Pile On Motivation

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Tag: Motivation

  • “Stress” v/s “Passion” – The Simon Sinek Way

    In our work lives we all search for fulfillment but rarely find so.

    There are occasions though wherein at the end of the day we feel fulfilled but we find it very difficult to articulate the exact reason as to why we feel good at times and not at other times.

    After having slogged for long hours at work we sometimes feel fulfilled yet sometimes very stressed out.

    The following quote from Simon Sinek is so clear and crisp that I was able to very well relate to the same , hope this spreads motivation around as well.

    “Working hard for something we don’t care about is called Stress. Working hard for something we love is called Passion.” — Simon Sinek

     

  • Definition of “Success”- The Simon Sinek Way

    Another crisp and crystal clear Simon Sinek quote that is not only inspiring to the core but very realistic as well..

    We all dream to reach a destination but only when we realize that what we have dreamt has translated to reality is when we realize SUCCESS.

    “Success is when reality catches up to your imagination.” — Simon Sinek

  • Difference between “Vision” & “Goal” – The Simon Sinek way

    What fascinates me about Simon Sinek is the ease with which he articulates his thoughts and make them sound so real. This is precisely the reason his thoughts resonate with me.

    One such example is his difference between Goal and Vision.

    The difference between vision and a goal is the finish line.

    A goal is 26.2 miles. You can simply count the metrics and know when you’ve completed your goal.

    A vision is having a crystal clear sense of what the finish line looks like, but no idea of how far away it is.

    — Simon Sinek,

     

  • Simon Sinek Leadership Lesson – “True Leader is one who shows the destination”

    What makes Simon Sinek’s leadership lessons easy to understand is the fact that we can easily relate to them in our daily work lives.

    One such lesson is when he says “Great leaders show followers a destination“.

    This does resonate with me since this has a relation with our human brain as well. When the destination is clear or a semblance of it is imprinted in the mind of a follower , the human mind is creative enough to reach the destination even if obstacles come in the way of the destination.

    True leaders who walk the talk and are “hands on” are willing to slog it out with the followers when they see their team members struggling to find a destination.

    As opposed to this , there are other leaders who feel insecure by the day and for lack of subject matter knowledge , make the destination deliberately confusing to the followers. A hazy destination confuses the human mind and inhibits the use of creativity. Traditionally these are leaders who are leaders only because of their rank/position and lack true respect from followers.

    As per Simon Sinek , the leaders , who are able to show their followers a destination , are the ones who are able to get the best of their team members and in turn the followers are willing to give their blood sweat and tear & are able to unleash their true potential. This results in insanely productive outcomes.

    This being said it must be said that such  leaders are very rare to get and want of such leaders makes our workplaces so suffocating. Most of the times in the presence of micro-managing leaders , who themselves are not clear of the destination , lack the true subject matter knowledge and intrinsic sense of motivation , workers get frustrated and tired of doing mundane work wherein their creativity and accountability are not put to test.

    We all are in search of such leaders who would make us feel safe , have courage and guts to show their followers the destination…..

    Pile on motivation!!

     

     

     

  • 5 Leadership Lessons, a masterclass – The Simon Sinek Way

    The following link has a recent video of Simon Sinek that I came across recently. The practicality of the 5 principles conveyed via this video fascinated me and enticed me to share this with a broader audience group to spread the word around.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CZx4DTglHJc

    Here are the 5 leadership principles, which if practiced as well as preached would not only help groom and create leaders but would also make workplaces a better and safer place for employees

    1) Go after things that you want to achieve in life without coming in the way of others – Human beings are very creative, when given a destination we are so obsessed that we devise ways to reach the destination through different means. This thus means that different people can have different ways to reach a destination but while doing so we should not cross our paths or come in between others paths. This would enable creation of a blue ocean strategy so very important for modern day leaders.

    2) Take full accountability for your actions – This is also known as internal locus of control wherein we as leaders should not only take credit for any good done but also take responsibility for any wrongdoing without trying to find scapegoats. Easier said than done since this is where most modern day leaders are lacking, they want to take the easier route of escaping when the chips are down leaving their subordinates to the mercy of others. This is where we need to correlate parenting with leadership wherein just like we cannot desert our trouble children we need to make our subordinates/employees feel safe.

    3) Help the ones to the left and right of you – A competent leader who leads by example is obsessed with helping the ones to the left and right of him/her who need help and support. A leader can inspire and get people who believe in what they believe only when a leader practices selflessness and helps people to secure their trust. In such a scenario the subordinates would give their blood, sweat and tear for such an inspirational leader. In the modern day, the leader is so obsessed with I that WE seldom captures his imagination.

    4) Practice being the last to speak – This is an amazingly difficult quality that most inspirational leaders have.Aside from being great listeners , an inspirational leader by virtue of being a subject matter expert knows when to step in and when to give others a chance to speak and express their opinions to feel empowered.The example of Nelson Mandela given by Simon in his video stands out as a great case study for aspiring leaders.

    5) Leadership by position is temporary – A leader is given all benefits , perks , allowances when in power , but this is not something that would be eternal.A manipulative leader may enjoy the best of benefits , perks , power , position but the day the power is taken away he/she would be grounded to reality and would cease to have the support of followers.This is why it makes all the more sense to inspire and lead and make followers rather than be manipulative and force people to follow.An inspirational leader does not need power or position to earn respect of sub-ordinates they become their followers for life.

    Hope these lessons would be able to encourage the leaders of the modern era to make the world a much better to live and work for subordinates/team members/employees seeking inspiration and motivation to make it big!!

    Pile on motivation!!

  • Comparison v/s Advancement , what do we prefer?

    I have been following Simon Sinek’s lessons about leadership and the simplicity with which he conveys his leadership related messages is a real treat.

    Some of the best takeaways from his numerous videos on youtube, his famous books are like:

    1) Serving those who serve others would give us fulfillment and would enable oxytocin to flow through our veins which will make us intrinsically happy

    2) Finite games v/s infinite games of game theory extended to business – Be a player of infinite games wherein you try to make yourself a better version of yourself every single day without comparing yourself with others…Going for comparisons and short term games gives birth to depression , jealously and can prevent us from giving our best

    Those who are engaged in infinite games go for advancement as opposed to comparison by those who are engaged in finite games.

    3) Nervousness v/s excitement – Deliberate practice and hard work can help transform nervousness to excitement where both have the same visible effects e.g. sweating of palms , increase of heart beat whereas the way we make use of excitement has a much more profound effect than nervousness.

    4) The symbols that we send to others in terms of the way to talk , engage will help us meet and be with people who believe in what we believe.In case we find such people they would give their blood , sweat and tear and trust would naturally flow.The basis of this is that we as human beings crave for social bonds being social animals and historically the way culture and country have been formed the same applies to formation of companies and teams as well.

    Pile on motivation..

  • Extending Parenting to Leadership

    The following two videos of Simon teach all of us wonderful lessons related to leadership. My key leadership related takeaways have been summarized below.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=INjECrw7YYs

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wKcRB8CEUd0

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KbYzF6Zy5tY

    Parenting and leadership are similar and require empathy and understanding. Just like a parent cannot do away with a child who is going through a tough time and cannot ask others to adopt him/her, a leader cannot just like that chuck an underperforming employee without showing empathy and understanding the root cause of underperformance. Empathy and understanding are core qualities of a motivational leader. Most Ladies possess care, empathy, and understanding as innate qualities and hence ladies as leaders can do a great job in being motivational leaders to make work places better place to work in

    As part of leadership qualities, find those who believe in what you believe since trust will automatically emerge when such a team is found. All this means is that we are guided by symbols when we try to find similar kinds of people, the only problem is that this way of forming a group is not scalable and needs insight and acumen. At the essence of this logic is the fact that as human beings we are still social animals and have an inherent need to socialize.

    When we build a team we should remember that the definition of a community, country when extended to a company or team have the commonality in that all of these are a set of people with common values and beliefs, hence people will always want to work in a place where leaders believe in what they believe for a better fitment.

    Leadership also needs understanding as to whether we are engaging in finite games or infinite games. Leadership strategies are going to be different based on the games that we are playing. An inspirational leader in a space where finite games are being played is a misfit since such an environment needs micromanagers who would cater to short term targets. Inspirational managers when engage in infinite games would be able to get the best out of their team by spreading motivation since such an environment needs creativity.

    Leadership because of power gives necessary advantages and facilities but that is only because of position. The facilities that are associated with a leader comes at a cost to protect all under you like a parent take risks to handhold their kids. A motivational leader is one who is not carried away by position hence even after surrendering their position people look up to them with loads of respect.

    Pile on motivation!!!!

  • Why analyzing data patterns has always been an art

    Super Freakonomics is an amazing book. This book is driven by scientific facts and goes a long way to show as to why studying patterns in data is the most full proof way of coming to conclusions especially when situations go beyond control and need to be quarantined.

    The examples of seemingly trivial solutions being able to cure grave vagaries like puerperal fever, seat belts being able to reduce deaths due to car accidents goes to show that there are times when we can think out of the box and extend solutions from other fields into new unexplored areas. Since our limbic brain understands only signals, at times we fail to comprehend how effective trivial solutions can be to cure seemingly behemoth problems.

    The role of media has been highlighted as well , Kitty Genovese incident, wherein to sell the news facts are twisted and this goes on to have deep impact on humanity down the line. News presented for many decades which sells as hot news, we really need to delve deep and find the true authenticity of the same since facts can be twisted to make the news sell

    Data analysis and data science has always played a major role and numbers/patterns have never lied. What we are seeing in the modern era, the demand for data scientists was always the case over the years now the effect seems more profound due to the high presence of social media.

    Look at data analysis done by Semmelweis for puerperal fever root cause eradication, Robert McNamara for seat belts in cars, Horsley’s data pattern analysis to track down terrorists, proof that good doctors may not have the best reviews, proof that heart ailments can be prevented by taking low cost medicines, the basis for all is data science being able to carve out a pattern from it.The baseball team selection example , with kids who have a full 10 to 11 months more maturity resonates with the message of Gladwell in Outliers on the Canadian ice hockey team selection. This too has been carved out by studying data pattern over the years.

    The best one is towards the end of the book wherein Al Gore’s honest efforts towards reducing global warming by changing human behavior has been compared with injecting Sulphur dioxide into the stratosphere to reduce global warming. Such kind of insights are really illuminating and the very fact that organizations like IV are thinking along these lines gives a lot of hope and belief that the world is in charge of innovative individuals who can think their heart out to save humanity from dreaded problems like global warming.

    Pile on motivation!!!!

  • The golden principles that emanate from the “WHY”

    The following video of Simon is truly a must watch.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=90ct4RVOQ4U

    The following guiding principles that emanate from WHY would help us lead our lives in a much better and proficient manner

    • Serve those who serve others to achieve fulfillment – From the video the examples given by Simon to demonstrate this fact is simply mind blowing. This is true in our daily lives as well wherein if we practice this in our personal and professional lives would release the selfless chemical oxytocin to achieve fulfillment. Selfless love stems from serving those who serves others out of pure respect for the individual.
      • In our personal lives the selfless love can be for spouse, kids, parents.
      • In professional lives this can be for colleagues or even the visionary leader who can make us feel safe.
    • Form tribes with people who believe in what we believe. There will be cynical people who would not believe in what we believe but in the end either they will either isolate themselves or join the tribe.
      • Leaders with a vision believe in forming a team of people who believe in what they believe to create the required synergy.
      • The synergy would enable followers to give their blood, sweat and tear for achievement of the bigger objective.
    • Deliberate practice is the term used to associate expertise in a certain field associated with a select few individuals. We have seen evidence of the same in “Outliers” from Malcolm Gladwell as well. By practice we can overcome our nervousness and convert it into a feeling of excitement when the need arises to up the ante during trying situations or circumstances. The evidence of excitement as against nervousness of London Olympics athletes is an amazing illustration of this principle.
      • In whichever field we are , when we love the work that we do , we are fulfilled by the work we do , we would feel excited as against being nervous when faced with trying circumstances.

    Pile on motivation!!!!

  • When social media becomes a menace

    The following two videos of Simon are truly inspiring to the core.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RyTQ5-SQYTo#

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BOTX0YwLWUA

    Social media and dopamine

    On social media and its harmful influence on millennials the following were my key takeaways:

    Any kind of addiction e.g. drinking, smoking or even gambling releases the selfish chemical known as dopamine which gives us a sense of short term happiness. All of these addictions have an age restriction associated with them violation of which is considered as an offence.

    Very little do we realize that social media in its various avatars like FB , Snapchat , Instagram with the kind of profound influence it is having in our society is nothing less than addiction in its most severe form without any age restriction.

    Social media addiction releases dopamine just like any other addiction e.g. alcohol, gambling etc.

    Social media is an amazing platform to connect with an audience when the purpose is noble enough but unfortunately when used in an uncensored fashion can cause havoc in society especially to juveniles.

    By means of a virtual platform, with absolutely no human touch, social media entices individuals to enhance expectations of getting results really quick without having to go through toil to arrive at a destination. Parameters like “number of likes”, “number of connections” are misleading since they do not involve any face to face human involvement. When we get results without much of a toil, the expectations increase and along with that impatience.

    Impatience leads to signs of depression, anger, agitation and this is a very common sign in millennials when results don’t seem to be easily gettable.

    In this age of smartphones, tabs, mobile apps and all possible social media platform, I think the time has come to take a call as to how to go back to the good old days when human touch used to the central theme of all interactions without using means of connecting through any virtual platform.

    Even though we live in an age of digital disruption we should all remember that we humans are all social animals who need a society to thrive in.The bottom line is that we all love to be loved by people who believe in us and who care for us. This sense of belonging and togetherness is not possible to achieve through virtual platforms and can only happen when we are able to connect with others at a personal level.

    Sense of fulfillment releases a chemical known as oxytocin and comes out of creation of true bonds as against false virtual friendship and connections that social media promises.

    Though virtual platforms and social media have brought in revolution in this modern era, the degree to which we need to make use of them needs to be judiciously decided by us without which this can create havoc in our society.

    Pile on motivation!!!!