Tag Archives: Life

Great Leaders, Know all their people well.

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Once in a talent review discussion, one of my bosses requested a young Business Leader to consider a CV of a candidate (top talent), the candidates name was blanked out in the CV. The business leader read the CV, said, “this is a fantastic profile, this person has such rich experience and has established a track record of success”. He asked my boss, “why the name is blanked out? Who is this person”? Then, my Boss told him, that, “he is one of your direct reports, who was hired before you were hired in the company”. He added, “I am sensing from this talent review discussion that you don’t seem to appreciate the potential in him” – Boss was direct but, very calm and constructive. The business leader reflected on the discussion and apologised, for not knowing his people he hadn’t hired directly. He was genuinely sorry about it.

What I learned from that interaction was as follows:

1) As leaders you shouldn’t value people, who are only hired by you. It’s a trait of a great leader to know all his people and all about them. No assessment report can ever replace the first hand knowledge about a person his experiences and background. Just coz a person wasn’t hired by you doesn’t mean he/she is less talented.

2) How senior leaders effectiveny coach and give feedback to other leaders in certain situations. They use the moment or the event to coach and give feedback.

3) I admired the courage of the young business leader, who took it on his chin, reflected upon it, didnt allow his ego to rule over him, accepted his mistake and apologised. He role modelled the art of accepting feedback and learning. This young leader later became one of the best business leaders in the company and achieved tremendous success for his people, his company and as such for himself. Today is he heading one of the biggest regions/continents of his large MNC company.

4) Why profiles or CVs of other unknown or lesser known people look more attractive? Coz, you don’t really know or appreciate the profiles of people who have worked with you or your company for long. Also the brief talent profile created for the talent review process may not be always an adequate representation of the talent – HR should facilitate the talent management process by projecting talent appropriately. Good HR leaders ask probing and insightful questions about talent to their leaders.

5) Talent reviews and discussions is a such a critical rhythm or mechanism for a talent focused organisation. It goes beyond putting people in the boxes. The senior most leader has to lead the talent management process, not the HR head. HR is a custodian and designer of the process – at best a co-owner.

Have you ever felt that you aren’t valued in the organisation coz your leaders don’t know you well? Pls share your views.

leaders #business #experience #people #learning #art #success #event #talent #talentmanagement #cv #leader #hr #designer

Why we refuse to learn from History.

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It seems Spanish Flu pandemic in 1918-19 had three waves, before the virus weakened and we humans built a immunity against it. We are dealing with the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic, today the Delhi HC has called it a Tsunami. It’s a shame that, after 100 yrs of Spanish flu pandemic and despite the stellar advancements in medical technology and practices – we didn’t learn much from the gory past. This is on all of us!

The second wave in India is peaking and it caught everyone unprepared. This wave will certainly flatten. Wisdom lies in preparing for the third one and not getting caught by surprise. So what do we have to do? I guess the following :

1) Get vaccinated – it’s your best defence and chance of survival.
2) Don’t let your guard down after this wave is over and make sure you maintain top health and keep practising social distancing, top hygiene and wearing masks at all times.
3) Let’s all pledge to build pressure and compel our government to invest heavily in our Healthcare infrastructure. We need more well trained and qualified doctors and healthcare professionals, more hospitals that are better equipped, easier access to health insurance and facilities, national stockpiles of critical medical supplies of medicines, vaccines etc.

Please remember this!

What’s going on in the windmills of your mind?

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Windmills

In the windmills of your mind…. this iconic song from the Thomas Crown Affair movie (1968, Steve McQueen & Faye Dunaway) was originally sung by Noel Harrison. As often found common with other rare melodies, this one has a touch of Mozart (The opening is borrowed from his work) is composed by legendary French music composer Michel Legrand, English lyrics by Alan Bergman and Marilyn Bergman. In the re-make of the movie (1999, Pierce Brosnan and Rene Russo) it is sung by Sting. This song has been on the playlist of almost every well-known chamber, symphony or philharmonic Orchestra. Other celebrity singers such as Barbara Streisand, Tina Arena, All Angels, Eva Mendes, Neil Diamond, Petula Clark, etc, have sung and recorded this song in various versions and languages (Lyrics and tune remain the same). It’s an epic!!!

When I like a song and if it stays on my playlist for years, it’s often coz of its terrific composition and seamless blending of superb lyrics, music, vocals, tune, harmony and the overall rhythm of that melody!! And this one has it all. In the movie the song is playing in the background and shows how the protagonist is dealing with his own thoughts and emotions, Thomas Crown is a rich and accomplished person who is seemingly bored with his life and for thrills sake he plans and executes heists and does it in style and challenges himself in order to challenge others who are in the pursuit of catching him. A smart mind leaning towards or flirting with the dark side and yet isn’t dark!!  One thing you wished is, if you found out and knew what and how other people think, especially the ones with whom you have little or no communication. Having communication with a person isn’t a guarantee to accurately know how he or she thinks!!!

This song is very poetic and allows us to interpret it – in our own unique way. This song is a classic depiction of how a human mind deals with its own motivations and temptations. Motivation and Temptation are two things (and not just words) that most people need to be aware of and deal carefully with. Motivation is generally understood as “the basic reasons that drive our acts and behaviors”, whilst Temptation is generally understood as “Inclination towards a sin”. The core meaning of both is very close if not similar.

One cannot, at least yet explain how the human mind works. There has been massive scientific research and now there is a reasonable understanding about the human mind but they are merely suggestions and there isn’t yet any conclusive explanation or finding. Hence as they say, Human mind is a very complex organ and as David Rock says, every brain thinks like a map yet it thinks very differently. Many are or have tried to study and interpret the human mind by observing and understanding human behavior and feelings and then they extrapolate or correlate those to how they must emanate from a thinking process of an organ know as mind (brain). Of course what seems to be clearly established is that, the way you think affects the way you feel and the way you feel affects the way you act and behave. The Think – Feel – Act & Behave chain of links and process.

I like the work done and presented by Stephen Covey, in which he clearly explains the way you can change and influence your and others behavior by influencing their thinking. If you want to change a behavior or a habit then change the way you think and the behavior will in-itself change.

What’s goes on in the windmills of the mind of senior leaders and employees of a corporation or an organization can impact the culture, performance, value system, existence and perpetuity of that organization. Yet we are so focused on assessing, evaluating, rewarding behaviours and the results (which we term as How and What of Performance Management). In fact the fountain head of How (Behavior) and What (Results) is the mind. Thinking is what happens in the windmills of the mind of every person. Organizations that focus, work and believe in shaping the thinking of the employees via using cognitive learning techniques are likely to prosper as opposed to others.

So, listen, feel and know what’s happening in the windmills of your mind… and live and enjoy the song and music of life.

A song that beats the “Windmills of your mind…” the one for me is, “Tusi Na Cosa Grande Pa Me…” have you heard it, if not, do listen to it 🙂

Image Above is Courtesy: A Pic of the Video Clip on YouTube by Petula Clark – Windmills of Your Mind

Astachal and My Art and Habit of Self-introspection

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I enjoyed this view almost every evening for about a decade (from 1975 to 1985) at the Gwalior Fort in India (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwalior). I was then studying at the prestigious boarding school in India, The Scindia School Gwalior (http://www.scindia.edu/). Whilst at school we had a very important and a beautiful ritual, which was the evening prayer congregation of fellow students. This congregation used to take place at “Astachal” the amphitheater of the school. The setting was very serene, scenic and simply beautiful, the amphitheater has a large size statue of Mahatma Gandhi which further overlooks the city of Gwalior with the hills and the sky in distant background (http://www.scindia.edu/asthachal.php). The timing of the evening prayer congregation at Astachal was usually synced with the sunset time of the season.

What I learnt and imbibed as a young student at Astachal was something unique, which serves me well even today and its become my daily habit of doing silent introspection. Whilst introspecting, I look within myself, get in touch with my own feelings and emotions and I ponder over my day; what went well, what didn’t go well, what I did for and to others, what others did for and to me, what made me laugh, happy, exited, sad, etc, etc. I hand over my sad and bad part of the day to my god and during the process of introspection I make resolutions, promises to self and plans for the next day. Every evening after the introspection, I feel the lightest and second best. The day after when i wake up and get ready for the day, I feel the best!!

Since I seem to have achieved some success (at-least my wife and children think so – coz we have grown up together!!) in my career. For the past one decade or so I have been operating as an senior executive in the corporate world – the pressures and stress has only increased and trust me, its always high. There are various things that help me deal with the pressure and stress and this ritual and habit of silent introspection that I imbibed at the Astachal is my daily antidote.

Today I live and work based out of three cities and two continents, every month at a minimum I travel to at least four countries in four different continents, I have a beautiful family that I love, a terrific team that I care for and a fantastic career that I value and to keep it like that, I have to work very hard, make efforts to stay physically and mentally fit and be sincere and true to myself and others. I guess, everybody needs a spiritual fix these days and may be this is my fix, which, I found and imbibed at the Astachal. Last week, when I was having a session with my coach and mentor, I was made to realize that this silent introspection habit is a strength and not many can do it effectively. When asked, how I do it well and effectively. I answered and gave the entire credit to my school, my fellow students, teachers and the ritual I picked up at the Astachal 28 years ago!! so what does this silent introspection help me achieve? it is helps me achieve the five following things:

1) In a meditative form in just 20 mins, I can re-cap my whole day and assess the positive and negative happenings and the related emotions (today not at Astachal but on a flight or in the back seat of my car). I get in touch with my feelings and emotions everyday. Hence, I let go off my negative feelings and emotions every day and I don’t carry them forward.

2) I feel chuffed about my positive feelings and emotions and plan to make them a part of my next day. Helps me stay positive and bright.

3) I apologies to people without any ego, if I have caused them grief and I thank and appreciate people who have helped me and made me feel good, and on almost a daily basis.

4) Most important, I am ready and prepared to have courageous conversation with people who have given me grief and have tried to erode my esteem. I don’t take it lying down!

5) I have a very peaceful and a light evening and enjoy my drink 🙂 and go to bed with reduced stress and pressure.

I dedicate this blog to Mr Chatterjee, our school music teacher who used to often lead us at the Astachal and sing songs such as “Door kahin jab din dhal jaye…” and “Surya asth ho gaya, gagan mast ho gaya…” I still know all these songs by heart. Simply beautiful!! 🙂

Here are a few more pics of Astachal (Courtesy some fellow school boy who clicked them and put them on the web. Thanks mate!!)
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