Unlocking Potential: Leadership Strategies for a Changing World
The principal focus of today's discourse is on the transformative power of mindfulness in leadership, as articulated by our esteemed guest, Singh. With over two decades of experience in enhancing organizational performance and nurturing high-functioning teams, Singh delineates how mindfulness serves as a pivotal tool for leaders navigating the complexities of a high-pressure environment. Through his innovative frameworks, the Ascendancy Action System and the Mindful Leadership Mastery Compass, he elucidates the significance of cultivating presence, clarity, and compassion in leadership practices. Singh's insights are not merely theoretical; they are grounded in practical applications that empower leaders to transcend challenges and unlock their fullest potential. As we engage in this profound conversation, we invite you to reflect on your own leadership journey and consider the pivotal role of mindfulness in fostering resilience and effective communication.
The dialogue with Singh unveils a compelling narrative about the evolution of leadership in the modern era, where the pressures of rapid change and complexity demand a new approach. Singh, a seasoned leader with a wealth of experience, articulates how mindfulness has become a cornerstone of effective leadership. He discusses the detrimental effects of operating on autopilot and the necessity for leaders to cultivate presence in their interactions. This episode delves into Singh's practical methodologies, including the Ascendancy Action System and the Mindful Leadership Mastery Compass, which provide structured approaches for leaders to enhance their effectiveness through mindfulness. Singh emphasizes the importance of intentionality and presence in achieving organizational goals, urging leaders to engage deeply with their teams and foster a culture of mindfulness. The conversation is rich with personal anecdotes and insights, illustrating how mindfulness can not only transform individual leaders but also create a ripple effect throughout organizations. Through Singh's perspective, listeners are encouraged to reconsider their approach to leadership, recognizing that true effectiveness lies in being fully present and engaged.
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Transcript
Today's guest is a visionary leader who's redefining what it means to lead in a fast paced, high pressure world.
Speaker A:Singh has spent over two decades transforming businesses and building high performance teams across the globe.
Speaker A:From C suite to the front lines, he's driven double digit growth, streamlined operations and led organizations through powerful change.
Speaker A:But what has truly set Singh apart is his secret weapon, mindfulness.
Speaker A:Through his signature framework, the Ascendancy Action System and the Mindful Leadership Mastery Compass, Singh empowers leaders to rise above stress, embrace resilience and lead with clarity, compassion and purpose.
Speaker A:Whether he's delivering a keynote, speeches, mentoring executives, or crafting leadership roadmaps, Singh's mission is clear to help leaders turn challenges into opportunities and unlock their full potential through the power of presence and intentionality.
Speaker A:Get ready for a conversation that blends strategy with soul.
Speaker A:Please welcome transformational force that is Sing to the podcast.
Speaker B:Thank you for having me.
Speaker A:How you doing?
Speaker A:Good to have you on.
Speaker B:I'm great, thank you.
Speaker A:So let's dig into my favorite question.
Speaker A:What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?
Speaker B:Don't write anything on an email that you don't want published on front page of a newspaper.
Speaker A:That's probably pretty good.
Speaker A:It sounds like a personal experience, words of wisdom.
Speaker B:It is.
Speaker B:And again, it ties back to leadership and mindfulness because most of the time we are running on autopilot and we are all so hung up in emotions.
Speaker B:When we respond with emotions, it's never logical.
Speaker B:And more than often, whether it is an email or a reaction in a conversation, we do something that we always go back and realize it was not the best thing we have done.
Speaker A:See what used to be great about email when it first came out, because I remember you could delete something you sent if the person hadn't opened it.
Speaker A:Now when you send it, it's gone.
Speaker A:There's no take.
Speaker A:Because I remember sending out one, I'm like, oh, I should have sent that and I deleted it.
Speaker A:They never saw it.
Speaker A:But now if you send it, you can't pull it back.
Speaker B:No, it's ticking.
Speaker B:Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.
Speaker B:And it's gone.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So I'm curious thing, you know, people like yourself who work a lot with leaders and do what you do sometimes there are people in our lives who have served as a mentor for us along our journey.
Speaker A:Was there somebody in your life that you want to kind of give a shout out to or thank you because of how important they were in your development?
Speaker B:I would say it's four, maybe five people in my life that I always keep in front of me in every conversation.
Speaker B:When I was 14 years old, it was a situation where being out of control cared.
Speaker B:So let me go back.
Speaker B:So my first gratitude and thank is to my parents, my mom and dad.
Speaker B:I'm dating myself.
Speaker B:But when I was born back in the day, we didn't have all these acronyms of diseases, ADHD and stuff like that.
Speaker B:So the kids were only either disciplined or not disciplined.
Speaker B:So I was in that non disciplined category.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So at age of three, three and a half, just to get me, get my energy out of me, I was introduced to Indian classical percussion.
Speaker B:And by age of 13, I had already done postmasters in Indian classical percussion.
Speaker B:But still my energy was not getting balanced.
Speaker B:What it means is if I would look in your eyes, I would fight.
Speaker B:If I don't look in your eyes, I will fight.
Speaker B:I was one of those kids at that time, right?
Speaker B:Think about that.
Speaker B:So when I was 14 years old, because of blessings and being an affluent family, I was sent to Tibet to train under a lama for two and a half months.
Speaker B:And coming out of that, I was a whole different person.
Speaker B:The second person that I always give shout out is one of the.
Speaker B:He's a big high priest at one of the Indian societies in India.
Speaker B:Back in Bangalore, I was doing my engineering.
Speaker B:Lost kid again because of all those.
Speaker B:I was not sure where I was going.
Speaker B:I learned so much about mindfulness.
Speaker B:I wanted to, you know, become one of those missionary guys to go out and serve world.
Speaker B:But then at that time, that particular Swamiji, he really paved my way.
Speaker B:He used to spend at least hour, hour and a half every evening after managing classes to just guide me into right direction.
Speaker B:So my humble thanks to him, fast forward.
Speaker B:Tom Giddens, one of the greatest sales guy in Aflac.
Speaker B:He was my next mentor to get me out of numbers and see the human behind the numbers.
Speaker B:And then of course, Mike Boyle, another mentor of mine.
Speaker B:So, yeah, I have always believed that whoever you are, you need to have seven relationships in your life, both personally and professionally.
Speaker B:And that's my book, Compass C U M P ss so it's Clarity Partners.
Speaker B:I put Opportunity advocates, your mentors, your pillars, your soulful connections and your support.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker A:So how did you, I mean, what, what led you to connect what you just talked about from your childhood, mindfulness to leadership?
Speaker A:Because a lot of times we don't, sometimes leaders leave without thinking.
Speaker A:So how do you, how did you connect those two pieces to your work that you do?
Speaker B:So now it's Been four decades since I learned that.
Speaker B:Very authentic, true historic practices.
Speaker B: it had a big taboo on it till: Speaker B:The way this whole journey started, this new journey of leadership and everything started with me was 20, 20 October, I was Chief technology officer and had a full blown ransomware attack.
Speaker B:And we came out of that in 30 hours without paying ransom.
Speaker B:But the questions I was asked after that led me to start thinking and reflect back in my life that what I did was very natural for me.
Speaker B:Why people are asking how I reacted in that situation, how I responded in that situation, how I manage the situation.
Speaker B:And I go back and look at my life and say that, okay, I never use this word mindful, but I've been teaching that to everyone around me.
Speaker B:For example, every single team I have had in professional life for 25 years, every new member coming, including my bosses, I used to have this common three questions before start of any meeting and less than 30 seconds.
Speaker B:The first is, what is the individual and collective outcome we want from this conversation, even if it is one on one?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:The second is, if I was not here, what is the other best thing I could be doing that would add more value to the same conversation?
Speaker B:And third, if I was not here, who else would be the best person to come in here and do the work?
Speaker B:Now, if you think about three questions, the first question brought you out of autopilot into the present to say what I want out of this conversation individually and collectively.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So that is the presence power.
Speaker B:You take a deep breath and you come in the present, break that autopilot.
Speaker B:The scientific research shows that it 85% of leaders, managers and leaders, when they come in the meeting the first five minute, they are not present because they're still stuck with whatever conversation they had before they walked in the meeting.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And they're still in that temperament, in that emotion, in that thing.
Speaker B:They're not present here.
Speaker B:So first of all, you are not doing justice as a human in the new conversation.
Speaker B:So just get the presentation.
Speaker A:So that first question, that first question and centers you on being present in that particular meeting at that time, and it clears your mind from whatever you just left before you walked in that room.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:The second question, when I say, if you are not here, what else you could be doing that would have a better value?
Speaker B:And in corporate life, there are hundreds of people who will agree that they are called in a meeting and they call others in the meeting who has no value in it.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So what you did with that question is you added your present moment into your prefrontal cortex to start logically thinking what is the best thing you should be doing right now?
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:The third question.
Speaker B:If you were not here, who was the other best person to come and do this thing or this conversation in this world?
Speaker B:That is prioritization and driving leadership.
Speaker B:Below you people think that leadership means I have to do everything.
Speaker B:No, leadership means that you have to identify the right talent for the right job and give them the opportunity to open their wings.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker A:So tell me how this plays out as you train leaders to do this.
Speaker A:Do they.
Speaker A:Do they do this before the meeting?
Speaker A:I mean.
Speaker A:I mean, kind of as you prepare yourself, kind of how to walk me through how that looks in a leadership role.
Speaker B:So in a leadership role, I walk in a meeting, and the first thing I do is everybody centered.
Speaker B:You can do it one of two ways.
Speaker B:I've used two different techniques.
Speaker B:The first technique is you just start the meeting.
Speaker B:Don't.
Speaker B:Don't.
Speaker B:You are not waiting for anyone.
Speaker B:Put the phones down.
Speaker B:Put your laptop.
Speaker B:Close your laptops before you do anything.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:If the presentation is there, people will show their laptop even before.
Speaker B:Before anything happens.
Speaker B:Put your phone down.
Speaker B:Close your laptop.
Speaker B:I want one word of intention from everyone in the room.
Speaker B:That word of intention is coming from your autopilot.
Speaker B:It tells me where you are.
Speaker B:It's not your presence, it's your autopilot.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Then I center you and say, okay, what you're wanting out of this meeting.
Speaker B:Do we all know what you want out of this meeting?
Speaker B:Why?
Speaker B:To spend an hour in a meeting or 30 minutes in a meeting when we are not aligned on what we want to get out of it?
Speaker B:What is the point of it?
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:So you don't just have a meeting to figure out why you're having a meeting is what you're saying.
Speaker B:Exactly.
Speaker B:And it is.
Speaker B:It is so fundamental, people don't realize it.
Speaker B:When I had the ransomware attack, right?
Speaker B:I mean, you can only imagine the kind of pressure that we have.
Speaker B:I just pulled in the six direct reports.
Speaker B:Four of them were remote because of COVID Two of them were in my office, and everybody because they had done that exercise.
Speaker B:It took us less than 2 minutes to identify who is going to do what.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:So who is going to talk to leaders?
Speaker B:Who is going to talk to FBI?
Speaker B:Who is going to talk to insurance?
Speaker B:Who is going to look at the servers, who's going to talk to vendors, who's going to employees?
Speaker B:That entire thing was done in less than two minutes.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:Because people are focused on the meeting and focused on what we need to get out of the meeting.
Speaker A:And we weren't just wasting time, you know, running around like we're afraid.
Speaker A:Like, like, so, like someone just threw marbles into a room.
Speaker A:We're all trying to grab a marble, right?
Speaker B:And, and it's funny, but even in corporate life, there have been situation board meetings.
Speaker B:There have been board meetings where literally I walked in, you won't believe, a big popcorn jar in my hand, right?
Speaker B:And one of the board members asked me, laughing, I mean, jokingly, right?
Speaker B:So you're hungry.
Speaker B:I'm like, no, this is entertainment show.
Speaker B:I don't have anything to contribute.
Speaker B:But I was asked to come to Toronto to in a meeting.
Speaker B:So I thought, I'll just sit in with the popcorn.
Speaker A:That's too funny.
Speaker B:But that changes that one incident changed the whole boardroom to say, oh my God, this guy is saying that we don't know what the hell we are here for.
Speaker A:But thinking about the poor CEOs running that meeting, how does he recover from that?
Speaker B:He just smiled and he said, singh, you always have an agenda, so why don't you share what the agenda is and then we can get to it.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker A:So this is, this is really helpful because I think so many of our, so many of our meetings, like you said, so much of our time together is wasted opportunity and people are just frustrated.
Speaker A:But you said mindfulness is really kind of a new concept.
Speaker A:And I've heard of a couple other people recently that I've had on my podcast who in corporate, you know, C Suites, America, talking about mindfulness.
Speaker A:But for those of us who don't typically think that way, how do we begin to shift the culture of our organizations to start thinking?
Speaker A:How do I make the best use of this time?
Speaker A:Because it's not something we typically learn to do very well.
Speaker B:So let's step back for a second.
Speaker B:Let's talk about the word mindful itself and why I did not use for a long time.
Speaker B:And again, I'll go back 40 years back the way I was trained.
Speaker B:It is one of the most traditional practices of lamas, Buddhists.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:That's where I was trained for two and a half months.
Speaker B:It's a whole different story what happened there and how it all came about.
Speaker B:But fast forward, let's explain what mindfulness means.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:Depending on the school of thought that you have, we say we have five senses or 12 senses, right?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Whichever you want.
Speaker B:Take now two things.
Speaker B:First, our brain has neurons firing 24 7.
Speaker B:If we're alive, our brain is firing neurons and it is collecting intelligence and information from all our senses all the time.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So mind is already full.
Speaker B:Let's start there.
Speaker B:It's not empty.
Speaker B:It's already full.
Speaker B:Mindfulness means can you take a pause and become an observer of all the intelligence that has been collected here?
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:Can you appreciate how much intelligence is there?
Speaker B:Now, the second part of that is, how do a person, anybody, do that in their real life day to day?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So that is another problem.
Speaker B:The most basic thing that scientifically delineates a dead and an alive, except for being brain dead, is breathing.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Anytime something happens, are you breathing or not?
Speaker B:That's the first thing we humans have gotten to a point where we don't appreciate and tap into that fundamental thing that is keeping us alive.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Right now, right here, right here.
Speaker B:Just follow this 32nd with me.
Speaker B:Okay?
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:Take.
Speaker B:Just close your eyes.
Speaker B:Close your eyes and take a deep breath.
Speaker B:Hold and inhale.
Speaker B:And one more time, hold.
Speaker B:Take a deep breath, hold, exhale and slightly open your eyes.
Speaker B:The first sensation that you have of your breath is right here.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:That's your prefrontal cortex.
Speaker B:That is the logical part of the brain.
Speaker B:And if you just pause and take that three deep breath, you come out of autopilot and what you will feel, and you would have felt this.
Speaker B:If not, then we can do it again.
Speaker B:You will feel extra information of this conversation that otherwise you would have not felt.
Speaker B:Not stepping into the.
Speaker B:That's it.
Speaker B:It's that simple.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:You don't have to twist your body in 200 different ways.
Speaker B:No.
Speaker B:You don't have to go to Himalayas for retreat.
Speaker B:No.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:Can you just get present in the moment?
Speaker B:And that's called presence, power.
Speaker A:I love it.
Speaker A:So what are some of the.
Speaker A:Some of the factors that I know?
Speaker A:We live in a very busy, very high tech culture, so our brain, like you said, is always firing constantly, all the time.
Speaker A:So seems to me like part of what you're trying to do is how do you slow that down and focus on the information that you need for that particular moment, because there's so much flooding your head.
Speaker A:So tell us a little bit about your mindful leadership mastery complex.
Speaker A:I'm kind of curious what strategies you use to help people tap into that knowledge that's there for them.
Speaker B:Awesome.
Speaker B:So first of all, it's not about rush.
Speaker B:It is about coming out of autopilot.
Speaker B:You cannot rush the mind.
Speaker B:The brain is already running at the level that has to run.
Speaker B:You cannot rush it anymore.
Speaker A:Darn right.
Speaker B:We feel things are rushed because we are not living in the moment.
Speaker B:What I mean by that more than often, when you're driving, you always go from point A to point B.
Speaker B:You always leave your home, go to church, leave church, go to home.
Speaker B:There are some days you feel, oh my God, how did I get here?
Speaker B:Right, Right.
Speaker B:Sometimes you go and grab a cup of coffee because you really want to have a coffee.
Speaker B:You had the first sip and the next thing you remember, the cup is empty.
Speaker B:What happened between that you take any example.
Speaker B:What is happening is the neuroscience of that is that we have allowed our brain, which is the laziest part of our body, to run on autopilot, which is amygdala, which is your fight and flight senses.
Speaker B:So when the brain is running on fight and flight, it is telling that I have to conserve all the energy, I have to protect all the energy possible so I can keep this human alive.
Speaker B:Which means your nutrients and your proteins and your chemicals are not going to different parts of the organ in your body that is supposed to be in a natural state.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:That's why we feel that the time elapsed and we did not realize what happened.
Speaker B:That's the fastness that we talk.
Speaker B:I wanted to share with you scientifically, when we say that life is fast, what is happening?
Speaker B:So that's one part I'll stop, put that as one caveat.
Speaker B:The second thing that is happening is everything is cyclical in nature.
Speaker B:The whole universe is cyclical in nature.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Same thing is our brain was designed, human anatomy is designed to be cyclical in nature.
Speaker B:As in, by the time sun starts setting, your brain starts excreting melatonin so that when it's time to sleep, you get a good sleep before the sunrise rays comes in, the brain stops excreting melatonin and starts giving adrenaline for you to wake up and get back in your sense, in your rhythm.
Speaker B:We have broken that.
Speaker B:We have broken that cyclicality because not only that, we don't sleep on time till, and this not, I'm not telling for you and me.
Speaker B:90% of people, they have a phone or an iPad right in front of their eyes.
Speaker B:It's blue light.
Speaker B:That blue light in your eyes telling brain that still sun out there.
Speaker A:Oh yeah.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:Right now you close your eyes at 10, 11, 12, whenever it is, and you expect to get in sleep.
Speaker B:You don't get sleep because your melatonin is not developed yet.
Speaker B:And then you're not getting that full six hour of Brain to regenerate all your cells because there's an alarm that buzzes and you wake up, right?
Speaker B:So we have broken the human cyclicality of anatomy, of our body.
Speaker B:That's why we feel we are rushed.
Speaker B:That's why we feel we are deprived.
Speaker B:That's why we.
Speaker B:All those things are happening now.
Speaker B:How I teach people to your question in the Inner Compass journey.
Speaker B:It's a 12 weeks program where we start with purpose.
Speaker B:What is the purpose of your life?
Speaker B:We have an assessment that people can take.
Speaker B:That's our intake in 25 minutes.
Speaker B:We carve out what are things that frustrating you?
Speaker B:What's fulfilling you?
Speaker B:The word I use is progress.
Speaker B:P R O G R E S S. Right.
Speaker B:So purpose, reflection, organizing and then grit, resilience, empowerment, self support and systematic development from GRID to other things.
Speaker B:Other things that you have to develop to get from point A to point B.
Speaker B:But defining point A to point B is your purpose reflecting back in your life.
Speaker B:People have lost capability of reflecting because they're in autopilot all the time.
Speaker B:You would not.
Speaker B:I asked this question with people that I, I always work with, right.
Speaker B:When they say, oh, I can reflect, I said, okay, when was the last time you said I love you to your spouse?
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:Or it was this morning.
Speaker B:Oh, really?
Speaker B:What did you feel at that time?
Speaker B:What did your spouse feel?
Speaker B:Did you see in the eyes?
Speaker B:What was that?
Speaker B:Yeah, no, because you are running on autopilot.
Speaker B:It has become like brushing your teeth.
Speaker B:It has become to say I love you?
Speaker A:No, it's like a routine.
Speaker A:Yeah, right, right.
Speaker B:When was the last cup of coffee you had?
Speaker B:Oh, I just had right now.
Speaker B:Okay, what did it, what did it smell like?
Speaker B:What did it feel like?
Speaker B:What was it?
Speaker B:The pressure when you put on your lips.
Speaker B:So that's reflecting that people have lost.
Speaker B:And then organizing another big one.
Speaker B:I started this conversation.
Speaker B:I said, there are seven relationship that everybody needs to have in their life, personally and professionally.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So organizing has two aspects.
Speaker B:The emotional aspect and then the relationship aspect.
Speaker B:The relationship aspect is from that Compass program.
Speaker B:The emotional aspect is to understand how you expand your emotional vocabulary.
Speaker B:People come and say, oh, I'm so frustrated.
Speaker B:I said, okay, hold on, explain me more.
Speaker B:It'll be one of three things.
Speaker B:It's not frustration.
Speaker B:One is fear of uncertainty.
Speaker B:I don't know what the outcome is going to be and I'm frustrated.
Speaker B:Two things not being in your control the way you want it.
Speaker B:Oh, I'm frustrated things are not happening the way I want it.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:It's not frustration.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And the third is not knowing how to explain your emotions to people.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:So expanding that emotional vocabulary tells you what exactly is the problem that is going on.
Speaker B:When you say you are sad, are you really sad or you are just tired?
Speaker A:Makes sense.
Speaker A:So how do you help people?
Speaker A:So by asking those questions, going deeper, you make people stop and go, is this really the emotion that I'm feeling or is there something else behind it?
Speaker B:Exactly.
Speaker B:So like I said, it's a 12 week program.
Speaker B:And being a science student, I believe in scientific spirituality.
Speaker B:What it means is I have created tools, scientific tools to help people walk through each of those situations.
Speaker B:So we have the emotional wheel which starts with the five words that people always use.
Speaker B:And then we start expanding into 60 different words that it can mean depending on which emotion you you are feeling.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:And given the 40 years of experience and my blessings from the Lama Back in 40 years back, I was able to create 260 different micro mindful practice.
Speaker B:Just like we did two deep breath, right.
Speaker B:It takes between 60 seconds to 120 seconds those exercises and then I give all those to my folks to say okay, now that you start relating to this emotions when this triggers use this particular practice.
Speaker B:Now initially it was very difficult for them to siphe through it.
Speaker B:So I've created custom AI's tools, companions that you can just type in there and say hey, I'm feeling this.
Speaker B:And it'll tell you exactly what to do out of those 260 practices.
Speaker A:Oh cool.
Speaker B:Same thing for the book that I wrote, Compass Circle the seven relationship.
Speaker B:I've created a whole custom GPT to help people walk through.
Speaker B:Hey, I have problem in this relationship, how do I go and improve it?
Speaker B:So it'll give you a whole strategy of who are these people, what kind of people it is, how to go find them, how to engage with them, what kind of email to send them, the whole shebang.
Speaker A:So if someone's reaching out to you and says hey Singh, I want you to coach my leadership team on this, where do you start with those?
Speaker B:Purpose everybody.
Speaker B:Purpose.
Speaker B:The way we define purpose is what, what is the best of what you have to give others, whether it is in an individual setting or a group setting or a company setting or a community setting, doesn't make a difference.
Speaker B:What studies have found is if individual's purpose is not aligned with goal of that community, whether it is a company, whether it is a church, whether it is an whatever society, whatever group that is, the relativity to that work is not there and if that relativity to the work is not There, there's no fulfillment.
Speaker A:So what happens when your purpose is out of line with your corporation?
Speaker B:You're burned out.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You're burning out.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:You're coming for a paycheck, not for your serving.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:You're coming in for paycheck.
Speaker B:The day you get a better paycheck, you will go.
Speaker B:But if you are connected with the purpose, then you are working with something that is way beyond your paycheck.
Speaker A:So once they get through purpose, what's next?
Speaker B:Then we do organizing.
Speaker B:Everybody has different style, everybody has different.
Speaker B:So like I said, the purpose factor assessment not only identifies your archetype, it also says what frustrates and fulfills you the moment you do that exercise.
Speaker B:We bring the team together.
Speaker B:And first exercise is to share with everyone who is doing what that is frustrating somebody else.
Speaker B:And how we can think about first is appreciate the limitations of others because you don't know.
Speaker B:So let's talk about that and then reorganize the way the team is structured and who is doing what work.
Speaker B:So for example, within a team you need a strategist, you need a manager who can manage day to day activities.
Speaker B:You need a teacher who can teach people new concepts.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:You need a cheerleader who can bring fun and those kind of things in camaraderie in the team.
Speaker B:So who is playing those roles?
Speaker B:And then depending on your structure of the organization, the goal of your organization, how do you maximize the best thing that people have in them?
Speaker A:So we got purpose, we got organization, we move beyond there.
Speaker A:What's next?
Speaker B:And then we get into flywheel strategy.
Speaker B:And flywheel strategy is what is the one small thing that individually and collectively we can start doing on a daily basis that is going to make a huge impact in the future.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:The flywheels.
Speaker B:That's the concept of flywheel strategy is not that you come and do a overhaul overnight.
Speaker B:Nothing is overnight.
Speaker B:I've not seen anything happening overnight.
Speaker B:Right, right.
Speaker B:And I get in these meetings and people are all this, oh, I cannot give best statement.
Speaker B:I always get right.
Speaker B:Oh, my team cannot spend two hours with you.
Speaker A:We have things to do.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And I'm like, you spent 40 hours in a wrong direction.
Speaker B:Trust me, it is better to pause for two hours and figure out what is the right direction.
Speaker A:It's more efficient.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:More purposeful.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:More intentional.
Speaker A:Wow, that's pretty cool.
Speaker A:So I'm curious, as you do this in corporations, I'm sure you run across.
Speaker A:Run across.
Speaker A:I mean that example is part of it.
Speaker A:Misconceptions of what you're there to do.
Speaker A:So what's the most common misconception about the work that you do with C suite executives and leadership?
Speaker B:So I, I don't think the misconception is what I do.
Speaker B:The misconception is what I get from them is, hey, I already know everything I need to know about me.
Speaker A:Okay?
Speaker B:And my, my.
Speaker B:And my question is very simple.
Speaker B:After that, when somebody says, oh, I already know everything I need to know about me.
Speaker B:I know my purpose.
Speaker B:My simple question is, okay, then, why you are not fulfilled, why you are not happy?
Speaker B:Why you don't have everything that you have desired in front of you?
Speaker B:If that was true, if you knew everything about yourself, why don't every individual that you interact get something that is valuable to them?
Speaker B:If you knew everything about yourself, why do you avoid having certain conversations?
Speaker A:So you're.
Speaker A:You're the imposter syndrome shatterer is what you are.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker A:That's pretty funny.
Speaker A:So tell us.
Speaker A:No, go ahead.
Speaker B:No, I was just saying.
Speaker B:But, but I think that is important for people to understand.
Speaker B:Your learning does not end with a position.
Speaker B:Your learning does not end with a certain age.
Speaker B:Your learning does not end with accomplishing X, Y and Z.
Speaker B:This universe is too vast to say that I know everything.
Speaker B:That's all I would leave it at.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker A:I'm curious because you've worked in so many different contexts and across the globe, is there one leadership challenge that you see?
Speaker A:This kind of depend doesn't matter where you are in the world, but this is a common leadership thing you see across the globe.
Speaker B:I would say there are two, right?
Speaker B:One is imposter syndrome.
Speaker B:Big time.
Speaker A:Okay?
Speaker B:Big time.
Speaker B:I mean, people don't like to see the mirror, period.
Speaker B:They don't like to see the mirror.
Speaker B:That's one big thing, right?
Speaker B:And because they don't want to see the mirror, even when they know, think about this.
Speaker B:This is how I explain very simplistically.
Speaker B:And this goes across the globe.
Speaker B:Anyone?
Speaker B:And I say leader.
Speaker B:If you are the, if you're the person who decided who got the last slice of pizza in the home, congratulations, you became a leader.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:Let's start there.
Speaker B:Life is nothing but a sequence of experiments.
Speaker B:What I mean by that is every moment you do something, if you like it, you do more of it.
Speaker B:If you don't like it, you change what you did.
Speaker B:The problem is even before people do something, they create an expectation of the result, right?
Speaker B:The worst thing they do is after they created expectation of the result, they get emotionally attached to getting It So when you actually did the activity, you are not present there because you are already in that expectation.
Speaker B:So people are losing the current experience, leaders are losing the value in the current conversation because you already expected outcome of that conversation.
Speaker B:Because before having the conversation, that makes sense.
Speaker B:So what leaders across the globe are missing is not experiencing the true life moment by moment.
Speaker B:And then when they don't get that expected result because they're emotionally attached to it, they will double down on that rather than backing up.
Speaker A:That's good.
Speaker A:So saying I have a question I asked my guest in season six is kind of a surprise question.
Speaker A:And the surprise question for today for you is if you were on a 10 hour flight and you could pick who you sat next to, who would you pick?
Speaker B:I have two people in my mind.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:The first person will be the lama who trained me.
Speaker B:There's so much more that I can learn from him in every minute that I could spend with him.
Speaker B:That's the first person.
Speaker B:And the second person would be my mom, the first teacher who gave me the instrument in my hand that taught me so much that even today I play at least for half an hour, 45 minutes every day, the Indian percussion, just to remember where I was 50 years back.
Speaker A:Wow, that's neat.
Speaker A:I also love to ask my guest this question, Singh, what do you want your legacy to be?
Speaker B:I'm not sure yet.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker B:Because I have not learned everything that is possible to learn to say, this is my legacy.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:I'm still, I, I still, I hope if I don't shut down the next five minutes breathing.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:If I'm alive, I hope that there's much more to learn and much more to give.
Speaker B:The only thing I would say is by last year or a couple of years back, I realized that there's only so much you can gather in this universe and after that you have to start giving back.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So I hope that the legacy, when it is there, is in terms of someone or something that was given to this community, this universe that stays with them for years to come in mindful practice, at least in those moments of 30 to 90 seconds that they can connect with themselves internally.
Speaker A:So where can listeners connect with you?
Speaker A:Figure out, find out what you're doing, learn more about what you do.
Speaker B:The easiest way to connect directly with me is on LinkedIn, DM me, and I'm always there.
Speaker B:Or you can connect with me on my website, singleadership.com.
Speaker A:And if you want to leave a thought or a mindful thought for our audience who's listening today.
Speaker A:Or what would be the one takeaway you want people to leave with today?
Speaker B:One simple thing.
Speaker B:Pick the last conversation that you had, no matter who it was, and the closest relationship that you can think of.
Speaker B:This is going to be that much more impactful.
Speaker B:Were you truly present in that conversation?
Speaker B:And if you're present in that conversation, don't lie yourself.
Speaker B:Test.
Speaker B:Three simple things.
Speaker B:One, can you recollect the smell and the air temperature when you had that conversation?
Speaker B:Two, do you remember every word spoken in that conversation?
Speaker B:And three, can you recollect both your and other person's facial expression when you had that conversation?
Speaker B:If it did not, then as a human, you failed.
Speaker A:That's pretty true.
Speaker A:I mean, as I think about it, you're right about a lot of our conversations.
Speaker A:We don't.
Speaker A:We're not really present.
Speaker A:We're just in the room.
Speaker B:That's the whole thing.
Speaker B:And it takes less than.
Speaker B:It takes less than 30 seconds to get present.
Speaker B:Just take three deep breath.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:Start there.
Speaker A:Well, Singh, thanks so much for coming on and providing us with some really deep thoughts about being in the moment.
Speaker A:I always talk about how time flies because we're not really always thinking about the people.
Speaker A:We're standing right in front of us.
Speaker A:And you just kind of gave us a way to kind of focus on being truly present and being available to people and enjoying every moment that God gives us in this world.
Speaker A:So thank you for that, Singh, and blessings on what you do.
Speaker B: ,: Speaker B:My target is to get to 250,000 this year.
Speaker A:Well, hopefully let us know when you get there.
Speaker A:We'll have you back on for the 257,000 first.
Speaker A:Thank you so much.
Speaker B:Thank you so much.
