Intellectually Curious - Edition 36
Welcome to the 36th Edition of the Intellectually Curious Newsletter. I would like to thank all the subscribers and for those who haven’t subscribed, please do so that you don’t miss the editions.
Why this Book:
I am always interesting in learning and being curious. One of the way to satisfy the need to learn and curiosity is to read and read books. Some of the books read are purely epistemic that are in response to my curiosity triggers and gives me a better perspective in an area that I have no idea about. Then there are other set of books that are both epistemic and can be applied in your day to day life and deliver self-improvement and may influence few others in the due course. Now there are tons of books on self-improvement and can be classified as airport variety (you buy in the airport, read during a flight and lose interest in the middle/complete it but never give a though about it again), academic variety – mostly based on solid theory – but little practical relevance, preachy variety – written by people after reaching heights of a career and preaching others how to be successful and the last one as applied improvement variety. The last one is written by practitioners who have applied it on themselves in real life and have coached others to follow these principles and have seen success and then share their findings. These books are way more practical to be applied in our daily life.
Now when I was listening to the interview of the author in a podcast, I was impressed by the simplicity and her down to earth attitude ( in case you have not seen the post or listened to the podcast episode here https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anandvaitheeswaran_cm-290-sabina-nawaz-on-becoming-the-manager-activity-7320431868934336513-JWsv?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAAEfUpoB77iHt8oMoBaNvbPPqDSOiT2DLZE ) and to my surprise she even responded to my post!
The book we are going to learn about is: You’re the boss by Sabina Nawaz
Concept of the book:
The book is about how to become a boss that you like your boss to be. Sabina Nawaz has worked in the corporate, gone through the motions and experienced it firsthand before being a coach to leaders across the world. This book we can say is a summary of all her collective experience over the year. The premise of the book is there are no “bad” bosses, only good people with best intentions who cross the fine line between good intentions and bad behaviors. As you grow in the corporate hierarchy there are two ‘P’s that start growing along with you Power and Pressure – and Sabina writes “pressure will corrupt your actions and power will blind us to the impact of these actions”. How true!!
I have seen this happening time and again and seen the fall of once mighty leaders. As Sabina has mentioned this is not a book only for “C-Suite” leaders but for everyone in a leadership role including someone who got promoted ‘today’.
Key elements from the book:
Once you are designated as a leader everything changes around you – right from the attitude of your peers, friends, former team etc etc. Anything you say, do are scrutinized with a different lens. People around you try to extract meaning in everything. Being appointed as a leader is definitely a success for you even if there are elements of luck in our selection which many ignore. Once you are in a leadership role, the biggest mistake done by almost 99% of the people is keep working the way you were working earlier. That according to Sabina is the first step to failure or stagnation. You need to shift your thinking to a different level if you have to succeed in your new leadership role. Sabina puts this beautifully as having a “scarcity mindset” – competing with your own team to show you are greater than them and having an “abundance mindset” which means you are collaborating with your team, promoting their work, giving room for the team to grow along with you. This I have seen to be the pitfall of many smart people whom I knew, who due to their scarcity mindset completely forgot life is not a zero sum game it is an infinite game with infinite possibilities. As mentioned earlier when you are the boss, everything you say and do has a meaning even if you don’t have such an intention and being aware of people pleasing mindset of everyone around you. People start thinking you are unapproachable and to share my own personal experience when I ask my colleagues why they don’t reach out to me the answer is always – we thought we will disturb you. Power creates an invisible barrier around you and we need to be aware of it.
In the next chapter, Sabina handles some of the biggest leadership myths that I feel have taken the shape of their own like – People leave bad bosses. No one comes to the office and start behaving badly (yes there are exceptions, even there when we dig in we will find out more) it is always about people having both good and bad behaviors and some days one of them dominates. Being a good boss is something that takes every minute of occupying that chair. It doesn’t go away. Showing no or less empathy justified as business isn’t personal is not going to help. We all are humans and we need assurance. I like the ”Yeah, but” myth – which basically what I do or say doesn’t apply to me. Once you are leader, many people start thinking that they are different and many rules do not apply to them – completely wrong. If you want to be successful, when a feedback is shared you need to move away from ‘yeah, but’ to ‘Yes, and’. The next myth is “I need to be authentic to myself” and unleashing a volley of bad behaviors. Next time you have such an ‘authentic’ impulse ask if it aligns with your values. We all make choices at all times and rather than falling back on the authenticity trap for your bad behavior, think and link it to your values and make a choice.
Sabina then moves on to how power impacts a leader. First it creates what she defines as “Power Gap” – an expanded distance that exists between a leader and the people who work for that leader. As this expanded gap makes sure that no one comes and tells you about your missteps and what they think about you and when someone has the guts to tell us the truth – we go into the defense mechanism of why we are correct and they are wrong. The highlight of the chapter is where Sabina defines the traits we think as critical for our success and how it is perceived by others and I liked how calmness is interpreted as uninterested. Good learning!!
Sabina tackles that next big thing for a leader – Pressure. It can make a normal person a monster. I have experienced in myself and wondered what changed – Now I know, it is the pressure that has exceeded my capacity to tackle it. Sabina brings in term called Pressure pitfalls – the mistakes we do when pressure is very high. We all are able to handle episodic pressure but not the sustained amounts of pressure from all sides. Considering the VUCA world, pressure cannot be eliminated but learning how to handle it without becoming terrible is critical for a leader.
The title of the book You’re the boss is well thought out as if you are not a boss of yourself and manage yourself effectively you cannot be boss of others.
In the next section of the book, Sabina introduces us to some foundational tools that can help us to navigate the leadership journey very effectively.
1. Cost-Benefit analysis to overcome the resistance we face – what are you giving up for which why
2. Micro Habits to move the needle and compounding will deliver the results for you – helpful after receiving a tough 360 feedback
3. The Yes list – make the progress visible to yourself and get energy boost from that
The case study given in this chapter is very impressive and three goals mentioned by the protagonist can be applied for all of us: 1) Be more aware of our impact on others 2)connect and engage and 3) coach, don’t solve
The next section is all about avoiding the power gaps. The first trap of Power Gap is the Singular story – you are so tied to your version of truth and that is the only truth. A really smart boss, will realise this issue quickly and will ensure that they hear all perspectives before arriving at a decision. Don’t make assumptions about anyone – ask what is going on and get curious than getting into the Singular story which also crops up because of the insecurity one experiences. Sabina gives a simple tool called ‘Multiple meanings’ to extract yourself out of the Singular story trap.
The next chapter is on identifying communication fault lines. If you buy this book and for some unknown reason decide that you will read only one chapter then this should be that one. Sabina has done a phenomenal job on this and anything I write will not do justice to what she has done. So when you buy the book directly go this chapter and you will find out every one of our problems listed in that chapter.
Next is all about the myth of the exceptional. When leaders deliver extraordinary results they start believing that they exceptional and one of a kind so they can do and behave in any which way they want with zero regards to everyone around them. This is the first step to unethical behaviors if your values have also gone for a toss. It takes lot of courage to behave normally even after being acknowledged as someone with exceptional skills. Sabina gives a simple framework that we should implement when we are in a senior leadership position to overcome this dangerous myth about ourselves.
The next section is all about how to handle the pitfalls of the Power gap. Important characteristic of someone in Power is emotional regulation despite that fact in leadership emotions are constantly triggered. The ability to self-regulate is critical for success. To do that Sabina says we should identify our hidden triggers that generate these kind of emotional reactions and once the triggers are identified we need to practice on how to neutralize them through various techniques like mindful breathing etc.,
The chapter on unmet hungers and the discussion about that in the podcast was one of the main trigger for me to immediately order the book. I could identify so much with myself and others around me through this chapter. A must read chapter after the chapter on communication. Then she moves on to explain in detail about getting sucked into the sole provider trap by playing different roles as the caretaker, the Whack-a-mole champ, the Flash and the Straight A student. Sabina defines each and every behavior and also provides framework to overcome them effectively.
The next big mistake that newly promoted managers do is to get sucked into details and mostly into trivial details or keep doing what one was doing before being promoted and feel comfortable in it than taking strategic, big picture thinking approach. One of the best advice I have ever received in my corporate life was from a SBU leader in one of my earlier organisation. He was interviewing me for a new role and during the interview he shared details about how he got his job – “I got the job not by saying I will continue what the current leader is doing (who was extremely successful) but by giving a detailed vision of what I will bring to the table and how it will take the organisation to the next level.” This has always remained with me. If you want to be successful and get promoted you need start behaving like your future self. Many people keep doing what they were doing instead of giving up completely is because of they think of they develop their teams then their job will be eliminated. Sabina gives a simple framework that helps us to come out of this infinite loop thinking. The next big pitfall of leaders is the Super Hero Syndrome – which means that they think they are the only set of people who can keep this company running – these days easy to spot them – the people who are sitting with their laptops during their holiday trip to a picturesque location. Sabina has provided a simple time management technique that will help us to reclaim the time that we otherwise keep wasting doing others jobs.
Sometimes we may lose our sense of purpose and vision and it is possible if your organisation or your own self is going through tough times. It is equally important to rediscover our purpose and meaning and a simple tool has been provided.
So should we read this book ? – Yes
Like I have mentioned couple of times, the podcast interview triggered me into buying and reading this book. I can say emphatically it is definitely one of the best investments I have made. Sabina has written a wonderful book packaging her experiences into a framework that takes us through the various failure modes of being a leader and how to overcome them. If you are seasoned leader with lot of leadership experience, you will think that Sabina was watching you and learning what is going on in your professional career and wrote this book. It is that practical.
Written in a simple manner, narrated as if Sabina was with us walking us through the pitfalls of pressure and power and teaching us how to overcome them effectively.
The book for me is definitely worth many many times to the time spent. We may not get the opportunity to get coached by Sabina and she has solved the problem by writing this book for all of us as if we are in a fantastic one to one coaching session.
New Technology / Scientific Curiosities:
Weird world of Robotic Animals:
Was the Universe timeless before the big bang:
Read, Learn:
Ghost rivers of Mars:
Podcast episode for this Newsletter edition:
An excellent conversation on logic and use of probability:
Something Interesting to know about:
US built 5000 ships during World War 2 and that too ahead of time!!
Interesting isn’t it ?
Hope you enjoyed this edition! Do share your feedback/suggestions
Digital and Business Transformation II P&L Leadership II Strategy, Portfolio and Operations Management II Volunteer-Sustainable Living
2moThank you for this post and for sharing the summary of the book "You're the Boss". I also listened to the podcast. Look forward to reading the book in the coming days. Keep inspiring Anand V.!