Soch To Success

April is more than the Fool’s Day. It is the month of beginnings, a month of new starts, a month that sets the tone for the year ahead, for people as well as businesses. It is the time to plan, learn, reflect and grow.

The invisible hard skill that one must adopt  

Almost everything that we do—at home or work—can be done better yet we do not look at improving habits. ‘Improve’ is the hardest skill to follow but if done, it can be magnificently rewarding.

Sunil Gavaskar, Madhuri Mishra and lessons in influence 

It is not only social media that makes an influencer. It is the resolve, the purpose and the consistency in work that makes an influencer.  

3 Lego lessons to keep entropy in check

Large organisations create teams to address the problem of entropy. But there are processes that bind all teams into a large one—making a big room full of Lego blocks. That’s why startups are agile. They are the small rooms of fewer Lego blocks.

Moral Intelligence—a trait of a remarkable leader

Right and wrong taught as values remain the compass for decisions that define moral intelligence. Like in life, in business, too, a moral intelligence lapse leaves a hole in the company’s trust and value systems.

Are you a choice architect?

Informed choices are important in life and in business. In the second of a two-part series on behavioural economics, we look at choice architecture, the practice of influencing choices.

Changing behaviour—one mime at a time

In the first of a two-part series on behavioural economics, we discuss how influencing behaviour can have a wide-spread impact—from saving lives to conserving water.

Cricket, GameStop and new rules of risk decisions

Rules have changed, a new democracy has taken shape and it is here to stay across all walks of life, including cricket and stock markets.

Why you must not call yourself an expert?

Try being an adaptive expert who applies knowledge effectively to find solutions to novel or atypical problems

3 must-know growth tenets from prepaid mobile success

Understanding the consumer behaviour responsible for the success of prepaid mobile adoption in India offers a peek into the evolution of current and future services

You can change the game with a 'nudge'

A nudge predictably alters behaviour without forbidding any option or significantly changing economic incentives. To count as a nudge, the intervention must be easy—putting the fruit at eye level is a nudge, banning junk food isn’t.

A leadership skill that I saw in a thief

Courage and fear co-exist and managing the balance between the two is the key to our success.

Survival of the fittest, err, the fitter 

We not only need physical fitness but also mental fitness. It is about looking inward and thinking how to grow fitter. It is about the fittest, not the fittest among us, but a fitter version of our own.

The terrific value of inversion thinking

Sometimes when there is too much clutter, there is no clear thinking. Like in designing, where we need to value the negative space, we need to pay attention to negative space in thoughts as well.

The magic of creative confidence

Creativity is not just about painting or being an artist, it is about thinking. Creative thinking gives birth to ideas, which are vital not only for business but also for day-to-day life.

Please pay your complete attention to attention

Attention is not merely staying focused on the task at hand but is also how to process other information in the brain.

The enormous value of note-taking in being successful

Taking notes makes a remarkable difference when you make it a part of your learning ladder. It helps retain knowledge better, which further helps the mind to build interconnected mental maps or models.

Extraordinary work will make you see a new perspective

Purpose-driven work creates a competitive advantage for businesses as well as people. To work with empathy is a powerful purpose. Adapt it.

Six reasons why WFH is not working

Office space gets you a landing strip for you to move away from other things and enter a work zone.

Learning lessons from big, remarkable events

Learning grows on learning. The more you learn, the more growth you experience.

Weddings, chaos and 3 must-know principles of entropy  

A business needs to not only lead by goal orientation but also keep entropy low by providing incentives, training, metrics for performance measurement, etc to keep it on track.  

Risks and decisions—you need to know these lessons

The ‘risk hai toh ishq hai’ line from the web series Scam 1992-The Harshad Mehta is a reminder—of the power of timely decisions, alertness towards our availability bias and our circle of competence.

Special offer on the grand gesture—your free superpower

As our life seems more static than growing, designing joy purposefully will bring in energy. Designing joy in small things is nice but grand activities will stimulate mind and body.

These 3 simple practices will make you nurture a growth mindset

Changing our beliefs can have a powerful impact. The passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when it’s not going well, is the hallmark of the growth mindset.

Sure-fire strategic genius of fighter pilot John Boyd

In the entrepreneurial world, you do not wait for a perfect product or a service. You observe the space, orient your offer and decide a course of action.