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Category: Leadership

  • What happened when Steve Jobs visited XEROX PARC?

    When Steve Jobs and his team at Apple visited Xerox PARC , Palo Alto CA in 1979 they were introduced to the new GUI based concept.

    Though Apple had made significant investments in command based interface for its Apple PCs , being an infinite minded leader he exercised “Existential Flex” and decided to adopt GUI for its Macintosh to be released in the next 4 years.

    Needless to say he faced quite a lot of resistance from his own employees who were not comfortable with disruption.

    The fact that the risk paid off is ample testimony to the fact that an infinite minded leader can preempt disruption in enabling an organization to reach great heights in an infinite game.

    Simon Sinek makes a mention of this in “The Infinite Game”

  • What if Kodak had listened to Steve Sasson?

    Steve Sasson is an American engineer who in as early as 1974 is believed to have invented the first digital camera.

    Kodak the pioneer of film photography had made huge investments in vertical integration involving “film based” analog photography.

    Steve Sasson had put forward the idea of embracing digital photography to Kodak leadership.Unfortunately since Kodak was being led by finite minded leaders at that time, noone was willing to exercise existential flex.

    Kodak knowingly turned deaf ear to technology disruption and paid a heavy price when Nikon dominated digital photography and made Kodak bankrupt by 2012.

    Indeed a pity and classical case of what happens when finite minded leaders are blinded by unknowns in the infinite game.

    Simon Sinek’s book titled “The Infinite Game” makes a mention of the same.

  • What is “shiny object syndrome”?

    Whenever a new idea arises , need not always mean it has merit.

    Frequently followers of leaders who need a group of “yes” men around , feel the need to say “yes” to a new thought or idea espoused by a finite minded leader.

    More often than not since these ideas do advance a “just cause” , these lead to distraction and the followers enticed by such ideas are eventually flummoxed and exhausted.

    Hence the need to be judicious to stay away from them.

    Simon Sinek’s “The Infinite Game” makes a mention of this.

    For more details on this , please refer to tge following link:(Source personalexcellence)

    https://personalexcellence.co/blog/shiny-object-syndrome/

  • Existential flexibility explained

    Existential flexibility is the ability of an infinite minded leader to initiate a disruption to a strategy or business model in order to advance a just cause.

    To explain this in more details, very frequently it may so happen in an infinite game , a just cause may become fuzzy and adoption of new strategy , technology , model may be required , albeit at a cost to stay relevant.

    Needlessly to say this would involve risk and beyond the realm of a finite minded leader who would be more comfortable with the status quo.

    Simon Sinek mentions this in his book titled “The Infinite Game”

  • Infinite minded leader – James Sinegal

    Learn from the following wikipedia link , more about James Sinegal the former CEO of COSTCO whose investment of “will” over “resources” has made COSTCO wholesale what it is today.

    A truly infinite minded leader who finds a mention in many of Simon Sinek’s videos.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Sinegal

  • Role of a “worthy rival” in an infinite game

    Historically if we look at business , numerous examples show how losing sight of a worthy rival , led to complaecency and eventual extinction of a company.

    When an organization has rivals , survival is the key even to the extent to thinking of disruption opportunities.The moment a company dominates with apparently no sight of good competitors gradually complaecency sets in.

    Look at the following examples of :

    1) MP3 players , walkmans when Apple came up with iPod.

    2) Kodak going out of market in the digital era

    3) Blackberry going out of market with the advent of iPhone

    4) Blockbuster underestimating disruption from companies like Netflix.

    These examples prove beyond doubt how the presence of a “worthy rival” is so very important for an infinite minded organization who wants to keep playing an infinite game.

    Simon Sinek mentions this in “The Infinite Game”.

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  • Nothing can be more infinite minded than this Apple ad

    This ad of Steve Jobs dates back to as early as August 1981.This was a time when IBM was about to enter the PC industry being dominated by Apple.

    Instead of trying to downplay a big name like IBM , Apple’s approach was to welcone its Worthy Rival in order to get better by the day.

    Please have a look at the ad , link below(source http://www.inc.com)and spare sone time to admire the infinite mindedness of Apple.These are qualities that has made Apple the company it is today.

    https://www.inc.com/bill-murphy-jr/37-years-ago-steve-jobs-ran-apples-most-amazing-ad-heres-story-its-almost-been-forgotten.html

    Simon Sinek mentions the same in his book titled “The Infinite Game”.

  • “Disruption” is for the infinite minded , “Adoption” is for the finite minded

    There are numerous business examples that showcase this fact.

    Let us take the case of the mobile phone market.Apple took the industry by storm with its disruptive iPhone.Neither did it copy anyone but came up with a disruptive design aimed at relieving the pain point of a mobile phone user.

    On the contrary if we look at the then market leader, Blackberry instead of focusing on its iconic QWERTY to build a separate niche , its finite mindset made it panicky and eventually forced it to copy Apple.

    Needless to say it led to the demise of the once iconic brand.

    Simon Sinek points this out in “The Infinite Game” to highlight the fact that in an infinite game disruption by means of an infinite mindset is the way forward.Adoption led by a finite mindset will be shortlived and eventually will force the player to quit the game.

  • “Cause Blindness” – What is it?

    When an individual is selfishly engrossed in his/her cause/motive , without any care for others around , he/she suffers from “Cause Blindness”.

    This is very harmful for an individual wherein he/she loses sight of own “weaknesses” & others “strengths”.

    More often than not this kind of mentality is driven by a finite mindset and can be very detrimental in the long run.

    Simon Sinek mentions this in “The Infinite Game”.

  • Infinite minded leader – Alan Mulally

    Refer the link below to know more about Alan Mulally and how making use of a infinite mindset revived Ford Motors from bankruptcy.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Mulally