Leadership

Future-proofing Your Team

As leaders, it is our responsibility to help those we lead become future proof, both as individuals and as a team. We are living in a world where things are changing really fast with AI technology leading the way. I would not be surprised if there is a big shuffle or restructure in terms of the composition of the workforce (human, robots and algorithms) and their respective roles in the organization. I believe that it is our responsibility to help our teams stay relevant in these turbulent and emergent future. We can do so by helping them learn new skills […]

Leadership

Sustainable Systems with Donella Meadows

Here is a series of 4 videos in which Dana Meadows delivers a lecture on how we can think about and create Sustainable Systems. She starts off with “Systems 101” and goes on to show how important is to think in systems when we are trying to solve any complex problem, and specifically when we are trying to become more sustainable. Even though the video is old but the thinking is still fresh and extremely relevant for our times. Hope you enjoy watching and learning from a master systems thinker. Good leaders are always looking for the underlying systems that […]

Leadership

Three Fundamental Responsibilities of Any Manager

Hiring As a manager, we need to constantly be looking at people from the perspective of finding our next hire. In order for us to be effective at this, we need to know our current team composition really well. We understand what key skills or the kind of person or perspective that is missing or can add significant value to the impact we create. Once we know that, we can then always be looking for such a talent in every interactions we have, both within the company and outside (partners, customers and even in our personal interactions). Even when we […]

Leadership

Leading in Different Contexts

Most people who talk about leadership (including me) talk about it as if leading is the same across situations and contexts. However, in reality it is not. Leading an organisation or a team in a stable environment is very different from leading the same time in a dynamic, ever changing environment. Leading the same team to drive innovation is very different from the other two. Leading the same team in a hyper-growth environment is very different. Apart from a set of skills that are relevant in all environments (empathy, decision making, building trust, good communication, taking care of those in […]

Leadership

Heard, Helped or Hugged

As a leader, there will always come a time when someone we lead is going through a tough time (personally and / or professionally). Firstly, good leaders notice this shift and have the ability to initiate a conversation about it, knowing fully well that it might lead to a difficult conversation for both. When such a situation arises, good leaders have the emotional acuity to know whether the colleague needs to be heard, helped or hugged. When we get this right, the colleague feels like they are seen and heard and that they matter. It makes them feel that they […]