Pause. Think. Go.

Flash back

It was several years ago that I met him on a Bombay Walk - the ones where they take you around to see and learn about the colonial aspects of S.Bombay. He was a journalist working for a well-known newspaper and I liked his articles on the art and culture of the city. I was happy to see him and for an opportunity to talk to him about his work. So I walked up alongside, introduced myself and told him how much I admired his articles.

'Which article?' he asked.

I mumbled something like. 'Er...I do not remember which one exactly....but...but....

To which he snapped back, 'You haven't read my articles.'

Though I  had genuinely meant my appreciation of his work, as often happens when asked specifically what, you tend to fumble for words. You are hard put to explain what it is you have liked. For, it is just a feeling you have about the person or the work they do.

The person you have expressed your admiration for, thinks your inability to express the feeling is a sign of your insincerity.

Flash forward 

Even after all the decades that have passed since the incident, I still remember the experience with an acute sense of embarrassment. It was Carl Buehner who said, 'They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel.' And his words describe the experience perfectly! 

I think the words of Buehner are particularly relevant in today's lockdown times, when cooped up at home, we tend to spend inordinately long periods of times on social media. Given the large number of posts and messages we have to go through, and the conversations we have on them, it is wise to remember to be careful with our responses. Given the urge to respond quickly to messages, we tend to overlook the feelings our words are likely convey to the receiver. Especially so with the abbreviated words we tend to use to save time and even with the emojis which we choose to respond with.

So before you  respond to messages on the social media, remember to;

•  Pause
• Think - spend a few moments rereading what you have written. 
• Does the language you have employed, convey exactly what you have in your mind? 
• How is it likely to make the receiver feel? Remember, your words may very well have an impact on the nature of your relationship with him or her.
  
• Go - press the Send button.
  

 

 

 

Our Wonderful Senses

Have you ever wondered why you say clip clop and not clop clip, ding dong, not dong ding, or dilly dally and not dally dilly? You might say, it just doesn't sound right and you will be correct in your statement. We all happen to know this rule without knowing it. According to the BBC, the operating but unsaid rule of language at work here is called Ablautreduplication.

The unsaid rule has it that if there are three words, they have to go in the order I, A, O. If there are two words, I is followed by either A or O.

This made me wonder about our sixth sense which tells us when something is 'wrong' inside or outside of us. A niggling feeling tells us a certain order, rule or pattern is just not right. Often, we can't name it, but we know it is there.

All our five senses individually, or together, contribute to producing these feelings similar to what happens in the case of Ablautreduplication. Notice how while listening to a piece of music, we feel it doesn't sound right?

Or when we see someone smile, we instinctively feel we can or cannot trust him/her?

Our sense of smell and taste too, are often trying to tell us that something is right  or not right.

What contributes to this phenomenon? Is it an 'inner voice', a unconsciously trained instinct, or is it some wisdom gained from similar past experiences?

Whatever it maybe, but for now, I am just going to step back, take a deep breath and surrender and be in awe of that wondrous Creator who designed it all.

Learning to be a CEO

“No one is born a CEO, this is an acquired skill”, says Dropbox co-founder Drew Houston. Furthermore he says, you learn the skills on the job.
So what are the key skills in the journey to learning to be a CEO? The journey has three stages to it:
Stage 1: Followership
This stage calls for reflection on one's personal values and belief systems and attempt to bring about congruence between them and those of the immediate boss and the organization.
This stage can very often call for great soul-searching and can be quite tortuous.

Stage 2: Managership
This stage calls for learning  new execution skills - trusting others to deliver just as well as you, building collaborative teams and learning to balance between giving too much control and too much leeway to team members

Stage 3: Leadership
As a CEO one has to graduate from managing people to managing ideas. Not only does one need come up with one's own Ideas that inspire people,  but also to encourage your people to think and to come up with ideas of their own. This means learning the key skills of empathy and listening.

Success is a Greedy Mistress

Success is a greedy demanding mistress. To begin with, she makes small demands - all she is looking for is your passion to be in the game to woo her. But as you gain wins and with It the heart of success, her demands become increasingly greedy - winning not just for the sake of winning,  but for all that it brings in its train - money, fame and status.

This is what I call ‘The Greed of Success’.

Take the example of the Aizawl football club which won this year's I-league championship. To start with, they just wanted to see the best way they play the tournament and lose less. But with time and wins over the giants of football, they became more confident. They started thinking they could finish as the runners-up and ended up winners of the championship and winning the prize money off Rs 1 cr! After the win, Captain Alfred Jaryan said - they don't play for money - ‘money can come in the way of true performance’. ‘We just put our heads down and try to achieve as much as we can’.

Let us pray Dame Success doesn't claim another victim.

How to Become An Expert at Anything

Cricketer AB De Villiers is one of the best strikers of the ball. Asked whether the new rule about reduced bat sizes will affect his game, De Villier’s responded; “I know what makes me good, and it's not a bat. I think I have a natural hitting ability...it's a combination of self-belief, talent and hard work. It's the 10,000 hour rule”.

This rule of ‘deliberate practice’, was first postulated by Bloom and Anders Ericsson. Deliberate practice is not only about practicing what you already know, but also about what you are uncomfortable doing?

Read more about it in this article from The Harvard Business Review, The Making of am Expert.
http://bit.ly/2qGIWSg

What is Learning Ability?

So you thought the knowledge of homeopathy and the practice of yoga is beneficial only for keeping people healthy? Rajiv Bajaj  has different ideas.
A key principle in homeopathy is that the cause of all disease is endogenous (unlike allopathy which attributes the environment also as a cause). Applying this thought to his organisation, Bajaj surmised that all organisational problems were rooted within the system.
Similarly, ultimate success in yogic postures lies in their steadiness and balance. Bajaj applied this same thought to the brand positioning of his motorcycles. Bajaj believes application of ideas and concepts from one body of knowledge to another results in the generation of a new language for addressing challenges and issues.

Learning ability therefore lies in how creatively and effectively you are are able to apply and transfer ideas and concepts of knowledge in one field, to the resolution of issues in another.

Read the whole story here:
http://bit.ly/2q4BnUW

Learning Agility in Today's Times

According to the book The Knowledge Illusion, we think we know a lot but individually know very little. Reason?  We treat knowledge in the minds of others as if it were our own. This may have it's downside as the knowledge of others may not be trustworthy.
But when Indigo Airlines flights were delayed due to a problem faced by flight crews, the CEO turned to his friend Rajiv Bajaj for help. Bajaj suggested a shopfloor technique which solved the problem.
Learning agility in today's times is about the speed with which the right knowledge is accessed, from the right source at the right time.
http://bit.ly/2q6HMCg