Category: Everything else

I find it really ironical that graduation speakers advice the crowd to “dream”, “dare”, “fail”, etc., when they themselves do not dare to put away their typed out speech, and just speak. There must be a reason, of course. Some of these graduation speakers have probably given 1000’s of impromptu speeches in their life time. But, somehow, it seems that the norms get hold of them during a graduation speech.

It’s smooth. Too smooth, perhaps. And way too polished. In doing so, they insulate themselves from making a mistake but give up on being human.

A lot of growing up IS having our edges smoothened and polished. We learn to dress appropriately, eat appropriately and behave appropriately. The trouble with all this smoothening is that we often are taught to think “appropriately” as well. Don’t ask too many questions or bring up too radical an idea.

The trouble with the perfectly polished is that there is no edge. And, if there is no edge, there is no tension. And, if there is no tension, there is no giant leap, no progress, and certainly no magic.

This week’s book learning is from Quiet by Susan Cain and is part of a series on “Brainstorming and Peer Pressure”. (Part 1, 2)

Between the years 1951-56, psychologist Solomon Ashe conducted a series of experiments on “group influence.”

Student volunteers in a group were subjected to a straight forward vision test. 3 lines of varying lengths were shown and they were asked to indicate the longest and shortest lines. 95% answered correctly.
However, when Ashe planted actors in the group who confidently gave the same incorrect answer, the correct answers plunged to 25%.

This was staggering. 75% of the participants went along with the group’s wrong answer to at least 1 question despite the answer being painfully obvious.

Are groups really that detrimental to performance? Two separate studies seemed to indicate as much –
– During the 1988-89 basketball season, two NCAA basketball teams played 11 games without spectators owing to a measles outbreak leading to schools banning spectators. The players played much better on every measurable statistic, even when compared to their performance in front of adoring home fans.
– Participants who were tested on anagram puzzles performed much worse when someone was watching.

So, audiences may be rousing, but they are incredibly stressful.

Sketch by EB

This “evaluation apprehension” is one of the big reasons group brainstorming doesn’t result in creative ideas!

But, Ashe’s experiment took the question a step further – what exactly happened to the students when the actors started giving wrong answers? Did they consciously answer to “fit in?” Coming up next week..

Here’s to minimizing evaluation apprehension on critical tasks this week!

During my ten months at the Indian Indian School, Riyadh (Saudi Arabia), my lunch time routine was set – the moment the lunch bell rang, I would run down to the basketball court with about 20 others, munching my tuna sandwich lunch. One of the gang (on rotation) would have a coke can which he would finish quickly while the others waited impatiently. He would then proceed to crush it.

Voila! Our football was ready. There would be 30 odd groups like this one on the basket ball court. That was the marked territory of the 4th and 5th grade. We had more than 30 sections of 40 students each in every class. I think the court was larger than normal size but in the 45 minutes that followed, it didn’t matter. Neither did the heat (it is a desert, after all). We were just young boys looking for an outlet to our energy as we didn’t have the opportunity to play outside of school. And boy, did we have fun.

I learnt a few very important lessons from this experience. First, if you have a goal that you are dedicated to, all the noise around you just didn’t matter. In this case, all we could see was our coke can. (On occasion, we did splurge on a tennis ball…)

Second, a big part of great memories comes from making the most of meagre resources. The senior boys monopolized the football field and lack of pocket money meant we almost always didn’t have the right “equipment.” So, we made do with a coke can – who would have thought?

Finally, fun can be extremely low cost. As we grow up, we often get caught up in the right place, right food, right drink, etc. If you’re determined to have fun, you will.. the choice is ours.

I came across this post making the case for “Travel while you are young.” Such posts are not uncommon – a search of the phrase on Google will tell you as much. I thought I’d provide the counter point.

As I write this, I know fully well that this is going to be the sort of “un-sexy” post that will only be read by the regulars in this community. The posts that make their waves across the blogosphere are the ones with “sexy” advice – the kind that make you look dreamily beyond the computer screen/cubicle and make you wonder if you should hand in your papers and walk into the promise land of “follow your passion” and “travel while you are young.”

So, don’t travel when you are young? Yup, focus on being so good they can’t ignore you instead. Invest in your learning. Work long hours while you can. Work weekends. Get really really good. Travel, but let that not be the goal. Let the goal be to develop skills that will help you make a positive difference to the world.

And, while we are it, don’t buy into nonsense about age. By societal terms, you are always either too young or too old to do something. Luckily, Bill Gates didn’t listen to such advice. Neither did Mark Zuckerberg or Colonel Sanders. And, neither should you.

I don’t necessarily disagree with a lot of the points such posts push. For instance, this post in question has a couple of  good points about habits. I just disagree with the assertion that travel is the seeming answer to making an “investment” in life that we make in our years of empowerment. And I will explain why.

Let’s start with a question – what is the purpose of this life? While we do not have a definite answer to this question, we do have two largely accepted schools of thought. The first asserts that the purpose of life is to pursue happiness while the second asserts its all about finding meaning which comes from committing to a cause greater than your own.

If happiness is the goal: There are two kinds of happiness – pleasure (short term) and gratification (long term). That exquisite bar of chocolate and that road trip on the Gold Coast are examples of pleasure. Gratification, on the other hand, comes from all those long and painful hours you put in to get good at what you do; that sense of focus and exhilaration at work/study/play when you completely lose yourself in what you are doing. Psychologists call this state “flow.”

Travel is pleasure. Pleasure is very important to our well being in small doses. But, it is not what brings long term gratification and happiness.

If purpose is the goal: Travel isn’t about committing to a cause greater than one self unless being self centred is a cause. And, it really isn’t all that hard.

Put simply, anybody with a bit of cash and time to kill can travel. If only it were that simple to make a lasting difference in this world…

So, let’s not make the act of travel look heroic. You might have many reasons to do it – you might love traveling, you might love frequent vacations, you might have time to kill with some spare cash, or you might have been European in the “good old days” when the welfare system made sure you had a free education.

That’s not to say it can’t be heroic either – if you volunteer at orphanages in a 100 countries, good on you. Hanging out at the beach or eating at a local’s house doesn’t count – unless the purpose is pleasure. And, once again, it’s okay to go after pleasure if you call it that.

And, in a true celebration of unsolicited advice, I’d like to add a piece of my own (oh, the irony) – Go after the “un-sexy.”

Think of all the “un-sexy” advice you have received in your life – never tell a lie, keep your promises, study hard, work harder, exercise regularly, eat healthy, be the best at what you do, read good books, be there for people who need you, etc. That’s the stuff that actually DOES make us happy in the long run.

Or, as JLM eloquently puts it – ‘That Geek in high school who you used to make fun of, Football Team Captain, just sold his company for $300,000,000 and is taking your old girlfriend to the Turks & Caicos for the next two weeks.  She says she has a few things to teach him and apparently he’s a fast learner.  They said “hi”.’

What about making a difference and changing the world, then? Does the un-sexy stuff accomplish that?

That’s not guaranteed. It never is. But, at least you will give yourself a shot.

And, the people who give themselves a shot at making a difference and changing the world are the ones that actually do.

During a manic period last week, I attempted to excuse myself for not staying in touch by explaining to my Grandmom that I barely had time to keep anyone informed about anything.

She pointed out that I had time to write a one line email to Mom. Why not send her the note, too?

Here’s the thing – I temporarily forgot that my Grandmom has an iPad and checks her email every day! She has been doing so for a year now. But, I do not think of her as such. It’s a flawed assumption or mental image.

I guess parents experience this as their kids grow up. I remember smiling myself at a workshop when an executive asserted that this “internet” stuff didn’t work for practitioners in his industry. But, here I was.. doing exactly that.

I apologized. I realized I need to keep up with my Grandmom’s growth.. Nice life learning.

The questions – how many such outdated assumptions or mental images do we hold – of family, friends, customers and colleagues?

Are they keeping us from building better relationships?

You are the CEO of Me Inc. And you are in your current job because you contracted with the company involved as you thought it was a win-win. The moment it’s not a win-win, you have the choice to leave and find another company to contract with. You could choose not to contract with any company and ship products directly to customers.

The choices are open. The choices are yours.

You work those long hours because Me Inc. needs it’s brand to thrive. It’s brand thrives on it’s reputation and you aim to build a reputation associated with great work. That sort of reputation needs no marketing or political manoeuvring. It’s the sort of reputation which results in many wanting to work with you because you are simply too good to be ignored.

By the world’s definition, you could be a corporate employee, a start-up employee or an entrepreneur – it doesn’t matter. By the world’s definition, Disney is a corporate that makes movies and theme parks. What matters, of course, is how Disney sees itself. Disney is an artist that exists to make people happy. Simple as that.

Call yourself whatever you want – CEO, entrepreneur, artist, business man  – it’s your choice.

You are not “stuck” at any place you don’t want to be. It’s your show. Run it. And, run it well.

I was heading into a test the other day when a wiser friend wished “Good skill!.”

“Good skill?” – I asked.

“Skill always better than luck.” – he said.

I loved it.

‘Only a naive person would discount the effect of luck on success. Only a fool would count on it.’

This week’s book learning is from Quiet by Susan Cain and is part of a series on “Brainstorming and Peer Pressure”. (Part 1)

In 1963, researcher Marvin Dunnette brought together 48 research scientists and 48 advertising executives from 3M for solitary and group brainstorming sessions.

For the “group” case – They were each divided into 12 groups each and given 4 different problems to brainstorm.
For the “solitary” case – In order to compare apples with apples, Dunnette also combined 4 individuals in the solitary case to make it a “virtual” group. He then independently ensured the quality of ideas could be rated, too.

The results..

– Men in 23 out of 24 groups produced more ideas working alone than in a group
– The results were exactly the same for the typically introverted research scientists and the more extroverted advertising executives

Shocking, isn’t it? 40 years of research has repeatedly demonstrated that our performance gets worse when group size increases. So, if you have talented or motivated people, encourage them to work alone.

Is there any benefit to group brainstorming then? The only positive result from group brainstorming is that it helps people feel “connected” – a worthy goal, so long as we understand that social connectivity is what we achieve, and not creativity.

Sketch by EB

The only exception is online brainstorming where large groups have shown to produce better work – of course, that means we have folks expressing their view without social pressure. The same has been found for virtual collaboration between professors.

So, how important a factor is social pressure in our performance? Coming soon to an inbox near you..

Here’s to ensuring we “brainstorm” only when necessary this week!

The Icarus Deception by Seth Godin is full of interesting ideas. One of them that has stuck with me is

“Art is not a gene or special talent. Art is an attitude, culturally driven and available to everyone who chooses to adopt it. Art isn’t something sold in a gallery or performed on a stage. Art is the unique work of a human being, work that touches another. Most painters, it turns out, aren’t artists after all – they are safety seeking copycats.

Art isn’t something that’s made by artists. Artists are people who make art.”

I was in need of some great music yesterday. I was listening to “Love Story meets Viva la Vida” – a tune that brings back wonderful memories. And that’s about when I saw some other videos from “The Piano Guys.” 

I listened to a few other videos before I clicked through on this video.

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