By Rajesh Setty on Sun 17 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 4 Comments
Photo Courtesy: Limonada at Flickr
You are expecting a friend and a door bell rings. You open the door and there is a skeleton standing at your door. When you look at it with horror in your eyes, the skeleton smiles and looks at you in anticipation that you will invite it inside your home.
What will you do?
Just kidding.. I hope that you will never have to face that situation ever in your life.
But.. there is a different kind of skeletons that you can’t avoid.
These are skeletons that arrive in your email. They are half-baked ideas, garbled messages, meaningless copies and general blah blahs. Some of them are so bad that you can instantly recognize them as skeletons. Some others have a coat and shirt on but they are simply skeletons that are well-dressed. There is no flesh and blood in them.
Skeletons waste time, energy and money.
Many people who ship those skeletons out don’t know that they are shipping skeletons. It is your responsibility to coach people and ensure that you are not on the receiving end.
Wait.. we are not done yet.
Look at your own “Sent Items” in your email box. Think carefully and see how many skeletons you have shipped out since last week. If you have shipped none, congratulations. You have save many people from the horror of seeing a skeleton in their email box.
On the other hand, if you have shipped skeletons, take some time to revise those emails and resend them with an apology.
You don’t want to see a skeleton, neither your friends, partners or customers.
Posted in the Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Fri 15 Jan 2010, 10:10 PM - 29 Comments
Note: Just being nice is not a clever substitute to being truly valuable. You need to be both. So, please don’t take this to an extreme [ Please refer: Just being NICE is not enough]
I still remember that conversation with Tim Sanders (who is one of the nicest people I have met anyway) several years ago. He said, “nice guys finish first.” This was probably in 2003 or 2004. I didn’t get that at that time. But the concept intrigued me and I observed time and again that nice people win BIG TIME in the long run. So this was part of my mini-research (less than 6 weeks) and I am happy to present the outcome of my research in this blog post.
If you enjoyed the outcome of my research, please consider sending this to someone nice and make their day. We need them to continue to be nice make this world a better place!!!!!
So, let us start with the basic premise:
In many ways, just like water finds its level, people find tribes that they are comfortable with. These tribes change with time but generally most people within a tribe are at the same level when it comes to the “capacity to perform in the marketplace.” When people with similar capacities are in a tribe, there is a “flow.” When there is an inconsistency or a frequency mis-match, the person who seems out of place tries to disengage from the tribe voluntarily or involuntarily.
It is a not a good thing or a bad thing – as over a period of time, the tribe in general evolves and the tribe settles to a particular “capacity to perform” range.
So, if you don’t do anything you will just drift along with the tribe to higher levels of “capacity to perform” in the marketplace. You can attribute that to “progress” or “experience” or whatever you want to call it.
However you view it, you will find yourself in that range of “capacity to perform” simply because the conversations you are having on a daily basis have a huge influence on your actions and the tribe determines the nature of those daily conversations.
It is hard to jump to the next tribe even if you want to. Why?
1. You will feel out of place
2. The tribe will not know how to deal with you as they have to change the “frequency” and “type” of conversations with you.
3. There is no incentive for the higher level tribe to accommodate you.
Now, this is very the magic happens for super-nice (and smart) people.
They make an exception by getting a seat in the next level tribe earlier than not-so-nice people.
The higher level tribe makes an exception too. They go out of the way to accommodate super-nice people who can potentially add value in the future. They are willing to invest in bringing you up to their level.
This is where you have an unfair advantage. In a crude way, you jump the queue to belong to the next-level-tribe quicker.
Let us just think for a minute what happens when you get access to the next level tribe earlier than your peers.
First, your conversations change as you will have different
Second, your conversations will start raising your level of awareness on topics that are “obvious” or “background knowledge” for tribes at a higher level
Third, Based on this new awareness and you start becoming more comfortable to having more such conversations and more importantly your “actions” will change.
Fourth, Your “results” will start to change and will start reflecting the results of the people in the higher level tribe.
Fifth, Soon you will be VERY comfortable belonging in the higher level tribe.
Sixth, After a while you simply become a member of this new tribe without even knowing that you jumped the queue.
OK I can go on..but you get the point. Continue to be super-nice and valuable and you will start jumping the queue and getting into next level tribes faster than people who are super-nice. [Also Refer: Ways to Distinguish Yourself #10 - Pursue Right Memberships]
In the short-term, where someone who is NOT super-nice (A) and someone who is super-nice (B) reach in their careers is not very different. So you may not notice the advantage of being super-nice. But five or ten years from now, where A and B have reached is very different. The person who is super-nice is far ahead of the other person. This is precisely the reason I said – nice people will win BIG in the long run.
I am sure you are all nice people. So the request is for you to be continue to be nice and NOT give up on it. In the short-term you may not see a difference but in the long run, you have an unfair competitive advantage to win BIG.
Have a great day.
P.S: If you want to see the outcome of my previous mini-research project, please take a look at:
Why some smart people are reluctant to share?
P.P.S: If you want to learn more about Tribes, please read “Tribes” by Seth Godin. It’s more about leading a tribe but a lot of it applies to belonging a tribe too.
Posted in the Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Fri 15 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 3 Comments
Photo Courtesy: Oberazzi on Flickr
Deciding on something or looking for proof for something that you have decided are not the same. They may appear to be the same but they are not.
When you are deciding on something, you are not biased on one or the other way. You want to take all the information available on choices that have made the final list and then make an informed decision.
When you are looking for proof, you have an emotional affinity towards a particular choice. In your heart, you want to make THAT choice and nothing else. You can call it your gut feeling, your preference, your love or it may simply be that the other choices are “not convenient” for you at this point in time. Whatever be the reason, you will now start “looking for proof” to support your preferred choice.
When you are looking for proof but are behaving as if you are deciding, you are confusing everyone involved and also cheating yourself. You start engaging in what might be called “selective hearing” – meaning you will hear what you want to hear and ignore the rest.
If your preferred option is the right option to take, there is no harm done. But if that’s not the right option, you get hit twice. First, because you didn’t give enough attention to find the right option and second, because you now have a skewed opinion about how “right” your preferred option is. You now have a newfound confidence about your choice albeit not very well grounded.
You don’t have to do anything radical to get out of this mindset. Being aware of this mindset will get you out of trouble most of the time. You will start catching yourself when you disproportionately favor a particular solution for your dilemma.
Have a great day!
Posted in the Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Thu 14 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 3 Comments
Photo Courtesy: Juvertson on Flickr
Most ideas wither and wilt in the marketplace. Some ideas take off brilliantly and become ultra-popular. Like any adoption curve, some people get it quickly (early adopters) but most people will wait for the ideas to get baked and time-tested before they jump in to embrace them.
Both (early adopters and late adopters) have their own advantages and disadvantages.
Early adopters might get a “hit” as they are always trying new things. However, since not all of them are “hits,” they might also end up going in circles.
Late adopters have a better chance of succeeding as they follow time-tested methods. However, they have lost the “hit advantage” enjoyed by early adopters
This article is specifically focused on late adopters of ultra-popular stuff. If you are one of them, you need to avoid “the curse of the ultra-popular.”
The curse is simply that once something becomes ultra-popular, there is no premium paid for learning it. The marketplace does not provide you “special status” for knowing the ultra-popular. After sometime, the ultra-popular is nothing more than table stakes.
Being aware or this is avoiding the curse as you don’t expect a “premium” for learning the ultra-popular. Your expectations are in order.
If you are not aware, you will end up expecting a premium for your investment in learning the ultra-popular and when you don’t get it, you are heart-broken.
Have a great day!
Posted in the Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Tue 12 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 12 Comments
Photo Courtesy: Julia Manzerova on Flickr
I have written about the power of “free” multiple times before. Here are are a few links:
1. TomPeters.com: The Business Case for Giving Away Your Best Work for Free
2. The Case for “Free” (Again!)
Every time I write about free, I get a few emails about the topic. Every email is different but at the heart of every email are a few things:
1. I like free. I believe in it. How will I make money if I give something for free?
2. I don’t have enough time to give things for free.
A blog post can’t do justice to properly respond to the “free” dilemma. However, if “free” is something that you want to experiment with ( I strongly advise you do ) then you should understand the one of the differences between atoms and bits.
- Atoms don’t scale. Bits do.
- Incremental cost of work by atoms won’t decrease with more work. Incremental cost of work by bits is almost zero.
- Atoms take up a lot of resources to work. Bits don’t.
Your “free” strategy should be mostly based on bits (of course, you require atoms to create those bits) if it has to scale. This means you have to create content that spreads without your ongoing effort to provide the fuel for the idea to spread.
- Providing 1-1 free consulting is atom-based. Creating a free report on the top ten mistakes to avoid is bit-based.
- Doing a free security audit is atom-based. Providing a free tool to a self-service audit is bit based.
- Creating “office hours” is atom-based. Conducting a webinar and providing replays of the webinar is a hybrid model (first part is atom-based and subsequent replays are bit-based)
Use the atom-power to create remarkable bit-based free stuff that spreads 
Posted in the Business Models, Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Mon 11 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 4 Comments
Photo courtesy: jmtimages on Flickr
As soon as you finish that project…
You may want to celebrate.
You might want to take a well-deserved break.
You might want to go off the grid for a while.
You might want to just not to anything and relax a bit.
Before I make my point, let us just stop and think for a minute about life.
Life, for me, is a series of projects. That was the opening premise of my first book (in US) called Beyond Code (you can download the entire book for FREE here)
In fact, you are always on at least two projects – one personal and one professional – that is if you are lucky. Typically you are on more than two projects. The size and scope of these projects are different but they are right there.
There is no time in your life where you can get a clean exit from one project and move to the next project.
[ Note: Ultra-successful people who have achieved autonomy don't fall into the category. They are exceptions ]
If you think about it, most of your life is spent on projects (until you achieve autonomy) and occasionally you get spurts of time where you are in-between projects.
The “in-between project time” is tiny compared to the “project time.” If you are waiting for the “in-between project time” to celebrate, you are missing most of your life. That will be sad.
What if you view engaging in your core projects is a celebration of life. That’s where you spend most of your life so why not celebrate it?
If, for some reason your projects are not worth celebrating, then why engage in them in the first place?
Something to think about.
Two related blog posts on projects:
1. Learn the art of managing multiple projects
2. Connect your projects
Posted in the Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Sun 10 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 4 Comments
Photo Courtesy: Laszlo-Photo on Flickr
Typically all it requires is to light the fire is striking a match against a match box.
What happens after that depends on many things.
At one extreme, you can create a forest fire within no time.
On the other extreme, you can just sit and watch until the matchstick burns down and throw whatever remains into the garbage can.
If you are lighting a fire to a cigarette, over a period of time, it will kill you.
If you are lighting a lamp, it will shed the darkness around you.
If you light a candle once, you might be able to create a ripple effect with that candle lighting a thousand other candles.
While it all seems simple, let us look at what is involved:
- You should have a burning desire to light the fire.
- You need the resources – a match stick and a match box. Or, at least two rocks.
- You should know how to light the fire.
- You should know where to light the fire.
- Lastly, you should take the action to light the fire.
- Honestly, the above was not the last step. The last step is whether you like it or not you need to face the consequences (positive or negative) of lighting that fire.
We still have more than 350 days in this year to light those fires.
Do you have the desire to light one and if yes, where are you going to do it?
Posted in the Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Sat 09 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 4 Comments
Michelangelo said it right – “Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.”
And how does the sculptor discover it?
Simply by removing all the unwanted stone surrounding the statue.
Is this easy? No.
Is this painless for the stone? No.
Is this foolproof? No.
But if you want to discover the statute inside the stone, it’s got to be done. No other option.
If, on the other hand, you want to be nice to the stone and decide that you will simply use a good cloth and start polishing it, what will you get?
Polished crap.
Not a statue but polished crap.
It is the same case with you. There is a beautiful statue inside of you. You just need to remove the unwanted stuff that is preventing that statue to come out. The unwanted stuff can be as simple as “unproductive habits” that is stopping you from getting to where you want to go.
For starters, the “feedback” from the market and the people who care for you is what will remove the unwanted stuff. But, only if you take it seriously and do something about that feedback. If you are defensive and not listen to the feedback, you may never discover that beautiful statue.
Posted in the Main Page category.
By Rajesh Setty on Fri 08 Jan 2010, 12:10 AM - 5 Comments
Photo Credit: JohnW on Flickr
Seems simple but it’s not.
We make assessments based on what we see. What is visible and what our senses can make out influences our thinking all the time.
Today, more than ever people are sharing information via one ore more social networks. This may give the feeling that what is shared is everything. This may be true in some cases but in most cases what you see is the tip of the iceberg. It is hard for someone to share everything that they would share with a close friend. It is not required either.
Think about someone that you met over a social network. You knew a lot about the person via your interactions within the social network. As you built a relationship with the person, you will notice that you learned a LOT more about the person. What you saw in the social network was the “tip of the iceberg” and what you will discover when you build relationship is the “iceberg.”
Being “very” active on the social networks should not be an excuse to shy away from building close relationships. You still need to carve out the time necessary to build the next level of relationships.
The tip of the iceberg is just that – tip of the iceberg. The iceberg is WAY bigger than the “tip of the iceberg.”
Posted in the Main Page category.
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