common sense at work

8/9/2019 Common Sense at Work

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A Must Read for professionals with traces of Comm

COMMON

SENSE @

WORK


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Sohail Zindani - 2011

Sohail ZindaniInternational Speaker, Author and OD Consultant,

Founder and Chief Learning Officer, Learning Minds! Group

Learning Minds! Group Publication


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COMMON SENSE @ WORK


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Common Sense @ Work. Copyright 2011 by Learning Minds! Group. All rights

reserved.

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without

written permission except in case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles and

reviews.

For more information about this book or other Learning Resources from Learning

Minds! Group, visit www.learningminds.biz

First Edition, April 10 2011

Designed and Composed by Marketing Division; Learning Minds! Group

E-Published by Learning Minds! Group
http://www.learningminds.biz/http://www.learningminds.biz/http://www.learningminds.biz/http://www.learningminds.biz/


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Dedicated to my Parents, Wife and little angel Diya!


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Contents

Thinking in lines of developing a table of content is yet another challenge to me.

However, a friend of mine reflected on his own wisdom by saying that having tableof content printed right at start of a book, actually gives the readers an opportunity

to s kip what they dont want to read and mark what they would like to read in near

future. Taking my friends advice seriously, I present the following, for convenient

skipping or and re-reading . For those whod really like to read this book can actually

skip this page.

Introduction - The Tragic Death of Common Sense 08

Common Sense in Common Things at Work 17

Common Sense in Leadership 18

Common Sense in Strategy & Consulting 24 Common Sense in Customer Service 30

Common Sense in HR 32

Common Sense in Education 41

In Search of Common Sense - 7-Steps to Re-Kindling Common-Sense 49

1. Anti-EGO Movement 50

2. Kids Wisdom 52

3. Go Across! 54

4. Read Crazy Stuff! 55

5.

I Dont Know Mantra! 566. Keep Normal Remain Human 58

7. Surprise! 60

Making Common Sense Common 63


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Draw Common Sense!

Go Crazy & Think Creatively - Try to make something that reflects Common Sense.


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Dont skip this page!

Introduction

The Tragic Death of Common Sense

Many years back:

when smile was natural and not a customer

service department requirement,

when leadership and management belonged to

the same family,

when no gender was trying to get better than the

other,

when schools and universities were busy

educating and only companies were doing

business,

when apple, blackberry and orange were onlyfruits,

when you use to be healthy without being diet

conscious,

when you knew who your neighbors and colleagues were [their name, cast,

preferences, dislikes almost everything] and you didnt need a survey to tell

you this,

when we were just a phone call away from anyone in our office with no

emails having to and cc and BCC;

we use to enjoy what was naturally given to us Common Sense. But then came the

era of complexity with some complex assumptions, projections, strategies and plans.


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Ive hated complexity and strategies as much as my Mathematics teacher used to

hate descriptive answers and my ex-boss used to hate people laughing.

It reminds me of my school age another story of complexity from algeb ra tointegration, from photosynthesis to nomenclature, each and every one, sitting in our

school staff room was busy making their living by not letting us live. Although, I

used to love few teachers but I never figured out how the school management got

to know about my love, as almost every time that teacher was either replaced with

someone else or the teacher herself decided to leave our school.

The greatest attack on simplicity and common sense came when we were graded for

arts and singing. How can one decide on who is better between Nusrat Fateh Ali

Khan and Michael Jakson. Well I do realize that I was nowhere near, but just to

heal my heart, I quoted this example.

Nothing is more

fairly distributed thancommon sense: no one


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thinks he needs more

of it than he already

has Rene Descartes


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Because common sense is common in humanity, the chance of acceptance and

comfort grows. Rather than making the most out of this commonality, some so

called gurus and legends made it more and more embarrassing for us to come up

with something that is commonly understood. To quote one of my teacher atuniversity, while teaching strategic management he said Your ideas are so simple

and basic it can never create strategic advantage. For creating strategic advantage,

you need to come up with some more sophisticated, mature and intelligent ideas.

Remember son you are grown up now.

Of course, I felt like killing myself [obviously after shooting him], but then I managed

my anger as I was all focused to get a better GPA that semester, to get a better

Internship offer and th en eventually a better job Of course nothing of that sort

happened, and so I am a fortunate entrepreneur now!

In short the more complex your idea is, the more mature it appears and it

increas ingly means that it wont be understood by those with common sense, i.e.

Humans, and hence wont be implemented in this era. But I am sure; strategist wont

mind it as they have nothing to do with implementation. Ideas that appeal

common sense are the only ones that gets implemented [as in any case, its Humans

wholl implement it]

Another suicide attack on common sense came from the buzzword gurus who made

millions of dollars by confusing us with the obvious. If I [a very basic, striving for

common-sense, kind of an author] say something directly might offend many. So letme quote a Time Magazine commentary on a Stephen Covey book that captured this

phenomenon:


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His genius is for complicating the obvious, and as a result his books are graphically

chaotic. Charts and diagrams bulge from the page. Sidebars and boxes chop the

chapters into bite-size morsels. The prose buzzes with the cant phrase empower,

modeling, bonding, agent of change without which his books would deflate like ablown tire. He uses more exclamation points than Gidgets.

As for me, common sense is seeing things as they are. You are following the dictates

of cold logic, eliminating both sentiments and self-interest from your decision.

Nothing could be simpler and natural.

Although I am NOT a marketing or sales or branding or advertising or promotion

professional, I would still like to take the liberty to give the following examples

and I hope you can sense the terrible and abusive murder of common sense:

.

..

.

..

.

..

. ...

.


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Example 1:

T KE THIS QUICK QUIZ: [Answer: Men or Women] - These attribute are must for a

Sales Person!

1. Who manages more things at once?

2. Who puts more effort into their appearance?

3. Who usually takes care of the details?

4. Who finds it easier to meet new people?

5. Who asks more questions in a conversation?

6. Who is a better listener?

7. Who has more interest in communication skills?

8. Who is more inclined to get involved?

9. Who encourages harmony and agreement?

10. Who has better intuition?

11. Who works with a longer to do list?

12. Who enjoys a recap to the days events?

13. Who is better at keeping in touch with others?

If, after completing this quiz, you ended up with having Women as winner you are

close to real ity. Now think about your own organization think about your

vendors think about the companies you work with think about the shops you

visit are they responding to common sense??? Ah! I know theyd tell you that its

either national context or the cultural issue or pertains to religious values but forme, its just their commitment to non -sense.

If, for some biological or psychological or gender phobia reasons, you ended up with

having Men as winners I strongly recommend you to take the quiz again a nd

again and again until you identify, where you actually went wrong.


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Example 2:

Who earns and possess the maximum wealth? Those who are under 45 or the ones

who are above 45? Now if you answered above 45 than can you please also explainme the sense of investing every damn dollar of the marketing and advertising

budget in positioning the brand and its benefits for those under 45!!!

If you are a marketing or advertising professional, I am sure, youll now be looking

forward to meet me with unlimited survey reports and theories in one-hand and a

Get well soon card in another [to prove me that Youth is the most attractive

market] but even then, you wont be able to disagree with the fact that money

belongs to those above 45 What a shame What are we do ing to target these

wealthy people!

Hey, how can I forget my ever preferred, highly cherished profession of Human

Resources? From Policy to Appraisal, from TNAs to Man Power Budgeting, it

represents many elements, designed to destroy common sense. However one

MUST note that organizations with HR policies, designed in line with Common Sense

are producing unthinkable and astonishingly awesome results. I can name many in

Pakistan and elsewhere and I take all pride in saluting them.

Let me share some most common anti-Common Sense features in HR:

In 99.99% of cases, organizational HR policy isnot designed by anyone working in the

organization today!

Appraisals are done annually and insults

regularly,


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Training Needs Analysis is conducted, tabulated and implemented, and is

being done in the same way for the last I dont know how many years and by

now no one in the organization has actually asked one simple question

How come we need the same training every year for the same group of peoplewith the same facilitator?

Salaries are raised across the board, same proportion, while the top

management is busy talking about Talent Management and Retention

Strategies

Company will invest millions of rupees in sponsoring mega events and

decorating huge billboards but will question the return of investment in

training their frontline people [who are the true face of an organization].

I will share many other examples in the chapters to come

This mass destruction of Common Sense continues at school, university, home,

government, etc. This book tries to cover as many areas as I can think of, but related

to workplace only.

For those, who are interested in seeking application of common sense at home, I

strongly suggest you to contact your children or nephews, immediately.


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Reflection Exercise:

Can you think of such anti-common sense activities at your workplace? If YES,

please share it with us by writing those hereand if you cant find any such anti -common sense activity at your workplace, either you are lying or you are the biggest

boss at work.


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Common Sense in Common Things @

Work

The best way to practice lot of common sense at work is to do so in the most

common areas and functions at work. I am not sure, but I guess common sense has

its own muscles which gets stronger with use. I find many people around us,

everyday, who are committed to revert back to the ultimate Creator, and return Him

the gift of mind, completely unused!

With over sophistication in almost everything that we do, common sense appears to

be reserved for few privileged souls only. It makes common sense even rarer

because the class for which we reserve the ultimate potential to use common sense

is normally the one, which is so bogged down with education and position and class

and reputation that they are technically not equipped to use common sense

anyways!

In pages to follow, I make my little effort to reflect on the common sense element in

the most frequently used terms and fields of management Ive also tried to include

few things, over and above business and management world


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Common Sense in Leadership

As Henry Mintzberg, professor of management at McGill University, said,Management is a curious phenomenon. It is generously paid, enormous ly

influential and significantly devoid of common sense.

With all due respect to all those amazing gurus of management, many of my

colleagues and I are yet not able to understand the difference between management

and leadership.

OK I do realize that technically you become manager in an organization by

designation, however, leadership is what you do to people.

Most honestly, after reading all the recent books on leadership and management, I

feel that being a manager is an insult. I mean, the way this term leadership is

projected over management, one would prefer leaving the job than to be called a

manager!

The best thing that I can recommend for your free time humor reading is to study

the difference between Leadership and Management. Let us put this difference in

common sense filter plant and try to make sense out of this ultimate nonsense,

which has earned millions of dollars for many gurus, around the world


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The m anager adm inisters; the leader innovates.

Interesting why youll ever appoint anyone who only administers and doesnt

innovate! now that is another issue if your organization is anti- innovation! For Gods

sake, stop embarrassing managers by telling them that they are good for

administration role only I guess what these legendary gurus are trying to tell us is

that the day a manager innovates he enters the elite category of leadership!

The m anager is a copy; the leader is an original.

Now this is absolutely amazing. I feel like stopping writing and laugh for another 2

days on this ridiculous observation. If manager is a copy then who is he copying?

perhaps another manager. I suggest, in this case, the company should have looked

for an original leader and appointed him as manager.

I surrender to comment on the points that follow. You read it yourself and for God

sake dont get inspired. Read it loud and give your best shot to make any freaking

sense out of it

The manager focuses on systems and structure; the leader focuses on people If

this is the case, what are these systems and structures doing at workplace!!!

The manager has a short-range view; the leader has a long-range perspective

Perhaps this can be an eye- sight issue

The ma nager asks how and when; the leader asks what and why Hmm The m anager has his or her eye always on the b ottom line; the leaders eye is on the

horizon Hey where are your eyes right now on the book or on the horizon???


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The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it and if manager

challenges it, he or she is fired!

The m anager does things right; the leader does the right thing Then who the hellis doing all these wrong things

The m anager creates boundaries; the leader reduces them I hope such a leader is

not a football coach!

The ma nager acts as boss; the leader acts as coach facilitator and servant so

what are coaches, facilitators and servants supposed to do

There were few more shameful differences which I intentionally eliminated, so that

all those readers who are by designation, a manager, dont get offended.

Whenever I read it I only appreciate one thing How beautifully these

management gurus have confused us! . Honestly, after reading such differences, I

think of a manager as a dustbin material. Authors and Gurus kept on projecting the

role of management in 70s, 80s and up till early 90s. But then, as soon as they

realized that the commercial potential of writing and speaking about management is

on decline they all came up with a brand new concept Leadership!

Why would you ever, in your entire professional career, appoint a person as a

manager who does wrong things the right way!

As I reflect on my career as management development facilitator, I can never forget

this shocking incident about the extent to which nonsense can be part of our

culture!


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It was a bright, clear and relatively cooler morning at one of the hill-side locations

in northern parts of Pakistan where I, along with 30 senior management team

members were gathered to make sense out of our managerial actions at work. What

a start we had We didnt require any o fficial ice-breaker as issues itself were hotenough. With the first half of the day that concluded at 11 a.m., I realized that the

young slim and quite frustrated looking guy, sitting on my right hand side was just

not part of the session mentally. I did try all my trainer techniques to get him

involved, but honestly speaking I failed miserably. So, in the tea break, I actually

approached him, and tried to understand what exactly was going on his mind. After

some fake attempts of trying to tell me that everything was fine, he spoke, I dont

know why the management have sent me here. There is NO one in my organization

who reports me, NO one asks me for any input. Now apparently this is not a

surprising comment for me as we hear it on quite a regular basis in organizations.

But in this case, what was MOST interesting is that this young guy was on 3-day

leadership retreat, and those who know what I charge and what are the

arrangement costs involved, this was quite an expensive blunder. Wait I know

some personal leadership gurus who talk about position and power in detail will try

to convince him about unleashing his hidden leadership potential. My advice is not

to even think of doing it particularly when you are 4000 ft. above sea level!

Call for Common Sense: Why are you busy training people on how to lead when your

organizational culture statement is: Do what we say and leave your brains at

home. Leadership is nothing more than demonstration and providing space for

others to demonstrate as well.Another important common sense in management comes from ground breaking and

mind-boggling research by Gallup and represented and articulated with excellence

by Marcus Buckingum in his books, where he advocates the importance and power

of managing strengths. On the contrary, managers are busy molding the lives of


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their subordinates, as per their wish or succession planning demand. The greatest

and perhaps the most genuine management guru, Peter Drucker defines this kind of

management as: Most of what we call management consists of making it difficult

for people to get their work done.

Marcuss work must be the basic curriculum for management studies but I guess,

our universities are busy looking for revised editions of mistakenly written

management b ibles in 70s and 80s and 90s what a shame!

Piece of Advice:

Make management studies a bit more interesting and challenging affair. The

management graduates that we are producing today are being educated for

yesterday Do something about it.

Invest seriously for developing management potential in your people. Not every

person is equipped to lead / manage others well. One must master this skill. Only

trainings wont help you. As I mentioned earlier, Leadership is Demonstration Is

your organization a laboratory where people can demonstrate Leadership? Are you,

as a manager, willing to let your subordinates manage things around you and for

you?


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What is your say on Leadership?

Its not the Gurus who define leadership Its You!


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Common Sense in Strategy and

Consulting

Strategy Strategy Strategy!

We are having everything with strategy these days strategic networking, strategic

meeting, strategic lunches, strategic thinking, strategic discussions. I wont be

surprised if we start talking about strategic sleeping, strategic love, strategic driving.

In fact, anything, that is not coupled with the word strategy appears to be highly

weak and mediocre.

Let us examine the core of strategy and its strong relationship with Common Sense.

The world is busy chanting the case South West Airline the ever profitable airline

in US. Thanks to the extremely effective, maverick-cum-evangelistic leadership of

Kelleher, Southwest has outlasted competitors big and small to become bigger than

all of them combined. Since 1971, when the company took delivery of its first Boeing737 after waging a four-year legal battle to get off the ground, Kelleher has built

Dallas-based Southwest Airlines into a responsive army of 30,000 passionate,

dedicated employees. Southwest is often number one on Fortune's list of best

American companies to work for. If you look at the numbers, Southwest is doing

things right, customer-wise: The company does $5.7 billion per year in business. Its

market capitalization of $14 billion is bigger than that of United, American and

Continental combined. It has been profitable every quarter and every year since

1973.

With so much success, when asked about the Strategy, Herb puts it straight and

simple by exposing their core strategy We have a strategic plan. Its called doing


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things. By doing nothing except employing common sense at work [taking the best

care of employees and customers], SWA has been able to stand as the best in class

for over 35 years.

Now I bet, if I present this case to any local airline [or even a regional airline

except the Singapore Airline], theyll tell you that this doesnt work here!

Strategy and Common Sense In Strategy have also been a victim to strategy

consultants. You tell them any problem, and they

suggest exactly the opposite as a way out. You tell

them that your organization is centralized, and

they will suggest decentralization as the only way

to breathe at workplace. If you are already

working in a decentralized workplace, I bet, they

will recommend a bit more sophisticated and a

well thought of centralization plan and to further

support it, they might also come with some

religious and social arguments for doing this.

Consulting on the other hand has been the core culprit of sucking common sense out

of strategy. To go even further and risking my profession, I am amazed how the

training business works. Very recently, I came across a program titled Get Hired

Right Now, and to the entire humanitys surprise, it was being conducted by

someone, who recently got fired in downsizing, based on poor performance and Iam sure, all the 16 participants of that workshop are planning to attend a workshop

on How to gracefully kill someone who cheated you.


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Jargons, theories and cases, consultants can do anything to prevent you from using

common sense.

Are all consultants and trainers in the same category? Absolutely NOT! In fact,telling you the truth, our corporate market could not have been this attractive and

interesting without these consultants, who have most sincerely contributed to the

betterment of workplace. Hats Off to those Champs!

Just as a test, try this:

Top Ten Things You'll Never Hear from a Consultant

1. You're right; we're billing way too much for this.

2. Bet you I can go a week without saying "synergy" or "value -added".

3. How about paying us based on the success of the project?

4. I suggest you should seek advice from some

other consultant on this.

5. Actually, the only difference is that we charge

more than they do.

6. I don't know enough to speak intelligently

about that.

7. Implementation? I only care about writing long

reports.

8.

The problem is, you have too much work fortoo few people and you dont even pay well.

9. Everything looks okay to me.

10. Its not a major issue use your common sense!


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If you hear anything as such I suggest you to think about hiring them!


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What about this one:

A medical doctor, an engineer, and a management consultant were arguing about

what was the oldest profession in the world.

The doctor started "Well, in the Bible, it says that God created Eve from a rib taken

from Adams body. This must have required su rgery, and so I can claim with a high

degree of confidence that mine is the oldest profession in the world."

The engineer responded, and said, "But earlier in the book of Genesis, it states that

God created the order of the heavens and the earth from out of the chaos. This was

the first and certainly the most impressive application of civil engineering.

Therefore, dear doctor, you are wrong: mine is surely the oldest profession in the

world."

The management consultant leaned back in his chair, smiled, and then said

confidently, "Ah, but who do you think created the chaos?"

And this one is my favorite:

A shepherd was herding his flock in a remote pasture when suddenly a brand-new

BMW advanced out of the dust cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in a

Broni suit, Gucci shoes, Ray Ban sunglasses and YSL tie, leaned out the window and

asked the shepherd... "If I tell you exactly how many sheep you have in your flock,

will you give me one?" The shepherd looked at the man, obviously a yuppie, then

looked at his peacefully grazing flock and calmly answered "sure".


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The yuppie parked his car, whipped out his IBM ThinkPad and connected it to a cell

phone, then he surfed to a NASA page on the internet where he called up a GPS

satellite navigation system, scanned the area, and then opened up a database and an

Excel spreadsheet with complex formulas. He sent an email on his Blackberry and,after a few minutes, received a response. Finally, he prints out a 130-page report on

his miniaturized printer then turns to the shepherd and says, "You have exactly

1586 sheep. "That is correct; take one of the sheep." said the shepherd. He watches

the young man select one of the animals and bundle it into his car.

Then the shepherd says: "If I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give

me back my animal?", "OK, why not." answered the young man. "Clearly, you are a

consultant." said the shepherd. "That's correct." says the yuppie, "but how did you

guess that?" "No guessing required." answers the shepherd.

"You turned up here although nobody called you. You want to get paid for an answer

I already knew, to a question I never asked, and you don't know crap about my

business...... Now give me back my dog!"

To conclude complex strategy and consulting solutions alone are not helping us

Its the common sense that WILL come to our rescue. In bad times like the one s we

are living in, its the best time to refer to common sense, and remember common

sense lies with the bottom line!


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Common Sense in Customer Service

This is a point where Common Sense may commit suicide! Honestly

Customer Service is such a cool job but has been heavily tempered by

organizational policies, ISO requirement, consultants paradigms and many other

major attacks from Customer Service Policy Manuals and Books.

Let us look at the basics. Customer Service is a humanistic job. The best effort youcan put in is by doing nothing extra [Only if you are human]. However, by giving you

vocabulary like an extra step, extra mile, extra penny, the so-called guru kept you

confused at the state you were already in.

For instance, smile! Now is it a stuff that comes naturally or is something to be

trained on or to be based on policy manual. But making it a compulsory part of

every manual, a psyche was created that it is something one must strive to get. What

a shame!

In my Customer Service Trainings, I do tell my participants to smile sensibly. Smile,

as I said, is a humanistic trait and human is a social animal. If your smile contradicts

with his or her socio/emotional state, the customer normally forgets about the

social part and focuses only on the animal side!

Most companies are talking about serving only the external customers with little or

no-emphasis on internal customers. Common Sense! If the driver is not excited to

drive even the best cars wont win. We te ll our customer how much we care for


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them but beat the living hell out of our employees, who were initially assumed to be

human and were solely responsible for taking care of our customers.

My love for companies like Engro, Telenor and manyother local organizations is on the greatest level,

because the only thing they do is that they care for their

employees and in return, employees do the same with

Customers.

So a practical tip of advice forget about all your hidden

potential and the giant within and anything inside you

that you dont know just focus on Common Sense how will you treat them if you

were treating yourself. 99% of customer service problemss can be solved by

employing common sense. Rest 1% can be left to consultants and manuals.

Very recently, a customer service director was hired at an organization I work with.

I got to know that he demanded his office on 7th floor of the building, as he doesnt

like noise around. My suggestion to HR throw him from the same floor to improve

overal l service standards at your workplace but by the way who hired him?


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Common Sense in HR

I was recently approached by a leading organization [Industry censored as you can

easily spot the client]. They told me this amazing outcome of their recently

concluded TNA activity, again done by a consultant. We had around 900 people to be

trained on communication skills alone. Now those who have had the privilege of

paying my fee can actually calculate the overall sum, allocated to conduct

communication training on such a large scale. After settling from the partial heart

attack [out of happiness of course], I asked the million dollar question who are

these 900 people? And the answer revealed that about 850+ people were from theproduction side only. We made a daring move and visited the production facility. [I

wish I could have included a DVD along with this book to give you the actual view of

the site]. To explain you in words only, these people [they call the shift engineers]

work in 3 shifts of 8 hours each. The closest of the distance between two humans

was 8 feet and the noise level was far more irritating than any boring CEOs speech

on vision and mission of his company.

I returned back to the HR office and labeled TNA form as WNA [Wish Needs

Analysis]. My only question was what youll achieve by doing communication

training with these folks and not to my surprise, the answer was 100%

achievement of our Training Targets and Budgets, based on our TNA.

Common Sense call: Dont send your people for training on How to Swim in Deep

Water, if you plan to engage them in a Desert.

Another great discovery happened in my early days of training. A local bank

approached me to train their staff on Motivation. I suggested them a one-day course,


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on which they demanded a two-day module. When I tried to convince them that the

module could be safely covered in one day, they told me how important it is to make

it a two-day course. They told me that it was mentioned in their training plan that

they will arrange training on motivation as a two-day course, and budgets wereapproved accordingly, so no matter what I do I have to do it for two days.

I agreed to do the assignment [perhaps a crime that I committed that time, and I am

still guilty for that]. In the last session of day 2, a Branch Manager came to me and

told me something that I will never forget He said, Mr. Zindani, youve done a

great job. Honestly, we all are very thankful to you for at least giving us an

opportunity to laugh. We also learned a lot from the cases you shared, activities you

did and suggestions you gave, but I have an advice. If you seriously want to motivate

them, ask our HR department to divide the entire sum, what they will be paying to

you for this program between these 19 people.

I felt most insulted, and trust me its take some serious guts to share this story

with everyone, but I guess, that HR department must feel more guilty than I feel.

Ive been sharing this recruitment joke in many HR Conferences and I present it

here for your reading pleasure and thinking trouble:

One day, while walking down the street, a highly successful executive woman was

hit by a bus and she died. Her soul went up to heaven where she was met at the

Pearly Gates by St. Peter himself.

"Welcome to Heaven," said St.Peter. "Before you get settled in though, it seems we

have a problem. You see, strangely enough, we've never once had an executive make

it this far and we're not really sure what to do with you."


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"No problem, just let me in." said the woman.

"Well, I'd like to, but I have higher orders. What we're going to do is let you have aday in Hell and a day in Heaven and then you can choose whichever one you want to

spend an eternity in."

"Actually, I think I've made up my mind...I prefer to stay in Heaven", said the woman.

"Sorry, we have rules..." And with that St. Peter put the executive in an elevator and

it went down-down-down to hell. The doors opened and she found herself stepping

out onto the putting green of a beautiful golf course. In the distance was a country

club and standing in front of her were all her friends - fellow executives that she had

worked with and they were all dressed in evening gowns and cheering for her. They

ran up and kissed her on both cheeks and they talked about old times. They played

an excellent round of golf and at night went to the country club where she enjoyed

an excellent steak and lobster dinner. She met the Devil who was actually a really

nice guy and she had a great time telling jokes and dancing. She was having such a

good time that before she knew it, it was time to leave. Everybody shook her hand

and waved good bye as she got on the elevator.

The elevator went up-up-up and opened back up at the Pearly Gates and found St.

Peter waiting for her. "Now it's time to spend a day in heaven," he said. So she spent

the next 24 hours lounging around on clouds and playing the harp and singing. Shehad a great time and before she knew it her 24 hours were up and St. Peter came

and got her.

"So, you've spent a day in hell and you've spent a day in heaven. Now you must

choose your eternity," he said.


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The woman paused for a second and then replied, "Well, I never thought I'd say this,

I mean, Heaven has been really great and all, but I think I had a better time in Hell."

So St. Peter escorted her to the elevator and again she went down-down-down back

to Hell. When the doors of the elevator opened she found herself standing in a

desolate wasteland covered in garbage and Filth. She saw her friends were dressed

in rags and were picking up the garbage and putting it in sacks. The Devil came up to

her and put his arm around her.

"I don't understand," stammered the woman, "yesterday I was here and there was a

golf course and a country club and we ate lobster and we danced and had a great

time. Now all there is a wasteland of garbage and all my friends look miserable."

The Devil looked at her and smiled. "Yesterday we were recruiting you; today you're

staff."

Is your induction program designed on these lines???

Performance appraisals are normally understood by the consultants who developed

it, or other consultants who had developed it earlier, from where the later

consultant referred. [I hope I made myself clear enough]. Very recently, at a client

site I got to know that they had given a raise of 2.375%. across the board. zI almost

fainted because of this sophistication, which was nothing but suffocation for thepoor employees.

As I see, the biggest point of conflict between performance appraisal and common

sense is that performance is a regular activity while appraisal is an annual drama. I


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dont discard the idea of having performance appraisals , but what I argue about is

the process. The best performance appraisals are the ones, designed by employees

and managers, together. Based on my personal research, companies can save a lot

on performance appraisal and TNA and such HR activities budget, if they invest a bitin Google searching. I hope you are getting what I am trying to say Ctrl C Ctrl V!

We have a very surprising complex of west. We copy and paste every crap that we

get. Its a shame Honestly, its a shame. I remember one of my trainings that I was

doing for a pharmaceutical company. In the workshop, we had their star performers

[Sales Reps], from all over Pakistan. As I started commenting on managing people,

and I asked the participants to develop a chart of the process in which theyd like to

be managed, a sales rep from interior part of Sindh, actually developed the worlds

famous One- Minute Managers model a model that have earned millions of dollars

for Ken Blanchard. I was SURPRISED. Surprised because he didnt know who Ken

Blanchard was, had no idea about the One-Minute philosophy, was hardly able to

read English, and yet he had that million dollar thought.

So piece of advice: Stop relying on global experts only talk to your frontline, and

theyll teach you common sense!

How can I forget Salary and Compensation department? Although, I know that they,

at the end of the day [in 90% of the organ izations], are top managements post -men.

I honestly dont know why an employer is willing to offer a raise of 50% to an

employee who wants to quit and is thinking about a raise of 2.375% across theboard for people who really want to work for the company. Any logic?


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I am sure HR will take the lead. HR, in fact is already taking the lead. But my only

concern is that this lead is not self-proclaimed and policy driven but something

people would voluntarily want to follow!

What HR can do to promote Common Sense at work?


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It is a thousand

times better to have

common sense

without education


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than to have

education without

common sense.

Robert Green Ingersoll


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Common Sense in Education

We are living in a world that was never so unpredictable, materialistic, fast-paced

and crazily growing. Everything is changing, and changing with immense pace. What

is true today will be obsolete literature tomorrow.

The bad news is that our Education s ystem is absolutely missing on whats

happening around us. Common Sense will be a much more sophisticated term in this

case, as I doubt even the basic senses capacity.

The first and the greatest flaw in educational models is the judgmental approach-

the approach that tells student how good or bad they are. The misery is that most

students take it very seriously. Shame on us as teachers and facilitators who do such

crimes! If the creator never did it for humans, how dare can we do it to our fellow-

beings.

Another concern that has been disturbing my mind is the amazing irrelevance.

What is taught at schools Primary, Secondary, Higher Secondary, Colleges, and

Universities has little or mostly nothing to do with the real world. Educational

syllabus is structured, predictable and provides an outline Real world is insanely

unpredictable, least structured and has no boundaries. How, by any means, can we

prepare the youth of today for the challenges of tomorrow with such a syllabus?

Food for thought: How many schools include Readers Digest as the part of their

science syllabus? A teacher asked me why they should do so I screamed, Why

Not! At least it has a connection to what the child sees outside your Prison look -

alike schools.


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Think about this as well University students having laptops with a Wi -Fi

connection, where they search the taught topic, come up with the most recent

literature available, and discuss it further. It may sound odd to many, but you knowwhat it will be a big problem to many of us around [so called teachers], because

than we know they [our students] will beat the living hell out of us!

I have been reading and listening about the ever increasing tuition fees of schools at

all levels. Honestly, I dont mind it, as I know, its just the beginning. Educational and

Healthcare cost will further rise by many folds in near future. My complaint is only

that by charging such a hefty amount, whats the use if these schools are producing

nothing but clones! In my opi nion, if a school system cant ignite the spark in the kid

to be original and be comfortable with who he is the school system should be

immediately banned. Today, when I recall my best teachers, it is true that They

made m e fall in love. They helped me figure out w ho I was.

Our toughest learning achievement mastering our native language does not

require schools, or even competent parents. It does require a desperate need-to-

know. Great teachers are great learners, not mere imparters of knowledge. Great

teachers ask great questions that feeds the kids lifelong quest of discovering more.

The world is not about right & wrong answers; it is about the pursuit of

increasingly sophisticated questions but the misery is that we increasingly reward

answers, and penalty is the very fate of questioning individual. Shame Shame! Please

note The Three Most Important Letters WHY?

Richard Paul, Director, Center for Critical Thinking says, We need to shift the focus

of learning from simply teaching students to have the right answer, to teaching

them the process by which educated people pursue right answers.


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Now consider what Jordan Ayan had to say in his book, AHA!... My wife and I went

to a [kindergarten] parent-teacher conference and were informed that our budding

refrigerator artist, Christopher, would be receiving a grade of Unsatisfactory in art.We were shocked. How could any child let alone our child receive a poor grade

in art at such a young age? His teacher informed us that he had refused to color

within the lines, which was a state requirement for demonstrating grade -level

motor skills.

Schools are busy participating in the massive suppression of

creative genius If you are reading this article, and belong to

any senior level position with your school try this, and

youll testify my words (not 99 but 100%) Go and ask,

How many artists are there in the room? Would you please

raise your hands. FIRST GRADE: Most probably all the

children will jump from their seats, arms waving. Every child

is an artist. SECOND GRADE: About half the kids would raise their hands, shoulder

high, no higher. The hands are still. THIRD GRADE: At best, 10 kids out of 30 would

raise a hand, tentatively, self- consciously. By the time youll reach SIXTH GRADE, no

more than one or two kids will raise their hands, and then ever so slightly, betraying

a fear of being identified by the group as a closet artist.

Now if this happens to you, come and meet me as I will personally congratulateyou for participating in this mass creativity destruction campaign .

For what I have to say about the school system, adequate testimony exists from the

examples of highly regarded scientists like [Nobel laureate] Richard Feynman,


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Albert Einstein, and many others, that scientific discovery is negatively related to

the procedures of school science classes.

Let us strive for common sense in education let us start educating children andyoungsters for what is to come or at least, wh at is happening

When we do our corporate trainings, I feel that missing link very strongly and I am

sure, many of my colleagues in the industry would agree. The graduates of best of

the universities are charged up with Jargons like SWOT, Risk/Reward Ratio, the BCG

Matrix and so on and so forth. What they are missing is on the How part.

My Suggestion: Although, I gave quite a few suggestions, my most important one

comes now, Teacher should be nothing more than Facilitators of ideas. By doing

this, we, the teachers, will make the greatest contribution for future.


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What you can do [as Parent, Teacher or Student] to bring Common Sense

back in Education?


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Believe nothing,

no matter where

you read it, or who

said it, no matter if I


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have said it, unless

it agrees with your

own reason and

your own commonsense.


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uddha


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In Search of Common Sense

7-Steps to Re-Kindling Common-Sense

Number 7 plays a very critical role in making any book successful, so I also thought

of giving it a try.

In this case, arriving to this 7 steps is not based on any extensive research but just a

humble attempt to bless my books with the spiritual and effective power of 7.

However, most interestingly, I conditioned my mind too much for 7 that it was

almost impossible to think anything beyond that. In fact to be most honest nothing

came to my mind after concluding point 6 but you see, 6 is not as lucky and

attractive as 7, and so I had to add a surprise element as number 7.


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1. Anti-EGO Movement

The first of them all EGO: Edging God Out!

It is interesting that for last many years, our attitude movers and shakers [authors]

have been writing about 1 001 ways and many others of eliminating EGO from

your life What a shameful call How is it possible to eliminate EGO, just like that!

In fact, I guess, these authors are just too EGO-centric themselves, as they are busy

preaching what is right to them, and making no endeavor in referring to common

sense.

When I call for Anti-EGO movement, I am talking about the process of

accommodating others about not only speaking but sparing few seconds every day

in listening about telling yourself, at least once a day that you dont know

something that others know The beauty is in small steps and not the complete life

transformation promises the Tony Robbins typos

Let us also see why Common Sense is inversely proportional to EGO. EGO tells you

that you are alwa ys right Now because you and your mind is not common to the

world, the sense that your mind makes out of things will definitely not be common.

As Ken Blanchard puts it up, No One is as Smart as All of Us.

So without shifting PARADIGMS and Unleashing Your Potentials as many wouldput it up, I simply advice to try avoid your very EGO for few minutes every day. Tell

yourself that in front of God, we all are equally intelligent and equally foolish. I am

completely sure that if you think you are human, you ll like this alternative approach

and minutes spent for anti-EGO movement will increase gradually.


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2. Kids Wisdom

The most beautiful, challenging, yet thrilling dimension of my training career comesfrom my interaction with children. They are smart, creative, simple and honest.

These four attributes are, however, quite rare in most modern professionals.

Although, we do invest a lot in making our employees creative, yet the environment

we provide is simply contradictory. My belief that humans are born creative and

later are misguided by experience, education and environment gets confirmed

when I talk to these little wonders!

Let me share few observations Ive made, while training those whiz kids:

They ask for every damn thing no matter how expensive it is. They dont even care

who has the actual possession of it They just want it, and so they demand it. We -

the grown-up waste most of our lives, thinking whether to ask for it or not!

They alway s want to win, without hurting anyone else. They dont create troubles

for others in order to pursue good for themselves still they want to win. Are we

still that eager, yet not greedy!

They are happy, with no particular reason. Searching for reasons to be happy is an

adult nonsense.

They get bored quickly. They hate doing the same things over and over again. This

attitude gives them the hunger to find new things to do, or at least new ways of

doing the same old thing.


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They forget grievances, and move on with building stronger relationship. They fight,

they yell yet they settle issues 100 times faster than the adults. What a shame for

us!

Kids see the stuff itself not the value! They are never concerned on how expensive

the stuff is they make their selection, solely based on their liking. Unlikely of us,

they never think on return on investment, future profitability and commercial value

they just purely love it for what it is!

They find their way out To Play!... Believe it or not kids have their own set of

worries [Education, Parents Orders, friendship promises, learning more and more]

but despite of all this, they find out reasonable time to play and be at their absolute

best as adults, we are just too bad at doing this.

Meditating might be an art or skill, we adults wish to master but if observed

carefully kids can meditate, anywhere and anytime. Ive been amazed to observe

how a kid gets lost with something he/she is playing or observing and will not get

distracted to even the worst of the distraction, provided by the outer world.

I know, many of us will be ashamed of our self by reading all this, as weve invested

hundreds of dollars in learning these things and yet nowhere closer. In fact, we have

so many Gurus to look up to for this stuff however, actually, the real gurus live in

our homes!


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3. Go Across!

When I demand to go across, I refer to the importance of meeting, talking, discussingand laughing with people from other departments and people from different walks

of life. We look in one direction, all our lives. We prefer only what we do may it be

religion, sports, education, job, relationship what so ever. We are Uni -directional.

Sensibly thinking, the sense in such case will again be Uni- Sense not the Common

Sense. To make our sense more common, we must meet people from different walks

of life.

Finance people love finance people because for them, they are the only humans at

work. Marketing people never talk to finance people because they think everyone

else at work, except the finance guys, are humans. So much of confusion and

hurdles Sales people hate production people as if they are the ones responsible for

their career stagnancy and production people hate sales people as if they are the

ones who are solely responsible for their ever declining appraisals. HR and IT are

the ones always responsible for everything, and they themselves dont know why!

Piece of advice: Make it an organizational policy for cafeteria that no two individuals

from same department can sit together. I am NOT kidding make it a policy or these

hard nuts wont crack otherwise!

Design your Performance Appraisals in a way that appraisals are interdependent

with other departments. For doing so, you need to design the appraisal yourself.

Google wont help you and it also means that many consultants wont be able to

assist you.


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4. Read Crazy Stuff!

Trend of reading has gone down in our society, and it is truly shameful. The bestsight is at the airport. Youll hardly find anyone reading. It s either cell phones they

are engaged with or simply looking here and there. Most interestingly, even in a 7-

hour flight, we either pretend to sleep or to watch other people sitting as if we were

the security in-charge.

Here, Id also put the blame on par ents. They never emphasize the importance of

reading, and as a result, the entire generation is now out of this habit of reading. Atmax, some of the most profound professionals read magazines and books,

pertaining to their own career Good! But not Good Enough!

By reading things about only one aspect of life and not the other will corrupt our

common sense. And so I advise read crazy things from Readers Digest to Fiction

Novels from Spirituality Literature to Science Adventures From Local Literature

to contemporary art each and everything in the world has something for you.

My Call: Read before you die.

List 5 books youd like to read.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.


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Read -before your die!

5. I Dont Know Mantra!

Now this is perhaps the most important phrase I will ever share with my readers

and listeners I DONT KNOW Aha! What a relief when one says it Just imagine

the openness to learning that you create for yourself by chanting this phrase do it

with me:

I Dont Know

I Dont Know I Dont Know

I Dont Know

I Dont Know is perhaps one of the most powerful leadership phrase ever! It

allows you to explore the common sense, prevailing in masses around you and also

empowers you to go beyond your personally crafted nonsense. By saying I Dont

Know, one immediately enters into the world of no position authority. Ive been

working with many clients, regionally; very few of them practice the I Dont Know

mindset. In one of my assignments with an automobile company, I met this Service

Department Manager at the corporate level. Initially I wondered why he is here

when he doesnt know anything, but more I spent my time with him, more I realized

the power of him saying I Dont Know. Whenever he said I Dont Know, the other

person jumped into the unknown to come up with a better solution. Now if hecomes up with something really amazing, this manager would praise him for doing

that, and if he comes up with something not workable or gets stuck, the managers

jumps in with some suggestions. As a result, the speed with which the team worked


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went up like anything. So by saying I Dont Know, you increase the overall speed of

work and quality of results.

Managers often ask how to practice this I Dont Know Mantra of Management Ireply start it from your home. If you have kids at home tell them that you Dont

Know and youll see that million dollar expression on their faces, which says

Aha.. Finally my Father has stopped lying

Word of Caution: Never say I Dont Know to your boss It doesnt work up -word.

Normally, your boss is stupid enough to believe that he/she knows everything. But it

also implies that your subordinates think the same way so better start saying I

Dont Know to them your subordinates.

The Common Sens e teaches me one thing: If you Dont Know something, and you say

that you Dont Know, people will at least respect your honesty. But if you Dont

Know anything and you dont say I Dont Know, people still know that you Dont

Know and theyll pray for you to get well soon!

List 10 common things you dont know how to do.

For example, I Dont Know how to Swim I Dont Know how to find the mighty x in

1.

2.

3.4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.


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an equation of Algebra!

6. Keep Normal Remain Human

With Power and Money, one doesnt change but actually gets exposed as what he

actually is. Another hurdle in the way of living a life full of common sense is that we

fill our lives with so much of power and fame and money that we leave little space

for anything else.

Normal people normally:

Laugh - Do You?

Listen - Can You?

Question - Dare You!

Learn - Do You!

Enjoy - How You!

Fear God - You MUST!

The trick is in remaining normal. These are the normal people who ended up their

lives in such a dignified way that we call them abnormal and start imitating the

state where they ended NOT POSSIBLE! Jack Welch, the highly successful

chairman of General Electric, put it well when he said in an interview in the Harvard

Business Review:

Insecure mana gers create complexity. Frightened, nervous managers use thick,

convoluted planning books and busy slides filled with everything theyve known

since childhood. Real leaders dont need clutters. People must have the self -


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confidence to be clear, precise, to be sure that every person in their organization

highest to lowest understands what the business is trying to achieve. But its not

easy. You cant believe how hard it for people to be simple, how much they fear

being simple. They worry that if theyre simple, people will think theyre simple -minded. In reality, of course, its just the reverse. Clear, tough -minded people are the

most simple

Simplicity is very difficult these days. I attend conferences and I normally speak at

conferences. What sucks for me are the graphically loaded, full of lies, strategically

charged presentations, intended to spread mass confusion.

It also reminds me of that interesting game I played in one of my workshops with a

senior group of professionals. The idea was to select 1 bowl out of total 5, with a

coin under it and they had 4 chances to get the right one 80% chance to win. To

my surprise, the person whom I invited to do the activity took almost 3 minutes 40

seconds to pick all 4 of them with the left out bowl bein g the right one What a

shame! I did this same activity at a school with kids of class 4, 5 and 6 and not to my

surprise, the young boy whom I invited picked random 4 bowls in hardly 5 seconds

and none of them was the right one either. My only question is who was better

the one who took almost 4 minutes to be wrong or the one who enjoyed the process,

went wrong in 5 seconds and made everyone laugh. The more senior we get, the

more alien we become to common sense and normality. The real heroes are those

who get senior in terms of position but maintain that million-dollar child attitude to

learn and enjoy

Stay Hungry Stay Foolish

Steve Jobs


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7. Surprise!

As I confessed earlier, the only motive to write 7 points was to achieve excellence inauthorship This brings me to point 7 of Surprise.

With the best of all senses, common or any other, all humanity fall short in front of

the power of Almighty. He crea tes and he destroys, whatever, wherever, whenever

So the last call of common sense is surrendering yourself in front of the Almighty.

Nothing more nothing less but surrender to the supreme. No strategic plans canchange the direction of Tsunami; no brainstorming session can stop floods; No birth

control pills can stop human growth; no Viagra can make you younger; no book on

Common Sense can educate you for common sense Its all beyond our control.

All religions preach the importance of effort but NO human can dare to have

control on results its so interesting that when we are about to end the journey of

our lives, we realize that it was just a dream. All the might, power and the position

we aimed and struggled for, looks like fiction toys we enjoyed playing with.

The very principle that all humans have to taste the flavor of death, is powerful

enough to keep you on ground, normal and full of common sense.


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Common sense anda sense of humor

are the same thing,

moving at different


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speeds. A sense of

humor is just

common sense,

dancing.

William James


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Making Common Sense Common!

WOW! I never realized I was getting disciplined enough to reach towards the end

of the book. I am amazed! So for conclusion, let us look into how we can promote

common sense in the society we live in, the community we serve, othe ffice we work

for, and the home we live in!

1. Start listening.

I guess, it is something very unnatural to our education system to teach

listening. We teach speaking, reading and writing and take listening for

granted interesting The very problem of humanity today is the lack of

listening skills. Because we dont listen, we dont understand. Because we dont

understand, we dont relate to it. And because we dont relate to it we miss it

completely!

2. ont Over Strategize!

The only thing that works is Action. As Jack Welch puts it up In real life,

strategy is actually very straightforward. Pick a general direction and implement

like hell.

3. Laugh! Even at your own self

Most of us jus t cant laugh seriously they cant. We are so damn serious about

life that common sense cant even dare to enter our lives. Having Fun in Life is

not Making Fun of your life. Let me give you a formula start smiling 10 times a

day and do it religiously, as if a Great Personal Potential Unleashing Guru hasrecommended you Smile 10 times a day do it regularly not 9 and not 11

10 times! Do it daily, and I bet, youll request me to allow you to increase the

number to 100 and my answer will be take 1000 of those and even more.

You look awesome [and human] when you smile... SMILE!


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4. Thankfulness to God

If God brings you to it, He will bring you through it.

In Happy moments, praise God. In Difficult moments, seek God.

In Quiet moments, worship God. In Painful moments, trust God.In Every moment, thank God.

5. Challenge the status quo.

Most people misunderstand common sense by doing what the world is doing.

Sometime, in fact many times, majority is nonsense in authority! Challenging the

norms, although is not appreciated in many societies but remember what

Einstein said Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from

mediocre minds.

6. Back to Basics

Last but not the least is what I adapted from Tom Peters recent book, The Little

BIG Things where he quoted Jack Bogle, Enough!:

Too Much Cost, Not Enough Value Too Much Speculation, Not Enough Investment Too Much Complexity, Not Enough Simplicity Too Much Counting, Not Enough Trust Too Much Business Conduct, Not Enough Professional Conduct Too Much Salesmanship, Not Enough Stewardship Too Much Focus on Things, Not Enough Focus on Commitment Too Many Twenty -first Century Values, Not Enough Eighteenth-Century

Values Too Much Success, Not Enough Character

All the very best for your Common-Sense Charged Life


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Common

sense is

instinct.


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Enough of it is

genius. George ernard Shaw


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About the Author:

Few people have impacted the day-today execution of learning in Pakistans

corporate arena more than Sohail Zindani. A gregarious,sought-after speaker, author and organizational development

consultant, Sohail is characterized by friends, colleagues,

competitors and clients as one of the most insightful,

humorous, compassionate and professional individuals in

training industry.

Sohail has a gift for adapting his presentation style to hisaudience. His unique humor, natural style, unconventional wisdom and

unsurpassable energy has thrilled, inspired and energized audiences around the

region.

Profile Snapshot:

International Speaker, Author and OD Consultant; - www.sohailzindani.com Founder and CLO, Learning Minds! Group www.learningminds.biz Listed Speaker at A-Speakers Bureau Member, International Advisory Board of World HRD Congress; Featured Speaker and Expert at Learning Regional and International HR

Events and Summits; Over a 110 Clients in 5 Countries

More than 35000 Participants Trained
http://www.sohailzindani.com/http://www.sohailzindani.com/http://www.sohailzindani.com/http://www.learningminds.biz/http://www.learningminds.biz/http://www.learningminds.biz/http://www.learningminds.biz/http://www.sohailzindani.com/

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