Category: Everything else

Where do ideas come from? – Seth Godin

1. Ideas don’t come from watching television

2. Ideas sometimes come from listening to a lecture

3. Ideas often come while reading a book

4. Good ideas come from bad ideas, but only if there are enough of them

5. Ideas hate conference rooms, particularly conference rooms where there is a history of criticism, personal attacks or boredom

6. Ideas occur when dissimilar universes collide

7. Ideas often strive to meet expectations. If people expect them to appear, they do

8. Ideas fear experts, but they adore beginner’s mind. A little awareness is a good thing

9. Ideas come in spurts, until you get frightened. Willie Nelson wrote three of his biggest hits in one week

10. Ideas come from trouble

11. Ideas come from our ego, and they do their best when they’re generous and selfless

12. Ideas come from nature

13. Sometimes ideas come from fear (usually in movies) but often they come from confidence

14. Useful ideas come from being awake, alert enough to actually notice

15. Though sometimes ideas sneak in when we’re asleep and too numb to be afraid

16. Ideas come out of the corner of the eye, or in the shower, when we’re not trying

17. Mediocre ideas enjoy copying what happens to be working right this minute

18. Bigger ideas leapfrog the mediocre ones

19. Ideas don’t need a passport, and often cross borders (of all kinds) with impunity

20. An idea must come from somewhere, because if it merely stays where it is and doesn’t join us here, it’s hidden. And hidden ideas don’t ship, have no influence, no intersection with the market. They die, alone.

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Loved this. Genius!

Don’t do work you love

This was the discussion I had with a colleague as he was discussing some interesting points from a book you read.

I find the argument pretty valid – ‘What if your passion was juggling? And what if you weren’t all that skilled in juggling?’

Would you still quit your day job as an IT analyst in an investment bank and pursue juggling?

Like all things, I think the ‘pursue your passion’ requires some perspective. To begin with, it probably requires your passion and skills to match (for eg: I have a real passion at football but I’m just about average at the game => I don’t dream of being a professional footballer). And secondly, even if passion and skills match, I think it also matters as to what your goals are, and how happiness at work fits in with the bigger picture.

For eg: if you are a manager at GE and are also married with 3 kids, you may want to just continue being a manager till you have enough in your bank account to sustain yourself and your family before becoming a professional juggler.

Pretty obvious, you say? Yes, absolutely. We tend to do this more often than not but the sad part is that we always romanticize about the ‘ideal job’ and the ‘ideal situation’. In my limited experience, there hardly ever is the ‘ideal job’ or ‘ideal situation‘.

Decide to make it ‘ideal’, decide to have ‘fun’, make enough money to make sure your parents (and/or spouse and kids) are okay, then quit everything and do what you love.

(If you are going to argue that all entrepreneurs are doing what they love, I would disagree. Entrepreneurship involves a LOT of dirty work which nobody would enjoy – what entrepreneurs enjoy is the thought of realizing their vision/their dream.
Is cleaning the office ideal? Probably not. But the dream makes it so..
And nobody stops you or me from dreaming.)

The Cartoon network display pic

I opened my facebook homepage today to find a whole bunch of friends with Cartoon network characters as their profile picture. It took me right down memory lane and I even went on youtube and bookmarked a couple of my favorite cartoons to watch (Heidi, Speed Racer, Centurions, Swat Kats – I finished Tintin, Batman, Justice League and X-Men over the few months!)

Anyway, this facebook event has grown to 6,000 odd people. So, why am I blogging about it? Turns out it was a close friend that started it by accident on Sunday night and he’s surprised at the massive reception.

So, if you are wondering why people are changing their display picture on facebook to cartoon network characters, that’s why.

I thought I should share this because it illustrates the power of social networks today. Small things we do can have massive impact and the butterfly effect just got more real!

PS: It’s also nice to see everyone going back down memory lane and remembering the ‘child’ within. It’s about being ‘child-like’ after all..

Human group evolutions and today’s corporate world

Guns, Germs and Steel takes us through stages of human evolution and about how human groups emerged gradually and I thought evolution of human groups was VERY similar if not identical to sizes of organizations in today’s corporate world.

Here is my take on the idea –

(Click to see full size)

Do let me know what you think in the comments! :)

Are you unsure about your next career step/looking to make it into consulting or a top B school?

If you are thinking of any of the 3 questions –

1) What do I really want to do in life? What are my strengths? How do I know what would be an ideal career path?

2) How can I get into a top tier consulting firm?

3) How can I get into a top B school for my MBA?

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The good news is that RealAcad has a solution for you. For those who haven’t had the opportunity yet to attend the full 1 week camp, RealAcad brings you a dedicated career development opportunity.

With combined experiences in BCG, Mckinsey, Goldman Sachs, IBM, private equity firms and hedge funds and armed with a passion to train and help you become successful, two of the RealAcad program advisors, Miriam and Ankur, are rolling out the RealAcad career program. This essentially means 1-on-1 sessions with them face to face or over Skype to give you an opportunity to pick their brains on how to do case interviews/write better B school essays etc.

There have been multiple successes within RealAcad of course, with RealAcaders who’ve successfully made it into the BCGs, Mck’s of the world along with admissions gained by RealAcaders into schools like Kellogg and Wharton.

The cost breakdown is here. And if you write to careers@realacad.com with a ‘Refered by Alearningaday’ as part of your message, you are entitled to a whopping 60% discount which is a part of a promotion for the 1st 2 months.

Do feel free to leave a question in the comments or write to me directly.

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For newer blog readers, I am an alumnus of the RealAcad program, and a very proud one at that. If you want to know more, again, do feel free to write in and I’ll be happy to take your questions.