A very good way of being adaptable, managing change and dealing with the vicissitudes of life is to become an expert in at least one field of endeavour. Are you an expert? Here are a few signs you might actually be one: 1. Content. You are constantly delivering fresh, relevant content that is […]
It is amazing how we often seem to excel at the cognitive level and fail miserably in execution. Or we may ruthlessly succeed at execution also, and fail miserably when it comes to having meaningful relationships. I suspect this is the main reason why we like to analyze, dichotomize and maintain a separation between “work […]
I’m sure we are familiar with the term “Get a life!”, which is usually directed at someone else in a manner hardly construable as positive, flattering or affirming. Well, do you have a life? At the end of yesterday, did you quietly reflect upon what you had achieved? Did you meet your goals? Why or […]
Yes it always will. One way or another. For where there is a WILL to love, there will always be a WAY. A parallel truth is what I have written about, which is that there ought not to be a dichotomy between character and competence. Competence is a subset of character. If you have good […]
The Theory of Constraints is something that caught my eye recently. I was indulging myself in a STRATFOR video in which George Friedman was postulating that due to the unchangeables of geography, historical baggage, human behaviour and time in history, peoples and nations may aspire to things lofty and noble, and not arrive at where […]
As Week Six of 2014 opens, take a little time to reflect upon the mindsets that characterize you. What is your default mindset? Are you happy with it? Are there things which you’d like changed? Do you need to grow in certain aspects? Here are a few Magnificent Mindsets which I trust will be something you […]
There was an occasion more than ten years ago when I was red-faced at work. Literally. My colleagues noticed that my face seemed redder than usual. In fact, they said that my face was unusually red, and asked if I were having a fever or some other ailment. I didn’t feel sick at all. In […]
Do you believe in surrounding yourself with people who are smarter or better than you at least in some way? Good for you! That shows that you are secure, mature and probably smart in your own ways as well! Intuitively, we all know that surrounding ourselves with people better than ourselves in some aspect or other […]
I really miss when spades were called spades. Circumvention is, unfortunately, a skill which I think all of us wish secretly we could disinvent. If you’re a leader worth your salt, you’d know what I mean. If we paid each of our people what they are truly worth, the income of the rainmaker would not […]
You might be familiar with the saying “We don’t see things as they are. We see things as we are.” As leaders, we need to remember this for ourselves as well as for those around us, and lead accordingly. That saying is true, of course. Our mental and emotional states tend to dictate how we […]
If you happen to be from the Band of Brothers I used to work with, or if you happen to be in HR or equivalent, you might be familiar with the term “Currently Estimated Potential.” It is meant to be an assessment of how far an individual is likely to advance given his performance so […]
Being a thermal leader isn’t all about hot air. It’s actually a great thing if you’re leading a team of eagles. Or perhaps any type of bird that knows how to use thermals in order to stay aloft for very long periods of time without getting burnout. Thermals are what many land-based birds, particularly raptors, […]
Before you throw that stone at me, answer this question: Would you like to keep cancer tissue in your body? Right, I didn’t think so either! Did you experience righteous indignation welling up inside of you when you saw the title of this post? Why? Do you subscribe to “Get the right people on the […]
Anxiety. Stress. Eustress. Distress. Do any of those happen to you? Of course, you’re human, right? The literature is full of articles and posts about anxiety and performance. There are arguments about whether there is a balance for optimal performance, meaning how much anxiety is too much, how much is too little, and how much […]
Lego? Why not? Your equipment happens to be blocks of different sizes, shapes and colours. Using just a few different types of building blocks, you could construct almost anything you fancy. This is mind-boggling when you remember that Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) controls everything about how we are made, and is made up of chains of […]
Douglas O’Loughlin shared this on Facebook, and I thought I’d pen some of my thoughts about this, since effective, practical leadership development is central to the topic. The McKinsey article may be found here: http://bit.ly/JqlnGE The article lists four principles for a better public sector: Better evidence for decision making. Greater engagement and empowerment of citizens. […]
Unity isn’t about same-as-you same-as-you. Unity can be likened to all the different instruments in an orchestra playing the same piece, just that each instrument plays its own special part in it.
We have all, I suppose, heard of “constructive conflict”. Do you think it exists? When was the last time you had some “constructive conflict”? Did you feel as though you were in conflict with others? It has been said that when you have more than one person in an organization, disagreements are inevitable. Therefore, the […]
I might be attracting the ire of some people with this post, but that’s an occupational hazard. Mind you, I’ve had many pets over the years. Dogs, mostly, but also mynahs, rabbits, guinea pigs, white mice, budgerigars, tortoises, fish, spiders and others I shall not name for the sake of the queasy of stomach. Did […]
Aye, they do indeed. When you look at someone, whether that someone be man, woman or child, what do you look at first? Physical features? Clothing? Shoes? Watches? Pens? Do you look at them overall and form your first impressions? Who among you reading this looks at the person’s eyes first? The eyes have been […]
I’ve just completed a day and a half facilitating a teambuilding session under the auspices of my allies Fish Camp Learning Sdn Bhd. Participants were put through their paces with both challenging outdoor and indoor activities, including sea rafting, and had the opportunity to know each other much better. They were very cohesive and definitely […]
Yes, you read it right. Quotes like “The Greatest Good of the Greatest Number” sound very good and noble. Think about it for a while and you realize that it is not the greatest number but the smallest number! After all, pyramids end at a point at the top, don’t they? And those at the bottom […]
Download the pdf. Hi, I’m Elijah Lim. Mirror, mirror, on the wall…who’s the best assessment of them all? Now, you will realize that there are many psychometric tools, there are many leadership assessments, personality tests, team assessments, you name it. Love them or hate them, one thing’s for certain – they’re here to stay, they’ve […]
In Singapore, a few companies have made the news because they posted job ads worded in such a manner as to imply a preference for foreign workers over Singaporeans. This violated some legislation which stipulated that companies ought to have a certain percentage of Singaporeans already in their headcount before they could proceed to hire […]
Download the pdf. Hi, this is Elijah Lim. “What do we learn from movies?” Now, most of us, if not all of us, have watched a movie or two in our lifetime. And of course, movies are meant to entertain us, meaning that when we go to movies, we are amused. Now, the word “amuse” […]
This is not a word-for-word transcript, but is the same in essence. Business Insider ran an article called “This Chart Shows The Relationship Between Hours Worked And Productivity” on 06 Oct 2013. It purports to show that productivity goes up when people spend less time at work. It’s probably so. I’m just not sure if […]
Download the pdf. This is not a word-for-word transcript, but the essence is the same. I came across a LinkedIn article called “Key Reasons Delegating Is SO Difficult and What To Do About It” on 07 Oct 2013. I’d written something about “Deliberate delegation” before, and this post caught my eye. It seems that the […]
Ever had someone talking AT you? You know what I mean – someone going on and on and on, and you’re either not wanting to listen, the topic is irrelevant to you, or it’s someone higher up the ladder telling you things you’d rather not hear. How did you feel about that? How would you […]
I came across an article on Harvard Business Review today called “Less-Confident People Are More Successful.” I wonder if there was any misunderstanding about what “confident” really means. Looking up the etymology dictionary, we see that “confident” is from: If the writer, Dr Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, intended for “confident” to lean more toward the side of smugness and […]
This is a short clip about character and competence. If I had to choose between either, I would always go for character. The transcript is below the embedded video, and you can also download the transcript in pdf. Transcript for Character and Competence. Hi, I’m Elijah Lim. Today, I’d like to talk to you a […]
This is especially for all you positive affirmation junkies out there. I know you’re there – I can feel the hate coming towards me. Pendulums are very useful things. In clocks and other gadgets requiring the services of simple harmonic motion. In a way, they illustrate what life is, continuously swinging from one extreme to […]
The sense of taste is the focus of a billion dollar industry. Although our senses of taste and smell aren’t supposed to be as discriminating as those of many species of animals, many of us still take pride in being more “discerning” than our fellows where tastes and aromas are concerned. We revel in being […]
How can a job be destroyed? It is like saying that a road is being diverted. You don’t divert roads, you divert traffic. You realign roads. Rivers can be diverted, aircraft can be diverted, but not roads. Jobs cannot be destroyed. They get obsolescent or obsolete. (Yes, there is a slight difference, go look it […]
Sometimes I hear the phrase “You can bring a horse to the water, but you can’t force a horse to drink.” I invariably reply “Yes, but you can give salt to the horse to make it thirsty.” Developing healthy appetites is something like that. Hunger is something natural, but appetite is learned. We all get […]
Lack of appetite due to a fear of getting fat. That’s the commonly known anorexia nervosa. So, what’s anorexia sophia? Well, sophia means wisdom. Anorexia sophia is a lack of appetite for wisdom. There might be a hunger and a craving for other things, but the appetite for wisdom seems to be a rare condition. […]
Quotes. Positive inspirational quotes. Negative demotivational quotes. Humorous quotes. Deep thinking quotes. Leadership quotes. Anonymous quotes. We all love quotes, don’t we? Quotes capture the essence of an idea, a concept, a state of being. They help to point out our foibles in ways that don’t make us feel so badly about ourselves. If you remember […]
Authority. You look up and squint so you see it more clearly. You stop in your tracks as it rumbles so nearly. The things that you wish for, you hold them so dearly. Yes, authority has a way of eliciting a range of different responses from different people at different times and seasons. Do you […]
Fairness. There are two underlying thoughts that accompany the concept. The first is “If I can’t have it, neither should anyone else.” The second is “Everyone has it, so should I.” You disagree? Think of popular culture. There is a line in a song which goes “If I can’t have you, I don’t want nobody, […]
It is a common saying nowadays that if someone is under-performing in a job, it is due more to a job mismatch than to the presence of issues the person in the job may have. The theory is that, if a person is a good fit with the job, with the organization, with the people, […]
If you are used to me by now, you will know that I don’t mean “Public Relations” in the first “PR.” So what do I mean? Personal Responsibility, of course! If you are a Public Relations honcho and depend on that to pay your bills, lower your hackles and read on! Of course, “PR Campaigns […]
Do you have a good EQ? I think Daniel Goleman didn’t intend to mislead anyone about EQ, but I do think that many people have swung one way or the other. Seems to be the case, as always. When will level-headed thinking prevail? Quite difficult, I suppose, since emotions versus our minds are something like […]
This is not only for all who are serving in large organizations, particularly government ones. Hands up if you have used that phrase, or a similar one! Right, that should include just about everyone! Hands up if you have ever been a Chief this or a Chief that! Ok, not too may hands going up. […]
Do you admire the person who seems to be able to make seemingly difficult decisions quickly and easily? Not only does he do that, but it always seems that he’s right? Do you know someone like that personally? Are you that person? Why do I get the impression that many people are content to become […]
Most people I meet seem to be always absorbed with their “Mission”. That mostly has to do with what they think their bosses want them to do on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or yearly basis. That’s important, of course, we need to complete assigned tasks and fulfill responsibilities. Meet or exceed team goals on […]
When Martin Luther King declared “We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal”, he inadvertently gave a phrase and a concept for all modern-day Robin Hoods to exploit. Now, I’m certainly no fan of the Sheriff of Nottingham either, but two wrongs don’t make a right. You know by now […]
You are biased. I am biased. They are biased. We are all biased. If you encounter someone coming up to you saying, “My reporting of the case in unbiased” or “I settled the quarrel in a fair and unbiased manner”, you should quickly laugh out loud in his face! There is simply no such thing […]
I keep seeing posts and discussions on delegation, so I thought I’d better post this again, so that people can keep this thing called “delegation” in its proper perspective. Is the word “delegation” a dreaded word at your workplace? If you are a leader, do you know who, what, where, when and why to delegate? […]
Baby Boomers. Gen X. Gen Y. Gen Z. Gen Gap. Gen Repeat Process. Gen ad infinitum. We really love labelling, stereotyping and generalizing, don’t we? Just because some “expert” said that “studies have shown that…”, means we pick up the paint roller and give all and sundry the broad-brush treatment. Does that happen to you? […]
When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn? So go the last two lines of every verse of the song “Where have all the flowers gone?”. Sobering thought, isn’t it? When “lifelong learning” has been emphasized for decades, do you sometimes wonder what the effects of learning are, or what they have been? […]
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