Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Drishtikone

Home
Hindu
"Upbeat" by Rajesh Setty – great read for recessionary times!

"Upbeat" by Rajesh Setty – great read for recessionary times!

Last updated on: July 26, 2009 at 8:30 pm by Desh Kapoor

"Upbeat" by Rajesh Setty – great read for recessionary times! 2009-07-26T20:30:02-05:00 Desh Kapoor

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

During the last one year, no other book has impacted me as much as this one book called “Upbeat” by Rajesh Setty. Rajesh Setty is a serial entrepreneur and is a zealous motivator. He has an excellent blog full of inspiration and good information. I would STRONGLY suggest signing up for his weekly newsletter. It is the ONLY newsletter that I get in my inbox, that I read regularly every week.

In this book, Setty talks about his thoughts on how to work yourself back in a recessionary time. He uses his experience in the last recession as the basis. His advise is spot on and although it might sound commonsensical.. but its perfectly usable and timely. It can benefit BOTH individuals and companies.

Its a 90-page succinct read. Very pithy and no-nonsense, the advise is very usable… you don’t have read through motivational rhetoric to come to something practical.. that’s the good thing! It is divided into different sections:

The Trap
The Discipline
The Network
The Strategy
The Action

If you could implement suggestions from even one section (the first two maybe) you could be a winner soon.

I interviewed Rajesh about his book and the background on why and how he wrote this book. His views and thoughts are very instructive and informative.

============

1. You have written about thriving through the tough times. What times in your personal life inspired you to write this book? Can you share how you handled at least one such tough times?

Desh, first thank you for the opportunity to have this conversation. I can share many stories and the set of events that has shaped me as a person so far are outlined in my story so far.

The story that led to the writing of this book is here below:

I had an opportunity to build my first technology startup during the previous recession. It was not easy. The easiest way to define what was happening then was that “nobody was buying anything from anyone and everybody was trying selling something to everyone.” If we loved bad news, then we were in luck. There was bad news everyday – on the TV, in the newspapers, on the radio and there was generally some bad news shared during any interaction with anyone – online or offline.

We learned a lot during that period as the only way to have survived running a “bootstrapped” startup was to stay Upbeat. So I wrote most of it during that journey but by the time I completed the book, that recession was over. So I packed it up and and kept it aside. I didn’t have to wait for long as there was a another recession very soon. I unpacked the book, updated it and got it published.

2. What is the central idea of the books in 140 words 🙂 ?

There is no guarantee that you will succeed just by staying Upbeat but you can be guaranteed to fail by choosing not to stay Upbeat.

3. How is handling the tough times different from handling the “good” times?

During good times, one can be Upbeat to get ahead and is useful for people that are ambitious. Being Upbeat will help but if they are not, it won’t be a threat to their survival. So in other words, being Upbeat during tough times can be a competitive advantage.

During tough times, you can’t afford NOT to be Upbeat. Things that were working would have stopped working and you need all the energy to go all out and make it work. Being Upbeat is NOT optional during tough times. In fact, NOT being Upbeat is a competitive disadvantage.

Rarely can you take massive action in a NOT so Upbeat mode. Tough times call for uncommon and massive action – so being Upbeat is a pre-requisite for that.

4. Are you a realist or an optimist by nature?

I am an optimist and I have three mentors who will put “reality” back into my head as I start going all over the place 🙂

5. There are many Personal Development Gurus from Dale Carnegie to Tony Robins to Deepak Chopra. Is there any one who has affected you in your life to do better?

I have ALWAYS had multiple mentors starting 1983 when I was a journalist writing for a local newspaper. This was at the age of thirteen. That was the first experience for me to have mentors and luckily I realized the value of having them. I would never have it any other way.

Since I fear that I will leave out many names if I start listing who all have influenced me, I will just respectfully bow away from answering this question.

Motivation and Personal Development

Previous Post

July 26, 2009

Answers are NOT EQUAL to Nation's Security, Dr. Singh!!

Next Post

July 27, 2009 Death of Journalism vs Rise of Blogging

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Aarti Achievement and Leadership AfPak Africa Annual and Year-end Asia Audio Australia Behavioural Sciences Bhagwad Gita Bhagwad Gita Blogging Blogs Business Business Intelligence Business Strategy Cannes Careers Chanakya China Conservation Corruption Creative Daily Links Desh Poems Development & Welfare Devotional Audio Devotional Songs Drama Earth Economics Education Entertainment Environment Europe Everyday Quotes Featured Articles Featured Songs Finance Flickr Pictures Food Geo-Political Global Warming Globalization Health & Medicine Hinduism Historic History Humour India Indian Culture Indian music Indian Weddings Israel Issues Legal Link Love Minorities Misc Motivation and Personal Development Movie Lists Movie Reviews Movies Mumbai terror attacks Natural Disasters Nature News Outsourcing Pakistan Parenting Personal Philosophy Poetry Politics Poverty Quotes Recipe Regular Blog Post Relationships Religion Religious/Spiritual Audio Sciences Showcase Slideshow South Asia Special Stories Spiritual Quotes Spirituality Sports Stories Strategy Technology Technology Terrorism Travel Uncategorized US Video Women Women_s Rights Worship Yoga

Select a Month December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 June 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 September 2014 August 2014 January 2014 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who was Mary's cousin, mother of John the Baptist?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Martha Rachel Elizabeth Sarah