Career. Leadership. Dark philosophy. Life's honest shades. Written every Sunday by Abhishek from Lucknow — 27 years in telecom, now writing for people who think too much.
"Zindagi mein sabse badi mushkil yeh nahi ki log aapko samajhte nahi — mushkil yeh hai ki kabhi kabhi hum khud ko nahi samajhte. Fursatnama usi samajh ki talaash hai."
27 years. Nokia. Ericsson. Cisco. Samsung Networks. HFCL. I've sat in boardrooms in Doha, managed 400 engineers in UP East, and deployed thousands of towers across India. But honestly? The most interesting conversations I've had were over chai at a dhaba, not in a glass-walled conference room.
I write about the dark corners of professional life — the promotions you didn't get, the manager who took credit, the day you questioned everything. I write about the shades of life that LinkedIn motivational posts conveniently skip. And sometimes I write about what I saw through a camera lens on a mountain in Himachal.
I'm a travel photographer at heart. A reader of dark philosophy. A Lucknawite who believes tehzeeb and directness can coexist. I'm curious about why people do what they do — at work, at home, at 3 AM when they can't sleep.
Fursatnama — فرصت نامہ — is just me writing honestly every Sunday. No brand voice. No hustle gospel. Just one regular person's honest take on work, life, and everything in between. Pull up a chair.
Two managers submitted updates for the same project. One report was 8 pages — full of charts, metrics, and acronyms. The other was 1 page, 3 bullet points. Guess which one got approved in 2 minutes? In 25+ years across Nokia, Ericsson, Samsung, and HFCL, I've learned: senior leaders don't have time for complexity. They need the decision, the options, and your recommendation. That's it.
Read Full Article →My father had never worked in a corporate office. My mother didn't know what a project manager did. Nobody warned me about the invisible game. I was playing chess while everyone else was playing a completely different game — and I didn't know the rules existed.
Everyone had the same solution: work faster, add more people, escalate. My manager asked a different question: "What's the one thing blocking everything else?" We stopped adding effort and started looking for the bottleneck. Speed is a distraction when the sequence is wrong.
Two senior engineers blamed each other publicly. The team went silent. By week six, the project was bleeding. I called a two-hour offsite with no slides. I started by sharing a mistake I had made. A real one. The room shifted within 20 minutes. When the leader shows a crack first, the team stops hiding theirs.
Abhishek writes the way a wise friend speaks — without agenda, without jargon. Every Sunday I find myself reading slowly, twice. Then forwarding it to someone who needs it.
In a world of hot takes and hustle content, Fursatnama is a quiet Sunday breath. The articles from Nokia and Samsung feel like lessons nobody teaches you in any training programme.
The Bottleneck First Rule article changed how I run my projects. I shared it with my entire team. That is the kind of writing that earns a bookmark, not just a like.
"Senior leaders don't need context. They need: the decision, the options, your recommendation. Everything else is noise."
"Speed is a distraction when the sequence is wrong. Fix the bottleneck first. Everything else follows."
"When the leader shows a crack first, the team stops hiding theirs. Vulnerability only repeats when it's rewarded."
"Competence gets you in the room. Visibility keeps you there. Most hardworking people never learn this until it's too late."
Whether you have a story to share, a question to ask, or just want to say that something resonated — I'd love to hear from you. I read every message personally.
"Fursatnama (فرصت نامہ) — فرصت کا مطلب ہے موقع۔ یہ خط ہر اتوار آپ کے لیے لکھا جاتا ہے۔"
The name came from a belief I carry from Lucknow — that a moment of pause, of genuine reflection, is itself the biggest opportunity. Fursatnama is that pause every Sunday. For you and for me both. Aiye, baithe. Thoda sochte hain saath mein.