Author: alearningaday

As I opened up my email excitedly this morning..

(Being a few 1000 miles away from my family, closest friends, I wake up all excited in the morning to check my personal email in the hope of finding a nice long, detailed filled note..)
..and began reading an email from a close friend, I realized the power of sharing your life with somebody else. Especially when it is not because you ‘have’ to but because you ‘choose’ to.
This friend evidently made quite an effort to type that email as it had all sorts of funny poetic verses. Through those few paragraphs, I could sense joy, anxiety, smiles and frowns. For a moment, my mind was transported back to the olden days where one might have had to wait for days for a letter from a loved one.
It is all so easy now, isn’t it? We can now hear from friends and family through a little touch screen handheld device from the comfort of our bed! So easy that we take it for granted and probably do less of it than we probably should.
It’s a simple question, really. Whose life have you touched today? The easiest place to start is with close friends and family. A simple note is guaranteed to brighten up their day.. So, go ahead. Do it.
We live to be touched by all those around us after all..

On 5 Dollars or 500 Dollars

David Schwartz illustrates the ‘magic of thinking big‘ with a simple example –

Imagine Bob, the sales person at a gift shop. A customer walks in and says ‘I am looking for something quick for less than 5 dollars. Can you please help me?’
Now, Bob’s gift shop is doing very well for itself and Bob is visibly disinterested at the thought of having to spend time on a customer who will likely only earn the shop $5.

Let us flip it around for a minute now.
What if Bob
– views the customer as a potential $500 customer?
– views this meeting as an opportunity to demonstrate amazing customer service so the customer returns with more business?

Wouldn’t Bob’s attitude to the customer be very different? In a nutshell, that encapsulates the power of thinking big at work, and in our lives. Every little thing we do has great potential!

I find this very helpful when we think of side projects we receive at work. While one way to think about them would be to just get something optimal out to the boss to keep him/her happy or look at them as potential opportunities to build our own ‘brand’.
Here’s to viewing opportunities for their full potential this week!

The Prima Donna

I experienced some prima donna behavior at a game today. The story is one we all can relate – a very good player constantly nit picking on all faults possible. It takes the fun of the game away, saps your enthusiasm, kills your confidence while he/she obviously thinks they are doing a favor..
This post is not so much about ‘them’ as it is about us. When/where do we exhibit such prima donna behavior?
BNET had a lovely article this week about ‘The 3 annoying habits of Successful people’. My belief is we all are successful at something – sports, academics, music, dance etc and we are all likely to relate. So, read on and see if you recognize yourself –

1. They need to win all the time. If it is important, they want to win! If it is critical, they want to win! If it is trivial? They still want to win. Here’s a hypothetical test that 75 percent of my most successful clients fail: You want to go to dinner at Restaurant X. But your spouse or friend wants to go to dinner at Restaurant Y. After a heated discussion, you go to Restaurant Y. This was not your choice, the food tastes awful, and the service is terrible. Now you have two options: You could critique the food and point out what a terrible choice this was, and this mistake could have been avoided if only you would have listened to me. The other option is to shut up, eat the food and try to enjoy the evening. Now what should you do? When I asked my clients this hypothetical, 75 percent say the right thing to do is to shut up. But what would they do? Critique the food. They do the opposite of what they know they should do.

Here’s one more hypothetical: You get home from a hard day at work. And your spouse, partner or friend says, “I had such a rough day today!” Now many smart, successful people will respond, “You had a hard day? Do you have any idea what I had to put up with today!” They’re so competitive they have to prove they are more miserable than their mate!

2. They try too hard to add value. Here’s an example: you have an enthusiastic, creative employee who comes to you with an idea. You think it’s a terrific idea. But instead of saying, “Terrific idea,” you say, “That’s good. Why don’t you add this piece to it?” Now this young person’s idea may increase in value by about 5 percent, but his commitment? Well that’s down about 50 percent because it’s no longer his idea–it’s yours.

It’s just incredibly hard for smart, successful people not to constantly go through life tweaking others’ ideas and proposals. Yes, you may be improving upon the initial idea, but you’re sapping their enthusiasm. And by the way, if you’re honest with yourself, you’re not just trying to be helpful. You’re telling the world how smart you are. For those of us with Ph.D.s, how quick are we to tell everyone that we have our doctorate? It’s just incredibly hard for smart, successful people not to go through life telling others how smart they are. But you need to stop, really.

3. They are publicly critical. As a successful, smart person, you know how important it is to create positive relationships. You also have high standards. You know when performance falls short. But what happens to these relationships when you criticize and complain about colleagues in front of other people? Of course not.

Now, just so you know, I’m guilty of this annoying habit too. The first time I got feedback from my staff, I had them fill out a form. One item on it was called “avoid destructive comments about other people.” What score did I get? The 8th percentile. That meant that 92 percent of the people in the world did a better job of avoiding destructive comments than I did. And I wrote the test!

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I had quite an experience reading this list as these are among the top few things about myself that I am trying to better.

And the reason for this is we often don’t really understand how prima donna behavior can impact others. One example from my own life is when a close friend joined me for tennis once. I was in a crappy mood and was in a total ‘prima donna’ mood so I went about critiquing her every move..

That friend never picked up a tennis racquet after that pretty horrible hour. That’s how bad it hurt.

Wake up call, that!

Is it over after the romance?

The courtship phase is beautiful for all parties.
Let us imagine 2 kinds of romance –
2 lovers who seemingly cannot enough of each other. The lovers send each other cards, buy roses, sometimes even expensive gifts.
A customer who is being woo-ed by an eager service provider. The service provider showers his customer with great prompt service, throws in deals and acts as if every wish of the customer were his command.
Then comes the defining moment. The lovers get together. The customer signs the deal.
All of a sudden, a few things happen –
– The roses stop coming. Suddenly, people are ‘not how they used to be’
– The customer, all of a sudden , is passed on from one customer service rep to another the moment he runs into trouble and finds himself crying out in frustration
Does that strike a bell?
Haven’t we all been on the receiving end at some point or another? (Think of telco’s!)
I think it is a big one for us personally – to remind ourselves, whether in our personal or in our professional lives, that personality opens doors but character is what keeps those doors open.
It may not seem like it. But it is a test of character, whether as a service provider or a partner/lover..

So you have started a blog..

And you have started with the traditional ‘Hello world/these are going to be my musings’ post.
Fabulous. Now, go the distance.
Will it hit a million views? Maybe not.
Will a post of yours receive a 1000 likes on Facebook? Again, maybe not.
Will you have 100s of comments like ‘those’ popular blogs do? Again, maybe not in the near future.
Often, we define journeys by the destination. It doesn’t matter if you don’t write so well or that your grammar is not so good. These skills are always ‘work-in-progress’.
But, just making an attempt to go the distance and do whatever you started out to do (record occasional musings, write poetry, write short stories) may take you farther than you ever imagined.
And even if not, it is probably worth trying anyway.
So, go the distance – just because you can. :)