What to Read..

One's progress is limited by his thoughts & action and Reading kindle the thoughts of lot of us which make it so important.. The biggest problem is to understand "what to read", when we went to school, It was Hindu Newspaper and then the Hindu Editorial and then in college it was Business Today, Business week etc and then when we work, we want to read every book but don't have enough time.. It so important to know what to read, what not to read and how to read when we have limited amount of time.. Some of my thoughts..    

Dr. Marshall Goldsmith - Bringing your negative behavior to neutral is no easy job, he makes it simple..

His Book on "What got you here wont get you there"

His Talk on Google

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WBeGAAYWg8

Peter Trucker- Everything written by him if you are into Management, His biography is a good one, not about his life but about his writings.. 

TED Talks - Each video of maximum 20 mins is a book written by the intellects of this world.. We can just watch this for hours together like TV programs.. TED took the writings of so many intellects to the world and these three are beauty.. 

Susan Cairn on "Power of Introverts"

Brene Brown on  "Vulnerability"

Larry Smith on "Why will fail to have a great career"

Dale Carnegie on How to win friends and Influence people - Basics of Human Behavior doesn't change in 80 years and this teaches the basics on dot..

Biographies -  Life of great leaders teaches us more than any other books, choose any.. Some i liked are Einstein, Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Lincoln..

Twitter - This is good medium to Read & Learn things, add all the Authors, Personalities, e magazines, Organisations, Areas of Interest as followers and get update everyday.. Check personalities what they follow..

Magazines/Apps - Harvard Business Review Magazine & Blogs, Mckinsey Insights App, Scoll.in (News App), Live Mint (Business News App)

E Readers - Have passion for reading and don't have enough time to Read, put your e reader on Read aloud mode and just Drive/Relax.. Good one is Flipkart e Books and google Play Books of which the later is cost effective. Amazon Kindle in Android doesn't have voice reader option..

The biggest Invention

Fire, Wheels, Electricity.. No..

The biggest one is the Written Language.. Imagine a world where there is only speech and there is no form of written communication like you see in animal world.. The learning of an individual is confined to the individuals he/she meet and that's it.. Today what humans experience is collective learning, the learning is not just shared across millions but passed on to generations where one start from the point where another has concluded without which we all would have been just animals..

So if human race transformed because of writings of a learned, what are we doing about it, Is it not gross injustice to the human race if we don't take this collective learning to the next level.. So let’s Read, Think, Do and Write before we leave this world..

I may be the last person to find this out but happy to be one among them!!..

Focus on your Strengths

I read one blog on "Weakness" recently in Linkedin which kindled my thoughts on Strengths and Weakness..

This topic is a very important one and matters most for lot of us, here is my thoughts on this..

You are what you are because of your strengths and not because of your weakness, same thing will hold good whoever you are, whatever you are and where ever you are.. Just take the best leaders in this world, they are what they are because of their strengths, everyone one of these leaders have got weaknesses much more than even an ordinary individual. So why should we worry about our weakness when even the best leaders has..

Also the fact is that you don't need to and you can't do much about your weaknesses.. Am not talking about the interpersonal flaws of Dr. Marshall Goldsmith but about the personality traits of who you are.. An introvert wanting to become an Extrovert or vice-versa, If Steve Jobs wanted to get rid of his weakness completely he would have spent his entire life time on that only.. Archimedes got killed by a soldier for his contemplation on a diagram, should we worry about his obsession as weakness.. For example, Lets say your weakness is procrastination, analyse why you have this weakness, it may be because you crave so much for perfection, you do so much of analysis, you get so much into details.. Now do you work so much on your procrastination or work on improving your analytical skills, your perfections which can make everyone forgive your procrastination and patiently wait for the completion of your work..

But why everyone is harping so much on their weaknesses.. Assuming Einstein has joined as a sales guy, what would have happened to his career, all through his lifetime he would have griped on his weaknesses and spent his entire lifetime improving his weakness, trying to convert his weakness into strength and would have tried to become a best CEO in this world.. 

The problem with most of us is, we do what we get and never break the barriers to do what we want or love.. The work that we do should match with the strengths (to the extent of 50%) that we possess, but when the job requirements gets deep into our weakness, the strengths that we posses becomes irrelevant in that context and we strive hard to improve on our weaknesses. Off course you can improve on your weakness a bit and you can try to become neutral but you can never reverse the pendulum.. And the effort is going to take a toll on you, the efficiency will be less, more hard work is required and the frustration levels will be high.. Lot of us get into that and settle down at some level, not what we aspire for..

So the solution is to check the career requirements Vs your strengths and if it matches to the extent of 50%, then you do not need to worry much about your weaknesses, focus on strengths and become so much good in that, that people cannot ignore you for what you have.. You just be aware of your weaknesses (which is also not easy) and a gentle reminder on that can bring you to neutral on your weaknesses.. And if the match is more than 70% then you don't need to worry about your weakness, you are just limited by your strengths and there is no limit to improve on one's strengths..

And finally, Do you Love what you do? As Steve Jobs puts it "As with all matters of the heart, you will know when you find it".. When you love what you do even your weakness takes a back seat, you are just limited by your passion and perseverance for what you love.. 

Purpose of work

We are not here to make money but to learn things, not here to spend the rest of our life but to leave our legacy, not here to please or fight everyone but to live in harmony, not here to do just what our boss says but also to do what is right for the organisation, not here just to grow up in the organisation but also to contribute something for the growth of the organisation, It doesn't matter where it takes you in your career but you live or leave the organisation with the sense of satisfaction & pride..  

Opportunity in Whatsapp

Whatapp is running short of content, how many times did you receive the same message or content from different groups which is very rare in other social media's like facebook..

The opportunity is that advertisers can make use of this by generating good content and floating it, tag that with their imprints..

Do What your boss says..

Do you do what your boss says or what is right for the organisation. Happy if both are same but unfortunately its not most of the time.. if you do the first one you have a great career and if you do the later don't know where it going to take you!.. 

Perfection

I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence I can reach for; perfection is God's business. - Michael J. Fox.. 

Few like Apple Inc does that "God's Business" and tops the chart with valuation of $ 672 Billion ...