Being a team leader very often means transitioning from being an individual contributor to a people manager’s role. That often comes with a salary bump and a career path that gets more attention everywhere. Doing well as an individual contributor has no bearing on how well the person does as a people manager.
The impact of these three forces pales in comparison to the impact of Covid-19 in the job market. Millions of people have lost their jobs. People realize that their business card can no longer borrow the brand value of their employer. Even if the employer provides outplacement services (like RiseSmart) to the impacted employee, without a strong personal brand, the person is just another resume in the pile. Without a personal brand, an individual gets lost among the 650 million people on LinkedIn.
It is the first taste of discretionary power one experiences very early in career. It is the first taste of responsibility for the success of others beyond one’s own self. It is the first opportunity to help and coach others to scale up and reach the desired goals. The leader’s role is to help the team achieve synergy not just remain the sum total of everyone’s results. To do that, the person managing a team must juggle three perspectives:
I wrote about the experience of spending a day with Gulzar Saab watching him record that translation. It was a fanboy moment for me
Layoffs are are a major reason for mental health issues. You can use the headline offered by LinkedIn to stand out in the job market. And what should you never say in the headline? When someone wants to know why you were laid off, how should you answer the question by using a statistic? And is there an Insurance Policy that covers you against a layoff?
What if content creators was left to a team of instructional designers, academics, storytellers, animators, video and audio creators. They could create short form and long form content that is engaging and interactive. If the content has already been created and can be used by the teacher, it is infinitely better than listening to someone standing before a camera and droning on.
The New Education Policy was unveiled in India. Harvard, Princeton, Oxford etc are all moving classes online. Is that the end of college? What about Social Learning - does that work? Can writers earn enough to pursue writing as a full time career? Because there is a new world of careers brewing it is a terrific time to be alive. So let’s dive in …
We are in the age when being able to understand emotions is going to be the common factor that successful people have. It used to be, that being sharp in analytical thinking used to be the basis of successful careers. But now problems have become so complex that the age of the lone genius is gone. It is the age of experience makers
Do goldfish have greater memories and attention spans more than humans? Hint: Goldfish, human attention spans and Netflix are connected. I remembered a quote that a teacher of mine shared when I was entering college. I shared it on LinkedIn and it unleashed a fish market! This week you will learn about Zoom etiquette with me.








