Describe how the socio-economic environment in which you live/work impacts

your business decisions?

The social structure and the culture of society have great influence on the
functioning of business activities. Each society has its own culture which consists
of the customs, values, attitudes, beliefs, habits, languages and other forms of
interaction between the members of the society.

Being from a lower middle class family, I was thought to live

economically and keep the expenses minimal. We have always tried to find
alternate methods to cut down the costs. For example, buying second hand
books instead of original books, buying local brand appliances rather than the
famous brand appliances to reduce the expenses. This economic situation has a
strong impact on me, even now when I am earning sufficient money; I try to keep
my monthly expenses down and save the money for the future. Similar attitude
is reflected in my professional field as well, where I will try to find an alternative
way in every possible module to cut down the costs. I along with my colleague
have developed few tools which works as an alternative to the manual process.
Using these tools in the execution was proven to be economical when compared
to the standard methods which we were using earlier and because of these tools
we got so many appreciations from the client as well from my managers.

Due to the changes in society and social conditions the perspective of

people got changed and so as their needs. In order to cater to their needs, we
need to find new methods or alter the existing methods. We need to be on our
toes to respond to the ever demanding needs of the customers. We need to be
adaptive and flexible to the changing requirements. Recently while we are
working on one project, we were in the middle of execution phase, at this stage
we got a new requirement from the client which needs to be added to the
ongoing phase. We had to create the test cases for the new requirements and
had to modify the existing test cases to accommodate for the new requirements.
Apart from this we had to re-execute according to the newly created and
modified test cases. In this stage, I thought of a plan and have divided the team
into two. First team will continue with the execution of test cases which deal
without the involvement of new requirements, second team will create and
modify the test cases. Once this was done, two teams together executed the new
test cases and we were able to deliver the whole project within the deliverable
time even when the requirements were added in the middle of execution.

Describe the most difficult decision you have made and its effect on you

The toughest decision of my life was to volunteer to give presentation in the

project to the client; it was a touch call because the future of project depends on
this one presentation and the person who ruins it has to face its consequences.
So everyone was hesitated to take up the responsibility as they were afraid.
Project was going through rough patch and client was not satisfied with our
performance. So, he wants us to give a presentation on our status, performance,
achievements and the reason why we need to be given another chance.
Everyone was confused as to who should give the presentation, at this time I
have volunteered to give the presentation.

The main reason why I have volunteered to give presentation is that I

have good experience on the project when compared to my other team mates.
The team lead doesnt have a good knowledge on all modules, so if the client
needs details on every module he may not be able to answer. Hence, I thought
that I was the only reliable option to give the presentation. At this time I was full
aware of the consequences which I had to face if I fail to impress the client. I
know that everyone will try to escape by putting blame on me. But, I thought
that this was the only way to get out of this situation and I made up my mind
that I am going to do this.

I have performed the right research and have collected all the data
required. I have identified the list of questions that may be asked and got those
things clarified by the decision makers. On the day of presentation I remained
calm even in pressure situations and I have managed to perform effectively in
the presentation. I had explained them about the various effective approaches
which we have employed in the project through which we have improved the
standards as well as cost savings. Client was satisfied with the presentation and
finally he agreed to give us the second chance to prove ourself. I was quite
happy with myself that I have taken responsibility in critical situation and I have
effectively performed even under tremendous pressure. This incident brought out
the stress tackling abilities as well as the leadership abilities in me.

I have received many accolades from the managers and directors

for my performance and even I got promoted owing to this incidence. This was
the toughest decision because I had to put myself in danger even when I can
relax and let team lead or manager take the responsibilities. I guess at this my
instincts were more powerful than my thoughts which made me to take up the
decision.