The Marathon

आजकल  12वी क्लास के रिजल्ट्स आ रहे हैं । 95 % स्कोर करने वाले बच्चों के माता-पिता बड़े गर्व से उनका नाम और फोटो डाल रहे हैं । बहुत से मित्रों ने बोर्ड परीक्षा में अपने बच्चों को मिले गौरवशाली अंक साझा किए हैं । भला अपनी संतान की उल्लेखनीय सफलता पर किस माता-पिता को गर्व नहीं होगा ?  ऐसे सभी सफल बच्चों और उनके माता-पिता को बहुत बहुत बधाई ।

लेकिन उनका क्या जिन बच्चों ने 54% स्कोर किया ? क्या उनके माँ-बाप के पास गर्व करने के लिए कुछ नहीं है ? जो बच्चे उतने अधिक अंक नहीं ला सके, वे अक्सर निराश और हताश महसूस करते हैं कि अपने माता - पिता की आकांक्षाओं पर खरा नहीं उतर सके।  उन्हें तरह तरह के तानों और सुझावों का भी सामना करना पड़ता है । मेरी यह पोस्ट उन्ही बच्चों के माता-पिता के लिए है ।

पहले एक छोटी सी कहानी सुनिए । 1987 में इटली के रोम नगर में अंतर्राष्ट्रीय खेल प्रतियोगिता थी जिसमे 1500 मी की दौड़ में भारत का प्रतिनिधित्व कश्मीरा सिंह  कर रहे थे । इस दौड़ में ट्रैक के कुल पौने चार चक्कर लगाने होते हैं । यानी पहले राउंड में कुल 300 मीटर और बाकी 3 राउंड में कुल 1200 मीटर । दौड़ शुरू हुई, और कश्मीरा सिंह ने दौड़ शुरू होते ही बहुत तेज़ भागकर बढ़त बना ली । ट्रैक पे लगभग 40 से ज़्यादा धावक दौड़ रहे थे, जिनमे कश्मीरा सिंह सबसे आगे थे । कमेंटेटर ने बताया कि भारत का धावक सबसे आगे चल रहा है ।

जी जान लगाकर भागते रहे और 3 राउंड तक कश्मीरा सिंह सबसे आगे चले, पर कमेंटेटर उनकी इस दौड़ से कतई प्रभावित नहीं था । वो पीछे चल रहे किन्ही दो अन्य धावकों पे निगाह रखे हुए था ।

बहरहाल चौथा और आखिरी राउंड शुरू हुआ । कश्मीरा सिंह धीमे पड़ने लगे, और एक धावक बढ़ के कश्मीरा सिंह से आगे आ गया । उसके बाद दूसरा, और धीरे - धीरे सभी धावक उनसे आगे निकल गए । उस रेस में कश्मीरा सिंह शायद 40 में से 38वे स्थान पे रहे ।

इस कहानी में हमारे लिए एक बहुत ज़रूरी सबक है । ज़िन्दगी की दौड़ में इस बात से कोई फर्क नहीं पड़ता कि आप पहले राउंड में आगे हैं कि नहीं । हार जीत का फैसला इससे होता है की  फिनिशिंग लाइन पे सबसे पहले कौन पहुंचा । उस दौड़ में सोमालिया का धावक फिनिशिंग लाइन पे सबसे पहले पहुंचा और उसने स्वर्ण पदक जीता । इसी कारण इतिहास में नाम उस विजेता का नाम का दर्ज है न कि कश्मीरा सिंह का ।

अभी तो इन बच्चों की ज़िन्दगी की मैराथन दौड़ का बमुश्किल पहला राउंड पूरा हुआ है । फिनिशिंग लाइन पे न जाने कौन पहुंचेगा सबसे पहले । शुरू में बहुत तेज़ दौड़ने वाले ज़रूरी नहीं कि इसी दमखम से लगे रहे । सबसे आगे वो आएगा जो धैर्य पूर्वक लगा रहेगा । जो बिना हार माने दौड़ता रहेगा । वो जिसकी निगाह लक्ष्य पे रहेगी ।

और सबसे महत्वपूर्ण बात ये कि हर बाज़ी को जीतना ज़रूरी भी नहीं । असली मज़ा तो दौड़ पूरी करने में भी है । अपने आस पास देखिये और आपको ऐसे बहुत उदाहरण मिल जायेंगे कि ज़िन्दगी में 54 % पाने वाले भी अपनी मेहनत और लगन से अंततः सफलता प्राप्त करते हैं ।

चायनीज बम्बू को सदा याद रखना, सबसे देरी से उगता है पर उगते ही सात हफ्ते में चालीस फुट का हो जाता है ।

इसलिये अपने बच्चों को प्रेरणा दे कि रुको मत, दौड़ते रहो, सफलता अवश्य मिलेगी । और कभी भी अपने बच्चो की तुलना किसी और से न करे, क्योकि हर एक बच्चा अपने आप में आदित्य है, अदभुत है, विशेष है।

Laughter is the Best Medicine

Here are a few one-liner jokes, in an attempt to get a smile from you:


Smile, it makes people wonder what you are thinking.

Life is unsure; always eat your dessert first.

It's not hard to meet expenses, they are everywhere.

Someday is not a day of the week

Whenever I find the key to success, someone changes the lock.

The road to success.. Is always under construction.
 
If you can't convince them, confuse them.


The light at the end of the tunnel may be an incoming train.

If you keep your feet firmly on the ground, you'll have trouble putting on your pants.

The trouble with being punctual is that no one is there to appreciate it.

I say no to alcohol, but it just doesn't listen.


In order to get a Loan, you first need to prove that you don't need it.


Alcohol doesn't solve any problems, but if you think again, neither does Milk.

A friend in need is a pest indeed.

Marriage is one of the chief causes of divorce.

Work is fine if it doesn't take up too much of your time.

When everything comes in your way you're in the wrong lane.


Everyone has a photographic memory, some just don't have film.


In a country of free speech, why are there phone bills?

If you cannot change your mind, are you sure you have one? 

It's not the fall that kills you. It's the sudden stop at the end.


Cunino's Law of Burnt Fingers - Hot glass looks same as cold glass.

A Dialog with Self

When we are faced with a tough problem that needs to be solved, we often look for the root cause of the issue. Who is responsible for it? And once we identify the person behind it, we get into a dialog with him to convince him to take necessary action to remove the obstacle. This investigation and dialog process is crucial to overcoming our day to day difficulties.

When we zoom out a little and take a broader view of our life as a whole, we invariably find many things that we do not like and would like to fix. We try to apply the same process there, and to our surprise, it is difficult to pinpoint who is responsible for it. We try our best to find someone who should take action, but do not succeed.

What are we missing? We ignore a vital clue here. We ourselves are the one responsible for most of the things that happen to us. According to Stephen Covey, the first step towards improving our situation is to accept our own role in it. When we introspect closely, we can trace most of our current problems to something that we did or have been doing; and this is good news. Once we know what we should do differently to improve our life, it is well within our circle of influence to change our actions accordingly.

On the other hand, if we continue to be in denial by holding others responsible for our misery, there is little hope of overcoming the obstacle. As we shift the focus to others and blame them for our plight, we dis-empower ourselves and become helpless.

So, we must get used to these two vital steps:

• Internal investigation or introspection about our own role and actions
• Dialog with self about what we must change. 

What are we doing that is making our life worse? Why do we choose to live a life full of stress and disappointments?  Why are we being our own worst enemy? Are we not complicating our life by violating the principle of integrity and sincerity in our interactions?  Are we not cluttering our lives with too many physical possessions and forcing ourselves to be in a rat race? Can we not do something different, something better?

I am quoting below a beautiful poem written by my dear friend Dr Rajeev Bishnoi (Bodhiraj). There is no better way to express the above ideas.

Anveshan - A Poem by Bodhiraj (Dr Rajeev Bishnoi)

क्यूँ अनमने भाव से जीते हो, और क्रोध आप पर करते हो
दिन में रहते निंद्रा के वश, क्यूँ रात-रात यूँ जगते हो
दिन रात परेशान रहते हो |

क्यूँ अपने से यूँ डरते हो, और आत्म श्लाघा करते हो
हो अपने बैरी तुम ख़ुद ही, क्यूँ दोष किसी पर धरते हो
और खुद लाचार हो जाते हो |

एक भाव तुम्हारे चेहरे पर, एक बात तुम्हारे मन में हैं
क्या भाव तुम्हारे है निर्मल, क्या बात तुम्हारी है सच्ची?
क्या कर्म तुम्हारे है अच्छे ?

जीवन को आकिंचन रक्ख़ा, या भौतिकता में होम दिया
अपने दिल के आईने में, भगवान का तुमको भास हुआ
या शैतानो का वास हुआ ।

ये प्रश्न तुम्हारे तुमसे ही, ये खोज तुम्हारी तुमसे ही
जिज्ञासा अपने ही मन की, यह ख़ुद का ही संवाद प्रिये
यह ख़ुद अपना अन्वेषण है ।

Beautiful words, if you like it and want more, listen to a song based on this poem by clicking on the video below:

Tips & Tricks for Managing People

Congratulations on getting promoted to manager’s level. You have worked hard and put in a stellar performance to earn it, and are looking forward to your new role, but are you prepared for it? How do you see your new role? You are aware that at this new level you are expected to accomplish much more than before, and may even be a little apprehensive how you are going to measure up to the raised expectations.

I can relate to how you feel as I experienced it myself in the beginning. What does it mean to be a good manager? Over the years, I have worked with many managers, and from their example, learned what is good management all about. In this post, I am putting together a collection of ideas that should serve new managers as a good starting point, and experienced managers as a refresher.

Change Your Mindset

First, you require a paradigm shift in how you see yourself and your role as a manager. So far, you have been a champion and heavy lifter in the team, and now you have become a manager, and a team is assigned to you. While you may continue to tackle challenging issues with your expertise, your focus should gradually shift to getting the best performance from your whole team. This is vital to meet the raised expectations from you. Your success as a manager depends on how your team performs. If the team does not live up to its potential, even if work very hard, you will either burn yourself out with overload, or under deliver. This was my first and most important insight as a manager. You must get used to the idea of success through your team, and actively work to enable them to succeed. This requires very different skills of leadership and people management. Sounds like an obvious idea? Look around and you will spot many seasoned managers who still do not internalize it.

Prepare Yourself

How do you go about acquiring people management skills? In the same way you honed your technical skills. Read the available material, go through trainings, talk to mentors, try to prepare yourself well for all aspects of your new role. Take time to be well versed with the process and guidelines of your company for managers. More importantly, start applying your learning in your everyday work and refine your skills with practice.

Understand, Respect, Build Trust

This is the most important quality you need to develop as a manager, and it needs regular communication. Schedule 1-1 meetings with each of your team member every week. If you have a large team, you can make it once in two weeks. Learn the right way to do it from your own 1-1s with your manager. Give due importance to the 1-1 slot, do not cancel it often. Never be impatient, cut short the discussion saying that you are too busy. Take time to listen and discuss the work, challenges, and aspirations of the employee. Listen attentively if the employee expresses an opinion about an issue. Provide feedback about her work, and suggestions for resolving the issues. If the 1-1s are handled well, they help you develop a solid understanding of your people, and enhances trust in your relationship over a period of time.

Create a High Performing Team

Learn to delegate work effectively to your team. Define what needs to be done, set up performance agreement, and then let the team do it on its own. For sure, have regular checkpoints to measure the progress and address any blocks. Be available to provide support for problem solving, but only when needed. Avoid micro management and top-down management style of making all decisions for your team. Let your people take the decisions in their projects, and do not interfere. Even when you are called upon to take a decision. Use a consultative approach with the team and aim for arriving at the best decision together. Your goal is to create a well-oiled machinery that runs smoothly even without you. On the contrary, if you are too busy and overworked as a manager, something needs to be fixed. Look carefully if you have made yourself the bottleneck in the team, without whom nothing moves forward. Organize your team better to free up your bandwidth for the important stuff.

Coach Your Team to be Proactive.

Do not just focus on crisis management / urgent stuff, which is often an outcome of not doing an important action in time. Coach your team to finish the important stuff well in time before it turns into an urgent crisis. Lead the team by your own example.

Encourage Collaboration

A team that works well together can accomplish much more. Avoid politics and rat-race, and do not foster a culture where people talk to you behind each other's back. Instead, encourage them to be open in giving feedback to others. In case of a conflict, do not take sides. Ask them to work it out between themselves through discussions. If you love being a mediator, more such instances will happen. In any case, never form a biased opinion about an employee based on what someone tells you behind his back. Try to ascertain the facts yourself first-hand.

Develop Your People

When you help people improve, they contribute more and it makes your team stronger over time. Make a habit of providing feedback to the team members on a regular basis. This helps them improve their performance over time.

Treat performance evaluation and rating process very seriously, as it impacts the careers of people. They have put their best in the job, and now it is your turn to show that you care. Remember to avoid bias in your performance judgement, your review should be based on facts, not impressions. It is even more important if you manage a cross-geographic team.

Think about career advancement options for each of your employee, and make sure to discuss it with her and be a mentor and coach. If you are a senior manager, work it out in consultation with the managers in your team. Trust the manager's judgement of his team's performance.

Handle Mistakes Well

Despite your best intentions, there are times when you make errors, and are confronted by your team about your bad decision. Such a discussion can be really difficult to handle. Best way to approach it is with sincerity, integrity, and openness. Do not shy away from admitting your mistake if required. Such an open behavior will earn you respect from the team.

Do not try tricks to wriggle out of the situation by making stories. e.g. do not blame it on senior management or HR, or push it under carpet, or say that this decision was required as per the company policy. Your employees can easily see through such antics, and you will land up with dissatisfied and disengaged employees. They will also lose respect for you looking at your shady tactics. So, the right way is be honest and act with integrity and serious intention. Sounds like an obvious principle? You will find many senior manager violating it.

Finally, do not feel bogged down by all this complexity. Working with your team and succeeding together is a lots of fun, and can be a rewarding experience. Just follow a few common sense practices well, and you will be on your way to become a successful manager.