Tag: RECRUITMENT

Expect More from Yourself, But Don’t Underestimate Yourself

We often ignore what we are already contributing, while focusing on the ways we wanted to contribute but couldn’t. Read on.

Diya had been working at a designing firm for a couple of years now. While she had many years ahead of her to go still, she had been experienced enough to be considered as a mentor to the younger joinees. She was the perfect go-to person for them, when they felt intimidated by the older colleagues and out of synch with colleagues who were younger than them but had joined earlier. She was a great person to have on the team.

Diya was also a diligent employee in many ways: she always came to the office on time, had excellent skills required to do the job and had great work ethic.

But for Diya, these did not feel like great contributions. She felt she didn’t add much to the office, and felt herself replaceable. She thought anyone would be able to just work hard and fill her shoes. She felt she didn’t add anything to her company in general.

With these gloomy thoughts, she was sitting with a gloomy face in the lunchroom one day. That day, through a happy coincidence, her senior Swati walked in and saw a sad looking Diya. As she sat down with her and asked what the reason was for her dull mood, Diya told Swati bit by bit about feeling she doesn’t contribute much to the company in general.

When asked the reason for feeling this way, Diya said,

‘I have seen other colleagues take ideas to the boss. Every week someone walks into boss’s cabin and gives them ideas. I only give ideas when a client gives us the brief. Every week, I see juniors brainstorming something together and I admire them but also wonder why I couldn’t come up with that. Every week I look at a senior and see their portfolio, and I wonder if I will ever reach where they are…I am just so boring and replaceable.’

While Swati understood Diya’s frustration and her tendency to compare, she was also astounded by how Diya was underestimating her own self this way. Swati then told her something, which helped Diya and can very well help us as well. Because, let’s face it, whatever profession we are in, we may have felt like Diya many times.

So, what did Swati tell Diya? The advice, by the way, is a real advice by writer Shane Parrish: In focusing in on all the ways you want to grow and contribute, do not lose focus on things you are actually contributing and doing well.

It’s good to be self-aware and find opportunities to grow and learn. It’s good to try to understand where we are lacking, so we may focus on how to grow in that aspect. But in that process, we shouldn’t forget:

  • Expectations Vs Reality:

Our expectations are so fixed at times, like Diya, that we forget the ways in which we are contributing in reality. Diya wanted to bring more ideas to the table, she wanted to make an impressive portfolio for herself. But she forgot to look at the way she was already contributing, such as being a hard worker, a dependable person willing to spend time to understand the client’s requirements properly, a great team-player, a wonderful person to act as a bridge between the different age-groups in her office and so on. This brings us to the next point.

  • Blind to our Own Strengths:

We may also be blind to our own strengths and contributions because of our expectations from ourselves. We often contribute in other ways which we may not necessarily be aware about. We may want to learn how to network better but we may already be a great person to handle logistics. We may want to learn one skill better, but there might be other skills we are great at but since we don’t ‘want’ those, so we are blind to those. How unfair to ourselves!

While focusing on a way to fill the lack, we shouldn’t lose sight of the abundance we bring in other ways. It’s good to expect highly from yourself, but sometimes the reality of how you are is in itself great too!

Father’s Day: The Ground for the Sunshine

We celebrated Father’s Day recently. Some thoughts on foundation, ideas, leadership and risks. While the mother provides her warmth like sun-shine, the father does it differently.

Father’s Day just went by. We must have seen posts, received and sent messages and celebrated in our own little ways.

Fathers or father figures often are seen as providers and rarely as nurturers. It is often considered the mother’s ‘job’ to nurture and care, while the father is sadly placed outside of that invisible circle. But the truth is fathers also provide nurturing and care but in different ways. In fact, the paternal way of showing care can be transferred into many a lesson about leadership, calculated risk-taking and implementation of ideas.

Keeping Calm, to Keep the Spirits Up:

Often times, it is said that men struggle with expressing their emotions. There might be some truth to this: it is important to display your vulnerable side and being in touch with your feelings is the first step in managing them. However, it is also important to at times keep up the self-control and display calm. Not to suppress your feelings but to keep a strong team morale. When crisis hits, fathers provide a sense of protection, not just through their actions but also by their way of being.

Think about the times when one team-member panicked and the entire team, as if through a domino effect, started panicking. Think about the times, on the other hand, when through a calm and composed problem-solving, solution-oriented approach, the entire team found a way to power through the problem.

Love, through Simple Actions:

It seems a common experience of many: mothers are great at showering us with affectionate words and actions both- the warmth is there to feel immediately, no questions asked. How do fathers show affection? Well, it is more through small acts of love. Mention you like oranges to your father once, and you may have a bowl of oranges lying on the table the next day. For fathers, showing care is through the quiet resourcefulness of having the phone-numbers of important people, right from a mechanic, to a computer engineer in their phone book, ready for everyone’s use at an instant. 

In our management with clients and colleagues, it is worth noting that it is only through small cumulative actions and quiet resourcefulness at the end of the day that determine how successful an agenda, idea or plan has been. Elaborate plans, post-it notes, vision boards, agendas might be set, but it is the persistent implementation, working on it with our heads down that will determine whether it gets actually done or not. It is the quiet resourcefulness of knowing who to contact when, when all the elaborate networking will actually provide fruition.

Fun and risk, at the right time:

Look at a father during holidays, when he isn’t away at his office, and you will see him giving his kids the times of their lives. Whether it’s through big and small travels, or through playing cricket with them, fun with fathers has its own separate joy. In fact, mothers also feel safer through his presence, and when ordinarily she may have restricted the child from doing something, she lets them have fun, since she knows the father will manage everything.

In our dealing with matters of work, it is crucial to add that ‘fun’ element of calculated risk. The one little step we take that may or may not be a part of the original plan but something we felt we should do. That one client we feel we should take a chance on asking once again even when ‘logic’ says something else. That one call we feel scared to make but do it anyway. That one plan we have been waiting to go forward with when the ‘right’ time comes.

Mothers and fathers complement each other. It is almost impossible to talk about one without mentioning the other. One nurtures by providing warmth that radiates in all directions, impossible to miss, and the other provides a quiet ground to grow on, stable foundations, with deep roots. Mother and father, like the sun and the earth.

Two Perspectives about Getting on and off the Wrong Train

Life sometimes puts us on the ‘wrong train’. How to decide if we need to get off the train or just enjoy the view?

Life rarely goes as planned. Maybe you didn’t plan on the having the job you currently have, even five years ago. Sometimes, we chase after opportunities and sometimes, we are made to create opportunities for ourselves. We decide on one thing and another thing happens. There are two perspectives to these ideas about change (of life and plans of life for us) and growth.

The Cost of Change:

There’s a well-known Japanese proverb that goes:

“If you get on the wrong train, get off at the nearest station. The longer it takes you to get off, the more expensive the return trip will be.”

This can be applied to so many scenarios of life:

-Feel stuck in a job you don’t like? Quit before your mind gives in to the habit of comfortable misery. Get off the next station.

-Feel stuck on an idea you know doesn’t seem to be working out? Stop and check if you should put it on the side for now, quit or course correct. Decide the ‘station’ you want to get off and do that before the train rams into your sense of competence.

-If a project needs you to test something on a user, test on one user, in a controlled environment, so in case there’s a flaw, it doesn’t reach thousand users later. Decide if it works and make the required changes as early as you can. The more you stall, the more expensive the return ticket becomes. As the writer Steve Krug puts it, ‘the cost of change grows over time.’

The Suprises of a Journey:

On the other side of this coin about ‘getting off’ from the ‘wrong train’, there are countless writers and philosophers from across the world that remind us how it is the journey that is more important than the destination. One may get on the wrong train, one may not reach their originally planned destination. But they still get to take in new, undiscovered scenery. The ‘wrong’ train may eventually make us find new a destination we didn’t even know we needed.

This too can be applied to many scenarios in life:

-Stuck with a job which you didn’t plan on having? Might as well learn something about it now and try your best to do it well, with your full presence. We may know people professionally who didn’t plan on getting in a career they are in right now and somehow, managed to be at the top of that career they ‘originally’ hadn’t thought of choosing.

-Your initial idea has turned all topsy-turvy and you don’t know what to do with it now? Maybe there is a new direction your idea is meant to go in.

-Testing on a thousand users led to a different outcome than anticipated? Maybe think if the users can still benefit from this ‘new’ outcome.

Getting on a wrong train may either lead you away from your planned destination, or it may lead you to a destination you were more suitable to go in. Our decision then lies not in quitting, or staying but deciding the cost of staying on the ‘wrong’ train. And both decisions can be sensible ones depending on our situation. Some questions we may ask ourselves are:

  • Is the cost of change likely to make your life miserable?
  • What will you lose if you stay on the wrong train?
  • Is there something you may gain if you stay on the wrong train? 

These are the answers we need, which may help us decide whether to get off at the next station or enjoy the scenery. So dear reader, would you like a new ticket or would you like to get off at the next station?

One Question, Three Answers, Three Outlooks

Three different answers to ‘what are you doing?’ can help you to be present, set goals and find meaning.

Can three people be doing the exact same thing, with the exact same tools and still see three different possibilities?

Three brick-layers are doing their job of laying bricks, neatly in a row. Someone asks one brick-layer: ‘What are you doing?’

He responds: ‘I am laying bricks.’

Someone asks the second brick-layer: ‘What are you doing?’

He responds: ‘I am building a wall.’

The third brick-layer gets asks” ‘What are you doing?’

He responds: ‘I am building a house.’

Three different people, doing supposedly the same job, having completely different answers. The beauty is that none of them are wrong.

Having said that, they do point to three different mentalities, which we have to adopt in different situations.

  • The Immediate Present/Task at Hand: The first brick-layer’s answer of ‘I am laying bricks’ is grounded in the immediate reality. No looking forward, no looking backward, and taking things one brick at a time. There are some tasks and situations that demand this kind of a mentality. Stressed about the outcome of something, wondering if it will go according to the plan in your head? We take it one brick at a time, one small task at a time. Not sure what to do next? We take it one brick at a time and eventually, a structure will start building itself. Overwhelmed with a huge seemingly impossible to-do list? We take it one small task at a time, and eventually, the boxes will be checked off.
  • The Larger Perspective/The Point: The second brick-layer’s answer of ‘I am building a wall’ is grounded in planning and setting realistic goals. It looks ahead, and that looking ahead gives the rationale of why something is being done in the first place. And in what sort of situations can we apply such an attitude? Your team is not sure why you are asking them to do a task? Tell them what doing that task will lead to. Your meeting agenda seems to be a list of random things to do? Structure them in a list of tasks, objects and expected results, and see the magic of reason taking over the assignment. Tasks make a hundred times more sense when we understand the point of doing them.
  • The Meaning/That’s What it’s All About: The third brick-layer’s answer of ‘I am building a house’ is grounded in giving meaning to life. It is the grandest of mentality and thus will require a slightly larger (than life) explanation. There are times when whatever we do, we feel it won’t matter. The commute to and from the office, the constant weeks of tasks, the meetings, the overtime- it all just seems to be a waste. Even when we do understand why we are doing something practically (to pay the bills, to finalise that deal, to ace that interview, to streamline the office), we sometimes do not see the point of anything. The reality of the mundane drains us. It is in times like these the third mentality comes in: it forces us back into the big ‘why’ of our choices.  The brick-layer became a brick-layer to build houses. Maybe you became a recruiter to help people find a job that matches their inner calling. Maybe you became a teacher to guide the young folks who are the future of the country. Maybe you went into finance to understand the use of abundance in the right way. Maybe you became a lawyer to give justice to everyone. In the daily office-work we sometimes forget why we were drawn to something in the first place. And when we remind ourselves what’s all this has been about, hope and motivation renew. Laying bricks to build a house.

Every day is not the same, and perhaps we can ask ourselves ‘what are doing?’ and decide the answer that is needed.

Are you an Intrapreneur?

Dear employee, do you dream big, and always seem to find new ideas to drive innovation?

Do you find a way to expand your role in a way that not only helps you with job crafting but also helps the company you are working in?

Do you always find a way to rethink a seemingly odd idea into something sellable? Well, you might be an intrapreneur!

An ‘intrapreneur’ is essentially an entrepreneur within a company, who can bring innovation and success for the company through their unique skills, their competence and perspective, that is, through their enterprising nature. So, employers, how to recognise the intrapreneur within your company? And employees, how to cultivate or recognise that streak of intrapreneurship within you? Here’s a quick list of qualities that makes one an intrapreneur:

Making Lives Better

An intrapreneur, much like the entrepreneur, has great ideas for innovation and change. What does an entrepreneur do? They find a way to add meaning to their life through a business idea, an innovation that will change the life of the community/the people around for the better. They find this one need, that one gap, and find a way to fill that gap, such that it will add benefit and meaning to their as well as the customer’s life. Similarly, within a company, an intrapreneur, through their enterprising nature, constantly finds ways to make their job more meaningful, and develops new competencies, fills the existing gaps within their role, expands it, and thus expands the scope of change within the company. An intrapreneur makes a company’s ‘life’ better.

Expert seller

One doesn’t have to be in sales to be a good salesperson. Who is a good salesperson? A good salesperson is someone who recognises that a product has great selling potential. They recognise the ideal customers, the ideal way to approach those customers, and the ideal way to market that product so that one can sell it well.

As an article by HBR points out, an intrapreneur is similarly a great salesperson of ideas. They recognise a good idea, even ideas that are underutilised or dormant; a good intrapreneur has the ability to revitalise a seemingly dead idea. They can market or remarket the idea such that the idea is ‘sold’ in the right manner, to the right clientele. In other words, an intrapreneur has the ability to look at ideas innovatively, and thus change the world, and the company, through that idea.

Well-connected

What makes an entrepreneur stand out from everyone? One of the qualities is their ability to network, and establish a reciprocal give and take of services with other businesses. A true entrepreneur understands the value of meaningful connections with other entrepreneurs as well as their ‘loyal’ customers.

An intrapreneur within the company similarly, is an expert networker. They not only get along well with their colleagues, but also have a great network outside of the company, that will enable the company to engage in collaborative endeavours, retain clients and consultations. They will always find new avenues for growth for the company. An article by People Matters brings to notice the side of the intrapreneur that wins over people, and the fact they are not afraid to take risks or fail publicly- they will simply learn and get better.

The intrapreneur thus, could be anyone, who is proactive, who understands the value of meaningful networking, and who sees the potential in ideas, and knows how to bring those ideas to fruition, to better their own as well as the company’s life. An intrapreneur thus brings the enterprising spirit within the company, for the company. So, dear employee, do you see the intrapreneurship bug in you? Dear employers, do you recognise the budding intrapreneurs in your office?