When was the last time that you thought about ants? Ants? Yes, ants. Remember, those tiny crawling creatures in your garden or elsewhere who always have spare time to invade your picnic spot in hordes? If you observe them closely, they are always busy and furiously working carrying food on their backs, dragging some leaf, building an anthill, fighting over food, and so on.
Picard who? Before I introduce him let me first tell you that most leadership case studies use examples of real people like Churchill, Lincoln, Steve Jobs, Peter Drucker, etc. As you are aware, tons of articles and books have been written on these people’s leadership styles along with case studies. But very rarely will you see leadership examples of fictional characters from a TV series.
No manager or leader can succeed in their business goals if they don’t have a team that obeys clear orders or instructions. In today’s times, team members don’t need to behave as obedient slaves but it’s still necessary for them to respect the orders or instructions of their manager.
It has often been said that you don’t have to perform a great deed or a big mistake for someone to like or hate you. You can be admired or despised for just about anything you do or don’t do. And everyone on our planet has their share of nearby and faraway admirers and haters from people they know or even don’t know.
Nowadays, if you watch or read interviews of any CEOs or top business leaders in the news media you will invariably see a question that asks which book they have recently read or are currently reading. And their obvious answers will be the names of some newfangled management book like why the moon is still round while the earth has become flat, the fifteenth leadership habit of some maverick, some new cutting-edge book about managing people, or even some fancy novel. But you will never hear any businessman say they are reading a medieval or ancient history textbook.
An ancient proverb says, ‘Everyone looks normal until you get to know them better.’ And the reverse is also true and that is, ‘Everyone looks abnormal until you get to know them better.’ On our planet, a large percentage of people exhibit characteristics of being tough, highly independent, stubborn, impossible to please, restless, perfectionists, etc., and they continue to lead their entire life like that. Practically, everyone would have experienced or heard true stories of such horrid people, inside and outside the workplace, who drive others nuts through their irrational behaviors. The traditional methods of diplomatic interaction that work for normal or sweet people just don’t work for them. So, how do you deal with such tough and cranky nuts?
Sometime back I was watching a TV program on a business channel where a bunch of reputed CEOs, CFOs, COOs, etc., were the judges for a young business entrepreneur program. Each young participant was expected to present a business case for the winning entry. However, the program was going nowhere as the judges weren’t allowing any participant to complete their presentation or go beyond a couple of sentences, and would constantly bombard them with question after question.
If you have the habit of reading popular business magazines, management books, or articles, you will definitely encounter countless references or case studies about various top performers (hyper-efficient employees) that exist in various organizations, departments, teams, etc. Of course, the definition of a top performer is a subjective term that can vary from manager to manager, or from company to company, and can be quite varied based on their personal experiences.
As soon as the words ‘bad boss’ is mentioned most people start imagining pictures of a wicked person, a crook, a tyrant, a scheming backstabbing individual, a selfish ogre, etc. And the typical textbook definition of a bad boss is one who screams, threatens, intimidates, grabs credit, fires people, throttles people’s necks, and so on. While such gory imaginations could be true in a few cases, it’s not so in a large percentage of cases. Actually, it’s not necessary to be a wicked person at all to be called a bad boss. Ironically, a good-natured or normal person can also fall into the category of a bad boss without exhibiting any boorish behaviors. To understand how there are a few common mistakes good people do to slowly transform themselves into bad bosses.
One of the biggest headaches for people today is remembering numerous passwords for the various internet services and websites they use. In the past, there were only a couple of internet sites like Yahoo or Hotmail to visit occasionally and you could easily remember a few passwords. Or you kept the same password for every site for easy remembering. And that was not a problem years ago because financial sites like banks, credit cards, and payment apps weren’t internet-enabled like today.
Just type the word stress in any internet search engine and it will throw up thousands of articles and videos on stress and the harm it can cause. The common methods of stress reduction are, Meditation, Yoga, Taking Medicines, Attending Stress Reduction Workshops, Coaching, Exercises, Dietary changes, going to fitness centers, and many others.
In today's business world, standing out and differentiating yourself from the competition is critical to your company’s success and survival. So, how exactly can you distinguish your brand, products, services, and everything you do from your competitors? Business gurus say that pinpointing your USP (unique selling proposition) is the way to do it and that requires deep thinking, creativity, and the usual offsite workshops in expensive resorts. But why waste time, money, and effort that way? The easiest way to identify your USP is to analyze your competitor's activities and secretly invent better solutions for each. This way you can quickly become stunningly different from the crowd. My handy list will teach your employees how to convince those pesky customers who ask - How are you different from your competitor?
In the 1960s, a Stanford professor named Walter Mischel conducted a series of psychological experiments on hundreds of students aged between 4 to 6 years old and discovered important characteristics for success in health, work, and life. It’s called the Marshmallow Experiment and was done this way,
