STRATEGIES FOR LEADING THROUGH UNCERTAINTY

 Dr. Michael Ryan, an Executive Director of WHO Health Emergencies Programme said this about handling #crisis https://bit.ly/3blGzLE

"Be fast, have no regrets. The problem in society we have at the moment is that everyone is afraid of making a mistake. But the greatest error is not to move. If you need to be right before you move, you will never win. Perfection is the enemy of good when it comes to emergency responses."

In a crisis situation, there's a lot happening & it is quite human for leaders to feel stuck, ill-equipped,or overwhelmed.
Rebecca Zucker & Darin Rowell EdD in their HBR article https://bit.ly/3uis2tK makes an reference to the book "Immunity to Change":
"To put this in concrete terms, computing power has increased more than a trillion-fold since the mid 1950’s, but our brains remain unchanged."

They make a case that in order to deal with #uncertainty,leaders must first learn to lead themselves. And outlines these points:

1 Embrace the Discomfort of Not Knowing
2 Distinguish Between Complicated & Complex
3 Let Go of Perfectionism
4 Resist Oversimplifications & Quick Conclusions
5 Don’t Go It Alone
6 Zoom Out

Catch the summary in my sketchnote.

What strategies have worked for you in leading through uncertainty ?

My Sketchnote:

Coming soon...

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6794804068515766272/

THE AGE OF UBIQUITOUS DRONES

 “We’ve always said that it doesn’t make sense to have a 2-tonne machine delivering a 2kg order.”

This statement by Don Meij (Domino’s Pizza Enterprises CEO) may have sounded too far off in future a few years back but not anymore as Drone Tech. has matured immensely to be able to serve several day-to-day use cases.

Some brilliant perspectives shared by Jaspreet Bindra in his LiveMint article https://bit.ly/3aReVId on the evolution of Drone Tech. Catch the summary in my sketchnote, key points that i liked:

1. Beyond military and last mile delivery use cases, Drones, however, are best used in agriculture, aerial photography, rescue missions and insurance. 
2. Drones will soon become a hardware commodity, much like personal computers.
3. Newer business models like “drones-as-a-service" will emerge.

However, one of the limiting factor is that regulation is miles behind the progress the Drone technology has made. It is a gap that is essential to fill to leverage its full potential. As Jaspreet concludes
"Like everything else in technology, it will be us humans who will decide whether we use drones for beneficial or malevolent ends. "

Learn more here: https://bit.ly/3nAmnMM

My Sketchnote:

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6794071472592814080/

BOOK REVIEW: OUR ICEBERG IS MELTING

 One of the early books on managing change that struck chord with me was a classic 'Who moved my cheese?' The book dealt with crucial topics such as dealing with change emotionally, methodically, about anticipating change, about not missing signals that our environment is giving us.

While "Who moved my cheese?" aptly dealt with the topic of personal change, I recently re-read a book that deals with broader subject of organizational/social change. This book name 'Our Iceberg is melting'. (OIIM)

If you have read Panchatantra (ancient Indian collection of interrelated animal fables), you will find OIIM relatable. The story revolves around a penguin colony. The penguins are living happily on their iceberg as they have done for many years. Then one curious penguin discovers a potentially devastating problem threatening their home – and pretty much no one listens to him.

The story picks from this plot and leads to timeless lessons on dealing with and leading change. Highly relevant for today's times when it's not just about change but the rate of change in organizations is simply unprecedented and it's only going to get swifter, more complex in the time to come.

Catch the summary of key lessons in my sketchnote.
Thanks Tathagat Varma for the book.

My Sketchnote:

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_book-review-our-iceberg-is-melting-one-activity-6791540764980719616-npq3/

WHAT IS SECOND ORDER THINKING?

 Former World#1 shooter Apurvi Chandela had an underwhelming World cup in Mar '21. She couldn't win a medal & in her final shot she couldn't even squeeze the trigger within time limit. In 2020 Covid lockdown she focused on her fitness & lost 7 Kgs.It turned out that her improved fitness led to loss of performance.

How?

Shooters wear a specialised,weighted shooting jacket & trousers made of a thick, stiffened canvas. If your kit is a little loose or if it doesn't have strong support, then you have to work harder to stay perfectly still. Source: https://bit.ly/3ajX7oz

Apurvi went with the notion that the improved fitness would lead to improved performance. But it turned otherwise. This is First Order Thinking in action. First Order #Thinking is easy, it happens when we look for something that only solves the immediate problem without considering the consequences.

Second Order Thinking is deep, it moves beyond the immediate problem & considers the multiple layers of consequences of a given decision. Had Apurvi thought of effects of her weight loss and evolved her shooting jacket/trousers, it would be Second Order Thinking in action.

Find the summary of this high leverage concept in my sketchnote.

How would you use Second Order Thinking at work ?

My Sketchnote:

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_thinking-activity-6790091731334496256-uzrD/

EXPLAINING BLOCKCHAIN TO A KID

 Cryptocurrency Exchange platform Coinbase went public this week, an event which is widely considered as a 'watershed event'.

As #cryptocurrency goes mainstream, more companies are jumping on the bandwagon. PayPal users can buy/sell/hold crypto directly via its service. Elon Musk recently said that Tesla was now accepting Bitcoin as a form of payment.

It's 'safe' to say that the concept of money, as we know it, is getting disrupted much the same way the advent of internet disrupted the world of information.

The technology that enables the existence of crypto is Blockchain.
It's always an interesting challenge to simplify an emerging tech like #Blockchain and explain it to a kid ?

Drawing inspiration from the examples in our day-to-day lives usually is of great help in simplifying a complex concept.

In the book, 'The Tech Whisperer' Jaspreet Bindra beautifully explains the concept of Blockchain using analogies such as Ledger, Kitty Party (yes you heard it right!) & says 'Bitcoin is to Blockchain what email is to Internet. A use case. Bitcoin is a use case of Blockchain.'

A few other analogies that i found useful were Casino and Google docs. Read more: https://bit.ly/3uV0xGm ,summary in my #sketchnote

How else would you simplify blockchain ?

My Sketchnote:

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_cryptocurrency-blockchain-sketchnote-activity-6789004346580455424-5JeK/

TACTICS FOR FINDING FOCUS

 Sachin Tendulkar in one of his earlier interviews said-

"The toughest thing about batting is to clear your mind. The mind always wants to be in the past or in the future, it rarely wants to be in the present. My best batting comes when my mind is in the present but it doesn’t happen naturally, you have to take yourself there."

Like sportspeople- All of us in our day to day lives as professionals fight this daily battle for attention towards the tasks that matter. Our attention is split- be it deluge of notifications from slack, our chosen social media, myriad of emails or add to the list the distractions associated with working from anywhere. Our mind has the peculiar ability of wandering off at the first available moment, and it doesn't need any permission.

Geet Sethi in his book 'Success vs Joy' defines concentration is simply remaining in the present. But the key question is how do we return #focus to things that matter?

Some good ideas in this twitter thread https://bit.ly/3mERiaA that i find worth sharing (Summary in my sketchnote)
1 Eliminate Low-Value Decisions
2 Sprint, then Rest
3 Noise Cancellation
4 Sleep Tight
5 Train your Mind

What are your tactics to maximize the focus ?

My Sketchnote:

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_focus-activity-6787192892118175744-KBfg/

HOW TO OLYMPIANS SET GOALS ?

 I was recently reading the book "Will It Make The Boat Go Faster?". This book is about an underdog story of Ben Hunt-Davis and his team's journey to Olympic gold in the men’s Rowing Eight at Sydney 2000.

They developed a whole new way of working and began challenging everything they did with the question: “Will It Make The Boat Go Faster?” If it did, they would keep doing it, if it didn’t they’d try something different.

By focusing on their performance (rather than results), their results started improving.

The team followed a peculiar goal setting approach known as 'Layered Goals'. The four layers included:
1. the crazy
2. the concrete
3. the control
4. the everyday layer

The crazy layer of your goal is, obviously, the outrageous one, a big bold goal.

The concrete layer provides the foundation. The concrete layer is where the crazy layer becomes specific. So, winning a gold medal results in rowing with certain time.

The control layer is about separating what you can from what you can’t control. e.g. You certainly can’t control the weather but you can control how often you would train.

the everyday layer, which included the actions we can do daily.

How do you think the layered goals approach can be used at work ?

My Sketchnote:

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_how-do-olympians-set-goals-i-was-recently-activity-6785748203217264640-i66k/