Positive Thinking – Your Secret Weapon

Learning, growing, and changing is possible with the right attitude and focus. All individuals have the ability to master their individual talents and be the best they can be! There are people who scoff at this philosophy and espouse limiting beliefs. However, that is the fundamental difference between positive thinking and foolish thinking. We all have the innate ability to be the best of who we were meant to be.

Based on a 2007-2008 NBA survey, the average height of a player is 6’6”. It would be fairly inconceivable for a person with the height of 5’4” to make the NBA a long-term career choice. It is certainly a goal that can be aspired to however, physical limitations could present ongoing challenges. Is it foolish thinking for an individual of 5’4” to want to be an NBA star? Retired player, Tyrone “Muggsy” Bogues (Hornets, Bullets, Warriors, and Raptors) who is 5’3” and Wizard’s point guard Earl Boykins who is 5’5” would probably disagree.

Many great people have overcome adversity and challenge to accomplish great things. Ronald Reagan spent his early life admittedly being an introvert, but during his Presidency he was called “the great communicator.” Marie Curie, was the first person to win two Nobel prizes, the first woman to receive a doctorate in France, the mother of two daughters (one of whom also won a Nobel prize), and a tireless humanitarian; suffered through times of extreme financial and personal hardship, Curie is an amazing example of a person with perseverance, breaking boundaries imposed by others. John Lennon, the revolutionary pop music icon overcame adversity of many types along his journey; a turbulent childhood in which his mother and father each abandoned him in different ways; courageously overcame drug addiction and repaired his marriage with his wife Yoko; and he was tragically gunned down in the prime of his life by a crazed fan. Pablo Picasso overcame great poverty to become a renowned artist.

We are not born great at anything. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “All great speakers were bad speakers at first.” No leader, manager, artist, business owner, or musician started out great. However, the difference between average and great is the desire to develop and succeed, a commitment to do so, as well as a positive attitude and the belief that you will make it happen.

What do you desire to accomplish? What do you want to be known for or what will be your legacy? Define what you want to accomplish, achieve, do, and be. Be careful not to let your practical mind limit your dreams and ideas. Grant yourself permission to think big and out of the box. Make the commitment to define who you are supposed to be. Learning, growing, and changing takes work but the effort is worth the results.

The second step is making the commitment to pursue your dreams and take action. Establish and define a plan. Determine the destination and create a map to get there. Sometimes the steps necessary will be small, and sometimes you may have to take a leap of faith but trust your vision. Your contributions will make a difference to many, so failure should not be an option.

Finally, remember that positive thinking will get it done. That is not to say you will not face obstacles and adversity as success does not come easy. It has been my experience that nothing of significant value ever comes easy or free. However, your focus and your attitude will give you what is necessary to create the right solutions and the next best steps. You can’t control what happens around you but you can certainly control how you react. Your attitude and positive mindset are your secret weapons to success as you define it. Don’t let anyone or any circumstance take away your secret weapon as it is far too important to your contributions.

How the Brain Works to Make Decisions

This is a really good book if you have got the same interest as I in how the brain works to make decisions: How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009).

Here’s what I have learned about the duel between the rational brain and the emotional brain, and how it might apply to sales, business communications and influencing people…

There is a flaw in our thinking habits called the framing effect, which is a part of decision biases called loss aversion. It explains why people are much more likely to buy meat when it’s labeled 85 percent lean instead of 15 percent fat. Also, why twice as many patients opt for surgery when told there’s an 80 percent chance of survival as opposed to a 20 percent chance of dying.

Neuroscientists hooked people up to an fMRI (functional MRI) imaging machine to look at which parts of their brains lit up while making gambling decisions. Here was the gambling game they asked them to play:

Imagine that you are playing a simple game whereby you are given $50 and asked to decide between two options:

1.     All-or-nothing gamble, in which the odds are 40% you will keep the entire $50, and 60% that you will lose everything.

2.     A sure-thing: if you choose this option you get to keep $20.

If you are like most people, you take the 2nd option, the sure $20. Next, they asked people to play the game again. The risky gamble hasn’t changed, but here are the options that are offered:

1.     All-or-nothing gamble, 40% chance of keeping entire $50, and 60% chance lose it all.

2.     Sure thing: but it’s framed as a loss of $30 instead of a gain of $20.

These two gambles are the same, they are just framed differently. In both cases, you walk away with $20 of the original $50. But the different descriptions strongly affect how people play the game.

When the choice is framed in terms of gaining $20, only 42% chose the risky gamble. When it was framed in terms of losing $30, 62% of people opted to roll the dice.

What is interesting here is that they were able to see in the brain: those people whose gambling decisions were influenced by the prospect of losing $30 were misled by an excited amygdala, part of the emotional brain that evokes negative feelings. Whenever a person thinks about loss, the amygdala is activated.

But the others who were not swayed by the framing effect also had activated amygdala, they also experienced negative feelings. They were able to look past their feelings and realize that the options were the same.

What made the difference? They had more elevated activity in the pre-frontal cortex, the rational brain. These people were able to feel their feelings, and choose to ignore them. They were able to make better gambling decisions because they regulated their negative emotions.

How do you regulate your emotional brain so that you can make more rational decisions? Awareness. By simply being aware that our emotional brain is sending negative feelings, we can decide to ignore it. The ability to become aware of our brain’s processes is called metacognition, and it’s a skill that can be developed.

We know when we are angry. Every emotion comes with the ability to think about it, to label it, to try to figure out why we are feeling it. Sometimes a feeling may make no sense, as in the case of this gambling game. We can deliberately choose to ignore the emotional brain.

The question is when to ignore it and when to pay attention to it. We don’t always know or take the time for it. And because emotions can also help us make better decisions, the key is being able to discern.

Forgiveness is the fragrance the Violets release as the foot crushes them

To forgive is not to forget. Forgetting is not hard. All you need is a bad memory or to treat the incident as insignificant. But to forgive is to make a new beginning, to start all over again with the person who caused you pain. It does not take away the hurt nor does it erase the past injury. It merely ceases to obstruct the path of a new beginning. To forgive you don't have to aggravate the guilt and squeeze the soul of the person. By forgiving you can walk together into the future.

In the Bhagavad Geetha (chapter 12), Lord Krishna describes 35 qualities of a devotee; one of them is a forgiving nature. Learn to forgive. Having forgiven another, what really happens?

The rancor, the anger within, which was eating the vitals, is automatically washed and cleaned. It purifies the system. You become 24-carat gold, soft, yet solid and shining. Mark Twain captures this quality when he writes: "Forgiveness is the fragrance the Violets release as the foot crushes them."

Epictetus said more than 2,000 years ago: "It is not he who gives abuse that affronts, but the view that we take of it. Your hurts comes from not what others did to you, but from what you choose to do with their actions. If you change your attitude about the hurt, you will soon find your victim status eliminated."

Here is a short video clip: The Gift of Forgiveness  Enjoy!

What Defines Leadership?

The search for the characteristics or traits of leaders has been ongoing for centuries. Yet, defining leadership has been challenging and definitions can vary depending on the situation. Here are a few:

• We have conceived of leadership... as the tapping of existence and potential motive and power basis of followers by leaders, for the purpose of achieving an intended change...
• Though leadership may be hard to define, the one characteristic common to all leaders is their ability to make things happen...
• Leadership can be defined as the will to control events, the understanding to chart a course and the power to get a job done, cooperatively using the skill and abilities of other people...
• Leadership is the ability to get men and women to do what they don't want to do or like to do...
• Leadership appears to be the art of getting others to want to do something you are convinced should be done...

The world is evolving at every second. Everything is being touched by this accelerated pace of change. No person, entity, industry, profession, and no part of the world or any business can escape the relentless pull of the future into the present moment.

Business leaders need to chart an effective course into the future even though they don't have a clue what their organizations will look like tomorrow let alone next year. Many business leaders are mired down in philosophies, strategies and approaches that were the standards held years ago when the rules and the world were more predictable.

The rules are changing - and the rules that are determining the rules are changing.

We are living in a crazy, frenzied time in history. The roller coaster left the starting point several years ago and it is poised for yet another rapid decent - challenging what we know, believe, feel and have forecasted. The smooth ride of the past is nothing more than a distant memory for most of us. Never again will we know what is around the next corner or where or how the ride will end.

How, then, can today's executive, business owner and manager predict what their vision of what tomorrow will look like with any degree of accuracy? It's anybody's guess what the next several years will create, manifest, modify, re-define or even destroy. What you can do is: stay loose, flexible, positive and optimistic. What you want to avoid is: remaining stuck in yesterday's paradigms, attitudes, philosophies and strategies.

What are some of the specific things to avoid as we move into the future?

• Believing that what worked last year or yesterday will work today or tomorrow.
• Thinking that what you thought yesterday about the future will come to pass.
• Status-quo thinking.
• Conventional wisdom or thinking.
• Using yesterday's results as a benchmark for tomorrow.
• Refusing to think out of the box.

Spend some time considering how all of this is impacting your ability to manage successfully.

Let's close things up with what eight of the most common leadership myths:

1. To lead you have to have followers. Leadership does not imply that you have to be in front of a group. If you are the only person working in a department you can still demonstrate leadership attitudes.
2. You can study your way to effective leadership. You can attend hundreds of leadership seminars, retreats, programs, and read all of the books on leadership -- even pay for leadership coaching. Unless you are willing to let go of some of your beliefs, attitudes, prejudices, opinions or paradigms you can have all of the leadership knowledge in the world and still fail as a leader. Just look around you! This doesn't mean that you shouldn't receive leadership training, but it does mean that education is not enough, it takes wisdom, understanding and execution.
3. That to be a leader you have to be in charge of something or someone. Leadership is not position. You can be the receptionist and have a leadership attitude about your roles and responsibilities. You can be in sales and have a leadership style and mindset.
4. You have to be a senior citizen with gray hair to be an effective leader. I know many executives who are still in their twenties and are model leaders.
5. Tenure or longevity equates to effective leadership capabilities. Just because you may have been with your organization for over thirty years does not mean you are an effective leader. Any success you might have had could have been timing, luck, pure effort, will or any combination of these.
6. Position or title equates to leadership. Just because you may be the CEO, President or top executive does not mean you have leadership attitudes or skills. There are a lot of executives running organizations today that I would not classify as good or even acceptable leaders.
7. Leaders have to be willing to do any task that any of your employees are asked to do. Sure if the floor is dirty and the Janitor is sick and not at work someone needs to sweep the floor. But is it really your responsibility to show your employees that you are not above this task? Your employees want a leader they can respect and trust not a back-up for the janitorial staff.
8. Leadership is an endowment or an education process. Leadership, trust, respect and confidence are earned and not a set of mastered skill sets.

Understanding Human Behavior Opens New Doors

Scientific discoveries and new technologies promise much better life to all individuals. But delivering on that promise means that we must think and act differently. The history of innovation shows that it is a lot harder than most people realize.


It's just like the adage "A tiger doesn't change its stripes." Throughout my career as an academic scholar, author, manager, advisor, consultant, mentor, and coach, I have seen how changing behavior can be very difficult. No one can change your behavior except for you. (That was my blog last week and now, I am going to expand on that.)

Businesses Often Fail to Innovate

Disruptive innovation teaches us that when the world changes, many leading companies fail to innovate. Lotus could not compete with Microsoft, General Motors could not compete with Toyota and now Toyota is challenged. American and United Airlines are unable to compete with Southwest, and now Microsoft can't compete with Google. Why? Changing behaviors is a lot harder than most realize, even if it means lost business, bankruptcy or the demise of a company.


That's a depressing discovery, but fortunately there is a solution.

Science behind the Experience

Behaviors are driven by beliefs. To change behavior, you must first change beliefs. This is where the neurophysiology of decision-making comes into play.


Our beliefs do not reside in some anatomic filing cabinet in our brains. Rather, studies show beliefs are generated by complex recurrent firing of patterns of neurons accompanied by subtle but very specific changes in hormones and neurotransmitters. This brain activity is developed by experience and linked to the feelings that experience engenders.


In other words, we are not rational but we are sentient. Our brains are hardwired by experience and feelings. The stronger the positive feeling and the more frequent the experience, the more we become hardwired to respond in the same way.


To change behavior you must first use experience to change beliefs; you have to act, not think. Experience generates feelings that inform future experiences. The more positive the feelings and the more direct the link to experience, the more likely beliefs are to change. When beliefs change, behavior changes.


So, you can't think your way into a new way of acting; you have to act your way into a new way of thinking.

Action Works by Acting

Here are the keys to leadership success in getting people to act their way to a new way of thinking:
1. Set a clear, simple and meaningful direction.
2. Develop and empower people; it's people, not technology, that make the difference.
3. Build trust and optimism through positive results in problem solving the needs of clients.
4. Solve those problems as real-time experience, close to the work, not in meetings.
5. Grow by repeating your success and relentlessly challenging the status quo.


The results are always positive.

Action Innovation Opens New Doors for Leadership

New technologies offer the promise of wonderful improvement in people’s lives. But we will never achieve that promise without changing our behavior.

Fujio Cho, Toyota's chairman, said it well: "No mere process can turn a poor performer into a star. Rather you have to address employees' fundamental way of thinking." The recent evidence that Toyota management ignored brake problems in a "culture of secrecy" for years suggests that they forgot that this lesson also applies to leadership.

Behaviors are driven by beliefs. Beliefs are formed by experience and feelings. Instead of thinking your way into a new way of acting, you act your way to a new way of thinking.

Our brains say it's so. Leading people to act their way into a new way of thinking opens new doors for business management.

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Surya M Ganduri, PhD. PMP. is the founder and president of eMBC, Inc., an international firm specializing in strategic and executive leadership development processes that Help People Succeed in an Evolving World. His company is dedicated to helping organizations and individuals manage strategic change, innovation, cultural transition, and goal achievement. Surya has over 26 years of business experience in management consulting, leadership development, executive coaching, process improvements, organizational development and youth leadership. Contact Surya ats6ganduri@eMBCinc.com. For more information, visit www.eMBCinc.com or contact eMBC, Inc., directly at (630) 445-1321.

Think of things that no one else thinks of

In my previous blog, I suggested a few pointers on how to think 'out-of-the-box.' This week, I am going to elaborate a little more on innovative thinking with a slight twist. How can you think of things that no-one else thinks of? 


The answer is by deliberately taking a different approach to the issue from everyone else. There are dominant ideas in every field. The innovative thinker purposefully challenges those dominant ideas in order to conceive new possibilities.


Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, who discovered Vitamin C, said, “Genius is seeing what everyone else sees and thinking what no-one else has thought.” If you can identify the standard viewpoint then survey the situation from a different viewpoint you have an excellent chance of gaining a new insight. When Jonas Salk was asked how he invented the vaccine for polio he replied, “I imagined myself as a virus or cancer cell and tried to sense what it would be like.”


Ford Motor Company consulted Edward de Bono, who put forward the concept of lateral thinking, and asked the question, "How can we make our cars more attractive to consumers?" De Bono approached the problem from another direction and re-phrased the question, "How can Ford make the whole driving experience better for their customers?" And, he came up with a suggestion that Ford should buy up car parks in all the major city centers and make them available for Ford cars only. His remarkable idea was too radical for Ford who saw themselves as an automobile manufacturer with no interest in the car parks business.


The spectators at the Olympic Games in Mexico City in 1968 were amazed to see a young athlete perform a high jump with his back to the bar. Until then, every high jumper 'rolled' over the bar with his or her face down. Dick Fosbury introduced an entirely new approach, the 'flop', leaping over with his back close to the bar and his face up. Fosbury was ranked 48th in the world in 1967; yet in 1968 he caused a sensation when he won the Olympic Gold Medal with his unprecedented technique and a leap of 2.24metres. What he introduced was literally a leap of the imagination - and it revolutionized high jumping. Nowadays all the top jumpers use his method. He thought what no-one else thought and conceived a new method.


How can we force ourselves to take a different view of a situation? Instead of looking at the scene from your view try looking at it from the perspective of a customer, a product, a supplier, a child, an alien, a lunatic, a comedian, a dictator, an anarchist, an architect, Leonardo da Vinci and so on. Apply the ‘What if?’ technique. Challenge all the common assumptions. If everyone else is looking for the richest region, look for the wettest. If everyone else is facing the bar then turn your back on it.


If you had to study a valley, how many ways could you look at it? You could look up and down the valley; you could scan it from the riverside or stand and look across it from each hillside. You could walk it, drive along the road or take a boat down the river. You could study a satellite photo. You could peruse a map. Each gives you a different view of the valley and each perspective adds to your understanding of the valley. Why not do the same with any problem? Why do we immediately try to frame a solution before we have approached the problem from multiple differing perspectives?


The great geniuses did not take the traditional view and develop existing ideas. They took an entirely different view and transformed society. Picasso took a different view of painting; he saw cubes, shapes and impressions instead of accurate images. Einstein imagined a new approach to physics; a world where time and space were relative. Darwin conceived a different view of the origin of species; he saw how they might have evolved rather than been created. Each of them looked at the world in a new way. In a similar fashion, Jeff Bezos took a different view of book retailing with Amazon.com, Stelios took a new perspective on flying with Easyjet, Swatch transformed our view of watches and IKEA changed the way we buy furniture.


If we can attack problems from entirely new directions then we can think of things that conventional thinkers miss. It gives us unlimited possibilities for innovation.

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Surya M Ganduri, PhD. PMP. is the founder and president of eMBC, Inc., an international firm specializing in strategic and executive leadership development processes that Help People Succeed in an Evolving World. His company is dedicated to helping organizations and individuals manage strategic change, innovation, cultural transition, and goal achievement. Surya has over 26 years of business experience in management consulting, leadership development, executive coaching, process improvements, organizational development and youth leadership. Contact Surya at s6ganduri@eMBCinc.com. For more information, visit www.eMBCinc.com or contact eMBC, Inc., directly at (630) 445-1321.