Little Things That Matter

Learn From The Past, Live The Present and Have An Open Mind to Face Tomorrow

What Does It Take To “Lead By Example”?

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Two days back, I had to change my gym routine due to my work schedule. As a result, I decided to try out an instructor whose class I have not tried out before. During the class, he kept repeating, “……come on, more energy” to some members of the class and yet there was no change. I had to consciously remind myself to be at a high energy level and keep my focus.

Why did I have to consciously remind myself to be energetic, when being energetic and enthusiastic is something that I am. What was lacking?

The instructor’s energy levels were low. His movements in the Combat class lacked power, enthusiasm and energy. He was eager in his facial expressions but not in his moves and technique, which is imperative in a combat class or in any of the fitness class.

I was reminded of that moment, 4 years back, where my master trainer told me that as a facilitator my energy and enthusiasm levels have to be congruent to what I am saying and to the moment. To quote him “If your energy levels are at 80% then the participants in the class are going to be at probably at 40%-50%. When you keep your energy levels to 150%, then you will have a class with enthusiastic and engaged participants.”

I experienced the lack of enthusiasm and engagement, in the fitness class and have experienced it in the facilitation of trainings or workshops by some other trainers and on some occasions, early on, in my own journey, of being a corporate leadership and communication facilitator.

No matter what role each of us play, we cannot expect others to follow, listen, support or do anything till we play that role in its entirety.

Be #excited, #eager and #energetic in what you do, say and how you say and look, to #leadbyexample.

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How can you be a leader if you are not:

 

1.Enthusiastic

If you are not enthusiastic about what you do, what you say, how you look, how you act and say, then you do not lead by example and you will not be able to gain others trust. You will not be credible.

2.Encouraging

When you speak words of encouragement you show others that you trust their potential and recognize and appreciate them. When you see others doing their job well, and show your appreciation and encouragement, you give others a fine reputation to live up to.

You inspire action by appreciating others for what they have done well. #leadership

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3.Getting a Fresh Perspective

Words of command or request mean nothing if you are not willing to be in the trenches. Similarly words of encouragement do not mean anything, if they are not genuine. A leader is one who knows how to let go and does so by getting a fresh perspective. If things are not working, ask yourself what other perspective could you have, to achieve your desired outcome.

4.Prioritizing

Each of us have 24 hours in a day, and yet constrained by time. By not prioritizing, you lose focus and are unable to be enthusiastic and energetic, thus setting a bad example.

5.Accountable

If you are not accountable for your actions, you will not be credible. Accountability is an important trait in every human being.

6.Resilient

Your ability to handle challenges and grow from there and thereby enhance your skills shows your resilience.

A #leader leads by example only if they walk their talk and are #consistent and #committed.

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No matter how you feel, you can be inspiring as a leader only when you show enthusiasm and energy in what you have to say or do.

How are you being enthusiastic?

How do you manage your moods and other challenges in order to be energetic?

Communication is an essential part of leadership. If you are looking to enhance your communication skills and be an effective leader, please consult me for one -on-one coaching, group coaching, workshops to facilitate a training or as a key note speaker.

Leaders Do Not LEAD

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Last Thursday, I had to go for a Nerve Conduction Test, that my doctor wanted me to do, since I was experiencing pain in the palm of my hands for past several months.

I had no idea what the test involved and I typically like to be in the know., I asked the assistant how long it would take and as I saw the doctor, soon after exchanging pleasantries, I enthusiastically asked him some specific questions on what the test involved. To one of my questions on where would he connect the electric nodes, he spontaneously responded “don’t worry there are no needles”. I had not expressed any fear of needles nor had asked anything about needles. My response that he can inject as many needles as the test may require and needles don’t scare me, because I have been a diabetic Type 1 for over 35 years, took him by surprise……

→How many times do we, when we are asked questions, tend to respond, based on our filters?

→How many of us patiently listen to the question empathetically?

→How many times do we listen without judgment and be in the moment?

→How many of us in our work and daily life, despite using the right tone, facial expression and body language, are made to feel guilty about asking questions ?

Leadership is about taking an overall perspective, having the humility to listen to another perspective and yet keep the communication and relationship healthy. Whilst giving an opinion may be adequate or necessary in some instances, in others it may not.

Leaders do not LEAD, when they Do Not

1.Let go

If we hold onto our bias, our filters, we will continue to view the world from that narrow perspective.
By not letting go of your baggage, you will be unable to influence others positively.

#Life will not be what you want it to be, if you and your view of the world is frozen. #leadership

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Let go and try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view #leadership

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2.Energize

Impactful #leaders pay attention to not only what they say but how they say #leadership

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. They energize their communication by expressing themselves powerfully and in that they do not judge and be swayed by opinions, likes or dislikes. They listen to connect and see things with a fresh perspective. They think before they speak and are conscious of their bias and its impact, if they do not reframe their communication.

3.Accept

If you fail to adapt, you will not #inspire others. #leadership

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As a leader, you need to trust your intuition. You realize that you don’t get to choose all the cards in your life but you do get to choose how you deal with the cards you are dealt in, by the attitude you take to the adversities.

4.Dare

Despite your experience, you dare to look at things with an unbiased and uncluttered mind.

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You make a conscious choice to look at things with a fresh pair of eyes. You are courageous to try out new things and ready to accept your mistake quickly, when you are wrong. If you do not dare to be a person who is genuinely interested in the other person, you will fail to build a rapport and enhance your relationships. 

#Leaders #LEAD by their character, walking their talk and giving others a fine reputation to live up to.

⇒How are you dealing with people and relationships in your life?⇐

⇒How do you choose to lead by example?⇐

Connect with me for leadership and communications training, workshops, one-on-one coaching.

 

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Five Successful Behaviors That Leaders Practice To Live Within Their Comfort Zone

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“I don’t like to be constantly told that I need to step out of my comfort zone. I’m happy where I am.” I was at Starbucks yesterday, waiting for a friend of mine to join me, when this remark caught my attention. The lady who made this remark was looking quite frustrated and was possibly having one of those down and out moments.

Do we constantly need to live out of our comfort zone?

Do we need to constantly push somebody out of their comfort zone?

In 1995, when I came to Hong Kong, I had till then never lived alone nor in a new country/city on my own. I took on a new role within the same organization, that I was working for in India. Here I was, in a new country, new culture, new work environment, new language, new role and yet….I learnt my way through, from my mistakes, believing in myself and not giving into my fears and I continue to live and enjoy this city, 20 years later.

If somebody had mentioned to me that I have to step out of my comfort zone, I probably would not have realized, what that meant, then. All I knew, at that moment in time, was that I have to make a meaningful impact, prove my worth, achieve the department goals and in all this, get a sense of fulfillment and grow in my career path and life.

Yet, when I reflect, I did step out of my comfort zone in several ways throughout my journey of 20 years and continue to do so. If I had not done so, I would not have made the journey to where I am today.

Can we live outside of our comfort zone all the time ? No, in fact, not necessary.

We need time to process our experiences and thus need to come back within our comfort zone. If we are constantly seeking new experiences all the time, we may run the risk of missing out the subtlety and experiences of life. In this day of the technological innovations, breakthroughs, and being connected all the time with our smart phones,  change is continuos and the last thing we want, is for the new and interesting to become boring within a short span of time and a sense of apathy to develop.

So, why is there so much importance being given to stepping out of our comfort zone?

We are creatures of our habits and over time, we all gather a set of constricting habits around us—those that we become less conscious of and lull into an auto pilot mode. Some of these habits restrict us from attaining our full potential because we allow ourselves to be dominated by our fears. When you allow some of these not so useful habits to rule you, you will be stuck in a rut.

So how do we motivate ourselves to step out of our comfort zone and yet not make it stressful and nerve wrecking.

1.Have a growth mindset

When you have a growth mindset, you become more aware of opportunities for your self-improvement. Living on an auto pilot mode and continuing the same habits which causes frustration adds to your stress and overwhelm. Challenging yourself to move forward adds that spice and flavor to your life and enables you to achieve progress in your life.

My transitions within the world of investment banking world, where I spent 20 years and switching from a corporate career to running my own business, four years back, has been possible on account of my growth mindset. Research in Neuroscience tells us that our connection to meaningful impact and contribution activates our neural reward networks.

#Learning, #discovering, re-learning helps the neurons in our brains to make new connections.

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2.Change your thoughts

Your thoughts control who you are. If you believe you can’t, you won’t. Living within your comfort zone today, was someday, probably, out of your comfort zone. Living within your comfort zone is good as long as it doesn’t make you stagnant.

How can you expect to progress and move forward in your life if you are not willing to do something with which you are uncomfortable? Anything new is likely to create some uncertainty or discomfort. The first day in your job probably felt uncomfortable and 3-6 months later, you got into the groove.

Give power to your negative thoughts and it starts to control your feelings, words and language and you are not able to break away from the vicious cycle of negativity. Empower your thoughts and the actions that follows as a result.

3.Face Your Fear

Unknown and uncertain things is many times perceived by our brain as a threat. If we allow that fear to dominate us, we become victims of it. A little anxiety may be just what you need to focus your efforts and perform at your peak, psychologists say. Ask yourself how did you overcome some of the fears you had before? What did you learn from that experience? Let logic more than emotion prevail in guiding you to overcome your fears.

“There’s a place for information,” Dr. Taylor (Kathleen Taylor, a professor at St. Mary’s College of California, who has studied ways to teach adults effectively) says. “We need to know stuff. But we need to move beyond that and challenge our perception of the world. If you always hang around with those you agree with and read things that agree with what you already know, you’re not going to wrestle with your established brain connections.”
Such stretching is exactly what scientists say best keeps a brain in tune: get out of the comfort zone to push and nourish your brain. Do anything from learning a foreign language to taking a different route to work.

#Self-confidence comes from believing in yourself and playing to your strengths

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4.Let go

Believe in yourself, the depth of your talent, the power of your ability and the reach of your potential. If you keep doubting yourself, then you will not be able to move forward. Reflect on things you do well, things which challenge you and where you need to improve, and how you can use your strengths to overcome your challenges. Seek the help of a mentor or coach who can be a sounding board and help you get the necessary insights. Let go of being in control of everything in your life. That adds to the overwhelm and stress.

When you change your mind about #stress, it changes your body response too. #transitions

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Viewing the stress response as helpful, the heart still pounds but the way your body responds is similar to when you are in joy and courage. If you think of something as a challenge, which you will enjoy, then you are able to live up to that challenge.

5.Diversity

Whilst learning, growth and development happens outside your comfort zone, seek diversity on things you already do well and within your comfort zone. This will give you the optimal balance of being challenged and in a healthy way. Try out different ways of doing something, you have been doing as a routine. For e.g. If you write every Monday, to publish your blog post and you feel bogged down by sticking to that routine, try changing it to another day. Not every aspect of your life at every stage needs to be viewed as stepping out of your comfort zone.

If using the word “Outside your Comfort Zone”, bothers you and causes agony in you, reframe your communication.

Ask, what do you need to start doing to get to your vision or goal? What do you need to stop doing to achieve your dreams? What do you need to give up to reach your potential ? Enjoy the journey and if you feel you are running on a hamster wheel, Stop, reflect and check if you have pushed yourself way too hard to cause overwhelm and fatigue.

The idea is to move forward and provide yourself motivation to take steps to achieve what you seek and that means to get uncomfortable with the comfortable and comfortable with the uncomfortable. Your growth as a human being and a leader depends on it.

Transitions creates overwhelm and challenges in our life. Some of the changes that we get dealt with are outside our control and some are within our control. How we transition to these changes in our life is entirely up to each of us. Grow and develop or choose to stay stagnant. Consult me for either one-on-one coaching, group training, facilitation, or workshops.

5 Creative Ways To “Just Do It”

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“There is no way I can do this.”

“I admire you for being so courageous, I doubt if I ever can be like you”.

How many times have you uttered those words out loud or had thoughts similar to those? More importantly, how many times have these inner thoughts been so loud that they have stopped you from pursuing creative thinking or coming up with fresh ideas?

All of us have these little voices or the inner gremlin sitting on our shoulder, at various intensities at various points of time in our lives telling us we’re not good enough or we don’t deserve what we have got or we are not capable.

These voices of self-doubt or inner critique stop you in your pursuit of excellence and from your growth and development.

How do you face your inner gremlin and tell her or him to shut up ?

How do you unplug your fears and “Just Do It”?

1. Clarity

Clarity of purpose is a great guide to achieving what you set out to do so. That inner guide reminds you of your purpose and why you do what you do. Do you have clarity on your purpose ?

2. Listen

When the little voice is a deal stopper, listen up. Listen to what it is telling you. Write it down and don’t dwell on it at that moment. Walk away. Come back and read it.

3. What is the worst that can happen ?

When you read what you have written, evaluate objectively what is the worst case scenario ? Is there any truth in your fear ? What happened when you faced a similar fear last time ? How did you get over it ? What did you do well ? What lessons did you learn?

4. Truth

Once you have identified the worst case scenario and there is some credence to your fear, ask how can you better from the worst case scenario ? What do you need to do to achieve the desired results and improve from the worst case scenario?

5.Self-Confidence

To enhance your self-confidence, you need to stop worrying and ask yourself how much is the price you are willing to pay for worrying and is it worth it? Self-confidence is built from self-acceptance and by identifying your strengths and achievements in the past. How did you overcome your last challenge?

Get support from a coach or a mentor to assist you in where you want to be.

Your fear and self-doubt is the truth, if you give power to it.

In your pursuit of #excellence and #quality, let go of your fears and #JustDOIt. #leadfromwithin

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Believe in yourself and work towards improving yourself on a daily basis. #leadfromwithin #self-confidence #fears

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How are you breaking from your fears and doubts and setting yourself on the path to success?

For one-on-one coaching, speaking, training and/or group workshops, let’s connect.

Accept The Change, Love Thy Self

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I was in a conversation with a friend of mine over the weekend and she suddenly remarked, I have become slow in whatever I am and in whatever I do. To quote “I feel I have become lethargic about a lot of things in my life. I feel I have lost my edge”. That statement caught my attention especially given her tone and facial expressions with which she said it. As soon as I heard her say that, I asked her how so?

The conversation went on for long as she was narrating several incidents in her life and how she had behaved. From her statements and the questions I asked her, I observed that she had become more mindful and conscious in a lot of things that she does. She thus feels frustrated at times that she is no longer the energetic and enthusiastic self that she was known for.

It was interesting that she made a strange connection between being mindful and being lethargic and thus dissociating herself with her energetic and enthusiastic younger self.

Are you disappointed with a conscious change you have made in life?

Have you reflected what these changes are and why you made those changes?

Do you consider yourself as a failure and somebody who has given up in life on account of some changes in your perspectives?

You are not a FAILURE if:

1. You are more conscious and aware in what you do instead of acting on impulse.

2. You think twice and don’t react to your emotions be it in responding to others verbally or in writing.

3. You have consciously slowed down in terms of how you plan your day instead of feeling constantly being on the rat race.

4. You are aware about your emotions and this awareness helps you to recognize your emotions and yet frame your communication in a way that it lands properly on the recipient.

5. You realize that when things don’t go as per your plan, it is not about you or the other person but it is about finding out what were the gap or interferences were that led to the plan not being met.

6. You realize that in your gym or yoga or exercise regime, each day is different and your body is different. Change is part of your body and each day is different and thus you need to keep an open mind.

7. You like action and fast pace but there are things in life you realize you need to step back. Accepting the latter doesn’t mean you have given up.

8. The circumstances in every aspect of your life is different from 15, 10, 5 or 1 year back and you need to change your way of thinking and the way you behave.

9. You are goal oriented and an achiever but your experiences have taught you that anger doesn’t help when the goal is not achieved as per your plans.

10. You take mini breaks to gain insights and help your lateral thinking.

You are not old if you have adapted to circumstances and made yourself more flexible in your attitude. We all need to evolve in our thinking and our behavior. Only way to do this is to keep an open mind, reflect, unlearn, relearn and look at things with a fresh perspective.

Don’t let your inner critique get the better of you. Avoid negativity.  Click To Tweet

Be Ambitious and Persistent But Do Only What You Can Do.    Click To Tweet

How flexible are you in making changes and accepting the new you?

For Coaching, Speaking or Training let’s connect.

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Learnings In The Journey Of Life

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LifeI reflect quite often. However, this weekend I got into a deeper reflection mainly due to behaviors of some people. I got into this mode of “I must be doing something wrong” thinking. This is the inner critique taking over and I didn’t want that dominating me. When I started to reflect, write and self-coach myself, I started seeing things differently.

Reflection helps me to let go, learn something new, get different perspectives and insights and handle certain situations differently. Over the years I have learned the following

1. Have the courage to be yourself. Reflect, learn, unlearn, improve and never lose your values. Click To Tweet

2. You can’t please everyone. You will meet people in life who will always be toxic and never appreciate your strengths or your authenticity. Click To Tweet

3. You are unique in who you are. Your experience with each of your relationships and situations is unique.

4. You don’t get what you want in many turns of your life, though you may have given your best. Trying to find an explanation or a reason only makes matters worse. Stop overthinking.

5. You are not your rejections or your failures. You have to believe in your positive potential and your ability. Click To Tweet

6. As hard as it may be, it is best to let go of some relationships. Click To Tweet

7. Be authentic but let your authenticity not fall in a way that you are misunderstood. Framing the way you communicate your authenticity is imperative. Click To Tweet

8. Know when to speak up, when to be silent and know when to walk away. There is a time and place for everything and your best guide is your intuition.

9. Change is constant and people change. Don’t blame yourself when people start behaving differently.

10. You have to be street smart and be part of the change. Initiate change, be the change but never lose your values or your integrity. Click To Tweet

11. Apologize even if you are not wrong because you can walk away with a clean conscience.

12. Let yourself be lead from within and your intuition and not by your falsified ego. Click To Tweet

13. Value yourself and never compromise your values. Never allow yourself to be trampled by someone else. Speak your mind but always be respectful to others.

14. In trying to impress and cultivate your new relationships don’t forget about people who have stood by you through your tough times.

15. Smile. Smiling when you are going through a tough time is the most difficult but from personal experience I can say it makes a huge difference to that moment. You have to consciously tell yourself to smile in that vulnerable moment.

16. Being strong may feel tiring many times but the world is with you through your smiles and not your tears. Learn to cultivate resilience because that helps you to bounce back and approach life with a positive mindset. Click To Tweet

17. Focus on improving your strengths and don’t overemphasize your limitations.

18. Think before you speak, question yourself before you act. Pause is better than impulse. Click To Tweet

19. Don’t forget to be kind to yourself and others.

20. It is never too late to improve and change for the better.

21. Living in the moment is difficult but find ways to do it. You get insights when you accept the circumstance that you may be in. Anger worsens the situations and increases your frustration.

22. Share your emotions and how you feel but with people who will honor you for who you are and will listen with empathy.

23. Maturity is a lot to do with what lessons your experiences have taught you and how you show up in different challenges that life throws at you.

24. No matter how good you are there will always be people who hurt you. Take it as a lesson and let go of the hurt.

25. No one has lived your life or walked your road. So don’t worry about the naysayers and those who are judgmental.

Various actions, reactions and behaviors upset me but whenever I’m in that space of feeling hurt and upset, I remind myself that I can choose how I react. I ask myself how is this feeling of hurt impacting me and as a result, how I might not be showing up fully to various moments in life.

Choice of our behavior and actions is well within our control and let us always choose what is best to reflect our character. Click To Tweet

In the end, what matters is loving your life. Find the joy in trusting your intuition, cherishing your happy and sad memories, learning through the challenges that seemed indomitable at that moment in time and allowing yourself to make the choices in the chances you take. Learn to trust your instincts and stop doubting yourself every step of your way.Click To Tweet. 

Life is a continuous learning journey and there is no right or predetermined answers. Click To Tweet

What have you learnt over the years?

What reflections can you share so that others may use it in their path of learning and development?

For Coaching, Speaking or Training let’s connect. 

 

Disrupting Your Negative Thoughts

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Image Credits : Lalita Raman

Jacinta has sent her proposal to her boss. She has worked over the weekend on this proposal making sure all the details had been covered and that there is no room for any errors. On Monday late morning she gets a call from her boss asking her to come over to his office. She goes in with a heavy heart. She observes her boss reading her proposal as she is entering his room. He finishes reading the report and gives it back to Jacinta stating, ‘Jacinta, your proposal is good, though I would like you to refine these two sections. The client meeting is in an hour and please make sure you have it ready much before that’.

Jacinta is disappointed and she feels she should have done better. She thinks that her boss is not going to like her coming to the client meeting. She feels that her boss won’t trust her with any such important projects in the future. She knows that he has lost confidence in her. She is so lost in this negative mindset that she fails to attend to another task with her heart and soul. She in fact loses a deal with another key client and this gets her into a further negative vicious cycle.

Clearly, Jacinta has blown the situation way out of proportion. Her negative monologue has turned a suggestion for improvement to an extremely disruptive thought process.

Have you seen people with similar behaviors? How about you? Would you have reacted the same or differently?

Thinking affects our feelings and in turn our beliefs and actions. Click To Tweet

What are these thinking traps?

1. Magnifying – you magnify the issue. You minimize your own strengths and your ability to believe in yourself of rendering a task or job. You magnify it to an extent where even some of the future events become certainties in your mind. In Jacinta’s case, her negative mindset has made her conclude that her boss will not trust her with any important projects in future.

2. Blanket generalization – you think that just because an unpleasant thing has happened before, it will always happen. Let’s say you miss the bus when you are in a hurry to get to your client’s office. You believe that this will happen to you every time you need to get somewhere urgently.

3. Perfectionist and “all or nothing thinking “– you set high standards for yourself and others. When you hear suggestions for improvement you see it as, you are not good enough and you could not render a simple task well. You start telling yourself you should have checked the report or your work again or should have written it better. Jacinta failed to see her boss’s remark as a suggestion to improve few sections. Her negative inner talk started to tell her what she should have done so that her proposal would have been accepted without the necessity of any refinements.

4. Jumping to Conclusions: you conclude negatively despite no evidence to support your belief. In Jacinta’s case, she believes that she is going to be told by her boss not to attend the meeting with the client. The fact is he hasn’t stated so nor has she clarified nor is there any evidence that he doesn’t want her to attend the meeting with the client.

How do you avoid falling prey to your negative thinking? Click To Tweet

1. Track Your Inner Dialog – Keep a journal of your thoughts when something doesn’t go as per your expectations. How do you react to this stressful situation? What were the consequences of your reaction to that situation? What beliefs did you form and how did it affect your thinking and behavior thereafter?

2. Analyze Results – Once you have written down several such daily activities and how you behaved, ask yourself and observe if there were any repeated patterns in the way you think and act. Which of these beliefs or behavior have led to specific consequences that made things worse?

3.Distractor – You have seen how your negative thinking affects your behavior and actions. How do you interrupt your negative thoughts? It is unlikely that telling yourself to snap out of the negative thoughts will work effectively.

A positive distraction like walking away from what you are doing or concentrating on your achievements in the past in challenging situations or talking to somebody who can inspire you is what you need at that moment. Even asking yourself How Dare I allows you to snap out of your negative thoughts?

Disrupting your negative thoughts allows your brain to snap out of the stress and negativity and thus helps you to think clearly.

Surround yourself with positive people who can inspire, encourage and believe in you to bring back your self-confidence. Click To Tweet.

Once you snap out of the negativity, ask yourself

– What happened?
- what did you do well?
- what could you do better?
- if a suggestion has been given by someone else like your boss, is there an element of truth to that?
- is the feedback destructive or constructive? If destructive, why bother? If constructive what can you do better? What lessons did you learn?

You need to look for ways that will help you stay committed to your goals and evaluate:

–Are you a product of your negativity? Click To Tweet


-How can you grow through your challenges and yet keep up the optimism? Click To Tweet

If you shroud yourself with negativity most of the time, and keep giving credence to your inner critique, you may consult a coach or mentor who will assist you in overcoming your negativity. Overall you need to believe in yourself and your strengths.

For Coaching, Speaking or Training let’s connect.

Responsibility Is A Choice

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I was at a lobby of a hotel last week waiting for a business meeting and I happened to hear a rather interesting conversation between a young lady and the guest relations manager of the hotel. As the lady was getting up to see something that the guest relations manager was showing, she collected her belongings at which point the manager mentioned to her, “Ma’am don’t worry about your belongings. They are safe.” The lady smiled, thanked him and said “I understand sir, but I rather be responsible for my belongings and what happens to it instead of entrusting them to someone else.”

Responsibility, I thought, was well-defined by this lady.

Responsibility

→Is having an obligation to do something and doing it. If you are accountable you need to be responsible. Responsibility can be shared but not accountability.

→Is taking care of your thoughts, actions and duties and

→Is answering for your words and actions.

    No matter whether you are at work, walking on the road, at the gym, on holiday or interacting on social media.

Responsibility is a word that equals Respons(e) + (A)bility. Each of us have the ability to make a choice. “A choice” for the response we give to each situation or events that take place in the journey called life.

Choose to take the actions that create the results that you will desire if they were applied on you.

How can we be responsible?

1. Not to shine your own light by dimming someone else’s. This applies to every aspect of your life.

2. For every stimulus, you respond to, you have the power to choose how you want to live your life and behave in every moment in the space that you occupy.

3. You are the only person who is responsible for your thoughts and decisions. Integrity, compassion, empathy, attitude control are important elements of responsibility and it doesn’t matter what role you play in your life. Attitude control is part of your responsibility.

4. When you hire people hold them accountable for their actions or inactions.

5. Do not assume and do not make generalizations and resort to stereotyping.

Life goes on…. And you must take personal responsibility because that is within your control.

“You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. That is something you have charge of- Jim Rohn.

Do You Make Judgements and Stereotype in the First 60 Seconds?

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Elevator speeches and the necessity to impress someone or a group of people has become the call of the day.

How many times have you judged, hated, or been impressed by someone in less than a minute? So if someone whom you were meeting for the first time were to walk in with a fast pace, looked pre-occupied with something, didn’t really spend time on niceties like how are you, how was your day, and didn’t leave any time for detailed discussion as you are going through the meeting, would you  judge that person to be arrogant, overconfident, impatient and curt?

Even in social media we make judgment about people by looking at the number of followers that each one has. Some people are desperate to get the attention of those who have several followers or have been featured in some write-up that someone on Twitter has done about them and included them in Some Top 50 or 75 lists. An assumption is made by most people, that all those who have appeared in such lists, or have a lot of followers, have a good character and are kind. Sounds familiar? Yes so we judge and get judged in a minute or less.

An elevator speech may be very good but the follow through & delivery may not necessarily follow the impressive Elevator Speech.

So what is important for you to know when you meet someone for the first time and this could be an interview, a meeting with a potential business client, a presentation or a stranger who could turn out to be your friend, or client

  1. How you dress is important and even on Social Media many forget that they can’t show a bad Display Pictures or pictures that don’t represent them. Though you don’t have to be branded from top to toe or bedecked in jewelry or wear revealing clothes how you dress and what you wear is very important.
  2. How you walk into an interview or meeting as well as your body language is something that a lot of people tend to underestimate.
  3. It is not necessary to put on an accent. Be authentic & present your view-point succinctly & with clarity . There is no necessity to be rude nor put on a mask.
  4. One could be dressed well but yet many spoil the show when they open their mouth – words used and the tone of your voice is as important as how you look.
  5. Your facial expressions need to convey your authenticity.

The first impression  is important but you have to follow through with content and substance and have a good closure. What you say has to be consistent with what you do and no matter even if you have managed to impress someone in the first minute or so, if you don’t walk your talk you’ll surely cut a sorry figure.

What can you do as an observer? When you meet someone for the first time make observations, go with your gut feel but don’t jump to conclusions in the first minute. You may have someone who seems to be in a hurry and brusque but may be a person full of kindness & gratitude. Engage the person in the conversation before you judge.

Let me share with you a story – one of my friends (now) who was an ex colleague of mine, when I was working with one of the companies was visibly upset at the first second he saw me even before introductions. He always avoided me, was rather rude in his response if I ever asked him anything & whilst it was a regular practice to have a brief meeting with most of your colleagues in the first few weeks, he always came up with an excuse for not meeting me.  The irony was some people really liked him but there were others who were too scared of him. His behavior did strike me as strange and intrigued me. I was eager to get to know him but after trying very hard for a few months, I decided to step back.

I did judge him but my intuition kept telling me otherwise. Days went by, we got talking to each other, our interactions increased but he was always very brusque when he started talking to me. We parted ways going to different organizations and our paths crossed again in another organization. His behavior was completely the opposite. He gave me the insight about this new firm, called me out for a drink. One day I asked him why his behavior towards me had changed dramatically in that he was so pleasant & friendly. To my surprise he said oh!  “I was upset that you were brought in at a higher rank to me when you joined that organization”. “But over time, I figured out that I was showing the anger on the wrong person. I started liking your style and your ideas, and now with both of us again crossing paths I decided I should make up for the bad behavior”.

Many times some people may behave in a particular way because they are judging you by your title or your connections or position.  This incident taught me that I should not necessarily judge and more importantly write off someone by the way they behave. Yes, we have short attention span and it is important to have elevator speeches but let’s not be in a hurry to assess someone in less than a minute.

“Think not I am what I appear.” Byron, Lord

Do you think that the first minute impressions are valid?

Is it right to make a judgement based on first impressions?

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