Our time is now

“Your reputation is more important than your paycheck, and your integrity is worth more than your career.” — Ryan Freitas, About.me co-founder What's common between Apple, Amazon,Disney, HP, Google and Harley Davidson other than the fact that their turnovers are enough to buy an entire city? I'm thinking most of you might have got this right. Yes, all these companies started out in garages, mostly by young minds who found formal education to be more or less unnecessary. In today's day however, we do not have the luxury of not completing our Bachelor's degrees. The Indian society coaches us to go for white collar government jobs. Thus, it would take extraordinary courage to venture out into the real world to invest some capital and earn a living. We are told - Beta, paisa kamaane ke liye bhi paisa chahiye (Child, to earn money, you need money in the first place). The relevance of this school of thought is slowly ceasing to exist in the post 2010 Indian economy. I believe that dinner conversations play a vital role in shaping young minds. They are an excellent means to impart values to children, be it etiquette or little life lessons children must learn. Giving the young ones a low down on the whos and hows of the economy should be a part of at least 1 dinner conversation a week. That, and, of course basic profit and loss, prices of essential commodities etc. Our elders have always taught us that, to reach the top you have to start from the bottom. I believe that this moonshine about workplace hierarchy does not have to apply to all of us. Where there is ambition, there are no ifs and buts. Why start from the bottom, when you can start from the top? Bearing these ideals in mind, Varun Agarwal, a first generation entrepreneur, started his own indie film production company which went on to get lakhs of hits on YouTube. Commercial products are a thing of the past. The Internet is money. One can convert data into dollars in close to no time at all. The amount of exposure the internet has to offer to a start up or even to an already established business is mind-boggling. Take the case of, Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal, two ex Amazon employees who founded an e-commerce company called Flipkart, which currently employs over 4,500 people and delivers everything from shoes to books, all over India. This company with its unique advertisements and marketing strategies caught the fancy of both young and old minds, and soon with the word of mouth, everyone was buying from Flipkart. There are huge risks involved in starting a business, but the perks of being your own boss may leave tempted to go ahead and pursue the dream of selling your talent or your idea. In spite of witnessing, over the years, how some dropouts have changed the way the world exists as we know it, our society will never stop equating intellect with academics. I was amazed at what a marvelous piece of engineering, Luca Iaconi-Stewart, a dropout, was able to create using his bare hands. Using only a Manila Folder, he made a 1:60 scale replica of an Air India B777 (http://www.viralnova.com/manila-folder-model/). As ironic as it sounds, children should be taught to free themselves from the chains of the system and explore their dreams. They should be encouraged to do what they are good at instead of forcibly teaching them to learn what they can never grasp. Non profit organizations like the E-cell, which is run by the students of IIT Bombay, help in manifesting the latent entrepreneurial spirit of young students in India. Nothing should stop you from investing in an idea you firmly believe in, as the world is full of people who can be stupid enough to pay you for it and tell others to do so as well. Always look for the fool in the deal. If you don’t find one, it’s you. You know your company is worth a lot of money when bigwigs 'Google' your company. You know you're worth a lot of money when bigwigs 'Google' your name.