Friday, May 25, 2018

Food for thought for the Weekend (26-May-2018): Harsh Truths. Listening etc.,

Food for thought for the Weekend: My series where I present assorted collection of interesting blog posts, TED talks, podcast and articles I read/listened this week, some quotes that resonated with me, excerpts from my own reading.

19 Harsh truths you don't want to hear, but must: I've had my fair share of ups and downs in my life and have been grateful to my creator. Yet, there always something to learn - especially in the areas of "harsh truths". This is a nice set of rules, and was a timely reminder for me and I also immediately forwarded to my college going sons. You'd probably are aware of most of these.

The power of listening in helping people change: Recent results indicate that the performance declines in about 38% cases after a feedback has been provided. One possible reason could be that the boss might come as judgemental and person receiving the feedback tends to get defensive. This HBR article explores whether a more subtle intervention, namely asking questions and listening, could prevent these consequences. Whereas feedback is about telling employees that they need to change, listening to employees and asking them questions might make them want to change.

How to say NO when it matters most: "The wisdom of life lies in elimination of non-essentials" - Lin Yutang. In this article Tim Ferris teaches overcoming FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out), to kill the golden goose when the goose is no longer serving you and general principles to say NO to something, which you'd have otherwise told YES. Finally he talks about start-up investment, but the questions he ask are generic enough to arrive at a considered "Hell! Yeah" or a default NO.

No comments: