Results by motivation – “I am an Energy Star”

Results by motivation –

“I am an Energy Star”

Show me Results!  --  this is something we want anywhere;  at home, work, utility services; government, students, schools, movies, sports…

How do get the desired results – carrot or stick? Both? Neither?  Luck?

Let me narrate one motivation strategy I used at my home.

We have three children at home; one of the constant dialogue I hear at home is “hey, whoever has switched on the light/fan;  switch it off”   -- the response from children is generally; “it’s not me” .     I have heard these noises many many times.  I was telling my children and wife;  “who” is not very important;  anyone can put off lights / fans / TV when not in use;  these lectures did not work.

I have put a simple motivation strategy;  devised a scoring card called “I am an Energy Star”.  This is pasted in the living room, side of the refrigerator;  the rule is anyone who switches off any energy device which is ON unnecessarily; will get one star.   More the stars, more the points and children would get a gift.  Believe me, it clicked instantly, and there is a competition to switch  OFF devices to gain stars  -- sometimes it works too much; even the necessary lights are put OFF.   

Let us switch to organization scenario,  as Leaders how are we working with our team to achieve results – by motivation techniques?  Or stick (if you don’t do this, then… ) approach.  Recollect few instances of the approaches you have practice recently with your colleagues and analyze which has given sustained results. It will be great if you can share your views and some examples of this.

Btw, I was sharing this “I am an Energy Star” example with two of my colleagues recently;  they implemented at home and it worked for them!

Won Silver or Lost Gold?

Won Silver or Lost Gold?

London 2012 Olympics is just round the corner and London and rest of the world is so excited about this and looking forward for this event. One thing which comes to mind on the sports event is prizes and medals.

Olympics are bundled with lots of sports like athletics, football, swimming, etc. At the end of every event three prizes are given, it is mostly GOLD, SILVER and BRONZE.

What do you think is going on in the mind of an athlete who has got Silver medal, is she happy about the prize? I can hear you saying – “of course, she is”. I heard some of you saying, “No, she is upset”. If we analyse it, she might have both the feelings; happy for winning Silver and upset for losing Gold. So what do we call this as Won Silver? Or Lost Gold?

I see this kind of feeling happens in our workplace as well, one of the situations I can think of is performance appraisal. If one gets “Exceeds Expectations”, does she feels happy about it or upset for not reaching “Outstanding”. In my opinion one should have both the feelings, “Won Silver” feeling should give confidence on oneself and a great motivation to keep going and at the same time “Lost Gold” feeling should help to reset the goal, identify gaps and striver harder to reach gold (goal?).

What is your view about this? What is your feeling in similar situations? What do you think is a good approach?

At that moment, I knew what love is - Happy International Women day

Happy International Women’s Day.

 

First, let me introduce myself;  I am a father of two; one smart boy and a sweet little  girl.   This article is based on what I have experienced in life.

Let me start with my son, who was born ten years ago, on a Wednesday evening in the millennium year 2000.   I got a phone call that day morning to let me know that my wife was admitted in  hospital for delivery, and was advised not to worry.  Tension mounted to this first time father - I flew from Bangalore to Chennai with lot of anxiety about the new born, will my wife be safe, will the baby he healthy, is it going to be boy or girl, will the baby  look like me, etc, etc.   When my son was born I was flying very high (quite literally, at 30000 feet above ground).    It was so timed, when I reached the hospital the nurse was getting the baby out and I was the first person to take the baby on hand.  When the nurse put the infant on my arms, I just frozen for a second and thrilled with the sudden promotion as a father.  I heard many times, you don’t have to teach fish to swim,  I think the same is true for the infants to smile, I got mesmerized by the smile of the 30 minutes old infant.   It was an wonderful experience of a first time father, a little smile from the baby made my life -  at the moment, I knew what love is as a father.

My son grew up and at every stage, I had a lot of learning.  During he early stages, learnt to sleep (and not sleep)  in haphazard timings; learnt tiny bit of work (large portion was done by my wife!!) on diaper change, feeding and so on.   During his toddler stage, I learnt quite of rhymes and stories to get occupied with  him, particularly on bed time.    When the little boy grew up,  I learnt things from him, one such example -  me and my son were try to quench our thirst with tender coconut,  took the straw out with hand closed on one side and let the coconut water on the ground. I asked him, “Karthik, why are you wasting the water?”, his response was “I am cleaning the straw, though the coconut water may be good, with dirt in the straw it will make it bad”. I learnt this simple technique from my son – at the moment, more than love I was pride to learn from us son.

Seven years later, my daughter was born.   This time I was with my wife through the pregnancy, as were living in England did not have extended family support during the first nine months of her pregnancy.  I want to tell you one thing during my wife’s pregnancy, my nature of job warrants a lot of long phone conversations, my wife used to tell me that, “your daughter when born will recognize you only by voice”,  when I joked that time, but I realized that was true later.   I could still remember inch by inch when my wife went through the labor, I was with her during that time.   While on one hand we were eagerly waiting for the  baby to arrive, on the other hand I was very tensed, looking at the pains what my wife was go through, after a long labor the sweet little girl was out to the world.    My wife was still suffering with pains and discomfort post labor.  However when the pink beauty was placed on the arms of my wife, I saw a brightness (can’t be measured by watts) on her face – at the moment, I knew what love is as a mother.

Me, my wife and my son were experiencing the little one grew up day by day.  I still recollect my son counted the number times her sister “turned around” when she was about 3 months old.  Our daughter also have gave us lot of learning in the early stages, this time managing two children who are six years apart, balancing the love and managing possessiveness of both children.

When my daughter was around two years old she started speaking few words,  any parent would want their child to say Amma (Mom in tamil) as the first word, but I did not want my child to say Amma (as my wife passed away when my daughter was 8 months old).   After my wife passed away, I doubled my role as father and mother for my children with support from my other family members.   Days, weeks and months passed by, my daugther was making few words and sentences and very playful.   One day she said “Amma” and it was me (her father) whom she called as “Amma”,  it was a very mixed feeling, very happy when my daughter called me (she still does) as Mother and very sad that she did not have actual mother.   This is really rare recognition to a father I am will remember this for my life.  I must tell you, at the moment, as a man I knew myself what a love is as a mother, great experience, truly women are gifted. 

Happy International Womens day – out of numerous roles what a woman plays in life MOTHER is the greatest role.

Technology overdose?

Many of us have seen so much of technology transformation in our life, even in the short span of 10-20 years time frame.

Take an example of telecommuncation in India which as made now “Geography as History”, gone are the days where one has to wait in queue for 5-6 years for a landline connection, now you have service providers in queue at your door steps in 5-6 minutes.

Last weekend, I was in staying in outskirts of Thane (near Mumbai) for a team event, the place where we stayed has no mobile phone signal. I was cut off without phone and internet from Friday night to Saturday evening; felt competely restless without wirless connection. I and my colleague managed to find some spots in the resort where there was atleast 10% intermitent signal to send SMS (we have named them as SMS spots). Btw, it is rare to find a holiday spot without wirless connection – must be an USP for that resort!.

I am thinking, are we over using (over dependant) on technology than required?; let us talk about few instances, let me start with me

1. When I moved to Chennai two and half years ago, was settling down in a house; things were scattered all over, my son’s laptop came in handy as a mirror to shave (too expensive for a mirror and not for the right use, isn’t it?)

2. Few years ago (non mobile phone days), if you had to pickup someone at the train station, there must a standard landmark to wait, like “book stall”, “tea shop on platform10” and so on. I am sure you would have picked the person without any hassle. Now with mobile phones, you atleast make some five calls, before you trace the person. Technology made us efficient?

3. How many times you have gone to the store and then called your partner (or someone at home) to send you txt msg on what to buy, where did the small chit of paper with grocer list go?

Can you discuss your examples of technology overdose?

22/12

22/12

When we see dates represnted like this, now a days (atleast after 9/11) our mind first thinks what is the worst that happened on this day.

In the last ten years so, along with many other things good things happened in the world, few worsts (wish there were only few!) also happened. 9/11(New York Twin Towers attack), 26/11 (Bombay blasts), 7/7 (London blasts), 26/12 (Tsunami) and earlier this year 13/2 (Pune blasts) - think of the damage to the lives, society, anger, scare, worries and the new risks these events have created, mind boggling!!. But all these have given us new learnings, which the world is practicing to avoid future incidents like these.

You may think, what is this 22/12? - It is my costly holiday ever!

I am writing here about my personal worst which happened on 22-Dec-2007 during our holiday in India (used to live in UK those days). My family (me, my wife, my 7 year old son and 8 months old daugther) decided to spend our Christmas and New Year in India with family and friends.

I have taken my wife to a Doctor for an consultation for herina (consulted few Doc in UK prior to the holiday and the recommendation was to do a surgery and it not an urgency), the Doctor whom we met also said the same thing (surgery), but only thing he said was “get it done the next day” and we could go back to UK as planned. We were sort of “mesmerised” by the sweet talk, did not think too much and trusted him so mcuh, got the surgery done next day and some complications post surgery and she passed away on 22-Dec-2007 leaving behind the children and me – isn’t a very costly holiday (mistake)? (The details on how the things unfolded can be read by an internet search on my name)

Keeping the story short, like the world worsts gave learning; there were quite a few learning from my 22/12; I keep advising many others about the hard learning we had; thought I can give my point of view when it comes to health

a) Do not get carried away by advertisement / TV shows / big buildings


b) Please do not rush


c) Do your own due diligence, particularly when things are not an emergency


d) Try and understand the medical terms, do research prior (use internet well)


e) Please ask questions, at every stage.


f) Don’t say “I can spend anything”


g) Know patient rights


h) Have second, third opinions before taking any critical decisions




Above all, lead a healthy life – and my new principle is “Don’t meet a Doctor, if you want meet, do so as a friend or relative” for that lead a healthy life. Frankly I have few Doctors whom I met as a patient but having good relatiionship as friend – things are not that bad everywhere, but we need to be careful.



Thanks for reading, and finally I wish we get to see more of 25/12s (Jesus Christ birthday) and 2/10s (Mahatma Gandhi's birthday) to the world and not those of 9/11 types.

WHEN ORANGE IS CALLED AS ORANGE WHY NOT …..

When Orange is called as ORANGE, why not Apple is called as RED, …. This is a query by a 4 year old to a Ph.D, the Ph.D was stunned by this question and unable to answer (one of my colleague told me during a dinner conversation).

These kind of questions like this 4 year old are very curious, no assumptions made, boundaryless and no fear to ask any question. I think manytimes, innovation / invention comes out of curious thinking (why, why not, how…).

Does a child like thinking motivate innovation? May be “yes”, a boundaryless thinking without any preconcived notion helps I suppose. Don’t think you and me would have asked this question. What is your view? Do you have examples of this child thinking kind of behaviour at work/business led to innovation?

I also want to take this topic from a parental side of things. I am sure many parents would have faced, curious and sometimes tough questions. As I parent, I have faced these kind of questions many times (like “why railway tracks also coming along with us”, “when Tata can make salt, why not Honda can make sugar”, “why pilots are not called as plane drivers”, …..), I am sure you would have faced questions like this from little ones. How many times we would have attempted to give correct answer to the child.

Keeping a direct and honest approach helps and paying attention to the child’s unique level of understanding and also knowing when the questions have been answered without crossing the fine line of too much information (for questions like “why I did not come out from daddy’s tommy”). At the same time parent should never be afraid to tell a child they don’t know an answer, but should be willing to research and find answers to the questions asked. When you have discovered the answer you have given is incorrect, the child should be informed which will enable the little one to develop the culture of admiting mistakes.

I am curious to know what are the questions your children asked, how tough was it to answer, how interesting was it?

By the way, I did some serach for the Orange question and got two versions; not sure of the real answer though

- Orange derives from Indian, tamil naranthai to Sanskrit nāraṅgaḥ "orange tree", with borrowings through Persian nārang, Arabic nāranj, Spanish naranja, Late Latin arangia, Italian arancia or arancio, and Old French orenge, in chronological order. The first appearance in English dates from the 14th century. The name of the colour is largely derived from the fruit, first appearing in this sense in the 16th century

- ORANGE is split in Tamil as AARU(no 6)and ANJU(no5). When Orange is split half - half you find most of the time 6 pieces on one side and 5 pieces on the other side.

Role reversal?

Few months ago, my father was sick, was treated under ICU and now recovering . Post his hospitalisation, when he was just coming back to normality and I took him a saloon to get this hair trimmed for a bright look. My father and the barber were looking for me for instructions on what to do, I was giving instructions to the barber like, “cut it short”, “trim the mush”, etc,etc

This incident made me to recollect my childhood heads (some 30 years ago), when my father used to take me to hair dressers and give instructions to the barber on how my hair should look (it was always summer cut, which I used to hate!) and on that day I was trying to give instructions for my father’s hair cut. Is this role reversal?

I was thinking about this many times in the last few months in the area of learning, we are always (or mostly) sterotyped that children should learn from parents, students should learn from teachers, junior colleagues should learn from Sernior collagues (Managers), and so on. There is nothing wrong in this, of course these coaching comes from experience, exposure, skills and education. But, when the teaching happens on the reverse (junior to senior) do we generally accept? May be a lot of we can learn from juniors, childrens, students, uneducated, etc

Let me share with your one such thing I learnt from my son. I was taking my children to Mahabalipuram (near Chennai), we took a short break on the East coast road for refreshing tender coconut. My son, inserted the straw in the coconut, sipped a little bit (without water entering his mouth), took the straw out with hand closed on one side and let the coconut water on the ground, he put the straw otherway around and repeated the process. I asked him, “Karthik, why are you wasting the water?”, his response was “I am cleaning the straw, though the coconut water may be good, with dirt in the straw it will make it bad”. I learnt this simple technique from my son. (of course, I read about pressure and surface tension in physics during my school days, but learnt one application that day from my son)

One more comment of one of our Sr colleage comes to my mind. I was in the panel dicussoion during “Inernational Womens’ day celebration” in our office with Sr women collegues talking to other collegues on how they came up in life, specfically around balancing home and work, etc. One of our Sr manager in the panel said, “I am a PM (Proj Manager) at work, I will be PE (Proj Engineer) at home”, in simple terms she said whatever level I am at work, I am flexible to learn from others at home (be it mom-in-law, husband, children, relatives,etc)

I have had many learnings from my junior colleagues at work too – business etittqutte, working on spreadsheets, etc.

Do you think role reversal from the standard (teacher – student) helps in learning? My views is “yes”. What do you think, can you share examples of learning you had from your children, juniors, students, your servant maids, etc