Inside Are You Part of the 2%?

Part 1 of 10

Are You Part of the 2%?

Move Your Dot Today!

On December 7, 2004, Suri Anantharama judged a school competition. Later that day, he was on his way to a friend’s birthday party when an SUV struck the driver’s side of his Toyota Camry. The car spun roughly 270 degrees. The driver’s door would not open, so he climbed across and got out on the passenger side. Both vehicles were totaled. He walked away without a scratch.

His wife and ten-month-old daughter had stayed home. That detail has never left him. Neither has the thought that he might never have seen December 8. Looking back, Suri describes a growing sense that the days he had been given called for a decision about how to use them.

This book follows that question through schooldays in Madras, family life, entrepreneurship, friendship, teaching, and community service. The stories move between people who saw potential in Suri and moments when he had the chance to do the same for someone else. Some acts took an afternoon. Others grew into years of teaching, mentoring, or building something people could use.

A day contains 1,440 minutes. Two percent is about twenty-nine. The book asks what could happen if a little of the time, attention, or experience we already have reached someone who could use it. Suri gives that choice a name. He calls it moving a dot.

Part 2 of 10

Two lines on a sheet of paper

Suri’s map begins with two questions. Who benefits from what I do? What changes because I did it? On the horizontal axis, a dot moves right as the benefit extends beyond the person acting. On the vertical axis, it moves up as the effect becomes more meaningful. The two questions let us look at the reach and the depth of an action separately.

Near the intersection sit much of the work and routine that keep a life going. Earning a living, caring for family, resting, and getting through a difficult week all take time. A dot near the center can represent something necessary. Caregiving can have a profound effect on one person, and paid work can create value for many. The 98% and 2% are metaphors for patterns of attention and action. The useful comparison is between the choices we make over time.

Imagine looking back over a week. One evening went to answering work emails. Another went to helping a student revise a first resume. If that conversation helps the student recognize an achievement worth describing, it already has an effect. If an introduction later leads to an interview, the same act may travel further than expected. The graph gives you a way to see the difference.

The book invites readers to plot real activities before deciding what to change. Look for a skill you already use, a relationship you already have, or a problem you are already close enough to understand. Any of those can give your next dot a place to land.

Part 3 of 10

What can twenty-nine minutes do?

The book compares a day to an account credited with 1,440 units every morning. Whatever remains at midnight cannot be carried forward. Suri adds a detail the analogy tends to leave out. We receive the minutes only if we receive the day. After the accident, that difference stayed with him.

Twenty-nine minutes is a way to picture a manageable beginning. A call to someone going through a hard week may take five minutes. Listening to a student rehearse for an interview may take half an hour. What matters is making room for a specific person or need and giving the act enough attention to be useful. The book’s discussion of the forces that keep us near the intersection makes this feel familiar. Responsibilities, habits, distractions, and the impulse to wait for a better time can fill a day before we have made one deliberate choice about it.

“Give the Flowers Now!” brings the idea into an ordinary relationship. Think of a teacher, colleague, or friend whose help you understood only later. Tell them what you remember. Name the occasion, what they did, and what changed for you. The specific detail is what makes a thank-you worth receiving.

Some readers will recognize the person they want to call before they finish this section. Others may need to look at a week on the calendar and choose a quiet stretch of time. Either way, the act becomes easier to carry out once the person and the time are clear.

Part 4 of 10

The first dots are close to home

Suri’s father, Anantharama Sarma, never graduated from college. All four of his children went on to postgraduate study. The story stays with Suri for two reasons. His father wanted his children to go farther than he had gone, and he seldom asked for anything in return. In “Love More. Expect Less.” Suri considers what happens when the help we give becomes a mental ledger. The more tightly we track who owes what, the easier it is for affection and generosity to turn into disappointment.

Another story shows what care looks like when several people offer what they can. After an infection following eye surgery in 1997, Suri needed repeated treatment and could barely open his eyes. His sister Sharada helped administer medicine and kept him from rubbing his eyes. His friend Vinayak took him to the hospital in an auto-rickshaw twice a day. His mother prayed, his cousin organized a group prayer from Ahmedabad, and his doctor continued medical treatment.

Vinayak’s part is especially easy to picture. There was a friend who needed a ride and then needed another ride. Vinayak kept showing up. The impact of that help came from its timing and repetition.

The book places this kind of everyday care alongside mentoring and public service. It asks us to notice what family and friends are carrying, including work so familiar that it rarely gets acknowledged. One concrete starting point is to take a task off someone’s hands and see what that gives them room to do.

Part 5 of 10

The people who change our coordinates

The book is dedicated to Dr. Narsi Narasimhan, Suri’s mentor, guide, and friend. In July 2001, Suri was traveling through Buffalo on his way to a wedding in Toronto when his bag was stolen. It held his passport and other important documents. Narsi learned what had happened, contacted the Indian consulate, and tried to speed up the replacement process. Suri remembers the reassurance as clearly as the practical help.

Years later, Narsi introduced him to an organization in the energy sector. The introduction eventually led to roughly half a million dollars in lifetime revenue. That result is easy to count. Other parts of the relationship are harder to measure. There was coffee, conversation, advice about entrepreneurship, and help with a family occasion. Over time Suri saw how naturally Narsi used his relationships to create opportunities for others.

Narsi’s influence also shows up in the way Suri describes Edukadu, the e-learning and mentoring platform his team built. When Suri shares what he knows or helps someone get in front of the right person, he can trace some of that instinct back to Narsi. The recipient of one act can become the person who makes a later act possible.

This chapter gives readers two ways to look at their own circle. Think of the people who helped you notice a possibility you had missed. Then think of someone who could use a thoughtful introduction, a little guidance, or the confidence of having another person take their work seriously.

Part 6 of 10

Start with the problem

When Ashok Ganapathy drew Suri into sales in 2005, Suri was already comfortable managing technology projects. Ashok taught him to listen beyond a customer’s first request, handle objections, and follow up with a purpose. Suri began asking what the person across the table was trying to accomplish and what was getting in their way. A skill he had once thought of mainly as persuasion became another way to understand and solve a problem.

Suri saw a related instinct in Van Page, who was working on gate security for country clubs. Van looked past the immediate transaction to what residents, visitors, and security staff would need next. Residents could schedule visitors ahead of time. Visitors could receive directions and a scannable pass. Thinking through the needs of all three groups helped a solution built for one club become useful to others.

Peri asks a similar question in a very different setting. When he notices someone hungry near a restaurant, he makes sure the person gets a meal before sitting down for his own. When Suri asked why he went about it that way, Peri explained that he wanted to make sure the person ate.

The scale and setting change across these stories. The discipline is the same. Pay attention to the person in front of you, ask what would actually help, and follow through far enough to see whether it did. That is how the book connects good intentions with the vertical axis of the map.

Part 7 of 10

What grows after the first act?

In “Impact Has Descendants,” Suri describes the work of Lindsey Nefesh-Clarke and Women’s WorldWide Web. W4 connects people and resources with grassroots initiatives that expand opportunities for women and girls. Suri is drawn to what can follow from a single opportunity. Education or access to technology can affect what a woman can do for herself, what her family can imagine, and what others around her are able to pursue. Local organizations help those opportunities reach people and carry forward.

Suri also traces an unexpected line from childhood to his own work with students. In 1986, as a thirteen-year-old, he carried two buckets of water on a walk of about 400 meters. Years later, while helping young people build confidence and communication skills through Take the First Step, he could remember how much effort an ordinary task could take. He came to see that memory as part of the preparation for work he had yet to imagine.

At a Teachers’ Day ceremony the following year, two chairs carried his name. The organizers had apparently assumed there were two students because he had won prizes in both Tamil and English essay writing. For Suri, the surprise in that hall was discovering that he was capable of more than he had assumed. Years later, his work with students gives that moment another meaning. A young person who sees one thing they can do may begin to ask what else is possible.

What grows from a dot often becomes visible only in hindsight. That is one reason the book gives so much attention to planting it in the first place.

Part 8 of 10

Fifty ways to move, starting with one

The book’s fifty ideas bring the graph down to the level of a regular week. At home, you might do a task that usually falls to someone else. In the neighborhood, you might check on someone or lend a hand with a practical problem. At work, you could help a colleague see how a task fits into the larger project. In the community, you might volunteer for parking or food service, or use a skill you already have to build a spreadsheet or improve a process for a nonprofit.

Experience gives you other ways to help. A first-time entrepreneur may need to hear how you recovered from a mistake. Two people in your network may benefit from a well-considered introduction. Someone doing work you know well may be ready to teach others if you give them the chance. The list is most useful when you choose an action you can picture completing in a real place, for a real person, this week.

Suri also suggests keeping a “Luck Account.” The idea follows a memorable episode in Las Vegas when roulette landed on 18 three times in a row. What he took from the experience was a reason to remember fortunate turns as readily as he remembered setbacks. The account might include a person who vouched for you, a second chance, or an unexpected kindness. Write down what happened and what it made possible. You may find an example there of something you can now do for someone else.

Part 9 of 10

Try it for seven days

The seven-day experiment asks for one deliberate outward act a day. The actions can be small enough to fit into an ordinary week. The point is to notice what happens when you make them a conscious choice.

1. Home. Do something useful for a family member before they have to ask.
2. Neighbor. Notice a small need nearby and respond.
3. Knowledge. Teach a skill, explain a process, or make time to mentor.
4. Connection. Introduce two people when you can see how they might genuinely help one another.
5. Community. Give some time to a school, nonprofit, faith community, association, or civic need.
6. Appreciation. Thank someone who helped shape your life while you still have the chance to tell them.
7. Multiplication. Invite someone to move an outward dot with you.

Each evening, write four short answers. What did I do? Who benefited? How did it affect me? What did I notice differently? If an act felt forced, record that too. At the end of the week, look for the action that felt useful and that you could keep doing through the next ninety days. Choose one and put it on the calendar.

A group can try the same experiment and reconvene a week later. Instead of comparing the size of the gestures, each person can tell the group what they noticed. Someone may discover they enjoy mentoring. Another may realize that helping a neighbor regularly takes less time than they assumed. Those details give the group a better picture of what it can sustain.

Part 10 of 10

What will you leave growing?

Near the end of the book, Suri recalls an image associated with the Tamil saint-poet Pattinathar. Even an eyeless needle cannot accompany us on the final journey. The smallness of the object gives the image its force. It prompts a different way of thinking about what we leave behind. A lesson may still be used years after the class ends. An introduction may lead to an opportunity the person who made it never hears about. Someone who received help may become the person another family depends on.

The epilogue returns to December 7, 2004. Suri survived the accident and received December 8, then thousands of days after that. He asks what he will do with another 1,440 minutes, if he is given them. By then, the question in the title feels personal. Which action can I take today, with what I already have, that might make a difference beyond the end of my day?

Draw your own two lines. Put a few ordinary activities on the page. Then choose one dot to move. Give it a person, a time, and something specific you can do. The rest of its story may take years to unfold.

Suri Anantharama is an entrepreneur, technology leader, educator, and longtime community volunteer. His work as a founder and his years teaching and mentoring give him two vantage points on the same question. What becomes possible when the time, skills, and opportunities we receive are shared?