Vinod Kumar (Blog home)

The only competition worthy of a wise man is with himself – Washington Allston

In business, at school and even at work – we always try to define an external yardstick to measure performance. In my opinion, in professional life if you are going to measure success by evaluating with external standards you are guaranteed to be dissatisfied. In this competitive world, you will always find someone better than you, doing more things than you, making more or has more than you can imagine. This catchup game will never end.

Define your own standards for success

In the past, I have had the opportunity to interact with so many people who say my inspiration is Bill Gates or Steve Jobs etc etc. Instead of focusing outwards, see what are your acceptable standards for success. You will be amazed to know your goals are larger and not constrained when compared to your idols. Don’t put yourself inside a box, think as though you have no box to constrain yourself.

Focus on competition has always been a formula for mediocrity. – Daniel Burrus

Don’t wait for that moment, create them

If you want to be incrementally better: Be competitive. If you want to be exponentially better: Be cooperative.

It is concerning when people say they are waiting for the right moment in their life to actually do “what they want to do”. Tomorrow is a mystery and we can only control what we have today at present. So the best investments today will not be on gold but on the people we love, the dreams that we have and living the life the way we want.

Reading Warren Buffett’s concepts around “doing what you dislike today so that you can do what you like tomorrow” is a great start. I personally feel, creating the opportunity and ceasing the same at the right time is critical.

Today, the work itself may be really exciting and noble, but if you are not positioning yourself for life after work, you need to change your role and revisit where you are. If you are counting upon that Life Changing Event, you are wishing for statistically unlikely event. Most successful people have taken the risks in life and it is these risks that make them what they are today !!!

Final words

I am not trying to advocate you leave your job and look out for that dreams. Work towards the dreams but be prepared to create that opportunities when the dreams can come true. Finally, be your best judge – don’t look out for that pat-on-the back or recognition that someone is going to shower with that lovely words over mail. Those will eventually come, set your own goals – work towards them and measure your own success.

Feel free to drop me a line if you have any interesting comments.

“Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.” – Jim Rohn

We hear the common phrase that Habits die hard – I partly agree. I am of the school of thought that Habit needs to change if it is for the better. Actually feel this subject should have been – Know to change habits if required :). So changing your habit is only going to make you more efficient, powerful and help you with a better lifestyle. I have been trying to change certain habits and these have been conscious decisions keeping in mind what happened in the past.

Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted.

Do it one at a time

I think this something similar to the multi-tasking conversation we had on this blog. This can be the most common mistake we make – trying to experiment too much at the same time. Our enthusiasm and inner zeal to get more output at one go is great, but in reality it doesn’t fly far. So finally the stress of keeping up with so many changes at the same time with the different pressures to be successful we tend to give up soon.

Yes, concentrating on changing one habit is quite mundane and may not sound exciting. My suggestion would be do it, make it a habit so that it transforms from an conscious activity to something you do subconsciously as habit.

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Lao-tzu

Find your way to make it happen

A common practice I hear is if you can do it for 21 days at a stretch then it will become a habit. Now that rule of thumb gets messy because that rule takes longer time for me personally to become a regular habit.

Especially when it comes to doing exercise or loosing weight or hitting the gym – all these tasks have failed miserably under this shorter duration. It has to be 60 or more days in my opinion to have some considerable visible impact on you.

Secondly, find a routine that suits you and fits your bill to execute relatively successful. So experiment on few options for couple of days and find your routine before making it a long-term habit.

Get out of comfort zone and look for smaller improvements

This is the game of the mind – it is going to push you harder to get out of that routine change from time to time. Snap out – don’t try to be a perfectionist (you will eventually get there) but look for that improvements that you can make yourself more efficient in what you do.

Any change in habits means you are going to give up some good habits that were attached with it. But now you are going to miss them dearly – never to forget you are going to get something else (the sense of unknown) that can change the way you live for a lifetime. So don’t miss the opportunity to explore, exploit and excel in the unknown.

Final words

Be specific and SMART in your execution, this will yield you better and measurable results. “I will do exercise hereafter” is not acceptable as you cannot measure. “I will do 30 mins of walking for 3 days in a week” – now we are talking business.

Now being the change that you wanted in your life and do tell me your experiences.

When you find peace within yourself, you become the kind of person who can live at peace with others.

Given the way we keep running, life can really be hectic, demanding, busy and overwhelming. We need to be control over the peace we can bring to our life and make small yet smart changes to keep this equilibrium. These are my top tips and do send me your feedbacks as I would like to learn from your experiences too.

Solve the problems today

Face your problems dont facebook them as this is not getting you any closer in solving this. No point in procrastinating, solve problems then & there and move forward. Atleast that relieves you off all the stress and sleepless nights. You probably know the solution, just you need that extra step to move on.

Take a break

You have many options here- read a book, meet a friend, watch a movie, play with your kid etc. It works wonders as it releases pressure and relaxes the mind. Slowing down sometimes doesn’t mean you are quitting, it just means you are going to do it perfectly with lot more thought behind it.

Declutter your mind

I generally like to be organized and hate randomizations (not that we have a choice in real world). Reorganizing at work space, home and everything you do can bring a lot of order to the way we execute things. Write them down and go ahead one-after-another. Life around you demands a lot of attention and cannot be easily ignored.

This list can be long, but taking steps one at a time is important. So do share me your mantra too.

If you surf the net on how to become productive or on how to get tasks done or on how to get organized, there are a million search results. If you are not making the most of your time, then you are likely to be in rush in completing tasks. Do keep repeating this back of your mind and you will be surprised on how this will help you organize and become better. This post is not exhaustive but more of my recommendations on the very subject – I am slowly but surely trying to master this myself and have talked about these to a number of you.

Break down into smaller problems

When I first joined Microsoft, the first book I got to read was – “How would you move Mount Fuji?”. The core concepts remains the same as the book calls out. Break your big problems into small manageable chunks. Even when you are in office projects, the idea of creating a Project Plan is to break your big release into smaller work items increasing your chances of success higher. Creating such plans will also eliminate the noise or activities that don’t need attention.

Doing one thing at a time

Whenever I try to multi-task I usually get unfocused. It can also add a lot of stress in the current activity as you are always switching and thinking of the future. I wrote a post recently on the very art of multi-tasking which in my opinion is a fad :)

Being early avoids panic

Being punctual and trying to schedule work ahead of time is always the best way to stay ahead of the game. I am early to office and leave office early most of the times. There are advantages to this too, getting in early gets you tons of time in tranquil to clear off the overnight mails. And getting home early also gives that much needed extra hour to spend time with family. Moreover, doing this routine I also avoid the hustle of the office goers traffic on the highway.

It’s a very simple thing to reduce stress in your mind and body.

Couldn’t finish – relax

In the topic of multi-tasking I did say I generally buffer time for the unexpected. When there are too many tasks on my plate, I use a sticky note or a notebook to pen down the tasks in hand. Prioritize the activities and then go about the execution ONE-BY-ONE. Getting real and practical is the key. Don’t beat yourself up and create a lot of stress within. Life is too short for getting worried.

Even if you get over Stephen Covery’s book on “7 habits of highly effective people”, it talks about finishing your current urgent tasks and move to urgent & not so immediate tasks. Doing so you are never behind the race in finishing the important tasks first.

Murfy’s Law – Expect the unexpected

No matter how well you prepare, things will not always go as planned. I tell this a million times and things will always go wrong in front of audience even after you have rehearsed the demo’s a million times before. Don’t let that ruin your day or your motivation. The most important thing is to be in control even when things are not going great.

When preparing your calendar, it’s a great idea to block an hour of “unexpected” time every day. This block of time is a free hour that lets you deal with any unexpected delays (traffic jams, flat tyres, crashed latop etc) that might arise unexpectedly. Worst case if unutilized, this can be your extra hour for workout.

Get help and keep track

When you take on more than is necessary, learn to ask for help. For everything else that come your way suddenly, learn to say no when you are short on time. Watch for patterns, you may notice that you’re a productive in the mornings but a sluggish in the afternoons — so use the morning time to get work out of the way.

You are precious

Tough ironing out time for your work is critical, does your calendar look stressed out without time for gym, family time, exercise, reading a book, playing with kids etc? Trying to fit in most of the work is critical but making a slice of time for yourself is super-critical.

Sleep and don’t try to sacrifice this quality time of rest for anything. Doing so can bring down your productivity the very next day. Know your yielding points and giving your body and mind that much needed rest is critical.

It’s important to make sure you feel balanced and healthy (mentally and physically) – not burned out !!!

Pass me your comments !!!

There is always more to life than just running behind success. When I wrote this very post around “What does it take to become successful?”, a lot of you did comment on that. Interestingly enough – PASSION is a key tenant in building your brand but there is always more to life than what meets the eye. Let me take a stab at some of these in this blog post which I felt like sharing – Call it my top 5.

“Just do it” – Nike way

I just love the way Nike used this line. Have used it at tons of places and seen millions use it. You might get surrounded by zillion thing to do but sometimes it is the drive to do it that matters. With all that surrounds you, if you need to hit the gym (well you got to make time and DO IT). This is true for most of the activities we do everyday.

When it comes to success it is fundamentally increasing your chances on probability. A really successful person is more like to have tried and failed more than the number of times he has succeeded.

“Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.” – Confucious

Most of times we see the things as we want them to be seen as rather than seeing them as they are. I remember times in R&D role in one of my previous employer, given any problem I used to solve it inside SQL Server even though it might have not been the right solution approach. But the crux being, it is a beautiful mind that always is looking out for solving problems and rather than looking at the facts in hand we are out there solving problems to save the world :).

Don’t get distracted or overwhelmed with the finer unimportant details but move on.

“Becoming a child”

I love to see kids and how they are so excited by the mundane things that we see. A balloon hanging from the ceiling is never interesting till it gets to the hand of a kid. So how about appreciating the things around us which we take it for granted?

So, when was the last time you went about appreciating the food made you ate, the rains, drive to office, your health, your friends & family and the things about you that make you what you are?

“I remember the story of the old man who said on his death bed that he had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened” – Winston Churchill

Most of the times it is the uncertainty surrounding us that make life interesting and challenging. There is no point pondering over past or getting confused over what will happen in the future. Did you have any control over – getting laid off, catching a flu, flights getting cancelled, rushing to office and you see a flat tyre etc. Getting superstitious is only going to drive negative energy and these are something created by our mind.

Most things we fear never happen. Worrying is waste of time, so let us enjoy today for what it has given us.

“You must be the change you want to see in the world.” – M.K.Gandhi

No one is perfect and what ever you like to do, there will be someone who is not going to be happy. This is very normal and so move on. Failure is not in failing in your attempts but failure is not even making an attempt. As point 1, do it and be the change you want to be. If you change yourself then you will change how you feel and what actions you take and ultimately carve the world you want to see.

Every time I sit with Ranga (a great friend, mentor and guide), I learn something new. I remember him once say, just because you are moving doesn’t quite mean you are making progress. Don’t get lost in your busy work schedules, improve on your productivity and never lose focus on the priorities in life.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did so. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain

I wanted to write more on this but will refrain from making this long and boring :). Maybe will reserve it for the next post. So feel free to pass your comments and what you have experienced.