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Leadership Requires Discomfort
Every leadership training I have been through, be it for the Indian Police Service or at McKinsey, was missing a critical element -- training people how to dissent. Without the ability to dissent, you only have yes-men (or yes-women), not leaders....
Recent Posts
First, Let People Work
A corporate executive I was recently talking to, said that on many days, he has meetings from morning to evening -- sometimes without even a break...
The Courage to Admit Mistakes
I hate cowardice. Yet, on a few occasions, I was a coward. When I launched my first startup, I built a product that found zero customers -- zero...
Small Steps, Big Results
To be fit, you don't need to run 100-mile ultramarathons or climb Mt. Everest. To build physical strength, you don't need to be a powerlifter. To...
Living Beyond Fear
Yesterday, during my evening walk with a retired IAS officer, he said that many officers in his service are unhappy with their professional life....
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Earn the Right to Advise
In 1994, when India's ex-PM Narasimha Rao addressed the US Congress, he told this story about Mahatma Gandhi: Once a lady came to Gandhiji and asked him to tell her son to stop eating sugar. Instead of doing what she asked, Gandhiji asked her to...
Mastering Skills: Focus and Deliberate Practice
There is nothing you can't get better at. But conditions apply. For any kind of learning, be it a physical or a mental skill, our neurons have to rewire -- it is called neuroplasticity. Our neuroplasticity is extremely high in pre-teens and remains...
Accept your life ‘as is’
The hardest thing in life is not clearing tough exams, getting big-brand jobs, making money, or earning fame. All these are hard but they aren't the hardest. The hardest is accepting your life 'as is' -- no preconditions, no changes -- just 'as...
Master Skills, Embrace Advancement
This post is written by ChatGPT. Just kidding. But how did you react to that first sentence? With horror? Nobody wants to read a post written by ChatGPT. When I read your post, I want to hear your story. I want to feel your struggles. I want to...