"Candle in the wind"

There has been lots of debate in the media and in private conversations about the recent threefold increase in salary of the Members of Parliament. Most of the reactions were negative and supported by some variations of the following arguments. There are millions of poor people in India and therefore the leaders of these poor people need not be paid so much. Or the politicians are corrupt and make pot full of money; so why pay them more salary.

Even if we add the various perks that the MPs enjoy (excluding the value of housing) the cost to country of an MP compared to the cost to company of senior executives in private sector is still low. A trillion dollar economy growing at the rate of more than 8% per year, can afford to pay its senior management who takes decisions relating to billions of dollars so much. Same is true for the bureaucracy too. In fact, if we pay decent salaries we remove some of the disincentive for good, qualified and capable people to be willing to take up this challenge.

The other discouraging factor that acts as a disincentive is the cost of standing for an election. It is quite a large investment. If one is not personally rich or cannot raise black capital, it is practically impossible for him or her to stand for election. We should think about ways in which funding support can be made available for capable people to afford this cost. May be the state can reimburse the election expenditure up to certain limits for candidates who manage to get certain percentage of votes. May be we can allow companies or industry association to setup funds in a transparent manner to support such candidates.

Today a large majority of the MPs come from very rich background because only they can afford the cost. If we find ways to encourage more honest people to take up this line of profession by paying them decent salaries and helping them to afford the cost of election we may be able to get a larger percentage of such people in the mix. (I am not that naive to think that this magic solution will lead to a legislature full of angels. I am only hoping that we could find ways and means to get some more voices of reason and some more minds with commitment to the cause, to walk into the den of thieves, to build some checks and balances and to enable better decision making at the highest level)

We also need to establish processes and tools to bring about better transparency in expenditure, more directed welfare measures and citizen initiatives to expose incidences of corruption and fraud. The initiative by Janaagraha a Bangalore based NGO, along with Raghu who was a senior civil servant for about quarter of a century in setting up a portal aptly named “I Paid A Bribe” is an excellent example of citizen initiative that offers busy people to participate in a quick and easy way and to play a meaningful role. The vision of this initiative as explained by the team is as follows.

“IpaidABribe.com is Janaagraha’s unique initiative to tackle corruption by harnessing the collective energy of citizens. You can report on the nature, number, pattern, types, location, frequency and values of actual corrupt acts on this website. Your reports will, perhaps for the first time, provide a snapshot of bribes occurring across your city. We will use them to argue for improving governance systems and procedures, tightening law enforcement and regulation and thereby reduce the scope for corruption in obtaining services from the government.

We invite you to register any recent or old bribes you have paid. Please tell us if you resisted a demand for a bribe, or did not have to pay a bribe, because of a new procedure or an honest official who helped you. We do not ask for your name or phone details, so feel free to report on the formats provided”.

I believe that if each of us who make sanctimonious remarks about the level of corruption and fraud around us (especially after a glass of single malt) can spend few moments to support such initiatives we can experience some improvement in our society.

I believe that every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty. ~John D. Rockefeller, Jr.

“Lead us not to temptation”

“Marshmallow Experiment” is an amazing study conducted by Walter Mischel, a professor of psychology at Stanford University in the late sixties. This study attempted to evaluate the ability of four year old children to delay their gratification. The children were called to a room and were offered a piece of marshmallow. They were told that they could eat it immediately or if they were willing to wait till the researcher came back in a few minutes, they could have two pieces.

Some kids ate the marshmallows immediately, some waited for few seconds and few of them could wait more than 15 minutes for the researcher to return so that they could claim their prize for delaying their gratification. Walter was trying to study the mental process of this delayed gratification. After a few years, he attempted to track the performance of these children to see if there was any correlation between ability to delay gratification and their subsequent performance. The results were exceedingly surprising. He observed a very high degree of correlation between self control and performance parameters, including SAT scores. This and the related studies have shown that performance was more dependent on self control than IQ.

It does not mean that self control is an inborn trait and cannot be learned and improved upon. There were children in the original sample, who had shown poor self control as children but grew up to have high degree of self control. (Look up this excellent article which discusses this issue in detail)

Let us take this learning to an adult, rather corporate context. Most of our jobs places two kinds of demands on us. These can be described as maintenance roles and developmental roles. Maintenance roles are usually clearly defined, they need immediate attention, the results are immediately visible and no doubt they are urgent. Developmental roles less defined, results are uncertain, results take long time to materialize and often not urgent.

Some of us let ourselves to be caught up with these urgent matters day in and day out. We practically have no time even to breathe. We have hundreds of reasons why we cannot take up any developmental activities now; whether it is reading up on related subjects, taking up a process re-engineering exercise, experimenting with a new technology tool or even finding some time to build relationships.

On the other hand, some of us will find, rather cheat, some time from our busy schedule to take up some assignments or experiments which may not be in the radar of priorities. An idea has caught our attention and we are willing to chug away at it; finding few free moments from our busy schedules. We are not sure what will come out of it. But we know we are searching for a possible tool, working on an idea that in the long run could make a difference.

If we look around we will see that most of the time people who have build something substantial, made a difference and provided visionary leadership are those who had the determination to see beyond what is urgent and willing to search for and toil for ways to make a difference. This also is nothing but a matter of self control. That may be why “Lead us not to temptation” is a key element in the Lord’s Prayer.

“There is an eagle in me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in the mud” -- Carl Sandburg, American Writer, Editor, and Poet

Conquering that fear

It was bright and sunny. The sea was calm but slightly wavy with a nice light breeze. The single seater laser (dinghy class) sail boat which I was sailing was cruising along smoothly . The open sea and the calming breeze always had a mesmerising charm and made me feel one with nature. Suddenly the wind started picking up speed. My boat too responded like a stallion that has been spurred. With the adrenaline rush I felt that I was on the top of the world. Nothing seemed to matter other than the feeling of speed, power and control as the boat raced forward skipping up and down the waves.

I was practically horizontal with my torso jutting out of the boat with the sheet (the line that controls the sail) in one hand and tiller (that controls the rudder) in the other hand. Suddenly the wind shifted. I was taken unawares and the boat turned turtle. This happens occasionally when we sail a little boat; nothing to worry about. There is a simple way to turn it around; a matter of technique than strength.

I had already jumped into the water and was hovering around the boat enjoying the waves. Then I tried to turn the boat over. Suddenly I had a severe catch in my shoulder muscle. I could not move my right hand. I realised that I was in trouble. Tried some work around; but, nothing would help. I just could not move my right hand and it was hurting badly. I hung on to the boat and decided to wait it out. The wind was getting harder blowing away from the land and I was drifting into the sea farther and farther.

This happened, when I was based in Jakarta for couple of years. . I always loved the sea and sailing was my passion. When I realised that there was a sailing club not so far away (about 150 km) from home. I was excited. I immediately signed up and used to visit the club at least twice a month. I would for the weekend and sail about four to five hours both the days. I enjoyed the experience thoroughly.

Now as I was drifting deep into the sea with one hand almost paralysed, the realisation dawned on to me that I could be in deep trouble. Minutes were ticking away. There were no boats to be seen anywhere near. . As it was lunch time all the other sailors were back on shore for their lunch or siesta. I started to feel scared; scared at the prospect that I may not return alive. A watery grave appeared a distinct possibility. There was nothing that I could do except pray for divine intervention.

Faces of that little girl who follows me calling me dada, her mother, my mother, my friends; all started fleeting in front of my eyes. Each minute felt like an hour. I felt the energy draining out of my body. I hung on there with a faith that there is somebody who looks after me and without his wish nothing will happen.

I closed my eyes and tried to relax. It was almost an hour since my boat had capsized. Then suddenly I heard the roar of a motor boat. I thought that I might be dreaming. I opened my eyes and looked around, and there it was; the rescue boat looking for me. Oh! What a relief.

They reached near me. I was too tired even to climb into the boat. They had to drag me in. I lay in the boat thanking my luck and the supreme intervention. When I reached the shore I had to be practically carried out to the hammock. Liz told me as she was relaxing at the shore she had a uneasy feeling that something was wrong. So she looked far and could see no mast. She told the rescue team that I may be in trouble. They told her that as I was a good sailor so there was no need to worry. They felt that I might have gone around a small island nearby and that is why the mast could not be seen. But she insisted that they take a look; and that saved my life.

I had a cool drink and lay down for an hour. Then I decided that I had to go out for one more trip immediately. I knew if I don’t do that then, the last memory in my mind would be the scary experience and I could permanently give up my confidence to be out in the sea.

I got up and walked to the boat. My wife and friends thought I was mad and enjoined me that I desist from this. But I got into the boat, went back to the same spot where I was drifting helplessly for an hour.

Then I returned. . I knew I had conquered one fear. The lesson stayed back in my mind. One way to overcome the fear is to try the experience once again (so long as it is repeatable).

Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear. Ambrose Redmoon

A leap of faith

Karna is a character from Mahabharata. He was the son of Kunti, the eldest brother of Pandavas. (As he was born before Kunti was married, he was abandoned as a child and only few people knew of his true parenthood) He was a better archer and warrior than Arjuna, the hero of the Pandava clan. But unfortunately he had a curse on him. On account of this curse, he would lose his faculties and forget his skills when he desperately needs them in a matter of life and death. If we explain this curse in common terms, we can say that though Karna was better skilled, when it came to performance under stress, he was not as good as Arjun..

In real life we come across people who suffer from this Karna complex. When faced with an emergency they freeze over; forget what they are supposed to do and can’t remember what they have learned. They break-down under stress.

In some professions like flying and fire fighting where risk is physical, the importance of performance under stress is well-appreciated and there are various training programs to strengthen this skill. But in many of the normal managerial decisions where the risk is not physical, not immediate and difficult to map to the decisions taken, the importance of this factor is often not properly acknowledged. In these roles we look for experience, intelligence, skills and knowledge; but often fail to recognize the skill for of decision making under stress.

This can be disastrous; especially because most often the risk faced in the managerial roles is psychological and not physical and we don’t realize how such stress can affect the quality of our decisions. Even when we recognize the effect of stress on our health, we ignore how poor decisions that are detrimental to the organisations may be taken on account of that.

Our schools don’t train us on this (in fact these days, we mollycoddle our children so much and we try hard to remove any element of stress they face that they could grow-up expecting fairy godmother to make their life easy), our selection processes do not measure the candidate’s ability to perform under stress and our induction programs and organisational trainings do not teach this either. The priority is given only to skill, knowledge and experience.

Most people will buckle under stress at certain level and behave irrationally or take irrational decisions. The threshold will vary from person to person. At higher levels of responsibility we need people with a higher threshold level. We need to recognize this factor as a critical element in leadership development. This is important because whether in a fire-line or company venue, making quality leadership decisions under conditions of stress and ambiguous authority is not a natural capacity. [1] Natural human reaction in times of risk is ‘fight or flight’. Training and practice can help us to override this natural reaction after due consideration of alternatives, probabilities and resources.

But training cannot guarantee how we will react. It is also a question of how we are made up. That is why we have to be careful in our selection process for assignments that have high element of stress, to ensure that the candidate is tested for this trait.

Very often the organisations do not give due importance to this when they promote people to positions of power and make their selection primarily based on skill, experience or even seniority. The worst case is when elevate a brilliant mind with a very low threshold for stress. When they are faced with stress they get scared and they don’t want to admit it. They get irrational and they don’t realise it. As they are quite bright and articulate they will use these skills to rationalise, argue and even bulldoze with a set of specious arguments , make up all kinds of theories and put forward a collection of highly improbable eventualities; all to run away from taking a decision and owning it up.

They do not want to take any risk, will not take timely decision, set up umpteen committees, surround them with a variety of consultants with high pedigree and take everybody for a merry go around. Their subordinates will be intimidated and colleagues will get frustrated. Eventually the team turns out to be a collection of technicians and clerks with no imagination or creativity.

Organisations will have to be conscious of this critical skill. It has to form a part of our recruitment, part of training and part of performance evaluation. Especially when we select people for leadership positions we need to find ways to judge the threshold stress level at which they will start losing their rationality.


Two roads diverged in a wood, and I... I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference."~ Robert Frost


Reference: [1] Developing Leaders for Decision Making Under Stress: Wildland firefighters in the South Canyon Fire and Its Aftermath.
MICHAEL USEEM, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania; JAMES COOK, U.S. Forest Service and National Interagency Fire Center ; LARRY SUTTON, U.S. Bureau of Land Management and National Interagency Fire Center

“Monkey and Me”

I was surprised when I read in National Geographic.Com that “A comparison of Clint's genetic blueprints with that of the human genome shows that our closest living relatives share 96 percent of our DNA. The number of genetic differences between humans and chimps is ten times smaller than that between mice and rats.”

With such few percentage point differences, see what we have managed to achieve in comparison with our simian cousins! We have built cities, cars and aeroplanes and have walked on moon while our cousins are still hanging from trees. Truly remarkable.

Then recently I came across a book written by Mr.Richard Conniff titled “The ape in the corner office”. This book provides a nice exposition on the similarity between the behaviour of apes and human beings. The focus of this book is more on the human behaviour in corporate setting.

The strategies we use to establish our ‘alpha’ status, grovelling and flattery we employ to get our way, the fights we have and how we makeup, how we use language to groom our colleagues and our bosses; all appear to be the same what our ancestors have been employing for millions of years. Just that the scientific progress helped us to have better and diverse tools for innovative implementation of these strategies!!.

Look at the way the Chimpanzees establish their pecking order and the alpha status. It is not just based on brute force. It is derived from a combination of the leadership skill, courage to take decision, strength of the network and also cunning and political manoeuvring; just like human organisations. The relative proportion of each element may vary. When the proportion skews more towards cunning there is a higher chance for group disintegration.

Many scientists have pointed in spite of all the scientific progress, the source of our base emotions and insecurities have not changed for millions of years. Now it has dawned on me that it is not just with respect to genes that we are 96% apes, many of us in our behaviour and inner desires resemble our ancestors more than we think we do!

Therefore, when we learn to look deep and understand the base emotions and inner drives that provoke us to act in certain fashion we may be able to have a better control on ourselves. This understanding could also help us in our relationships as it might give us a perspective on how the other person could react or why the other person reacted in certain manner.

“We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star. But we can understand the Universe. That makes us something very special.” Stephen Hawking