Mukesh Gupta's Blog, page 42

Leadership Effectiveness – Questions to Ask of Ourselves

As leaders, the way we behave when we are alone or amongst a group is always noticed by everyone around and has an impact whether we like it or not and whether it is intentional or not. So, it is better to be intentional about the kind of impact that we want to have rather than leave that to chance.

So, in order to learn how to go about being intentional about the impact my emotions have on people around me, I registered and attended a session on Emotional Intelligence and how we can use the...

Do Something Great with Your Life

This fun, short video has a great life lesson for us all.

Do something great with your life. And Hurry Ok!!!

Ramin Serry via (Don’t call it a comeback)

Reducing Costs Vs Cost Cutting

Real benefits come when managers begin to understand the profound difference between “cost cutting” and “eliminating the causes of costs.”

Brian Joiner in Fourth Generation Management

Most leaders don’t understand this difference. In the quest for quick results, they often opt for the latter when it is infinitely better and more efficient to opt for the earlier.

Reducing cost is all about 

Finding activities that don’t add value and removing them (waste) or automate and delegate processes so t...

32 lessons from this year’s Do Lectures

I stumbled onto this list collated by Matt Spry about what he learnt from this year’s Do Lectures. This is great advice for anyone to lead their lives.

Here is the entire list as quoted by him on his post here.

1. Do less, but better

2. Consciously choose everything you do

3. Follow your curiosity, talk to more people, try things, tell your story

4. Set small experiments with low expectations

5. Always look to the edges for inspiration and a glimpse of future

6. Our work and values may not change...

Be Intentional in Designing Your Environment

It is an age-old adage in India that a clean desk is the mark of a clean mind.

What they meant was that the external environment was a direct result of our state of mind. As with other such things, the reverse is as much true. Our external environment can have an impact on not just our mood but can even impact behavior.

Take for example, the experiment being done in Berlin’s Hermannstrasse train station. This station is a known place for criminal and anti-social activities. The experiment is...

Doing Work that Matters with @JamesVictore

I am a big fan of the work that James Victore puts out. Fan enough to back him and his work on Patreon. He was recently described as “part Darth Vader, part Yoda,”. You can make out his work the moment you see it. Its that distinctive and that real. 

He is original, has a point-of-view and is never afraid of sharing it. He is also immensely creative. He is a good artist, a great teacher and an even better role-model, if we want to do work that matters. 

In this video (at Do Lectures), he sha...

Look After Yourself

Here is a short list that the team at Do Lectures posted on twitter about looking after ourselves. Spoke to me. 

My score is 3/10. Need to improve that. What is your score? How many of these do you do? 

Look after yourself:
1, Celebrate small things
2, Celebrate big things
3, Don’t compare
4, Make time for exercise
5, Eat well
6, Look for the good
7, Stop being so hard on yourself
8, Have some rest. And don’t feel guilty about it
9, Give yourself a pat on the back
10, Bed early— Do Lectures (@DoLecture...

Leading In Tough Times

I follow Dan Rockwell’s blog – Leadership Freak as part of my reading list and am always looking forward to his take on leadership related topics. He brings a simple yet profound but practical approach to solving some of the most difficult issues on leading well.

In his post 3 WAYS TO NAVIGATE TOUGH TIMES, he shares the following as the key steps that leaders need to take in order to successfully navigate tough times. 

#1: Prepare before tough times arrive.

#2: Nurture clear-headed thinking.

#3...

Hiring Anyone Who Applies for a Job

As part of my reading list, I stumbled on to a post that talks about a bakery that gives a job to anyone who applies – no interview, no background checks, no drug tests, nothing. You enrol on a list and whenever an opening arises, the person at the top of the list is offered that job. Simple. They start as an apprentice for a 10 month period, post which they get an entry level job at the bakery. They practice Open Hiring. 

This made me think. {I know

Succession Planning and The Peter Principle

At some point in our professional careers, we all have come across some managers and wondered –

How on earth did this person become a manager. He seems to be so incompetent?

Welcome to the world of Peter Principle. Peter Principle states that

People in a hierarchy tend to rise to their “level of incompetence”

– Laurence J. Peter

In other words, people get promoted based on their past performances until they are no longer able to produce the same level of performance and they remain stuck there...