Nuggets On
excellence
Learn how individuals from across disciplines have pushed themselves to move to the very top of their field and profession. As we move towards a flattening world with a leveling of the playing field, there is a high risk of being commoditized if we do not strive towards excellence.
Attributes Of A Great Commentator
Vijay talks about the role distinction between a Broadcaster and a Commentator. He also alludes to the challenge of catering to audiences with varying tastes and appreciation of the game. The challenge is in creating content that appeals to different segments and is not just tailored to the tennis aficionados. Vijay shares some thoughts around how broadcasters could draw audiences in and then keep them there because of the quality of the game.
Framing Good Questions
Vijay discusses how less is more when you are interviewing a person. He discusses the role of brevity and the need for active listening to ensure that you are picking up the cues. He talks about some thoughts around how to navigate such a conversation. He uses the metaphor of Billiards where you are not just thinking about the initial contact of the cue ball with the red ball but are thinking two steps ahead of where all the cue ball might go.
Stand-Up: What it takes
“Find the balance to feed your stomach and feed your soul”: that’s the mantra for delivering to your potential, according to Papa CJ. In this nugget he talks about the qualities of being a good stand-up comedian and how these requirements actually transcend profession and time. Listen on to find tips to harness the true power of your potential.
Venture Investing - Supporting without intruding
As an entrepreneur who has built a business, how do you engage with an entrepreneur when you are an investor. Avnish talks about walking the tight rope of providing input while holding back as appropriate.
Sharpening investing skills
In Venture Investing, several years can pass before you realize the returns on your initial investment. Avnish talks about how investors can create a feedback loop in the interim and learn from the journey without having to wait for that long.
Balancing commerce with creativity
Film production is a tricky area where one has to walk the tight rope between creativity (as appreciated by the audience) and commerce. Atul talks about how he thinks about it and also alludes to the evolving consumer mindset where some early opinions could significantly swing the fortunes of the movie one way or the other.
What it takes to compete at the top
Vishy talks about how players need to adapt their style in a world where machines are makin the games longer and more nuanced. He specifically talks about the declining relevance of a dogmatic approach due to the machines suggesting more and more combinations which are possibly outside the realm of comprehension of the average human mind. He also refers to the crucial role of fitness to be able to make sound judgments deep into a game that has only gotten longer with the increasing role of machines.
Understanding the processor inside
In this nugget, Vishy talks about how he harnesses the potential of his mind in being a chess player at the very top over a prolonged period. He talks about how the human mind is like a wild horse that needs to be harnessed carefully. He shares some of his insights on how he tries to get the best of his conscious and his sub-conscious mind in preparing for big games. He also discusses some of his rituals in ensuring that he brings the best of himself to bear in various match situations.
Secret sauce behind great ads and film-makers
KV Sridhar talks about what separates the great ads and film makers from the rest. He shares his insights from his recently launched book – 30 Second Thrillers where he goes behind the scenes of legendary ads (tag lines such as Wah Taj, Hamara Bajaj, Only Vimal, I love you Rasna) and breaks down the secret sauce behind the ads and the ad film makers.
Perspectives on Excellence
Jay shares examples of three leaders (PV Narasimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi) who have driven significant change despite the challenges that came with the implementation. He talks about how great leaders use a window of opportunity or a crisis to quickly shift gears in dramatic fashion to drive seismic shifts.
Apprenticeship - the magic sauce in Private Equity
Amit talks about what it takes to build a sustainable Private Equity business over the long term. He also talks about the criticality of apprenticeship in people growing to become effective investors. He talks about three things that investors need to get right (people bets, strategy bets and timing) and how that evolves over time. He also discusses what it takes to transition to Investing as a profession and how he evolved from Investor 1.0 to Investor 2.0 during his tenure at Bain Capital.
Turbocharging your growth -TMRR
Mouli talks the fact that the time people put in a job is not an appropriate indication of the experience they have gained. He outlines TMRR (Target, Measure, Review and Reflect) as a process through which people could derive a lot more experience than what the average person might get in that time period. He also talks about how people can build in the habit so that they practice it on a regular basis.
More from Chandramouli Venkatesan
Training for the Olympics
Deepa talks about her pursuit of excellence led her from one place to another and eventually to a medal in the Olympics. She talks about the 68 National Golds and 21 International Medals including medals from Asian Games, Para Olympics, World Championships and Common Wealth Games.
Perspectives on Excellence
Deepa talks about her disciplined approach that enabled her to win the Silver Medal at the Rio Paralympics. She also talks about her frame of mind and personal context which gave her the fire to make the Silver Medal winning throw on that day.
Characteristics of great coaches
Jayashri discusses her observations of Shri Lalgudi Jayaraman and how he would unlock the potential of each of his students by tailoring his approach and finding a different set of tools for each individual. She also talks about how he would role-model standards of excellence in his practice of the art form
Deliberate practice
Jayashri discusses how she splits time during practice. This includes building stamina and preparing your mind to think faster when you perform with other musicians. She also talks about practicing new songs for at least a period of 3-4 months before the music begins to “flow” out of her.
Sir Ang Lee and Excellence
Jayashri talks about her collaboration with Sir Ang Lee where when she collaborated with him to sing for the movie – Life of Pi. The song was eventually nominated for the Oscars for the Best Original Song (first Tamil song to be nominated). She talks about how Sir Ang Lee brought out the best in her during the five days that she spent recording the 5 odd lines of the song.
Coach Coachee relationship
Matt discusses how he stays on top of adjacent disciplines such as nutrition, sleep science, strength and conditioning and other related topics to be relevant in the work he does. He also reflects on the learning opportunities in working with the athletes and coaches that he trains at Purple Patch Fitness.
Sachin Tendulkar and personal mastery
Paddy speaks about how personal mastery is something that people need to pursue deliberately in addition to professional mastery. He speaks about how Sachin Tendulkar went about his journey of growing as a cricketer and as a human being. He also speaks about how this is much more important today than it might have been a couple of decades back.
Self-awareness Unicorns
Tasha speaks about the notion of Self-awareness Unicorns, the 50 people they shortlisted from 1000s of people to study them. She speaks about how she arrived at this shortlist and who is in it. She goes on to speak about some of their practices around how they cultivated internal and external self-awareness.
Cathedrals vs Shopping malls
Lynda speaks about having a mind set for building something tangible and substantial over the long term which means something than solving for the here and now. She uses the metaphor of cathedrals versus shopping malls to make the point. She also speaks about the tension between building for the long term and staying agile as we try different pathways during transitions.
REM and Non-REM sleep and criticality of each
Matthew speaks about how we sleep occurs in 90 minute cycles in the brain. He says that in that cycle there are multiple stages of Non REM sleep and REM sleep that occur in sequence. He also goes onto to talk about the various benefits of Non REM sleep (Immune system, memory storage, better blood pressure control etc) and REM sleep (creativity, empathy, reproductive health etc). He speaks about why sleeping 25% less in terms of hours could actually mean getting 60-90% less of REM sleep given the way the 90 minute cycles are organized.
Writing evergreen material
Atul speaks about how he derives inspiration from legends like Anand Bakshi and Kishore Kumar to ensure that he creates material that has value a few months down the line. He speaks about resisting the temptation to pander to the “flavour of the month”. He also speaks about the effort involved in creating a special show. He suggests that it takes about a year of work to create an hour of good quality stand up material.
The path to excellence
Marshall speaks about how one could think about becoming the world’s best at something. He speaks about leveraging parallel experts (people who are experts in an adjacent yet related space) and developing one’s own point of view and a voice.
Getting behaviours and habits to stick
Marshall speaks about the challenges in getting behaviours to stick and the need for a Coach to keep you accountable and ensure that you be at it. He speaks about how he gets somebody to call him every day to get him to ask him a few questions around areas he wants to improve and how that has helped him with behaviour change.
Visualization and peak-performance
Dan speaks about how elite athletes conjure up peak performance when it matters the most. He speaks about how even some of the Olympians experience imposter’s syndrome. He speaks about the notion of neuroplasticity and how this can help performance.
Riding an S curve
Dorie speaks about the life cycle of becoming an expert in an area. She speaks about 4 waves involved here – Learning, Creating, Connecting and Reaping. She also speaks about the criticality of transitioning form this to the next wave once we exploit the full potential of that space.
Develop your voice not your brand
Ravi refers to the phenomenon of Stotting found in the jungles where quadrupeds, especially gazelles, spring in the air and lift all four legs off their ground often to signal their fitness to the predators. Ravi speaks about how we all should communicate our capabilities in a crowded and a noisy market. He urges us to focus on Marketing and not Sales when it comes to creating opportunities for ourselves.
Imposter syndrome as a founder
Alisa speaks about how lonely it is to be a Founder and to manage multiple expectations across a range of stakeholders and when you couple that with the fact that they are often operating in areas where they don’t necessarily have deep expertise, it can be an unnerving experience.
Secret to Roger's longevity
Chris speaks about Roger’s ability to context switch instantaneously from one situation to another. He also speaks about how Roger decided to declutter his plate by choosing to play fewer tournaments when he knew that he could get the ATP points he needed by doing will in lesser number of tournaments.
How Roger picked his Coaches
Chris speaks about how Roger thought about his Coaches at various points in time and how he moved from Peter Carter to Peter Lundgren to Tony Roche to Paul Annacone to Stefan Edberg to Ivan Lubicic while having Severin Luthi as a constant in his team. He speaks about his judgment on some of these matters over his career.
