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Do you know the effective way of moving forward in your career? If no, read more .. < Back Guide for career progression - 3Ps process Do you know the effective way of moving forward in your career? If no, read more .. While the trajectory of your career is influenced by both hard work and luck, it's equally shaped by your ability to recognize the right opportunities and make strategic moves at the right moments. As you ascend into more impactful roles, the competition intensifies, making advancement more challenging. Drawing from my own experience and observations, I've distilled the journey from one career level to the next into a three-step approach. Following these steps, in conjunction with seizing opportunities and timing your actions effectively, can greatly enhance your career progression. Before delving into the steps and unveiling the secret, it's important to note that this approach may not universally apply to all scenarios and job types. It's tailored to the context of the IT sector, where hierarchical structures prevail, and individuals are driven to climb the corporate ladder. Now, let's explore the three-step process I mentioned earlier. This process typically spans 2-3 years (given the current IT landscape), demanding patience, adaptability, a willingness to invest effort, a knack for acquiring new skills, and the occasional stroke of luck. The three stages of this process are Prepare , Practice , and Progress . Henceforth, I'll refer to it as the 3Ps approach. 1. Prepare yourself well In any job role, setting your own goals is crucial. Without a clear direction for your career and objectives, you could easily end up adrift, like a piece of wood in a river's current. So, establish your goals. Make sure they're realistic, achievable, and, importantly, measurable. Your goals should be tangible enough that you can showcase your accomplishments to your managers and colleagues. It's wise to set goals that can be realized in both the short term (3-6 months) and the long term (2+ years). When setting goals, remember they should meet two essential criteria: Benefit Your Project/Organization: Your goals should contribute positively to your project or organization's success. Add Value to Your Performance Report: Your goals should reflect achievements that hold weight and contribute to your performance assessment. Once your goals are defined, the initial and most crucial step is to hit the ground running by dedicating yourself to your project with diligence and intelligence. Key actions to consider: Rapidly grasp the project's intricacies. Demonstrate teamwork and active listening skills. Assist your teammates. Deliver strong results in your project, establishing your dependability. Showcase your capability to handle the project with confidence. Typically, within 6-8 months, you should be ready to transition into the next phase of your progression. Once you've fulfilled the aforementioned criteria, you're poised to step forward and embrace even more challenges. 2. Practice Diligently – Become a Vital Player The next phase revolves around immersing yourself in project work and evolving into a pivotal contributor. To comprehend the term 'key player' is fundamental to mastering this stage. When I refer to a key player, I mean someone who is: Self-sufficient in project-related tasks Exceptionally proficient and reliable in their role Capable of delivering solutions to challenges Possesses a deep understanding of the project and its environment Achieving self-reliance requires dedicated efforts to understand the project's nuances, internalize its objectives, and align your short-term goals accordingly. As the saying goes: Working hard is crucial, but working smart is even more so! Evolving into a key player not only elevates your significance within the project but also strengthens your trustworthiness, contributing to favorable impressions from your superiors. Rather than merely clocking in hours, it's pivotal to focus on demonstrating outcomes. Although sometimes long hours are needed, tangible accomplishments carry more weight. A span of approximately 6-8 months is a reasonable timeframe to attain key player status. Yet, let me emphasize that this isn't an easy feat. You must constantly exhibit a willingness to learn, adapt to changes, and exhibit your competencies on the journey. This becomes a critical aspect during this phase and serves as a significant exit criterion. Demonstrating your project's value is crucial for your management to acknowledge and appreciate your contributions. (Apologies for unveiling this crucial tip!) Key tips to bear in mind while striving for key player status include: Showcase your value by yielding results. Take the initiative to implement technical solutions for common challenges. Boost efficiency by automating routine tasks. Remember, outcomes matter more than the time spent. Attain process efficiency and highlight gains for both management and customers. Strive to be consistently visible. If you succeed in this pursuit and evolve into a key player within the team/organization, you're better positioned for the next phase in your career journey. However, keep in mind that this isn't a straightforward path and might necessitate regular discussions and aligning short-term goals with your manager. It's imperative to keep your manager informed about your progress, your immediate objectives, and how your contributions benefit the project! 3. Progress forward Assuming you've effectively become a key player within the team and have been performing at your peak for a substantial period, it's time to prepare for the next step by 'unlearning' some of your current project knowledge and cultivating successors. When I mention 'unlearn,' consider these key steps: Identify someone who can step into your role within the project. Personally train this individual on the project's intricacies. Ensure the knowledge you've amassed is transferred, understood, and practiced by your chosen successor. Remain accessible to your manager for tasks that need completion (since, ultimately, you're aspiring for their role, right?). Initiate the process of making your own role in the project redundant. You might wonder about the last point – after all, if the second phase urged you to be a key player, why suggest making yourself redundant now? It's a valid question and a tremendously crucial one. The answer is simple: unless you pave the way for your project to function independently of you, how can you ascend to the next level? The significance lies in building a proficient team and robust resources for the project's continuity. It demonstrates your legacy as a professional, manager, and effective leader. During this phase, connect more frequently with your manager than you did in the earlier stage. Seek to comprehend their responsibilities, methodologies, and performance expectations. Secret tip: Your manager is also striving for advancement. By aiding their progress, you pave the way for your own ascent. Grant them space to rise, and you'll find yourself rising too! If luck shines your way, you might observe favorable outcomes in your subsequent performance reviews. Then, you can loop back to applying the principles of phase 1 to your new role! As I mentioned in my initial post, this cycle generally spans about 2-3 years. Patience and a strong work ethic are vital attributes during this journey. ---- Photo in the image by Volodymyr Hryshchenko on Unsplash Previous Next

Have you ever felt de-motivated, dejected, disappointed or down hearted ... < Back Seven tricks to feel motivated at workplace and in life Have you ever felt de-motivated, dejected, disappointed or down hearted ... Have you ever felt de-motivated, dejected, disappointed or down hearted after a long day’s work ? I am sure you would have at some point in your life, if not every day after the work. Staying motivated and positive for long time is a real struggle. We are surrounded by and often assaulted by negative thinking and anxiety about the present situation and of course about the future ! We always have a phase where we start doubting ourselves and feel depressed. Unfortunately there is no master key or a simple solution to unlock the mystery of de-motivation. Even after we feel we are over it, sometimes, it comes back to haunt us in an even bigger way. Here, in this article, I would like to mention few of the points that would help one keep up the motivation, focus and avoid the long spells of depression and dejection, especially at work ! Love music Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. ~Berthold Auerbach Whilst I am not a big fan of music collection, I do have a small collection of specific songs that I find dear to my heart. It is a decent mixture of all types of songs ranging from disco to classical and ghazals to bhajans. Depending on what emotional state I want to get, I choose the song and listen. This helps me often to get right state of mind before I proceed to do next task. Have a buddy at work Its important to have someone at work whom you can consider a best friend or a buddy. You need to have one such friend with whom you can share your work difficulties and vent out temporary frustration. Believe me, more often than not, you need some kind of instant emotional support with whom you can talk and share things. At more stressful jobs, you often experience bursts of negativity around due to several work related matters. So it is always helpful to have someone who you can count on to help you get out of negativity and back to normal mind state. Human is a social animal and we all have an inherent need of talking and being heard. In case you do not have anyone whom you can to and talk your heart out, it really feels like dejected and lonely at times. Spent a good time with your friend and talk on topics that interest you to get your positivity back on track. On the other hand, please extend help to your buddy when he / she is in the need of help. Have a hobby / passion In my opinion, having some passion in life is very important. For me, my passion is watching football. It keeps me going and helps me keep happy. My favorite club is Manchester United and I do everything I can to watch them playing (on TV at least). Watching them play my favorite game makes me happier and feel inspired. However, if they lose then there is an equal chance of me feeling more miserable after that. I do keep recordings of certain match clips which I tend to watch when I am feeling a little low and it certainly has helped in keeping me inspired. Passion is closely related to the emotional behavior of the human and if you see your passion fulfilled, its more of a chance that you feel inspired and motivated. Focus on positives Sometimes, if we experience too much negativity for a prolonged period of time and feel de-motivated for a longer spell of time, we go into a state of mind where all the thoughts start with negative options and creates negative vibes around us. Once you fall into the negativity trap, its not very easy to come out and have any positive feeling about anything. In past, when I had fallen into the trap of negativity, I used to feel negative for no real reason and sometimes a mere presence of few people around used to make me start feel de-motivated. However, the wiser I got, I tend to avoid feeling on this trap by concentrating more on the positives that are coming out from the situation. Look at the scenario holistically rather than what is only seen to you Thank God for not making things any worse Find out one positive thing that you can take out of the situation. As I often mention in many of my conversations, “there are always 100s of negative things that can be made out of the situation, but if you find at least one positive thing out of it, consider it a learning for life and thank GOD”. Positivity is a habit, and once you get it, you can easily overcome situations that are trying to put you back in the hole of negativity and de-motivation. Praise others Spreading good words makes one feel positive and help others feel good about themselves. This, in turn make change in people’s behavior towards you in a better way, making you feel better. Believe me, speaking positive about someone else’s work and personality is the best way to connect with the person in a right way. I remember a specific incident when I was given to work with a so-called difficult person. All the people who worked with that person earlier, warned me about the boring and micro-management behavior of the person. While I too felt a little bit strange with his work methods, the more I started to talk to him and praise him about some real good work he had done in past (in some cases without anyone’s real help), it made him really comfortable with me and I could see an immediate behavior change in him towards me allowing me freedom to work the way I want. Ultimately this led to work satisfaction for both of us and a little bit more positive at work for me ! However, one thing that you need to keep in mind is when to praise someone and how much to praise. There is fine line between real appreciative person and feet-licking bastard ! You need to ensure that you do not cross to the other side .. Open your mind I always feel that one need to share what he / she feels about the situation in a right way. Its not often very motivating to work in uneasy, unconvincing situations or scenarios where you are in a confused state or feel half-committed to the cause. Learn a bit about emotional intelligence and try to be aware of your state of mind. One very important, but often neglected, fact is to know our state of mind and understand our emotions. We go through so many emotions such as happiness, inspired, dejection, unhappy, nervousness etc., at work place during various hours of the day and due to several causes, it almost becomes a habit to suppress them and continue with the job we are doing. Can you stay in a meeting where you do not feel like being, and contribute productively ? Can you give right suggestions and solutions to a problem, when you are in a state of anger or frustration ? Definitely not ! The more you suppress your emotions, the more you feel out of control and start losing your own focus. Its important to let others know what state of mind you are and help yourself in getting back to where you should be. Believe me, the more I tried this, the more I felt in control of the situation and my responses were getting better, in turn making me feel positive and motivated. Think big and have faith When you get the questions, such as “why does it always happen with me”, “why am I being pushed to do something that I do not want to do”, “no one seems to help me here” start flowing in your mind, think of is as time to take a step back and consider the bigger picture and look at the intention behind the situation. When such situation occurs, look at the big picture and find out the intentions behind this situation. In case you are wondering how to do this, I recommend reading a story in my leadership series. You can safely bank on the thumb rule of “intentions of people at work place are never bad, sometimes behaviors are” to sail through this period. On the other hand, if you are unable to trace the intentions and get any positivity of the big picture, think of it as the lowest point and be happy that things can only improve on this point onwards. Just have faith ! #positivethinking #work #mindset #behaviour #worklife #emotions #emotionalintelligence Previous Next

A little story of a conversation between me and one of my product managers .. < Back Trust does wonders to people A little story of a conversation between me and one of my product managers .. [ Originally published on Linkedin here ] PM (A bit worried) to me – Hey Swapnil, we have a 1:1 catch up scheduled every two weeks right now, but I would like it to be a bit more frequent. Can we talk weekly or daily? I would like to validate my thinking and decisions I make before I talk to the team and stakeholders and communicate them the updates and decisions. Me – Hmm. Why do you want to validate your decisions with me? PM – I just want to ensure that I am on right track and making right decisions and have thought through from all perspectives and I think you can help me validate my thinking. Me – What if I say No? PM (Puzzled) – But, what if I make a wrong decision? And how would you know what decisions I make every day with regards to the team? Me – Well, that’s exactly why I say No. I want you to know that I trust you one hundred percent and you should feel comfortable being in-charge and make decisions. Its OK, some decisions will go wrong and we may need to revert those, but that’s the learning you will get through the process. Intent is important and even if you make some decisions wrong keeping right intent, it will not impact my trust and my backing to you. PM (A bit relieved) – Thanks. Feels better now! What if the team members, do not agree with my decisions? Me - Well, it’s not enough just to communicate decisions. You should also be able to communicate ‘why’ you made those decisions and what was the reasoning behind them. Tell them the story, constraints, context and intent behind making that decision and be open and transparent with them. I am sure they will understand each decision you make and by doing this, you are also strengthening the trust bond between you and team members. PM (Happy) – Makes lot of sense. Thanks! But I would still like to come and talk to you on things that puzzle me. Me – Anytime! Like you just did today! Trust does wonders to people! #trust #leadership #decisions Previous Next

< Back How developers can become a lot more productive Swapnil Deshpande & Vivek Kant speak on developer effectiveness, with Times Jobs. The phenomenal pace of digitalisation, especially following the pandemic, has led to a surge in demand for developers. But hiring and reskilling developers is turning out to be an expensive and time-consuming affair. Another way to tackle the problem is to improve the productivity and effectiveness of your existing developers. That was the subject of our discussion in the Times Techies Webinar last week. “A typical programmer spends no more than 30-40% time in actual coding,” said Vivek Kant, CTO of Finserv MARKETS. The rest of the time, she is in meetings, asking and following up on approvals (like for use of IT infra), following up with another team which has built an API she needs to use, going back to business analysts or product owners for clarifications of requirements and design. “There’s also the discoverability issue in today’s microservices and API world, where all applications are dependent on each other. There are so many of these, I wouldn’t know what all exists, what each one’s capabilities are. The developer spends a lot of time trying to find these, raising tickets, waiting for responses,” Swapnil Deshpande, chief digital officer at Thoughtworks, said. Deshpande also found different Thoughtworks offices working on exactly the same problems, without realising it. So Deshpande’s team set about developing what they call an internal developer platform and a developer experience portal, and launched the beta version in July. Called Neo (network-enabled organisation), the platform connected all developers, became a repository for all knowledge in the organisation, enabled requests and approvals (it’s increasingly even automating provisioning once an approval is given). “Getting basic IT infrastructure now takes less than a day, compared to 7-10 days earlier; the average time between ideation and first line of code has gone down from a couple of weeks to a couple of days; building APIs is down to minutes, from days. Developers can discover all assets entirely by themselves by searching on the portal,” Deshpande said. Kant said developer effectiveness at Finserv MARKETS has increased 20-30% after his team improved tooling, automated processes, and built developer self-service capabilities. “I believe we can go another 2x, 3x on developer effectiveness,” he said. Previous Next

Innovation is almost non-negotiable for every company today. Its important aspect that ... < Back Innovation techniques – for the brilliant ideas in you Innovation is almost non-negotiable for every company today. Its important aspect that ... Innovation is almost non-negotiable for every company today. Its important aspect that every company should consider, if they want to sustain and thrive in this competitive market. And hinking of innovation, one of the most important aspect of innovation is the “Idea Generation”. Unless ideas are generated, innovation can not fly. There are quite a few idea generation techniques that would help generate large number of ideas to find new solutions and different ways of achieving the purpose. Here in this article, we are going to have a look at three common techniques of idea generation. Brainstorming / Brain writing For the brainstorming or brain writing session, we need to gather a group of participants who are familiar with the challenge statement. Create a challenge statement and the attribute list and make them visible to the team. For the purpose of brain storming, it is recommended that the group of participants is typically less than 7 people. If you have more than 7 people in the room, then you should go for Brain writing technique. Ideas should be put up spontaneously verbally during brainstorming session and written on a piece of paper during brain writing session. During the brain writing session, after each idea is written on a piece of paper, it is recommended to crumple the paper and throw in the middle and pick up someone else’s crumpled paper to write next idea. Ensure that some rules such as non-criticism of any idea, welcoming unusual ideas and encouraging other participants to build on other’s ideas should strictly adhered to. Encourage ‘quantity’ of ideas. For the purpose of idea generation, quality follows quantity. Overall ideas should be rated based on the benefits it can give and easiness of achieving them. All the ideas should be properly documented for future reference. Scamper SCAMPER is a checklist of lateral thought technique that can expand one’s creativity. SCAMPER is a acronym of the following words, Substitute – Try and see what can be substituted in the current situation in order to improve upon the scenario. Ask the questions on what can be substituted, how, when, why ? Combine – Try to enhance the synergy by combining, merging, attaching, adding and uniting separate attributes together for the issue. This might give a different solution altogether. Adapt – Try and make adjustments to certain aspects and attributes of a product or process Modify/Magnify/Minify – Try and change the size, quantity or quality of the attributes. Try to make things later or smaller, faster or slower and see what difference it can make to the situation. Put to other use – Try and change the place or purpose for which an object or a process is currently being used. Eliminate – Try and remove, omit or get rid of a quantity, part or whole object from the situation and see how it happens. Rearrange/Reduce/Reverse – Try and place attributes against each other, pit them opposite or contrary to, turn around; to change order or adjust, different plan, layout or scheme. Think like a child Whilst, I understand that changing the perspective from an adult to the child itself can be challenging but believe me it can be a fun. In order to try and generate ideas using this technique, make your mind set similar to that of a child by thinking of a children you know and you can anticipate the reaction of. Try and see the situation through their eyes and feel what they would like about the situation, what they would be proud of, what they would dislike, feel funny or useful about and note down the reactions. Consider the simple example of a muddy puddle. When we adults see it, we try and step over or step around it. We imagine muddy shoes, dirty clothes and filthy carpets at home if we step into the puddle. However, if you ask the same to kids, they would call it fun and imagine to build bridges and dams to cross it !! #generation #idea #mind #mindset #Innovation #techniques Previous Next

Kavitha is Head of Design with Digital Platforms & one of the best in visual design. Women leadership series - In conversation with Kavitha Thyagarajan 5 Mar 2022 Kavitha is Head of Design with Digital Platforms & one of the best in visual design. How would you introduce yourself? I am a multidisciplinary designer, enjoying my current role as Head of Design for TechOps Digital platforms, where I am surrounded and inspired by the most talented techies everyday. In my past life, I worked as an Architect and landscape designer. I believe in Mies van der Rohe’s motto “Less is more” and my work often reflects the same. Can you tell me a bit about your career journey? When did you first get into a leadership role? I have extensive experience in designing digital applications for consumers and enterprise solutions. I manage an interdisciplinary team of designers and developers and deliver value across cross-functional, multiple stakeholder, and distributed environments working in a globally distributed team. I have helped organizations set up a User experience design team and UX practice and have led and mentored design teams. My first role as a leader was when I was managing a bunch of designers and developers working across different products and services. This was my safe and comfortable zone and I never felt that I was doing anything different. What were the top challenges you faced during your journey and how did you overcome them? When you are leading a team that caters to different business functions that have its own priorities, it’s always a constant struggle to manage these priorities and at the same time delivering value. Initially this was a bit of struggle, but setting clear expectations with the global stakeholders, keeping them informed and making decisions along with them, helped me bridge the gap. I would always have an open and honest conversation with my stakeholders and would truly be invested in solving their problems. This gained me their trust and built a long term relationship with them. A leader must also know to navigate ambiguity and give a sense of direction to the team when they look up to you. I always believed that I needed to have answers for all the questions which would stress me out. I slowly realized that it was ok to accept that you don't have an answer yet and be transparent about it. This created a special bond and mutual respect for each other with my clients and team. What motivates you? I am a dreamer and constantly get inspired by numerous people around me. I love to experiment and I thrive on creativity. Mundane and routine bores me and hence I always find something that lets my creative juice flow. Do you have a role model in your life? Can you name a few people who you look up to? There are so many amazing people around me who I admire and follow. Couple of folks I get my inspiration from are John Maeda from the Tech and design leadership angle, Dan Norman - the design guru, Irene Au - for her amazing design leadership role where she has built and led design teams for some of the top companies. What does leadership mean to you? How would you describe your leadership style? Leadership to me means leading by example and setting up a safe and fun environment for everyone to thrive. Investing in people's growth and achievement is a great asset to have as a leader. Being open, honest, transparent, approachable and having empathy for others has helped me grow as a leader. At the same time, it is important to have a clear vision and strategy, direction, staying calm and focussed during adversity. What would be your advice to young leaders? When you take up the role as a leader for the first time, don’t get overwhelmed with everything around you. Take it slowly but stay connected with the key people on the team. Empowering others to make decisions, sharing responsibilities and communicating constantly with your clients and team is crucial. Active listening is an asset that every leader should have. Things will soon fall in place when you have empathy for everyone. Another important aspect is to focus on your own personal development. Make sure that you allocate some time in a week specifically for this. This will help you grow as a leader you always aspired to be. Last but not least, make sure you have fun.

Sakthivel Viswanathan is a Technology Principal with Thoughtworks and co-leads the IDP (Internal Developer Platform) Program. With more than a decade of experience, his strong focus has been to bridge the gap between technology and business objectives and to make the jobs of the business leaders easier. Emerging leadership series - In conversation with Sakthivel Viswanathan 9 Feb 2023 Sakthivel Viswanathan is a Technology Principal with Thoughtworks and co-leads the IDP (Internal Developer Platform) Program. With more than a decade of experience, his strong focus has been to bridge the gap between technology and business objectives and to make the jobs of the business leaders easier. How would you introduce yourself? “Hello there!” I am Sakthivel. Working as an application developer in /thoughtworks. In recent months, playing the role of Technology Principal for Digital Platform products. Having a decade long experience in programming and leading the technology side of delivery. In recent years, my strong focus has been on bridging the gap between the technology and business objectives with the goal to support and make the jobs of business leaders easier. I spend most of my time in my leadership role and I continue to find a balance in keeping myself updated with the evolving technology world in the areas that are of interest to me. Can you tell me a bit about your career journey? What inspired you to take on the leadership role? I still feel and remember the enthusiasm, challenges and late nights during the initial days of my programming career. With the days passing, It was personally evident that my interpersonal and career skills grew with varied opportunities and stints. I remember taking on the leadership role during my days in Cognizant for the first time, when I was expected to influence a client with programming expertise with the intention of forming an offshore team with three members. It was a wonderful opportunity to understand the leadership role and I was prepared and ready to take on the unknown and came out well with tons of learnings. The single most important turning point in my career was the experience I gained by putting myself on the spot and to take on the challenges through the journey. It was the best thing that I did for myself and it helped both professionally and personally. What were the top challenges you faced during your journey and how did you overcome them? From my personal experience, the challenges I faced during my journey include managing my time and reducing the cognitive load for operating effectively. I have come a long way from the time it was incredibly difficult to manage my time and I continue to reflect and adapt based on the needs. Some of the key strategies that I follow to be effective in my role is to have a focused time and to start the day with must do items. Ensuring to reflect on the progress at the end of day and course correcting if necessary. This helps to consciously plan the next day better. To manage the cognitive load, I tend to avoid switching contexts too much. While it is important to respond to pressing items, it is equally important to plan for a dedicated time for activities such as these. In my opinion, there is no one rule that fits all but opportunities to experiment and learn from individual experience. I am personally a big fan of doing “One thing at a time” which gives a sense of self satisfaction in accomplishing goals instead of trying to complete “Way too many things at a time”. What motivates you everyday? Nature is a great source of inspiration and motivation for me. Tiny events such as birds chirping, morning sun shine, clear blue skies and cool breeze, gives me a positive vibe which takes the day forward. Do you have a role model in your life? Can you name a few people who you look up to? My parents are my role models. Their dedication and tireless effort to shape my future is the single most thing I admire whole-heartedly. The other personality that I admire most is my spouse. She has been my guiding light and the person I look to during some critical times in the recent years. Apart from them, Late Dr A.P.J. Abdul Kalam inspired and continues to inspire me. His humbleness, devotion to his profession, dedication and the heights he has reached through hard work is something that is cherished by millions of people, I am proud to say that I am one in the million. I recommend reading his autobiography “Wings of fire”. What does leadership mean to you? How would you describe your leadership style? To me leadership is all about commitment. It is vital for leaders to be committed to a goal. A leader, who demonstrates strong commitment towards a goal can easily nurture confidence and trust among others. No one is perfect and I am no exception. I strongly believe in commitment and I always try my best to be as committed as possible. The other important leadership style that I follow is active listening. A leader listening to his subordinates and juniors demonstrates that he or she is willing to value their ideas and perspectives. This increases trust, innovation and fosters a positive work environment. An environment where people are ready to talk about anything related to their work is an outcome of a leader who values opinions however small they are. What would be your advice to other leaders? Being an effective leader is a continuous learning journey, a general advice that I have for my fellow leaders is to continue the learning process irrespective of the position you are now in. Continuous learning helps us to sharpen our skills and be more effective. Be open minded to accept constructive criticism and feedback. Being humble and understanding the criticism helps us to adapt and course correct in challenging situations and environments. Always embrace failure as you celebrate success.

Jinjun Huang comes with 14+ years of experience in IT and has been with @thoughtworks since 2018. He joined us as a Tech Lead and then switched to become a Product Manager in 2020. Jinjun looks up to his father in law as a role model. Jinjun has learnt key lessons of responsibility, hardwork, and optimism from him. Emerging leadership series - In conversation with Jinjun Huang 30 Jan 2023 Jinjun Huang comes with 14+ years of experience in IT and has been with @thoughtworks since 2018. He joined us as a Tech Lead and then switched to become a Product Manager in 2020. Jinjun looks up to his father in law as a role model. Jinjun has learnt key lessons of responsibility, hardwork, and optimism from him. How would you introduce yourself? Hi everyone, nice to meet you. My name is Jinjun Huang. I am from Wuhan, China. I am a product manager of the Digital Platforms team in Thoughtworks. I have 2 kids, an 11-year old daughter and a 5-year old son. In my spare time, I like to take them for a trip by car, playing basketball and computer games as well. Can you tell me a bit about your career journey? What inspired you to take on the leadership role? I graduated from Harbin Institute of Technology in 2008 with my bachelor degree in the major of Computer Science. Then I worked as a software engineer for over 10 years in multiple companies. I joined Thoughtworks in 2018 as a Tech Lead, then switched to a product manager in 2020. At the beginning, it was very natural for me to take the role as a technical lead because I was more senior than the other team members. But after taking the technical lead role, I found it challenging to leverage the team to achieve the team target instead of working individually and finishing my own development task. I started to enjoy my leadership role when I found my leadership can amplify the team's performance. What were the top challenges you faced during your journey and how did you overcome them? The top challenge for me was the mindset change. I used to think about a product from a pure technical perspective. But when I found technology was not the only determinant to make the product successful, I started to learn what business success means from different perspectives. My MBA courses helped me a lot during this progress. I learnt a lot from some failed business cases, even some of them were amazing from a technical perspective. What motivates you everyday? I am motivated by the sense of accomplishment of my daily work. My clients and target users’ daily life can get easier with the products and support of my team. My organizational leaders are confident that my team is working on the correct things and in the correct way. My teammates enjoy their daily work and feel their hard work is meaningful to the organization and the whole world. Do you have a role model in your life? Can you name a few people who you look up to? I look up to my father-in-law as my role model in my life. My father-in-law is a farmer. He raised 4 nephews and nieces after his elder brother passed away, even though he had 3 kids already. He works really hard to feed the big family. He keeps studying as a great wireman. He can handle all kinds of difficult conversations in his daily life with his great emotional intelligence. I learnt a lot from him including responsibility , hardwork and optimism . All of them helped me a lot during my career journey. I look up to Dewang Cao, a Chinese entrepreneur, the founder of Fuyao Group. He is a very successful businessman, a very famous charitarian. At the same time, in his biography he admits some personal mistakes, including some very sensitive parts. I learnt what courage and introspection means from him. I look up to Shijian Chu, a Chinese businessman. He brought his first cigarette company to top1 of Asia, and then was thrown in jail for some reasons when he was 71 years old. When he got out of jail when he was 74 years old, he started his new undertaking and became the King of Orange in China when he was 84 years old. I learnt what gritty means from him. What does leadership mean to you? How would you describe your leadership style? Leadership seems like a catalyst to me, which can enable the whole team to achieve something they didn’t look forward to. I think all of my team members are really talented. What I need to do is accelerate the chemical reactions happening in the team, enable all of them to be a better team player, a more professional employee, a better person. I’d like to build my leadership style as a visionary and coach. On one hand, I think it is really important to be a visionary as a leader. When the whole team can be united with the same vision, and all of the team members think it meaningful for themselves, for their clients and end users and even for the whole world, they can make great decisions by themselves to achieve it. And they can benefit a lot during the process. On the other hand, leaders need to stand with their coworkers daily. Leaders need to coach the team members not only to do the correct things, but also do the correct things in the correct way. With the coach they can be cultivated to handle more complicated scenarios by themselves in the future. Only in this way, the team can grow organically in the business style of a professional service company. What would be your advice to other leaders? Pay special attention to be a visionary. Be confident of the subjective initiatives of the team members. Believe they can make great things happen when they believe what you believe. At the same time, help them in the operation level in the coach way. Day by day, they will grow naturally until they surprise you. Chinese version 你会如何介绍自己？ 大家好，我叫黄进军，来自中国武汉，是 Thoughtworks 的数字平台团队的一名产品经理。 我有2个孩子，一个11岁的女儿和一个5岁的儿子。 闲暇时，我喜欢带他们出去自驾游，偶尔也会跟他们一起打篮球，玩switch游戏。 你能告诉我一些你的职业生涯吗？ 是什么促使您担任领导职务？ 我2008年毕业于哈尔滨工业大学计算机专业，获学士学位。此后在多家公司担任软件工程师超过10年。在2018年，我作为技术主管加入Thoughtworks，然后在2020年转职成为产品经理。 一开始，因为我比其他团队成员都更资深，所以担任技术负责人是一个很自然的事情。但是在担任技术负责人之后，我发现带领一个团队来实现团队目标远比单打独斗地完成开发任务要困难得多。 当我发现我的领导能力可以提升团队的整体绩效之后，我开始喜欢上了我的新角色。 你在旅途中遇到的最大挑战是什么？你是如何克服这些挑战的？ 对我来说最大的挑战是心态的改变。 我曾经习惯于从纯技术的角度来思考一个产品。但当我发现技术并不是使产品成功的唯一决定因素时，我开始从不同的角度了解商业成功意味着什么。在这个过程中，我的 MBA 课程对我帮助很大。 我从一些失败的商业案例中学到了很多，其中一些如果从技术角度来看甚至是非常先进和超前的。 你每天的动力是什么？ 激励我的每天的工作所带来的成就感。可以把它们分为三个层面： 第一，借助我们团队的产品和支持，我的客户和目标用户的日常生活会变得更加轻松。 第二，我的组织领导者相信我的团队正在以正确的方式做正确的事情。 第三，我的队友享受他们的日常工作，并觉得他们的辛勤工作对组织和整个世界都有意义。 你的生活中有榜样吗？ 你能说出几个你敬仰的人吗？ 我的岳父是我生活中的榜样。 我的岳父是一个普通的农民。 他的哥哥去世后他养大了4个侄子和侄女，尽管他自己已经有了3个孩子。 他非常努力地工作来养活这个大家庭。他一直在学习并成为一名出色的电工。 凭借高超的情商，他可以应付日常生活中各种棘手的谈话。 我从他身上学到了很多，包括责任感、勤奋和乐观。 它们在我的职业生涯中对我帮助很大。 我敬仰中国企业家、福耀集团创始人曹德旺。 他是一个非常成功的商人，一个非常有名的慈善家。 同时，在他的传记中他也承认了一些个人错误，包括一些非常敏感的部分。我从他身上学到了什么是勇气和自省。 我敬仰中国商人褚世建。 他将自己的第一家卷烟公司成功的经营成跻身亚洲第一，却在71岁高龄时因故入狱。74岁出狱后又开始二次创业，直到84岁成为中国橙王。我从他那里学到了什么是坚韧不拔。 领导对你意味着什么？ 您如何描述您的领导风格？ 对我来说，领导力就像是一种催化剂，它可以让整个团队达成他们不曾预想的成就。 我认为我团队里的所有成员都非常有才华。我所需要做的只是加速团队中发生的化学反应，让他们都成为更好的团队成员、更专业的职场人、更好的人。 我想建立的领导风格是成为有远见的人和教练。 一方面，我认为作为领导者，成为一个有远见的人真的很重要。 当整个团队能够以同一个愿景团结在一起，并且所有团队成员都认为这对他们自己、对他们的客户和最终用户乃至整个世界都有意义时，他们就可以自己做出伟大的决定并实现它。 他们自身在此过程中也会受益匪浅。 另一方面，领导者需要每天与同事站在一起。 领导者不仅要指导团队成员做正确的事，还要用正确的方法做正确的事。 有了教练，他们可以培养自己在未来处理更复杂场景时的能力。 只有这样，团队才能在专业服务公司的经营模式中有机成长。 你对其他领导人有什么建议？ 成为一个有远见的人。 相信团队成员的主观能动性。当他们相信您所相信的愿景时，他们可以成就伟大的事情。 同时成为一个好的教练，在操作层面帮助他们。日复一日，他们会自然生长，直到让您大吃一惊。

Gyanesh started his IT career as a developer more than two decades ago but soon transitioned into the security domain out of curiosity. He is someone who does not like to say "no" and help whoever comes to him with a problem. Gyanesh derives satisfaction on solving problems and feeling of responsibility and trust motivates him. Emerging leadership series - In conversation with Gyanesh Ojha 16 Feb 2023 Gyanesh started his IT career as a developer more than two decades ago but soon transitioned into the security domain out of curiosity. He is someone who does not like to say "no" and help whoever comes to him with a problem. Gyanesh derives satisfaction on solving problems and feeling of responsibility and trust motivates him. How would you introduce yourself? I am Gyanesh Ojha. Some people miss the “y” in my name and call me Ganesh. I know it's difficult to pronounce names but I’d prefer people pronounce my name correctly 🙂 . I am from India but am currently living in Singapore with my wife and daughter. I work at Thoughtworks and am currently responsible for South East Asia (SEA) InfoSec. I am passionate about Information Security and spend time sharing my knowledge with others to make them InfoSec savvy. I have been continuously honing my Infosec skills for over two decades now. Can you tell me a bit about your career journey? What inspired you to take on the leadership role? I started my IT career as a developer more than two decades ago but soon transitioned into the security domain out of curiosity. Early in my career, my focus area was application security, vulnerability assessment, penetration testing and audit. Those were my consulting days when we used to test government websites, private organization’s applications and used to audit banks and private organizations against IT security standards. Gradually I moved towards compliance and internal information security management. My mentor, Dr Deoraj Bhanu Murthy inspired me to think out of the box to solve real world problems and in the process made me take on the leadership role. What were the top challenges you faced during your journey and how did you overcome them? I am a person who doesn’t like to say “no” and the reason is simple. I want to help whoever comes to me with a problem. When I worked as an individual contributor, this would result in a constant backlog that I found difficult to clear. But when I started to lead a team, I had to decide where my focus should be and prioritize my tasks. So, I started to filter and focus on high priorities looking at my team’s bandwidth and, in the process, I learnt to say “no”. Though it is still not that easy for me, I have made quite a good progress. What motivates you every day? The satisfaction I derive on solving a problem, no matter how big or small; the joy I feel on seeing a colleague being more infosec aware and the responsibility my seniors trust me with, motivates me every day. In my personal life, the support and unconditional love of my family push me to outperform in every aspect of life. Do you have a role model in your life? Can you name a few people who you look up to? I look at the positive side of all the individuals I have connected with so far, both in my professional and personal life. But Dr Deoraj Bhanu Murthy is the one I truly Iook up to. I feel blessed to have had the chance of working with him early in my career. What does leadership mean to you? How would you describe your leadership style? Guiding team members in the right direction, taking ownership and responsibility of the team’s work and making the team believe in themselves is leadership according to me. Simon Sinek says, “Leaders are the ones who are willing to give up something of their own for us.” This pretty much sums up my style of leadership because I believe true leaders don’t think their team works for them, instead they work for their team. What would be your advice to other leaders? There is no perfect leadership style. So don’t stick to just one style of leadership. You might have to change your style to better suit a situation. So, be open to change and bring out the best in you without compromising on the values. Also remember that being a manager is not the same as being a leader

In the always-on, digital economy change happens fast. Any business that .. < Back Building innovation engine In the always-on, digital economy change happens fast. Any business that .. [ This article was originally published on Thoughtworks's Insights. You can see the original articles here . ] Don’t wait for tomorrow In the always-on, digital economy change happens fast. Any business that rests on its laurels can expect to become obsolete. In an ultra-competitive market, you have only a small window to spot opportunities and exploit them before your competitors. That’s because no matter how fast your market is evolving, technology is evolving faster. Tech-led, innovative disruptors are everywhere. Just look at long-established markets like global commodity trading. Within three months of launching, VAKT ($), the blockchain-based energy trading platform had signed up more than two-thirds of companies responsible for all deals in North Sea crude oil trading. This pace of change is unprecedented. And the consequences are clear: Unless your organization is geared up to innovate, you’ll always be playing catch-up. Many established organizations are comfortable not being at the bleeding edge. And that’s understandable: in febrile times, taking time to come up with a measured response can seem the pragmatic thing to do. In fact, pragmatism shouldn’t be conflated with inaction. If you really want to understand the best course for your business, you need to understand it from a cost perspective. How much will exploring disruption and investing in innovation cost? What value can you derive from exploiting opportunities? What is the cost of missed opportunity? What will you have to spend to get back in the game? And in many cases, that means you need to take action now. As Forrester Research principal analyst James Staten notes : “Driving change is far better and less fearful than waiting for others to disrupt you and having to painfully respond and adapt.” Introducing the ‘innovate to impact’ framework Concepts such as innovation can become overused, with everyone adopting slightly different ideas about what they mean. In this context, I’d define innovation as: Creating something new, that generates a tangible value to the intended audience. The most salient points here are “new” and “tangible value”. If it’s not new, and if it’s not bringing tangible value, it’s not innovation. It’s worth noting at this point that one-off innovation isn’t really much use. Take pic sharing trailblazer Snap. Its clever use of AR tech briefly made SnapChat the must-have app for any social media-loving teen, paving the way for an IPO that valued the company at over $30 billion. But its innovations were easy for competitors, such as Facebook-owned Instagram to copy — over the months following the IPO, Snap’s market cap dropped by more than $20 billion. Snap has only subsequently been able to recover lost ground through embracing the ideas of continuous innovation. To those that see innovation through the lens of eureka moments — where advances are only made after flashes of inspiration and brilliance — continuous innovation can appear anachronistic. It’s like capturing lightning in a bottle. This isn’t a view I subscribe to, but it’s one I’ve often encountered; therefore, before we start thinking about a roadmap for innovation, it’s worth considering some of the major obstacles you’ll need to overcome before any innovation program can get off the ground. Barriers to innovation Ask any business leader you encounter and they’ll say being more innovative is highly desirable. But for innovation to be something more than a pipe dream, you need to be realistic about the challenges you’re likely to face. While there could be many reasons why innovation programs fail to take off within the organization, the most common barriers I have encountered are: Fear of failure In a world of performance reviews and targets, nobody wants to be associated with failure. When people are in fear for their livelihood they can become risk averse. What’s more, innovation means change — and change can be scary. Being ready to innovate often demands a huge cultural shift, where experimentation is embraced. And if things don’t work, what’s important is what you’ve learnt from the experience; not who’s to blame. Too busy on BAU You’re probably used to hearing from your teams how busy they are. But when all your efforts are expended on keeping the lights on, your ability to innovate suffers. And since people are busy, they often feel that they’re adding value — perhaps without questioning whether they could add more. The importance any organization attaches to innovation has profound cultural implications. It’s all very well making grand gestures, such as setting aside regular time for blue sky thinking; but if those sessions are the first thing to be cut when cost savings need to be made, don’t be surprised if your staff question your commitment to innovation. Lack of diversity As author Simone Bhan Ahuja notes, lack of diversity within innovation teams can hamstring your efforts from the outset : “You’ll know you have the wrong team when everything is running along smoothly but the team’s output doesn’t look much different from business as usual.” If you’re looking for new approaches and ideas, you’re going to need diversity of thought — people with different skill sets, people that come at problems from different angles. Key skills for the group may include: product strategy; product development; entrepreneurship; domain expertise; experience design; research and analysis; and ideation and creation. Typical approaches to innovation? Given the importance attached to innovation, it’s little wonder that so many people in the organization want to lead it. And while it doesn’t pay to be too prescriptive — each organization is unique and needs to find an approach that fits — here are some common approaches, along with their pros and cons. As we’ve seen earlier, this collaborative approach will need team members with a diverse set of skills. And it also has the greatest opportunity to succeed when it involves the tech function. That’s because today’s greatest innovations are dependent on tech; the complexities and processes needed to deliver innovation reliably depend on tech expertise. But collaboration also needs checks and balances: who is the one deciding on whether to focus on building something or enabling innovation? When should you focus on products and when is it more important to energize the team through events such as hackathons? Ultimately, you’ll also want to consider how you plan to support sustained innovation over the long term. This isn’t something you can achieve overnight. Planning for continuous innovation is a journey — and one, if done right, that will become a strategic differentiator against the competition for years to come. We call this journey the Impact to Innovation framework. This Innovate to Impact framework gives you a roadmap to create internal incubator teams, that become the engine of your innovation. The framework also sets out how to grow the impact inside and outside of your organization through scaling different stages of maturity. As the model suggests, for innovation to become a strategic differentiator, you cannot just stay at the experimentation level: you need to show the impact of innovation and have a plan to grow that. It can be useful to think about this journey at the outset: Stage four becomes your blue ocean ; you have to think about how innovation can become a strategic differentiator for your business and work backwards from there to identify what steps to take now. In subsequent articles ( Part Two, Part Three and Part Four), we’ll explore this maturity model in more detail, enabling you to understand where you are today and how to reach your desired end-state. Previous Next

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The Incremental & Radical innovation techniques are most commonly used .. < Back Learning innovation ! – Part II– Incremental & Radical Innovations The Incremental & Radical innovation techniques are most commonly used .. Last time I wrote about one of the techniques of learning Innovation called Innovation by Subtraction. This time, I would be trying to explain one more type of Innovation viz., Incremental & Radical Innovations. The Incremental & Radical innovation techniques are most commonly used across the world for innovation. They are also called Sustaining & Disruptive Innovation techniques. Incremental innovation generally relates to enhancements or small improvements in the existing products or services, whereas the Radical innovation brings a significant improvement in the product or the service. One of the most common examples of the Incremental innovations are the early Pentium chips developed by Intel. From Pentium I to IV, they were generally based on the similar pattern however as the new version came out they brought out newer technologies & innovations in their chipset, which could be attributed to the Incremental innovation. Moving from a single core to dual or quad cores in their latest processers could be termed as a Radical innovation though. Another example of Incremental innovation being Microsoft’s Windows 98 operating system, which was an enhancement over the Windows 95 operating system. The Windows 95, however was a Radical innovation over the previous Windows 3.1 operating system interface. Now you may ask me how to differentiate between the Incremental innovation from a Radical innovation or you may even ask, what should be the degree of deviation between an innovation to be considered as Incremental vs Radical? The answer to this question was defined by a team at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute . They recommend to consider an Incremental innovation as a Radical if it meets one or more of following characteristics, The innovation provides entirely new set of usage features and experience In terms of statistics, it provides about five times or better performance Or it provides more than 30% reduction in the costs of the product / service Normally the Incremental & Radical innovations go hand in hand. If you see my previous examples you would see that the Radical innovation has followed after one or more Incremental innovations. So you would relate to the fact that the Radical innovation is characterized by a long period of Incremental innovations before and after it. The important benefit of the Radical change is the fact that it can potentially and significantly change the basis of competition in the favour of the innovator. Incremental innovation is relatively easy to obtain than Radical one and I am sure by now you would have understood pretty much of it. There are significant examples of where the Radical innovations have given great advantages to the innovators. Some of them are as follows, IBM Introduction of electronic typewriter, nearly wiped off the manual type writers form the market and gave IBM a significant business advantage. Wal-Mart Innovated a radical process change in the way the supply chain was managed throughout its stores in the US that gave a significant advantage in terms of time & cost and helped it cement its position as No. 1 in the retail market. Incremental Vs Radical – Which one to choose? Radical Innovations are significantly risky, take more time to develop and are more expensive to obtain in nature, whereas, the Incremental are significantly less risky, relatively cheaper & based on a proven product or a process and are more likely to produce results in a shorter time frame. The Incremental innovations provide the businesses with a steady stream of enhanced and improved products / processes or services, but due to relatively simpler nature of these innovations it is required to keep in mind the following, Ensure that the innovations are focussed around the market demands. Since the nature of innovation is such that you would eventually keep on developing new enhancements, small features, there is a danger that you might do something which the customers would not want and may not need in their product. If you continue to churn out the improvements or new features that the customer does not want, the customer eventually might look for alternative products. Don’t forget Radical innovation! Incremental innovations do not necessarily envisage the future technology and attempt to provide a bridge between current and future technologies. Imagine what would have happened to iPhone if Apple would have used the traditional keyboard design of the phone !! Also, remember that its on Radical innovation that changes the business game in your favour !So when you look around next and do a brain storming about innovation, you might want to start with an Incremental innovation and who knows you might bring out a Radical innovation in your product / process or your service! Good Luck! #Softwareengineering #Innovation #productivity #learning #techniques Previous Next