perspective

There are 4 posts tagged perspective.

Understanding Conflicts Better – The First Step to Conflict Resolution

CONFLICT!
Is that a word that scares you? Is that something that makes you run in the opposite direction? Do you wish you had the skills to handle conflicts better?

If you are like most people, you are no fan of conflicts and have often been caught up in the maze of a conflict. I certainly have, and I can honestly attest that conflict (or the fear of it) has given me many sleepless nights.

In my 12 years of professional life, I have spent many a moment amidst conflicts, and many more reflecting upon them. Why do they happen? How can I best handle them? Can I still achieve my goals and enrich my relationships with conflict all around me? Can I beat the stress and anxiety which comes with conflict and still be happy and peaceful? Can I deal with conflict in a way that I can be proud of?

There has been wise advice shared with me which I have ignored out of arrogance or ignorance, only to stumble upon and be humbled by the same realisation later. Over time I have written down some notes which I have referenced later in times of conflict. This article is the first in a series of articles I am writing from these notes which revolve around the subject of handling conflict in our professional and personal lives.

Human Beings Do Not Think or Feel Alike. Conflicts are Natural.

Wherever there is life, there is conflict. Every species on this planet experiences conflict in its fight for survival. Plants and animals strive for limited food, space and mates in the wild, often giving rise to conflict. Humans are much more complex. In addition to food, space and sex; we want power, fame and money; giving rise to even more conflicts.

Conflicts are a natural order of life, and if we step back and see the bigger picture, there is nothing unexpected around them. They are inevitable when we work with people who speak different languages, come from different cultures and countries, and have different values and beliefs.

They Should Not Be Surprising. Instead They Should Be Expected.

Today we live in a world driven by democratic and secular values (in most countries). If you don’t see any conflicts, perhaps people are not speaking up enough, and that I believe is a bigger problem for any society or organisation.

In democratic societies differences of opinion are not only expected but it is also a duty of each citizen to express himself without fear or hesitation. I believe that having diversity in thought is a strength, and knowing how to manage conflicts becomes a critical skill to learn if we are to live and work in such an environment.

Are Conflicts Bad? Or Do We Lack The Skills To Handle Them?

After facing and trying to avoid many conflicts over the years, I have come to believe that conflicts are not bad or something to be avoided. However, it is a common misconception and I have seen people do anything to avoid them.

We have no choice or power over when a conflict is going to present itself. Our only choice is in responding to them. We find them undesirable or unproductive not because they are unpleasant but because we have no idea about how to handle them.

Understanding Conflicts Is The First Step To Resolving Them

Understanding Conflicts Is The First Step To Resolving Them

Conflicts Are Not About Right or Wrong. Usually Both Sides Are Right.

In almost every conflict I have seen, both sides are right. There is no wrong side. Conflicts are about different perspectives, and each perspective is valid for the one holding it. A perspective becomes right or wrong only when we get attached to a particular point of view.

Can we see that we are all seeking to express the truth as we see it? Can we acknowledge that everyone sees the world differently and form their own perception of events? Conflicts happen not because of different perceptions, but because of our inability to acknowledge another’s point of view.

Conflicts Have A Lot of Energy. Can We Use It Productively?

Conflicts are like a flowing river. If left unchecked, they can cause flooding and destruction. But if we can build a dam and channel the water in the right direction, we can turn it into electricity.

The same thing applies to conflicts. The only question is – Can we use the energy in a conflict productively? Can we channel this energy into productive conversations that can lead to creative solutions and better results?

However, if we can’t control the energy in a conflict, it can result in damage (stress, frustration, bad results) and lost opportunity.

Conflicts Can Be The Foundation for Great Results and Relationships.

Healthy disagreement creates friction and energy. If we look back at history we will find that every great accomplishment has come out of differing opinions of people who have found a way to work together.

In every conflict, if we are willing to do the hard work required to navigate through it, we can turn them into an advantage instead of something to be avoided. Conflicts can be the bedrock upon which great successes and deep relationships can be built.

“An enemy is a person whose story we have not heard.” – Gene Knudsen Hoffman

In the next article I will share a few things which most of us have done in the past amidst a conflict, but which I have learned that we MUST NOT DO when we encounter a conflict.

There Are Only Perspectives, No Truth. And Five Different Perspectives You Can Apply In Each Situation

Tom : “I am sorry I am a bit late to this meeting. My previous meeting ran over.”
Sara : “I am more worried about the missed deadline on the product your team is developing. Your team is slow.”
Tom : “It’s not my fault. Two members on my team reported sick last week and I can’t help it.”
Sara : “I don’t really care what happened. But I know I can’t count on your team. This makes me look bad.”
Tom : “You are not being fair, Sara. “
Sara (to herself) : “Tom’s lack of experience shows. He doesn’t hold his team accountable, and always has excuses for delays.”

How many times have we spoken or seen others speak such sentences? As we solve complex business problems, very often we “know” the truth (you are slow, this is not how things work here, etc) and base our actions on it. In this article I want to stress that there are no truths in the workplace (and life). There are only perspectives, and there can be many different perspectives depending on how you look at the situation. Once we realise that our apparent “truth” is only a perspective, it allows us to view the same situation differently to help us make better decisions.

How We Form Our Truth?
The first thing we must do is to take a pause and ponder about how we form our truth in the first place. We (human beings) gather inputs from our five senses – smell, touch, sight, sound and taste. Anything which is external reaches us via one of the senses. We touch something which is hot, and we “know” it is dangerous and not safe. We hear something from multiple people or from a reliable source, and are inclined to believe it as “truth”.

The quality, source and frequency of sensory information we gather has a big role in how we interpret it. For example – If you read an article with a lot of grammatical and spelling mistakes (quality), you are less likely to trust the content. Similarly, if you hear about the same thing from multiple people (frequency), you will be more inclined to trust it.

Once we collect the sensory information from the outside world, our brain make sense of it. It decides which signals to pay more attention to and which to ignore. Our brains also apply the collective influence of our memories, beliefs, thoughts and values to every new information, and derive meaning from it. I already wrote about Listening Filters and how they create the “truth“. For example – Growing up in a very hierarchical corporate culture (and society) in India, it still takes effort on my part to see and interact with people above me on the corporate ladder as peers in Amsterdam.

What if when you die, they ask "How was heaven?”

What if when you die, they ask “How was heaven?”

The Five Different Perspectives
The important thing to realise here is that the “truth” we form by the above process is only “our” truth, and not the absolute truth. Realising that different people can see and create their own truth in the same situation is the key to working together more productively. Seeing our own truth as a ‘perspective‘ instead of the truth leads to humility and a willingness to consider other perspectives.

Unless we step down from the high pedestal of truth we often end up placing ourselves on, we can’t see all the other perspectives out there. I believe there are (at-least) five different perspectives which can offer tremendous insights to us. However, it is not always easy, nor are we often willing, to view a situation from these perspectives. They might lead to some uncomfortable moments, but the process can often result in new insights and learnings. These not only can lead to better results but also help us become more human in the process.

As I write down the different perspectives below, I will also specify a few questions we can ask to uncover each perspective :-

First Person (My) Perspective
The first person perspective is how I see and perceive things. The biggest clue about the first person perspective is the usage of pronouns like We, Us, Our, I, Me, Mine in our thoughts and language. This is the most natural perspective for all living creatures, and we listen and think in first person perspective by default. The first person perspective leaves you with ownership, authenticity and often attachment to your point of view.

Questions to Uncover First Person Perspective
1. What conclusion am I arriving at?
2. Is it the truth, or just my opinion?
3. What reasons/proof do I have for my opinion?
For Example – Sara’s (in the above conversation) first person perspective could be – “Tom is a difficult person to deal with because of his immaturity. I can’t trust him or his team as he is not accountable.”

Second Person (Your) Perspective
The second person perspective is seeing things from another person’s point of view. Listening to someone and making efforts to understand her perspective shows respect. The second person perspective calls for seeing and feeling the world as another person does. It doesn’t matter if you agree or disagree with it. The second person perspective has a lot to do with listening and it can have a massive impact. Second person perspective leaves you with empathy and humility.

Questions to Uncover Second Person Perspective
1. How would this situation look and feel to him/her?
2. How would he/she interpret the situation? Can I step in his/her shoes?
3. Can I feel how he/she might be feeling (anger/joy/frustration) right now?
For Example – Sara’s second person perspective could be – “Tom is new to this job and he must be finding it difficult to make demands from his people. He must be really stressed out and might need some help to manage his priorities better. I might only be making matters worse for him. Instead, can I help him somehow?”

"Don't judge a man until you've walked a mile in his shoes." - American Proverb

“Don’t judge a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes.” – American Proverb

Third Person (His/Her) Perspective
Another perspective could of a related third party. If you are talking to your colleague, a third party perspective could be of your manager or another colleague. For example – In a workplace, a third person perspective could be of a colleague whose work will/might be impacted by what you are talking about. Seeing through the third person perspective leaves you with a big picture view, more options and opens up blind spots.

Questions to Uncover Third Person Perspective
1. How would my boss think about this situation?
2. How would the sales head think about this conversation?
3. If I were him/her, how would I have described the situation?
For Example – Sara’s third person perspective, from the point of view of another colleague, would be – “Tom is trying hard to keep everyone happy, and failing at it. And Sara is not making it any easier for him by making demands without understanding his situation. How will they make this project succeed? If they fail, it will hurt our team and we will miss our targets.”

Stranger (Witness) Perspective
The fourth perspective calls for viewing the situation from the point of view of a witness. A witness is someone who neither has any stake in what you are discussing nor does he knows either of you. The witness perspective is purely objective, and the witness observes the proceedings just like a camera would. Taking this perspective leaves you with detachment and objectivity. You see things as they are, without any judgement and attachment to either side or to a specific outcome.

Questions to Uncover Stranger Perspective
1. How would a stranger see and report my situation?
2. If this were a movie, how would I describe it?
For Example – Sara’s stranger perspective could be – “Tom is acting like a typical newbie, and is going to make the same mistakes everyone makes. People around him are too busy in their own lives to help or assist him grow through this phase in his career. Sara or Tom’s manager can step in to help, but do they even realise the need for it.”

God / Compassion Perspective
The fifth perspective calls for looking at the situation from a place of love, kindness and compassion. With this perspective, we look how we can make things better for every party involved, and worse for no-one. We attempt to listen to our inner voice (consciousness) in this perspective. How does it feel? Is there something which I know but am unwilling to acknowledge?

Questions to Uncover God Perspective
1. Would I want this conversation to be aired on TV, or reported in tomorrows’ newspapers?
2. Do I hear an inner voice saying “this doesn’t feel right” or anything else?
3. How would Jesus / Allah / Buddha / Krishna do in my situation?
Disclaimer – This perspective has nothing to do with religion or our religious views, but is rather an invitation to stand in a place where we want to see everyone happy. It is about feeling instead of thinking, and using our heart for mutual well-being instead of our brain for personal gains and business results.
For Example – Sara’s fifth perspective could be “Tom must be going through a hard time, and might even be carrying his stress into his personal life. And I am not making it any easier for him. Can I help him manage his priorities better? Can he seek some training or help? The same holds true for me too. Going after business goals are fine, but it doesn’t have to be at the cost of stress and unhappiness.”

“There are no facts, only interpretations.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

“There are no facts, only interpretations.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

To conclude, asking the above questions and viewing our situation from multiple perspectives can be tremendously liberating. It can provide us with options which weren’t visible to us before. Getting lost in what we believe to be the truth (first person perspective) can bring us stressful days, broken relationships and health problems.

All of this can often be avoided by taking a look at the above five perspectives. It can often ease up any emotional build up (stress, anger, over-excitement) and prevent us from doing something in haste and from our limited viewpoint. It might not solve every business problem we get stuck in, but we can surely finish with better results and make more informed choices after considering these five different perspectives.

What I learned in the last few months I worked on SaleRaja?

Right from August 2007, when we started SaleRaja, it has been like a baby for me. It was something on which we had great hope. SaleRaja was supposed to be our way out of normal day-to-day jobs. I never thought I would have to work for any other company again at that time, and we even got a promising response in the beginning. But soon, the growth in terms of traffic and registrations began to steady out and it was clear that we would need a lot more funding and resources to scale it up to the next level.

With the recession in 2008-09 and considering our background (having only technical skills and no financial, marketing and sales skills), we struggled to get any funding. There was one remote chance of funding or a tie-up but unfortunately we blew that up. Also, my partners decided to part ways because of impending personal issues like marriage and finances, and there I was, running SaleRaja alone in Dec 2008. I got together with one more guy in the beginning of 2009, then with another girl for sales for 3-4 months, at the same time myself managing my day job at Jivox and coding for SaleRaja in the mornings and evenings.

It was around September 2009 that I was alone again (it didn’t work out as expected with the other two). I was still working day in and day out, doing coding as well as sales calls, but it was beginning to take its strain on me. I was no longer enjoying what I was doing, was getting tired and fatigued easily, and my energy levels started to dip for the first time in many years. The 16 hour work days which used to pass like a breeze started to seem like a self-imposed torture. This continued from September to December 2009. It was during these last few months of 2009 that I started to ponder on questions like –

  • Is this really what I want to be doing?
  • Why am I not enjoying this work now if I used to love it so much earlier?
  • Where am I headed if I continue this way?
  • Is there any other view or picture which I am missing here?
“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” - Wayne Dyer

“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” - Wayne Dyer

I had jumped into SaleRaja at the age of 23. I also had blind faith in the idea that doing business is not possible after marriage, so this was THE time for me. And I had so much faith in mine and my friend’s abilities that failure never looked an option. I think I got so caught up in these predetermined notions that I tried harder, harder and harder but was unwilling to see the big picture, the picture that there might be something missing from our skill sets, the picture that business can even happen later on in life too, and that these last 2.5 years have taught me a lot even if they have not been as expected.

So what I learned from this experience is that sometimes we get so caught up in our day to day existence that we seldom take time to step back from our daily activities to reflect and observe our life as a whole. It is like we are so much busy in reaching the destination that we don’t even have time to stop for fuel. When we are stressed by situations, we start taking our decisions also in that emotional state. It’s strange how one bad incident can take us off track and get us going in the opposite direction instead. Only if we remember to look things in perspective of our whole life.

Taking time to stop every once in a while and gather our senses is also very important. We have to be calm and make sure we don’t panic. No matter how busy we get, we should always keep some time (a few hours or a whole day) to sit quietly and introspect that we are going in the right direction or not. It will allow us to focus on what we already have rather than what we don’t. Then we can go about calmly making new plans and vision for the future. In this quiet time we can ponder on long term questions like –

  • What all resources do I have now, and what all do I need?
  • What have been the past successes and failures, and lessons from them?
  • What skills, qualities, talents I need and how can I get them?
  • How can I more effectively use what I have right now to get the best results?

Gaining perspective also allows us to be patient and conserve our energies for future riches rather than wasting it on frustrations. It can also prevent us from making a big and costly mistake. Many times we just have to wait before the tide turns in our favor and we can start running again. Sometimes, perspective also makes us aware that we are not going in the right direction, and we might need to take a step or two back before starting again. Like in my case, I realized I didn’t have the resources and skills to pursue SaleRaja. Also, my egoistic view that business can’t happen later in life was getting in the way of making better decisions. It was then I decided to step back and take a break from entrepreneurship, work on to plugging my skill gaps, and then get back to entrepreneurship later on. It was a tough decision back then considering the work I had put on SaleRaja for the last 2.5 years, but necessary, as Steve Jobs remarked in his famous commencement speech, “It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it.”

I am glad I took this time to introspect, and today, 20 months after that decision, I can say I am on the right track, plugging my gaps and will soon be ready to jump into the entrepreneur world once again.

Volunteering, What It Can Do For You?

Volunteering has a meaningful impact on your community. It contributes to the overall social and economic health of the community, as people are engaged positively into contributing for disadvantaged sections of society. It could range from visiting the sick, planting a tree or advocating for human rights. But apart from the benefits to the society, we most often miss the benefits it can have for the person who is volunteering. Here are some ways how volunteering can benefit you –

Learn new Skills
Volunteering can help us learn more skills and makes us aware of our hidden skills. We can help organize a fundraising event, do an awareness event, or teach students in a school. By doing this we can improve our goal setting, planning or budgeting skills. It also helps us to improve our decision making skills and contribute to personal change by affecting our beliefs about day to day behavior of people. If you always had a hobby and you wanted to know if you should pursue it, you can volunteer with your skills to see for yourself whether you enjoy doing it or not, or where you stand in that skill. For example, taking initiatives like ‘No Waste‘ and ‘Dandi March‘ has certainly made a huge difference to my people management and leadership skills.

Volunteer for Yourself

Volunteer for Yourself

Sense of Fulfillment
When we volunteer, we give our time and skills generously by choice. There is no anxiety and stress as we have made the decision all by ourself. Therefore, volunteering gives us the highest level of accomplishment and a sense of fulfillment. Whenever I have helped others, I have always felt joy and I think it is the same with all human beings. Even after working on something physically stressful while volunteering, people always feel stress-free, relaxed and more alive after doing it. And irrespective of the outcome, the knowledge of contributing to a good cause is always rewarding.

Wider Perspective
In our busy day to day lives, volunteering can help us create some stability in our lives. The confidence and experience gained from volunteering can be helpful in seeing workplace issues in a different perspective. We discover new traits of our personality and can reach for new levels of performance at the workplace too. For me, meeting people from different age groups and different professions has given me the ability to put my world in perspective with so much other stuff happening which I was totally unaware of earlier. It has also helped me improve my social and interpersonal skills. Volunteering can help anybody get out of the ‘rat race’ and create a balance in their lives.

Connecting with others
When you volunteer, you will meet new people from different walks and segments of the society. These contacts can be valuable in establishing business contacts or for seeking employment in the future. Meeting people and making new friends increase the feeling of relatedness with the community, and is rewarding intrinsically. People and societies depend on each other for survival but commercialism and consumerism have seen people getting more and more individualistic. What better way to connect and give something back to your community than volunteering.

Nobody can do everything, but everyone can do something

Nobody can do everything, but everyone can do something

“A candle loses nothing by lighting another” is a popular quote by James Keller. We can not give something (out of free will) without getting something in return. When we give our time and skills to another, it is like lighting a candle. We don’t lose anything, but gain more light (knowledge). Volunteering always leaves us richer in spirit, happiness, skills and takes away your problems, stress and anxiety. If you have not spend time volunteering till now, do so. It is certainly one of the things you must experience sooner than later. For volunteering opportunities, see this initiative (Pick A Fight) I am taking with a few of my friends.