What Attitude Are You Wearing Today?

Today is an important day; a job interview or your first day at work or better still your first meeting with that special someone! You get up in the morning pre- occupied with the day. You spend some extra time in front of the wardrobe giving careful thought to what you’re going to wear. You CHOOSE your clothes, you CHOOSE your hair do, and you also CHOOSE to put on that special imported cologne for the occasion. Yes, we all choose our attire for the day. But do we ever CHOOSE the attitude we’re going to wear for the day?

Simply put, attitude is ‘Mood’ for the day. Do you see yourself complaining about the breakfast or thanking for getting a hearty meal in the morning? Do you catch yourself irritable about having to get up early to get to work or do you find yourself looking forward to the endless possibilities that the day holds for you? Do you start your conversations with, “What a gloomy weather” or “What a great day for some reflection!” What do you CHOOSE to wear; a pleasant, positive and cheerful attitude; or complaining, nagging and belligerent attitude?

Do I hear you saying… “But how can I choose my attitude? Life is not all under my control! In-fact, most of my life is not under my control. My teachers don’t know what they’re teaching, my job exhausts me, my boss does not support me, and my salary is peanuts for the amount of effort I put in.” The list is unending and no argument would be able to surpass the multiple layers of events and experiences protecting and strengthening these beliefs.

Last week, while conducting a training program for a group of professionals from a large pharmaceutical company, I met a young man Suvinder Kumar. During the tea break we got talking. I noticed his smiling face and cheerful demeanor. Soon I found myself engrossed in listening to his inspiring story. Suvinder started his professional journey as an office boy at a small law firm operating out of a garage in Chandigarh. His job was dusting, attending to visitors, carrying files etc. They told him not to touch the computers, for he didn’t know anything about them. Today, after eight years of work, Suvinder is a successful professional managing warehouse and purchase function of a large company. Informally known as the IT guru. In his last company (again a large pharma compamy) he managed the IT function of the company. Some journey for an office boy with a duster in his hand!

The key question is, “how did he manage to achieve this breakthrough?” With a slight twinkle in his eye he says, “I always wanted to learn more, I took initiatives and did jobs that no body asked me to do. I started typing letters, designing documents, fixing small problems related with computers. I wanted to grow, I knew that I had started as an office boy, but that’s not where I’d stay.”

Suvinder is an example of choosing the right attitude.

It is our attitude that decides the difference between our success and failure. In management corridors the popular wisdom circulates ‘Hire for attitude, train for skill’. This wisdom is the result of learning over a period of time that if the attitude is positive, one can train the person, however if the attitude is not positive the best of training will not help. From Mahabharat, Eklavya personified ‘Positive Attitude’. Despite being spurned by Dronacharya he managed to learn and become the best archer with potential to pose a challenge to Arjuna’s supremacy in archery.

In reality, we always have a choice! One distinction that makes us human is our ability to CHOOSE. And yet when it comes to choosing our attitude, instead of exercising our choice we let the environment determine our attitude. We let our attitude be determined by the traffic, weather, boss, colleagues etc. but not ourselves.

Today when you stand infront of your wardrobe, don’t just choose the clothes for the day, choose also the ‘Attitude for the day’. So what attitude are you wearing today?

rajesh@peoplefactorindia.com
The writer is a management consultant and a leadership coach.

Continuous Improvement

One competency most prized and valued in business today is that of ‘continuous improvement’… the relentless and never ending quest to raise the bar in any sphere in your life. Let us look at an athlete who, throughout his practice sessions, times himself and focuses on beating his own record each time. The key here is not to limit yourself to work place. On the contrary, start by using this principle in your personal life. In-fact the attitude that we adopt and practice in our personal life surely affects our professional life in a significant way. I am a firm believer that if one does not have the mind set of continuous improvement in one’s personal life one may find it very difficult to adopt the same in one’s professional life. In keeping with this belief think about any area of your personal life where you can say that you are focused on achieving continuous improvement? Is there some thing that you are trying to do better than yesterday or last month or last year?

The first golden rule is that ‘improvement comes from the processes’. Simply by setting new and higher goals you start thinking of how to get there. For example, if you’re trying to manage your time more efficiently, then just set a goal that this month you would reduce your late sittings to half & still manage to complete all the tasks for the day. You’re bound to fall flat on this goal if you just keep doing the same things the same way. Look closely, you would surely identify the ‘time waster’ and ‘fatiguing’ activities; eliminate these. This continuous learning, tweaking & changing is the foundation for achieving the desired milestones. We improve our situation only if we learn that the current situation is lesser than desirable or simply that there is still scope for improvement. We improve by making small changes in the way we do things.

The second golden rule to remember is that ‘God is in incremental growth’. Try losing 6kgs in two weeks… you might actually succeed, but within no time those kilos would be back. Or take a language crash course and learn a new language in just a month, you might be able to correct sentences in that language but you’ll see your limitation in using the language to express yourself. Very soon you’ll actually forget most of it. Any endeavor following the rule of spurts, is sure to fail. As commonly known, any incremental growth would have its peak and might not stay as motivating with time. Well at this juncture, change your goals! The constant dialogue has to be improvement and there are innumerable areas for ‘continuous improvement’. Success then is inevitable.

On the larger canvas, it is this relentless focus on continuous improvement that guides the success of most organizations. Ask any CEO about the mantra for growth, more often than not it is not the big bang; it is actually the small incremental and ongoing improvements at each step and in each process!


In one of my earlier assignments about ten years ago, the CEO had taken ‘Quality Drive’ for the whole organization. Struggling with ‘how to drive home quality’, he thought of not using work environment as the driver. The risk being that the real spirit of quality would get reduced to dead process documents. Continuously improving himself, he came up with an interesting initiative that made a humungous change in the organization’s culture and in the true sense, Quality got internalized. In each of my training programs he took the first slot of half an hour to address the participants. He asked every one to list about four or five areas of personal life where they would like to improve and track the frequency of default, using quality management tools and did the same himself. Simple things like polishing shoes everyday, grooming every week, reading two books every week etc. got shared in his session. Month after month, he shared and asked the participants to share their goals, successes & defaults. This practice germinated from the belief that unless people see continuous improvement in their personal life, they would not be able to focus on the same in their professional life. Wow, what a way to integrate continuous self improvement to continuous organizational improvement!

rajesh@peoplefactorindia.com
The writer is a management consultant and a leadership coach.

Right to complain

A little child is being rewarded by her mother for good behavior. “Mom I want ice- cream!” She shouted excitedly. The momentarily indulgent mother immediately takes the course to the best ice-cream corner… not knowing what she’s getting into. On the way, the little girl is busy describing her favorite ice-cream, “Mom, you know what I like most, the vanilla base with a cashews layer in the middle and then the pineapple ice- cream.” While describing her wish her mouth is watering at the very thought of the world’s best vanilla ice-cream topped with a piece of pineapple! But lo, the best ice-cream corner in town is out of the vanilla flavor. They have only chocolate. Now this little girl is torn apart, she wants ice- cream from this corner only. The thought of walking another ten minutes to reach the not so nice corner did not excite her at all. And here there is only chocolate flavor available. Well she takes it. At her first lick, she gets a pleasant sensation in her taste buds. She likes chocolates anyways… BUT how can she start to enjoy a chocolate ice-cream, when she’d spent half an hour imagining, expecting & picturing a vanilla! Now, starts the complaining, “Why didn’t he have vanilla? I don’t like chocolate, I don’t know why you had to get me here? What a waste?” The mother is completely exasperated. “You’re spoiling your fun, at least enjoy what you have,” she tries to persuade but to no avail. Because while the little girl is enjoying the chocolate ice-cream, she’s also enjoying complaining!

Ever wondered what life will be like without the right to complain? The biggest luxury of life is the right to complain. If this right is taken away from us, for some life may become very boring and for some it may finally dawn that they need to own their own choices!

Recently in a workshop, a participant declared, “But in life we do not always have choices.” My immediate answer was, “Okay, give me an example.” To no one’s surprise, he couldn’t come up with any. Not that he didn’t have a long list of frustrating incidents, but as he thought about them with this new perspective of choices, he didn’t think it worth mentioning those events. He already knew the answer. Sounds so familiar, there are situations where we think we do not have choices. Is it that we do not have choice in any given situation or is it that we do not want to give up the right to complain while enjoying the benefits of the choice exercised? I have a close friend who is stuck in a job he doesn’t enjoy at all- you see the chocolate ice-cream phenomenon. On one of his more than normal grumpy days, I asked him, “So why are you sticking?” With slight irritation, he answered, “I’m not sticking, I’m stuck!” I suggested he just reverse his own statement and repeat it a few times for himself. Like, “I’m not stuck, I am sticking.” I think he tried it, I don’t hear him complaining anymore and he also got a promotion last month.

Take any area of your life that you are dissatisfied with and yet you continue to remain in that situation. You will notice that it is not that you do not have another option available; you will notice that out of available options what you have chosen is the better one, though this was not what you originally wished. It is in this situation that we say that we do not have any option. Essentially we are saying that we do not like the available options and would like to retain the right to complain and grumble.
Your ability to change your reality expands manifolds when you take responsibility of your own situation; when you give up all complaints and accept your choice. It is only after true acceptance of your choice that you get the energy to create new options- to make the best of the current situation being the first. This process of taking ownership and responsibility makes a deeper level change in you. You realize that you and only you are responsible for your situation and only you can bring about any change. While owning your choices can be a big burden, it actually liberates you.

rajesh@peoplefactorindia.com
The writer is a management consultant and a leadership coach.

Appreciate Differences

One thing common between conflict and creativity is ‘Difference’. When this difference is viewed negatively it leads to conflict while if the same difference is viewed positively it leads to creativity. What we need to remember is that ‘creativity’ is one end of the continuum on the other end of which lies ‘conflict’. The good news is that creativity can be learnt. Yes, in this age of algorithmic solutions to most corporate problems, we see some structured programs that enhance creativity or creative problem solving. Before we board the bus of constant creative thought, we need to watch for our own interpretation of the same. Here I am not talking about the genetic inheritance of creativity. Creativity in the professional world of business is actually the ability to draw the best from the available pool of knowledge and information. And this throws open the doors for all of us to be creative!

In our professional life we adopt a negative and an egocentric perspective towards any difference. Since most workplaces have hierarchical organizational structure, invariably the difference gets resolved in favor of the more powerful, leading to frustration, bitterness and lack of commitment amongst others. On one hand the corporate corridors are cluttered with the slogans like ‘if two people think alike one is not needed’ while on the other if a person differs from the ‘significant other’ his life becomes difficult.

Why is it that despite the cognitive awareness that difference is good for the organization, people are not able to encourage and appreciate differences and germinate creative alternatives? The answer is, ‘ego’. Like our material possessions we get too attached with our points of view and lose focus of the real objective. In my professional experience I have observed that if at any point, a difference of opinion continues for more than 3-5 minutes it invariably moves towards a clash of egos and the real objective no longer remains the focus. While we were getting trained as management trainers, we remember this fact being drilled into us thoroughly, “if a difference of opinion with the participants lasts for more than 2 minutes, it is not an argument to resolve an issue. It is an argument to prove a point. The outcome of such arguments is not ‘a new perspective’ instead it is a ‘hurt ego’.”

The fountain- head of CREATIVITY is APPRECIATION OF DIFFERENCE.

A significant tool to use in situations requiring creative problem solving is ‘Brainstorming’. Group brainstorming has a base assumption that when one individual reaches his limit on an idea another person can take the idea to its next level. A caution here is that some ideas generated in the group might sound bizarre or impractical to start with. However, while keeping the norm of appreciating differences, the group can make sense of the ‘out- of – box’ thoughts. For instance one of the legends of corporate is that in one of the brain storming sessions of a tooth-paste company, a person suggested that one way they could increase the consumption of tooth paste was by increasing the size of tube opening. At the outset, a suggestion of that kind at a senior strategic meeting would no doubt have triggered discounting & would have been termed frivolous. However, better sense prevailed and he was asked to explain. This gentleman explained that people applied pressure out of habit, if the tube opening were bigger, they would have more paste on their brushes and hence would consume more! Some of you might remember those aluminum tubes with small nozzles that are history now in the toothpaste industry!!

As a professional, form two habits; seek opinions, perspectives and points of view that are different from yours. Privately, review all the points of view in the context of the objective and arrive at a decision. This will help you in becoming much more effective in people management and creative problem solving.

rajesh@peoplefactorindia.com
The writer is a management consultant and a leadership coach

Connect with People

In the increasing virtual world of high-technology, the ability to build personal connections with others is becoming a critical success factor.

Technology today has equipped the young professionals with an enormous number of digital tools to connect with people like chats, Linked-In, blogging, Orkut and other virtual communities being just a few. Now connecting with old friends, batch- mates, ex- colleagues or for that matter making new contacts is just a click away! So we can safely say that our Generation X, is exuding energy with all the online relations they manage… yes connecting with people generates a great deal of energy.

However we need to ponder over our ability in connecting with real people? In the real world, which fortunately is still a reality for a large part of our life, the rules of connecting with people are quite different. We may not realize but all of us move around with a kind of a notice board on our faces. Some faces scream ‘do not disturb’; while others say ‘stay away’; some others are completely buried in the sounds of their ear- phones oblivious of their environment. How about a face that is welcoming to open a dialogue and build a relationship? Notice yourself reacting to facial expressions very intuitively, almost non-rationally. It’s the same for others. It is your facial expression that tells people whether you are charming or alarming.

People decide to approach or avoid us based on the notice board on our faces. Do you find people approaching you easily or avoiding you? Are you the kind who builds quick connections with others or the kind who can travel for hours sitting next to somebody without even exchanging a greeting? You enter a lift, where per force there would be strangers within your personal space… what is the most common expression on everyone’s face… that of being alone where others don’t exist at all! Almost every one is looking at the numbers being displayed at the top. Some would be staring at their own toes as if reading an important message written on their shoes. And for some others the good old (rather new) technology comes handy, the cell phone helps them avoid any contact with the world.

In my earlier assignment I had a youngster from Chandigarh working with me. This young guy despite having a modest education and background has the gift of connecting with people. He always has a pleasant smile on his face and is most willing to open a dialogue. He is least self-conscious and is very willing to help. Once we were traveling together on a long flight. Very quickly I got into reading my book. This guy for a while tried to read the newspapers but soon he got bored. Next he tried to strike a conversation with me and read my notice board saying, ‘I want to read’. After a while I noticed that this guy was engrossed in an animated conversation with one of the air-hostesses, and she was requesting him to find a job for a close friend of hers who knew Japanese. At present this youngster is a ‘Recruiter’ with Microsoft in Hyderabad. As I reflect on his success, I think one critical differentiator in his case has been his ability to build connections.

In an old adage we’ve learnt that any interaction between two individuals is a sales situation. You could be selling a concept, an idea, a product or yourself in the mind space of another person. In the profession of sales it is taught that ‘people first buy you before they buy what you are selling’.

To develop this critical skill, the one key change we’ll need to bring about in ourselves is to exhibit the same confidence with people that we exhibit with digital tools to build connections. In the real world, we need to adopt a few every day practices: observe our own facial expression, smile at the world – we have only one life, greet strangers, be genuinely interested in knowing another human being and her story, offer help and finally notice the good in people! In a nutshell, check your facial notice board.

What Company Do You Keep?

Often in my workshops people say, “Tell us some simple ways of bringing about positive changes in our life.” I think our parents and elders knew exactly what to do. If you recall, in your growing up days, they were always concerned about the company you kept. They were curious to know almost everything about your friends; their family background, their habits, their likes and dislikes, where you spent time with them and what you did during free hours. And like most youngsters you would have resented it as too much intrusion or almost categorized it as spying. Ever wondered why they were doing this? There is a traditional wisdom which says that ‘likes attract each other’ or ‘birds of a feather flock together’. Our parents wanted a peek in our lives through our friends.

Closely look at your own friends circle. Being with this group makes you feel good about what you are and what you do. This ‘good feel’ emanates from the fact that you are similar in-terms of habits, way of thinking, your reactions to your environment, your achievements, your choice of music, your health habits etc. People are naturally attracted towards the people who are like themselves. This phenomenon is rooted in an inherent psychological need of security & survival. When we are with people who are like ‘us’, we feel secure and find comfort in our way of life. We have all the data to justify that OUR way of living is the RIGHT way of living. You will notice people who get sad easily find the company of those who support this behavior or are themselves sad. Cynical people are in the company of other cynics. The happy go lucky manage to find people of their own type and spend time together.
A few days back an interesting research was cited in the newspaper: People with obese friends or siblings are at a greater risk of becoming overweight. This connection is not as blatant as friends and siblings adopting each other’s lifestyles, it is more subtle. What appears to be happening is that a person becoming obese most likely causes a change of norms about what counts as an appropriate size. People come to think that it is okay to be bigger since those around them are bigger, and this sensibility spreads.
Our environment has a very profound impact on us!

Going back to the main question: ‘how do I change my life?’ If you want to change your life, just change your company, change your environment.

Have you come across a relative or a friend who was completely at ease with himself and his environment in India, but after having one long stint in the U.S., he repeatedly complains about how we ‘Indians’ do not follow traffic rules! You might get irritated with him. You might even say that all these guys start abusing India the moment they step out of the country. But he is not trying to annoy you. Actually, he is only voicing a new way of thinking that he has learnt in his new environment. He is now sensitized to the need and the benefits of the new behavior and probably wants you to benefit from his experience.

Think of what kind of life you want. Find out in your environment or beyond, people who have the kind of life you desire. Once you’ve identified people who are closer to the kind of life you want, you need to get in their company. You need to become part of their environment. The moment you’re part of this new environment, people will notice a change in your way of thinking. This difference is the secret of creating a new life. Slowly without realizing you start changing your way of dressing, your reactions, your hangouts, your dreams, your efforts, everything.

A few words of caution, when you are choosing new company, be careful! Ask yourself, “Am I choosing the people who have changed their lives or am I choosing the people who were born in my dream life?” You will find similarity with those who have changed their lives and not with those who were born in the life of your dreams.
Cheers!!