Mukesh Gupta's Blog, page 12

Is Trust Given or Earned?

Greatness comes from …

Rahul Dravid celebrates Ravichandran Ashwin's 100th test match, highlighting what it takes to be great. His wisdom transcends cricket, applying to all professional fields.

Insanely Interesting People who Influenced Me #18 Daniel Kahneman

The author expresses gratitude to various individuals who've shaped their outlook on life and work, including thinkers, leaders, and artists. A significant figure is the late Daniel Kahneman, whose research in Behavioral Economics and decision-making wisdom, articulated in "Thinking Fast and Slow," profoundly influenced the author. This piece serves both as an acknowledgment of Kahneman's genius and as an inspiration to others.

Games People Play

French Anthropologist Roger Caillois categorized games into four classes—Agon (competition), Alea (chance), Ilinx (consciousness altering), and Mimicry (alternate reality)—that, according to the content's author, are instrumental for leaders to create intentional, memorable experiences. The application of these games in leadership aims to encourage desired behaviors, mark special moments, foster deep connections, and engender a competitive spirit, ultimately differentiating exceptional leaders w...

Your Hidden Super Power

Superheroes emerge from a transformative inciting incident—this post equates such an occurrence with awakening "Curiosity," a potential superpower. Touted as "Radical Applied Curiosity," and envisioned for a hero called "The Common Man," it's an innate trait propelling humanity's survival and innovation. The narrative urges rediscovery of curiosity through slowing down, noticing changes, experimenting, acting on insights, and gathering support. Its application to empathy, creativity, and innovat...

Speaking from a Stage

To be a good communicator, especially on stage, remember these three core principles: 1) Initially, you're not the focus until trust is built with the audience. 2) People won't care about your message unless you give them a reason. 3) Speak the audience's language and address their aspirations to hold their attention. Consistency in these practices builds trust and improves your public speaking skills over time.

Unlocking Success: The Key Questions You NEED to Ask About Your Stakeholders

Premise: We now live in a world where we are going through a change of one kind or another. Even when we are not leading a change initiative, we are, at all times collaborating with others, who are not part of our team, people who have a different goal than our own, people whose contribution might be critical for our success. In such scenarios, one of the skills that becomes critical for our success is our ability to align and influence the various stakeholders that we work with. I have found th...

Never Ready, until we have to be!

We are never really ready for a challenge, until we have to be. If we are ready for it, we have waited too long to take on the challenge. We need to believe that we can learn as we go along depending on what we need to learn. As they say, when the student is ready, the teacher appears! So, trust in your ability to learn and adjust. Take on the challenge before you’re fully ready.

PBTO: Goldratt’s Rules of Flow – Delivering Projects on-time on-budget and on-spec and driving up profitability

This is the recording of a live conversation I had with Dr. Efrat Goldratt-Ashlag to explore how the principles from the Theory of Constraints can be applied to multi-project environments (Digital transformation efforts) to deliver projects on time, on budget and on spec. She shared insights from her latest book (now available in Worldwide) Goldratt’s Rules of Flow to help us understand how to increase the velocity and throughputs of project deliveries within our organisation. We covered the fol...

Light and Leadership

This quote by Viktor Frankl is so apt for all great leaders. Do you agree? If yes, why? If not, why not?