Seven Habits to foster Good Relations with Everyone

Human beings are social creatures. In our day to day activities we have to interact with many people. Most of the tasks that we perform or we ask others to perform depend upon the cooperation we receive from others. Evidently, our success depends on our relationship with others. Besides, good relations contribute to our happiness. First, let us understand what is good relationship? This means a number of things which are:

i) Faith in others. We can have good relations with someone only if they feel that we trust them and they can rely on us.

ii) Respect for others; we need to give consideration for ideas and opinion of people we deal with. Mutual respect is the basis of working together cordially. In this situation work is done with collective wisdom and creativity.

iii) Living up to your words; it means that whenever you have offered any kind of help to someone, you must give it. At the same time you need to be mindful of what to say and use your language and speech with discretion.

iv) Diversity should be welcomed. Each individual is different. Their opinions are different, being from different backgrounds. Good relationship will require you to accept the diversity.

v) Communicate with great care. We need to communicate with people around us all the time. If we are too secretive, others will observe it even inadvertently. This will act as a road block in good relationship. Therefore we must be open in our communication. You need not hesitate to say that certain information you will not like to reveal, but politely.

Having talked about the definition of good relationship, I would, now, like to share my thoughts about what habits we need to inculcate for developing good and cordial relations. These are:

Habit 1. Develop your networking skills. You should never be shy to reach out to people whom you want to connect and build relations. This will require high standard soft skills, clear and honest communication, ability to collaborate and resolve conflicts whenever these takes place. Difference of opinion even among close compatriots is not uncommon. It should be your habit to respect the difference of opinion. If you are not convinced you can always say politely that ‘we agree to disagree’.

Habit 2. Understand your relationship objectives. In the busy life today, we do not have time to build relations with people for the fun of it. Therefore, it’s necessary to clearly understand the relationship needs of both you and the other person. What you expect from them and what they might expect from you in return need to be contemplated. By no means can you be considered as selfish. In any case if you are not careful of what you want. How you can take care of others, if you cannot take care of yourself.

Habit 3. Spare sometime for building relationship with people who are important to you. It’s not enough to talk sweetly whenever you happen to meet someone. Conscious deliberate efforts are required to build good relations with anyone. Your keenness should be supported by your conduct and actions. Small courtesies like complimenting someone’s achievement, saying ‘thank you’ if something is done for you and sending greeting on New Year, birthday or anniversary greeting etc. go a long way to strengthen cordiality.

Habit 4. Develop a positive attitude. Incidents in your life might have left some scars of suffering even without your fault, But this should not be a reason for a negative attitude. In fact, your attitude is you; it should be visible on your face, speech and the body language. Your negative feelings inside your mind will never allow a visible positivity. Make it a habit to spend some time to develop your emotional intelligence. This will improve yourself awareness and ability to handle difficult people or difficult situations with a positive attitude. You will earn respect from others and so good relations will follow.

Habit 5. Listen twice as much as you speak. Each of us has two ears but only one mouth to speak. So, speak less and listen more. Everyone wants to be heard and to be understood. If you fulfill both these needs, they will only be too happy to be in your company. When you speak you don’t add anything to your knowledge, however, when you listen actively you are likely to enhance your knowledge. Further, you will speak with discretion and take care of speech elements like pace, pitch, emphasis on the keyword and the tone. Thus, what you speak will be more effective and appreciated by the listener. You will find the habit of listening more and speaking less very helpful in building good relations.

Habit 6. Recognize and appreciate others whenever the occasion arises. If anyone has rendered any help to you, he/she need to be thanked and appreciated. It should be your habit to compliment others genuinely. It should not appear that you are just completing a formality. The receiver of the compliment/appreciation will acutely observe your action. She must feel that the appreciation has come from your heart.

Habit 7. You must know your boundaries and exercise discretion. There is no point in allowing anyone to intrude in your private space. Nor, you should do it yourself. Everybody needs privacy. Everyone is engaged in various activities. You have to find available time for interaction with others. In modern times, due to very competitive environment, there is no scope for any gossips or stretching any discussion beyond limits.

Since habits die very hard, it is equally difficult to inculcate new habits. Identify your development needs in respect of above habits and then start working on these. You need to be patient with yourself and consistent in your approach.

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Importance of Personality and Soft Skills

Personality plays a very important role in success of individual life. Hence it is important to understand the meaning of Personality. According to me, Personality means physical Appearance, dressing, communication, relationship with individual, character, commitment, intelligence etc. In today’s world, most of people make judgement based on the personality of people. Personality requires everywhere whether it is film industry, corporate world or social life. Today lot of organisations are focusing on building personality amongst employee. Recently AirAsia has hired Amit Chandoliya a model as a CEO for India business because of his personality and this has been concurred by Air Asia Global CEO. Hence it is important for everyone has to focus on improving their personality apart from their technical and other skills. Today lots of private institutes are offering course on personality development. I have considered myself as an average kind of personality. I am working towards improving my personality by keeping focus on improving my physical appearance & communication skills.

I have considered myself as a hardworking, helpful & dedicated person. I am never satisfied with myself and always try to look for something new. I am risk taking person. I don’t believe in criticising others. I am straight forward person. I believe in respect for individual.

People feel that I am straight forward person and don’t involve in politics. People consider me as helpful person and like to share & discuss their problem with me. People perceive that I am hardworking, reliable, committed & approachable. Whenever there is problem & it is getting difficult, my boss counts on me. I still recall one of the challenging assignments in my earlier Company, when my boss colleague & his two junior had left the Company at same time in mid of Statutory Audit. They left the firm in critical stage of Audit & only they had possessed the critical knowledge of Financial of organisation. After lot of deliberation this assignment has been handed over to my boss and he had chosen me for this assignment to me. This shows the confidence of my boss on me. I have completed the assignment successfully.

I don’t have any bad habits of tobacco, alcohols. I like playing cricket and eating good food. I always get up early and sleep early. I have a habit of eating early dinner.

My long term goal is to start my own business by keeping focus on my current professional work. I am trying to explore various business opportunities and discussing with various businessman & friends. I know that I have to put more serious effort to achieve this. I would also like to improve my communication skill which will help me in improving overall my personality. I have focussed myself on improving the communication skills and joined communication class.

I believe in relationship and give importance to relationship. It is easy to breakup relationship but building up relationship take long time. The base of relationship is trust & comfort with others. I have very good relationship with people at work, at home & at society.

I am open minded person. I open for criticism and new ideas. I don’t frame judgment based on what others say.

I am not very good listener. I know this is one of my weak areas which I have to improve. I have identified this as a one of the priority for myself. I am working on this to become an effective listener. I am becoming more focus now as listener.

I don’t take rash decisions. I always think and evaluate pros & cons before making such decision. Sometimes I discuss the issue with my family & others and take their input before making such decision. I am fast decision maker. I believe that most of the decisions taken by me are correct.

I am not a ‘yes’ kind of personality. If I don’t agree with anyone, I don’t say yes.

Active Listening Skills

In today’s fast paced world, communication is extremely important. In fact, in business it is critical. However, communication is equally important at home when interacting with your own near and dear ones. It is also important during social interactions, when you meet people. There is no doubt that your speech should be very articulate. The speech will communicate the ideas that you want to convey. However it is even more important to be an active listener!

Communication is always is a two way process. Your articulate speech will go in vain if you are not listening to the person you are speaking to. You can even listen to the person with your eyes. Body language tells all. Facial expressions clearly denote whether the opposite person is listening to you or not. This means that the best vocal capabilities will not be effective until these are matched with equally attentive listening abilities.

Now let us examine how to be a good listener. Some of the qualities of a good listener are as under:

1. You should listen as a friend. Often your opinion will be different from the person who is speaking. We are all individuals and therefore no two persons think alike. Listening as a friend enables reconciliation of contradicting opinions.
2. Further more, it is necessary for the listener to make the speaker appreciate that you are an attentive listener. When somebody is speaking try not to fidget with anything on your table. You should not gaze at the news paper / magazine on your table. Even looking at the speaker with a lost expression, will convey an impression that you are brooding over something else and not listening to what is being said. Thus you should not only listen actively but you should also show to speaker that you’re listening actively.
3. Encourage the speaker to join you in the comfort zone. When you have removed all distractions and you make the speaker aware that you are listening to them, you must encourage him to open up by your friendly nodding of the head smile wherever desirable and maintain a comfortable eye contact. While speaking on telephone you can use words and expressions like – ‘yes’,‘go ahead’, ‘hmmm’… etc. These are the voice symbols which tell the other person that you are actively listening during the phone conversation.
4. Act but never react. Whenever the discussion is held around heavy states one as to be extra careful. If the speaker raises the voice it is necessary for you to maintain calm. However you must never give an impression that anybody can take you for granted. This can be achieved by not reacting to any unsavory remarks by the speaker. Instead you should use such words and expressions which will make it explicit to the intruder that you are unshakable. It is this state of calmness which will unnerve your opponent. The expression with ‘Act never react’ simply means to use your mind and reply appropriately, firmly but without raising your voice if the opponent has raised his.
5. You need to comprehend whatever you have listened. It is always a good idea to summarize and repeat briefly the points you have just heard. It will help you to understand all the points clearly; and in case there is any confusion the same will be clarified there and them.
6. As a good listener you have a right to ask questions to the speaker. The speaker will never object to relevant questions which are briefly asked.

To conclude, good listening skills is not a rocket science. It just requires an empathetic attitude and an attentive mind, and forms that basis for long lasting relationships.

Maintaining A Positive Attitude!

In the age of Information Technology and extensive use of computers, one way consider the human brain as a unique operating system capable of producing excellent solutions to all your problems all that you have to do is to keep on updating the system i.e. your brain with the lessons life teaches from day-to-day because

You come to this world with the balance sheet of the previous birth. A programmed of possibilities you call it ‘Samskara’.

You study the features of the program or you don’t.

You learn to use it or you don’t.

You strive to enhance it to bring out the newer better utilities or you don’t.

You are places in certain circumstances: you have a duty to perform. You carry out your duty or you don’t.

You crave out a life for yourself or you don’t.

If you decide your profession you define your duties, or you don’t. Own turn.  Even then, either you define your duties, or you don’t.

Whichever way you define your own duty, you perform your duty or you don’t.

If you perform your duty, utilize fully your operating systems inbuilt software – your ‘Sanskara’, keep on enhancing it, brining out new, better versions and keep on utilizing your own operating systems; you are a yogi. Or the great Bill.

The important message is to keep on updating your wisdom the human ‘operating system’ for better decisions. And also to take good care of your thoughts because they have an important bearing on your life.

Think big, and think great School your thoughts, it is never late.

Thoughts are like the Seeds in earth; These condition the fruits before their birth. Good thoughts Make your decisions good Bring out the best As they should.

Thoughts of jealousy, malice and similar kind Enter your mind, make you mad, and blind!

While your thoughts and a constant desire to develop a positive attitude will take care of your mental health, it is equally necessary if not more, to take good care of your body your physical health. A software engineer ensures that his computer is not only updated with latest technology in the field off his operation but also is free from any viruses and is technically sound. Likewise to get the best out of human life, it is essential to maintain excellent health both physical and mental. Human body is much more than a machine. So it requires much greater care as it is…

A unique body with priceless mind comprises Creator’s greatest gift to mankind incalculate good health Not for body alone

Money mends many things can surely contribute to good health money for its own sake is a wasteful wealth.

Your good health alone can give you a store house of energy that you always need. Besides, one must understand that to lead a meaningful and healthy life, abundant energy is a pre-requisite.

Energy is a life force your activity’s chief resources mind gives you direction Energy helps implementation action choose appropriate combination of the two according to your profession whatever you do

A rigorous regime need not be imposed regulate thought process Devoid of stress get abundant energy, and bee composed.

With a sound mind, a healthy body and a wonderful storehouse of energy good decision come easy. And you know.

When to act or to desist it’s a quality essential top on the list of people desiring success and they persist pursuing their goals with decision fast there’s little doubt that their success will last

Whenever you have decided to launch an important project some opposition from known or unknown quarters can always come. Often opposition comes from close quarters. Colleagues, friends and even relatives may criticize only for the sake of criticism. There may even be some latent motive. So be prepared and have conviction in what you do.

When you are convinced what you say is right when no other alternative is within your sight and for your right you are prepared to fight your conviction you let speak even strong opponent will act weak

There is so much in life and so much to do. However for anything new even within your existing project you must get used to taking initiative. Besides having ample initiative gives such a great confidence and makes every day more interesting. Pray to your God the Almighty, the way you visualize him saying.

Grant me an unending initiative to further my tasks and be creative indecision clarity may rule throughout

Risks may not, my mind, shatter completing tasks be my only matter Flexibility when required let always come so that my day’s battles are won

Rigidity of ideas must be never display democratic openness must come to play your grace may always shine brighter making me your devotee, a downright fighter

Whatever you my do, doing it well is of utmost importance for…

Aspiration to know even more, delving deep into matter core availing fully faculties of the mind Virtue this is, of a splendid kind let your imagination fly free awakening creativity to a finer degree pondering on the problem in hand solutions come with a magic wand

If you try to pay less heed searching shortcuts to successes you tend to loose you aim and enter another futile game virtue tells not of easy means strengthens your will; goals are easier seen.

Hindu philosophy suggests that life is a continues battle where we have to fight out against the implementing hurdles, difficulties created by others etc. if life is a battle ground, be always prepared to fight your battle well.

Most humans are fond of celebrating their victories without fighting their battles.

Don’t announce your victory without fighting the battle don’t celebrate the success don’t let reason rattle. Success does not always, come with effortless ease, as though you are the only person for her, to please. Hold yourself and give, your own mind, time to think nothing worthwhile is achieved in a fleeting moment, the time, it takes to blink.

Most off the conscious times, you are at your work. So if you can be happy while working you really feel that life worth living.

By following these simple hints and practices, you are well on your way to create a positive attitude and you must.

Row the boat of ‘duty’ sail safely across a sea.

Search through your mind what your duty can be.

Never is there a situation nor any circumstance

that could ever effect your intention of duty;

you want to perform.

Hindrances, hurdles even hurricane may hurt or shake

your resolve. With devotion to your duty; Greater courage will evolve.

Duty first, always in mind

greater joy; you will never find

Unfortunately, sometimes we develop a tendency to complain and even so bitterly about the fallacies that we come across in the system, in the organization we work or among the people we interact with.

But one must move on with life without complaining.

Why should you? Always make a fuss living in your static world rather catch life’s vibrant bus life moves on and so must you time will not wait whatever you may do!

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Making Meetings Work

Lots of meetings are conducted by each organization every week. Often the participants are senior/middle level executives. The cost of the time spent by the participants is very high. Besides, if a meeting is a not successful in achieving the objectives, the frustration and interpersonal conflict add to the cost.

However, if meetings can be held effectively, these are invaluable techniques of taking strong decisions after thorough discussion. It’s necessary to understand for the coordinators and even the CEO’s to have adequate knowledge of how to make meetings effective and productive. The chairman of the meeting plays a very important role for the efficacy of the meeting. Besides, meetings must give a satisfaction of openly discussing the ideas which you may have but you may not find an opportunity to express. Thus while on the one side we find that the poor meetings can be waste of expensive time of the executives, on the other these can be very helpful. If the meetings are organized effectively, they can be tools for resolving many managerial issues. These can thus be very helpful for the Management. The first important question, therefore, is the real need for the meeting. The coordinator has to clearly workout the objectives of the meeting. He or she has also to clarify how best the objectives can be achieved.

In order that we make the meetings productive and helpful we should attend to the following points which are often ignored:

1)      Planning and preparation: we should define the objectives of the meeting.

2)      We should select the participants and prepare a list of the proposed attendees. We may also invite their suggestions on the proposed agenda.

3)      The organizer needs to set the ground rules off the meetings in consultation with the chairman. In his brief introduction before the meetings starts the chairman can explain these ground rules. These could be summarized as :–

a)      Participants should speak precisely and avoid verbosity.

b)      Only one person should speak at time.

c)      The point which is already made by one participant should not be repeated by the other and

d)      No one should take the discussion on a personal level.

4)      The organizer must contemplate on what could be the problems. Necessary steps to avoid these problems should be taken.

5)      Getting results and action: minutes of the meeting should be written sooner than later, these should be circulated among the participants with or without a note by the chairman.

6)      There should be follow up action plan and the action need to be monitored.

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The Hare and The Tortoise – New and Improved!

The Hare and The Tortoise

Long ago when I was young and in school, I read a story, of the Hare and the Tortoise. They ran a race.

We all know that the Hare rightly thought that the he was fast. But he was wrong in thinking that he could take his victory for granted. He fell asleep during the race. The Tortoise overtook him and won.

Later on, the Management Gurus made some additions to the story.

Having lost the race, the Hare does some contemplation. He is unhappy that in spite of the fact that he is a fast runner, because of his casual behavior he lost the race. Now he decided that true to his speed, he must win the race and gain back the lost self-esteem.

So he went to the Tortoise. He said “Lets have another race”. The Tortoise agreed. And they had another race. This time the Hare, did not take it casually. He did not sleep on the way and won the race by a handsome margin.

The Tortoise was sad. At the same time he felt that since his speed is slow, it was just natural that the Hare won the race. But he decided that he must find a way to win back his lost glory. He applied his mind and thought of a plan. After clarifying the plan in mind he went to the Hare and invited him for another race.

The Hare readily agreed. He knew that he would never commit the mistake done in the first race. But then the Tortoise said that this time I will decide the route. The Hare agreed. The route was planned in such a fashion that there were two-three ponds on the way.  When the race began, the Tortoise slowly ran on the land but easily swam through the ponds. On the other hand, the hare had to run around the ponds and lost a lot of time for covering the distance. The result was that the Tortoise won the race this time. He was happy that with his clever plan he could win the race from the Hare who was obviously faster and smarter than him. He credited himself that it was the victory of his wisdom.

The Hare was very upset for some time. But then he thought, why not make friends with the Tortoise. He had some qualities and abilities, while the Tortoise had some others. If pooled together both could become a great force. So he went to the Tortoise, and suggested to him that they would one again follow the same route; but that occasion they would not race each other. He said, “We will try to cover the distance, in the shortest possible time”. The Tortoise thought for some time, brooded over, and asked the Hare to explain what he intended to do.

The Hare said I am smart and fast. You are slow, but wise. Let us pool our speed and wisdom. Let us try to cover the distance in the shortest possible time.  So they ran again – this time together.  At first the Hare carried Tortoise on his back, but when they came to the pond, it was the Tortoise who swam across, carrying the Hare on his back. In this manner they were actually make it to the finishing line, much sooner than before.

The moral of this story is that if we work together, we win together!

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‘Voice Modulation’

We hear a lot about voice modulation in the age of public presentations.

What is modulation? And why is it so important?

Voice Modulation is your ability, rather, talent to bring in variance in pace, pause, pitch, emphasis on the key word and the tone. Unless you modulate your voice while speaking to a group or even a lone listener, the chances are that you speech will not be effective at all. We have often seen some members of the audience dozing away while the speaker continues his/her speech. Now, I will explain- pace, pause, pitch, emphasis on the key word and the tone.

Pace: if you speak very fast you will not be understood but, if you speak very slowly you tend to become dull and listeners will not like to listen to you. However, when you speak with a medium speech, though audience can understand you but the same pace of your words will render your speech monotonous.

Pause: Just as in written text you have coma, full stop, paragraph and other punctuation marks, your speech too must reflect the same by means of pauses of different durations. This will make the speech effective.

Pitch: It is the note on which you speak. While attending a solemn meeting you cannot speak on higher pitch. But at the same time if the commentator of a football match speaks at a low pitch, nobody will like to listen to him.

Emphasis on the key word: Just as you get unwanted results if you Google a wrong key word, different meaning will be conveyed by the same sentence when you emphasis a wrong word.

Tone: Tone is most dicey. It is easy to control the words and the sentences. But it is very difficult to control the tone. Tone represents the emotions with which you speak. Often times, due to inappropriate tone the speaker lands into trouble.

Interpersonal Relations

Our interpersonal relations with others depend upon various factors. Two most important factors are one – our behavior towards the concerned persons, and two and how we speak to the concerned persons.The contents of what we convey to our peers and friends will primarily depend upon our behavior. If our conduct to certain persons has been consistently good. It shows our regard towards them. But how we speak to them, is equally important if not more. The efficacy of our speech can be improved by making our speech articulate. Besides, we also need to become good listeners. People want that when they speak, total attention of the listener/listeners should be focused on their speech. Their ego is hurt if they find listeners inattentive.

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