Rarely have I seen people glow with the excitement of their job than one of my client members today. Enjoying what you do certainly drives energy and passion. It was a very different Mr K I last saw or that I rarely heard off. Today, he was passionate about what he could do, and excited about meeting people to turn around things.
I really think that what sets us different from the expats I've seen in my life at work is that the expats are here because of choice, and they chose to be here, to do something they are good at which they enjoy, and they get paid for it handsomely as well!
Now, that is what I call enjoying work...
How many of us are doing what we are doing by choice?
What if you choose to do differently?
Take action... to enjoy what you do, and the results will be different. Or find something you enjoy to do.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Friday, October 26, 2007
One wish
I learnt something from a humble Japanese man that day. It was the one wish which is the symbolic heart of leadership.
Recently we had a big "kick-off" meeting in Putrajaya, where the senior leadership of the company across APAC came together to plan for the next company fiscal year.
During one of the sessions, we had four of our geography leads on the stage - they were from India, China, Japan and the rest of SouthEastAsia, Australia and Korea - these were the 4 largest geographies we had in the region.
The question one of the audience asked - "What is the one wish you have if you could ask for from all of us here?" - bearing in mind this was being asked to each of them, and the audience was a 400+ strong senior leadership representation across the various APAC countries.
The one wish which bears the most meaning to me was when the Japan lead said that he wanted each of us to give each of our team career counselling everyday, to touch each of our people and guide them when we could, daily. As a multinational company, we had so many challenges, virtual teams and also a 180,000 strong global employee base. Our people are indeed our biggest asset and as leaders we sometimes chase after too many deadlines or requests that we forget the soul of our own organisation is indeed those who work with us.
I ask you - reach out to someone who works with you today, and say thank you to them for being there, or contributing to something. It will not make you less a leader, instead it will make our lifes richer with meaningful interactions.
A powerful "one wish" which is practical, yet easy to request for from all of us.
Do it today.
Recently we had a big "kick-off" meeting in Putrajaya, where the senior leadership of the company across APAC came together to plan for the next company fiscal year.
During one of the sessions, we had four of our geography leads on the stage - they were from India, China, Japan and the rest of SouthEastAsia, Australia and Korea - these were the 4 largest geographies we had in the region.
The question one of the audience asked - "What is the one wish you have if you could ask for from all of us here?" - bearing in mind this was being asked to each of them, and the audience was a 400+ strong senior leadership representation across the various APAC countries.
The one wish which bears the most meaning to me was when the Japan lead said that he wanted each of us to give each of our team career counselling everyday, to touch each of our people and guide them when we could, daily. As a multinational company, we had so many challenges, virtual teams and also a 180,000 strong global employee base. Our people are indeed our biggest asset and as leaders we sometimes chase after too many deadlines or requests that we forget the soul of our own organisation is indeed those who work with us.
I ask you - reach out to someone who works with you today, and say thank you to them for being there, or contributing to something. It will not make you less a leader, instead it will make our lifes richer with meaningful interactions.
A powerful "one wish" which is practical, yet easy to request for from all of us.
Do it today.
Monday, October 22, 2007
Charisma - the secret sauce of leaders
We have definitely chosen the right man to go to space. Dr Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor definitely has charisma.
My father is a certified coach and a learned man - he mentioned to me, this guy has charisma and he definitely charmed the school children, the local media, the foreign media and even the ministers and scientists, not forgetting the fellow astronauts.
Charisma, is in fact, the main element behind leadership. I have personally believed that one is born with charisma, but without it, one learns to adapt using social intelligence.
Surprisingly, we all agreed he has charisma, he is able to answer and motivate even the minister to a level of pride in the country's achievement in sending the first man to space.
I am sure he will be able to do more now as he has arrived back on earth.
It is hard to define the word charisma, but it is a mixture of charm, intelligence, friendliness and the ability to express this in one's behaviour, appearance, words and actions. It is indeed the secret sauce for extreme leadership.
After all, who does backflips interviewing with the Science, Technology and Environment minister? And manages to teach me something on surface tension by sucking a drop of liquid "caught" with a spoon!
Dr Sheikh Muszaphar, welcome back to earth. You have ignited the imagination of a nation, and I am sure we will hear more from the leader in you in the coming months and years.
Space, the final frontier.
Friday, October 19, 2007
Phone vs Food
The human longing for interaction is touching. I had a meeting with a vendor today, and he told me about working in Bangladesh, where the poor was a majority and the poor people could only afford between food or a phone call.
I am not ready to see poverty, I clearly could not understand this type of harshness of environments. But my heart goes out for those in this predicament, how could companies buy IT services or solutions when the customer cannot even afford to eat?
It is indeed a large world outside, and for a moment, I count my blessings for what I could do everyday and appreciate better the little difference I could make whether at work or at home.
I am not ready to see poverty, I clearly could not understand this type of harshness of environments. But my heart goes out for those in this predicament, how could companies buy IT services or solutions when the customer cannot even afford to eat?
It is indeed a large world outside, and for a moment, I count my blessings for what I could do everyday and appreciate better the little difference I could make whether at work or at home.
Paradigm Shift - a fable of a castle and riders
I miss my comrades.
There is an analogy I've mentioned to some of my colleagues. It was about a castle and the riders. The castle has inhabitants, which were different clans. Sometimes the clans were at civil war, and sometimes they were at peace. But most of the time, the inhabitants of the castle lived a happy life.
The castle is surrounded by a moat. The only access is a drawbridge. The castle is surrounded by high walls. These prevented undesired company to penetrate the castle. The drawbridge was usually up.
The castle is surrounded by harsh land. There will always be people roaming around the castle, toughened by the harshness, and always longing to be in the castle, the happy life beckoning. These are the riders. They were my comrades.
I work for a specific sector within my company. There was a period where there was a low morale amongst the staff, it was about 3-4 back. We lost a lot of good team members, and there were factions within the larger projects. During that time, I always felt I worked pretty much alone and in the toughest circumstances, never enjoying hunting in a team for new sales or execution of new projects. It had always been me and a very young team and scattered support from comrades who were in similar predicament, those not in the large projects.
I had a few comrades. We were the riders.
I rode outside the castle for the longest time. There were three of us. We lost the first comrade when he left. I had only one other rider left, we complemented each other in our hunts and never envied the castle inhabitants. Then he too left, and I was alone. I outlasted all the riders.
In time, I was recognised for my ability to tackle the surroundings, and I was allowed into the castle, but I chose my path outside. Along the way, I brought out new riders, and young riders. Some lasted, whilst some did not. Some were trapped in the forest, not even able to ride freely close to the castle.
Cryptic? The moral of the story - I thrive on solo flying. But this is not a sustainable function. I am very tired of riding outside the castle and today, I was thrilled to see some of my fellow comrades, my ex-colleagues again, and indeed they had a successful career after they left - I was very happy for them.
I thrive in difficult environments but I cannot last forever. In analogy, one cannot ride alone and battle the harshness at one go. The inside life is always happier, but the outside life has the freedom and challenges. The right thing to do is to find the right team to ride together and change my paradigm. Riding outside is good, staying trapped in the castle is not real.
In a paradigm shift environment, it is not the view but the eyes of the viewer which matters the most. And the paradigm shift means I need to convince more to join me as riders instead of wanting to join the others in the castle.
Maybe I can then stop missing my comrades.
There is an analogy I've mentioned to some of my colleagues. It was about a castle and the riders. The castle has inhabitants, which were different clans. Sometimes the clans were at civil war, and sometimes they were at peace. But most of the time, the inhabitants of the castle lived a happy life.
The castle is surrounded by a moat. The only access is a drawbridge. The castle is surrounded by high walls. These prevented undesired company to penetrate the castle. The drawbridge was usually up.
The castle is surrounded by harsh land. There will always be people roaming around the castle, toughened by the harshness, and always longing to be in the castle, the happy life beckoning. These are the riders. They were my comrades.
I work for a specific sector within my company. There was a period where there was a low morale amongst the staff, it was about 3-4 back. We lost a lot of good team members, and there were factions within the larger projects. During that time, I always felt I worked pretty much alone and in the toughest circumstances, never enjoying hunting in a team for new sales or execution of new projects. It had always been me and a very young team and scattered support from comrades who were in similar predicament, those not in the large projects.
I had a few comrades. We were the riders.
I rode outside the castle for the longest time. There were three of us. We lost the first comrade when he left. I had only one other rider left, we complemented each other in our hunts and never envied the castle inhabitants. Then he too left, and I was alone. I outlasted all the riders.
In time, I was recognised for my ability to tackle the surroundings, and I was allowed into the castle, but I chose my path outside. Along the way, I brought out new riders, and young riders. Some lasted, whilst some did not. Some were trapped in the forest, not even able to ride freely close to the castle.
Cryptic? The moral of the story - I thrive on solo flying. But this is not a sustainable function. I am very tired of riding outside the castle and today, I was thrilled to see some of my fellow comrades, my ex-colleagues again, and indeed they had a successful career after they left - I was very happy for them.
I thrive in difficult environments but I cannot last forever. In analogy, one cannot ride alone and battle the harshness at one go. The inside life is always happier, but the outside life has the freedom and challenges. The right thing to do is to find the right team to ride together and change my paradigm. Riding outside is good, staying trapped in the castle is not real.
In a paradigm shift environment, it is not the view but the eyes of the viewer which matters the most. And the paradigm shift means I need to convince more to join me as riders instead of wanting to join the others in the castle.
Maybe I can then stop missing my comrades.
Sunday, October 7, 2007
Schools of Thoughts
One late weekday, I was driving back from work, one of my customer's senior staff called me, and I was too tired to really try to understand what she wanted. Eventually even though we spoke briefly, I vividly recalled that conversation.
She said, if it was not because of people like me and her (the context here was that we had this conversation at 9pm+ driving home) everyone else would just be ok to finish their work and go home at 5:30pm.
Driving home, at 9pm+, I shared with her what I felt was the young vs the old school of thought - that today's society, the younger generation just wanted to get rich quick with minimal effort. Young people job-hopped and looked for balance lifestyle in careers. These new generation executives go on holidays and equip themselves with expensive purchases and toys as a lifestyle option.
The question here is that - who is right? We both knew we were the "old" school of thought, whilst I wish I was not categorised in this bucket, I was indeed clearly an old school of thought.
Old school of thought :
- Work hard for a living, believing that hard work is the most reliable way for guaranteed success
- Never pausing to rest as the belief of competition is nearby and working hard is the best equation
- Expects those around to embody the same principles, and expects extreme loyalty
- Appreciates and rewards smart, intelligent and loyal followers in opportunities but continues to demand continuous contribution
- Typically works harder and longer than co-workers even as a boss
New school of thought :
- Work smart for a living, believing that smart work means identifying the right opportunities, regardless of at which arena or junction
- Takes holidays and expensive hobbies as it motivates them to go further
- Likes being around smart co-workers, and finds social networking a better equation than working
- Believes that performance is measured on outcome and not hours
- Does not bother on the hours worked or perception with respect to co-workers or boss
As a leader straddling between the two schools of thought, it is constantly a challenge to try to balance the needs to teams - at one point the mind is schooled in the old school of thought, but the environment of high performance is moving towards the new school of thought.
Who is to say who is right? I would like to believe that the extreme leader is the one who knows how to adapt, rather than stay within the school he or she was brought up with. I believe the young have it right somewhere, but the old knows how to adapt, improvise and enjoy this lifestyle too if they are willing to understand what drives the younger generation.
I am still learning.
She said, if it was not because of people like me and her (the context here was that we had this conversation at 9pm+ driving home) everyone else would just be ok to finish their work and go home at 5:30pm.
Driving home, at 9pm+, I shared with her what I felt was the young vs the old school of thought - that today's society, the younger generation just wanted to get rich quick with minimal effort. Young people job-hopped and looked for balance lifestyle in careers. These new generation executives go on holidays and equip themselves with expensive purchases and toys as a lifestyle option.
The question here is that - who is right? We both knew we were the "old" school of thought, whilst I wish I was not categorised in this bucket, I was indeed clearly an old school of thought.
Old school of thought :
- Work hard for a living, believing that hard work is the most reliable way for guaranteed success
- Never pausing to rest as the belief of competition is nearby and working hard is the best equation
- Expects those around to embody the same principles, and expects extreme loyalty
- Appreciates and rewards smart, intelligent and loyal followers in opportunities but continues to demand continuous contribution
- Typically works harder and longer than co-workers even as a boss
New school of thought :
- Work smart for a living, believing that smart work means identifying the right opportunities, regardless of at which arena or junction
- Takes holidays and expensive hobbies as it motivates them to go further
- Likes being around smart co-workers, and finds social networking a better equation than working
- Believes that performance is measured on outcome and not hours
- Does not bother on the hours worked or perception with respect to co-workers or boss
As a leader straddling between the two schools of thought, it is constantly a challenge to try to balance the needs to teams - at one point the mind is schooled in the old school of thought, but the environment of high performance is moving towards the new school of thought.
Who is to say who is right? I would like to believe that the extreme leader is the one who knows how to adapt, rather than stay within the school he or she was brought up with. I believe the young have it right somewhere, but the old knows how to adapt, improvise and enjoy this lifestyle too if they are willing to understand what drives the younger generation.
I am still learning.
Friday, October 5, 2007
Sales with an Extra "0"
Recently, I was in Singapore for a sales briefing cum meeting with fellow executives. My boss just came off a leadership session where he was motivated on being exposed to a new paradigm of high performance executives.
He mentioned on how the method and discipline embodied by these learnings will enable us to add an extra "0" to sales. I was very intrigued by this proposition. It was not the method which intrigued me, but the objective.
But then when you dissect the objective it is relatively different depending on your angle of view - this was my view - that all concepts hold until a certain threshold - see below :
1 -> 10
10 -> 100
1,000 -> 10,000
1,000,000 -> 10,000,000 << where I am at
10,000,000 -> 100,000,000 << this one I believe is the threshold, but where I would like to be
100,000,000 -> 1,000,000,000 << and then it becomes impossible
I strongly believe extreme leaders push the envelope for the extra "0" every corner, every step. It is merely a question of whether one has reached that light speed terminal velocity*
*Do note that in science, terminal velocity is both a constant as well as an extreme start stop indication.
He mentioned on how the method and discipline embodied by these learnings will enable us to add an extra "0" to sales. I was very intrigued by this proposition. It was not the method which intrigued me, but the objective.
But then when you dissect the objective it is relatively different depending on your angle of view - this was my view - that all concepts hold until a certain threshold - see below :
1 -> 10
10 -> 100
1,000 -> 10,000
1,000,000 -> 10,000,000 << where I am at
10,000,000 -> 100,000,000 << this one I believe is the threshold, but where I would like to be
100,000,000 -> 1,000,000,000 << and then it becomes impossible
I strongly believe extreme leaders push the envelope for the extra "0" every corner, every step. It is merely a question of whether one has reached that light speed terminal velocity*
*Do note that in science, terminal velocity is both a constant as well as an extreme start stop indication.
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