Nuggets On
views on success
Leaders talk about how they have recalibrated the notion of what success means to them. This is often a moving target and one has to constantly evolve it as we go through our respective journeys. They also discuss how this thinking has helped them make a more robust “where to go” decision when they were at an inflection point.
Shifting your goal post over time
Prakash talks about how he has thought about his goal post at different points in time and how he finds his True North. He shares a nuanced view on how one should think about value in the pursuit of the sweet spot in which one could consider operating.
Taking stock of life after Bazee sale
When Avnish started Baazee, his financial goal was to make USD 2 Million. When he sold Baazee to Ebay for USD 55 Million, he had made close to 10x of his estimate. He talks about how he took stock of life and moved forward from that point.
Setting a goalpost at UIDAI
In a start-up, how do you think about setting a goal post? It is a tricky question when there are several unknown unknowns. Nandan talks about how he thought about "What good would look like" in 5 years for the Aadhaar project.
Reflecting on the past and the future
Pramath reflects on his journey till date and talks about what has enabled him to get this far. He discusses the role of staying grounded and authenticity in building trust and developing alliances. He also shares his thoughts around where he wants to drive impact and make a difference in the years to come.
Evolving perspectives on success and impact
KV Sridhar (Pops) talks about how his metrics of success have slowly shifted from business outcomes (brand performance, ad recall) towards the impact he makes on humanity. He talks about the responsibility the advertising industry has in addressing and influencing the biases (conscious and unconscious) that exist in the society today. He specifically refers to the unconscious biases towards girls and women and what he did to sensitize the ecosystem.
Evolving views on the notion of success
Mouli talks about how the early years were often focused on achievement, which later gave way to an orientation towards Mastery and the last phase being driven by purpose. He talks about how he found his purpose along his journey and how it has impacted the choices he makes in everything he does whether it is a market visit or writing a book.
More from Chandramouli Venkatesan
Overemphasizing fit in a career choice
Mouli talks about how he has made some of his early career moves based on the notion of fit. He also acknowledges that there is often an information asymmetry here and uses surrogate sources (profiles of others who have gone there and succeeded) of data as a means of determining if he would belong. He also emphasizes the criticality of focusing on learning rather than earning to drive professional growth over the long-term.
More from Chandramouli Venkatesan
Winning the Second half of career
Mouli talks about how people need to consider evolving the metrics with which they measure their success as they move towards the second half of their career. He strongly advocates the notion of helping others succeed as a means of driving your own success.
More from Chandramouli Venkatesan
Perspectives on Success
Roopa talks about how she thinks about success and frames it as a journey than a destination. She talks about how the notion of purpose has energized her during her days at CRISIL and in the work she does at Omidyar Network (Supporting innovations that can create opportunities for millions of people who are otherwise either excluded or underserved or disempowered)
Thinking about levers of Impact
Neera talks about how Dasra has evolved into an organization that works in three broad areas (Research, Building Organizations and Giving Strategically). She also talks about the way Dasra has made choices as it has grown as an organization and how it plans to measure impact and success as it grows into the future.
Evolving the goal-post at Dasra
Neera talks about how she and Deval have thought about where they have wanted to take Dasra. She also discusses how when they had a funding challenge a few years back, they had to revisit almost all of their key assumptions and have an honest discussion about where they wanted to take Dasra and move forward with increased conviction.
Provoking reflection through osmosis
Rajat provides some context around the style he adopted in the book and talks about the fact that notion of success is so contextual to each individual. He talks about sharing his journey candidly with people so that they could see a piece of themselves in the story and take out what makes sense for them through osmosis rather than by injection.
Setting goal-posts with the Indian Cricket team
Paddy speaks about the 4 goals that Gary Kirsten and he set out along with the Indian cricket team when they started working in 2007. 1) Becoming the No.1 test team in the world 2) Winning the 2011 ICC World Cup 3) Creating a happy team environment and 4) Helping players become better people. He speaks about the process they followed to get to the answer.
How Bill thought about impact
Alan speaks about what mattered to Bill and how he measured his impact or success. He speaks about Bill’s genuine love for people, his keen desire to help them succeed and his passion for building communities around him.
The 3 big transitions that couples go through
Jennifer speaks about the underlying architecture of her book and lays out the 3 transitions that most couples go through in their journey. Transition no. 1 is about the question – how do we make this work? Transition no.2 is often about the question – what do we want to become? Transition no.3 is often about the question who are we? She speaks about the criticality of addressing these as a couple and not just as individuals.
More from Jennifer Petriglieri
The third transition - Who are we now?
Jennifer speaks about the third transition that couples often face often when they are empty nesters and when they have exhausted the gunpowder in their artillery. They now take stock of life and say “Who are we now” and what is the purpose behind our existence.
More from Jennifer Petriglieri
Achievement and happiness
Raj speaks about the link between levels of success and happiness. He goes on to speak about the relationship between happiness and education levels. He mentions that happiness rises till the undergraduate level but not necessarily post that, suggesting that the commercial threshold for us to be really happy is much lower than what we might think it is.
Abundance mindset and happiness
Raj makes the connection between our mindsets (scarcity versus abundance) and our levels of happiness. He mentions that more than the amount of money we have, our relationship with the money we have is a better indication of our happiness levels.
Pursuing flow than chasing superiority
Raj speaks about the notion of pursuing flow rather than chasing superiority as we think about making key choices in our journey. He also speaks different kinds of flow and goes onto speak about the importance of mastery in us experiencing high flow (harder to achieve at the foothills of a pursuit).
Transitions in mid-life
Jennifer speaks at length about Stage 3 (Socialized mind) and Stage 4 (Self-authored mind) as these two account for ~90% of the adults in the world. She also speaks about the notion of liminality and the connection with transitioning across these two stages. Suffice it to say that this is not easy but this transition requires years of commitment to firmly move from one space to the other.
More from Jennifer Garvey Berger
Our relationship with money
Venkat speaks about the link between our relationship with money and our overall happiness and fulfilment. He speaks about the link between the process of wealth creation and the formation of our attitudes towards money. He speaks about how the distinction between our needs and wants can provide greater degrees of freedom and open up newer possibilities for us and can liberate us from the “money trap”. He also speaks about LivingMyPromise, a movement where several people have chosen to give 50% of their wealth away.
Dreaming big
Venkat speaks about how he thinks about his vision – inculcating the spirit of giving in India. He sees it as a journey that gives him a sense of direction. He also speaks about how he derives from Bill Gates who says that if he has managed to solve a problem well, then the odds are people a few years down the line may not remember him. Not being remembered around an issue that exists today is possibly the best measure of somebody having addressed the issue.
From PE to Philanthropy
Ashish speaks about the notion of controlled ambition which enabled him to stay detached from the material outcomes and also gave him the conviction to step away from the corporate world despite his accomplishments. He speaks about expenses growing at a much slower clip than his income that enabled him to take the step to move towards philanthropy.
Metrics to measure progress
Measurement of metrics in a Social Impact context can be complex. This is unlike the corporate world where there are established P&L and Balance Sheet metrics that can be used to measure progress. Ashish speaks about how he thinks about metrics when it comes to evaluation of progress with Ashoka University or Central Square Foundation.
When money stops moving the needle
Ashley speaks about research that suggests that above USD 60,000 money does not necessarily buy more happiness. She goes on to say that above USD 100,000, people might start to feel worse off because they start comparing themselves with a different economic stratum. She speaks about how the pursuit of wealth for the sake of it being a happiness trap.
How women often think about ambition
Sally speaks about how women often think about ambition slightly differently from men. She also goes onto to say that the paradigm of leadership has evolved over the last few decades that a lot more men today also have started looking at ambition in a holistic manner compared to a few decades back. However, she says – “women got there first”.
Being a Chief Life Officer
Bob speaks about the notion of a Chief Life Officer, and how each one of us can play that role for ourselves as we go through life. He also makes the distinction between what is valuable and what is priceless and urges us to think about the distinction as we think about choices as we often move from being a warrior to a king to a sage in our respective journeys.
Measuring what Matters
Lloyd speaks about how thinks about impact and makes the distinction between Asset items (things that endure) and Flow items (things that come and go). He speaks about the small things that we (can) do that can make a significant impact in other people’s lives and in the impact they can have around them.
Attitude towards Money
Rajiv speaks about how he thought about money when he decided to step off the financially lucrative corporate track. He also makes the distinction between foregoing future upside versus taking a cut on the lifestyle as things stand today.
Beyond retailing time
Dorie speaks about how Marshall Goldsmith (inspired by Paul Hersey) moved from being an effective Coach to start thinking about his legacy and started writing and conceiving of several initiatives including MG100.
Metrics to measure green shoots
Dorie speaks about how we should think about situations where the green-shots might take a while to appear especially when we embark on something new. She shares some perspectives around how we should think about cutting losses versus persisting and what metrics we should track.
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.
Cultivating an abundance mindset
Ravi speaks about how we can create a mindset of abundance even if we are in a situation where we might face material scarcity. He speaks about the link with Philanthropy and makes the distinction between having resources and being resourceful.
Different forms of Capital
Ravi speaks about the different forms of Capital that we possess and how we can deploy that in the context of a situation. He specifically refers to the conversations at Social Venture Partners, a philanthropic organization I am a part of.
How will you measure your life
Ravi speaks about how we could think about measuring our life. He speaks about how he has gone about discovering what makes him distinctive and chosen the various initiatives that he has participated in.
Sowing the seeds for the next innings
Chris speaks about how Roger thought about success at various points in time but at the same time was sowing the seeds for his next innings of his life (e.g., the connect with Bill Gates in the context of his Foundation).
