Self-confidence is great. But believing you are smarter than acclaimed achievers is foolish. Admitting you don’t know, allows you to learn and grow. “The more you know, the more you realise you don’t know” – Aristotle, philosopher.
Deepinder Goyal of Zomato tweeted a requirement for Chief of Staff. Conditions; first year no salary plus donate ₹20 lakh to a cause. Obviously, he received tons of flak. Interestingly, I applied for the job with some conditions of my own.
Why would I, with over three decades of experience as an entrepreneur, want to ‘intern’ with Deepinder? Simple, my team and I are working on a couple of start ups (brilliant concepts) but we are unable to scale up. It’d be a fantastic learning opportunity for me to work with Deepinder.
He’s taken Zomato from start up, to scale up via several rounds of funding and is now a listed entity. Zomato has even acquired Blinkit. Imagine my exposure to people, processes, strategic thinking… I won’t just read or hear about experiments; I would do and learn – unmatched education/ experience? I will learn how to scale up, leverage tech and allocate funds…
Lesson 1: Know what you know and don’t know. Knowledge is power; know its value and willingly pay the price.
Elon Musk tweeted that no one on a 40-hour week can change the world. While Mr Narayana Murthy insists youngsters should shun five-day weeks and put in 70 hours a week. Social Media was abuzz with posts accusing them of greed, exploitative practices and soliciting unfair benefits.
I’m not against those that prefer short days/ weeks; they know what works for them. I put in long hours and often 7 days a week. My strength is my ability to work hard, consistently and persistently. I’m not exceptionally gifted with intellect nor am I great looking (yes, looks count). To make up for that, I have to work hard – simple. Tim Notke, the renowned basketball coach’s quote resonates, “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”
Lesson 2: Don’t let others decide what works for you. Listen to all – but take your own calls.
On social media, many ridicule or advise absolute geniuses and achievers. I often feel that they haven’t comprehended the subject or the context. At times, they haven’t evaluated their own skills, knowledge and achievements against the person they are belittling. They remind me of ‘me’ from years ago.
Fresh out of IHM, Mumbai (1990), I worked closely with late Prema Purao of Annapurna and late JafferBhai Mansuri of Delhi Darbar; simultaneously for over a decade. They built their organizations from scratch, yet at times I felt they made bad decisions. Often their rationale didn’t impress me. One day, my thoughts hit home, “If I’m so smart, how come I work for them and they don’t work for me? How come they built these brands from the ground up and I haven’t built a thing?” It was obvious that they were smarter and I lacked maturity and ‘smarts’. From then on… I listened, observed and learnt from them and many other achievers.
I read a disparaging post on Lalas (slang for owner). “They don’t understand HR, Finance or smart business practices.” My thoughts – “If you’re smarter than the owner, start your own enterprise and implement your ideas.”
Lesson 3: “When the pupil is ready, the master appears” – Lao Tzu, philosopher. Listen, understand, challenge existing thoughts and beliefs, be open to change and learn – be a student – your teacher will appear.
Since the last two decades, HTI (my organization), has worked with Speciality Restaurants. I adopted Anjan Chatterjee, their MD, as my teacher. Print and television were big at that time and lesser known hospitality professionals were splashed around. I knew through Andrea (my wife – the then Editor of ‘Savvy’ and ‘Savvy Cookbook’) that AC refused to be interviewed. I enquired, “Why the low profile?” His heartfelt response, “A brand should speak for itself.”
Lesson 4: “Work hard in silence, let your success be your noise” – Frank Ocean, singer and songwriter.
When Elon Musk, Deepinder Goyal, Murthy, AC or any achiever recommends something, the least I’m going to do is consider it. They’ve built something that few can even dream of, leave alone achieve. I’m sure that people who comment contrary to their suggestions have valid reasons. Their skills, talent, status in life and aspirations is their context. I will naturally evaluate its relevance to my situation/ conditions and take my own call.
Bonus Lesson: Do more than you are paid to do. Additional efforts and initiative accumulates additional experience which, in turn, commands a higher pay/ professional fee.
Fools Abound; let us not add to their numbers!
(Dominic CostaBir, Director, Hospitality Training Institute (HTI) and Woosh Biz, is a first generation entrepreneur. A passionate hospitality veteran with 30+ years of experience, in ‘Third Eye’, he provides a perspective beyond plain sight.)
