Checklists as a Sign of Weakness

There are a few things that tend to get me pretty riled up. One of them is the perception of checklists as a sign of weakness, as a sign of an inability to remember things, as a sign of over complication..
And every time I find myself getting riled up, I remind myself of the brilliant quote by surgeon Atul Gawande in his brilliant piece of work ‘The Checklist Manifesto’.
“We don’t like checklists. They can be painstaking. They’re not much fun. But I don’t think the issue here is mere laziness. There’s something deeper, more visceral going on when people walk away not only from saving lives but from making money. It somehow feels beneath us to use a checklist, an embarrassment, It runs counter to deeply held beliefs about how the truly great among us — those we aspire to be — handle situations of high stakes and complexity. The truly great are daring. They improvise. They do not have protocols and checklists. Maybe our idea of heroism needs updating.” — Atul Gawande

I’ve been using checklists pretty intensively for many years now and it comes with the package of being a self confessed productivity ‘geek‘. In fact, it has even inspired me to egg a more technically adept friend to spend some time developing a checklist app for the iPhone with me taking the respectable position of cheerleader for the moment. We’re targeting an August 15th release date. Let’s hope that happens!
While it does sound like I am on some weird checklist crusade (with the slogan being ‘checklists are NOT a sign of weakness, but a sign of power!), the simple truth about checklists is that they work. And, more often than not, they help create bandwidth when most required.

Maa

There is a certain beauty in the ‘Mother’s’, ‘Father’s’, ‘Friendship’ day’s that get me to pause and reflect. Yes, I don’t think it’s all about the marketing!

Anyway, I was listening to a song from a wonferful Aamir Khan movie (Hindi) called ‘Taare Zameen Par’ and I thought I would dedicate to my mom for everything she has been, is and will be..
This video also gives you the back story. Ishaan, the young dyslexic kid is being left behind at a boarding school (where Aamir Khan, his art teacher, takes him under his wing and changes his life) and this deals with his immediate grief at not having his mother with him..
For all my non Hindi speaking readers, here are the translated lyrics..
I never, do tell you,
But I am frightened by the darkness, mother
Usually I, don’t show it,
But I do care about you, mother
You know it all, isn’t it mother?
You know it all, my mother.
Don’t leave me like this in the crowd
Such that I am not able to come back to the home.
Don’t send me so far
Such that you don’t remember about me at all.
Am I that bad, mother?
That bad… my mother?
Whenever… father…
Quickly… swings me around, mother…
My eyes… seek for you…
I do think … you will come to hold me, mother…
I don’t… tell him this…
But I do… get scared, mother
On the face… I don’t let this come
In my heart… I get frightened, mother
You know it all, isn’t it mother?
You know it all, my mother.
I never, do tell you,
But I am frightened by the darkness, mother
Usually I, don’t show it,
But I do care about you, mother
You know it all, isn’t it mother?
You know it all, my mother.
Thanks mom. You do know it all. :)

Your Keyboard – One ‘Spec’ to rule them all

We all face buying decisions for laptops every few years. Those tend to be pretty important decisions as laptops these days are like our constant companions. So, we better like what we are stuck with.
When we make those decisions, the big questions (aside from deciding wide screen vs square etc) are around the specs. How many GB hard drive? Dual core? Blah blah.
Now, for those of you who use your personal laptops primarily for browsing, email and multimedia (and not for hardcore processor heavy tasks – I think we make a good 50% of the population), I have a tip.
Forget the specs, focus on the keyboard.
Of course, you have the basic decision to make – is it going to be a small portable laptop? or a bigger laptop with big screen, many USB ports etc. Once you are past that, I really hope you do focus on your keyboard because if that ain’t comfortable enough, it won’t matter how good your other specs are. All you’ll be doing is fighting pain in your fingers..
All the best with choosing your laptop!

Small hack when emailing or following up with a large group of people for information

We often have the task of requesting/emailing or following up with a bunch of people for information. Some of us do it to confirm attendees for a meeting, some others do it to collect material for a bit of research etc. And often, tracking responses can be a pain especially since those who don’t have information are unlikely to reply.
The issue we often face is we don’t know if the people who haven’t replied have actually read the email. And this can tend to be a difficult position especially if these are your superiors as constant follow up is not really an option.
In such situations, a simple line like..
‘Those who have read this and have no ….. to add, I would appreciate it if you could just reply with a :). Thank you in advance!’
..tends to works well. And takes off some stress from our system as well! :)

The Chopsticks Story

It’s 2 weeks from RealAcad at Stanford now and my mind went back to my first camp in Stanford in August 2007. The camp was due to start on Monday, the 6th of August. And on Sunday, a bunch of us ‘students’ got together to socialize prior to the camp.
We walked into a Japanese place. Now, we were a group of 5 – 1 Belgian, 1 Haitian studying in the US, 1 Kyrghstani studying in the US, 1 American and 1 Indian studying in Singapore (yours truly, of course). Food was soon served – there was just 1 problem. There were no forks and spoons, only chopsticks.
And I looked around clueless. The others who had begun digging in realized the issue and 1 of them offered to teach me.
‘You’re from Singapore, right?’ – asked another while I was going through Chopsticks 101 and I could feel my ears go red. I managed to get through the meal and thankfully, we didn’t do any ‘only chopstick’ meals in the camp.
I remember getting back to the office and making sure I ate every ‘Maggi’ Noodle meal in the next 2 months with chopsticks (We were a startup and we had plenty of maggi stocked) till I became very comfortable. I even remember going back home to India and eating rice at one of the Chinese joints with chopsticks!
And, I sure am glad I learnt that lesson early that it happened then and not at a Chinese meal with the consulting team on my 1st project or a Japanese meal with my boss. Many of us aim to ‘get into’ places. But, it’s often little things (not necessarily chopsticks mind..) can mean us being shown the door.
The other big lesson I learnt is that 1 year in Singapore had meant very little in terms of cultural openness in the food sense. And that changed for the better. It’s a beautiful world out there, after all.
Thank you chopsticks.

The Asylum forward

I was strolling in the gardens of an insane asylum when I met a young man who was reading a philosophy book.

His behavior and his evident good health made him stand out from the other inmates.

I sat down beside him and asked:

‘What are you doing here?’

He looked at me, surprised. But seeing that I was not one of the doctors, he replied:

‘It’s very simple. My father, a brilliant lawyer, wanted me to be like him.
“My uncle, who owns a large emporium, hoped I would follow his example.
“My mother wanted me to be the image of her beloved father.
“My sister always set her husband before me as an example of the successful man.
“My brother tried to train me up to be a fine athlete like himself.

“And the same thing happened at school, with the piano teacher and the English teacher – they were all convinced and determined that they were the best possible example to follow.

“None of them looked at me as one should look at a man, but as if they were looking in a mirror.

“So I decided to enter this asylum. At least here I can be myself.”

—
Some of these email forwards tend to touch a chord. I guess that’s why they get forwarded around!
This one did touch a chord.