Right Attitudes

Ideas for Impact

Nagesh Belludi

Inspirational Quotations #811

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If you ask me, what I have come to do in this world, I who am an artist, I will reply: I am here to live my life out loud.
—Emile Zola (French Novelist)

If the history of the past fifty years teaches us anything, it is that peace does not follow disarmament—disarmament follows peace.
—Bernard M. Baruch (American Financier)

Revolution, in order to be creative, cannot do without either a moral or metaphysical rule to balance the insanity of history.
—Albert Camus (Algerian-born French Philosopher)

Every condition of life, if attended with virtue, is undisturbed and delightful; but when vice is intermixed, it renders even things that appear sumptuous and magnificent, distasteful and uneasy to the possessor.
—Plutarch (Greek Biographer)

If you want to be successful, find someone who has achieved the results you want and copy what they do and you’ll achieve the same results.
—Tony Robbins (American Self-Help Author)

My father taught in the wise way which unfolds what lies in the child.
—Louisa May Alcott (American Novelist)

At times it is folly to hasten at other times, to delay. The wise do everything in its proper time.
—Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso) (Roman Poet)

Appreciation is a wonderful thing: It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well.
—Voltaire (French Philosopher, Author)

Ideas in secret die. They need light and air or they starve to death.
—Seth Godin (American Entrepreneur)

Never forget that absolutely everything you do is for your customers. Make every decision—even decisions about whether to expand the business, raise money, or promote someone—according to what’s best for your customers.
—Derek Sivers (American Entrepreneur)

When one is seized with a passion to understand one’s self, one has to leave behind all normal life and habitual modes of thought.
—R. K. Narayan (Indian Novelist, Short-story Writer)

Money won’t make you happy, but everybody wants to find out for themselves.
—Zig Ziglar (American Author)

You should pardon many things in others, nothing in yourself.
—Ausonius (Latin Poet, Rhetorician)

Don’t One-up Others’ Ideas

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A manager who has the tendency to put his oar in his employees’ ideas ends up killing their ownership of ideas. This diminishes their motivation and performance.

When employees feel disrespected or unappreciated, survival instincts will kick in—employees turn inward and stop participating fully in their teams. It will only erode their commitment and led to poor results.

People Tend to Reject Ideas Offered by Others in Favor of Their Own

'What Got You Here Wont Get You There' by Marshall Goldsmith (ISBN 1401301304) In the bestselling What Got You Here Won’t Get You There (2007,) the celebrated leadership coach Marshall Goldsmith describes this behavior as the tendency to “add too much value.”

If you’re inclined to get wrapped up in adding your two cents and improving the quality of an idea a little, you may devalue an employee’s commitment to execute the idea:

Imagine an energetic, enthusiastic employee comes into your office with an idea. She excitedly shares the idea with you. You think it’s a great idea. Instead of saying, “Great idea!” you say, “That’s a nice idea. Why don’t you add this to it?” What does this do? It deflates her enthusiasm; it dampers her commitment. While the quality of the idea may go up 5 percent, her commitment to execute it may go down 50 percent. That’s because it’s no longer her idea, it’s now your idea.

Effective Coaching is Helping Others Discover Insights

Focus on helping others discover insights—not by solving the problem for them, but by helping them improve how they’re thinking about the problem.

  • If you have an idea that the other must hear, don’t tell them immediately. Use Socratic questioning to tease the idea out of them.
  • Examine how you hand out ideas. Resist the temptation to add your advice. Before you propose an idea, pause and ask yourself, “Is it worth it?”
  • Avoid declarative statements such as “you should …” or “I think … .”
  • The higher up you go in an organization, the more your suggestions become interpreted as orders.
  • Don’t marginalize the concerns of your team members in the interest of moving your ideas forward. Ignoring employees’ inputs can send a message to the entire team that you’re not actually looking for their creative ideas, but that you’ve got your own agenda and just want them to rubberstamp it.
  • Get your team involved early. People are more motivated to do the things they have to do if they are part of the planning and strategy.

Idea for Impact: Improve your team performance by encouraging better thinking, not by handing out advice.

Don’t give unsolicited advice. Don’t make team decisions to which you—but nobody else—is committed. Learn to persuade others to see things your way by tapping into their talents, passions, and abilities.

Remember, being an effective manager is not about winning yourself; it’s about making other people winners.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Why Your Employees Don’t Trust You—and What to Do About it
  2. 20 Reasons People Don’t Change
  3. Don’t Lead a Dysfunctional Team
  4. What Knowledge Workers Want Most: Management-by-Exception
  5. The Jerk Dilemma: The Double-Edged Sword of a ‘No Jerks Here’ Policy

Inspirational Quotations #810

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Nothing can have value without being an object of utility.
—Karl Marx (German Philosopher, Economist)

How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book.
—Henry David Thoreau (American Philosopher)

The man who does more than he is paid for will soon be paid for more than he does.
—Napoleon Hill (American Author)

As the turning of logs will make a dull fire burn, so change of studies will a dull brain.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (American Poet)

Whatever you do, make it an offering to me—the food you eat, the sacrifices you make, the help you give, even your suffering.
—The Bhagavad Gita (Hindu Scripture)

There is no prejudice that the work of art does not finally overcome.
—Andre Gide (French Novelist)

If you want your life to be more rewarding, you have to change the way you think.
—Oprah Winfrey (American TV Personality)

Nothing is more sad than the death of an illusion.
—Arthur Koestler (British Writer, Journalist)

A trifle is often pregnant with high importance; the prudent man neglects no circumstance.
—Sophocles (Ancient Greek Dramatist)

Governments are necessarily continuing concerns. They have to keep going in good times and in bad. They therefore need a wide margin of safety. If taxes and debt are made all the people can bear when times are good, there will be certain disaster when times are bad.
—Calvin Coolidge (American Head of State)

The pleasure we derive from journeys is perhaps dependent more on the mindset with which we travel than on the destination we travel to.
—Alain de Botton (Swiss-born British Philosopher)

He who is greedy is always in want.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) (Roman Poet)

Some men are like musical glasses; to produce their finest tones you must keep them wet.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (English Poet)

Everything has its beauty but not everyone sees it.
—Confucius (Chinese Philosopher)

If we are strong, our strength will speak for itself. If we are weak, words will be of no help.
—John F. Kennedy (American Head of State)

An exaggeration is a truth that has lost its temper.
—Khalil Gibran (Lebanese-born American Philosopher)

Here’s a Tactic to Sell Change: As a Natural Progression

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In Venice: The Hinge of Europe, 1081–1797 (1974,) the eminent University of Chicago historian William McNeill outlined how the Venetian Republic shaped European history. Describing the notion of trans-cultural diffusion, he wrote,

When a group of men encounter a commodity, technique, or idea that seems superior to what they had previously known, they will try to acquire and make their own whatever they perceive to be superior, but only as long as this does not seem to endanger other values they hold dear.

University of Washington’s Roger Soder quotes McNeill’s remarks in The Language of Leadership (2001) and supplies a case in point:

This is best illustrated by the technique of Jesuits who brought “new math” [including astronomy and mechanics] to China in the 1600s. They created the myth that the new Western mathematics had in fact evolved out of ancient Chinese ideas. The new ideas, they felt, would be accepted much more readily if they were seen as a natural progression of previously accepted methods.

That’s an important lesson on how to sell change: as a natural progression of the status quo.

Idea for Impact: People find themselves unable or unwilling to make fundamental changes in their lives. They tend to be particularly unwelcoming of ideas that they fear will alienate them from their core values. Tread delicately if you want effective change.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. This Manager’s Change Initiatives Lacked Ethos, Pathos, Logos: Case Study on Aristotle’s Persuasion Framework
  2. Don’t Say “Yes” When You Really Want to Say “No”
  3. What Most People Get Wrong About Focus
  4. Serve the ‘Lazy Grapefruit’
  5. Honest Commitments: Saying ‘No’ is Kindness

Yes, Money Can Buy Happiness

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This HBR article considers why the pursuit of money isn’t bringing you joy.

Even though, as a society, we really have more time to spend than in previous societies as a result of convenience and mechanization, we tend to use free time to work yet more and expand our bank accounts, rather than invest that time in things that can provide us with more happiness—meaningful relationships, for example.

The article (and the related podcast) explains how to value your time over money, in particular by hiring help. Here is a précis:

You might not be able to change how many hours you work in a week, but you might be able to change how much of those non-work hours you’re spending on chores.

If you are having a really busy weekend and you have four or five hours of chores to do at home, that means you’re going to have four or five less hours to spend in any other way that could promote meaning and happiness.

When considering how we can use money to increase our happiness, most of us think of investing it in positive experiences like Hawaiian vacations. But it’s also important to think about how to eliminate negative experiences from our day. Take small actions—don’t do anything too drastic, but just sit down and think about whether there’s anything you can outsource that you really don’t like, that stresses you out a lot, that you can afford.

Idea for Impact: Use your hard-earned money to buy time, reduce stress, and increase happiness

If you feel increasingly strapped for time, consider (think opportunity costs) earmarking a fraction of your discretionary income to hire a personal assistant and buy get yourself some more of that most valuable of life’s supplies, free time.

Start by asking your friends for referrals for a reliable assistant. Outsource your housework, shopping, errands, and other tasks that you dislike. Use the salvaged time to seek activities that bring you joy—recreation, relationships, spiritual and intellectual nurturance, or even productive work.

However, farm out personal chores in moderation. There’s some evidence to suggest that people who outsource too much have the lowest levels of happiness, perhaps as a consequence of indolence.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. The Simple Life, The Good Life // Book Summary of Greg McKeown’s ‘Essentialism’
  2. The Extra Salary You Can Negotiate Ain’t Gonna Make You Happy
  3. The Problem with Modern Consumer Culture
  4. Wealth and Status Are False Gods
  5. Busyness is a Lack of Priorities

Inspirational Quotations #809

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In this world without quiet corners, there can be no easy escapes from history, from hullabaloo, from terrible, unquiet fuss.
—Salman Rushdie (Indian-born British Novelist)

Every error of the mind is the more conspicuous, and culpable, in proportion to the rank of the person who commits it.
—Juvenal (Roman Poet)

There are very honest people who do not think that they have had a bargain unless they have cheated a merchant.
—Anatole France (French Novelist)

If you are possessed by an idea, you find it expressed everywhere, you even smell it.
—Thomas Mann (German Novelist)

A wise lover values not so much the gift of the lover as the love of the giver.
—Thomas a Kempis (German Religious Writer)

A joke, even if it be a lame one, is nowhere so keenly relished or quickly applauded as in a murder trial.
—Mark Twain (American Humorist)

If you can’t stand the heat, you’d better get out of the kitchen.
—Harry S. Truman (American Head of State)

That’s the secret to life … replace one worry with another.
—Charles M. Schulz (American Cartoonist)

The most important thing about getting somewhere is starting right where we are.
—Bruce Fairchild Barton (American Advertising Executive)

Wisdom is like electricity. There is no permanently wise man, but men capable of wisdom, who, being put into certain company, or other favorable conditions, become wise for a short time, as glasses rubbed acquire electric power for a while.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (American Philosopher)

Happiness does not lie in happiness, but in the achievement of it.
—Fyodor Dostoyevsky (Russian Novelist)

Let a man leave anger, let him forsake pride, let him overcome all bondage! No sufferings befall the man who is not attached to name and form, and who calls nothing his own.
—The Dhammapada (Buddhist Anthology of Verses)

High thoughts must have high language.
—Aristophanes (Greek Comic Playwright)

Humans should not worship other humans at all, but if they must do so it is better that the worshipped ones do not occupy any positions of political power.
—Christopher Hitchens (Anglo-American Social Critic)

How Stress Impairs Your Problem-Solving Capabilities: Case Study of TransAsia Flight 235

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As I’ve examined previously, airline disasters are particularly instructive on the subjects of cognitive impairment and decision-making under stress.

Consider the case of TransAsia Airways Flight 235 that crashed in 2015 soon after takeoff from an airport in Taipei, Taiwan. Accident investigations revealed that the pilots of the ATR 72-600 turboprop erroneously switched off the plane’s working engine after the other lost power. Here’s a rundown of what happened:

  1. About one minute after takeoff, at 1,300 feet, engine #2 had an uncommanded autofeather failure. This is a routine engine failure—the aircraft is designed to be able to be flown on one engine.
  2. The Pilot Flying misdiagnosed the problem, and assumed that the still-functional engine #1 had failed. He retarded power on engine #1 and it promptly shut down.
  3. With power lost on both the engines, the pilots did not react to the stall warnings in a timely and effective manner. The Pilot Flying acknowledged his error, “wow, pulled back the wrong side throttle.”
  4. The aircraft continued its descent. The pilots rushed to restart engine #1, but the remaining altitude was not adequate enough to recover the aircraft.
  5. In a state of panic, the Pilot Flying clasped the flight controls and steered (see this video) the aircraft perilously to avoid apartment blocks and commercial buildings before clipping a bridge and crashing into a river.

A High Level of Stress Can Diminish Your Problem-solving Capabilities

Thrown into disarray after a routine engine failure, the pilots of TransAsia flight 235 did not perform their airline’s abnormal and emergency procedures to identify the failure and implement the required corrective actions. Their ineffective coordination, communication, and error management compromised the safety of the flight.

The combination of sudden threat and extreme time pressure to avert a danger fosters a state of panic, in which decision-makers are inclined to commit themselves impulsively to courses of action that they will soon come to regret.

Idea for Impact: To combat cognitive impairment under stress, use checklists and standard operating procedures, as well as increased training on situational awareness, crisis communication, and emergency management.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. What Airline Disasters Teach About Cognitive Impairment and Decision-Making Under Stress
  2. Lessons from the World’s Worst Aviation Disaster // Book Summary of ‘The Collision on Tenerife’
  3. Under Pressure, The Narrowing Cognitive Map: Lessons from the Tragedy of Singapore Airlines Flight 6
  4. “Fly the Aircraft First”
  5. The “Ashtray in the Sky” Mental Model: Idiot-Proofing by Design

Inspirational Quotations #808

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Dispassionate objectivity is itself a passion, for the real and for the truth.
—Abraham Maslow (American Psychologist)

I would sooner read a timetable or a catalog than nothing at all. They are much more entertaining than half the novels that are written.
—W. Somerset Maugham (British Novelist)

Real life is, to most men … a perpetual compromise between the ideal and the possible.
—Bertrand A. Russell (British Philosopher, Mathematician)

He who asks of life nothing but the improvement of his own nature is less liable than anyone else to miss and waste life.
—Henri Frederic Amiel (Swiss Philosopher, Writer)

Not what you say about yourself, but what others say.
—The Talmud (Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith)

No matter how big a house you have or how slick a car you drive, the only thing you can take with you at the end of your life is your conscience.
—Robin Sharma (Canadian Writer, Motivational Speaker)

A man that speaks too much, and museth but little, wasteth his mind in words, and is counted a fool among men.
—Martin Farquhar Tupper (English Poet)

Let thy words be few.
—The Holy Bible (Scripture in the Christian Faith)

The first duty of a man is the seeking after and the investigation of truth.
—Cicero (Roman Philosopher)

I believe, if we take habitual drunkards as a class, their heads and their hearts will bear an advantageous comparison with those of any other class. There seems ever to have been a proneness in the brilliant and warm-blooded to fall into this vice.
—Abraham Lincoln (American Head of State)

Being brilliant is no great feat if you respect nothing.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (German Poet)

There is no worse sorrow than remembering happiness in the day of sorrow.
—Alfred de Musset (French Poet, Playwright)

If you want to gather honey, don’t kick over the beehive.
—Dale Carnegie (American Self-Help Author)

Dying is the most embarrassing thing that can ever happen to you, because someone’s got to take care of all your details.
—Andy Warhol (American Painter)

Rumor grows as it goes.
—Virgil (Roman Poet)

There is only one journey: going inside yourself.
—Rainer Maria Rilke (Austrian Poet)

The Business of Business is People and Other Leadership Lessons from Southwest Airlines’s Herb Kelleher

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Herb Kelleher (1931–2019), the larger-than-life cofounder and long-time CEO-chairman of Southwest Airlines, passed away earlier this year. He is celebrated for establishing a people-oriented company culture that any leader would envy.

What started as a doodle scratched on a cocktail napkin (this account has been disputed) changed the face of flying. Herb’s then-revolutionary vision of low-cost air travel boiled the business down to its essentials. The disciplined execution of this strategy broke the mold of the aviation industry, brought the freedom of travel to millions of people, and encouraged successful copycats the world over—from JetBlue to Ryanair, and IndiGo to Air Asia.

Here are some key lessons that Herb (he preferred to be called just that) had to teach.

Companies are built in the image of their founders. Herb was well known for his competitive chutzpah, his extroverted antics, and his knack for unforgettable publicity ploys (e.g. his paper bag commercial or the ‘Malice in Dallas’ arm wrestling contest.) To the flying public, Southwest became a brand infused with the unconventional, flamboyant, free-spirited personality of its boss. That culture will continue to reflect his vision even after he’s gone—the tone he set at Southwest is not unlike those set by Steve Jobs (foresight) at Apple, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield (social values) at Ben & Jerry’s, and Walt Disney (teamwork.)

Ego is the enemy of good leadership. Southwest stands as the paradigm of the power of a lighthearted culture. Herb’s stewardship of the well-being of employees started with the ego at the top. At a 1997 testimony before the National Civil Aviation Review Commission, Herb introduced himself saying, “My name is Herb Kelleher. I co-founded Southwest Airlines in 1967. Because I am unable to perform competently any meaningful function at Southwest, our 25,000 Employees let me be CEO. That is one among many reasons why I love the People of Southwest Airlines.” An ego-bound leader with no sense of humor can cast a shadow across everyone’s work, whereas a self-effacing leader who engages a genuine, self-deprecating humor can help create an environment in which employees take risks, work as a team, and enjoy themselves more. “Power should be reserved for weightlifting and boats, and leadership really involves responsibility.”

Focus on your people, they’ll take good care of your customers. Southwest’s successes are widely attributed to its highly committed and motivated workforce. From the very beginning, Herb fixated on looking after his employees, so they looked after each other and took care of their customers. And, the devoted customers ensured the growth of the business. He famously declared,

The business of business is people—yesterday, today and forever. And as among employees, shareholders and customers, we decided that our internal customers, our employees, came first. The synergy in our opinion is simple: Honor, respect, care for, protect and reward your employees—regardless of title or position—and in turn they will treat each other and external customers in a warm, in a caring and in a hospitable way. This causes external customers to return, thus bringing joy to shareholders.

Hire committed people who’ll fit your company’s culture. Under Herb, Southwest pursued job candidates who exemplified three characteristics: “a ‘warrior spirit’ (that is, a desire to excel, act with courage, persevere and innovate); a ‘servant’s heart’ (the ability to put others first, treat everyone with respect and proactively serve customers); and a fun-loving attitude (passion, joy and an aversion to taking oneself too seriously.)”

Hire for attitude, train for skill. For Herb, recruiting was not about finding people with the right experience—it was about finding people with the right mindsets. “We will hire someone with less experience, less education and less expertise, than someone who has more of those things and has a rotten attitude. Because we can train people. We can teach people how to lead. We can teach people how to provide customer service. But we can’t change their DNA.”

Get your employees committed. “We have been successful because we’ve had a simple strategy. Our people have bought into it. Our people fully understand it. We have had to have extreme discipline in not departing from the strategy.” Herb’s magic extended to making employees think like long-term business owners. He once reflected,

We don’t just give people stock options. We have an educational team that goes around and explains to them what stock options are, how they work, the fact that it’s a longer-term investment. From 1990 to 1994, the airline industry as a whole lost $13 billion. Southwest Airlines was profitable during that entire time, but our stock was battered. Eighty-four percent of our employees continued with Southwest Airlines stock during that four-year period. That’s the kind of confidence and faith that you have to engender, so people have a longer-term view, and they’re not trying to outplay the market every day.

Southwest has never been in bankruptcy, nor has it had to layoff or furlong employees—an extraordinary achievement in the turbulent airline industry.

Stay focused on the core mission. During Herb’s era, Southwest never wavered from its core operating strategies. “We basically said to our people, there are three things that we’re interested in. The lowest costs in the industry, the best customer service, a spiritual infusion—because they are the hardest things for your competitors to replicate.” Herb’s low-cost recipe, however, did not expand to pinching on his employees’ earnings during tough times.

Herb’s Idea for Impact: “The business of business is not business. The business of business is people.”

'Nuts- Southwest Airlines' by Kevin and Jackie Freiberg (ISBN 0767901843) Herb left a colossal impression not only on the airline industry and on those who worked with him, but also on people-management as a practice.

Volumes have been written about Herb’s exemplar of how organizations can be responsibly people-centered. Read Kevin and Jackie Freiberg’s Nuts: Southwest Airlines’ Crazy Recipe for Business and Personal Success—it provides an insight into the unique culture and legacy that Herb shaped at Southwest.

Wondering what to read next?

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  2. The Likeability Factor: Whose “Do Not Pair” List Includes You?
  3. A Sense of Urgency
  4. The Pickleball Predicament: If The CEO Wants a Match, Don’t Let It Be a Mismatch
  5. Make Friends Now with the People You’ll Need Later

Inspirational Quotations #807

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Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence.
—Richard Dawkins (British Ethologist, Atheist)

Some age, others mature.
—Sean Connery (Scottish Actor)

I know I’m no glamour girl, and it’s not easy for me to get up in front of a crowd of people. It used to bother me a lot, but now I’ve got it figured out that God gave me this talent to use, so I just stand there and sing.
—Ella Fitzgerald (American Singer, Composer)

There are three principles in a man’s being and life, the principle of thought, the principle of speech, and the principle of action. The origin of all conflict between me and my fellow-men is that I do not say what I mean and I don’t do what I say.
—Martin Buber (Austrian Jewish Philosopher)

What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.
—Christopher Hitchens (Anglo-American Social Critic)

He who approves evil is guilty of it.
—Indian Proverb

All philosophy lies in two words, sustain and abstain.
—Epictetus (Ancient Greek Philosopher)

We must ensure that the global market is embedded in broadly shared values and practices that reflect global social needs, and that all the world’s people share the benefits of globalization.
—Kofi Annan (Ghanaian International Diplomat)

Happy is he who can give himself up.
—Naguib Mahfouz (Egyptian Novelist)

In our time, when such threatening forces of deavage are at work, splitting peoples, individuals and atoms, it is doubly necessary that those which unite and hold together should become effective; for life is founded on the harmonious interplay of masculine and feminine forces, within the individual human being as well as without. Bringing these opposites into union is one of the most important tasks of present-day psychotherapy.
—Emma Jung (Swiss Psychoanalyst, Author)

Enthusiastic partisans of the idea of progress are in danger of failing to recognize… the immense riches accumulated by the human race. By underrating the achievements of the past, they devalue all those which still remain to be accomplished.
—Claude Levi-Strauss (French Anthropologist)

I think self-awareness is probably the most important thing towards being a champion.
—Billie Jean King (American Tennis Player)

I love art, and I love history, but it is living art and living history that I love. It is in the interest of living art and living history that I oppose so-called restoration. What history can there be in a building bedaubed with ornament, which cannot at the best be anything but a hopeless and lifeless imitation of the hope and vigor of the earlier world?
—William Morris (British Artist, Author)