leadership and innovation ( post something I wrote before)

Last Friday KTSF interviewed a former Chinese Dotcom CTO
and an Director from a big company (she was my alumna by
chance, so  I payed attention to the show:-). They
talked about leadership and innovation, which I got
some deep impression.  Leadership and innovation were
used to be different concepts, such as leadership is
giving people the impression of being strong,
demanding, people skills, having vision and influence
etc. While innovation is always involoved with coming
up with new product and technology, scientic or
engineering stuff. But imin Lee (she is from cisco,
and she was the CEO of a startup company acquired by
cisco) said innovation should include business model
since science has developed so fast that application
of technology in business application has become very
critical. In that sense, innovation in developing new
business model is also counted, which might be ignored
or narrowed out.  And the Netease CTO said, innovation
should include the ways of get things done
(做事的方法). He seems to come from management side,
so his mind set was from management, team buildin, and
hiring the right person etc.

The integration of leadership and innovation should
apply to every aspect of work. Leading not only needs
authority and efficiency, but also innovation. A
leader should have both these characters and skills.
And leadership and innovation should not be talked and
studied seperately. We chinese many times are afraid
to lead -- leading almost is interpreted as people
management which we think we are not good at it; we
chinese maybe good at innovation at technology, but
may not be very good a business applications. That may
makes us to be a hardworking people, but may not be
successful people. So their opinion is nowadays
leading must be associated with innovation. And
innovation must rely on leadership to implement and
drive things and get things done. Ipod might not be a
new technology, but it leads to the change of life
style. 

The following is my own thoughts:
And in personal life, we also need leadership and
innovation skills, that includes living by yourself,
with family, group of friends and within a community.
leadership skills make you dare to voice your voice,
to implement your desire to make changes, and
communicate with others.  Innovation can make you do
things smartly and differently from conventional
routine. Having the innovation mindset also drive you
to find alternatives, do others don't dare to do. That
would make your life and the life of people around you
a lot different. 

Life is a contrary game

Just like golf is a contrary game:

• If you want to hit a ball high with iron, you have to hit it down, not up.

• If you are anxious to see the result of your swing by lifting your head earlier, you might end up messing it up. The key is to delay lifting your head and don't be anxious to know the result. Focus on the ball by looking at until you no longer can keep your eye on it.
• If you want to play it well and play it hard, you might end up playing it bad. If you don't care on the result, instead focus on details, you might play well.

How about life, quite similar:

• If you are stingy and want to save $$, you might end up loosing $$
• If you are anxious to be successful, you might end up with nothing. Rather, if you stick with you interest and enjoy doing what you are doing, you are already successful.
• If you want to be perfect, don't try to fix your weakness. Rather continue to work on your strength.
  
• If you want someone to be perfect, don't change him/her. Treat him/her as if he/she is perfect.
  
• If you want to be happy, then you have to bear the toughness.
• Your heart might not be lonely when you are alone. While you are surrounded by people, your heart might be lonely.
• When things are bad, thinking good things will be coming. When things are good, think bad.
• If you want to get someone, let him/her leave. If you grasp someone, she/he might leave.
  

有多少爱可以重来

有多少爱可以重来 常常责怪自己 当初不应该 常常后悔没有 把你留下来 为什么明明相爱到最后 还是要分开 是否我们总是徘徊在心门之外 谁知道又和你 相遇在人海 命运如此安排 总叫人无奈 这些年过得不好不坏 只是好象少了一个人存在 而我渐渐明白 你仍然是我不变的关怀 有多少爱 可以重来 有多少人 愿意等待 当懂得珍惜以后回来 却不知那份爱会不会还在 有多少爱 可以重来 有多少人 值得等待 当爱情已经桑田沧海 是否还有勇气去爱

Discover your strength (2) What is Talent?

Talent is often described as "a special natural ability or aptitude". In more plain language, talent is any recurring pattern of thought, feeling, or behavior that can be productively applied. Thus, if you are instinctively inquisitive, that is a talent. If you are competitive, that is a talent. If you are responsible, that is a talent.

Why are your talents enduring and unique? your recurring patterns are created by the connections in your brain; and beyond a certain age you are not going to be able to stitch to a completely new design -- your talents are enduring.

How brain works?
Your brain gets very big quickly and then shrinks into adulthood. As your brain becomes smaller and smaller, you become smarter. Why does the odd thing happen? It is because of "synapse", interconnection between two brain cells(neurons) that enable cells to communicate with one another. Behavior depends on the formation of appropriate interconnections among neurons in the brain. Your synapses create your talents.

Neurons are created very fast after you are conceived and the number reaches its peak when you are born and you have about that many up until late middle age. And shortly before your birth, synapse is formed when interconnection is made by each neuron to each other. At the age of three, 15000 connections for each of your hundred billion neurons are made. That is a very huge number of threads. Then most these threads are neglected and disrepaired. Between age of 3 and 15, you lose billions of these carefully forged synaptic connections; you can rebuild them. But "less is more", your smartness and your effectiveness depend on how well you capitalize on your strongest connections. Nature forces you to shut down billions of connections precisely so that you can be freed up to exploit the ones remaining. Otherwise, there would be too much noises. Your genetic inheritance and early childhood experiences assist you in finding some connections smoother and easier to use than others. Meanwhile, ignored and unused connections wither away. No signal at call can be heard. For example, if you end up with a T1 line for competitiveness, you will use them to compare your performance with others. If you wind up with a T1 line for inquisitiveness, you are the kind of person who can't help asking why.

So the truth is our sense isn't common at all. Each of us perceives the world uniquely. And the difference between people have nothing to do with race or sex or age;they are a function of each person's network of mental connection.

Why are your talents so important to strength building?
By defining your talents as your strongest synaptic connections, we can now see why it is impossible why it is impossible to build a strength without underlying talent.

Your performance depends on you use your strongest T1 links in daily decision makings. By natural you will use your those T1 links instantaneously with least resistance. You can learn skills for the purpose of damage control, not for development. Skill won't elevate you to excellence.

Learning through repetition may result in a few new connections, it will not help you create more superfast T1 lines. Nature has developed three ways for you to learn as an adult: continue to strengthen your existing synaptic connections, keep loosing more of your extraneous connections, or develop a few more synaptic connections. The least efficient of the three is the last because your body has to expend relatively large amounts of energy creating the biological infrastructure to create these new connections.

thoughts of the day

1) Find out what you love and what you are talented. Trace these things at all costs. Is it a BS? I think not, very basic question, but extremely important. It encompasses your life partner, your job, hobbies and other things.

What are the normal obstacles at doing this? Loneliness.
Human being are afraid of loneliness. If you are trying to do this, you are almost belonged to the 10% rare population. In extreme word "alien". So you have to do many things alone. You have to overcome this challenge in order to fully chase something important to yourself. In one word, it is a lonely road.

So how to overcome this problem? We are all human being, we want to be specific when talking about solutions. I think one thing we can do, the best, is to form a group of people like you, who also belong to this 10% population. If you think you are quite unique person, don't downgrade yourself to associate with people who don't understand you.

Beside this approach, I don't know what to do? So my approach is just to bear it. Not a good one, but at least, loneliness won't kill you, hehe.

2) Your voice. Don't be afraid to give your voice. That is your identity, your opinion, your influence, your image in people mind and your confidence builder. Never give up this right; it comes with your right of birth. Always not be afraid to show your identity.

3) Better and Stronger. How? Be your best no matter in what circumstances.
But exactly how to achieve this?
I think practically you have to follow the good image in your mind no matter in what circumstances. Just like playing golf, if you have tiger wood's swing motion in your mind and you can emulate that motion, you will hit a good shoot. But many times, this image get distracted by either someone with louse swing around you, you are frustrated, you are tired, or you are just in bad mode.

Emulate the good and visulized image and form a habit gradually. If you can burn this image in your brain and stick with it, they will become part of your body some time. When this new habit replace your old habit, you will be better.

4) Greatness and making mistakes. The cost of greatness is making mistakes. If you are afraid of making mistakes in playing tennis, you won't be able to serve hard with risk of loosing both serves. It is a terrible mistake to be conservative in tennis. You want to become stronger by making mistakes, psychologically and technically.

5) Enjoyment, having fun and relaxation. It is very important you know how to enjoy life, have fun and how to relax. Without doing this, you are a stupid person in this world.

Paradox of Influcence

How can I influence someone to my point of view? (From Dr. David Palmer)

1. Invest Time: Begin at the end, what is the outcome you need? What is the likely outcome they need? Research how the person fits into, or doesn't fit into, the situation. Identifying what you know and what you don't know from other sources. Next, plan the meeting. What questions will you ask? What quesitons are you likely to be asked? Schedule a face-to-face where you won't be disturbed. Depending on the issue and the circumstances, you may need to meet several times.

2. Focus: Focus all of yourr concentration and attention on the other person. Your mind works four to five times faster the nthe average person talks so it takes concentrated effort to focus all of your thinking on the other person. Train yourself not to mentally challenge (in your mind), but to accept, everything they say. It is the only way you can truely listen to everything they say. Be genuinely interested, lean into the conversation; it is terribly flattering.

3. Ask Questions: Ask quesitons about their favorite subject, themselves. Ask about their background, accomplishements, the biggest problems or challenges now or in the past, and what they think the future holds short and long term, etc. In most cases, it's desirable (1)to have questions well in mind by writing them ahead of time, and (2) to take notes, you'll need them later.

4. Reveal: Share some brief, not too personal, information about yourself. You don't want to convey the impression that you're interrogating the other person; you do want to build a relationship. And what you do reveal should parallel what they have revealed.

5. Ask for Opinions: Ask the other person for opinions about the issue(s) you wantto discuss. Be a reporter; ask quesitons that start with what, where, when, how, who and [judiciously] why, being careful not to raise defenses with your why questions. Soften your voice, slow your rate of speech, and get a slightlhy pussled look on your face when you ask why questions. Selectively ask, "How is the important to you?"

6. Listen Actively: Truely listen, carefully and actively (nod your head, use encouragers like, Humm, Interesting, and Then What) , and keep taking notes, if appropriate. It's not only flattering for you to put their words in writing, but it also helps you remember, and you both know you have a record.

7. Summarize: After you have exhausted your questions, summarize what the other prson said in three to five key points(from your notes. Then ask: "Have I got it" If you don't have it exactly right, she'll set you straight on-the-spot. Make adjustments to your summary statements until the other person says, "Yes, you've got it." Do NOT move to Step 8 until you get this response. Why? The Paradox of Influence: People must first be convinced they thoroughly and completely influence you before you can influence them!

8. Ask for Commitment: Now it's your turn to persuade. Ask, "Would you be willing to discuss some ideas I have on this subject that might prove to be mutually beneficial?". If the other person doesn't say, "sure" that this point, you didn't ask enough questions. Go back to Step 5 and ask them more questions to discover the basis for their reluctance.

9. Present: Do not challenge the other person's ideas directly, but present your ideas as "alternative approaches" to solving the problem or improving the situation. Relate your ideas to their self-interests - be direct, keep it short, give genuine compliments, simile and look them in the eye while you're doing it. Be quitely strong, thougtful, and determined.

10. Ask for Help: Ask for the other person's "special help." And if he or she says, "No,", look very disappointed... and don't say a word. Let them fill the silence with a counter offer. Next, whatever the other person offers, ask for more. Finally, strike a bargain with the perceived advantage going to them.

Discover your Strength (1) -- General

According to the book "Now, discover your strengths" (by Marcus Buckingham & Donald O. Clifton), a strength is "consistent near perfect performance in an activity". In that sense, Tiger Woods's extraordinary long-game and his putting is a strength. While his ability to chip out of a bunker is not. Bill Gates's genius at taking innovations and transforming them into user-friendly applications is a strength, whereas his ability to maintain and build an enterprise in the face of legal and commercial assault is not.

By defining strength in this way, the author reveal three of the most important principles of living a strong life:
1) How to make sure you are acting at your strength? The answer is you must be able to do it consistantly, which implies that it is a predictable part of your performance. And you must also derive some intrinsic satisfaction from the activity. Occationally getting a 80s score at golf game doesn't mean you are a 80 golfer, only constantly hitting 80s can claim that. By contrast, Bill Gates is quite capable of implementing Microsoft's strategy, but performing this role drains him of energy, this ability is not a strength. So the ability is a strength only if you an fathom yourself doing it repeatedly, happily and sucessfully.

2) You don't have to have strength in every aspect of your role in order to excel. excellent performers were rarely well rounded. On the contrary, they were sharp.

3) You will excel only by maximizing your strengths, never by fixing your weaknesses. It is not to say to "ignore your weaknesses". They found ways to manage around their weaknesses, thereby frring them up to hone their strengths to a sharper point. A fews ways to do that: hire someone to do it for you(Bill Gates); stop doing it(if you are not good at some career);damage control by either reaching acceptable levels or by minizing the chances to deal with your weaknesses(like Tiger Woods and weak backhand tennis players)