Posts

The Art of Giving is The Art of Living - Avinash Ananda

Image
The Art of Giving is The Art of Living, By Avinash Ananda This is a special post, featuring an article written by my friend, my mentor and World's leading happiness and leadership coach - Avinash Ananda in Jan 2022. I am reproducing the contents with his permission to reach a different audience. I was honored to receive the Global happiness centric leadership excellence award from him in 2024. This award was given by Meta Mind International, in association with Kotler Impact and HRD India. See pic below. .................................................................... "Give not for Getting, but for the Joy of Giving." - Avinash Ananda When I speak of giving, what I mean is to contribute to others selflessly, abundantly, and joyfully. You could contribute positive energy, a smile, and gifts (both material and non-material). Even your work could be an act of contributing when you work with love, joy, and excellence. The act of listening with 100 per cent att...

Life lessons from Motorcycle rides

Image
Life lessons from Motorcycle rides. Most of us lead busy lives with minimum 50 plus hours of work every week. Add matrix reporting lines, multi geo time zone work pressures, travel, business, customer, and people management. Life can be very hectic and demanding. That's the time, you must prioritize your happiness and well-being. Recharge regularly. Make time for your hobbies. I have done several thousand kilometres of motorcycle rides across beautiful India over many decades. Research proves Motorcycle riding enhances many skills. You need to be physically agile & fit, have great balance and reflexes, excellent hand, leg and eye coordination, temperament to handle uncertain terrain with sense of adventure, protective clothing for safety and also handle elements of extreme heat cold humidity rains etc If done correctly, motorcycle riding is one of the most joyful, therapeutic, meditative and flow like activities you can do in your life. The sense of bliss, memories and achiev...

Brand story - Mercedes Benz

Image
As a marketer I'm fascinated by stories told by brands about thier heritage.  MERCEDES BENZ   Do you know How Mercedes Benz got its name? How they got thier 3 pointed star logo? And how the man who invented the automobile (Karl Benz) is their founder? And how it took a gutsy woman (Bertha Benz), to promote the automobile to the masses? And do you know Mercedes, is named after the daughter of entrepreneur called Emil Jellineck? Karl Benz is widely regarded as "the father of the car", as well as the "father of the automobile industry". His Benz Patent-Motorwagen from 1885 is considered the first practical modern automobile and first car put into series production. He received a patent for the motorcar in 1886, the same year he first publicly drove the Benz Patent-Motorwagen. He was a prolific inventor. While designing what would become the production standard for his two-stroke engine, Benz patented the speed regulation system, the ignition using sparks with batte...

The fourth place in Olympics

Image
The fourth place. Gold Silver Bronze. Every Gold medal winner is happy. But do you know, the Silver medalist’s are less happy than bronze medalist’s. They are unhappy about missing gold while the bronze medallist is happy to be on the podium. Have we ever wondered what happens to the fourth place athlete in olympics? The world is sometimes cruel. We live in a society where winner takes it all. But let's spare a thought for people who are really good, but sometimes can't make the final step. There are countless world champion gymnasts swimmers track and field athletes who are not fortunate to win even a bronze medal. Roger Bannister the first man to run a mile under 4 mins and a legend finished 4th place in 1952 olympics. Milka Singh and PT Usha fastest Asian male and female sprinters respectively got 4th place in Olympics. Soccer legend, Pele, voted the athlete of last century never won an Olympic medal. Latest example. Novak Djokovic won 24 grand slams. Participated in 5 olymp...

Dream teams

Image
Dream teams In business or in sports have you been part of Dream teams? Dream teams dominate thier domain in results. have great camaraderie. and are remembered a long time, even after many decades for thier legacy. Did you know, for 28 years, 7 consecutive olympics from 1928 India won the field hockey gold. In 1935, cricket legend Don Bradman met hockey legend Dhyan Chand for the first time and watched him play for the Indian side that beat South Australia 10-1. "You score goals like runs in cricket," Bradman said to Chand after the match. Chand, who was born on August 29, 1905, won three Olympic gold medals with India. His team of 1928 to 1936 was the original Dream Team. In 1936, India beat Germany, 8-1 in olympics before Adolf Hitler in the stands at Berlin and showed how Brown men from India proved Hitlers White Aryan Supremacy theory wrong. Later in the same Olympic games Legend Jesse Owen's did it again. People of color can be world beaters given the right opportun...

Strong and Silent leader : Rahul Dravid

Image
Strong and silent leaders  We are used to a world where, many times, showmanship triumphs substance. And People who don't walk the talk. So it's refreshing to see someone like Rahul Dravid who does things so quietly and calmly, it stands out for its principles  A few would recall when a university in Karnataka wanted to award him doctorate degree for his cricket success, he politely refused saying, he would rather study and specialize in some subject before getting it. Recently, Rahul Dravid refused BCCI's extra ₹2.5 crore ($300k) bonus over rest of his support staff for T20 World Cup victory. Keeping up with his principles of taking an equal share of prize bonus as the rest of his support staff, the outgoing head coach refused to take the additional ₹2.5 crore that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) was awarding him — at par with members of the playing squad of India’s T20 World Cup winning team. Dravid had made a similar point as head coach of India’s winnin...

Lessons from India winning T20 world cup

Image
We can learn a lot of leadership lessons from sport. Cricket is religion in India. it's like soccer in Brazil. You will have CEOs to Street vendors commenting on the game and I'm no different.  Today (Saturday 29th June 2024) is a momentous day for many Indians. Congratulations Team India. On becoming the world T20 Cricket champions 🏆 T20 Cricket world cup final had so many lessons. INDIA was the only undefeated team in the entire tournament. India beat USA, Afghanistan, England, Pakistan, Australia and finally South Africa to win the cup. In the finals, South Africa needed just 30 runs in 30 balls. The trophy was almost theirs. But In 5 overs SA got choked (again) and could score just 23 runs and lost many wickets. India kept thier nerves, won the game by 7 runs.  There was an all round display of brilliant batting bowling and fielding by India. Bumrahs brilliance in changing the course of the game by taking crucial wickets when momentum was in SAs favor, Surya presence of m...