Me, the NCC, Mohabattein and a managerial training session

I am sure hard core Hindi movie fans would remember this image of Amitabh Bachhan and his line from the movie Mohabattein.


Well, some time back I was conducting a 2 day session for a client and at the end of the first day a young girl came to me and said:


"Sir, when I saw you in the morning before the start of the session, it looked like you are a very distant, kadak person like Amitabh Bachhan from the movie Mohabattein."


Even as she struggled to remember his key words, I chipped in and spelt those words for her: "Parampara, Pratishtha and Anushasan".


Her spectacled face nodded with a wide smile on her face.


The 49 year old me couldn't suppress my own smile. The initially-hesitant, reserved, ambivert me tends to sometimes unwittingly radiate that impression.


"But at the end of the day today, you turned out to be amiable, approachable and fun to be around. We had some great learning."


Till she mentioned it, I had never thought of those words in a way that I could associate with.


I haven't seen that movie and somehow could never relate with the movie or AB's characterisation based on whatever little I had seen of the movie on TV back then or from its storyline or songs.


I just smiled at her knowing what was coming the second day.


The second day, we spoke about tough love in developing team members and that's where I turned to that participant with a knowing, smiling look and I shared how my short stint in the National Cadet Corps (NCC) had a life altering positive impact on my character shaping and self-leadership.


After all, Anushasan, Parampara and Pratishtha were key words we trained and lived by in the NCC even as we never heard or used those words expressly.


I had joined the NCC by choice in my first year of college 32 years back to learn self-discipline and get better as I was reshaping my life after school.


But I learnt more. I became free of the fear of peer pressure to do the wrong things.


And I was proud to have earned the respect of my ustad and two stripes on the uniform.


Those lessons deeply influenced me when I became a manager and had to develop my team members.


By the end of the second day, all the participants resonated with the idea of developing team members the way the best of managers have done.


#Selfleadership

#Discipline



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