Big picture thinking Vs. Micro detailing

Big picture thinking Vs. Micro detailing

A few weeks back, we have been discussing the need for big-picture thinking and the ways to develop at self-level and among the team. One aspect left out was  “ Which is ideal for the leader? Being big picture orientation or getting into micro detailing? When to switch in and switch out between big picture thinking and detailing?
 
There is no ideal style or state of thinking. Everyone should have both big picture thinking and micro detailing orientation. We need to know when to switch in and switch out as it depends on the context and situation. That awareness is essential. We can not always be in the extreme state as life is all about balancing, given the larger interest of others than self.

Some effective people are aware of themselves and able to switch in and switch out, and in both states, they bring value to the others and organization.
 

For example, 
 

I worked with a  senior colleague in an organization, who was regarded as a big picture thinker and visionary person. In a specific period, there was a huge demand for our products. Due to the supply chain issue, the team was struggling to manage the delivery crisis. He involved himself in the crisis, worked with micro details, and helped the team to sail through the crisis. At the same time, he understood the problem at the root level and thought about long term solutions. Post-crisis, he took some initiatives and solved the problem in the subsequent year. He brought the solution for the chronic problem due to his ability to switch in from the big picture to micro-level when it is required and the ability to see the big picture when working in detailing and solved the problem permanently. 

The point is as business managers or leaders; you need to develop the capability of switching in and switching out from big picture view to micro detailing and vice versa. This capability will help in sustainable growth.

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Additional note on this capability of switching in and switching out

Since I have the opportunity to work with more than 100 business leaders of small business, I did a little research on the leadership style (big picture orientation vs. micro-management) of those leaders. Only 47 % of the sample demonstrated both the capability during the intervention. Interestingly, there is a positive correlation between the business head who is capable of switching in and switch out and the consistent growth of the organization for the last 5~8 years period.

Whereas the business heads(41 %) who demonstrate a higher level of big picture thinking orientation and lack of detailing on a day to day issues, the organization struggles on the consistent growth or some organizations are stagnant or even switched to other businesses. Similarly, the business heads (12%)who demonstrate high on micro-level detailing also loses the sight of growth opportunities.

I am aware that many variables influence the growth or stagnant aspects of the business. I am not concluding that this leadership capability alone contributes to growth; however, it is also one of the contributors. We need to do more research on this aspect.

Coping with uncertainties

With the prevailing uncertainty, most of us are undergoing internal anxiety and restlessness.

We have many queries, and no one able to predict and answer the following, which adds more anxiety and disturbance.

1. How long this lockdown continues, and when things will become normal to go out freely?
2. Even after lockdown, what will happen to my job and my business?
3. Will I have sufficient cash to manage the basic and my business expenses?
4. Will there be any change in the business model, how i  fit into that, and so on?

Whatever may be the answer or outcome, our mental strength is essential to cope with any challenges, and we can develop power through the combination of spiritual, emotional, logical intelligence.

My perspective on dealing with the uncertainty as follows

Accepting the reality:
First, we need to realize that we cannot control everything in life, and we need to go along with the flow. Today's situation is a common, global phenomenon, and we are just part of it. Go with the flow.

Expecting the best to come:
When we are uncertain, our mind works on what can go wrong. The more we think about the possibility of failures, we start believing that and our behaviors/actions fall in line with belief. Alternatively, accept the fact that nobody can predict the future. Let us believe that the best will unfold and cultivate the positiveness.

Cultivate the positives by looking at your past:
We have experienced many such uncertainties in our lifetime. For example, we have seen uncertainly in the 1990/ 2001 / 2008 economic crisis, in the last two decades more of natural calamities and epidemic incidents. During those times, we used to think the future is dark. On a personal level, every one of us might have come across the loss of family members, loss of job or money in the business, the stock market, or through theft.

During those moments, we might have thought that the future was almost lost and felt helpless. However, by overcoming all the social and personal crisis, we are still standing tall. That means, life challenges are just a storm, peaceful life is certainly possible post-storm. So, expect the best in any crisis, we will be better than ever before with our inherent strength.

Feel the gratefulness for overcoming those challenges and being secure today than before. That will reinforce the positiveness within us.

Faith in the power of nature  
As we discussed many times, the law of nature is more powerful and eternal for all times. Remember those phrases
"Nothing is permanent, either good or bad." 
"You will get trouble to the extent you can bear."
"Everything happens for a reason and right time; we are just part of it and playing a small role".
"When we look at all our live events in a longer time frame, the challenges look small. Time heals everything".

Your mindset and looking at the right, balanced perspective is vital for managing any uncertainty.

God bless all!
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Having discussed at the personal level, I have given my perspective  to help the Entrepreneurs / Business owners / Head of the small, emerging organization to manage the lockdown and post lockdown scenario

1. The things to be done during the lockdown
2. Likely scenario immediately after lockdown and the solutions approach 
3. Long term business fitness for managing uncertainty in future

If you are interested, pl use the link below and read it as I believe that the contents will give some clarity or reaffirm the thought process of the business heads to manage the uncertainty.
https://businesstransformationinsights.blogspot.com/2020/04/coping-up-with-uncertainties-in.html

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Peaks and Valleys

Peaks and Valleys

Even though this book is old, this is very apt at this point, to make good and bad times work for us by maintaining mental stability and positiveness all the time.


Name of the Book: Peaks and Valleys
Author: Spencer Johnson (Bestselling Author of “Who moved my cheese” book)
No of pages: 100+

The  Theme of this book :
In the entire lifecycle, everyone goes through good and tough times. Our tendency would be enjoying too much during good times and getting upset too much during tough times as it shows the lack of maturity in dealing with the gift and uncertainties.

This book gives perspective on dealing with good and bad times of life in a story format and easy to read.

I especially recommend to entrepreneurs and business leaders to get perspective on managing good and tough times in business.

The essence of the book is given below. 

Valley (Tough Times):    
                                                                                          
 This time is an opportunity to learn more about life. Find the good hidden in a bad time. Could you make use of it? Do more service to others. Learn from the mistakes; develop strategies, competency development for a better future.

Peak (Good times):

This Time is for celebrating the achievement and enjoy the moment. But, be humble and grateful for being on the height. Reflect on what good things made your top and look back on the path you have come across. Sustain it.

Prolonging Peak (Good times):

When we are in peak, the tendency would be to get into complacent and arrogance. Instead of it, practice humility, do good things better, and do more service to others. Always remembering to reach the valley as part of the cycle.

Be mentally strong now, and everything will pass on!

Learning Resources

Learning Resources 

"Sometimes we can not change the circumstances, but we have a choice to choose our attitude and actions"

Given the lockdown period, each individual has a choice to develop the competency and today we have multiple options. Given below some of the options which i am personally exploring and suggesting you as well.

1. Online courses:

Variety of subjects available in the market place and depending on your interest you can pursue any short term course.

2. Online Learning website  / Apps on multiple personal, professional. spiritual  subjects

Medium.com
Harvard Business Review -HBR Management Tip
Gita 365 - Spiritual contents (Apps) ( Thanks to my friend who had suggested)
Youtube channels of your interest mainly on Interviews by professionals to get new perspectives and fresh ideas 

3. Evergreen / classic books to be read forever:

Personal and relationship perspective enhancement
 
The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho
Law of Success in 16 lessons – Napoleon Hill
Awaken the Giant within –Anthony Robbins
Discover your Strengths – Marcus Buckingham
Why Mars and Venus Collide –John Gray
The road less traveled –scott Peck
The Habit of Winning –Prakash Iyer
Seven habits of highly effective people –Stephen Covey
Valuvaana Kudumbam, Valamaana India-Prof Kanagasabapathi
Living with the Himalayan Masters –Swami Rama
Rich dad, poor dad – Robert  Kiyosaki
 
Business growth perspective
Five Levels of Leadership – John Maxwell
Blue Ocean Strategy
The Goal –A process of ongoing improvement –Eliyahu M Goldratt
The machine that changed the world – James womach
The high-performance entrepreneur –subroto bagchi
Stay Hungry stay foolish –Rashmi bansal
I too had a dream – Verghese Kurian

( Will suggest regional language-Tamil Books if you drop me a mail )

4. Some good/new management books can be explored :

The Fourth Industrial revolution -Industry 4.0 - Klaus Schwab
Profit First
CEO factory -HUL experience
Kindle Life - Swami Chinmayananda
Lean startup
Edge - Turning adversity into advantage
Trillion Dollar coach
Emyth -revisited
The next step- In individual and social development -Madhusudan  Reddy
Compilation of Vivekanandar speech at Chennai ( i will send based on request which i compiled)

5. Eat, Sleep well, watch movies along with family and be cool as everything will pass on.

Reflect and  Be grateful for everything you have in life ......

Ultimately, you need to be happy and peaceful irrespective of circumstances !!! That is also competency to be developed.

Developing the team's big picture thinking

Developing the team's big picture thinking

Having discussed the process of developing big picture thinking at an individual level, let us understand how smart leaders teach the big picture thinking to the team.

As I observed some leaders and their method of developing big picture thinking among the team in the organization as follows

1. Sharing the big picture perspective frequently to the team.
2. Briefing the context when delegating the task 
3. Helping the team to see the meaning in the work

1.    Sharing the big picture frequently to the team:

I know one CEO of a social organization, whenever, he conducts a meeting with his team, he makes a point to share about the prime purpose of the organization as "Making positive Impact" to customers. The team also articulate the same purpose and behave inline with the big picture perspective during in any business transaction with the customers and stakeholders. 

2.    Briefing the context when delegating the task:

Most of us tend to give a checklist or to-do list to the junior colleague. Effective people use to delegate responsibility and brief the person about the context of the job.

For example, instead of merely asking your salesperson to prepare the next three months' sales projection, if you give the context of sales projection to manage the plant capacity, mobilizing the working capital and so on, that will make the person more careful on the accuracy of the sales projection. (The point is wherever possible, brief the context as this makes the other person understand the big picture!!)

3.    Help the team to see the meaning of the work:

When anyone knows the meaning of his / her work, it will enhance their big picture thinking and contribution. As we are predominately organized ourselves as a department or function, most of the time, the team's thought process will be confined from a functional perspective. The leader's role is reminding the individual or team how the work is aligned with organizational objectives or how their work is helping the customers.

The effective leader is continuously striving to develop 360 perspectives both at self and at the team's level.

Let us discuss when we need to switch over between big picture thinking and micro detailing next week! 

Developing big picture thinking

Developing big picture thinking

Having discussed the definition of big picture thinking and its benefits on growth, let us understand the process of developing the big picture thinking as an individual.

Once three people were working on the bridge construction. The stranger approached the first person asked what he was doing. The person said, "Can't you see that i am laying stones." The stranger quickly moved on to the second person and asked the same question. The person replied: "I am working on my income to take care of myself and family."

      The stranger moved on to the third person and asked him what he was doing. The person replied with a smile, "I am building a bridge, once the bridge construction is over, many people will pass on. I am helping others to move fast. This bridge will be here centuries after I leave."    
 
       The story has a profound message of how you are looking at your work with a higher purpose makes a difference in the quality of work and life. That is big picture thinking. Here we extend our perspective or thinking from being working for survival to a higher purpose,
 
 Similarly, with your qualifications and experience, you are working as a professional. How do you look at your profession for the next  5-10 years' time? Today, you are running a business in a small way, how do you look at your product/ service and its impact on the market  10~20 years from now?

If you look at your profession as a means for survival, that is low order level thinking. When you extend your thinking about the impact you can create through your job or your business, you are into high order or big picture thinking.

When you are proposing some ideas to your team, and if they are not receiving it well, you may think they are resisting. That is low order thinking or micro-level thinking. The big picture thinking could be either team needs more explanation about the proposal, or they are not ready to digest, or you need to improve the communication skill, or the timing is not perfect. That is big picture thinking. In this process, you are looking at the event from 360 angles.
 
The key is how you are extending your thinking process from minute to higher, wider,360 angle makes you learn the big picture thinking process.
 

Big picture thinking is an art and can be developed at any age with awareness and practice.

Big picture Thinking

Big picture Thinking 

One of the qualities of competent people is the ability to have “Big picture thinking or perspective” in any circumstances.

What is meant by Big picture thinking or perspective?

A big picture perspective is looking at any interaction or event or opportunities from a higher, broader angle view to get the holistic idea rather than immediately getting into details.

For example, when you fly over your city on a flight, you able to view the entire city. You may be able to look at high rise buildings, rivers, roads, flyovers, and so on. This holistic view is possible only when you are at an elevated level, say at higher feet from the ground.

Similarly, in personal and professional life, when you look at any events, incidences, conversations from a higher-level view, you will get a holistic idea about opportunities, growth potentials, and other benefits. The key is elevating yourself at a higher level or distant yourself emotionally and look at the things.

Suppose your boss is asking you to take additional responsibility as being aware of your potential. If you are a big picture thinking oriented person, you will be immediately thinking about learning opportunities, future growth prospects, exposure, and so on. Else, immediately you will be worrying about too much about the unfamiliarity of the job and refuse to accept or getting into a conversation on monetary benefits, working hours flexibility, and so on.
 
The point is not to get into the details, but how you are distant yourself emotionally, elevating yourself to look at a higher and wider level helps you to get a holistic view. Once you see the comprehensive picture, your mind is ready to take on any challenges on the micro-level. This mind shift only provides the path for growth.

Now the question maybe

1. As a leader, how can I develop my people to get into big picture thinking?
2. As an individual, how can I develop my thinking process?
3. When can we shift from the big picture to detailing and vice versa

Let us discuss it next week!

Look up -insightful lesson

Recently i came across the viral video,(released 6 years back with more than 6 crores views till now ), and it talks about our addiction to smartphones and social media and losing the personal connection with the real, live human beings in front of us.

Director Gary conceptualized the theme by a story of a lost young man falling in love with a woman who gives him direction and their life together without the hindrance of social media.

Suggest you watch this video with Captions twice, and you will be able to relate how much we are losing our time in WhatsApp/ Facebook / YouTube and other social media blindly without real relationship building with the people next to us.

I hope you enjoy it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7dLU6fk9QY

Dealing setback -a leader's mindset

A few weeks back, i  met the CEO of a firm whom I know for many years. He is looking after many businesses, apart from his passionate activities. A few years back, he ventured into a new business, and he had been consistently growing since inception.

When I asked him about this year's performance of his new venture, he replied that performance was not up to the expectation and indicated some no's. I wondered about his coolness and asked about his mindset to manage through this slowdown setback.

His reply seems to be the real testimonial of authentic leadership.

• My senior team is continuously working hard, and I am not finding a problem with them except the external environment
• Despite the external reason, we are working on our initiatives, and this will help us when the external environment turns positive
• Now I am spending more time with the team  to share  more insights about business and their development
• I am optimistic that the initiatives will bring more business when the external environment turns favorable 

The responses reflect the right leadership behavior. As we discussed some time back, leadership is all about mindset, thought process, and actions that impact others positively.

It is essential during tough times the leader should maintain coolness, not getting into negativity or blaming everything, believe in non-permanency, work for the long term, and hope for the future. More than that, taking personal responsibility to turnaround within the individual or team's capability is more critical.

No wonder that his team regards him as a role model.

Sometimes as a leader, we forget our balance during setbacks!

managing emotions in transition

managing emotions in transition

 

As discussed, three stages in the transition process in any change, and there are emotions involved in each step. Effective people are better at managing those emotional aspects.
 
During Expose to Change:

It is natural to get all the emotions like shock, angry, upset. The key is to be aware of those feelings and how you are passing through it. Some people, when they are not aware of it, they react to those emotions by way of outburst and spoiling the relationship.

For example,
you might have observed that in the origination, the moment the boss proposes something, the immediate reaction from any one of the subordinates is "NO" or "NOT POSSIBLE". This is the outcome of inability to manage the emotions during expose to change. (But the same person might have anchored the change successfully but leaves the impression that the person always a skeptic and cynical! )

Hence, this stage calls for awareness of emotions and neutralizes it by calm, listen further, and move on to the next step.

Immersion stage:

Once you pass through the first stage, in this immersion stage, you are mentally accepting the change and undergoing the consequence of the change.

When you feel "Let it Go," that moment, you are allowing yourself for the change or transformation to the next transition.

Recovering stage:

In this stage, you are in reflective feeling and analyzing the pros and cons of the changes. You are discovering a new self, which is more rewarding due to the change event.

For example, when you accept that you need to relocate to a new place as a change, in this phase, your mind took the change and started weighing the good and bad. You are about to see the big picture and some insights as well. That is when you are ready for a transformation.

The point is whether the change event is big or small. Naturally, everyone will undergo three phases of transition, and each stage consists of emotions. How you are aware of feelings and getting new perspectives makes you effective in handling any change!