Nuggets On
judgment
Judgment is a key trait that differentiates the great leaders from the average ones. How do you make decisions and exercise choices in a world full of options and grey areas with multiple stakeholders around you. In addition, the playlist has nuggets that discuss how one creates a climate for the people around you to exercise good judgment.
Building good judgment
Sound judgment is a must have for any leader in any domain. Having a sense of what makes sense all things considered is hard and critical. Zia provides her perspective on what it takes to have good Judgment from a Lawyer's perspective.
Building good business judgment
Suresh talks about the trade-off between long-term considerations like consumer trust and the short-term cash flow pressures. He specifically talks about the considerations that went into them proactively destroying about 35000 tonnes of food (that was arguably of good quality). He also breaks down what it takes create a climate where the people under the take the right decisions even when under duress.
Focus vs Perspective
Devdutt talks about the distinction between Focus (Rana-bhoomi) and Perspective (Ranga-bhoomi). He talks about how when you adopt focus, you see the world from your perspective while when you have perspective you see it as a whole without boundaries. He links this to the business context and talks about the distinction between the healthy side and the dark side of capitalism where companies often over-emphasizing adding value to shareholders (often at the exclusion of some of the other stakeholders that could be impacted).
Building perspective and judgment
Devdutt talks about the distinction between sarpa drishti (focus, short-term) and garuda drishti (perspective, long-term). He talks about how there is merit in having a certain rhythm with which one wears each lens. He talks about the churn that happens between the two when you toggle between them rather than looking at them sequentially. He also talks about the merits of having clarity of the role you are in (CEO, Board, Owner –etc.). He mentions that often, a lot of confusion ensues because people aren’t clear about the role they have been entrusted with.
Balancing the macro and micro views
Jay talks about how he thinks about the macro discussions he has when he is in Delhi or with an international delegation (which is often about solving for the future) and balances it with the concerns of the here and now that people in his constituency are facing. He talks about he manages to combine the bird’s eye view and the worm’s eye view.
Perspectives on Prioritization
Jay talks about the criticality of creating the leverage as a leader to find a mechanism to process the volumes the data that comes to you to be thoughtful about your decisions. He goes on to talk about how he has to balance the need to go after legislative priorities with crises that might erupt in your constituency from time to time.
Building better business judgment
Amit discusses how people get better at judgment calls over time. In an industry where the lead time to feedback is long, this is a significant differentiator over the long-term. He also discusses how, in order to drive disproportionate returns, it is critical to walk the tight-rope between seeking all the inputs required for a decision but at the same time have the courage of conviction to stick your neck out to avoid a consensus evaluation.
Developing a sense of judgment
Roopa talks about she developed a sense of judgment in the new context when she moved to Omidyar Network. She talks about the fact that she now has to exercise judgment on entrepreneurs who in turn will exercise judgment on several topics that are relevant to them. She discusses how she went about acquiring that nuanced sense of judgment by understanding the world of the start-up entrepreneur and the world of technology.
Delivering good judgments
Vinay talks about how the same judgment can have a different journey of implementation depending on the ecosystem in which the judgment is pronounced. He talks about the distinction between barking and biting when he looks at a Judgment. He urges the leaders (Judges, Lawyers, CEOs) to think hard about the ecosystem they are in and the control they have over implementation before they go for a certain verdict.
Leadership under extreme constraints - Lion, Fox and Mouse
Vinay talks about how Narasimha Rao combined the notion of intellectual agility (ability to fundamentally shift one’s beliefs when new data presents itself) and implementation agility (knowing how to drive change through a complex system). He talks about how Narasimha Rao could play Lion, Fox or Mouse and the criticality of timing in these situations.
Making/Not making key decisions
Vinay talks about how Narasimha Rao made decisions or chose not to make decisions strategically depending on the political context. He mentions that often people think of Narasimha Rao as an intellectual but Vinay argues that he was a man of action but also somebody who was acutely aware of his political ability to drive through change.
In Summary - Playing to Potential
Vinay talks about how Narasimha Rao was a fusion of Don Quixote (somebody who acted without too much thinking) and Hamlet (somebody who thought a lot but didn’t act as much) and how he brought the various shades of gray in his personality to bear as a leader. He talk about how we need to be cognizant of our environment when we think about what we do and how we implement it.
Judgment and values
Arun talks about how values play an important role in how we build a sense of judgment on situations. He specifically presents the opposing perspectives of two views. 1) Utilitarian view 2) Individual rights view. He goes on to talk about the importance of tailoring our approach to the specific context rather than being binary about it.
Listening & "Thinking fast and slow"
Arun talks how we might not be feeding our “thinking slow” part of the brain enough (using the phrase made popular by Nobel Prize winning Economist - Daniel Kahneman). He talks about how people now have greater reach in connections but with often diminishing levels of richness. He quotes some recent studies where brains of children have shown to be influenced by this and how this is impacting several areas including how we feel about ourselves, our attitudes and empathy. He re-emphasizes the power of having reading as a habit to further build the muscle of “Thinking Slow”.
Trusting the expert
In the book – Sponge – Ambi shares an illustration. Let us say, you have an architect who designs a house for you with 5 pillars. You feel that this doesn’t look good aesthetically and you want her to design it with 3 pillars. She does so and builds a house for you. A few months later, the house collapses. Whose fault is it? Architect’s or yours? Ambi talks about how clients with varying styles (ranging from Dr Varghese Kurien to Mr Rohintan Aga) work effectively with experts to get the most out of them.
Judgment - Balancing head and heart
Ambi discusses how some of the leaders he has worked with combine science and art in making good judgments. He talks about how some of these leaders walk the fine line between following process and using well-informed gut to make superior decisions over time. This is specifically relevant in the world of Marketing and Advertising where the production values can vary by orders of magnitude.
CEO connect with end consumer
Ambi talks about how leaders like Karsanbhai Patel of Nirma have an intuitive understanding of the customer need. He specifically talks about the “chaiwalla test”, a concept he discusses in his book, to talk about how some leaders find smart ways of getting a quick pulse from the real demographic rather than making misleading assumptions.
Making good Board decisions
Mr OP Bhatt talks about the role of a Chairperson in ensuring that good decisions are made. He talks about the situations where sometimes not making a decision and seeking more information is better than suboptimal decisions. He also discusses how he would handle divergent opinions on the Board by facilitating a more nuanced conversation that embellishes the issue and the nuances come out.
How Gandhiji made decisions
Dr. Guha speaks about Gandhiji went about making complex decisions. He talks about how he was able to combine the need to be democratic and to listen to the various people around him with the ability to be decisive and back his instincts given the overall context.
More from Dr. Ramachandra Guha
Unanticipated consequences and "Cobra effect"
Kartik speaks about how, if we are not watchful, algorithms might end up creating outcomes that we hadn’t really pictured when we started using them. He speaks about one particular example of an instance with Amazon where using algorithms to screen resumes led to the gender bias being further amplified before Amazon noticed it and addressed it.
More from Kartik Hosanagar EP2
Exercising consumer choice - balancing efficiency and diversity
Kartik uses the example of music (Pandora, Last.FM and Spotify) and speaks about the different approaches to algorithm design and the implications on the kind of content we are likely to see as consumers. He also speaks about how the designers of algorithms need to have a holistic approach to developing metrics to evaluate the efficacy of the algorithms.
More from Kartik Hosanagar EP2
Enabling good decisions
Alan speaks about how Bill would go about engaging with leaders and ensuring that they made good decisions. There is a piece here around following the right process for making a good decision. He also speaks about his role in helping leaders move on once a decision is made (whether it is in your favour or not).
Getting the problem definition right
Sudhir speaks about the close link between IIMA and HUL in terms of the approach towards problem solving and Marketing. He speaks about the role of PL Tandon and Labdhi Bhandari in helping build the IIMA Marketing curriculum along with Prof AK Jain. He also shares an example of when he failed at framing the right question when he was in the Ice Creams business.
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.
Trap1 - Looking for simple stories
Jennifer speaks about how we grow up listening to linear stories that have a beginning, a middle and an end and there is often a very clear chain of causality. She mentions that this leads us to “making sense” of the world through simplistic stories and often that can be really far from the truth. She speaks about how we can recognize this trap and avoid it.
More from Jennifer Garvey Berger
Trap 2 - Feeling right does not mean it is right
Jennifer speaks about the distinction between feeling something is right versus thinking that something is right. She mentions that the feeling of rightness often arrives a few milliseconds before the actual process of cognitive certainty around a problem and this could lead to us forming an opinion first and then back-filling the data to suit the answer we end up feeling right about.
More from Jennifer Garvey Berger
Making robust hiring decisions
RG speaks about his experiences from having made around 200 odd CEO appointments in his years as a mentor and as a Board Member. He goes onto say that his hit-rate might only be around 50-60% over the years. He shares some principles around how we can build robustness in hiring decisions and how we can think about experience, competency and potential as we evaluate different types of candidates.
Defining and measuring Judgment
Andrew speaks about how he came up with a framework to measure judgment. He also speaks about the nature of research he did to get to what was judgment and the variables that go in there. He also speaks about how the framework has evolved over time as he did his research and particularly speaks about the role of values in judgment.
More from Sir Andrew Likierman
Listen attentively; learn critically
Andrew speaks about the criticality of listening attentively to not just what is being said but also what is not being said. He says that the first element involved in judgment is about the quality of the data we consume, the extent to which we do our homework and our ability to ask the right questions to the people around us to get the information that really matters (than be inundated with volumes of information that may not be relevant).
More from Sir Andrew Likierman
Seek diversity, not validation
Andrew speaks about how we need to seek diverse inputs while going about a decision and not just look for people that reaffirm our view. He refers to Abraham Lincoln who had the reputation of assembling people around him that gave him a contra-view.
More from Sir Andrew Likierman
Keeping track of judgment run-rate
Andrew speaks about how leaders can keep track of the run rate of decisions they make. He speaks about how some sort of a reflection process (daily, weekly, yearly) could help you take stock of the key choices you have made and how you fared in them.
More from Sir Andrew Likierman
Identify, then challenge, biases
Andrew speaks about how we all have intellectual and emotional biases when we make decisions and he speaks about how we can minimize being influenced by the biases during such moments. He speaks about some tactical tips around how one of the organizations tackles this by unearthing prior biases that different people in the room might have towards a situation.
More from Sir Andrew Likierman
Question the solution set offered
One of the key elements of Judgment that Andrew speaks about is the notion of looking at the entire range of possibilities. Sometimes we fall into the bias of “what you see is what there is” during a transition. It is critical to ensure that we examine the entire range of possibilities before we take a call in a certain situation.
More from Sir Andrew Likierman
Making sense of complexity
Vinay speaks about how tactful politicians like Vajpayee understand the notion of an “Overton Window”, a skill that CEOs need more and more as the levels of complexity compound in the world we live in.
More from Vinay Sitapati - Jugalbandhi
Optimizing versus Satisficing mindset
Ashley discusses how our approach towards getting the “best deal” in a situation can actually accentuate time poverty. She says that we end up finessing on getting the best deal but miss out on savouring the experience (called life!). To borrow from John Lennon, she says something to the effect of “Life is what happens when you are busy trying to get the best deal”
Limitations of the rational mind
Venerable Tenzin Priyadarshi speaks about how he took the call to walk out his home into the unknown when he was 10. He speaks about the limitations of the rational mind and how we all tend to take actions and then often subsequently justify our decision using logic. He also speaks about the criticality of parents getting out of the way while bringing up children.
Recognizing and developing good judgment
Bill decodes the Amazon Leadership Principle – Are right a lot. He speaks about how Amazon thinks about good judgment and the nuances between 1 way door decisions and 2-way door decisions. He speaks about how Amazon creates a culture of open-ness to multiple perspectives in the spirit of enabling good quality decisions.
Helping Children Design their life
Ayse speaks about how we can equip our children to design their life as they set sail on their respective journeys in a world filled with twists and turns. We connect the dots with an insight from Pramath Sinha on how we can help equip children to navigate the world of uncertainty.
Being intentional about life
Ravi speaks about how it is very easy to drift through life and it is critical for us to be deliberate about the various choices we make. He urges to pay attention to what we are paying attention to.
Council of Advisors
Pradeep speaks about how some of the kings assembled the right council of advisors around them to help them through complex situations. He refers to Malik Ambar, Ahilyabai, Serfoji and Aurangzeb in how they thought about getting advice from experts.
More from Pradeep Chakravarthy
Regrets and Choice
Dan speaks about the work of Barry Schwartz around regret and teases out the distinction between regret and FOMO (Fear of missing out). He also speaks about how we call can undertake “time travel” to ensure that the “me of 10 years from now” would minimize regret.
Resolving Dharmasankatas
Raghu speaks about the notion of resolving Dharmasankatas – the double bind situations where there are no easy answers. He speaks about how Indian leadership (going back to King Vikramaditya) has had an emphasis of resolving Dharmasankatas. He goes on to speak about the Leadership traits that help in resolving these tricky situations.
More from Raghu Ananthanarayanan
Karna and Krishna - the conversation that never happened
Raghu makes an interesting observation. He says that while Bhagwad Gita was a discussion between Krishna and Arjuna on the various dilemmas the latter was facing, it could have well been a conversation between Krishna and Karna. He says that Karna was so consumed by his hurt that he never even saw the dilemma and that was a missed opportunity. He connects this to several people and communities that might be going through a similar phenomenon.
More from Raghu Ananthanarayanan
Dealing with grey
Manjari speaks about some of the situations at work where she had to balance the multiple egos and agendas and find an approach that is tactful. She also goes on to talk about her black and white approach to situations and how she cuts through the clutter.
Allowing Venting Vs Coaching
Ethan speaks about how we could be effective in helping people deal with Chatter. He suggests that while we need to play a role of empathizing and listening to allow the person to vent, we also need to consider providing some coaching or widening of their perspective so that they could move forward. He speaks about the few people that he calls Chatter Advisors that he turns to where he gets a healthy balance of listening and Sounding Board support when he experiences Chatter. He speaks about some of the characteristics that leads them to be on his Speed Dial.
Power and Value Neutrality
Jeffrey speaks about how nuclear energy can be a boon if used to generate electricity but could be a bane if it is used to make a bomb that kills people. Jeffrey goes on to say that context determines if something is good or bad and says that Power works in a similar fashion.
Implication of being judgmental
Jeffrey speaks about how being judgmental comes in the way of learning and can drive people away from us. He speaks about how Steve Jobs, Donald Trump and Elon Musk wielded power but as a result had a lot of attrition around them. He also speaks about how we may not have the right to tell somebody else what they ought to do but we possibly have a right or an obligation to tell others how they can get better at doing something.
Waypower over Willpower
Carol and David speak about how we can adopt multiple approaches to a situation. They borrow from the notion of fight, flight, fright or befriend and talk about the different approaches leaders could take to a situation – Lean in, Lean back, Don’t lean at all and Lean with.
Validating the vantage point
Carol and David speak about Validating the vantage point that a leader has. They speak about the various elements of a vantage point – resolution, level of detail , biases, near term vs long term and more.
