Last week, in a proper residential complex in Thane, there was a visitor. A crocodile. I am not kidding you. A crocodile showed up in the play area. Now, the reaction of the residents of the housing complex is a story in itself. That for later. For now, I want to talk about a recipe for continued success. Success precedes everything else. Including a crocodile in the park.
You see, success is a good thing to have. It gets you a high. Plus, we live in an increasingly binary world where success defines everything! There is no ‘one’ recipe for success. Contexts determine success or otherwise. One part of my work brings me face to face with pragmatic business leaders who have stayed successful in different contexts. From my conversations with them, I thought of sharing a recipe for success. One recipe. Not ‘The only’ recipe.
Nothing concrete
A COO of a large business made a point the other day about how she makes it a point to ‘blast the success concrete’. “After all”, she said, “concrete is stuff that is all mixed up and solidified”. Her point was simple. When she encountered organisational success, she doubled down to look around again. “Success needs very close examination”, she said.
“One, it is an opportunity to learn the right lesson. Two, it is an opportunity to use the bandwidth to prepare differently for the future”. That was prescient of her. The bandwidth success provides the ideal setting for the recipe here
A recipe for success
Managing and getting people to change, when that change is not immediately required but is good in the long term is the essence of the recipe. Success lulls you into complacency. Continued success requires continuous change and discipline. The dismantling and rebuilding keeps the leader light and nimble. Laurels stay in the cupboards and the leader takes comfort from new challenges.
Plus, this recipe of changing when you don’t have to offers a far better version of the future when compared to having a gun against the head with ‘change or else’ scrawled on the wall. And of course, it is economically far more viable.
There is a phrase that explains this the recipe in the best way possible: Perpetual Beta. That phrase encompasses a lot. Leadership is about continuous sculpting and rebuilding of the self for the changing world. It requires an examination of beliefs and assumptions of the world and how it works. Perhaps a deeper understanding of the self with all warts and blemishes. And a certain humility to look beyond the obvious!
How much of that have you done in the recent past? Remember perpetual beta. You will hear more about that from me.
That crocodile
Now for that crocodile that showed up in a residential complex in Thane. An entire army of residents came together and caught the animal the next day. Now, imagine a croc showing up on your driveway one fine day. For fun-sake, let’s give him a name. Let’s call him ‘CHANGE’.
Am curious. What would you do when a big sharp-toothed creature call named CHANGE showed up at your door, one fine day?
Read on
For this edition, I present some interesting reads for you.
Disruptions, delusion and defences in digital transformation? The mental traps that people fall into whilst implementing digital transformation projects is something that I encounter daily! Its a moniker for all things change. Take a look.
The world of on-demand experts – AR changes work and employment in the new world. The impact it has on learning and change needs to be understood.
News Hero: How about looking at incidents and see the positive side of things. There are many sides to the story. Certainly the side beyond what is popular or what sells! I loved this.
Google teams – Here are five attributes of successful teams in Google based on analytics. Some fascinating insights there.
Stanford backlash: Imagine Facebook or google not being the most favourite of places to work at. Right in their backdoor. That’s some change. What are the parallels you see in your world?
That’s that for this edition. Yes. I really am curious to know what you would do if CHANGE knocked on your door. Let me know. Perhaps I will tell your story in the next edition.
Image credits Pixabay
