you can afford. It was visible and palpable in his half-blank sentence even after so many months of that sky-dive. A sentence that was gushing with energy, adrenaline and ecstasy even without some perfect words yet to be invented by humanity.

The free fall ended only physically when he checked his altimeter and opened the parachute. Of course, not in the way his heart beats at the very memory of it.

What begun after that was five minutes of smooth, slow, beautiful gliding. Those five minutes seem like the shortest five minutes even after a rapid free fall. You want it to go on and on. The land greets you soon though, and landing at 20 kmph, this Indian had another edge, thanks to all the Mumbai-train alighting experiences. He landed like a swan, and landed an altered man, in many ways.

And Sanjay will not stop at that, as expected.

Time, location and professional constraints notwithstanding, he keeps his eye on the goal of training properly for the requisite hours and going the solo, pro way as soon as possible. Till then, he keeps another eye on another goal of scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef.

“But what about work? What’s the connection? Did your cockeyed journalist voice not ask this oh-so-obvious question.” He finally piped in after listening to this seven-minute anecdote patiently, and intently. I ignored the jibes. For I had asked the question to be honest.

Sanjay had given a simple, no-nonsense answer.

{#PageBreak#}

“It’s all about pushing your limits. Even now, my team members are at a base camp preparing for a mountain climb several feet high, happily engrossed for a week. I feel jealous and happy, because I know that nothing can make you freer and bolder than doing the unexpected. We live in a highly competitive world, full of pressures. Personal or business, the way we approach a situation, makes all the difference. Adventure changes the confidence you have towards life. It helps you make tough decisions. Doing something exotic, something completely unknown, making hard choices, not knowing what to expect is a magic trick. When you move away from your comfort zone, you are free, and you are better.”

I wish I had the same effect when I repeated those words, but I could only draw a mock-clap from the audience I had. He thankfully stopped his histrionics in twenty seconds and asked me the question he was itching to confront me with.

“And did you note all of that in your interview? Like besides, all those numbers and cloud, rivals or portfolio talk?”

“No. I do one thing at a time. It was not the interview I had planned. Like..” he cut my sentences midway.

“Or shall we just say, even an interesting story like that, did not interest you more than the gobbledygook you scribble in your notebook. Think of it, and you guys call us boring.” With that he uttered a loud, fiendish laugh.

The last laugh is indeed a cruel one. You know it when it plays out in front of you. If only, things like ‘the last supper’ also manifest at the right time, I thought to myself, as I watched him nibble a candy. 

Or may be later. He still had another story to go. 

Sanjay at least taught us one thing right — keep pushing your limits.

I let him eat.