We discussed two topics under "Principles of People development" this week:

• It takes time
• People skills are essential for success

We focused mostly on some of the characteristics of great leaders including: they admit mistakes, they are able to get along with a wide variety of people, and they possess sensitivity & tact.

We dwelled in great detail on one specific area - "being able to get along with a wide variety of people".  We agreed that this skill is a necessary evil, especially in the workplace if one wants to grow in a leadership role.  We talked about some mutual friends who adamantly resist socializing with new people (or even with people from their existing social networks) because many people they come across do not share the same values or interests as their own.  This is a genuine and understandable concern.  We wavered for a long time whether the same justification holds good in a workplace as well?  We never came to a definitive conclusion but agreed that everyone, especially "leaders" have to make some compromises/sacrifices for the greater good and getting along with a variety of people is one of them (even though not everyone might share the same values, principles, interests etc.)

For more details about this chapter, please review the mindmap at: Chapter 7: People

As usual we had an exciting discussion around people and how the relationships factor into leadership.  We concentrated on the topic "Giving the right assistance to people"

We analyzed how our department rated on various areas of "people empowerment " including working on your peoples’ strengths/weaknesses, give them your entire self, giving them undivided attention, giving them complete ownership and giving them a great chance at success.

We delved deeper into the issue of giving unconditional ownership to the people around you.  We agreed that it is very hard for analytical and technical people to give up control/ownership and acknowledge the success of others.  I referred to a recent BusinessWeek podcast I was listening to titled "When should you keep your ideas to yourself?" where the legendary Marshall Goldsmith discusses how it is not always the best idea to "improve on" or "add value to" some body else’s idea.  Although that may add 5-10% quality/efficiency to the outcome, in all probability the other person might lose 50% or more commitment to execution of that idea.  This is very relevant to Mr. Maxwell’s theory of giving ownership to others.  100% means 100%  You do not want to claim any part of the idea, execution or the outcome of your team member’s plan.  You should not have to share the spotlight with him/her.

While discussing the need for having a vision and relating that to our own department’s vision/goals, we also brainstormed on a long-standing goals of ours.  I am very excited that we have a concrete plan of action to accomplish that goal in a methodical manner and we committed to the action plan as a team.  To learn more about that goal and other critical ideas we generate at these book club meetings, please join us next time.  We meet the 1st and 3rd Wednesday of every month!  Also, be sure to check out our new website section called "Learning" where we are trying to catalog all the actionable lessons we learn during the course of our conversations.

We had an extended discussion on “asking the right questions” during our first-ever afternoon meeting of Bizbookclub. We focused most of our discussion on confronting people when a leader needs to.

Mr. Maxwell recommends that a leader should try to substitute “confront” with “clarify” if it is threatening to others. However, we agreed that some people and situations actually yield better results if confrontation is used tactically.

We then moved to an interesting sub-section on confrontation called “10 commandments of confrontation”. We had some very exciting segues into vital behaviors, core characteristics and other psychological aspects of humans. We generated a very exciting idea about vital behaviors during this side-conversation and I will dwell on that in future posts. As it is becoming a trend with our meetings, we could hardly get past 1 section of 1 chapter, albeit for a good reason. We concluded the meeting at the 8th of the 10 commandments.

For more details about this chapter, please review the mindmap at: Chapter 7: People

Yes, there was a long gap between the two meetings, but that actually served us well. I had a lot of time to mull over the diverse and frank opinions expressed during that night’s conversations.

For a change, there was a humongous opinion difference in every topic we discussed that night. Right from providing encouragement to understanding what motivates people. We extensively studied some of the characteristics of our colleagues in an attempt to understand what works and what does not. The conversation, by no means, came to a conclusion. Case in point: we covered only a fifth of the chapter that night!

Some take-away points from that night:

• We will soon be switching to afternoon meetings (same weekdays) because majority of the regular attendees are from Fiserv-Hillsboro anyway and there has been a growing demand to cater to the family folks
• We are going to focus more on actionable items while debating the pros and cons of the countless ideas that seem to spring during the conversations
• I will add a new section on the blog to collect these actionable items

Anyway, I loved the energy and opinion differences that night and hope to continue on that path for a long time to come.

Here’s a link to the MindMap for our all important chapter: Chapter 7: People

I just finished reading the next chapter titled “Developing your most appreciable asset: People” from our book.  I have to say I am pretty pumped up:)  This is one of the biggest chapters in the book and obviously resulted in the largest mind-map so far!  There are a lot of generalizations and possible hot topics in this chapter and personally this topic is very close to my heart.  Honestly, if you missed all the previous meetings and even if you cannot make it to the remaining 3 meetings (for this book), I highly recommend joining us tomorrow.  We can have an explosive conversation on this topic…

Hope to see you all tomorrow.

Here’s a link to the mind-map: Chapter 7: People

I have been reading the book “Influencer: The Power to Change Anything” off and on for a few weeks now. 

One of the sections about influencing emphasizes identifying and changing vital behaviors.  And I could totally relate to the example on how just identifying a few vital behaviors will tremendously impact your quest for losing weight.  Here goes the list:

• Exercise more days than not (i.e. >= 4 days a week)
• Eat Breakfast everyday
• Weigh yourself daily
• Plan where and what to eat during lunch
• Make a grocery list in advance and don’t shop while you are hungry

As simple as that!  The National Weight Control Registry identified these vital behaviors by tracking people who lost at least 30 pounds and kept it off for a minimum of 6 years.  So, this definitely for the long-term…

We discussed the importance of “Attitude” in our daily lives, especially for leaders.  As with many of Mr. Maxwell’s principles and ideas, this topic was inspirational and the stories he used were relevant.

Rajeev brought a very unique perspective to many of the principles through his association with Chinmaya Mission Study Group.  Through his opinion, he instilled some much need humility and spirituality in me

We agreed that reinforcing any of these principles was one of the most important tasks for them to be most effective and long-lasting.

Happy reading and we hope to see you all on February 20th as we explore chapter 7: People.

Here’s the link to yesterday’s MindMap one more time: Chapter 6: Attitude

In this chapter Mr. Gardner focuses mostly on respecting people from other cultures and backgrounds; which is critical, again in a global workplace.  Mr. Gardner focuses on the education of respect right from infancy to adulthood.

I probably didn’t capture the entire chapter into the MindMap because there is a lot of detail around specific examples; so you might be better off reading the chapter anyway.

But just to give you a head-start on the topic, here’s the link to the MindMap: MindMap for the Respectful Mind

The third in the series of the “Five Minds for the Future” MindMaps is here!

Although I want to be more on the creative side, I end up being the synthesizing kind most of the time; not a bad outcome, but I strongly believe that truly innovative and revolutionary changes emerge from a creative mind only!  So, I am hoping I can stretch my creating mind as I reach my mid-30s

Hopefully this chapter and the MindMap can help me and other people in the same boat. 

Anyway, here is the link to the MindMap: MindMap for the Creating Mind

The second in the series of the “Five Minds for the Future” MindMaps is here!

Check out synthesizing mind, which I believe is one of the most important in the 21st century of globalization and limitless information!

Here’s the link to the MindMap: MindMap for the Synthesizing Mind