How Do You Manage Expectations?

How Do You Manage Expectations?

Is this a topic worth our time today?  Yes, absolutely I swear.  Why?  Simple.  Lots of misses [and sometimes mishaps] are happening all over the place all because of we tend to overlook the need for us to really manage expectations.  Oh, the devil's advocate might confront me with 'OH WE CAN LIVE WITH THAT', NO ISSUES'.  Not until you realized that you fumbled BIGTIME.

Seriously, when is the earliest time we would fall off expectations?  Could be as early as our parents unleashed us because finally we would be going to school.  DON'T get me wrong though.  Shortfall from expectations are NOT that prevalent and pervasive during our childhood.  It is when we start creeping towards adulthood when gaps and disconnects with regard expectations start to surface.  Oh, God knows how many times we fell short of expectations.

Let's rattle off of having raised expectations sometimes way beyond the roof.  When you were out in the job market, you brought out the best YOU in all those interviews.  Lo and behold you got hired for a coveted job but once you got onboarded, you had those delivery shortfalls. And who's dejected?  DON'T look farther than that hiring manager who you 'knocked off' with that A-performance in the interviews.  And do you remember when you were wooing your 'dream partner-spouse', when you were promising the moon, the stars and all ?

OR, look at yourself.  When you were so driven, so overly ambitious, you wanted to accomplish one too many too soon then only to falter because you fell short of expectations?  Or if you were a budding entrepreneur, your pre-launch was just so electric and so perfectly executed by your marketing experts but when your operations started to grind, your initial customers hardly became repeat customers.  Would you know WHY

Frankly, in life, if our performance meets expectations, that runs alongside $$$$$ and try faltering and fumbling, the $$$$$ will go on a skid.  So what's the FIX for this?  Be TRUE, Be REALISTIC, Be PRAGMATIC, Be GROUNDED, Be RATIONAL, Be LEVEL-HEADED.  In that manner, we can avert DISMAY, DEJECTION, DISAPPOINTMENT.  This is no rocket science so you'll be fine. dude ✅✅✅

Either You Have It Or You DON'T

Either You Have It Or You DON'T

Oh, I relish and cherish those times in the past when things were more like an EITHER/OR kind of thing.  But that was from the not so distant past.  Today, we all grapple with the harsh realisties in life that it's Either You Have It Or You DON'T.  Gone are the days when you can fiddle with your fingers then pronto, you got aces up in your sleeves to play.

It's true that a lot can be learned and honed in life but what is there to hone if you DON'T have it in the first place?  How can you ever dream receiving an INVITE to the NBA Summer League or at least the G League if you DON'T hoop in the first place.  How can you be a techie when you faltered and fumbled in your I.T. courses.  How can you be a dependable lifetime partner if by yourself, you can't even take care of yourself.  How can you be a budding entrepreneur if you can't even put in a semblance of order with your cash flows even as a laymen.  So, this poster says it all:  YOU CAN'T PUT A CROWN ON A CLOWN AND EXPECT A KING.

Let's take a budding student who wants to pursue a medical career which obviously requires tons and tons of readings and memorization.  But what if he's been perennially struggling with his reading and memory capabilities?  Will you just push him towards that career track if he is just utterly decrepit and helpless with those innate capabilities? Either You Have It Or You DON'T

Now, let's go down to basics.  If you want something sharp enough at your home, obviously you got to have a knife.  No matter if it's so rusty and sharp-less, you got to have it in the first place.  Back to our domestic lives, if you ever dreamt for a stable and life-long partnership with your spouse, you got to have the embedded traits of that partner/spouse you envision. 

So you think you're worth it?  Perfect, then, as this poster says, IT WORKS IF YOU WORK IT SO WORK IT YOU'RE WORTH IT. That was quite a mouthful but we just need to call a spade a spade Which reminds me of cases in the workplace where someone has been angling for a promotion but hey, that dude is better known for his flops and fumbling acts that breach contractual SLA's.  So, this is non-negotiable really.  If you want to progress and get out of that stagnation, you got to ask yourself if either you have it or you DON'T❗❗❗

Do You Have the 'LUSTER of a GEM'?

Do You Have the 'LUSTER of a GEM'?

Oh, everyone does love gems.  And what pulls them to gems are its luster.  BTW, do you have the 'LUSTER of a GEM'?  You may be a student now or an up and coming member in the workplace or someone eyeing to woo a partner for the longterm or a budding entrepreneur.  Regardless, for you to take the right first step, do you have that 'LUSTER of a GEM'?  

Unless you yourself can see that 'LUSTER of a GEM' in you, then, forget all your grandiose plans, just give up all your ambitions to be a top tier whether in school, at work, in your relationship or even in a commercial initiative.  Why?  Because that means, your ceiling may not be that high enough.  And if you are the hiring manager looking to groom someone straight from the university, why will he put all the marbles on someone who seems middle-of-the-road, someone who may not have that 'LUSTER of a GEM'?   

If you have set the bar high enough, that is most laudable but that means you got that coveted 'LUSTER of a GEM'.  Otherwise, how high is your ceiling for growth?  Obviously, that is dictated by your potentials more than anything else.  While it is NOT God-given, it is something where you need to earn your spurs.  If you DON'T look like the best partner in life, how optimistic are you to successfully woo the ideal long-term partner in your life?  If you DON'T look a 'high-flyer', why will the hiring manager gamble on you?

Truth of the matter.  You must not only be 'hungry' and thirsting for success but much much more important is that you will be perceived and compared to that hungry lion, ready to pounce on an opportunity to devour his prey but do you have that coveted 'LUSTER of a GEM'?  DON'T get me wrong.  While that is NOT a must in life, think about it with a wider view of life itself.

So, what do you really need to do?  UNLOCK YOUR POTENTIAL no less.  And while this is much easier said than done, how do you REALLY UNLOCK YOUR POTENTIAL? DON'T look very far.  Do a self pulse check.  What excites you most?  What is it that makes your heart beat faster?  What is it that makes you more gratified once it's done?  What endeavor gives you that SELF of FULFILLMENT?  In the simplest words, figure out as to WHAT IS YOUR PASSION?  Trust me, that will lead you to the very door that will let you UNLOCK YOUR POTENTIAL which gives you that LUSTER of a GEM.  Go for it, dude✅✅✅

When You Think You're NOT GOOD ENOUGH

When You Think You're NOT GOOD ENOUGH

Think about it, when we poured everything out, when we gave all what we had, when we exerted all efforts, when we even exhausted all our resources albeit limited and yet we seem to pause and question ourselves when we think that we're NOT GOOD ENOUGH?  Is that just fair and reasonable?  Or are you doing yourself a grave injustice for questioning yourself after you went through?

Yet it is damn true that when you start comparing yourself to every Tom, Dick and Harry, you will never cease to question your performance to date. NOT GOOD ENOUGH  may sometimes be a valid question as long as it is tossed in the correct perspective.  You just DON'T peep and sneak and when you see someone achieving something, you start to worm back and indulge in self-pity.

Instead, why can't you scream and shout that indeed you are GOOD ENOUGH? Despite your lapses and infirmities, you are where you stand right now, and while you may yet be a SUCCESS STORY now, you are on track to achieve that, barring hitting snags.  At that point, DON'T forget to SELF- MOTIVATE yourself.  Your family and BFF's can be your rah-rah team cheering you but you got to motivate yourself more than anyone else.

How to this off?  Bolster your SELF-ESTEEM no less.  That is the 'shot in the arm' you would need.  DON'T let things recede.  DON'T skid.  DON'T retrogress.  DON'T feel inferior.  DON'T undervalue what you have accomplished till to date.  Instead, look at at that half-glass as HALF-FULL instead of being HALF-EMPTY.  Call for a timeout, a ceasefire, so you can reassess things with a balanced fulcrum.

DON'T be like this kitten as well, NOT being appreciative of the food serving.  Imagine if you didn't have any food?  And as you trudge in your life journey, DON'T miss out on having those MILESTONE SUCCESSES.  They may look so small and petty 'FEEL GOOD' stories but you need that to be part of your catalyst.  As you know yourself inside out like the palm of your hands, be creative to KEEP MOTIVATING yourself❗❗❗

Are You Running On Fumes?

Are You Running On Fumes?

Who says life is all about everything shining and dandy.  Without batting an an eyeless, I'll bet that several times in ou rlife, everyone of us was like Running On Fumes.  Imagine if you are driving along the inter-state highways in the United States and you suddenly received that LOW FUEL alert when your next nearest exit is no less than fifty miles?  Will you just throw the towel and raise the white flag.  What a spine tingling scenario indeed.

OR, we might be in a LOW ENERGY scenario.  Imagine yourself just halfway through on something you're doing but at that point, you are running on LOW ENERGY, so what is your best option by then?  Would you withdraw from the race when you have endured more than halfway?  Will you just walk away from the tracks and call it a day?

If one day, there is a heightened situation at your workplace, an urgency that will require you almost round-the-clock save for meals and some power naps.  How will you handle things when you are running on fumes?  Think about it.  At some point in your journey, you may feel so zapped, so drained, so spent after investing so much time and effort.

So how do we handle extreme contingencies we all abhor to experience, if at all?  First off, reassess how much your consumption, whether it is about the fuel or your very own energy.  Turn off the aircon.  Minimize unstable throttling of the car and where possible stabilize its speed and where possible, minimize frequent deceleration and acceleration.  And avoid sudden brakes.

Simply put, running on fumes means to keep doing things even though you DON'T have much energy or resources [left in your tank].  In financial terms, it means you need to keep going even with less funds, less capital, less cashflow.  Instead, you got to remain VIGILANT despite the fatigue or to continue working despite the low energy.  JUST DO IT and you'll be fine❗❗❗

You Can Be Anything But DELUSIONAL

You Can Be Anything But DELUSIONAL

Let's face it, we are at various levers, varying layers. And with our individual peculiarities, everyone is just unique so, no one can be at fault for one's lapses and fumbling acts.  So,  you can be anything but DELUSIONAL.  You might wonder why do we need to pin down on being just DELUSIONAL?  Yes, because, we could live life on X's and O's and end up in our respective tracks but there is pitfall we got to avoid.

Yes, and that's avoiding being DELUSIONAL. Why?  Because that's a fact of life.  We have seen and witnessed numerous debacles that all ended fatally just akin to a train wreck. Then questions would pop-up.  Why could that happen?  In the grand scheme of things, it's unavoidable if someone will ask if there was a sabotage to the plan, if at all, when executed.

VTW, being DELUSIONAL is not just all about medical and health issues.  Many plans went awry even before it even started primarily because the DELUSIONAL aspect was then manifesting, albeit in a subtle way.  If you're still in school, you might have been angling to graduate with First Honors [when everything shows that you're struggling in most of your elective subjects.

At the workplace, were you angling for a CxO-level role when as a team member, you were already struggling.  Wasn't that DELUSIONAL and in a relationship, were you dreaming that your partnership with your spouse/partner will last a lifetime when tiffs evolved into fights more often than not.  Isn't that DELUSIONAL and if your commercial forays always had your P&L's in the red, yet, you constantly expected a turnaround.  Isn't that being DELUSIONAL?

So how can you be back in-track once you go off-course?  Take a deep dive and eke out your insights to right the wrongs, to remediate the misses.  Take a genuine and honest soul-searching.  DON'T protect your fat ego.  DON'T keep your misplaced pride.  DON'T maintain your baseless and  false hopes.  That way, you can be anything but DELUSIONAL❗❗❗

Are You 'LOCKED IN' ?

Are You 'LOCKED IN' ? 

No sirrrrs, today's piece is NOT about being 'LOCKED IN' a prison but somehow to be 'LOCKED IN' means having the very focus which a typical incarcerated person may manifest at any point in time of his waking hours.  But you might wonder, what is it in that incarcerated person that is worth emulating, if at all?

Let's swing over to the NBA and ask, why it has become such a successful commercial initiative with sponsorship revenues alone hitting $1.2 bn last year? It really boils down to the fact that 99.99% of NBA players have always been compared to dogs in the kerne;l, dogs who are so 'LOCKED IN' they'll do anything and everything to eke out a WIN whether in the regular or post season.

So, whether you are still a student now, a worker at the workplace, an entrepreneur or someone who's now into a relationship and commitment with your partner/spouse, expectations from you is no less than to be 'LOCKED IN', whether you are in pursuit of your academic performance, your work, your business or even your relationship. You can't even waiver by a fraction of 1%.

The FIX so that we get 'LOCKED IN' ?  It's no less than a 5-letter word, F-O-C-U-S.  It is something non-negotiable, no quarters given, it's either you take it or not, it's either you are IN or OUT.  Waiver and you're gone.  Wither and you'll be out in the cold.  Weaken and it could be GAME OVER for you.  Now, how to be 'LOCKED IN' by being FOCUS?  You got to put your heart, mind and soul into it.

Now for a 'LOCKED IN' - 101, I grabbed this poster because these four [4] squares say it all [and I guess I don't need to make a sales pitch, right ?  Just look at the other side of things and start being IFFFFY.  IF you DON'T fix short-term issues, how can you have that FOCUS ?  IF you DON'T sort out the IMPORTANT versus the URGENT ones, how can you not get mixed up and eventually lose FOCUS?  IF you are unable to avoid distractions and those interruptions in life, how can you gain momentum?  And IF you DON'T limit yourself for the non-urgent ones, do you think you can be 'LOCKED IN'❓❓❓

When The Window Is Closing....

When The Window Is Closing....

Windows have always been tagged to opportunities such that as long as the window is open, we were always assured that those opportunities remain to be up for grabs.  But what happens when those windows are closing?  Do we wait by the wayside for it to close?  Or do we go against the force that is closing that window of opportunity?  Good question.

Truth of the matter, as long as those windows are wide open, it leads us all to an bright and optimistic outlook of things ahead of us.  Even the blue skies have become synonymous to the opportunities we always cherish.  But then, nothing is really cast in stone.  Even the bright and sunny days can, all so suddenly, turn into dark gloomy skies where we all know what will follow, that is, those heavy downpours.

Oh yes, for optimist, even a window that is gradually closing is still an "open-nish" window for him, something that should NOT raise his worry or apprehension.  But for the guarded ones, those are tell-tale signs that opportunities are slowly slipping away from us.  So, what do we do when the window is closing?

To the realist, a closing window tends to portend imminent things that may not augur well to him. And he starts to run a MIND-MAPPING.  Like a blurred view out in the window implies that his hopes out there are getting blurry too?  That those probabilities that were originally on target are slowly slipping away?  That was once attainable may NOT be achievable now? 

Whereas, when you just landed a job, when you just got a laptop, when you just got married, when you just have moved in to your new home, when you just started school or when you just started off your first foray into business, all these materialized after you saw this via your windows of opportunity.  But what if that window of opportunity was closing?  Pronto, find a lever to countenance and stop that gradual closing because you need to BUY TIME till you hit pay dirt.  Just DON'T let that window close yet❗❗❗

Talking About 'PAY'

Talking About 'PAY'

This could be interesting talking stuff, once we start Talking About 'PAY'.  To set things straight, we won't be talking about PAY GRADES as that is way beyond our purview.  Instead, let's dissect when we hear from some quarters that they are working more than what the PAY they are getting.  How often we hear these rumblings on the ground, that he/she is NOT getting a fair share of things because things DON'T seem equitable enough because his train engine seems to CHUG-CHUG-CHUG way beyond and above his/her PAY.  Can we pause for awhile and really validate if this noise makes sense.   Really ?

Whereas, there is small plurality who can't believe it that he/she is getting PAID way more than he expects.  This is no figment of our imagination.  We should have witnessed some of those whom we know quite well enough are part of a rare group who feels they seem to be paid more than the the work they put in.  So, what sets them apart from the majority.  Well, there is a huge disconnect, as wide as the Red Sea where the disparity in mindsets and motivation are just too huge, too mind-boggling for us to explain.  Suffice it to say that these two groups are really poles apart.

What becomes inevitable is the obvious apples-to-apples comparison between these two disparate groups.  And for the seemingly deprived and short-changed group, it's just damn tough for them to accept that for the same volume and kind of work, a small plurality is receiving 20% to 100% more than he/she is getting.  But that's where COMPETITIVE EDGE arises.

It's true, most of us work to live, rather than live to work but hey, how can we overcome that huge disparity between the seeming short changed ones versus the seeming high flyers in the work place.  But rather than dissect others, let's dissect ourself.  Are we too QUANTITATIVE? Is OUT-of-SCOPE our favorite retort?  Are we just too ensconced in our silo such that collaboration and team plays are foreign to us?  Are we just too exacting such that we want to avoid being short-changed because we won't even consider to compromise at work?

At the end of the day, our stakeholders may NOT be favoring any particular one but in a workplace, it is inevitable that we all get compared on apples-to-apples basis.  And when you are 'penny conscious' and just too quantitative, think about it as eventually, the decision-makers will have to separate the men from the boys❗❗❗

How Often Are You Late

How Often Are You Late

Apologies if I'd seem confrontational with this frank query:  How Often Are You Late?  And how aware are we with regard the consequences of LOST TIME?  Are we to quantify the ACTUAL LOST TIME? WHAT IF you LOST TIME because you missed the project submission deadline?  WHAT IF you ended coming late to your final job interview?  WHAT IF you arrived late in your agreed appointment with the girl you're wooing?  WHAT IF you arrived late for a bidding?

Our bigger problem though is NOT recognizing the LOST TIME we incur and sometimes when we do recognize it, we never get to recognize the concrete ramifications into our lives.  And should we agree that every LOST TIME can't be bought with $$$$ at all? So, how can we recoup those unquantifiable LOS TIME? Of course, you could retort that there's a TOMORROW anyway so you can recoup that LOST TIME.  But hey, the time you will tap for tomorrow is not the LOST TIME of yesterday.  Time that is lost is time that went down the drain, period.

Last month, we had a scheduling issue since we had a confirmed holiday that was a hundred miles from home.  To accentuate things, we got to attend an engagement which was a good hundred miles from our holiday location.  And the catch is, I've never been there to that engagement site before [so we I had to cling on WAZE].  Lo and behold, we arrived at that location for the very first time a good fifteen minutes ahead of schedule.

But hey, why can't we learn our lessons enough?  I have an answer though.  We are just damn stubborn, so that explains why we never learn our lessons NOT UNTIL we got hit badly and we realized that we were able to claw back and recover because by that time, all the cards were stacked against.  So?  Would you now agree that being LATE IS UNACCEPTABLE❓❓❓