IF YOU WANT TO CHANGE YOUR LIFE CHANGE YOUR DAILY ROUTINES

I would like to quote Ken Robinson who says “Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler did not solve old problems. They asked new questions.”

In my experience of leading various educational institutions, I have realized and learnt that success as a leader is hidden in what you do on a daily basis. This process was further strengthened when I started following Marshall Goldsmith and ultimately completed the certification of stakeholders centered coaching in 2020. When I received my certificates, the package also included “Triggers” a very insightful book by Marshall Goldsmith and later I also completed the online course on Triggers which led to the understanding of “The daily questions” routine.    

One of the great experiences of the stakeholders centered coaching is a deeper understanding of the 3 words – Courage, Humility and Discipline. This process entails all the three as one is being transparent and vulnerable. Discipline of doing it on a daily basis. The questions start with Did I do my best…. And these emphasize on self-accountability thus you don’t blame the circumstances.

As I finished the course, I had this urge of coming up with my own daily questions routine and it never got done as I did not execute the process. In March 2021 we added a business development officer to help us with my consultancy business and I gave her the task of calling me every evening to get the scores on each of the 12 questions and since then it has become part of my daily routine.

My daily questions are in the different areas of my life. These are 12 altogether and are under the category of Spirituality, Family and Relationships, Self-Development, Health etc. and I rate them on a scale of 1 to 10.

The process adopted:

·  An introductory email was written to my colleague explaining the process and the aspects of Confidentiality and being non-judgmental were highlighted.

·    The 12 questions were put on Excel sheet and the same is now on the Google Drive so that it can be accessed by both of us. Sometimes when she is busy then I fill it myself. This is done on a daily basis and scores recorded. A monthly graph is also generated that gives me a snapshot of the areas for further improvement.

Some key learnings from the process:

·         Consistency is the key to success even if it in the form of small steps.

·         The language of the questions is very important Instead of writing “Did I try my best” I have put “Did I do my best”. The difference is of one word only yet it is huge. I read somewhere that “Trying and Doing are two different things. When you try you hope and when you do you succeed.”  

·         Feed forward is better than feedback. The rating could be used to be able to improve in the future.

·         The element of growth mindset is built with the notion of constant improvement.

The words of Marshall Goldsmith are worthy enough to conclude and I quote “We are excellent planners and poor executers.”

BY MINHAS TEJANI - CHIEF EDUCATION OFFICER – TEJANI CONSULTING (minhast@tejaniconsulting.com)

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