Archive for December, 2005
By Rajesh Setty on Mon 05 Dec 2005, 10:34 AM - Leave Comment
Long ago, I read a book called “The Magic of Thinking Big
” by David Schwartz. In one of the chapters Schwartz talks about the value of treating your work as important. He explains this in the form of a story of three brick layers. It’s short and simple.
When asked “what are you doing?” the first bricklayer replied, “Laying brick.” The second answered, “Making $9.30 an hour.” And the third said, “Me? Why, I’m building the world’s greatest cathedral.”
It was fascinating to read the story and all of us can easily guess how the lives of the three bricklayers would have shaped up in the future.
The story has some important lessons for all of us and makes us think how and what we say when asked the question “What do you do?” which is one of the standard questions that might be asked when you meet a new person. Without the right job attitude and the pride in what we do, we might reply back in a way that won’t help or hurt. Or it may lead to the other person to box us as one among the many the antithesis of distinguishing ourselves.
So, the question for you is “What do you do?” and now observe how and what you say in response.
Posted under Distinguish yourself, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Sun 04 Dec 2005, 10:42 AM - Leave Comment
Jim Collins [in BusinessWeek] talks about his meeting with Peter Drucker during his early days. Collins says that this question altered his trajectory of life. I am sure we all can learn a lot too.
“What do you want to contribute?” – Peter Drucker
Posted under Great Quotes, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Sun 04 Dec 2005, 8:13 AM - 2 Comments
First time entrepreneurs (especially if they are bootstrapping) have a first hand experience in this – they willingly step back before moving forward. I have a personal experience too. I remember this clearly – When I co-founded CIGNEX five years ago (66% pay cut, lifestyle changes, smaller office and a ton of uncertainty) everyone would say that it was a risky step and the timing was not right. They were right on both fronts – it was risky to put my life savings and we were entering a period of recession (of course, I didn’t know that then.) If I look back today and ask if the experience was worth it – I won’t blink an eye before saying “YES.” What I was able to learn as an entrepreneur and building a what I became because of this experience would never have come if I continued in my previous jobs.
Life will continue to present opportunities that may not look good in the short term but may be the best thing to happen to you in the long term. The wisdom is to spot those opportunities and be willing to make those sacrifices in the short term to get ahead in the long run.
My friend and mentor – Tim Sanders, talks about such an experience in his book “Love is the killer app.” Tim got recruited by Mark Cuban for his startup company Broadcast.com for a startup salary (way below what he was making.) Sanders looked at the long-term possibilities of working with Cuban and growing. Long story short – Broadcast.com was sold to Yahoo! for around $5B in a few years and Sanders, I am sure was very happy with his earlier decision.
Talk to people who you think have made it and ask them if they had to step back sometime in their life before reaching the heights they reached – you will be surprised how many will answer in the positive.
Good luck!
Posted under Compelling Offers, Distinguish yourself, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Sat 03 Dec 2005, 4:00 PM - Leave Comment
Jim Rohn said that success is measurable progress in reasonable time. This quote extends it a bit and reminds us that it’s important to move in the right direction.
“I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving. We must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it — but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor”
- Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894)
Thanks to my friend Mukundan for sharing this quote.
Posted under Great Quotes, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Sat 03 Dec 2005, 6:00 AM - Leave Comment
Who does not know Mark Cuban – the founder of Broadcast.com (sold to Yahoo! in 1999) and owner of Dallas Mavericks
Now, in his own words, Mark describes his journey, trials and tribulations, successes and failures from nothing to where he is today on his blog. Here is the link
Success and Motivation – redux
Read and be inspired!!
Posted under Leadership, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Fri 02 Dec 2005, 9:52 PM - Leave Comment
I have always believed and continue to believe that we have more help than we require at any point in our life. Whenever I say that during a talk, half the people nod in agreement and the other half give me a skeptical look. While I believe in everything I said, I also want to add that you should have the capacity to receive help that is provided.
Let’s take an example. You are a software professional and you are good at what you are doing. Plus you have two other interests – public speaking and chess. You are passionate about both these hobbies and everyone in your office and their families know about them
One of your colleagues was in a book fair and finds a set of great chess books being sold for a song and he remembers you and buys them for you. You are glad and thank your colleague for the thoughtful gift. It was obvious that this would not have happened unless you had interest in chess and your colleague knew about your interest in chess.
If you can resist the temptation to look at this example literally, you will see that there are many situations in your own life where people around you may have the capacity to help but you may not have the capacity to receive it. Remember the law of the bucket and the glass?
Rather than complaining that everyone is selfish and nobody wants to help, should we not focus on exapanding the capacity to receive help?
Posted under Distinguish yourself, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Thu 01 Dec 2005, 4:37 PM - Leave Comment
Shelf-life is probably a bad word but I can’t think of anything else now – so rather than breaking my head on it I decided to explain what I mean and it will all get cleared in a minute.
We meet or get introduced to all kinds of people on a power scale. Some – powerless on one end of the spectrum and some – extremely powerful and can have a huge impact on your life on the other end of the spectrum and some – that are in between.
Once we meet, we talk and meet again and talk and slowly build relationships.
Young and upcoming professionals typically have a hard time building relationships with very powerful people unless they bring something extremely compelling to the table. Unless this changes, their own rating on the power scale won’t go up. Meeting powerful people is only a part of the equation. The real test is how long can you hold the attention, engage them and keep them in a relationship (shelf-life of power relationships)
Here is a quick exercise you can do:
1. Go back one year in your life. From this time, list all the powerful people that you met or got introduced to
2. For each of these new introductions, write down the length of time you were engaged fully. If some of these relationships are current, very good. If not mark times in months such as 1, 2,3..6 etc.
3. For ease of calculation, take an average and that should be the “shelf-life” of power relationships
4. Lastly, the new year is coming up – what could you do to consciously increase the “shelf-life” next year?
Posted under Distinguish yourself, Main Page.
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