Dare More, Be More

It was the final Strategy class during preterm session at Stanford. After discussing corporate strategies of several successful world class companies, Prof. Leslie took the last few moments to express his views on the strategy of life. He encouraged us all to “Be Bold” in our career and in life. His advice made me reflect on my personal life and the lives of men and women that dared to be bold.

Boldness is the attitude that makes the difference between playing to win and playing not to lose. With my personal experience as a typical middleclass boy (if you know what I mean) from a suburban town in India, I can relate to the feelings what it means to be playing safe in life. I always preferred to sit in the last row at school – my perceived zone of safety in that environment. I always chose not to ask questions in any open forum lest my ignorance gets exposed to the crowd. By suppressing the dumb question in my mind, I might have looked intelligent (?) in that moment, but I also chose to remain ignorant forever, as they say in a Chinese proverb. I do not know whether it was my wrong understanding of the meaning of failure or the fear of looking different from the crowd that made me defensive in my approach to life. My tendency to seek approval from people around me in my thoughts and actions in order to send across a message “I belong” made me live somebody else’s life. At some point, I even convinced myself, I should actually be the person others want me to be. I believed that to be the recipe of maximizing social acceptance. Well, after a couple of grey hairs I realized nobody really cares. But I know I am not the only one leading somebody else’s life.

Later in my life, when I travelled abroad, I was particularly impressed with people that took themselves less seriously and tried new things, constantly. Life is a tragedy for those who feel and a comedy for those who think. The bold approach to life does not let one bogged down with unwarranted feelings of fear while trying new things. People who make things break a lot more things. Making things is a journey and breaking is a path to reach there. One of my friends from China read a book on mountaineering, bought a few travel aids and started his journey – alone. On the way he met somebody who turned out to be a professional mountaineer. They became friends and my friend learned mountaineering from him.

When I went to Israel for a business trip, I was curious to notice every building in the city had an underground basement. My sales colleague explained that is where the residents take shelter during bombings. He also told me that if there is a bombing in the morning the coffee shop across the street is open no later than 5 P.M in the evening, the same day. The good moments in life are too short to be missed due to fear of past or future bad moments!

Recently, I chose to give myself a lot more freedom to be just me and do what I think is the right thing to do to express my truest self. And, “I am loving it”.

Yes, life is short and the biggest risk of life is probably taking none. One man I know who made the most from his short but meaningful life made sure he always did three simple things everyday- something funny, something generous and something risky.

Being bold is a culture that shapes the culture of society, organization and nation. The culture of an organization is the extension the personality of the leader. When a risk averse leader leads an organization, the strategy for the company is generally to follow and not to lead. It is no wonder that top business schools focus so much on the diversity or breadth of experience of candidates in the admission process. People, dare more, do more and are bound to be more.

I was babysitting my two year old son, Priyam the other day, and I counted in two hours I told him 43 “Don’t”s and 13 “NO”s. Next day, I came up with a radically different kid management strategy. I allowed my son to break a few things, at the risk of a verbal duel with my wife. But I dared to take a chance. My son had a “home alone feeling” under the supervision of the new and improved dad.

But the short term consequence was not an enjoyable experience for me.Total empowerment of a two year old was not perceived as a great idea. I failed to convince my wife my long term vision and the concept of innovative parenting. But I felt good (I know she follows my blog), that it was my honest attempt to do my bit to make the next generation of kids bolder so that they lead a richer life with a more diverse set of experiences.

When my son grows up, I will probably offer give him just one advice which I learned from my marketing professor Michaela at Stanford – “Go Big, or Go Home”. I hope he makes a lot more things than he broke the other day in future and prove his dad right-for once!