The slog overs! — It’s now or never! — The SAP Social Sabbatical in Ho Chi Minh City in it’s final lap!
In the limited overs’ version of cricket, the slog overs provide the spectators a lot of entertainment. It’s the time when batsmen have the license to destroy the bowling attack if they have adequate wickets in hand. The general method is to swing the bat at every ball … and when you hit …hit it hard…so that even mis-hits fly out of the boundary. Good bowlers tend to bowl more yorkers and slow balls to neutralize the batsmen’s attempt to come down the pitch and hit. Batsmen adept at improvisation, e.g. switch hit, reverse sweep often find it more comfortable in the slog overs. Slog overs can help a team to cover up for slow scoring rates in the earlier overs, but may not necessarily win a team a match! Consistent scoring throughout the match is still the better option.
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The fact that our Social Sabbatical in Ho Chi Minh City is just 2 days away from conclusion, it does give me a feeling of the slog overs! Our G.A.P sub-team within Team Mekong, has completed on all deliverables as agreed in the SoW with the customer and we are presently busy preparing for a couple of presentations to be made later this week to demonstrate our project achievements. In our quest to be more creative with our presentations, Evi and I have gone on a coffee shop and restaurant hopping to find the best possible place for our creative juices to flow :-)
Thursday and Friday this week are important days for us as we make our final presentation for the project to our client as well as to SAP CSR and Pyxera Global.
In pursuit of Gross National Happiness
Some of us from Team Mekong attended a session titled From GDP to GNH: A shift towards sustainable organizations on 25th April at the Saigon Innovation Hub. The speaker at the session was Dr. Tho Ha Vinh, Program Director — Gross National Happiness Centre Bhutan. Dr. Tho threw light upon the 9 elements and 4 pillars of GNH and made a case for why economic growth should be a means to an end and not an end itself. The end should be to make people happy. It was also one of the “wow” moments, when we realized that most of the things in life that make us happy actually come for free. With the help of 2 case studies — B Grimm and Eileen Fisher, Dr. Tho highlighted the need for businesses to aim for sustainable development and impact on triple bottom-line — financial, social and environmental.
A half-day of fun, socializing and reminiscing at the Thanh Da Peninsula
Evi and I joined the G.A.P team for a half-day trip on 26th April to a resort in Than Da Peninsula, on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh city. Situated on the banks of river Saigon, it was a perfect setting to chill over a water melon juice, loads of river water fish, and socialize and reminisce about the month of April spent on the Social Sabbatical. It was motivating to know about the key takeaways each G.A.P employee had from our sessions / workshops with them so far as part of the Social Sabbatical. Here are some pictures from our trip to the resort.
That’s it for now. Will be back with my next story titled Post-match presentation! Stay tuned.
As this wonderful experience i.e. SAP Social Sabbatical is about to come to an end, my mind is already filled with a feeling of nostalgia and a sense of discovery of purpose! This has truly been one of the most enriching and fulfilling months in my life so far. And this would not have been possible without the G.A.P Institute team members and all 12 of us from Team Mekong.
