Opportunities knocking at the doors

I am grateful to ASAP for opening up the doors of contemporary platforms for communication in front of me. Leaders at different levels take such initiatives to upgrade their human resources and thereby their organization. It really is an opportunity to bridge the digital divide.

In the eighties I was only a fresh postgraduate with an additional skill of Higher Grade in English typewriting. Computer was beyond reach during my initial years of service in the Army. However, as an expert in typewriting, superiors asked me to learn computer when our department clerk went on leave. Some others discouraged me saying that I will have to work as a clerk(I was working with a Higher grade pay) and remain in office till midnight. Then I obeyed the latter and plotted manuscript letters during the absence of our clerk. It was an opportunity that I missed to learn IT skills.

Later by the end of nineties I was compelled to work from a remote area in Arunachal Pradesh where departmental related various projects were to be submitted uploading in WANs as the physical movement of letters were disrupt by incessant rains in the region. Again I was motivated and guided by my superior to learn computer skills. He sat with me and taught IT for some days. With the interest generated, I approached a subordinate sepoy who was from Coorg and he advised me to work in computers fearlessly and ensured to recover data even if the computer crashed.(He had a certification from Microsoft in hardware).

Later I joined a computer course for three months and learned to work on it systematically. Further I didn’t want to miss an opportunity to join Automated Data Processing (Fundamentals) Course. It was a turning point in my life. From then I started empowering my colleagues (seniors aswell as juniors) in IT skills.

I am proud that I was able to teach online Income Tax filing to as many as 100 persons when the learned were not ready to impart it to others as it was a means of income and earning respect.

Now it is in the form of Kannanunni , Sherin , Sibi and Manu Sirs who prompted me to upgrade. Earlier,with my learned skills I was able to make a poster in PowerPoint consuming a lot of time. But when I learned to work with CANVA, it became very easy and attractive. Doing it with Drives is learned from Sibi Sir and Manu Sir now introduced me to WordPress.

Radhakrishnan K,SDE