The document summarizes feedback from interns at Springer Books on their cross-cultural internship experience between Germany, the Netherlands, and India. It discusses how the interns from different European countries were placed in different departments and initially found it challenging to adjust but were supported by Indian colleagues. It highlights how the interns grew personally and formed strong friendships despite finding Chennai too hot and food too spicy. The interns said they would never forget the experience and learning.

1. Ins ghtSPS Newsletter August 2016
Unit-wise representatives of Insight
� K. Hemalatha (Unit 1, 1213) � N. Kannan (Unit 2, 2450) � R. Giri (Unit 3, 3210)
� M. Malini (Unit 4, 4224) � N. Subramanian (Trichy, 5520) � C. Kiroubakaran (Trichy, 5503)
� S. Krishna Sarma (Unit 6, 6740) � N. Kalyani (Unit 6, 6059) � Dr R. Saktheeswari (Unit 7)
�Vijayalakshmi Manoharan (Unit 7, 7317) � Lncs_Bflow (Unit 6)
ATribute to Mr. Sivamani
Dr. Kasturi recalls with all
sadness her last conversation
with Sivamani:
“In fact, I spoke to him last on
Tuesday evening when I simply
called him and which I will re-
member forever.He told me that
he had planned to meet me on
Wednesday morning and would be coming to Unit 4. He
expressed to me a wish that I should get him masala tea, for
which I promised him delicious dinner in RajPark”.
Gone from our sight, but never from our hearts.
“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the
only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great
work.And the only way to do great work is to love what you
do. – Steve Jobs
Mr. Sivamani was a testimonial to this phrase.
He was a valuable part of SPS for four years, moulding
and nurturing every task, with his own unique finesse, a
lesson to each of us today.
‘Very straight forward. I could directly go up to him for every
solution.” - Mrs. Bhavani, AMCE, Language editing
“He had an amazing sense of confidence something I had
always looked up to. Apart from the professional ties, he
would look to me as his younger brother,guiding and correct-
ing my every step.Truly missed! - Mr. Thivahar, TL.
He had (Sivamani sir) his own unique sense of style. He was
known for his commanding and perfectionist personality.- a
main driving force to the employees
- Mr. Sudhakar, Production Editor
“Sivamani sir was a great initiator in every aspect. He would
always be my guiding light, as he was my main source of
confidence”. Mrs. Isarani, TL.
“Sivamani or Siva as he was known was a classmate of mine
at college and also happened to be my roommate during the
last semester in Engineering at Pune. He was a nice guy to
everyone and extremely helpful when it comes to financial
assistance. He always used to be cheerful and enthusiastic
in everything that he pursues.There are plenty of memories
of our college days right from our self cooking adventures
to late night parties. One thing that I admired in him was
his fearlessness in the sense that he will challenge anybody
for something which he thought was right. From those days,
he was a leader material and it was evident in many occa-
sions. I wouldn’t say he was sentimental but he certainly
had a sentimental side which he would reveal at times.You
will be missed by one and all Siva and we will cherish your
memories for a long time”. - Mr.Sanjeevi, Deputy General Manager,
Wiley Journals
“You carve your name on hearts, not tombstones.
A legacy is etched into the minds of others and the
stories they share about you.
- Springer BooksTeam
Six months ago, we left freezing Europe with the only cer-
tainty of Chennai being hot. The rest would be a profes-
sional, social, cultural and personal experiment we just had
to experience as we went.
Experience we did.We were all put in different departments
of the book production so we still had plenty to tell each
other once we got to our apartment in the evening.Jana and
Tabea from North Germany supported the German book
production from Springer with their language skills in copy
editing; Kristin from Berlin (the German capital) assisted
the AC team while Mirela (Munich) and Steffi (Hamburg)
supervised the workflow in their role as project managers.
The Dutch book production team (Bohn Stafleu van Lo-
ghum) has been backed up by Frans (Gouda) who became
production editor.The peculiar Dutch language issues were
explained and fixed by Esther (Rotterdam) and Laura (Am-
sterdam).It took us several weeks to get adjusted to the In-
dian office, but now we would not have wanted to miss this
trial as five of us are about to return to our native homes
again. In the beginning we were a bit clueless considering
the culture and professional requirements of SPS, but the
patience and positivism of our Indian colleagues eased us
into the water.
As expected: Chennai is almost too hot for us and the
food too spicy. However, we did not expect the intensity of
friendships found here and that this could boost our per-
sonal growth to such an extent, that we will never forget
these months.
Interns @
Springer Books
Cross Cultural Internship between Germany, the
Netherlands and India
Six SigmaTraining Programme
When you touch people’s interest, people’s process – you touch their hearts.
This is very much true. It was a fantastic 25 hours (spanning 3 days) of learning various
Six Sigma tools. Mr. Harikrishnan, Consultant, Qualimations took us through the vari-
ous concepts with full interaction and examples.A presentation by Mr Ramanujam gave
deep insights into the possible results of application of Six Sigma concepts. So glued we
all were, only at the end of the 3-day session did we realize that all good things must
come to an end.
Here is a Summary of our learning; Six Sigma is a problem solving methodology and
we discussed how the DMAIC (Define,Measure,Analyze,Improve,Control) aligns very
closely to the SPS business and im-
proves market share. Six Sigma inte-
grates the goals of the organization
as a whole into the improvement
effort. Sure, quality is good, but not
independent of other business goals.
Deriving the Critical quality charac-
teristics that affects business and using the Quality tools was the key when we mapped
the value stream and benchmarked using QFD (Quality function deployment).The Cost
of Quality,failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA),correlation,regression analysis,and
process capability indices contributed significantly to revenue gain by allowing us to go
deep into our process and understanding the root cause for concerns or opportunity.
The lean part of Six Sigma extends the use of the improvement tools to cost, control-
ling wastes, cycle time and other business issues as well. Six Sigma strives for world-
class performance.The Six Sigma standard is 3.4 failures per million opportunities, but
it goes beyond errors.The best of the Six Sigma organizations try to meet or exceed
their customer's expectations by creating an infrastructure of change agents. These
people work full- and part-time on projects in their areas or in other areas.These proj-
ects are the units of revenue generation and where the change agents work on with a
single goal in mind: making the businesses as successful as possible.
The management deserves all praise for arranging this training programme with a good
mix of people right from finance to managers on the shop floor to managers of the
CQF team. S. Krishna Sarma
India in Olympics
The expectation of just one or two medals in Olympics continued in the just-concluded 2016 Olympics too. Unless
there is a change in the mindset of the officials part of the Indian Olympics Association, this trend will continue in
the next couple of Olympics.The reason being participants should enjoy while playing. But instead they are feeling
luxurious.
Abinav Bindra said that England is spending Rs 47 crores to win one medal. He specified that much amount of money
has become necessary to win a medal. He should be aware that Kenya, Ethiopia, Jamaica are winning medals without
proper infrastructure. How is it possible for them?
Leander Paes, Karnam Malleswari, Mary Kom,Vijendar Singh, Sushil Kumar,Yogeshwar Dutt,Abinav Bindra – all won a
medal in their respective Olympics, but could not win in the subsequent Olympics.The reason may be that after win-
ning a medal, they thought they have achieved something huge in Olympics.
Sindhu, Sakshi, Dipa and Jitu Rai were awarded Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna. I think it is too early to give this award to
them.They have a long way to go.
PV Sindhu won a silver medal in RIO Olympics.That’s it.After that she is raining in crores of rupees, Government
job, land to build a house, etc.What is the need for all this? The player is sent to a major event only to win. It is their
profession, their duty.They have to win. I don’t know whether any other country is providing this kind of facilities to
the players.
Instead government, officials, and sponsors may fund to improve sports and they can show interest in improving the
infrastructure for specific sports.
L. Karthik, Hardware Engineer
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