Category: Leadership

  • A Choice Outcome

    On my way to work this morning I passed a student transport service that was broken down at a fairly quiet intersection. Young children aged 7 or 8 milled around on the pavement as the driver attended to the vehicle. As I slowed down I noticed one of the kids staring intently in my direction. Whether he was looking at me or the car is hard to say, but I wondered if that scene for him would prove to be inspirational in some way later on in life. Not inspirational in the typical sense of ‘I want to be like that when I grow up’, but rather in the sense that it represented certain goals for him.

    If I think back to my time in school, I recall similarly poignant moments that defined my perspectives or my priorities. It wasn’t earth shattering moments of ‘Eureka’ but rather unexpected sights or experiences that left their mark. There was a time in school when we were preparing for the official opening of the new school premises that we recently occupied. I was in the 6th grade and normal classes had been disrupted for several weeks already as all the kids were involved in some or other project relating to the building of floats or other decorative items for the event. It was then that I learnt how to cut polystyrene, spray the index tab onto library books in bulk, classify books according to the Dewey Decimal system and so much more. At one point I looked up at my teacher and asked him why it was that we didn’t learn things like this more often instead of sitting in class and studying from books all the time?

    I don’t recall his response, and his response was not defining either. What defined that experience for me was the practical knowledge and skills that I had acquired in such a short space of time as opposed to the endless boring sessions of indulging in theoretical and academic studies of subjects that would barely have any practical value in my life. I think it was then that my mindset shifted from the traditional methods of acquiring knowledge to one that is more experiential by nature. To this day I grow impatient and often abrasive if I find myself compelled to sit with textbooks or drawn out discussions about challenges that need to be resolved, and instead, I often aggressively prompt people in the direction of considering practical options or impacts around what we may be contending with. I think I’ve learnt to temper my impatience with some finesse more recently, although many would still disagree. Nonetheless, it has served me well, and if I had to try to pinpoint a time in my life when such an approach became tangibly attractive enough for me to adopt as my own, it would be that unexpected experience in school that was not shaped by the schooling system at all.

    In a similar light I contemplated the thoughts that may have formed in that kid’s head this morning as he stood there in the cold watching me pass as he waited for the driver to repair the vehicle. With every scene or experience that we endure, we make choices. Some are conscious, but most are not. Most play out in our sub-conscious minds as we shape our characters and lives relative to the circumstances around us. That child could have been looking at me and thinking what a snob I am, while admiring the humility of the driver that made a living from ensuring that he got the kids to school and back safely, and hopefully on time. Whichever of those two perspectives appealed to him at that point, that is what he will find himself sub-consciously polarizing towards as he goes through life.

    I think these choices that we make grounds us in our lives to the defining moments that informed our perspectives. The less mindful we are, the less likely it is that we’ll be able to identify these choices when we’re making them, and therefore the less informed our choices will be. While woefully simplistic as an analogy, it suggests some answers as to why some make destructive choices in life, while others choose more wisely. If anything, it prompts inclinations in us that we can choose to embrace or choose to question. Those that embrace without question are often victims to circumstance. They’re the ones that want to be seen as the brave ones that persevere in spite of their lot in life. They’re the martyrs among us. Always ready to assist even if such assistance enables dependence.

    Then there are those that question before embracing. They’re the ones most often seen as cold and calculated. But it takes both types to make this world an interesting place. The ones most endearing would be those that have a healthy balance between these two extremes. That healthy balance would probably be reflected in those that embrace without question that which is confirmed (to them) to be wholesome, while being pragmatic and realistic before diving into a mess to help a victim. While the choices we can make are endless, I guess the point of this deliberation is that the choices that most often shape our lives the most are rarely the choices we made consciously. I think that’s an important realisation that, if we embrace it, will prompt us to be courageous enough to question why we are the way we are. This is needed if we ever hope to grow beyond just the cycle of evolution that our lives inherently dictate. If we don’t wish for such growth, then perhaps we’re the martyrs we spurn in others?

  • Mental Masturbation

    Walking through the city of London (while attending a conference recently) and observing the locals and tourists alike, I found myself contemplating a lot of truths we take for granted back home. I use the word ‘truth’ lightly in this case because much of how we perceive the world is based on conditioning and indoctrination rather than inherent truths. If we are to assume that the perception of our reality remains to be true for us at least, then let us accept that that is the truth that we all hold ourselves to serve.

    This would beg the question as to how those truths are informed. Hence conditioning and indoctrination. The reason these two points are so important is because very few of us are products of our traditional upbringing these days. Even those traditional upbringings are questionable because of influences that they inherited in centuries or eons passed. And so the waters that provide bouyancy to the truth become muddied even further. But back to London.

    I stood in awe, quite literally, at how many tourists were smitten by the old buildings that hold absolutely no significance in their lives. More than this, I was also flummoxed by the crudity that I saw around me that was being celebrated as dignity. Before you accuse me of elitism, or being judgemental, please refer to the previous paragraph. Growing up as an Indian in South Africa and therefore having been conditioned by the simultaneous brainwashing of an educational system with roots in English colonialism, and the cultural force of apartheid, I was also raised to believe in the superiority of the white race and the radiant historical significance of monuments like the Voortrekker Monument and Big Ben, or the nobility of purpose in the founding occupational forces that landed in the Cape of Good Hope so many centuries ago, or the present occupational force of reverse racism that lands it butt in the butter each day that it takes its seat in parliament. And that’s when it struck me, not for the first time though, that the significance attached to these icons are simply notions that we subscribe to.

    A flag is only a piece of cloth that has a pretty design on it until the ones in power imbue it with a symbolism beyond its innate nature. Those that are subservient will therefore defend this symbolism to the death and lose sight of the truth behind it. And so my mind wandered as I wandered while I noticed the conflicts welling up inside of me. As I walked through St James’ Park I kept thinking ‘Zoo Lake’ in my mind. (The Zoo Lake is the equivalent destination in Johannesburg). Then I walked down the streets of perfectly manicured trees that lined both sides with a beautiful shade of green and I was reminded of the northern suburbs of Johannesburg. And as I continued my travels through the city I kept finding myself drawing parallels between what I experienced in this foreign land and what I have available to me in my own homeland. With one key difference. Access to resources.

    That realisation was accompanied by its own conflicts. On the one hand, we couldn’t compete with the global investors that pump wealth into this region in order to gain more wealth out of it, but on the other, we probably have proportionally equal amounts of wealth being squandered through corruption and incompetence. The difference? While walking through London I got a distinct sense of a collective pride that everyone had in what their country offered. It was in fact nauseating to flip through channel after channel in the hotel room only to see some or other aspect of the English lifestyle being celebrated as superior to anything else. That’s what we lack. Collective pride.

    And so, in the absence of such pride, we turn on each other. We become opportunists looking to get what we can from what is available, with very little focus on giving back. We tolerate corruption by contributing to it, and we condone poor service delivery by squeezing the blood out of our labourers. There is no nation, let alone nation building. We bicker, we complain, we criticise, and we loathe, and the contradiction in this statement does not escape me, which brings me to the title of this post.

    We’re a nation of mental masturbators. Extremely eloquent in defining responses or solutions, but lethargically poor at building unity and serving each other. And I noticed this same tendency building up inside of me as I walked through the streets of London, forming essay after essay in my mind about how we could be even greater if we had access to the same kind of resources, etc. all the while knowing that that is not true. If we had access to more resources than we already have, we’d just take corruption to a greater level, and dish out incompetence in greater portion sizes.

    Watching the madness around Nkhandla and seeing the president laugh mockingly at the same nation he is supposed to be serving, and juxtaposing that against the American president that was dragged through the coals simply for getting a blow job, and it becomes plainly clear that we view illicit sex that others envy as infinitely more detrimental to society than showing the middle finger to the poor and downtrodden, and then speaking of it as if you are above it. That, in my mind, is the worst form of mental masturbation. The ability to speak authoritatively of morals and values when you’re the same scum that sets the standard and consistently raises the bar for such despicable norms, and then still insisting on dignity while robbing the very same people that put you in power of the dignity that they actually pay for.

    Sitting back and decrying our state because of the legacy of apartheid is again, mental masturbation. 21 years. That’s enough time to raise a child, put them through school, followed by university and pretty much obtain a degree, yet we have adults (read ‘idiots’) in power who are supposed to be educated while surrounded by the best advisers of their choice that still think that their downright incompetence and moral corruption is a result of apartheid. No, it’s simply self-loathing greed. Self-loathing because no one with an ounce of self-respect will conduct themselves as despicably as our leaders do. Unfortunately they are the icons that the masses subscribe to. But I recall my initial reaction to Big Ben when I first saw it. I also flipped out my cell phone to take that first pic, with the realisation of its impotence only dawning on me later.

    So I find it difficult, as frustrating as it is, to judge harshly those that continue to vote for the cancer that is eroding the fabric of our nation. It leaves me with one defining realisation. While the non-white in South Africa may not have enjoyed much dignity in the eyes of the ruling elite at the time, we had dignity among ourselves. Now that apartheid is gone, it seems we gave up that dignity in our pursuit of the trinkets that propped up our apartheid masters but sinking one level lower. That lower level that we’ve succumbed to is because at least during apartheid we all took care of our own kind, both the whites and non-whites alike. Now, we’re too selfish and morally depraved to do even that.

    So any criticism of the moral decay that we see around us is nothing more than mental masturbation from a nation that has sold its soul in favour of the aspirations of its apartheid masters. Ubuntu? Did I hear someone mention Ubuntu? Don’t make me laugh. We’ve lost even that simple truth and traded it in for individual enrichment.

  • The Art of Insincerity

    One of the most common observations that people share about me is that they know where they stand with me. I’m the one that usually speaks everyone else’s mind for them when they lack the courage to be bold. I don’t do this deliberately, I do it out of frustration. That frustration stems from the realisation that whining in private never changes what irks us in public.

    Initially my inclination to speak out is based on a belief that those that are silent are in fact oppressed in some form or another. It’s a belief that drives me to be convinced that if given a shoulder to lean on, or a support structure from which to draw strength, people will inherently find more reason to be true to themselves, and in so doing, act with greater conviction in the face of obstacles, or oppression. Such idealism has never served me well.

    The reality is closer to people wanting to be liked more than they care about fighting any good fight. Popularity is what drives us more than conviction. Perhaps this is why leaders are despised in the making, but revered in office. We judge harshly those that push for change when such change disrupts our own comfort zones, but feel no qualms about indulging in the benefits of the new realities created by the same people we once despised, often even proudly claiming affiliation with the struggle that brought about the much needed change.

    Glory hunters. That’s all we are. To be associated with that which is perceived as popular or meritorious by those we idolise is what drives our conviction. Pride of association. It’s a powerful tool to influence the masses. But it comes at a price. The price we pay for it is the isolation we feel when we realise that we’re simply the pawns of the masses in the run up to the turning of the tide.

    The art of insincerity is best displayed in that final phase of a tough project when all the naysayers suddenly rally around being fully supportive as if they were by your side all along, drooling with the anticipation of sharing in the glory of the achievement that everyone thought you insane to pursue in the first place. That’s when the ambivalence sets in because despite the obvious hypocrisy, you need them to appreciate the benefits of the endeavour, because without those very same consumers, the outcome will be redundant no matter how brilliant the solution.

    This is true in both work and life. The fact that we still have good reason to differentiate between the two is sad, but that is a topic for another day’s ramblings. So it seems the art of insincerity is a reciprocal one. It’s one of the times when holding fast to higher principles will erode the value of the outcome. Sanity can only be salvaged through the adjustment of our expectations. If we expect sincerity, we’ll be distracted from our purpose. But that demands a reciprocation of insincerity, because if we don’t have an expectation of sincerity, then by default we accept that demanding less than what we would ideally want is in itself insincere relative to our convictions. In so doing, we too will master the art of insincerity that we so vehemently despise in others.

    I guess the test of life might lie in being a better hypocrite than the next. I think we call that political correctness, no?

  • Double Standards

    The hypocrisy of society is reflected in its inclination to chastise individuals for being individuals while declaring that we should all be respected for our right to be so. The individuals among us are often belittled and ridiculed when we seek to encourage change because of a notion that if we try to achieve more, we’re automatically assuming a level of aloofness that undermines the validity of our neighbour’s struggles. The only time we’re allowed to be bold is if a presently recognised authority or personality (a.k.a. uninformed celebrity) bestows such acknowledgement on us as well.

    We are a mentally lethargic society that seeks direction from academics and political leaders alike in our assessment of the merits of anyone’s argument, before we will apply a meagre dose of courage to actually think for ourselves. The distractions have become the substance, and substance is rarely recognised any longer. Too many times have I found myself being ridiculed for holding alternate views about a common misconception only to later see the same pea-brained bodies propagating the very same view because it was suddenly associated with a public figure. Public figure, celebrity, academic, and the like should not be mistaken for an informed source or an independent mind.

    We have become masters at producing templates for individuals to adopt, and those that don’t adopt our templates are discarded as irrelevant. Our templates are disguised as frameworks and free thinking models, associated with a farce of freedom of expression, embellished with unspoken limits which, once crossed, finds the transgressor stripped of any credibility that they may have previously enjoyed in those superficial circles. It’s a matter of first winning the popular vote, and then being able to sway opinion, rather than winning the popular vote because you have an opinion.

    This is not a vent, nor a cry for sanity to prevail, both of which would be futile anyway. This is merely an attempt to state the obvious, because far too often we miss the obvious in our efforts to appear informed or introspective. Stating the obvious without demonstrating any personal conviction in the process (unless you’re a celebrity) may afford you a rare opportunity to actually influence the minds of those around you to challenge the reality that they take for granted. Of course, even if they do pause for a moment while seriously contemplating the gravity of your observation, their moment of pause is often quickly followed by a nonchalant shrug waiting patiently for an endorsement of the truth they just contemplated before they find reason to act on it.

    Those that act on a recognised truth independent of such endorsement quickly fill the ranks of the individuals that shalt not be. They are the eccentrics, or the weird ones. The ones that apparently don’t get it because everyone disagrees with them, while they smirk internally and smile politely externally having realised that a lost sheep will forever remain lost if their only sense of direction can be obtained from a shepherd. And all the while, the sheep will be goaded on to think for themselves and exercise their right to freedom of expression, provided they express themselves within the norms that have been deemed acceptable by the tokens that rule their brainwaves.

    Yet another case of pervasive ignorance parading as collective wisdom. Or more importantly, the sane man appearing insane in front of an insane society.

  • CV Writing – Part 2 of 2

    In the previous article we focused on what not to do in a CV, which in many ways should give you an idea as to what to do. However, to ensure that there are no incorrect assumptions around this, here’s my list of key points that should be noted when compiling or updating your CV.

    1. Cover Letter – While this is something that I generally despise, it is required by many recruitment agencies before they will even consider your application. So keep it brief but focused on your qualifications and experience relative to that specific position that you’re applying for. A generic cover letter will probably not do justice to your CV, so as painful or tedious as it may be, review your cover letter for each application to make sure that you draw their attention to those qualities of yours that you believe makes you the best candidate for the job.
    2. Chronology of Experience – Many people get this wrong by placing it in ascending order sorted by date from their first position to their current position. The preferred order should be for your latest position first, since that would be most relevant to the job being applied for, and then working backwards to the beginning of your career. This makes it easy for the recruiting manager to be exposed to your current level of expertise without losing interest after browsing through potentially irrelevant roles that you may have filled in the past.
    3. Summary of Employment – When you find that you’ve got quite a lengthy and colourful career behind you, you may want to reduce the earlier roles to just a summary table rather than going into detail about that cashier’s job you did when you were trying to get through university almost 15 or 20 years ago. Remember to keep it relevant, so not every part time role you filled needs to be explained in detail in your CV. This table would therefore include just the name of the company, your job title, start and end dates of employment, and possibly reasons for leaving, if that may add value. Otherwise leave it out and rather discuss it in the interview instead, if the need arises.
    4. Training History – Another area of pain, too many people include every internal training course that they attended. If that training is specifically relevant to the position being applied for, and that position is internal to the company you’re at, then include it. However, if it is an application for a position at another company that does not use those systems, then either remove it, or position it relative to the skills that were acquired that could be applied in your new role. I prefer to keep the training list limited to just industry recognised courses or certifications with a footnote summarising the type of additional training that may have been received over the years.
    5. Proficiency Table – Another useful but often abused piece of information is a table that indicates your level of proficiency in various standard business applications, platforms, or skills that may be relevant to your career path. This should ideally indicate the name of the application or skill, the amount of years of exposure, the level of expertise (e.g. Basic, Intermediate, Advanced, Specialist, Expert, etc.), and when last used. Include the version of the application or tool if necessary. This table can be a combination of both skills and business systems or applications, but once again, relevant to the position being applied for. You don’t want to bother a recruiting manager for a professional role with your qualification as a hairdresser or dance instructor, if you know what I mean?
    6. Readability and Layout – This is something that I emphasised much in the previous article and I need to emphasise it again. When compiling your CV, remember that it is usually intended to be read by someone that does not know you, and that is probably wading through stacks of CV’s from people applying for the same job. A professionally written CV using business language and not slang or unnecessary techno jargon is what will appeal to a seasoned manager. Do not assume an overly familiar tone in your writing. Don’t try to be hip and cool. Keep it structured and relevant.
    7. Business versus Technical – One thing that works well for me, especially when applying for management level positions, is to separate the job outputs into Business Deliverables versus Technical Deliverables. If you get this right, it will demonstrate a clear understanding on your part relative to what the business value is of the role you’re fulfilling versus what the technical or commodity skill is that you’re bringing to the table.
    8. Title Page – Last but not least, ensure that your title page is professional and not corny. If you intend to include any graphics, please, for the love of all things sacred, do not use cheesy clip art from MS Office. It may seem cute to some, but you’re not trying to be cute. You’re trying to present a professional image of what you have to offer. So look at some of the standard Title Page templates in MS Word for ideas if you’re not creatively inclined. If you intend to use a photo, make sure it’s not a photo that belongs on a social networking site like Facebook or Twitter. Use one that looks professional but not creepy. So as a rule of thumb, if it looks like it belongs on Police Files, or in your passport, it’s a no-no as well. Consider how you want to be perceived, and then truthfully reflect that in a recent photo that represents that image. If you thought you looked really attractive in a photo that was taken 5 or 10 years ago, but it doesn’t quite reflect your current state, don’t use it. You’ll only set yourself up for internalised ridicule when you walk into the interview room looking nothing like the image that you portrayed in your CV, which will give the impression of dishonesty and being out of touch with reality.

    I hope that helps in your search for that ideal position that will bring out the best in you. And if it does help you to land that ideal job, remember us little folk when you make it big. Good luck!

  • Does It Matter?

    I watch with a very cursory sense of interest how the significance which people associate with their contribution to a given course or situation influences their conviction in what they say or do. This becomes somewhat morbidly amusing when I see all the corporate gurus that define elaborate strategies to foster staff engagement and collaboration, always focusing on creating opportunity for inclusion and discussion, but completely missing the point of significance.

    The simple truth, from my vantage point anyway, is that if you don’t think your input matters, you’re highly unlikely to make any concerted effort to contribute meaningfully to begin with. So the few that realise this will go around reminding people how much they matter, and how important they are to the success of the outcome. Too many fall for these empty gestures aimed at manipulating them while only a few would question the sincerity of it given the absence of a suitable delegation of authority to be able to influence the outcome in a material way.

    I think somewhere in there lies the secret to being a successful leader in a hypocritical society, where a measure of hypocrisy is excusable, if not needed, because everyone apparently does it. I find it difficult to buy into the ‘everyone does it so it’s ok’ mind set. It implies that offensive behaviour suddenly becomes acceptable just because most people have degraded to that point. It means that the gradual decline of society into the moral abyss must be embraced because everyone will be doing it. The logic fails me, more so because there are so many that subscribe to it.

    But that is not what this ramble was intended to be about. The clutter and noise makes the maintenance of a train of thought extremely difficult these days. Distracted by what is worthwhile and what is not, I’m spending more time focusing on being measured in my responses to those that don’t deserve it, and less time on just being true to my convictions. This is tiring. It exhausts me to have to be this deliberate just because of the need to protect myself politically from those that embrace that normalised hypocrisy.

    I’m too much of an elitist to succumb to such a commonly pathetic way of life. On this front, being arrogant would be the vice that I would embrace given that the brazen hypocrisy of others is merely the fruit of their arrogance. Therefore, if my philosophy on dealing with arrogance holds true, my elitist approach is in fact a duty to civil society.

    That’s my story and I’m sticking with it.

  • CV Writing – Part 1 of 2

    This is a post that I wrote for an internal audience in our company, but I thought it would be worth sharing on this blog as well. Let me know what you think.

    Far too often we place too much emphasis on what to do rather than identifying what not to do which results in us building constraints that should otherwise not be relevant. This is because when we focus on what to do, we automatically limit ourselves to a finite set of options, which prevents us from finding more creative ways of doing things if they weren’t thought of before.

    So instead of telling you what to do in your CV, I thought it would be best if I shared some thoughts on what to avoid instead. Let me know if you have anything that you think is worth adding to the below list:

    1. Never use Comic Sans as a font style in your CV ever! Seriously, Comic Sans and other similarly informal fonts (just the name itself spells trouble if you want to be taken seriously!) should be avoided in formal writing.
    2. Select fonts that are easy on the eye especially when viewed electronically. Times New Roman and Courier are also no-no’s. They are difficult to read and easily cause eye strain for someone that has to wade through piles of CV’s when looking to short list candidates. Remember, you want to make it as easy as possible for someone to identify your strengths in your CV.
    3. This brings us to the third point which is formatting. The wall of text two-column format was ok when CV’s were written using type writers. Those days are gone unless you’re trying to write a romantic note to someone. Remember, we’re bombarded with professional business articles and other documents on a daily basis, so a shoddy document sticks out like a sore thumb. Take the time to format your document, once again with the emphasis being on readability.
    4. Readability must therefore be focused on making it easy for someone to work through your CV without knowing who you are, what you’re about, or what your achievements or current job entails. So be careful and ensure that you don’t assume that everyone knows what all the acronyms and company-specific jargon means, unless of course you’re applying for an internal post and your use of acronyms and jargon is relevant to the area in which the vacancy exists.
    5. Don’t leave blank fields and incomplete information when using someone else’s template against which to capture your information. Remove those sections of the template that are irrelevant to your profile. Ensure that the alignment of text and layout is consistent and professional. Again, the emphasis is on readability.
    6. Use a decent word processor application, and use it decently! There is no excuse for shoddy formatting because of a lack of skill. If you don’t have the time to learn how to use widely available word processing applications in order to compile a professional looking CV, then ask for help. But just because you think your best effort is good enough doesn’t mean the recruiting manager will appreciate your efforts as well.
    7. Poor spelling and grammar is a major turn-off. This is especially true when you’re applying for a position in an area that has a high focus on quality. Which job doesn’t focus on quality and an eye for detail these days? Don’t expect to be taken seriously if you’re going to be tardy about your spelling, or using poor grammar. Don’t write the way you speak. Write the way you want to be read! Use the proofing tools available in Microsoft Word or whichever word processor application you’re using. It’s there for a reason, and it takes away any excuse you may have had for compiling a poorly written CV.
    8. Keep it fresh, but tasteful and professional. If you have the skills to use the formatting options available in Word or similar application, use it with a view to make your CV look distinctive but professional. Going with the boring legal style layout of two columns and walls of text in either column that often don’t line up or is poorly/inconsistently justified will most likely get your CV to fade into the background with the majority of CV’s that are submitted in that way. Once again, focus on readability but make it appealing.
    9. Use of photos and company logos is a nice idea, but you really need to know what you’re doing if you hope to make it professional. You’re not writing a product catalogue for the companies you worked for, so don’t make their logos too prominent if you do use it. And if you’re going to include a photo of yourself, make sure you strike a balance between a mug shot and a social networking update, because you want to be presented in a professional light. So if you include a photo that belongs on Facebook, it assumes a level of familiarity with the recruiting manager that is most probably inappropriate, and it sets you out on the wrong foot because you’ll have to break the stereotype or biases that they may have before you can get them to really listen to you, if you make it to the interview phase.
    10. Unless specifically requested to provide it in Word format, send your CV in PDF format because it’s easier and quicker to view, and looks more professional. It also takes up less space in the recipient’s mailbox, which is often limited in the private sector. It also negates any concerns around word processor version incompatibility issues, because often formating of a document is messed up if it is saved in a version of Word that is different to the version on your PC.
    11. Finally, remember to update your past experience so that you don’t keep referring to it in the present. Often we write about our responsibilities and achievements in our current role in the present tense because that is what is relevant at the time of applying for that next position. However, once we get that position, and a few years down the line when we’re ready to move again, we often just update the CV to include the details of the new position and leave the previous one worded as it was. Going back and tidying up is definitely recommended because it also ensures that you review the relevance of the detail that you included for more junior positions relative to a much more senior position that you may be applying for now.

    Remember, you want their eyes to fall on your most important attributes and skills without having to trawl through tons of information that is useless in their world. So make sure that you adapt your CV if needed relative to the focus of the role you’re applying for, and the culture of the company. Just because the CV was appropriate for your last application, doesn’t mean it is still optimal for your next one.

    I hope that helps. Good luck with your career development, and please feel free to comment as needed.

  • From Virtual to Reality

    I launched a new forum at the office this week. It’s called the Thought Leadership Forum. I know, it sounds clichéd, and it probably is. But that is the extent of the cliché. I’ve often felt frustrated at the lack of real life engagement about the many ideas and philosophies that I debate at length with myself on my blog wondering if any of it has any real  life value. How much of it is simply idealism that entertains or encourages from time to time, versus how much of it holds practical value in helping others to rise above the lethargy that has become the hallmark of many lives these days?

    So I decided to be bold (perhaps recklessly stupid instead) and opened up the debate to more than 60 of my colleagues at the office. It was daunting to even consider this but over the last year and a bit I’ve been experimenting with sharing my blog with various people around me. People that often seem to want advice or even just to engage about topics that I am obviously passionate about. At first I felt a sense of trepidation which didn’t last any longer than it took for me to realise that their validation was of no consequence to me. There was always the risk that they would ridicule my ramblings, but strangely enough most have lost interest in a very short space of time. Some have commented vaguely on the content and the topics but none have engaged meaningfully about anything that they read.

    That in itself provided an insight into my fears and assumptions, as well as their sincerity about wanting to truly challenge the stereotypes that they’re often prone to whining about. I focused on the former since I’ve realised that trying to convince people to take themselves seriously is a futile effort. People only ever take themselves seriously after they’re faced with a grave challenge in their life that forces them to question their significance to those around them, and more importantly, when they’re forced to face the truth of what they claim to stand for. It takes a defining moment of sublime struggle to cause us to question our purpose or our understanding of ourselves. At moments like that we realise what dreams we were holding on to but rarely, if ever, nurtured.

    And so I set out to start the debate in the first session of the Thought Leadership Forum that I launched and was pleasantly surprised at both the turnout and the level of engagement. It’s early days, and there is nothing to suggest that this initiative might even survive beyond its second session, but the fact that I was able to force people to stop and reconsider their long held perspectives about common issues that we often take for granted on a daily basis is a really good thing. It was encouraging to see how many were confident enough to make statements about what they believed were universal truths, only to stop and give a nervous giggle when it was challenged because they realised that they didn’t necessarily consider it from that perspective before.

    Perhaps, selfishly, I needed to take this blog from virtual reality to reality in order to test the water about my personal beliefs and its relevance to the average human being. Perhaps this is my way of determining whether or not there is merit in writing that book after all, or if my thoughts and ideas are simply pedestrian by nature and instead of causing people to sit up and listen, it may instead cure their insomnia. Perhaps this is the beginning of a new chapter in my life where I aspire to influence people in reality rather than to continue to hide behind the comfort offered by the nuances of virtuality.

    People are strange. Sometimes, almost as strange as I know them to be.