Friday, 21 February 2014

Traditional v/s Creative Resumes

2/21/2014 12:50:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

Traditional v/s Creative Resumes

HR managers give extra credit to creative resumes during hiring

Every time you apply for a job and send your resume to a prospective employer, you wish that your resume would stand out among the heap of other resumes. To ensure that employers take note of their resumes, job-seekers have started adding creative zing to their resumes. But does it always work? Are they better than the good old traditional resumes?

According to Aditya Narayan Mishra, president – Staffing and director – Marketing, Randstad India, in the tough job market, a candidate who presents a resume outside the traditional format will always stand out in the crowd. The new formats of presenting resume in the form of videos and info-graphics have helped the employer to distinguish the candidate carefully.

Sanjeev Dixit, chief people officer, Allied Blenders and Distillers, believes that there is no harm to have a mix of traditional and creative resumes, ultimately resumes that make sense to the hiring/HR manager clicks. He stated that he would definitely hire a candidate with a creative resume, provided it is extremely lucid and consistent.

Aparna Sharma, country head – HR, Lafarge India Pvt Ltd believes content is the key. She believes that resumes that present important facts and gives an insight to the candidature’s profile is what matters. Just creativity without content is a passé.

Creative resumes should be role-specific

Although a creative resume has to be visually appealing, factual and descriptive with regard to the candidate’s skills and employment history, it should be role specific as well. “A creative director, or a person focused on innovation or user experience, can take this creative approach. However, if the role is more traditional, weightage to creative elements would be less; rather importance would be given to content and experience,” states Mishra.

Jacob Jacob, chief people officer, Apollo Hospitals Enterprise Ltd, believes that creative resumes are not recommended unless the profile, for which you are applying, requires a creative flair – like an ad agency executive, creative writer, branding expert and internal communication executives.

Varda Pendse, director, Cerebrus Consultants believes that creative resumes are good for only certain roles – designers/architects/media personnel/marketing roles. Creative resume in traditional sectors or roles actually may not create impact and may act as a distraction from the individual.

“I recently received a video clip as a resume for a manufacturing role. It was amusing to go through the video and see the individual share his experience and knowledge through a video clip. But I believe, unless one is interviewing for a role which requires analysing attributes such as poise and voice modulation, such a resume would be discarded by the HR manager,” she averred.

Although, the appeal of creative resumes seems to be growing with every passing day, experts believe that these resumes can never completely phase out traditional resumes. “With technology paving way for candidates to present creative resumes, applicants, however, should always bear in mind that the basic version of the resume is very important and cannot change at any point,” concludes Mishra.

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6 Steps To Build Successful Career In Retail

2/21/2014 12:44:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

6 Steps To Build Successful Career In Retail

New entrants need to focus on analytical skills, creativity and decisiveness

According to industry experts, career prospects in the Retail sector look promising in 2014. The boom in the sector is mostly led by multi-national corporations adding retail outlets in India seeing the changing demand and preferences of the Indian Consumers. Owing to soaring consumer demand, retail companies will continue their hiring spree in 2014, especially at entry level and front-line roles.

Vaibhav Singhal, MD & CEO, Savemax shares a 6-step guide to build a successful career in the Retail sector during a *TimesJobs.com High-Tea session:

Education: Technically, one does not need any specialised education to get into the Retail industry. The nuances of retail and categories can be picked up on the job as well.
Skills: There is an ample growth and development opportunities in the Retail sector. The new entrants in this sector should focus on analytical skills, creativity, and decisiveness and risk tolerance. At the store level, one needs to understand the store planning, people management, inventory control, understanding of operations and customer management skills well, apart from being good with data.
Jobs: Demand for talent will grow in functions such as store operations, supply chain management, merchandising, human resource, finance and marketing. The industry will require qualified graduates/MBAs to execute these jobs.
Experience v/s Expertise: Expertise cannot be compromised in any field. One cannot get a good experience if there is lack of expertise to begin with. However, expertise gets enhanced with experience as well. So it is a cycle. One needs to start well and then progress (learn) better.
Job profile v/s brand name: Having a clear job profile is important for all employees. For a candidate it’s important to have a clear picture about the company’s vision, future plans, financial strength, and culture before he comes on board. The candidate should also have adequate knowledge about people who are leading the company.
Focus on customer delight: Retail is a business where focus is on customer delight. New entrants should possess the right attitude, enthusiasm and maturity to serve their prospective and existing customers effectively.Companies can then train them with ground level understanding of consumption patterns in the Retail industry and strategies to attract new customers as good customer service plays an essential role in building a network of loyal customers, which will result in business growth and development. This has to be backed by sound retail fundamentals, basic common sense and the right service attitude.

India’s love affair with WhatsApp

2/21/2014 12:40:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

India’s love affair with WhatsApp

A recent survey by US-based Jana Mobile found that 55% of mobile messaging users in India use WhatsApp.

BANGALORE: Mahesh Murthy, founder of digital marketing firm Pinstorm, is holidaying in Peru's capital Lima. But he's also using the holiday to plan a high school reunion in Kerala some time in August this year.

Even as he soaks in the churches and monasteries of Lima, Murthy is constantly onWhatsApp to unite his jet-setting friends from Seattle, Norway and Holland at the Kerala reunion.

"It's such a smart chat app to stay in touch with the group," Murthy told TOI on the phone from Lima. WhatsApp is India's preferred mobile messaging application. The youth are obsessed, the older folk too are increasingly shifting from SMS to mobile messaging services, especially WhatsApp. This can be a huge benefit for Facebook.

A recent survey by US-based Jana Mobile, an organization focused on redirecting advertising budgets to mobile phones, found that 55% of mobile messaging users in India use WhatsApp. Another estimate puts WhatsApp's monthly active users in India at 36 million, rival Hike's at 15 million and Line's at 16 million. There are also other messaging services including WeChat, Rocketalk, JaxtrSMS, Gupshup Messenger and Nimbuzz. WeChat says it was the second most downloaded app on Apple iOS in India last year.

Sanjay Vijaykumar, founder of Kerala-based mobile internet company MobMe, said the company had a board meeting on Thursday and they circulated the minutes to 25-30 senior members of the leadership team through WhatsApp. "Even before we put out the minutes on paper or email, we sent it using WhatsApp. I trust WhatsApp to circulate critical information. For me, it's a simple, effective tool to connect with multiple groups and get office work done in a jiffy," he said.

Aayush Bagaria, 22, an engineering graduate, said one big attraction was that WhatsApp was free and therefore more cost effective than SMS. "The phone's contacts list auto syncs with WhatsApp, which is not the case with Blackberry or Hike. You can do group chats, and I have several groups including of my college and school friends. But the biggest advantage is the ease with which you can share files like images, videos and audios with large groups," said Bagaria, who recently gifted his aunt a smartphone, partly so that she could get on to WhatsApp.

Kavin Mittal, creator of the Hike messenger service, said India was following a growth trajectory similar to the global one in the messaging space with the proliferation of cheaper smartphones and data plans. Mittal said users will soon be able to do much more on messaging apps. "We've just scraped the surface of what's possible with the mobile internet," he added
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Not converting good starts, says Virender Sehwag

2/21/2014 12:36:00 pm CRICKET No comments

Not converting good starts, says Virender Sehwag

35-year-old Virender Sehwag still has the urge to play top-flight cricket and he intends to stay fit to be in contention. (TOI Photo)

CHENNAI: Virender Sehwag had a poor domestic season when he averaged less than 20 in seven games with only one half-century to his credit.

But the dashing right-hander doesn't see too many mistakes in his game as he tries to make a comeback to the Indian team.

"When I watched the videos of my game, I did not find too many mistakes. The only mistake was that I was not converting the good starts into big ones," Sehwag, who has been picked up by Kings XI Punjab for the forthcoming IPLseason, said.

The opener, in his prime, used to score heavily on green-tops across the world, but Delhi's decision to play on wickets with some grass this season didn't help him. "There were times when I could not score runs because of the grass on the wicket," Sehwag said, adding that "it's not an excuse".

The 35-year-old still has the urge to play top-flight cricket and he intends to stay fit to be in contention. "Fitness is crucial and the domestic first-class season helped me stay in shape."

Sehwag met a few underprivileged children on the request of his friend S Ramakrishnan, a former video analyst of the Indian team.

Fine-tuning has limits; it's time to create.....In his first interview as Microsoft CEO, Nadella,...Short look of his Interview

2/21/2014 12:15:00 pm EDUCATION, JOBS, TECHNOLOGY No comments

Fine-tuning has limits; it's time to create

File photo: Satya Nadella

When Microsoft tapped Satya Nadella as its third chief executive, the technology giant turned to a longtime engineering executive and company insider. He takes over at a critical time, as Microsoft grapples with both strategic and cultural challenges. In his first interview as CEO, Nadella, just weeks into his job, talks about leadership lessons from his predecessors, his management style and fostering innovation. This interview has been edited and condensed.

Q: What leadership lessons have you learned from your predecessor, Steve Ballmer?

A: The most important one I learned from Steve happened two or three annual reviews ago. I sat down with him, and I remember asking him: "What do you think? How am I doing?" Then he said: "Look, you will know it, I will know it, and it will be in the air. So you don't have to ask me, 'How am I doing?' At your level, it's going to be fairly implicit."

I went on to ask him, "How do I compare to the people who had my role before me?" And Steve said: "Who cares? The context is so different. The only thing that matters to me is what you do with the cards you've been dealt now. I want you to stay focused on that, versus trying to do this comparative benchmark." The lesson was that you have to stay grounded, and to be brutally honest with yourself on where you stand.

Q: And what about Bill Gates?

A: Bill is the most analytically rigorous person. He's always very well prepared, and in the first five seconds of a meeting he'll find some logical flaw in something I've shown him. I'll wonder, how can it be that I pour in all this energy and still I didn't see something? In the beginning, I used to say, "I'm really intimidated by him." But he's actually quite grounded. You can push back on him. He'll argue with you vigorously for a couple of minutes, and then he'll be the first person to say, "Oh, you're right." Both Bill and Steve share this. They pressure-test you. They test your conviction.

Q: There's a lot of curiosity around what kind of role Bill is going to play with you.

A: The outside world looks at it and says, "Whoa, this is some new thing." But we've worked closely for about nine years now. So I'm very comfortable with this, and I asked for a real allocation of his time. He is in fact making some pretty hard trade-offs to say, "OK, I'll put more energy into this." And one of the fantastic things that only Bill can do inside this campus is to get everybody energized to bring their A-game. It's just a gift.

Q: What were some early leadership lessons for you?

A: I played on my school's cricket team, and there was one incident that just was very stunning to me. I was a bowler - like a pitcher in baseball - and I was throwing very ordinary stuff one day. So the captain took over from me and got the team a breakthrough, and then he let me take over again.

I never asked him why he did that, but my impression is that he knew he would destroy my confidence if he didn't put me back in. And I went on to take a lot more wickets after that. It was a subtle, important leadership lesson about when to intervene and when to build the confidence of the team. I think that is perhaps the No. 1 thing that leaders have to do: to bolster the confidence of the people you're leading.

Q: Tell me about your management approach in your new role.

A: The thing I'm most focused on today is, how am I maximizing the effectiveness of the leadership team, and what am I doing to nurture it? A lot of people on the team were my peers, and I worked for some of them in the past. The framing for me is all about getting people to commit and engage in an authentic way, and for us to feel that energy as a team.

I'm not evaluating them on what they say individually. None of them would be on this team if they didn't have some fantastic attributes. I'm only evaluating us collectively as a team. Are we able to authentically communicate, and are we able to build on each person's capabilities to the benefit of our organization?

Q: Your company has acknowledged that it needs to create much more of a unified "one Microsoft" culture. How are you going to do that?

A: One thing we've talked a lot about, even in the first leadership meeting, was, what's the purpose of our leadership team? The framework we came up with is the notion that our purpose is to bring clarity, alignment and intensity. What is it that we want to get done? Are we aligned in order to be able to get it done? And are we pursuing that with intensity? That's really the job.

Culturally, I think we have operated as if we had the formula figured out, and it was all about optimizing, in its various constituent parts, the formula. Now it is about discovering the new formula. So the question is: How do we take the intellectual capital of 130,000 people and innovate where none of the category definitions of the past will matter? Any organizational structure you have today is irrelevant because no competition or innovation is going to respect those boundaries. Everything now is going to have to be much more compressed in terms of both cycle times and response times.

So how do you create that self-organizing capability to drive innovation and be focused? And the high-tech business is perhaps one of the toughest ones, because something can be a real failure until it's not. It's just an absolute dud until it's a hit. So you have to be able to sense those early indicators of success, and the leadership has to really lean in and not let things die on the vine. When you have a $70 billion business, something that's $1 million can feel irrelevant. But that $1 million business might be the most relevant thing we are doing.

To me, that is perhaps the big culture change - recognizing innovation and fostering its growth. It's not going to come because of an org chart or the organizational boundaries. Most people have a very strong sense of organizational ownership, but I think what people have to own is an innovation agenda, and everything is shared in terms of the implementation.

Q: How do you hire?

A: I do a kind of 360 review. I will ask the individual to tell me what their manager would say about them, what their peers would say about them, what their direct reports would say about them, and in some cases what their customers or partners may say about them. That particular line of questioning leads into fantastic threads, and I've found that to be a great one for understanding their self-awareness.

I also ask: What are you most proud of? Tell me where you feel you've set some standard, and you look back on it and say, "Wow, I really did that." And then, what's the thing that you regret the most, where you felt like you didn't do your best work? How do you reflect on it?

Those two lines of questioning help me a lot in terms of being able to figure people out. I fundamentally believe that if you are not self-aware, you're not learning. And if you're not learning, you're not going to do useful things in the future.

Q: What might somebody say in a meeting that, to you, sounds like nails on a chalkboard?

A: One of the things that drives me crazy is anyone who comes in from the outside and says, "This is how we used to do it." Or if somebody who's been here for a while says, "This is how we do it." Both of them are such dangerous traps. The question is: How do you take all of that valuable experience and apply it to the current context and raise standards?

Q: Any final big-picture thoughts on how you're going to approach your new role?

A: Longevity in this business is about being able to reinvent yourself or invent the future. In our case, given 39 years of success, it's more about reinvention. We've had great successes, but our future is not about our past success. It's going to be about whether we will invent things that are really going to drive our future.

One of the things that I'm fascinated about generally is the rise and fall of everything, from civilizations to families to companies. We all know the mortality of companies is less than human beings. There are very few examples of even 100-year-old companies. For us to be a 100-year-old company where people find deep meaning at work, that's the quest.

Samsung Galaxy Star Trios with triple-SIM support listed on Brazilian site

2/11/2014 11:22:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

Samsung Galaxy Star Trios with triple-SIM support listed on Brazilian site

Following LG, Samsung introduced its triple-SIM handset in Brazil, called the Galaxy Star Trios. The low-end handset supports three SIM cards, and features refreshed specifications compared to its predecessor, the Samsung Galaxy Star S5280, which got released in first half of 2013. For now, pricing and availability details have not been provided.

Listed on the Brazil's official Samsung website, the Galaxy Star Trios runs on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean without promises or expectations for any software updates. The Galaxy Star Trios features a 3.1-inch QVGA (240 x 320 pixels) TFT display. The smartphone is powered by a single-core 1GHz Snapdragon S1 processor paired with 512MB of RAM.

The Galaxy Star Trios misses out on front-facing camera but includes a 2-megapixel rear shooter. The budget device comes with a 4GB of built-in storage that is expandable via microSD card (up to 32GB). The smartphone also supports Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, 3G connectivity and Bluetooth 4.0.

A 1300mAh battery backs the smartphone. The handset also measures 61 x 106 x 11mm and weighs around 105 grams. The Samsung Galaxy Start Trios is available in Black colour variant.

Recently, a new budget Android-powered handset from LG, the Optimus L1 II Tri, was also found to belisted on the company's official Brazilian website along with its price and specifications.

The LG Optimus L1 II Tri runs on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean OS. It has been also noted that the handset comes with support for three SIM cards, which are also the most highlighted features of the device. The screen size and resolution along with camera, memory and built-in storage closely resemble the Samsung Galaxy Star Trios' specifications.

Samsung Galaxy Star Trios

KEY SPECS

Display

3.10-inch

Processor

1GHz

Front Camera

Resolution

320x240 pixels

RAM

512MB

OS

Android 4.1

Storage

4GB

Rear Camera

2-megapixel

Battery capacity

1300mAh

See full Samsung Galaxy Star Trios specifications

Nokia to unveil budget Android smartphone at MWC 2014: Report

2/11/2014 11:20:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

Nokia to unveil budget Android smartphone at MWC 2014: Report

Nokia will unveil a low-cost smartphone running a version of Google Inc's Android operating system, despite the company's close partnership with Microsoft Corp and its competing Windows system, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

The handset division of the Finnish company, which is in the final stages of being acquired by Microsoft, will show off the new phone at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona later this month, the report said on Monday, citing unidentified sources who were familiar with the matter.

Nokia and Microsoft declined to comment.

The new Android phone will be aimed at emerging markets and will not feature some of Google'shigher-end, custom Android features.

Microsoft and its main handset partner Nokia have struggled to make an impression in the smartphone market dominated by Samsung's Android devices and Apple Inc's iPhone.

According to technology research firm, Strategy Analytics, 79 percent of smartphones shipped worldwide last year ran on Android, 15 percent were iPhones running Apple's iOS and only 4 percent ran Windows Phone software.

(Also see: Android in 79 percent of smartphones sold in 2013, iOS share falls: SA)

Nokia has been rumoured to be developing a budget Android smartphone for some months now, a device that is supposedly being developed under the Project Normandy programme.

Expected to be called Nokia X, the rumoured low-cost Android handset is said to sport a highly customised, or forked version, of Google's Android operating system, such as what Amazon uses for its Kindle Fire range of tablets.

While previous reports claimed the Nokia X smartphone would run a forked version of Android 4.4 KitKat, one of the most recent purported leaks suggested the Finnish manufacturer was using Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Stay tuned for more details about Nokia's rumoured budget Android phone ahead of its expected MWC 2014 launch.

Written with inputs from Reuters

Spectrum auction February 2014: Bids total Rs. 58,332 crores by end of day seven

2/11/2014 11:19:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

Spectrum auction February 2014: Bids total Rs. 58,332 crores by end of day seven

Telecom companies have put in bids worth Rs. 58,332 crores in the spectrum auction at the end of 49 rounds on the 7th day of bidding on Monday.

The amount is about 86 percent of what the 3G auction fetched in 2010, although the current round has far more spectrum for two bands - 900MHz and 1800MHz - on the block.

"Total 49 rounds were over Monday. Total bids worth Rs. 58,332.82 crores were received which is 21.7 percent more than the total value of radiowaves put up for the auction, at the base or reserve price. Bidding will continue tomorrow," Telecom Secretary MF Farooqui said.

He added that bids worth Rs. 34,743.2 crores have been received for 1800MHz - about 98.8 percent of the total value of radiowaves put up for sale, at the base price.

However, in case of 900MHz, which has received bids worth Rs. 23,589.62 crores, the value has exceeded by 85 percent at the base price.

The government will now get at least Rs. 17,362.66 crores in the current fiscal from the auction in case companies opt for instalment mode.

The bidders can pay the part of the money upfront and the remaining amount over a maximum of 10 yearly instalments.

Out of five online spectrum auctions, the present auction is largest in terms of radiowaves on sale, and third longest till date in terms of duration.

3G auction in 2010 lasted for 34 days, broadband wireless access (BWA) ended in 16 days. 2G auction in November 2012, on the other hand, ended in just two days, while the CDMA auction in March last year concluded the same day.

There is no time limit for the sale of spectrum and the duration of the current auction will depend on the appetite of the eight companies in the fray Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular, Reliance Jio Infocomm, Aircel, Tata Teleservices, Telewings (Uninor) and Reliance Communications.

The government has put on the block about 385MHz of spectrum in the 1800MHz band, and 46MHz in 900MHz band.

Samsung Galaxy S5 spotted on AnTuTu benchmarks in two variants: Report

2/11/2014 11:16:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

Samsung Galaxy S5 spotted on AnTuTu benchmarks in two variants: Report

Ahead of the much-anticipated debut of Samsung's next flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S5, thought to be scheduled for February 24 at Barcelona, a new report has seemingly revealed two variants of the device.

Sammobile in a report has claimed that Galaxy S5 has been spotted on AnTuTu benchmarks in two variants: SM-G900H and SM-G900R4. Earlier, a report had claimed that the South Korean manufacturer might unveil two variants of the alleged Galaxy S5: a metal variant which and a plastic variant.

Sammobile speculates that Samsung might follow the lead of Apple and release two different models (like the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c) of its Samsung Galaxy S5 targeted at different price segments.

According to the report, the alleged SM-G900R4 model of the Galaxy S5 comes with a 2.5GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 (MSM8974AC) processor, Adreno 330 GPU, 3GB RAM, QHD display (1440x2560) and 32GB inbuilt storage. Further, the alleged SM-G900R4 is seen sporting a 16-megapixel rear camera alongside a 2.1-megapixel front-facing camera. The Samsung Galaxy S5's rumoured SM-G900R4 variant runs Android 4.4.2 KitKat, with no word on the TouchWizUI. The alleged Galaxy S5's SM-G900R4 model scores 31,843 on the AnTuTu benchmark.

On the other hand, the alleged SM-G900H Galaxy S5 variant comes with an identical camera sensor and software as seen on the SM-G900R4 model. Its rumoured other specifications are quite different, with a 1.5GHz Samsung Exynos 5422 processor, ARM Mali-T628 GPU, 2GB of RAM, a full-HD display, and 16GB inbuilt storage. It reportedly scores 35,445 on AnTuTu benchmarks.

Samsung has confirmed its "UnPacked 5" event at the sidelines of MWC 2014 on February 24 in Barcelona. Earlier, a report citing an insider with knowledge of Samsung's plans suggested that theGalaxy S5 unveiling will be a low-key event. According to the report, Samsung Galaxy S4's underperformance in terms of sales, despite of a flashy launch in New York last year has been a reason for the company to go for a toned-down event. In addition, the report also noted that Samsung could showcase the Galaxy Gear successor along with Galaxy S5 at MWC.

The Galaxy S5 is widely expected to feature the fingerprint scanner, which is said to be integrated into the device's display panel.

Nokia Asha 502 review

2/11/2014 11:14:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

Nokia Asha 502 review

Nokia, the Finnish smartphone and tablet maker, has always been considered a game changer in the ever-evolving smartphone industry. As a rival to other world leaders including Samsung and Apple, the firm fell behind for a while but has now made a huge comeback with its line of Lumia devices running the Windows Phone OS.

At last year's Nokia World event, the company introduced six new handsets. While the high-end phablets took the spotlight, Nokia also made sure that it still caters to the needs of its budget customers. Introduced at the event, the Nokia Asha 502 budget smartphone is a shining example of how hard the firm is still trying to take over the low-end smartphone market by stuffing a bunch of impressive features into a small-sized device.

The Nokia Asha 502 is the successor to the Asha 501, and has some noticeable bodily and internal OS feature tweaks.

In hand, the Asha 502 feels both compact and strong. We found its build and overall design very appealing, and the phone itself is comfortable to carry around.

After spending a decent amount of time with the Asha 502, testing its battery life, camera, Internet connectivity, gaming capabilities and much more, here is what we think about this budget handset.

Build quality and design
The Nokia Asha 502 is extremely comfortable to hold, as its sharp corners give the user a better grip and reduce the chances of it slipping and falling. The small device measures 99.6 x 59.5 x 11.1mm and is well suited for users who have average or small hands. One its most distinctive features is the plastic monoblock body. The entire back panel and all four edges of Asha 502 are encased in a transparent material, giving the handset a crystallized effect.

Dedicated hard keys are usually found on the sides of a handset, and Nokia offers exactly what a user needs. Both the lock key and the two volume keys are closely placed on the right side of the handset, but are not so close that a user could accidently press the wrong button.

The buttons are easy to locate even in low-light situations as they are slightly elevated from the body surface. There is no dedicated camera button, but the feature can be accessed with a single swipe on the touchscreen.

The Nokia Asha 502 has a small microphone on the bottom-right corner along with a Micro-USB connector and a 3.5mm headphone port placed on the left and right of the top panel respectively. Nokia has given the left edge of the handset a clean look. The rear panel has a camera centred at the top, with a small but powerful LED flash to its right. Just below the camera, a large Nokia logo is embossed into the transparent sheath. There's a thin speaker on the bottom, leaving the rest of the rear panel blank.

The front panel houses a small 3-inch screen and a speaker grille, with Nokia's logo between them. Below the screen is a single capacitive touch button for going back to the previous screen or closing apps.

On removing the Asha 502's back panel, one can see the removable battery taking up most of the space, with slots for the first SIM just above it. The slots for the second SIM and microSD card are on either side.

Display
The Nokia Asha 502's 3-inch screen is smaller than those of other devices in the same price segment. Users coming from phones with 4-5-inch screens might be able to get used to it, but if you like the feel of phablet devices that are currently popular, you'll find the small screen cumbersome to operate.

The Nokia Asha 502's multi-touch screen features a QVGA (320 x 240 pixels) resolution. The screen can display only 256,000 colours as opposed to the full range of 1.6 million colours that is the usual standard. When set to full brightness, the screen is easily visible under direct sunlight.

Software/Interface
The Nokia Asha 502 runs on the latest Asha OS, version 1.1, which is an update to the software used by the Asha 501. The OS uses simple swipe gestures for most actions, and the back button is mainly used to close apps and return to the main menu screen.

The Asha 502, like other Asha models, comes with a feature called Fastlane, which helps users access apps quickly, without searching through the main apps page. The Fastlane window shows the apps which have been used most recently. One can navigate to the Fastlane view by unlocking the device and simply swiping towards the right from the main apps page.

As seen on Nokia's higher-end handsets running Windows Phone 8 OS, the Nokia Asha 502 also allows users to change the positions of icons or delete entire apps by simply long-pressing on any icon.

The settings app gives you direct access to the Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Flight Mode, and Dual-SIM settings, amongst others. The Personalisation section lets you select ringtones and vibration settings along with the wallpaper, lock screen image and Fastlane settings.

Since the Asha 502 is a budget handset, users will have to put up with limited customisation options for things like the Fastlane settings, and limited background apps.

The phone struggles to load heavy websites in its browser, but it can run optimised Java games such as Assassin's Creed 3 and Asphalt 6: Heat. The graphics are not impressive, and users who expect even average quality graphics will be disappointed.

The Asha 502 includes one of the most useful features that Nokia recently added to its Lumia phones, the Glance screen. Glance shows the time and notifications on the screen even after the phone has gone into standby mode.

Nokia's Xpress browser opens most websites quickly because data goes through Nokia's server where it is compressed before being delivered. However, it fails when it comes to running heavy Java-enabled websites. Up to six tabs can be open at any time. Some of the popular apps which come preloaded on the device are Facebook, Twitter, Line, Wechat and WhatsApp. We also tried watching some Youtube videos on the handset, which turned out better than we expected.

Camera
Even though it's a budget device, the Asha 502 has a 5-megapixel fixed-focus rear camera with a f/2.4 aperture and an LED flash with a range of one metre. There's no front-facing camera and very few camera software features.

The camera interface of Asha 502 is pretty easy to operate. The camera app can be directly accessed from the lock screen by swiping upwards. Once open, you can long-press on the screen to access the camera settings which include flash adjustment options, self-timer, white balance, filters, camera shutter sound and a choice of five resolutions.

The Asha 502's camera is just about average when it comes to image quality and clarity despite its 5-megapixel resolution. Images captured in bright sunny conditions look good, but like most such handsets, the Asha 502 fails in low-light situations. You can't see much detail on the device's small screen, but images shot in low-light are grainy and unclear.

Features and performance
In use some stuttering was noticeable while swiping between screens, and there was a few seconds' lag while closing applications. However, by long-pressing the back button, we were able to kill apps faster. Nokia says you can double-tap the screen to wake the phone from sleep, but 6-10 were usually required before the feature worked.

The phone has very little internal memory, with only a few MB free for users. However, the handset comes bundled with a 4GB microSD card, and you can use cards up to 32GB in size. We also noted that it took a considerable amount of time for the handset to show the contents of the memory card, which we suspect is due to the low amount of RAM.

One of the features Nokia has been known for in India is call quality. The Asha 502 was decent enough, and it did not lose network connectivity even in basements. Similarly, people on the other end of our calls also reported clear quality.

The 1010mAh battery was very impressive, as the phone made it through two consecutive days of usage with a single charge.

The FM radio on Nokia Asha 502 is average and the headset needs to be plugged in for the application to work.

The Nokia Asha 502 is undoubtedly a fingerprint magnet. After a little time, the screen as well as the crystalline cover will accumulate smudges, and you'll have to wipe the phone repeatedly to make it look good.

Verdict
To sum it up in few words, the Nokia Asha 502 is a very basic phone with the simplest features one can expect in this segment. The handset is best suited for light users, who will use it mainly for calls, texts and very occasional social networking.

The handset lacks features that other manufacturers offer in this price range, such as 3G connectivity, bigger display, multi-touch functionality and a better processor for quick operations. A few alternatives to consider are Samsung Galaxy Pocket Neo, Samsung Rex 90 and LG T585. The Asha 502 thus has a lot of room for improvement.

The handset is priced at Rs. 5,739 on the official Nokia India website, but it can be bought for around Rs. 5,500 from online retailers such as Flipkart and Snapdeal.

Nokia Asha 502 in pictures

Nokia Asha 502

Rs. 5739

Design
Display
Software
Performance
Battery life
Camera
Value for money

Good
Long battery life
Good pricing
Appealing design

Bad
Small screen size with average display
Low camera performance in low light
Limited apps ecosystem

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Nokia Asha 502 review

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