Webinar On Winning in The Age of Disruption Lessons From The Army

→ Lessons to be learned by the army

1. Recce and Surveillance- Army men constantly are looking out for threats through reconnaissance and surveillance. This is the time to exercise this in our own life. Look out for threats to identify the plausible opportunities. Review your sources of information. Get your maps right. Bad habits that you may have accumulated over the years might threaten to impoverish you which can destroy you during disruption. Outline your opportunities& discuss them with the well informed and realize the power of crowdsourcing.
2. Make Actionable Plans- Develop a positive perspective and list down your goals with utmost clarity and honesty. Resolve to go at lengths to attain them and if you are willing to pay its price. Commit yourself to a timeline and carry out an intermittent review. Worries that drive you to action are not bad. Question that you should ask your self while worrying is; Is it useful? If yes then take action, if not then don’t spend another moment on it.
3. Provide for contingencies- Every great idea has more than one plan (upto 3, more may contribute to confusion). Visualize all the scenarios. All your plans have to be equal, sound and viable when it’s time to execute them.
4. Motivation- It’s important to keep everyone around you motivated. There are three types of errors.

→ First, error of judgement- Error of judgement happens when anyone takes a wrong call unintentionally or when a subordinate takes a wrong call in absence of superior. Reprimanding him for this error will turn him into a rabbit, & you need tigers. So acknowledging his efforts and forgiving him for his mistake is the best way to deal with this error

→ Second, error of omission/Laziness- This kind of error has to met with strictness. Issue a warning /memo, if there is no improvement then you expel them.

→ Third, error of intention( error done intentionally)- Never spare this kind of error. This is how you build and organization.

→ Being Generous with praise and communication builds motivation amongst the team. Empathize with them. Appreciation is great tool at a time of disruption. Not as a means of manipulation but as a genuine praise. Act brave and lead by your example. Your mind is very powerful. Acting brave commands, the entire body to follow the mind and then it’s reflected back with your actions.

→ Embrace Risk- If you want to win you need to embrace risk. Be driven by process at office and solid habits at home. Strive to take calculated risks. Army men do not take blind risks that threatens to collapse the system. The team is enabled with confidence and trust when one takes responsibility of actions. They start believing in the system and feel protected. Build an ecosystem of support that enhances the spirit of organization.

→  In order to effectively embrace risk, identify habits that have created roadblocks in past. You need to focus on the process and celebrate small wins than pursuing wholesale change.

Build Defenses- Prepare for your future. Improve your communication skills, soft skills, bring down your bias towards technology, Improve your understanding on big picture. There is phrase ‘Lie Doggo’ used by the army men. It means to conserve. It means make no movement. This time of COVID has taught us living with frugality. Latch on to this habit of; that we need very little money to survive. Create reserves for not only money but health, relationships & time. And finally keep on perpetually thinking to recreate those reserves.

1. Learn what all soldiers know- Fears are the biggest liars. They seldomly transpire into reality. Mentally accept the worst that can happen and then prepare to improve on it.

• Army is also not disbarred from inflated egos. But they are automatically brought down as everyone is expected to work together in sync. They are respected for their seniority but more for who they are as a person. Greatest trouble, in army and corporates, is that we are very hierarchy bound. We unintentionally make the position of a person synonymous to reasons for liking them, which should not be the case. A lot of times it has to be dealt by understanding our own ego. It is difficult to deal with an inflated ego of a superior when our own ego is also coming into the play.

• Every home, organization, group and clubs have a culture. You may not have envisioned it but it is born via the visible actions of the founders. It may be a culture of a company to climb up in career or organization by stepping on/cutting down somebody’s throat. Similarly, top- management co-operating becomes a culture which is reflected in the behavior of all the employee

• Officers like qualities is also a part of a culture. It emphasizes on how the officer dresses, speaks, stands, walk, and behaves in a certain way. It respects seniority, not slavishly.

⇒ Recommended books by Maj Gen Neeraj Bali.

         1. Future shock- By Alvin Toffler

         2. A New Earth- By Eckhart Tolle

►Watch the webinar here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFlhxXV1ofk