To the uninformed the title would sound mysterious. If you google it you will discover an Indian cricket player that had tenacity to stay the course while the other wickets fell around him and walk home at sunset with a small pool of runs on the field.
He was not known for his meteoric rise in the alums of batting or flamboyant performance against the bowlers. Far from it. He simply stayed put when out on the wicket and collected his ones and twos.
Many of us are in that boat. We are not trail blazers of any sort but simply do what we must to earn our living. There is no major glory of being glam or in with the couture, but the metronomic tedium of moving to the next sunrise.
That can be good. Its a matter of perspective. There is glamour in scarcity. Conversely ubiquity brings loss of the cool factor. That is how our society is programmed to operate.
Vengsarkar was ubiquitous when it came to staying on... throw any bowler at him and he would stick to the wicket like a leach on skin. Did not shake.
Its like a McDonald's. A known entity. Simple. Boring. Its everywhere and you know what you are going to get. That can be Good. People often get caught in wanting to chase - something - money, fame, glory, titles, power, EPS, growth et al..the next IT thing. That is not to discourage those born with an ability to stretch the proverbial blankets and seek out new frontiers or ideas or the unconventional.
But to acknowledge that for every bright idea from Silicon Valley or any other hub of innovation comes a repeatable and predictable formula and people that breathe it to support the economic success of that very original idea.
This is a blog to raise a toast to those unsung heroes - the middle of the bell curve - the majority - the commuters - whatever you label it - that make it work.
Even a brand like Apple can face worries of its own success...unless you innovate you are not a darling and therefore relegated to the Vengsarkar pile. But what of all the efforts you did put in earlier? Well we always want to look to the future. So if you are not part of the roadmap its adieu.
I am not sure if that construct is eventually what defines progress but it certainly is responsible for a lot of strife in today's society.
This time for a tech conference in the realm of what else? AI. But applied to an oft neglected space called Knowledge Management. The latter is a community of practice that focuses on analyzing, organizing and making available reams of data that have been gathered over time by various functions within an organization for anyone in the company to utilize. This function or process is ripe for applying AI agents (or agentic AI framework) and optimize for better outcomes. It was informative. More rewarding was getting acquainted with folks who practice this craft as well as learning of what they see in the corporate or public sectors. Since the venue was Washington DC it also afforded me the chance to take evening strolls albeit the weather was trying. With wind chill in the single digit it still is a glamorous place to perambulate through history absorbing what this country has been through since its founding days. I was able to visit the place Lincoln was killed along with his monument t...
Here's a toast to the Vengsarkars...good coinage, by the way.
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