We humans operate far more on the emotional level than on the intellectual.
The intellect explains what the emotions decide, for the intellect is but a speck in an ocean of emotion.
Because we are motivated more by our feelings than by facts, you will have better relationships if you make people feel good about themselves.
Let's consider more common mistakes people make that cause others to feel bad about themselves. Criticism is extremely destructive. In fact, almost all criticism, no matter how carefully expressed, is perceived by the recipient as an attack.
We may intend to be constructive, and even label it as that, but it nearly always feels destructive to the one who is being criticized.
Children desperately need to be complimented, but adults need it too. One of the deepest human needs is to feel important. People thrive better on compliments than criticism.
One more thing.... its very important.... One should never never criticize another person in public, or even offer a mildly disparaging remark.
If you want to be genuinely loathed, practice the murderous art of demanding people in public.
If someone needs to be corrected, always do it in private.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
- "Life is too short to wake up in the morning with regrets, so love the people who treat you right, forget about the ones who don't, and believe that everything happens for a reason."
- "If you get a chance, take it. If it changes your life, let it. Nobody said life would be easy, they just promised it would be worth it."
- "Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly. And enjoy your life."
Monday, January 25, 2010
Think............
THINK:
If you think you are beaten, you are,
If you think you dare not, you dont,
If you like to win, but you think you cant,
It is almost certain you wont.
If you think youll lose, youre lost,
For out of the world we find,
Success begins with a fellows will
Its all in the state of mind.
If you think you are outclassed, you are,
You’ve got to think high to rise,
You’ve got to be sure of yourself before
You can ever win a prize.
Life’s battles dont always go
to the stronger or faster man,
But sooner or later the man who wins
Is the man WHO THINKS HE CAN!
Thursday, January 21, 2010
If I were......
If I were a book, you will put me in a bookshelf after you’ve read me. Later, I’ll probably lie in an attic and find my way to a library. My life would span a few decades, or even more. If I’m exceptionally good, I’ll be a timeless classic.
If I were your personal diary, I will probably last your lifetime, even if you stop using me after a while. You’ll keep me under lock and key, and no one else will read it. You will always treasure me.
If I were a real greeting card, you must have looked at me fondly, caressed me as if I were precious. You may not look at me again for many years, but I’ll be stashed away in some drawer of “memories”. Some day, you will enjoy nostalgia going through that drawer.
If I were a photo from your childhood, I will be stuck in some family album. This family album will be a great source of joy during holidays when the whole family is together.
If I were a blog post, I will live for a few years at best. That is, unless my blog is hacked or accidentally wiped out. I will be happy if your children know the name of my blog.
If I were a JPEG, I’d be one among the millions on Facebook or Flickr. Some people you’ve never met in real life may look at me and write comments. If I offend the sensibilities or political opinions of the owners of such social networks, I may be deleted.
If I were an email, my life in your inbox will be a few hours. After you’ve read me, I will be deleted or archived, and forgotten forever.
If I were a status update on a social network, I’ll be real-time, one among many that flow like fallen leaves in your friends river of feeds. If I’m good, I might be “liked”, extending my life by a few more minutes.
If I were an IM or chat conversation, I am real-time. I exist for a few fleeting minutes. I am usually used just to say Hi, or pass a link. Nobody ever looks at me again, as I vanish from this universe usually without leaving a trace.
If I were a tweet, my value usually lasts a few minutes. I may be short, but I am real-time. If I am any good, I will be passed around, shared among people who don’t know much about each other beyond their 140 character bios.
If I were YOU., I would leave a comment.........
If I were your personal diary, I will probably last your lifetime, even if you stop using me after a while. You’ll keep me under lock and key, and no one else will read it. You will always treasure me.
If I were a real greeting card, you must have looked at me fondly, caressed me as if I were precious. You may not look at me again for many years, but I’ll be stashed away in some drawer of “memories”. Some day, you will enjoy nostalgia going through that drawer.
If I were a photo from your childhood, I will be stuck in some family album. This family album will be a great source of joy during holidays when the whole family is together.
If I were a blog post, I will live for a few years at best. That is, unless my blog is hacked or accidentally wiped out. I will be happy if your children know the name of my blog.
If I were a JPEG, I’d be one among the millions on Facebook or Flickr. Some people you’ve never met in real life may look at me and write comments. If I offend the sensibilities or political opinions of the owners of such social networks, I may be deleted.
If I were an email, my life in your inbox will be a few hours. After you’ve read me, I will be deleted or archived, and forgotten forever.
If I were a status update on a social network, I’ll be real-time, one among many that flow like fallen leaves in your friends river of feeds. If I’m good, I might be “liked”, extending my life by a few more minutes.
If I were an IM or chat conversation, I am real-time. I exist for a few fleeting minutes. I am usually used just to say Hi, or pass a link. Nobody ever looks at me again, as I vanish from this universe usually without leaving a trace.
If I were a tweet, my value usually lasts a few minutes. I may be short, but I am real-time. If I am any good, I will be passed around, shared among people who don’t know much about each other beyond their 140 character bios.
If I were YOU., I would leave a comment.........
Monday, January 18, 2010
we should all hibernate....
I love watching people doze.
So many funny things happen when you are dozing.
In a class or meetings, when you are sleepy, your attention span is less than 8 seconds (think about it, it really is!). And you gradually phase out.
You just had an awesome lunch with butter naan, and all your blood is mostly in the stomach. The little blood remaining is in your eyes and oh boy your eyes are bloodshot.
You know why dozing people look like they are high? Because dozing people raise their eyeballs and eyebrows, but forget to raise their eyelids. So you basically get to see eye-whites, half open eyelids, and ridiculously raised eyebrows.
All dozing people have severely arched eyebrows; look out for it the next time!
Anyway, you decide to skillfully rest your head on your hand so that your overall posture looks “interested”. Then about 2 minutes later your head loses all balance and drops like a cabbage on the desk. You regain an awakened state and very slyly put your hand on the left side of your face (or the right side, depending on which side has more people) and pass out in seconds.
You think no one has seen you, but you have a bunch of people nudging their neighbors to look at you. With your hand almost clutching your hair to prevent the head from falling, you are a laugh riot. With those raised eyebrows. Poor poor you...
Since the dawn of time, man has loved to sleep. In fact we like to sleep even more when we have work to do. Now that winter is here, temperatures in my city have started going quite low and I can’t help but think, why is it that humankind has never hibernated?
It would save us from the trouble of waking up early for an 8:00 AM class/meeting at temperatures quite low. We should hibernate in winter. It’s so simple. And so advantageous.
Firstly, well, we get to sleep. For hours. We can go to bed in late November, and wake up in early March or something. For the late risers, they can wake up in April. In fact when they go back to work they can say, “Well, I would have come in March, but my alarm clock didn’t ring“, or “Yeah… sorry, I decided to sleep in.”
Secondly, your body ends up using all the stored fat while you are asleep and wakes up when there is no more stored fat. So basically it’s an excellent way to burn fat (who would have thought that!).
Thirdly, well, we get to sleep... that too for hours and hours .
Of course, according to whatever I researched on hibernation, I learned that your body figures out a way to recycle it’s wastes and your kidneys work excellent in maintaining water levels etc.
I really think we should all give this a shot. There is one detail I did miss out, you need to put a plug up your butt. Yeah. You really need to. Bears use hair and grass and mud and old fecal matter. We can of course, have Apple build it – the iPlug. We could request features like internet capability and vibrating alarm.
Or we could have Microsoft build it, but you would have Home edition, Professional edition and the Ultimate edition. I don’t even want to think what the Ultimate edition would have, but it would cost low when mass produced.
Amidst all this, I just thought about this thing. How much we would like to sleep as a function of our age. I spent most of my childhood not wanting to sleep, and now I am spending most of my non-childhood wanting to sleep.
Life is definitely unfair.
So many funny things happen when you are dozing.
In a class or meetings, when you are sleepy, your attention span is less than 8 seconds (think about it, it really is!). And you gradually phase out.
You just had an awesome lunch with butter naan, and all your blood is mostly in the stomach. The little blood remaining is in your eyes and oh boy your eyes are bloodshot.
You know why dozing people look like they are high? Because dozing people raise their eyeballs and eyebrows, but forget to raise their eyelids. So you basically get to see eye-whites, half open eyelids, and ridiculously raised eyebrows.
All dozing people have severely arched eyebrows; look out for it the next time!
Anyway, you decide to skillfully rest your head on your hand so that your overall posture looks “interested”. Then about 2 minutes later your head loses all balance and drops like a cabbage on the desk. You regain an awakened state and very slyly put your hand on the left side of your face (or the right side, depending on which side has more people) and pass out in seconds.
You think no one has seen you, but you have a bunch of people nudging their neighbors to look at you. With your hand almost clutching your hair to prevent the head from falling, you are a laugh riot. With those raised eyebrows. Poor poor you...
Since the dawn of time, man has loved to sleep. In fact we like to sleep even more when we have work to do. Now that winter is here, temperatures in my city have started going quite low and I can’t help but think, why is it that humankind has never hibernated?
It would save us from the trouble of waking up early for an 8:00 AM class/meeting at temperatures quite low. We should hibernate in winter. It’s so simple. And so advantageous.
Firstly, well, we get to sleep. For hours. We can go to bed in late November, and wake up in early March or something. For the late risers, they can wake up in April. In fact when they go back to work they can say, “Well, I would have come in March, but my alarm clock didn’t ring“, or “Yeah… sorry, I decided to sleep in.”
Secondly, your body ends up using all the stored fat while you are asleep and wakes up when there is no more stored fat. So basically it’s an excellent way to burn fat (who would have thought that!).
Thirdly, well, we get to sleep... that too for hours and hours .
Of course, according to whatever I researched on hibernation, I learned that your body figures out a way to recycle it’s wastes and your kidneys work excellent in maintaining water levels etc.
I really think we should all give this a shot. There is one detail I did miss out, you need to put a plug up your butt. Yeah. You really need to. Bears use hair and grass and mud and old fecal matter. We can of course, have Apple build it – the iPlug. We could request features like internet capability and vibrating alarm.
Or we could have Microsoft build it, but you would have Home edition, Professional edition and the Ultimate edition. I don’t even want to think what the Ultimate edition would have, but it would cost low when mass produced.
Amidst all this, I just thought about this thing. How much we would like to sleep as a function of our age. I spent most of my childhood not wanting to sleep, and now I am spending most of my non-childhood wanting to sleep.
Life is definitely unfair.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Whose job it is anyway...??
I'm at the gym in mid-sweat. I'm struck with a great idea that will make life better for the gym patrons and staff. It's cheap and easy to implement. So, I decide to share my suggestion with my friend, the facilities manager.
"Well, that is a good idea..." he says, shrugging, but you'll have to tell our regional manager 'that’s not my job.'
Can you relate? You see something that can be improved and you suggest an idea; You experience something rotten, but avoidable and speak up to fix it; You stumble on something broken and alert management to it; You sense something missing and call it to someone’s attention -- and you're met with the response "Sorry, that's not my job."
"Not my job" is the enemy of good customer experience. Customers who expend time and energy to make a suggestion are reaching out because they care in some way, either to improve their experience; to gain a greater sense of satisfaction; or to right something wrong.
When customers provide feedback, it is an act of trust and good will. A "not my job" response forces customers to make an unfortunate choice: seek an alternative source for satisfaction or walk away, entirely.
Customers must also re-process their brand association against this treatment, which may be perceived as indifferent, uncaring, lazy, un-empowered, impolite, foolish or all of the above.
Amazing how it's possible to communicate so much with just three little words."not my job" culture may cost today's companies more than they realize. The "not my job" virus harms more than individual customer relationships. Once present, it can spread quickly to infect the front line culture. The "not my job" illness ushers in an attitude of apathy and indifference.
This undermines customer-centric, initiative-taking behavior and disrupts teamwork and cooperation. Many executive leaders feel their companies are immune to this illness. Perhaps this is because they've invested heavily in the creation of business process frameworks and processing of customer feedback.
However, even the most sophisticated organizations, customer listening can fail. When a corporate culture is not clearly oriented toward customer service; when the organization is not properly aligned to manage customers in an empowered way; or when customer facing staff are not clearly and consistently coached on how to effectively manage customer feedback, failure occurs.
Is the "not my job" virus infecting your organization? Run a few informal tests of your own: Assume the role of a customer and walk in, call or click in to any store and attempt to raise a concern, question or suggestion. See what happens. How are you responded to? Do you leave knowing where will your feedback go? Do you feel satisfied by the response provided to you? What three adjectives summarize your experience? Try this a few times in different channels.
While it's certainly impractical to act on every customer suggestion, the tangible benefits of active listening alone are enough to secure repeat business from even the most difficult customer. By listening more actively, you may also learn something valuable from your customers, as well.
Remember, there's simply no up-side to the "not my job" culture in an organisation..
Just iradicate it at the earliest.
"Well, that is a good idea..." he says, shrugging, but you'll have to tell our regional manager 'that’s not my job.'
Can you relate? You see something that can be improved and you suggest an idea; You experience something rotten, but avoidable and speak up to fix it; You stumble on something broken and alert management to it; You sense something missing and call it to someone’s attention -- and you're met with the response "Sorry, that's not my job."
"Not my job" is the enemy of good customer experience. Customers who expend time and energy to make a suggestion are reaching out because they care in some way, either to improve their experience; to gain a greater sense of satisfaction; or to right something wrong.
When customers provide feedback, it is an act of trust and good will. A "not my job" response forces customers to make an unfortunate choice: seek an alternative source for satisfaction or walk away, entirely.
Customers must also re-process their brand association against this treatment, which may be perceived as indifferent, uncaring, lazy, un-empowered, impolite, foolish or all of the above.
Amazing how it's possible to communicate so much with just three little words."not my job" culture may cost today's companies more than they realize. The "not my job" virus harms more than individual customer relationships. Once present, it can spread quickly to infect the front line culture. The "not my job" illness ushers in an attitude of apathy and indifference.
This undermines customer-centric, initiative-taking behavior and disrupts teamwork and cooperation. Many executive leaders feel their companies are immune to this illness. Perhaps this is because they've invested heavily in the creation of business process frameworks and processing of customer feedback.
However, even the most sophisticated organizations, customer listening can fail. When a corporate culture is not clearly oriented toward customer service; when the organization is not properly aligned to manage customers in an empowered way; or when customer facing staff are not clearly and consistently coached on how to effectively manage customer feedback, failure occurs.
Is the "not my job" virus infecting your organization? Run a few informal tests of your own: Assume the role of a customer and walk in, call or click in to any store and attempt to raise a concern, question or suggestion. See what happens. How are you responded to? Do you leave knowing where will your feedback go? Do you feel satisfied by the response provided to you? What three adjectives summarize your experience? Try this a few times in different channels.
While it's certainly impractical to act on every customer suggestion, the tangible benefits of active listening alone are enough to secure repeat business from even the most difficult customer. By listening more actively, you may also learn something valuable from your customers, as well.
Remember, there's simply no up-side to the "not my job" culture in an organisation..
Just iradicate it at the earliest.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Is more really better....????
I'm standing in the grocery aisle, scouting for my favorite toothpaste, and notice a perplexed man pacing next to me. I look up and smile. He is scratching his head. Apologetically, he looks up. "My wife told me to get 'Crest regular toothpaste'" he says, "Nothing looks regular to me."I decided to help. However, I soon became mesmerized by rows and rows of Crest toothpaste. I'm not kidding - six shelves stocked with Crest toothpaste - stacked 15 boxes deep, in places...
I couldn't back up enough to get them all in this photo! Not one of the shiny boxes looked like the traditional Crest -- in fact with the exception of a few packaging variations, the toothpastes (rather than the gels or the liquid stuff) looked pretty much the same to us both.
The search for traditional Crest toothpaste got to a point of silliness... Eventually, the man sighed and picked up a box in frustration. He left positive he'd chosen the wrong thing and left to face his wife. Later on, in a fit of hotel room boredom, I became curious to know just how many types of toothpaste Crest offers. So, I did a little investigation. The Crest website features more than 50 types of Crest toothpaste. Some overlap categories, but here's a rough overview of the products they offer;
· Whitening (7)
· Adult Cavity Protection (3)
· Kids Cavity Protection (3)
· Tartar Protection (4)
· Sensitive Teeth (3)
· MultiCare (2)
· Flavors (10)
· Baking Soda (1)
· Gels (5)
· Liquid Gels (11)
· Stripes (10)
The list does not include a wide array of toothbrushes, flosses, tapes and rinses which contribute to extra shelf space. This begs the question: Is more really better?
When product choice interferes with a customer's ability to find a product they really like, maybe it's not such a good thing!
Many similar products within the same price range can often equal confusion and overwhelm the customer. Now, having an assortment of 15 items isn't always feasible or realistic, especially in an era of product proliferation.
The lesson there is, where selection is robust, users must have the ability to quickly filter and/or compare by preference to find what they want.
Therefore, if you've got six shelves of product - you've got instant brand positioning and a statistically higher percentage of being chosen by the consumer.
In the end, even though Crest frustrated and confused the customer - they did succeed in getting brand positioning and the sale.
In this era of information and marketing saturation, many of us would logically agree that sometimes, less is more. This sentiment will hold true until you or I fail to find our favorite type of laundry detergent, diet soda, ziplock bag, soup or box of cereal!
Then we may become indignant about a lack of choice.
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