Monthly Archives: January 2010

To learn to make a chair, there are three approaches.

I can teach you how to make a chair in theory and tell you a lot more about wood, types of chairs, design etc. This allows me to teach you a lot of things, and you gain knowledge about chairs, its history and how to make them. You can know all about chairs in a short amount of time and you would feel that you are getting value for money.

But you too can read a book (maybe not as many) to get the same knowledge.

You need a buyer who wants your knowledge instead of him reading a book. So you are substitute for his time. You are his google. You can use methods and tools that you learnt in different and creative ways. You are paid for your creativity.

If a chair needs to be made, your buyer will tell you to get it made and either you will micromanage the carpenter or try it yourself. The first chair created will be terrible. You may not be able to communicate to the carpenter and he will make a chair as perhis belief since he did not understand you or thinks you don’t know anything or does not want to listen to you.

This is what most of the educational institutes do.

Or

I can ask you to make a chair and learn from your mistakes. Since making a chair is physical, it takes time. That means you will learn very few things in the limited amount of time but you have more expertise in these few things.

The buyer knows that you have made a chair and if needed you can make a decent chair. However, the buyer may not need a chair. Also you cannot be his google so he has to spend time himself to learn something, or ask you to learn something and then tell him. Both ways, a lot of time is spent on too few things. You are being paid for your expertise. If the buyer wants a different type of chair, you may not have expertise in it.

If a buyer is clear he wants carpenters who can build a chair, he will want you. When he asks you to make a chair, you will have better rapport with the carpenters because you can roll up your sleeves and help build. You will also create more realistic project plans.

This is what most students want. But then what is the difference between engineering students and polytechnic students?

Or

I can tell you where you can read the theory and then discuss how someone (the subject) else made a chair. You can go through the process, using your theoretical knowledge and making comments on the process. I can add practicality based on my experience. So you learn from my experience of making a chair, your thoughts about making a chair, and the subject’s processof making a chair. So you learn from two persons who have made chairs, and clarify your thought process. I can also ask you how else to make a chair, and that will promote creativity. Drawbacks are that you need to learn the theory yourself – as without this background, you will not understand what is going on, I need to have done this before, and you will get your hands dirty only virtually, not physically.

This is the case method, which requires equal participation from the student and me.

The buyer needs to know that you have seen how a chair is made, you have discussed with 2 carpenters what can go wrong, what went right etc. And you have a lot of knowledge about a lot of topics with some practical experience.

What is the right approach?

Emails are one of the worst inventions for interpersonal relationships. I know that it is cheap and fast. But it is impersonal.

I are naturally shy and therefore hide behind emails. It allows me to compose at leisure and rewrite my mail, therefore lose all spontaneity. It therefore is not a true picture of who I am. Someone else can also write my emails on my behalf.

On the other hand, I have a tendency to personalise everything that I receive as input – whether it is an email or feedback. So when I get an impersonal letter, I colour it with my impressions of the sender. If my last interaction with the sender was bad, the letter is coloured by that impression…and vice versa. So junk mails have no impact because I have no connection with the sender.

If I am selling, or looking for a job, or talking to a friend or significant other, I should try and talk to him personally so that he can get a better impression about me. Otherwise when I send an email, like when applying for a job using a CV or an impersonal letter, it makes me the same as 500,000 others who are looking for a job.

If however, I have talked to a person, or someone else has talked on my behalf, then there is a personalisation, and when I send an email, the email is coloured by their impression about me.

If my email is forwarded to another person, again it becomes impersonal because the new recipient has no interaction with me. It is therefore sometimes better if I talk to the end user (the department that plans to hire me, e.g. the sales department) who then talks to the HR persons.

We need to decrease email interaction and increase verbal or face to face interaction. Handwritten letters are better than emails. At least there is a personalisation and a spontaneity.

We have a headache, we take aspirin or paracetamol or consult a so-called expert, take their recommendation and get back to doing what we were doing. Since the problem goes away, we do not bother. Each time the headache returns, we take a larger dose or try a different medicine. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not. One day we realise that this is not working and go to a proper doctor. We then understand that the root cause was different, by which time it may be too late.

We treat life the same way. When we have a problem, we consult a so-called expert or read a self-help book and apply its principles. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not.

There are tens of thousands of ‘self-help’ or ‘how-to’ books, ranging from fixing your physical problems (weight, looks, complexion, height) to fixing your emotional and mental problems (memory, speed of thinking, control of emotions) to fixing your after-life (spiritual, religious problems). If they give quick fixes, it is a good book or advice. If it asks you to do things from basic principles (like yoga) where the results take too much time in coming or are not evident, we do not like that book or advice.

We become evangelists of some remedies thatwork. We close our eyes to the root problems, or ignore any signs that are contrary to our beliefs. We also try to convert others to our way of thinking. We force our beliefs on others. Check out the latest diet, fad, religion, spiritual guru.

The answers are within ourselves. We are a product of what we didor did not do in the past. All this past programming made us what we are today. This cannot be deprogrammed by an instant pill. We have to spend a certain amount of time undoing and redoing.

We then have four choices.

1. We can get disheartened and keep searching for the magic pill. We will run from one fad to the other, ask more and more quacks about what to do and believe that the symptomatic relief is the final cure.
2. We can accept ourselves as what we are, and by the same token, accept others as they are. We understand our shortcomings and work around them, and compensate for others’ shortcomings and/or help them.
3. We can start the process of undoing and redoing the most important things. For example, health issues happen when we are old, and we have time to undo/redo our range of activities pertaining to our health. However, once we have taken the career path of ,say, engineering, we cannot go back into medical.
4. We can, early on in life, start doing the right things, so that we are programmed the right way. This requires us to analyse and agree that we need to create some skill sets, find the best way to do it and stick to it, giving it a chance.

If I analyse any bad experience, I generally conclude that there was/is something wrong with me or what I did, or something wrong with the other party involved in the transaction, or with the world (circumstances, parents, boss, government). If that transaction has been beneficial to another person then he obviously does not come to the same conclusion as I do.

When one person feels good and the other feels bad, I would call it a win-lose situation. When I lose, I blame myself and others. If all situations were termed win-lose, then someone or the other in this world would be blaming something or someone. Does this mean that at any point of time, something is always wrong? Was the whole world created wrongly?

If the situation was a win-win situation, then neither party believes that there is anything wrong with the world/ them/ us.

I think the issue is our belief of right or wrong. When we win, things are right, else they are wrong. This is just a belief. Reality is that there are only actions and consequences. A consequence may be adverse to me sometimes, and sometimes it may be positive.

Sometimes, when we get hit by a lot of adverse consequences, we lose heart and do not see the positive in even beneficial consequences. We believe that we always have ill-luck.

On the contrary, I can choose to believe that there is a ‘silver lining’ to all mishaps. I can choose to believe that by the law of averages, good and bad consequences will even out / cancel each other. I can also analyse all the bad things that happened to me in the past and choose to believe that they closed one door but opened another door to my destiny. I would realise that every transaction is essentially win-win even those I considered as ‘I lose- you win’.

Then I would conclude that there is nothing wrong with me, with the other party or the world. People are not good or bad, people are just reacting, the best way they know how to, to circumstances. Actions are not right or wrong, they are reactions to stimulus, coloured by the reactor’s beliefs.

People are neither right or wrong, people just ARE. Something is not right or wrong, something just IS.

I have a tendency to judge people or companies. They are all doing the best they can under the circumstances and we do not know all the circumstances to judge them. When a person acts in a particular way, he does it based on his beliefs. We take this action of the person and extrapolate from it, his beliefs. Can we generalise based on one action?

I need to remember that I do not like to be judged. Why should I not extend the same courtesy to others?

I have discussed beliefs before. Any action has a response based on beliefs. If you believe that the company you are working in is bad, all your judgements will be coloured negatively. If you believe, like all humans, companies occasionally make mistakes, you give it a benefit of doubt.

The company is not forcing you…your boss, (an individual) is forcing you. He has his reasons. He has a belief, based on his upbringing, experience, genetics, about how to get things done. He is not there with a life mission to make you unhappy. He is paying you a salary, he is upgrading your skills, he is teaching you life lessons.

Messages come from all weird people in life. We need to be receptive enoughto receive these messages.

In order to make oodles of money, I need to have something to sell that other people want and are willing to buy and pay. What I have are my assets.

I can have a physical asset (either god given, inherited, purchased or created by me) – this can include looks etc. as well as material assets, or mental assets (my ability to think, ideate etc) or interpersonal relationship assets. Sometimes it is a combination of all three.

Another aspect is the permanence of the asset and how many times it can be sold. For example, looks can be sold until I am old or a better product comes up, or people are bored, but real estate that I possess can be sold once only.

My experience is not an asset. It is an effort to create an asset. What did I achieve and the lessons learnt are the assets created, that would help a prospective buyer.

All assets need to be periodically maintained, cleaned up etc. Relationships are also assets and are evergreen, as long as I maintain them.

Another such asset is attitude. It is well known that people who look at the positive side of things are more successful in life. For example, a sales person who is realistic will not revisit a customer but an optimistic one will make one more effort. Situations change and sometimes he gets an order when logically he should not.

If I make a list of my assets, I suddenly realise that I am quite rich. All these assets are part of my balance sheet (read resume). Some assets are attractive to some buyers, others are not. My experience may not be attractive, but the lessons learnt may be.

The trick is to find out what the buyer wants.