Serendipity and Learning

 I am one of those people who looks at a restaurant menu and asks - what is the most different item on this list. I am vegetarian and within those limits, I always make it a point to explore something different.  And I have been rewarded with delightful experiences across the country. Whether it is in a little shack in Gokarna or a restaurant in Panaji or a small Maharashtrian outlet in Parel, Mumbai. To me, this is a great way to get the mind used to stepping out of familiar zones. And that is an important aspect of divergent thinking. Cut to lockdown and I tried various dishes from across the country thanks to chefs on instagram. For each of these dishes, I had to source things that are not normally seen in our kitchen. Panchphoran, Cinnamon, Kalonji, Mustard oil - to name a few. And thus Big Basket is an outlet for building divergent thinking muscle.  I learnt that there are different types of raisins, many herbal juices (positively abhorrent by way of taste, but with ...

 The gennexts have taken to reading Tintin. And suddenly there was a doubt.  What is a barnacle ? Or what is a bashi bazhouk ? Or why Thundering Typhoons? And led me to this...

 As schools have gone online, after the initial hiccups it has somewhat started working well. Not perfect, but well. And around now has come the first hurdle. Exams.  How to tackle exams in a covid scenario. I am only referring to school internal exams - not competitive ones like JEE entrance or anything of that sort.  Like everything else, the default approach to a new situation is to force fit everything we learnt in the earlier situation to the new one. So, in the same way schools have asked students to keep the camera and volume button on, camera to always the student in view at all times. I don't see how an invigilator can actually keep an eye at multiple students - seems impossible.  This is apart from technology solutions like no alt -tab of browser, connection drop = exam submission and all that.  The reason that all this is being done is to stop the child from "cheating" in the exam.  Why can't this be tackled differently? Why not have the onus of ...

About 20 years ago in our MBA class, the organization behaviour professor asked us "How many of you want to be CEOs". A plethora of hands went up. I think only a few hands did not go up. One of them was mine. And the professor asked me, why did you not raise your hand? I said, I dont know if CEO is what I want to become.  And 20 years later, I am actually sure that there are surely many other possible goals and roles than become CEO.  PS:You can argue that I was not good enough. But I consciously took a different path to measure my success differently. PPS: Many from the batch did go on to become Head of departments, functions, geographies. A couple did rise up to be CEO. But most CEOs were the ones who started off on their own. So, a question worth asking MBA students is, How many of you will take the entrepreneurship route - and notice that is far more than becoming CEO?  Of course if at that time we were asked that question only 2-3 hands would have gone up knowing my ...

As someone who has facilitated numerous workshops, sessions, labs and gatherings face to face like many others, I have been sceptical of Virtual facilitation. However in the past few months, I have handled Onboarding of leaders, run a virtual webinar with nearly 400 members in the audience, run sessions with 100+ attendees and run smaller cosier webinars with less than 20 attendees. The topics have ranged from Onboarding Leaders to Interview skills to Creativity workshops (who would have imagined) to Strategy workshops (indeed). Up until now, while I had handled virtual webinars, it never seemed like the real thing. It was seen as a poor substitute to face to face workshops.  I must admit, I am learning the tricks of the trade as I do so and enjoying the challenge! And every webinar I think I am unlocking newer levels of effectiveness. Some tips: Animation - used well is a great way to progress on a topic Chat window - Both the group response and the private window are fantastic to...