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Articles: My Thoughts | Story of the Stanford
- Mr. Srikanth Chintala
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This story is taken from the message given by Mr. Azim Premji (CEO of Wipro) to the graduating students at the 38th Convocation of Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai in 2001. While giving his valuable advice to the students, Mr. Premji passed on ten lessons; the tenth being 'Never let success go to your head.' He asked students to keep sense of modesty and humility intact to retain the sense of proportion and balance, no matter what we achieve, and illustrated with a story:
A lady in faded dress and her husband, dressed in a threadbare suit, walked in without an appointment into the office of the President of the most prestigious educational institution in America. The secretary frowned at them and said, 'He will be busy all day.' 'We will wait', said the couple quietly.
The secretary ignored them for hours hoping they will go away. But they did not. Finally the secretary decided to disturb the President, hoping they will go away quickly once they meet him.
The president took one look at the faded dresses and glared sternly at them. The lady said, 'Our son studied here and he was very happy. A year ago, he was killed in an accident. My husband and I would like to erect a memorial for him on the campus'.
The president was not touched. He was shocked. 'Madam, we cannot put up a statue for every student of ours who died. This place would like a cemetery'. 'Oh, no', the lady explained quickly,' we don't want to erect a statue. We thought we would give a building to you.'
'A building?' exclaimed the President, looking at their worn out clothes. 'Do you have any idea how much a building costs? Our buildings cost close to ten millions dollars!' The lady was silent. The President was pleased and thought this would get rid of them.
The lady looked at her husband. 'If that is it costs to start a university, why don't we start our own?' Her husband nodded. Mr. and Mrs. Leland Stanford walked away, traveling to Palo Alto, California, where they established the University as a memorial to their son, bearing their name-The Stanford University. The story goes that this is how Stanford University began.
(Mr. Premji is an alumnus of Stanford).
Srikanth Chintala.
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