Motivational tips for a competitive edge

Today, when belief in fairytales has become passe, would we believe if someone claimed to reveal some ‘secret laws of making money’? Also wouldn’t we be a little more than curious to know the contents of a ‘secret dairy’, which would have some keys to the map from one of India’s biggest entrepreneurs.

Though the initial reaction may make this sound unrealistic, the contents of the book, ‘He Swam with the Sharks for an Ice Cream’ contains secrets to making money. It will also actually make it possible to introspect and change the way of functioning, working and thinking.  

The book was launched in Mumbai on Thursday and eminent spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar recently launched the same book in Bangalore.

In recent years, the publishing industry has witnessed a new phenomenon - tomes which are a fusion of fiction and non-fiction.

This implies that an author scripts a non-fiction book, but rather than making it pure theory, he narrates the subject matter in a story format. He uses characters, events, places to express his views.

Many successful business books like Who Moved My Cheese, Fish, One Minute Millionaire, The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari and others have implemented this strategy.

In this self help book by author Dhaval Bathia much of the book’s content relates around the business wisdom of Dhirubhai Ambani (apart from other entrepreneurs like Ratan Tata, Bill Gates, Ray Croc and Warren Buffet).

This is Bathia’s fourth book. “I chose to inculcate and carry forward ‘teachings’ of Dhirubhai Ambani because he is a true epitome of a never-say-die attitude,” said Dhaval.

He added, “This man hailing from rural India without any formal education or resources managed to create a Rs65,000 crore empire in merely 40 years. Certainly his strategy is worth studying and adopting.”

This book revolves around the life of two young executives — Dave and Abhi who work for a company called Om Group. Like typical employees in their late twenties, both Dave and Abhi find themselves beleaguered by corporate life.

A tough boss, work deadlines, dragging themselves to office every morning and drifting around without any sense of purpose, their life lacks charm.

However, an unexpected mail from their boss sends them on a journey that will transform their life forever. Dave and Abhi’s meet with a retired billionaire who shares with them ten secrets of how he created a billion dollar corporate enterprise.

Unlike many other international bestselling self help books, we can all relate to this book. Each of the ten chapters describes a secret lesson that Abhi and Dave learnt from the billionaire.

Ranging from employee motivation, accelerating growth and increasing profitability the book is packed with tonnes of practical knowledge. Quite interestingly, much of the story revolves around how Dhirubhai Ambani created Reliance.

The language used throughout is simple and appealing. The pace of the narration is consistent and takes a dramatic turn towards the climax, where patriarch of Om group and billionaire Haribhai divulges secret laws of making money.

This part where the protagonist is talking about the way to earn unlimited income by using different elements is interesting and easy to put in to practice.

Dhaval Bathia wrote his first book ‘Vedic Mathematics made easy’ at the age of 17 which has now become a bestseller in English, Korean and Spanish.