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Generosity in stories

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Short stories are powerful but how do you make short of what was so powerful, deep, wide and insightful? Even when general attention is down to micro seconds, I will not take a short cut here as short cuts tend to cut you short. How can I compress 19 long pages of comprehensive notes I took from the Economic Times Masterclass on Brand and Business Storytelling conducted on 15th and 16th October 2026 in Mumbai by dearest well wisher and story monk Ameen Haque along with fireside chats he moderated with legends like Mr. Prahlad Kakkar, Mr. Shekhar Kapur and Mr. Prasoon Joshi as well as a session conducted by Mr. Harish Bhat? Here is a recurring theme I experienced from beforehand and through the two days: Generosity. Generosity in Ameen’s invitation for me; The generous number of stories everyone shared; Generosity in Mr. Kakkar’s presentation of the stories behind some of the iconic brand campaigns of his contemporaries like the late Mr. Piyush Pandey’s iconic Cadbury ad from the early ...
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Management and Leadership

Recently in a session for managers, as I was listening to the client setting the context, my mind went to the perennial question about the difference between management and leadership. What struck me in the moment was #leadership is when #mindfulness and higher order #values come into play while taking a decision. That, makes the decision transformational as against the scores of transactional decisions that are made while managing things on a daily basis maybe sometimes guided by values like comfort, convenience, efficiency, expediency, pragmatism, etc.
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Truth, Change and the long opportune road ahead

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These are some of the things that I ended up sharing in some of the recent conversations with clients and friends: There is still a teenager in every grown up and that’s something we need to factor while designing a #change intervention. *—————————————————————- Not everybody has the capacity to handle #truth or value truth even if it's a truth you are sharing about yourself. It scares most people into thinking that the same degree of #radicalhonesty would be expected of them as well. Share accordingly even as you practice radical transparency and truth about yourself. “You must always speak the truth but not all truths must be spoken.” - an interesting line I came across last year. And on this, an ex colleague shared two responses one of which was a line from her boss: “You need to have a better relationship with truth.” Second was something she came across on Instagram few days back: “Today I will do a service and not speak my mind.” *—————————————————————- “I still have a l...
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Facts, Lies, Storytelling or Marketing?

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Seth Godin wrote a book called “All Marketers are Storytellers.” Interestingly when you see the actual image of the book, you will see that the word liars is cut and superimposed with the word Storytellers. I love paan bur have only one in a year. Now when I saw this image, I wasn’t sure if it is all facts or just marketing!! I leave it to you to figure it out 😊😊.
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When 500 people began to get happy

This year, December 6th fell on a Saturday. So what's the big deal? There is a December every year and the 6th day of the month also comes every month. So what's the big deal on it coming on a Saturday this year? Well it fell on a Saturday even in 2009. As in most of the Decembers in Delhi that day was also mildly cloudy and crispy cold with some sunlight sneaking through. Something happened that day that I will never forget in my life; something I will forever remember in my life. I had to take my son to his paediatrician for a regular check up and I was driving my mother-in-law's old greyish-blue Maruti 800 with the number plate ending in 4245. Just as we turned left on the Delhi-NOIDA link road from our Mayur Vihar Phase 1 colony, I noticed the weather and also the bleak, expressionless  faces  of the other drivers on the road. They all looked sad and spiritually constipated. Nobody seemed happy. Maybe they were all focussing on their drive and the road ahead even as the...
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Mindful leadership begins with this...

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I am a mind mapping fan, though some people would say that I am beyond being a fan. They might say that I am a fanatic when it comes to mind mapping. I will always wear that as a badge of honour. Nevertheless, what you see attached is a mind map structure I drew for some of my participant-managers at one of my clients in NOIDA. Self-awareness is an important component I believe in and I designed it in their leadership journey. So, have a look at the mind map structure I created in one such session and see what all comes up in your mind in response to the first level of branches you see. Add them as further extensions/ sub-branches of the first level branches you see in the attachment. Would you be comfortable creating it about yourself and share it either here or with me in DM? For those who choose to share, I will share a further version of this mind map structure that I have created on my mind mapping software. As I learnt from Mr. Jim Cathcart , 'All leadership begins with self-...
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