Practicing Anti-Conformism
Edition #106
Introduction
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Take a journey to www.contraminds.com. Listen and watch some great minds talking to us about their journey of discovery of what went into making them craftsmen of their profession to drive peak performance.
The Conformity Of Silence - Talk To Strangers Even Though It's Weird
In this quite fascinating essay, Bryan Kaplan writes about what prevents people from initiating conversations, which is conformism. Bryan encourages you to embrace non-conformism.
Here are some key ideas and thoughts shared in this essay:
In modern societies, conformism mandates silence.
Speak freely in a friendly manner to anyone you wish.
Start small if that behavioural change is too radical for you to stomach. Ask cashiers about their days — and actually engage in their responses. Talk to strangers in line at amusement parks.
Silence is not golden. Silence is sad.
Silence is the sound of missed opportunities.
Read the entire article here.
How To Understand And Manage Workplace Friction: Conversation Between Adam Grant And Bob Sutton
Adam Grant speaks to Bob Sutton, who is an organisational psychologist and also a bestselling author. In this engaging and thought-provoking conversation, Bob shares insights on how to overcome friction at work.
Here are some key takeaways from this conversation to think about and reflect on:
There is an ‘Optimal Zone of Consensus’ that you should strive for when it comes to friction at work - You must be mindful of this, especially when a significant majority completely agree with you or a significant majority completely disagrees with you. You must be self-aware of both these extremes.
There is bound to be friction at workplaces - there will be people and situations which will lead to good and bad friction.
Leaders who isolate themselves from what is happening on the ground and live in a bubble cannot appreciate the root causes of friction in an organisation.
Most often, leaders come in the way and distract people! They are the creators of friction, especially when they are far away from the day-to-day working environment that other people go through.
As a leader, audit the number of ‘questions to statements’ you exhibit in your behaviour.
When leaders follow the ‘Leading by Doing’ principle, the friction on the ground becomes apparent to them.
The best leaders are the ones who give early and immediate negative feedback. This will create friction, but learn to do it thoughtfully rather than clinically.
You can listen to the entire podcast on:
The Future Of Generative AI
The Legendary Turing Lectures are conducted by The Alan Turing Institute, UK’s National Institute for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence. In this brilliant lecture series, Prof. Michael Wooldridge talks about the Future of Generative AI.
Prof. Michael Wooldridge brings out a brilliant account of the evolution of AI since its early days, how it has transformed and changed over the past few decades, what opportunities AI is throwing up, A 101 explanation of the concept of neural networks, the pros and cons of large language models(LLMs), the growth of Artificial General Intelligence and where it is headed and what are the AI applications that will see rapid adoption and use over the next few years.
Prof. Michael provides a very simple and lucid explanation of the AI concepts and has a great way of making the AI concepts come alive with real-world examples which you can relate to.
Just click the above video and watch.
Practicing Anti-Conformism
Right from a very early age, you are taught to conform - starting with what and how you must study, how only good grades define your intelligence and success, where and how you must work, what defines career success, what is the generally accepted way to communicate, etc.
All these lead to a particular behaviour where you don’t question the norms - whether they currently remain relevant or not. Also, you may not be comfortable with you or your teams asking questions or challenging the norms all the time. Some of these rules or norms may have been relevant many years back, but many of them may not be relevant right now. However, the absolute hard truth is that you are not ready to question them.
Also, intuitively, there are many times you may feel deeply inside that something is not working or does not ‘feel’ right, but you may be forced to be silent or go with the majority opinion. There is considerable pressure on you to conform to many people’s views, rules, ways of working or running a business, their definition of career and success, etc.
To top it all, some of the norms that forced you to conform, over time, start to restrain your behaviour and act as a huge bottleneck to express your views or do things freely. This starts to gain roots at school and college and finally has a spillover effect at the workplace, too. This mental wall of being a conformist needs to be torn down.
If you have to be a non-conformist -both in your mind and head- you must have a ‘deep conviction and a sense of reality’ to pursue the path irrespective of what others around you feel or say. Also, being a non-conformist is a recipe for dissent, opposing views, naysayers, failures, etc. Hence, pursuing them relentlessly requires inner strength, as some of these behavioural habit changes will not happen overnight. Also, being a non-conformist thinker and doer allows you to pursue a path not taken by others, question deeply held beliefs and business-related thinking, and break the shackles.
The non-conformists are the ones who defy the norms by asking questions like:
‘Why should we only have physical stores?’
‘Why should we go only to the bank to withdraw money?’
‘ What does it take to mass produce cars rather than building them linearly?’
‘Why do we need a keyboard for a phone?’
‘Why should we carry cash?’
“Why watch movies in theatres or only what is shown by a TV Channel?’
These questions have led to breakthroughs, and hence, over time, building a non-conformist mindset allows you to explore other viewpoints, be open and adaptable, remain curious, and, therefore, question the system for the better. This can lead you to make product breakthroughs, create new networks and connections, build new skills, and develop new business models and revenue streams for yourself and your company or business.
Hence, develop a ‘non-conformity’ muscle in you - One that allows you to see the world differently, helps you express your viewpoints without getting bogged down, makes you open to experiment, etc.
Some of the lessons we learnt from this week’s mission:
People being silent is not a sign of conforming or being aligned with your strategies and plans. It may be a sign of being uncomfortable to speak up.
Look for a ‘Zone of Optimal Consensus’ when you deal with issues and work with people to solve them.
While AI-using LLMs will see rapidly increasing adoption and growth, Artificial General Intelligence is still in its infancy despite all the hype around it.