Compassion - How can it be cultivated ?

Compassion is one of the characteristics that is unique to us homo sapiens, yet we don't exhibit it all that often. In my opinion, compassion is the hallmark of a good human, a good leader. In many of my earlier posts I have dwelt on empathy and genuine interest, which underpins effective communication, influence and all those other traits of an effective person. But compassion is fundamental to empathy and genuine interest. Not surprisingly, Hindu scriptures place compassion right at the center of spirituality. How compassionate are we? And are there a set of people with whom we are compassionate and those with whom we are not? Do prejudices play their part? Can we cultivate compassion that is bereft of prejudice and ulterior motive. The answer is an emphatic YES.
 Indian scriptures and Bodhisattva lay emphasis on the cycle of births. We are believed to be going through a cycle of rebirths based on our Karmic actions (negative and positive) in our past births. The more good we do in this birth, the better fortunate would we be in our next birth. In each birth, we need to perform good actions, for the benefit of others without any expectation for oneself. In this whole churn of cycles of birth and rebirth, the ones who are our friends, our parents in this birth, might have been our foes in our past birth. And those who are our foes in this birth might have been our near and dear ones, our well wishers in the past births. So then, would it be prudent to be compassionate with our near and dear ones in this birth and disregard or ill-treat our so called foes?
 Even if you were to ignore the cycle of births, have you ever returned a bad deed with compassion? When someone is bent upon spoiling your professional progress for example, instead of confronting that person head-on, have you tried to be compassionate with that person? Have you tried to analyze why this person might want to thwart your progress, and how you can help this person? If you were to reach out to this person, and probably help with this person's progress, would you not end up winning another friend instead of a foe? Would not this person hold you in high regard and consider you a leader as opposed to an adversary? Organizations are always in need of this kind of a leader. And even in your personal life, instead of returning a bad deed with another one, if you were to return with a good deed out of compassion, you would have more friends rather than foes, and that in itself would go a long way in restoring peace and sanity in our life.

How to create good presentations?

 There are many tips and tricks of trade that has been taught to people in the corporate world, for creating a "great" presentation. I am happy if we gave "good" presentation rather. Why "good" and not "great" must be a question that you might have in mind....

 Well ... what is the objective of presenting? To put across our point of view and rally people around our "Point of View". Do you think people will rally around you just because you have fancy animations and pictures in your presentation? Or talking at length about it?

The answer is NO. It is much like having a conversation, except that a presentation could be for a larger audience with common or related interests. For others to be able to support you, your first intention must be to have a win-win situation.

What good can you do to others by this "Point of View"? How will it benefit others? Put others' interests before yours. These are what our scriptures have taught us as "golden rules" or "principles" of life. If one sticks to these, we would naturally create a riveting presentation which has the "goodness" in it. And that is what I meant when I said I would rather create a "good" presentation than a "great" presentation.

 In my own presentations I try to stick to 3 ways in which my "Point of View" can benefit the audience. If I can't identify the "goodness" factor, I open up the session to get views on how the audience thinks it can benefit or would like to see. That way even if I don't have the answers, we get to agree on a cause / action, which in essence , is the whole purpose of "presentation".

The conflicts, obscurity and all of it is taken care, when there is "goodness" for everyone. In my opinion, people generally don't agree or don't understand when they don't see the "goodness" factor.

Any thoughts or experiences that you would like to share?
 

Live an Let Live ! – Mantra for Communication with focus on leadership

One of the first instincts of human-beings soon after birth is Communication, and yet,

as mature adults we have a myriad of problems Communicating! Strange! One might

argue that the purpose of communication of a baby is different from that of an adult. It

is multipurpose, multidimensional etc. etc. and hence it is challenging. We go through

some of the best and tested corporate training and grooming to COMMUNICATE. I

would instead take a leaf from our ancient Indian scriptures and make it simple. We can deal effectively with differing social styles in people; Handle problems without harming

relationships; address challenges in collaboration; Cross cultural communication;

communicate effectively to establish and maintain mutual purpose and mutual respect

• with just one mantra - Live and Let Live! Wondering how? Read on ….

What is the essence of this mantra? No matter what technique you use, if the underlying intentions are not noble, it will show through. Noble?? I can already see eyes rolling. What has noble got to do with effective communication? Can we have noble cause and intentions and still survive in this world? I am convinced it is.

Irrespective of the differing social styles, culture, religion, “survival” instinct is the

basis of human race. And anything that seemingly threatens this instinct leads to

conflicts - harms relationships, destroys trust, destroys mutual purpose and mutual

respect.

Self preservation is the behavior that ensures survival instinct. Everyone wants to

preserve their views / opinion, their respect, their interests. It is instinctive to put

“mine” before the others – my views, my opinion, my respect, my interest…

Everyone tries to put theirs first and then think of mutual purpose and interest.

I for example, would start with … I need to finish task A in my project, I can do x,

y, z, but need help with two other activities, which can be done by Betty, so let me

talk to her. Now, when I go with this intention and mind-set, I would try to make it

mutually beneficial, but still my priorities and interests would be placed above Betty’s

and that’s when I will have to try putting it in a way that is attractive to her social

style, and might still sometimes end up harming our relationship.

Communication would become much simpler and effective, if we are

genuinely interested in others. This is the essence of “Live and Let Live”. Live and

Let Live means, genuine, unadulterated interest in people, which lets us grow as a

person and professional and lets others grow as well. This I can promise will lead to a

fulfilling life both personally and professionally.

Let me take the same example above, and walk through it, following Live and Let

Live mantra. I would not talk to Betty just because I need to complete task A, and I cannot complete a few activities. I would ask Betty to help me out, only if it is going to bring some benefit to Betty. Benefit could be in terms of visibility, growth, reward / recognition etc. Here I am being genuinely interested in Betty, while also trying to get my task done. If I do not see anything truly beneficial for Betty, I will not ask her.

But, can this be applied to all situations? What about communicating for your own

growth? Let me walk through this scenario. It is natural to want to grow in the Organization. But, what is the Organization going to get out of it? My thoughts

should be, what can I bring to the Organization if I take up the new role? How can it

benefit the organization and my management? If you can answer these, and then

communicate about your growth, it would be very effective.