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Posts Tagged ‘leadership’

GET up and get going -13

Posted in daily writings and musings of the psychologist, tagged , , , , , , , , , on December 15, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Inertia – the route to killing self

I am tempted to quote verbatim the comments made by one of my blog readers

“Plans are nice to read, but difficult to get done. World is not so smooth place to live-in; external factors are always there to crumble your internal wishes! Particularly in this materialistic world, financial hurdles don’t allow common people (like me) to achieve our dreams. One may say, we have no guts to achieve what we dream. But at the end of the day, when I think of spending sometime in blogging or reading an interesting book a sense of job insecurity creeps into my mind spoiling all other interest” .

Death of human physical being is certain. It has its fixed time, place and the manner. It can come through accident, disease, destruction and even destiny. But many a times we tend to invite an untimely blow of sudden death to our souls and inner selves. That happens when we stop growing instead we start the downward spiral of mental de- growth.  We lose not only interest in every thing around us but we also end up distancing ourselves from our desired for and intended goals in our life. This may happen because we have lost interest in surroundings around us or it may happen since we are tempted to opt for the security of our cushy jobs and the perks attached to it. But the worst situation comes when we do no take any initiative because of the fear of the unknown. A look at the reasons for inactivity and its systems will help here to understand our very own personalities and the   gimmicks we indulge into to accept the death of intellect for future growth.

Our inertia causes downward growth when we:

  • Leave decisions of our life to others
  • Always complain about the lack of time
  • Always complain about lack of resources
  • Always complain about lack of opportunities
  • Get irritated for non achievements
  • Can not find any topic of interest to discuss with friends/ family
  • Simply talk of doing great things
  • Sleep either more or less than necessary
  • Avoid career discussions

The way to self realization is replete with many challenges and rewards. Challenges to understand and synergize our strengths and weakness to either thwart the threats and or also to en-cash and en-value the opportunities. This can come only when we make all efforts to take out some time for our own self development.

I am reminded of the famous words of Dov Frohman when he says “every leader should routinely keep a substantial portion of his or her time—I would say as much as 50 percent—unscheduled. … Only when you have substantial ’slop’ in your schedule—unscheduled time—will you have the space to reflect on what you are doing, learn from experience, and recover from your inevitable mistakes. Leaders without such free time end up tackling issues only when there is an immediate or visible problem”.

We get stuck up in the rut of ordinary routine when we refuse to take out time for ourselves. We must take out time to reflect and think as to which way we can improve our lives, our mental ability, our leadership qualities, our positive yet differentiating strengths to keep us ahead from the others in the race to self realization. Every day at the end of the day we must reflect as to what happened during the course of the day. We must examine in the process whether the experience has been a positive gain or a negative abrasion. Such critical analysis of experiencing will make us imbibe the positive within us for future enjoyments and the negatives will either be left behind or accumulated for   future corrections.

Only a very conscious effort made to learn from our experiences and mistakes can open the path  to the progress and make us effective leaders. Let us begin this today itself  by asking ourselves very basic and simple questions:

  • What was my today intended for?
  • Did I do what I had planned?
  • Did I achieve what was I trying to achieve?
  • What had contributed to this achievement?
  • What could I not achieve and why?
  • Is the non achievement any way affecting my life’s long term plans?
  • In what way is my non achievement affecting others?
  • What can be the long term / short term affects (positive or negative) for me and others?
  • Can I do the same thing differently next time?
  • Can I do any thing to improve upon whatever I did today?
  • Can I make my family, colleagues, co-workers, friends, partners in this route to improvement?

Our introspective reflections will bring forth the positive thoughts amongst others too, whose opinions do count for us and who can be instrumentals/ motivators in helping us get up and get going in a more constructive approach for future accomplishment.

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GET UP AND GET GOING –11

Posted in daily writings and musings of the psychologist, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on October 22, 2012| Leave a Comment »

“Kapoor, I’ve got wonderful news to share with you. Puri had been fired early this morning. He had been called to the managing director’s chambers at 9.00 in the morning and handed over the pink slip. I have just been given this good news from my boss about Puri, whose second in command spoke to my boss instantly after Puri had come out of the top office”, shouted Chawla on the phone lines . He sounded very jubilant on the telephone lines. .
Puri was our super sales manager who had been hired a year ago to steer the company safely out of the de-growth vortex that had set in into the system due to poor handling of the team by the earlier manager( who currently has been acting as number two to Puri) ). He’d possibly played this match to put down the new incumbent and regain his lost glory. That he had tried this was the most well known fact all over the company but no one expected it to happen so soon. It was also known to the managing director that the entire team of the company was tied for most of the time in war games of one up- man ship. Even though the company had missed the last two quarters’ targets, he somehow believed that either of the fighting group will have the talent to pull the company up and show some improvement.
The team also believed that they had a far better capability and the talent pool than any other organization in the trade yet…..somewhere they had failed to click.
Such a situation is common to most of the organizations with people getting scared of losing their jobs and losing their sense of balance and team spirit.
How bad can that further become? I wonder. Certainly not life threatening, but definitely many careers will be put on the scaffolds given the current scenario of mistrust prevailing amongst the top positions of the not so enlightened business organizations..
In our pervious write up we had spoken about the distribution of power created by the lightening of the spark. We had spoken about the empowerment of all those that we come in contact with to become catalysts in our realization of the great dreams .We, when looking at such situations however get convinced that it is very difficult for all of us to share the illusory powers that we get to wield due to our being in particular chair or position.
The process of spreading empowerment amongst other fellow beings is not an easy task. The world plagued by the uncertainties of recessionary trends and the scare of losing jobs and earnings for the day, is facing tremendous competition between the peers, the boss and the subordinate, the organization and its executives handling it. We have in all manners left behind the spirit of hand holding. The race is on to outdo each other in pleasing every boss that happens to be one or two levels above and then pull down the same B—– through the back biting, letting down in tasks allotted and with the hope to, catch the next promotion ladder. Office politics has become a dirty arena of ensuring that it is the neighbor perched on the adjoining table, or sitting in the next cabin that must go first. We also tend to believe that his going most probably could save our physical self even though my soul may go to hell.
The process of empowering others involves sensitivity. It involves being more social, more acceptable and more yielding in our approach to each other .However in the race to ensure self gratification, who thinks of a neighbor, a subordinate or a team member.
Individuals have been trained to look for support and dependence right from childhood when they are taught to walk by clutching on to the finger offered as an aid .As grown ups too we obviously welcome such extended fingers and it is seldom that we will bite the finger that helps us stand up on our two feet. It is this gratitude that earns us the social acceptability and in turn extends the spark of empowerment to the dependent.
A selfless share of power with the attitude of making others share their grievances and grief, and fears and apprehensions can earn many a smiles back to us for our own happiness. We can imagine the positivity that spreads around when there is a smile observed on every face sitting in the room, we occupy to dispense our daily tasks.
Physically every man after a certain age can take care of his own needs, but it is cerebrally that he needs external interaction and stimulant to grow. Let us make it our task to give everyone who we come across the same stimulant. This process has our own selfish interest involved into it. Do we also not need the same stimulant from some other source? If so why not get the same back from our own people by developing good healthy human relationships, understanding levels and a sense of camaraderie.In the next write up we will focus on as to what is it that can make us not only good leaders but also good companions and human beings to help each one of us get up and get going.

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Get up and get going – Part 1

Posted in daily writings and musings of the psychologist, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 30, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Many a times, life becomes a difficult hill to climb. It poses so many uphill climbs and downhill slides full of rocks, pebbles and stones that the mind gets boggled and goes numb. But then the same life also presents the challenges that men and women will love to surmount. Has the mankind not been pleased by defeating any and every obstacle that comes in its way to the progress of life. Can we imagine for a minute the sense of achievement and the heavenly bliss and the excitement Sherpa Tenzing and Edmund Hillary must have experienced when they had hoisted the national flags of their respective countries after having reached the top of the Mount Everest? Did they for a minute ignore the obstacles and the difficulties they had faced while climbing .or for that matter does Bachhendri Pal not remember the avalanches and the snow storms when she dares to conquer the mountains again. I am sure she must be remembering all the tough times, the turbulent weather and the impediments, the life threatening moments and the life saving graces while climbing those daunting mountains again And again. It is the thrill of overcoming the difficulties and the obstructions
But how many of us can look at life as a challenge and take a vow every time we go downhill to bounce back again. We mortals get overawed and deterred by the insignificant obstacles conjured and made big by our fearful minds. We do not try with full faith in ourselves and complete trust in God almighty, because of the negativity controlling our minds. The negativity forces us to negate our own powers, our own objectivity and positivity. The result is that we concede and give in even before the skies above could give us the results of our sincere efforts. Just think of those Olympians who having lost the chance to win a gold medal in one Olympics , do not give up but continue with their practice for next four years with the hopes and determination that next time they will make it.
These truths are not mere stories to motivate but experiences to be shared with men and women to tell them that you still can do it. Just get up and get moving the mountain top waits for you .

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