A Moment of Thought

A man came out of his home to admire his new truck. To his puzzlement, he found his three-year-old son happily hammering dents into the shiny truck surface. Without giving it a thought, he hammered the little boy's hand.

When the father calmed down, he rushed his son to the hospital. Although the doctor tried desperately to save his crushed bones, He finally had to amputate the fingers from both the boy's hands.

When the boy woke up from surgery, and saw his bandaged stubs,
he innocently said - "Daddy, I’m sorry about your truck".
Then he asked- “but when are my fingers going to grow back?"

The father went home and committed Suicide.

This short true story further illustrates the 90/10 principle (Read previous article). You might be saying the story sounds a little too extreme; But the truth is not being able to take control of your reaction can have a far more reaching fatal effect than this.

At times we say some actions are reflex or perhaps, there's no time for thinking before reacting. The truth is, you can consciously decide what your reaction will be. You can master the art such that you become conditioned to what i'll call a positive reaction (irrespective of the situation).

Think before you React.

The 90/10 Priniciple

Author: Stephen Covey
Discover the 90/10 Principle.
It will change your life (at least the way you react to situations).
What is this principle? 10% of life is made up of what happens to you. 90% of life is
decided by how you react.
What does this mean? We really have no control over 10% of what happens to us.
We cannot stop the car from breaking down. The plane will be late arriving, which
throws our whole schedule off. A driver may cut us off in traffic.
We have no control over this 10%. The other 90% is different. You determine the
other 90%.
How? ……….By your reaction.
You cannot control a red light. but you can control your reaction. Don't let people fool
you; YOU can control how you react.
Let's use an example.
You are eating breakfast with your family. Your daughter knocks over a cup of coffee
onto your business shirt. You have no control over what just happened.
What happens next will be determined by how you react.
You curse.
You harshly scold your daughter for knocking the cup over. She breaks down in
tears. After scolding her, you turn to your spouse and criticize her for placing the cup
too close to the edge of the table. A short verbal battle follows. You storm upstairs
and change your shirt. Back downstairs, you find your daughter has been too busy
crying to finish breakfast and get ready for school. She misses the bus.
Your spouse must leave immediately for work. You rush to the car and drive your
daughter to school. Because you are late, you drive 40 miles an hour in a 30 mph
speed limit.
After a 15-minute delay and throwing $60 traffic fine away, you arrive at school. Your
daughter runs into the building without saying goodbye. After arriving at the office 20
minutes late, you find you forgot your briefcase. Your day has started terrible. As it
continues, it seems to get worse and worse. You look forward to coming home.
When you arrive home, you find small wedge in your relationship with your spouse
and daughter.
Why? …. Because of how you reacted in the morning.
Why did you have a bad day?
A) Did the coffee cause it?
B) Did your daughter cause it?
C) Did the policeman cause it?
D) Did you cause it?
The answer is “D".
You had no control over what happened with the coffee. How you reacted in those 5
seconds is what caused your bad day.
Here is what could have and should have happened.
Coffee splashes over you. Your daughter is about to cry. You gently say, "Its ok
honey, you just need to be more careful next time". Grabbing a towel you rush
upstairs. After grabbing a new shirt and your briefcase, you come back down in time
to look through the window and see your child getting on the bus. She turns and
waves. You arrive 5 minutes early and cheerfully greet the staff. Your boss
comments on how good the day you are having.
Notice the difference?
Two different scenarios. Both started the same. Both ended different.
Why?
Because of how you REACTED.
You really do not have any control over 10% of what happens. The other 90% was
determined by your reaction.
Here are some ways to apply the 90/10 principle. If someone says something
negative about you, don't be a sponge. Let the attack roll off like water on glass. You
don't have to let the negative comment affect you!
React properly and it will not ruin your day. A wrong reaction could result in losing a
friend, being fired, getting stressed out etc.
How do you react if someone cuts you off in traffic? Do you lose your temper? Pound
on the steering wheel? A friend of mine had the steering wheel fall off) Do you
curse? Does your blood pressure skyrocket? Do you try and bump them?
WHO CARES if you arrive ten seconds later at work? Why let the cars ruin your
drive?
Remember the 90/10 principle, and do not worry about it.
You are told you lost your job.
Why lose sleep and get irritated? It will work out. Use your worrying energy and time
into finding another job.
The plane is late; it is going to mangle your schedule for the day. Why take outpour
frustration on the flight attendant? She has no control over what is going on.
Use your time to study, get to know the other passenger. Why get stressed out? It
will just make things worse.
Now you know the 90-10 principle. Apply it and you will be amazed at the results.
You will lose nothing if you try it. The 90-10 principle is incredible. Very few know and
apply this principle.
The result?
Millions of people are suffering from undeserved stress, trials, problems and
heartache. We all must understand and apply the 90/10 principle.
It CAN change your life!!!
Enjoy….

The GS Family

A li'l Peep into HR 2

Hope you had a good weekend? Mine was fun. Almost wished it wouldn't end.
I decided to continue on HR as i started last week. I considered posting something on a lighter note but i think that concluding subsequently will be better for easy comprehension.
In case you have not read the previous article, please do, as this is a continuation.

Capacity for Change:
HR puts in place a system that can manage change and transformation effectively. Transformation refers to a fundamental cultural change within an organization.
Change refers to the aboility to improve the design and implementation of initiatives within the firm and also to reduce the time cycle inherent in organizational activitites.
HR professionals are cultural guardians and catalysts and also help to identify processes for change.
HR does this by helping employees let go old and adapt to new cultures and helps the organization to identify the processes that can manage change.
HR professionals are change agents. They help make change happen, understand the critical processes for change, build commitment to those processes and ensure that change occurs as planned.

Employee Contribution:
This role is more than managing the day-to-day problems, concerns and needs of employees. It is imporatnt to note that the intellectual capital (manpower) is a critical source of a firms value i.e the people make up the firm.
HR performs the role of aggressively and actively developing the intellectual capital. This it does by helping employees to contribute through their competence to do good work and their commitment to working diligently. HR ensures that the employee contributions are linked to business success.
With active HR as employee champions that identifies and meets the needs of the employee; overall employee contribution will go up naturally.
HR personally spends time with the employees and train and encourage line managers to do the same.

All Possible HR roles are summarised under the above headings.
HR refers to HR professionals and Departments.

Hope you had a wonderful weekend. I had a good one.

A li'l Peep into HR 1

I love HR and i'm currently reading a book titled the "Human Resource Champions" by Dave Ulrich.
I'll like to share a little from the book for the benefit of those who know nothing about the peofession, those who have a misconception about it.

HR has a multiple role model ranging from Operational (day-to-day) to strategic (long term), and the focus ranges from people to processes.

These roles are
1. Strategy execution
2. Administrative Efficiency
3. Capacity for change
4. Employee contribution.
These roles are can be termed deliverables of HR practices. That is, they are the outcomes of HR activities.

Strategy execution:
The strategic HR role focuses on aligning HR practices and strategy with the business practices and strategy in order to create a system that can achieve the organizational objectives. Here HR professionals increase the capacity of an organization to execute its strategies; They participate in the process of defining business strategies by asking questions that move strategy to action and by designing HR practices that are in allighment with the business strategy.
In any organization, strategies exist either explicitly or implicitly,HR professionals should be able to identify the practices that can make the strategy happen. The primary role here is to translate business strategies into HR practices.

Administrative Efficiency:
HR is the caretaker of the corporate infrastructure. HR ensures that efficient HR processes for Staffing, training, appraising, rewarding are designed and delivered.
HR professionals accomplish administrative efficiency in 2 ways:

a.Ensure efficiency in the HR processes
b.Hiring, Training and rewarding Managers who increase productivity and reduce waste.

By delivering administrative efficiency, HR plays the role of an administrative expert, mastering and pioneering re engineering refforts that foster HR and business processes by being able to cut out unnecessary costs, improve efficiency, and constatntly find ways to do things better.
Simply put, Administrative efficiency is the ability to accomplish more with less.

There is a general misconception that HR is a social/corporate therapy for employees, It is designed to provide oractices that amke employees more competeitive. Not anyone, even if you are a people person can do HR. HR is based on proven theories, principles, research and it is evolutionary in nature.

Life is a Gift

Life is not earned, neither is it inherited. It is a temporary gift. Don't take it for granted, live it meaningfully. Every moment of every minute counts. Your action in a moment can affect a lifetime. Don't waste precious time, it is invaluable because it cannot be replaced.
Enjoy life because it's short, do things that make you happy and others too.
Your experiences to a large extent define your perspective to life; so see the humor side of life.
Life is precious and delicate; Handle with care.


Picture origin: http://www.istockphoto.com/imageindex/693/5/693561/cradle.html

Free Your Mind

Thinking back, i remember i always wanted or felt i could do a lot of things that are meaningful and productive with my life. Thought having it altogether in a multi-faceted world was a piece of cake.
But lately, i noticed that i had made an unconscious choice of letting my life revolve around my work alone (which is pathetic). And this is not only peculiar to me but i think to a lot of other people who have to wake up early in the morning and go to an office to come back late at night to just end up sleeping. It sounds like a program or a routine, which we all have automatically been accustomed to.
This is not necessarily true with everybody, some people have mastered the art of not doing more things at a limited time but doing those things that matter within the allocated time.
But for those of us that are having a form of challenge here, i want to say that it is possible. Our lives doesn't have to be so streamlined and limited to our work life. How about other little things that add value? Take a second to think about this- How many times in the last 5 days have you made a conscious effort to give of yourself to someone else not with an underlying motive of getting something in return? Giving of yourself could be your time, money, affection - (your valuable resources). Or even taken time out to consider a bigger picture of how the world can be a better place for people around you and even the world at large?
One can be humanitarian in nature and yet be living a selfish life. You feel some form of sympathy for people that are less fortunate but rarely do anything to make them a little less fortunate. Think about it you have been living for yourself alone and even at that the vaccum in your life is widenning the more.
I can directly relate to this because i have been living thesame way too. Though i know i can do better, i have more than enough time to do those things that really matter, make decisions and take actions that have the potentials to live after me; but i've been engrossed in my almost valueless (in actual sense) daily routine. After a long thought which came about from a strong feeling of unease, i decided to consciously live beyond my daily life. I think about means and avenues where i can develop myself not solely for the purpose living more comfortably but largely for the benefit of mankind.
Bottomline is, we all that are caught up in our daily monotonous life can start to make a conscious effort to step out of that self imposed limitation and do those things we would love to do but ordinarily could not create time for.
Have a changed perspective, look at the big picture, don't limit your choices and decisions with you in mind alone. Think about how you want to be remembered after you have spent your time.
Live for a purpose that is beyond you.

Reference Image: International Consortium for Higher Education, Civic Responsibility and Democracy.

Freedomuntitled as the name implies is a faceless blog. That means it is not dedicated to a single topic or a particular area of interest. Here, anything is possible if it is value based.