Notes on the meeting on October 13, 2010

Dear Friends, 

President Kurian Abraham said, “We are all here to improve our communication skills.” Thereafter, he read out some tips to be an effective public speaker that he came across in an article in the Harvard Business Review.

Here it is:

Focus on your audience: Pick a person and speak directly to him.

Re-label the negative as positive: You should convert stage fright into anticipation and excitement.

Avoid rigid rules: There are no set rules. Just deliver a good speech. If you remain calm and relaxed, the audience has a better chance to appreciate your speech.

There was an unexpected guest: K.P. Fabian, the former Ambassador, and the brother of K.P. Joseph. Kurian Abraham provided the introduction. Additional information has been culled from www.ambassador-fabian.com:

Ambassador KP Fabian, 68, served in the Indian Foreign Service from 1964 to 2000. His last posting was in Rome, as Ambassador to Italy and Permanent Representative to UN organisations including the Food and Agriculture Organisation, the World Food Programme, and the International Fund for Agricultural Development. Even while in service, Ambassador Fabian wrote and spoke on international affairs, mainly at universities in Madagascar, Austria, Iran, Sri Lanka, Canada, Finland, Qatar and Italy. 

Table Topics was by me. Subjects included the enduring charisma of superstar Rajnikanth and the goings-on in the Karnataka Assembly.

Incidentally, in Table Topics, when Mr. Fabian was asked about the politician who made the most impact in post-Independence India, he mentioned the name of Jawaharlal Nehru for setting up the India we have today and for upholding secularism.

Grilling was of Baby. 

This time we had a discussion on a topic, suggested by Venugopal: ‘Is Emotional Quotient (EQ) more important than Intelligence Quotient (IQ) for business/professional success?’ 

Mr. Fabian began the proceedings by recounting the instance of a friend of his, a brilliant nuclear physicist, who had quarreled with most of his friends. “He is a man of high IQ, maybe more than 130, but a low EQ,” he said. “It is necessary to have both to be successful.” He also mentioned the example of Bertrand Russell. “He was a great philosopher-mathematician, but had a poor emotional life,” said Mr. Fabian.  

Ramachandran also gave an interesting example of physicist Albert Einstein, who had a low EQ. Once, there were some rats in his chamber. A friend suggested getting a cat to get rid of the rats. He bought two cats, a big and a smaller one. Interestingly, he made two holes: a big and a small hole. Asked the need for the small hole, he said, “This is for the small cat to get through.”

K.P. Joseph gave the example of two classmates of his. While one was academically brilliant, the other was a backbencher. “But it was the backbencher who went on to win the Padma Bhushan and became on top of the world,” he said.

Kurian said that toppers in college rarely become toppers in life. “To balance EQ and IQ is the big task for every person,” he said.

Alex spoke about the need to have more EQ than IQ to be successful. “Children are unable to develop their EQ because of a lack of interaction with other children,” he said.

There were contributions from Nirmala, Agarwal, Baby, Venugopal and myself.

Then Mr. Fabian spoke about the impact of the Commonwealth Games on the residents of Delhi.

In Soapbox, there were contributions by K.P. Joseph, Alex, and myself.

Vote of thanks was done very well by Nirmala.

A very intellectually stimulating evening was had by one and all.

Shevlin