Grab them damn it!

In today's age of cut throat competition, opportunities are anyway hard to come by. To top it all you have challenges like the global economic crisis breathing down everyone's neck. In such a scenario when people fail to prove themselves at crucial junctures, it clearly indicates lack of preparedness. Whether they lose out owing to shortage of wits or skills hardly makes a difference as at the end of the day, they are termed 'losers'. As they say, "Strike the iron when its hot".

Lets take the example of something as inconsequential to our lives as the Indian Premier League (IPL). The tournament presents a golden opportunity for youngsters to prove their mettle. Yet you have some of these Indian fringe cricketers failing to perform at crucial situations and making a complete mockery of themselves. Obviously, there would be some who would say that performing under pressure isn't such an easy task. Well my answer to them would be, there couldn't be a better chance to prove yourself than when the spotlight is on you. One has to be ruthless in pursuit of goals, irrespective of what the external factors are. If you are unable to maintain the level of intensity during tough times, you surely don't deserve to be one amongst the rare breed of successful people.

From a moment lets shift our focus from sports to politics. The recent election results highlighted a fundamental set of values which was neglected by the BJP and they had to bear the brunt for it. How many times have you heard the learned scholars talk about the importance of concentrating on your own strengths instead of focusing on the opposition's weakness. In the pre-poll days, the BJP had tons of opportunities to promote itself on the basis of its strengths and highlight its USP but alas it got way too busy criticizing the Congress and its leaders. You had someone like Mr. L.K.Advani screaming his lungs out, inviting Dr. Manmohan Singh for a live debate but not for once did you hear him talk about what he had in mind when it came to nation's development. You had the BJP coming up with campain tracks like 'Bhay Ho' in response to Congress' 'Jai Ho'. Initially people did respond to these negative tactics but eventually they backed out for the simple reason that they didn't come across anything that BJP was offering to them except for negative comments. Deservedly so, the BJP suffered mass demolition.

On the contrary you had the Congress (read UPA) doing the basic groundwork, reaching out to people, talking about policies and governance and spreading its network with a positive intent. You had someone like Rahul Gandhi travelling from village to village trying to connect to people. Fine, some may argue it was a case of political necessity but so was the case for BJP. The difference lies in the fact that while the Congress made full use of its opportunities to promote its intentions, BJP was found making a fool out of itself.

On a more general basis, its a well known fact that socializing and networking skills are of paramount importance these days. Digging and maintaining contacts is the need of the hour for the simple reason that you never know who might help you out in desperate times. Yet, I see people neglecting contacts either by getting judgmental about them or merely acting lazy. Either way, its a loss for them and I seriously pity their mindset and attitude. These are the times when you even need to get well along with people you detest to the core. The good old "I don't care" attitude just doesn't work anymore. One needs to be smart enough to realise where the opportunity lies and take full toll of it.

The art of networking has drastically evolved over the past few years. Gone are the days when you would think about the utility of a person before trying to befriend him/her. These days almost everyone you come across is a potential useful contact, be it a top notch business executive or a cab driver. So you would do well to leave your ego aside and be in the good books of anyone and everyone. Moreover a large contact base could never prove to be a drawback anyway.

Eventually its your ability to take advantage of the limited opportunities that would decide your fate. The difficulty level and multiplicity of hurdles just can't be excuses to escape from your true worth. So before the golden goose slips away, GO GRAB IT!