Finite and Infinite Games - Simon Sinek

Blog Entry #97

I watched yet another Simon Sinek talk, this time on Finite and Infinite Games. I wish he was allowed an hour to speak because 25 minutes weren't enough to cover all topics, so when you watch the full talk here, you'll notice it's ended abruptly. Nevertheless, there are a lot of fundas to be garnered from his speech, which I've chronicled below.

Simon Sinek starts his speech by describing an incident that happened in the Vietnam War. Though 'Nam launched a surprise attack on the US, they ended up not only losing the war but also 350 times more people in troops! Using this event, he then goes on to explain the concept of finite and infinite games. Firstly, the idea of a game is that you must have at least one competitor. In games that are finite, there are known players, the rules and objectives are fixed and agreed-upon. On the other hand, infinite games comprise known and unknown players, changeable rules, and the primary objective is to stay in the game for as long as possible. If you look at finite vs finite players or infinite vs infinite players, in both cases, the situation is stable. One example of infinite vs infinite would be the Cold War. However, in the case of finite vs infinite, one side is playing to win, while the other side is playing to keep playing. What happens in such a case is that the finite player ends up in a quandary, running through willpower and resources in order to win and close out the game.

Simon Sinek then moves on to exemplifying the same concept in the field of business, comparing Microsoft with Apple. He once went to a Microsoft Summit, where the only talk was of how to beat Apple. When he later went to an Apple summit, he noticed a hundred percent of the executives devote a hundred percent of their time and effort in brainstorming how to help teachers teach and how to help students learn. When he met an Apple employee later that day and told him that he found the Zune better than the iPod, all he received in response was 'I have no doubt.' This helped him realize that Apple is playing the long game. People working there are obsessed with where they're going and are thus an infinite player, unlike Microsoft. As an infinite player, you are only focused on getting ahead and you don't really care about being the 'best' or the 'first.' It would be nice if we played the infinite game when it came to traffic signals. Rather than be the first one ahead, try to enjoy the drive and be a kind-hearted, non-honking soul who respects road rules.

The third section of his speech outlines a set of checklist items one must focus on to be an infinite player in the game, the first being 'having a just cause.' Be clear on why your organization needs you because, without a just cause, you feed people what they want rather than what they need. He urges that the universities focus on teaching skills such as effective confrontation, communication skills, long-term thinking, and building good relationships. The other items on his checklist include 'having courageous leadership', 'trusting in teams'. 'having a worthy rival', and 'keeping your playbook flexible.' On courageous leadership, he insists on a leader believing in their just cause and sacrificing short-term for long-term rather than the other way round. Courageous leaders know the difference between rank and leadership, and accept the responsibility of creating an environment in which people can work at their natural best. This part reminded me of fixed vs growth mindset, wherein Lee Iacocca did exactly the opposite of the traits mentioned above. You can read about mindset here and about Mr. Iacocca here.

Towards the end of his speech, he reiterates about what universities are teaching their students and he is visibly outraged. He is aghast and dismayed when he sees banners and billboards of universities advertising themselves with what starting salaries students get once they graduate. He believes that such advertisements judge superficial things and are not directed toward attracting ideologists who commit their time and energy to impact the world. Unfortunately, the time runs out here and he is forced to end his speech.

Overall, I believe the key things to take away from his speech are the concept of infinite games and how to be an infinite player in life.

Time-logging

Blog Entry #96

Introduction

The previous post talked about starting your own ultralearning project. One of the helpful techniques to monitor your activities was by keeping a timelog. In this post, I'll talk about how timelogging has (or hasn't) helped me.

TBH, tracking every hour of my day made me realize that I was getting a lot more done on good days than I imagined myself to have accomplished. I would've planned to do just 6 tasks the previous night (this definitely helps, but for me, planning first thing every morning works better because I then know my true wake-up time), but I'd end up doing 14 or more in actuality.

Keeping a timelog is fun for me because it entices me to complete more just so I can tick off more number of activities in one hour (can't help it, I'm a 'J' on the MBTI scale). Another thing I do to increase the number of things I get done in an hour is 2 25-minute pomodoro timers for important, time-consuming, focus-based tasks like writing a blog post. Then, I follow that up with three 10-minute timers to get three other shorter tasks done within half an hour.

These 10-minute timers help me sift through emails, get some household work done, make myself a cup of green tea, or just walk around the house to collect my thoughts. Through trial and error, I've figured out that either 2 10-minute timers followed by a focused task of 25-minutes followed by the third 10-minute timer work in some cases whilst 3 10-minute timers on days of high energy help me get done with chores in succession.

“A woodpecker can tap twenty times on a thousand trees and get nowhere, but stay busy. Or he can tap twenty-thousand times on one tree and get dinner.”

— Seth Godin, The Dip

Looking busy and actually doing productive work are very different things. Many times I find myself skimming through articles but not really reading anything. So, I spend the time but don't get any value out of it. Other times, I am able to focus on one article and comprehend the depths of the message being conveyed. Not only that, but I am also able to recall key points from the article at a later time and share them with the right set of people at the right times.

Example

Let's look at a sample timelog sheet taken from Google:

This is pretty much what I also do and it's exciting to see how much you can get done in one hour.

You can also make fancier ones like this:

But frankly, this one appears to be more confusing.

Conclusion

To timelog or not to timelog? That is the question.

Well, it depends on how beneficial this activity is for you. If you're a nose-to-the-grindstone kind of person, you may not need something like this because you're already disciplined. Timelogging helps me and those who feel they've not gotten anything done during the day. Timelogs help you see where your time actually went. You can also view how much time you spent doing various activities. Knowing this proportion can help you plan future activities better. If you feel keeping a daily timelog is an overkill, tryout a weekly or monthly timelog, provided you're able to recall all of the activities you've done in that period. Also, even if you're ultra focused, it might be a good idea to give timelogging a try, as you'll feel a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day.

Happy timelogging!

Start an Ultralearning Project

Blog entry #95

Scott H. Young, an ultralearner and the author of 'Ultralearning' piqued my interest when I came across his blog post that explains how he learnt the entire 4-year MIT curriculum in just 12 months. As someone who enjoys learning and is probably also addicted to it, when I came across the word 'ultralearning', it intrigued me immensely and I had to know what it was.

Scott Young wrote a two-part post on a DIY ultralearning project. I shall attempt to give you a gist of those 2 posts: Part 1 and Part 2.

  

TL;DR

• Part 1
• Figure out what to learn
• Choose a learning format
• Gather preparatory materials
• Part 2
• Set up a focus-friendly environment
• Create an activity/time log
• Meditate

The first part talks about finding the 'what', the 'why' and the 'how' while part 2 talks about barriers to learning. Basically, ultralearning refers to the deep self-education that helps learn difficult things in a relatively short amount of time. It can be thought of as the opposite of dabbling, which is simply playing around with something and eventually learning it, without time or commitment set aside for it.

The 3 steps of starting an ultralearning project include figuring out what you want to learn quickly and intensely, choosing the project format, and preparing to learn the material. For step 1, though it may be tempting to pick multiple subjects, it is important to choose only one and make it a shorter, more focused project with certain constraints, such as 'I will set aside 1 hour every day to learn how to play the guitar for 1 month.'

Step 2 is choosing your project format. Project formats could be one of 3 styles - one, full-time, two, fixed schedule, such as '1 hour before bed daily', or three, fixed number of hours, such as '4 hours every week', but the hours you choose could be random. While deciding on a project format, also ensure to select the total length of time that you will spend on learning.

Step 3 is just as important as actually starting to learn - preparation. Gather the required material and run a pilot test of your schedule to see what works and what doesn't. Design an attack plan, such as 'First, I will watch or read so-and-so, next, I will solve practice questions, and third, I will use the Feynman technique to teach this to myself.' The pilot test will help you understand if you've set too unrealistic a schedule for yourself or not.

In Part 2, he talks about some of the barriers to learning, why people are afraid to start, or don't follow through after starting, and solutions to those problems. If you have a full-time job and you're working 40 hours a week, choose to expand your project longer than 1 year. Quoting Scott Young: "If you know how to finish the challenge while also putting in 40 hours/week on a full-time job, I should be the one emailing you for advice!"

An important thing to remember is that Time is abundant, while attention is not. Hence, make working on your project a habit by setting up a fixed time to invest in it every day. Secondly, choose projects that really matter because the investment of time and effort is relatively huge.

Actually starting on your project involves creating a conducive, focus-friendly environment, and conducting a time log of your activities to monitor your focus. A sample time log would contain a pre-filled time column, such as 7am to 8am, 8am to 9am, and so on. It could contain three other columns too - activity, purpose, and effectiveness. Scott Young spent about 50 to 60 hours every single week on his ultralearning project.

Finally, what's a focus-related blog post on improving focus without mentioning meditation? He recommends meditating in order to gradually better your focus over time. Also work your way through every day via conditioning and self-pep-talk. Ultralearning projects are undoubtedly challenging and intense, but you can reap humongous benefits. Being able to learn something quickly and in-depth is definitely a must-have skill in this day and age of information overload, at least for me. Hope to start an ultralearning project soon enough and post about my experience. Look forward to hearing about your ultralearning project too!

5 Rules by Simon Sinek

Blog entry #94

I recently watched Simon Sinek's Talk to Millennials on 'Change your future'. He shared anecdotes with a moral for each (of course) and stated 5 rules to follow.

TL;DR - The 5 rules you must follow:

1. You can get what you want, but you cannot deny anyone else to go after what they want
2. Take accountability for your actions
3. Take care of each other
4. Learn the skill to keep your opinions to yourself
5. You deserve a Styrofoam cup

He started his speech with 'There are two ways to see the world.' The anecdote went as follows: He was standing at a fair with his friend when they saw a number of people forming a line in front of a free bagel stand. While he saw the free bagel, his friend could only see the line. So no matter how many times he repeated 'free bagel' with more emphasis each time, his friend could only stick with 'no, I don't want to wait in line'. So what Simon did was simply walk up to the front of the line, grab two bagels from the 100 that were there and give one to his friend. Here's where he quoted his first rule, where he also mentioned that there are two kinds of people in this world - one, who can only see the obstacles that prevent them from getting what they want and the other, who see what they want and how they can get it (without denying others from getting what they want).

The second anecdote was a short yet powerful one. In the Renaissance period, it was observed that women died 48 hours after giving birth. The surprising and tragic reason for this was that, brace yourselves, doctors did not wash their hands! What's more, they refused to acknowledge this for 30 years. So the underlying message here was that sometimes, you're the problem. Learn to take accountability for your actions. The third one was a simple 'take care of each other' story exemplified by Navy SEALs.

It was amazing how Simon Sinek narrated 5 different anecdotes within a quick 15-minute video to convey the underlying one-line message for each of the tales. Story number 4 talked about Nelson Mandela's father, a tribal chief. Mandela, during his childhood, observed 2 things from his father during meetings - one, they would always sit in a circle, and two, his father was always the last to speak. The rule here is to keep your opinions to yourself, and not nod 'yes' if and when you agree with somebody. I've found this skill important because what happens with me is that if I stop nodding 'yes' after a bout of continuous nodding, the speaker immediately senses that I no longer agree with them on the point they've just made.

Finally, the last story talks about how his friend, when he held a top position at a firm, was given a warm welcome, a car with a driver to have him picked up and dropped to and from the airport, to and from the hotel, and a ceramic cup for him to have his coffee in before his speech. The same set of people, a few years later, had to receive his friend once again, who this time around, held a not-so-high position at his firm. He didn't get a car pickup and drop facility, and for his beverage, all they gave him was a Styrofoam cup! So the lesson here is that the ceramic cup was never for him, it was for the position he held. Similarly, all of us must remember this story about humility and gratitude.

Here's the full speech for those interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8l-YpiiBH4o

Same video, but without the bagel story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKJ9-OTbanE