5 reasons why you should work with passionate people

This January we complete a year of existence as The Potter's Earth, and a little more than that for me personally as a corporate-to-startup convertee. The start-up bug is the biggest flu-of-the-season for Indians these past few years, and all around in my circle of friends and acquaintances who have taken the ubiquitous 'plunge', one gets to hear stories of personal joys and travails, of start-ups, wind-downs and re-started-ups. I recently read a good piece on 5 reasons you will be grateful you choose to work for a startup, and it got me thinking how many of these reasons hold true for us at The Potter's Earth.

As we roll out of one hectic year into another even more hectic one, with my team of colleagues - family, friends, family-of-friends, and colleagues-now-turned-friends :-) - as fellow travelers, here's my own 5 reasons why 2014 was an awesome year and why I know 2015 is going to be an even better one.



1. No fear of Mondays!

One of life's small joys is being able to foot-tap to the 'khooni monday' song from the movie Go Goa Gone, and say, "this doesn't apply to me - at last!" Even though we have graduated from the early days of 7-day weeks to 5-and-a-half day weeks, Sunday seems more like a day to take a break from the fast pace of work, gather your thoughts, write down ideas which are hitting you at oddest moments, and then waiting - yes, actually waiting for Monday so you can go back, talk to the team about it, and get cracking.

2. A Common Purpose (or Being with people who choose to be with you, and vice-versa):

By no stretch of imagination can I say that any one member of our team is similar to any other. Each of us has our own strengths, idiosyncrasies and blind spots. The one common thing that keeps us together is that each of us, individually and collectively, believe in what we are trying to do at The Potter's Earth and really, really, really want to make it work.

3. Freedom from the PowerPoint Trap:

Grounded as I am in my years of corporate training, it took me some time to realise that the presentation of an idea on a beautiful PowerPoint slide has nothing to do with its actual value and viability. On the other hand, there's nothing like seeing a pulse-racing idea emerge from illegible scrawls and scribbles hurriedly written on backs of envelopes before they evaporate from the thinker's mind. Of course, once that's done I quickly transcribe that to a PowerPoint slide, but you get the drift of what I'm saying :-)

4. Actually Making a Difference!

Any new idea in the education space comes with an associated sense of nobility and doing good. And at The Potter's Earth the one thing that keeps us going is the belief that what we are trying to do, and what we have to offer, will truly make a difference to the way young people spend the rest of their lives. The shortened chain from conceptualization to implementation to value creation  is one of the most empowering things that gets me willing to go out there every single morning.

5. Hierarchy's just a word:

A lot of people I know really get off on the title of Founder, Managing Director, CEO of their startups. But as I recently read somewhere, a CEO in a startup is the acronym for Chief Everything Officer. In my cocooned corporate past life, little did I know how to fire up a coffee machine, work a photocopier, or hire an office handyman (the last job, by the way, is part of the startup CEO's job description). In our small team at PE, there's no place for hierarchy - which is good considering how often I find myself at the bottom of the pecking order!

So as we step into a brand new year, this note goes out with special fondness to all you guys at The Potter's Earth. It's been an awesome journey so far, and I am glad we are only just getting started!

Happy New Year 2015!

And now I need to go get the coffee machine fixed.

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Anamika Dasgupta Sharma is a Coach and Co-Founder of  The Potter's Earth. In her past life, Anamika was an HR professional and worked with various corporate giants. Along the way, she found her true calling to help young people to make informed career choices, and thus was born the idea of The Potter's Earth. Between the pre-teen days of her two boys and the hectic fledgling days of her startup venture, Anamika enjoys a crazy but fulfilling life, which she refuses to trade with anything less crazy. She tops it all up with indulging her passion for writing, blogging and reading.