The First 90 Days

  

The first 90 days, by Michael Watkins, is a very useful read for anyone making a transition into a new organization.  I'm listening to it for the second time since I'll be making a transition very soon. While the book focuses on leaders starting in a new role, it is useful for an employee at any level seeking to understand the way things work in a new organization.

1. There are four types of situations according to a STARS model:  Startup, Turaround, Accelerated Growth, Realignment and Sustaining Success.  Each require a different approach.
2. Startup: Decisive Decision making needed (hunter mentality rather than farmer mentality).  Use the shoot, then aim approach.  The energy is excited chaos, and your role is to make calls on what not to do.  Climb quickly up the technical learning curve, political learning curve is less critical here. Take the offensive approach on the product and market.
3. Turnaround: Decisive Decision making needed (also hunter mentality).  Shoot, then aim approach.  Morale may be low here, but people are aware that change is needed. This means you can make changes by using the plan-then-implement approach (rather than the collective learning approach).  Take the defensive approach on the product and market.  Pare down to critical elements of the product and secure that as a base first, then go after more marketshare.
4. Realignment: Collaborative decision making is needed (farmer mentality).  You have more time to assess the situation here, so aim carefully before firing.  The Political learning curve is critical here, so set aside time to climb up this curve. People are not aware that change is needed, so to make change, you need to use the collective learning approach.  Help people become aware that change is needed, and collaborate to create a plan for change that everyone is bought into.  You may take an offensive or defensive approach on the product and market depending on the situation. 
5. Sustaining Success: Collaborative decision making is needed (farmer mentality).  You have more time to assess the situation here so it is an aim and fire approach.  Spend time to climb the political learning curve so you can assert the right influence to get things done.  Measuring success is tricky here, since it's more incremental successes rather than "splash" success.  Set expectations with management accordingly.  Take a defensive approach to the product and market, make sure you secure existing marketshare and keep the organizing moving forwards, not backwards.

This book goes into more detail than above on general issues to consider during the transition. Here are some more highlights:

• Mentally promote yourself before starting on the role.  Think through how your relationships with others in the org changes because of the change. This is especially important for an internal transition, as alliances and friendships may shift as a result of this transition.
• Related to above, think through the functional scope of your new role.  If you are transitioning from specific-area manager to general management, you may not be able to rely on domain expertise for your future position.  Consider this, and consider how your strengths and weaknesses help or impair your future path.
• Take 100% ownership of your relationship with the boss.  Set the meetings, bring the agenda, build the bridge.
• Understand whether the organization values team vs individual accomplishments, and which is considered a win.

Here is a slideshare deck also that further summarizes the book's concepts.  This is a great read if you are going through or about to go through a transition.  Don't miss it!

The Willpower Instinct, by Kelly McGonigal

The Willpower Instinct is a book about the ins and outs of human willpower, and how we can best leverage this resource.  It is an extremely powerful and fun read, and highly recommended for anyone who has ever tried to make a change in their lives.  I find myself nodding and smiling along with the anecdotes, and I've learned powerful lessons to gain control in my next willpower exercise.

1. Willpower is a Finite Resource.   Willpower, the ability to overcome our animal instincts and act in favor of long term interests, is managed by our pre-frontal cortex.  The pre-frontal cortex, as with the rest of our body, can get tired with over-use, needs breaks and requires nourishment.  That is why every time you feel tired or hungry, you are more likely to give in to temptation.  Manage this finite resource carefully and make a note of low-willpower and high-willpower moments.  Choose high-willpower moments to make important decisions, and be aware of the pitfalls of low willpower moments. Plan accordingly and defer decisions during low willpower moments.  For example, my everyday willpower challenge is to avoid junk food.  When I get home hungry after work I have a low willpower moment so I tend to go for the junk food.  To mitigate this, I keep the junk food hidden and the healthy food prepared ahead of time, so the decision to avoid junk is easier during my low willpower moment.  After I eat and rest, I regain my willpower.  At which time I am motivated again to cook healthy food for the next day.
2. Beware of the License to Sin.  Have you ever completed your exercise goal for the day, then gave yourself license to indulge in sweets afterwards as a "reward," thereby negating calories burnt during exercise?  This is the effect of License to Sin.  When goals are being associated with "being good," it is tempting to indulge in a reward afterwards.  To work against this effect, de-associate goals with "being good."  Goals are strictly goals being met or not being met.  Instead of thinking "I have been good, therefore I should be rewarded."  Think instead "I have met my goal.  I feel good that I have met my goal."  The meeting of the goal should be a reward, or the goal is set inappropriately.  In the case of exercise, indulge in the positive surge of energy and endorphins gained from exercise.  Enjoy the intrinsic reward of the goal rather than use it as a license to sin.
3. Beware of the Social License to Sin.  Rule-breaking and loss of self-control are contagious.  An environment where bikes are parked in the "no bike" zone and litter is strewn on the street will encourage people to follow suit.  In fact, it will also encourage people break other rules.  The good news is, self-control is also contagious.  Taking inspiration from self-control masters such as athletes and spiritual leaders are a good way to boost self-control.  Building relationships with people who exhibit your desired self-control habits will also "rub-off" on you.
4. Wanting is not Happiness, unless it is.  Dopamine is released every time the body experiences desire.  But desire is not happiness. In fact, desire is associated with frustration.  Do you remember a time you were excited about the promise of a reward, but when the reward comes, there is a slight feeling of loss and perhaps depression?  Maybe it's Christmas Day after opening the presents.  Be clear about whether it’s the "promise of reward" you are seeking or the reward itself.  In some cases, the strongest vices, such as shopping, may be a desire for the "promise of reward" instead.   If that's the case, window-shopping may serve as the reward itself and the credit cards can stay home.  Separating the "desire" from the "reward" can help with goal setting and goal adherence.
5. Beware of the "What the Hell" effect.  Failure to adhere to a goal one time can trigger self-blame and shame that leads to a declaration of "what the hell" and lead to further failure.  Self-blame and shame also triggers your body to seek a dopamine hit so it can feel good right now, which encourages indulgence.  Prevent yourself from going over the cliff by exercising self-compassion.  Contrary to common perception, studies show that those who forgave themselves for missing the mark on occasion, will quickly get back on track.  Those who wallowed in self-blame will spiral into a cycle of bad feelings and failure.

Smart Thinking, by Art Markman

Smart Thinking is a book by Art Markman about how smart people solve problems.  It is an eye opening read about why a human brain can solve problems that chimpanzee cannot.

1. Smart thinking is ability to gather and remember good content and knowledge, then apply them in unusual ways.  An example is the Dyson vacuum, which uses a sawdust collection method within a home vacuum context.
2. Learning and using proverbs can help with smart and out-of-the-box thinking.  Applying knowledge in unusual ways requires out-of-the-box thinking.  Our brains are constructed to naturally perform in-the-box thinking.  That is because the brain is optimized for information retrieval within a context that makes the most sense.  So information about food is easiest to retrieve when one is in the kitchen or at a market because it is the most useful there.  To do out-of-the-box thinking then, one needs to free the brain from the context of its surroundings.  Using proverbs can do this.  Proverbs describe a situation in an abstract way, thereby freeing the brain from the current context and allowing it to freely perform cross-context and out-of-the-box thinking.  
3. To change a habit, you must replace it with another one.  You cannot replace something with nothing.  For example, "stop smoking" as a goal is not as good as "every time I want to smoke, I work on a jigsaw puzzle instead."  Without another anchoring habit, the old habit will prevail in association with established environment or contexts.  For example, if smoking occurs during TV time, then the urge to light up will be strong during TV time.  Trying to resist the urge to smoke is very difficult, and the brain's association between watching TV and smoking will prevail unless another activity is programmed in its place.  Working on a jigsaw puzzle, or picking up crochet may be other ways to keep the hands busy during TV time and build a new association within the TV-time context.
4. Causal Thinking separates human intelligence from chimpanzee intelligence.  Humans try to understand the "why" behind how things work.  Chimpanzees observe patterns but do not deduce the "why" behind it.  One example is a puzzle whereby a container with food will eject the food if a straw is inserted from the right.  Chimps in the experiment eventually learned to insert the straw on the right.  But when the puzzle was turned around such that the straw needs to be inserted form the left, the chimp had to start over with trial and error until he could establish the new pattern.  Without understanding the "why," the chimp is unable to solve for a similar situation using prior knowledge. This human curiosity about the "why" allows humans to go beyond pattern matching and allow each generation to improve upon the designs of the previous generation.
5. Being smart can be learned, and comes with practice.  One can practice causal thinking.  One method is to constantly self-teach when learning new information.  This method forces thorough causal understanding, because without it, self-teach is not possible. When learning new information, it is useful to think of the information in terms of objects, events and causal relationships.  

Search Inside Yourself

Search Inside Yourself is a book written by early Google employee Chade-Meng Tan, whose goal is to "create the conditions of world peace".  And he wants to do this by making people happy, based on the premise that happiness creates peace.  This is essentially a book on meditation written from the point of view of an engineer.  The book is simply and humorously written, but here's an EVEN simpler summary:  5 lessons for those who don't have the time to read an entire book just to be happy.

1. Meditation is scientifically proven to work!

      As befitting an engineer, Meng spends a good amount of time proving why you should meditate.  He explores studies on the "happiest man on earth" and scientifically defines happiness, how to measure it, and how the practice of meditation can increase it.  He then demonstrates how improved happiness yields improved emotional intelligence and how this has a strong correlation with success in the business world (even for engineers).

2. Mindful meditation is not about controlling emotions, it is about observing them at "higher resolution"

      Meng makes the assertion (again through scientific data) that people who are good at meditation do not shut off anger or pain.  They actually react more quickly to those emotions because they are more aware of them.  But by recognizing their emotions more clearly, they are able to recover from the emotions much more quickly and make choices on how they want to react.

3. Meditation is just breathing, and you're doing it right.

     If you're looking for detailed meditation practices, this book is not it.  Meditation is simply focusing your mind, and in this book, that simply involves observing your natural breath.  Two analogies really sticks.  Meditation is like exercise.  You are training your "brain muscles" to focus on something (like your breath).  When you lose focus, you just bring it back.  Losing focus is not failure.  It's an opportunity to exercise you brain and bring focus back.  Like doing bicep curls, losing focus, and then regaining focus is exercise.   Maintaining focus is like riding a bike.  You lose balance, then regain balance.  When you are able to do this quickly, it looks like you are balanced.  Likewise, you will always be losing focus and regaining focus.  When you can constantly regain focus quickly, it looks like you ARE focused.

4. Personal Motivation

    To be happy and successful, you have to know what that means to you.  First step is Alignment: knowing what you're looking for.  The next step is Envisioning: setting a vision for future happiness.  The final step is Resilience: the ability to keep moving towards your goals despite setbacks.   The last bit requires a positive attitude.  Rationally, if 51% of things are going well in your life, you should be happy.  However, negative results have 3 times the impact on our brains compared to positive results.  This makes being happy difficult.  Meng suggests that to counteract this, you think of neutral events as positive.  For example "I'm not in pain right now."  "I am well fed."

     

5. Habits for Social Interactions

   Empathy has been proven to help people succeed, and it feels good too.  The key to this is approaching people and thinking "This person is just like me."  If you have trouble empathizing, Meng believes that this is something that can be practiced.  You can literally set an alarm every day that says "Wish for people to be happy."  By doing it, you ARE empathizing, and soon this becomes natural.  Again, you are "exercising".

The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace, by Gary Chapman and Paul White

The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace is a book by Gary Chapman and Paul White about the five different ways people experience appreciation. It's a re-write of "The Five Love Languages" also by Gary Chapman adapted for the work setting.  While the concept is powerful, the book is very repetitive and tends to provide very obvious examples. Nevertheless, there are a few interesting lessons.

1. The five languages of appreciation are: 1) Words of Affirmation. 2) Acts of Service. 3) Quality Time. 4) Physical Gifts. 5) Physical Touch.
2. Each person has a primary and secondary form of appreciation. You can saturate someone's primary form.  In that case their secondary form may be more highly valued.  For example, someone who doles out compliments freely may find their words of affirmation be discounted by those receiving them. In this case, quality time may be more highly valued from this person.
3. Primary and secondary forms of affirmation tends to be constant over time.  
4. Primary and secondary forms of affirmation differs depending on context.  Appreciation languages for personal relationships may differ from work relationships. 
5. Words of Affirmation can include affirmation of acts (a task well done), personality (cheerfulness) and character (honesty). 

Change Your Brain, Change Your Body

Change Your Brain, Change Your Body is book by Dr. Daniel G. Amen about the mind-body connection.  He advocates using holistic healing and supplements to boost brain function in order to heal the body. It's a long and sometimes repetitive read since diet, exercise and adequate sleep are pretty much standard for many ailments. However, he does back up his statements with research studies, which may compel the less-disciplined reader to actually start following a habit of good diet, exercise and sleep. His book is also comprehensive, and will likely touch on some subjects that are less familiar to the reader. For me, the topics of hormones and heart health were new. The book also includes supplement guides for specific areas of the brain and body, which maybe useful to reference. Some key lessons I learned:

1. Get your beauty sleep.  Getting adequate sleep is the best way to improve skin.  That is because skin cells regenerate during sleep.  "Seniors need less sleep" is a myth too.  Since skin regeneration slows down as we age, seniors need just as much if not more sleep to keep skin looking young. Adequate sleep also helps you lose weight. In one study, women who sleep 7 hours instead of 5 per night lost an average of 6 pounds over 3 weeks without any intentional change in diet or exercise.
2. Exercise increases the generation of new brain cells.
3. Eating less sodium is good, but more importantly, potassium and sodium needs to balance. We are often high on sodium and low on potassium.  Therefore, eat high potassium foods such as bananas. At the same time, eat no more than 1 teaspoon of added salt each day.
4. High Heart Rate Variability (HRV) is good.  Individuals who exercise regularly have a lower resting heart rate and high HRV. In fact, physicians track the HRV of the birthing infant during childbirth. 
5. Before getting a divorce, get hormone checks for both partners. Hormone levels change as we age and can cause serious disruption in our moods and personalities.

Rework

Rework is a book by 37signals founders Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson.  This book has a very unique format. Every other page contains a graphic summarizing one big business idea, then the following page provides a short story to support the idea. In essence, the book is one big stack of flash cards with business lessons. It's possible to read this book out of order and it's a useful reference guide to have on the shelf.

1. Embrace Constraints.  Throw Less at the Problem.  Limited resources forces you to be creative what you have.
2. Ignore the Details Early On.  During the early stage of a business, it is important to focus on the key strengths and not try to do too much.
3. Focus on what Won't change.  Rather than chasing the next big thing, focus on the characteristics of business that will always be in high demand. For example, Amazon.com focuses on fast shipping, great selection, friendly return policies and affordable prices.  Japanese automakers focus on reliability and practicality, and 37signals focus on speed, simplicity and ease of use.  These characteristics are timeless.
4. Make Tiny Decisions. Big decisions are hard to make and hard to change. So make many choices that are small enough that they're effectively temporary. This way you won't make big mistakes, and you have the chance to adjust as you go.
5. Underdo your Competition. Instead of adding ever more features, try adding less and aim for simplicity. Examples include single-gear bicycles, the Flip camera, and the iPod shuffle.