Navigating the corporate world

A satirical take on the corporate world that promises to help you handle the nitwits and smart-mouths you inevitably meet in your professional life.

Be it Mr Excuse who always has an excuse ready, Mr Maggi who believes in the power of getting things done within two minutes or Mr Micromanager with an incessant need to control every little thing, Disha Chhabra’s Corporate Avatars has the answers for you. This IIM Calcutta alumna’s third outing as an author is a satirical take on the corporate world posing as a business self-help book, that keeps up it's promise to be your ultimate guide to handle the nitwits and smart-mouths you inevitably end up meeting in your professional life.

As an e-commerce professional with twelve years of experience in the corporate world, Disha smartly decodes fifty personality types you are sure you meet at work, complete with tips to perfectly identify them and deal with them.

She began listing each of these characters after almost three months of engaging in discussion with people across various industries. “When I sat down and thought if I could segregate these characters that I encountered, it became about who these people are, how to identify them and dealing with them. I spoke to friends and other people and asked them who was the most difficult person in their lives. Some people are workaholics, some play political games or they might just smell terrible but they do make our life difficult. My research brought me to the conclusion that these personality types were not specific to any particular industry,” she says.  

Her first two books titled My Beloved MBA Plans and Because Life is a Gift were honest attempts to inspire the world around her drawing in from real life experience. Disha’s decision to leave a high-paying job to pursue her MBA was just the beginning of her journey as an author. A fervent blogger, Disha, an IIM Calcutta alumna, always found happiness in her writing, “I used to blog very often but I never thought I’d write a book. It was when I joined MBA that I met people who had been through a lot. It really got me interested in how we put so much thought into every decision we make and even if we resist change having the support of your family is what makes the journey easier,” she quips.

Having a full time job while writing and researching for a book is not an easy task to handle but Disha does this and more with panache. Her social media presence helps Disha involve in community projects. She adds, “There is a lot of time management that one has to do and you do have to cut down on leisure time during the weekend. But once a story convinces you to write, you crave to do it often and taking the time out to do it won’t bother you. Apart from writing, I engage myself in a bit of social work. I crowd-source projects along with NGOs as I noticed that people are more willing to contribute when they know that it’s going to a particular project. If one day I quit my corporate job, it won’t be for writing but to do something that I know will make a bigger difference to the society.”