“Under poor leaders we feel like we work for the company.With good leaders we feel like we work for each other.”
Adopted from Simon Sinek’s book titled “Together is Better”
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Leadership lessons for the day – Simon Sinek
Adopted from Simon Sinek’s book titled , “Together is Better”
“Leadership is like a muscle , practice everyday to make it perfect”
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Leadership lessons for the day – Simon Sinek
Simon Sinek’s Together is Better is a leadership masterclass.
The following have been adopted from the book:
1) Leadership is an education.The best leaders think themselves as students and not teachers
2) A star wants to see himself rise to the top. A leader wants to see those around him become stars.
3) A leader must be inspired by the people before a leader can inspire the people
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SHELL URSA and role of trusting teams
Simon Sinek in his book titled “The Infinite Game” makes a mention of SHELL URSA and highlights how as a result of having trusting team members the audacious project could turn into a grand success.
Shell URSA initiative was to drill as deep as three thousand feet below ocean level to extract oil.Not only was this a very audacious initiative but equally dangerous for the members involved in this task.
When the team members were taught the value of collaboration , made to feel safe in each other’s company they could express their vulnerabilities in the expectation that collaboration would save the day , come what may the situation.
As a result of trusting teams , encouragement of collaborative environment by Rick Fox , the project ran at 99% up time and production was 43% more than industry standards.
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How “WHY” is different from “Just Cause”
Simon Sinek who introduced the concept of WHY , has very aptly mentioned the difference between WHY and “Just Cause”(One of the pre-requisite for Infinite mindset) in his wonderful book titled “The Infinite Game”.
WHY gives a sense of purpose in our lives whereas a “Just Cause” is the vision which we move towards to achieve fulfillment in our lives.
Please find below some the biggest differences..
WHY Just Cause WHY can be only one There can be multiple “just causes” an individual is attracted towards Is the foundation built from past deeds Is the futuristic vision Gives us a sense of purpose in our lives IS the vision which we move towards to attain a sense of fulfillment -
Mainframe migration to AWS – Options
Mainframes which have been the backbone of mission critical applications for many decades now , can be migrated to AWS cloud to modernise the workloads.
The options to modernise fall under the following categories.The option to choose needs to be considered on a case to case basis.
1) Shutting down Mainframe workloads by:
Rehosting the workload to AWS
- using a lift shift approach using a modern Emulator.
Automated re-factor of code
- from Mainframe language to modern language e.g. Java and run on AWS.
Platform migration
- by running Mainframe equivalent OS and DB on AWS.
2) Augment Mainframes
Support for Data analytics
- – migrating data from Mainframes to Amazon cloud specific DB with Support for analytics.
Develop outside Mainframes
- in a AWS any new functionality and use API economy to connect to Mainframes.
3) Development and test environments on AWS to reduce cost of separate environments on Mainframes.
The following is an awesome link with more description on these options.
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Human evolution vis-a-vis the changing role of human brain
Daniel Pink touches upon this aspect in great details in his book “A Whole New Mind”
Human civilisation in developed economies has moved on through the following stages:
Agricultural Age-> Industrial Age-> Information(Knowledge Worker) Age-> Conceptual Age
The role of left brain and hence L Brain Thinking which defines IQ held prominence till the Information Age.
In the Conceptual Age though IQ alone is no longer sufficient and must be complemented by EQ powered by the Right Brain.
Hence R Brain thinking will rule in this new age.
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What does it take to be a “LinchPin”
Recently I had the honor of reading Seth Godin’s book named “The Linchpin”.
The book is inspiring to the core and explains how linchpins find it very difficult to survive in stable , banal & process oriented factory environments.
For ages , the factory model of working , where there would be a factory owner(owing machines etc.) ,workers(users of the machines) & supervisors , has been the widely accepted norm primarily because of the security benefits it brings with it.
In developing countries , working in a factory environment for a good brand is still regarded as a great achievement.
A factory environment by the way is one wherein the owner has machine and resources ,workers follow instructions and are PERL(Perfectly easily replaceable labors).Machine would be there , manual would be there where workers have to obey instructions and do work for cheap with no space for innovation and managers have to just manage them to ensure processes are being followed to reduce cost and increase profit.
Though this has worked for many years , in the modern day where the world in connected by internet and laptop can be bought for a mere $300 , people crave for fulfillment since machine(laptop) is not something only factory owners can afford.
Hence instead of sheepwalking , linchpins are born who want to move away from a factory environment and dare to do work which very few people can think of doing in order to achieve fulfillment.
Linchpins master the limbic brain and let their rational brain take charge of the fear , stress of the limbic brain when it comes to taking risks in order to create insanely different things to achieve fulfillment.
The biggest lesson to learn is that in this age of the internet and a connected world , sheepwalking has no meaning if you back your abilities and you are in search of fulfillment from your job.A factory environment and related job is for the faint hearted who are satisfied with the status quo and are not striving for fulfillment from the work they do.
Pile on motivation……