Understanding And Measuring Ownership At Work.
Edition #176
Introduction
Welcome to The ContraMind Code.
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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 Ownership Gap.
Why do some people demonstrate ownership better than others? What stops people from taking ownership of anything that they do? Often, many initiatives in companies get delayed or fail because there is a lack of collective ownership across people and functions. Finally, is a lack of ownership a root cause of mediocrity?
Justin Welsh makes you think about some of these aspects in the article.
People with an ‘Ownership Mindset’ look at every problem they see around themselves as theirs and strive to find a solution!
People with ownership look ‘inwards’ when something that they take up does not get the desired outcomes they expected.
You can spot a lack of ownership in somebody when he or she constantly blames outside forces, beyond their control, for not getting the results or outcomes.
Observe where a person is spending their energy to spot a ‘ gap in ownership attitude’ - “Energy is spent fixing things while energy is spent explaining why things can’t get fixed.”
“In my experience, they'll even take responsibility for problems that aren't actually their fault.”
“Successful people have an almost obsessive sense of ownership.”
Read the entire article here.
Rare Steve Jobs Interview.
The reason why it is always great to go back to the history of people, their life and thoughts, etc., is that it teaches a lot about how these people imagine things, how they think about problems or opportunities and how they find ways to make it work.
This is a rare interview with Steve Jobs, in February 1985, which has been decoded and incredibly analysed by David Senra of Founders Podcast on what went into the mind of this man and how he was thinking about computers and their future at that time. It may have taken two decades to make his imagination and dreams come alive, but the question that begs attention is “Do you have the ability to stay with your thinking, ideas, beliefs, convictions and work on them relentlessly by shaping them for many years, even if they take time to fructify?” Also, it teaches you the most important character trait that each one of us needs to develop- “How can you develop the ability to question what you see around and seek alternative or new ways of doing it?”
You can also listen to this entire episode on:
Software Is Changing (Again).
These are some of the questions in everybody’s mind today:
Is AI making software coding irrelevant?
How will the software code of tomorrow look like?
What skills should a software programmer of tomorrow need in the age of AI?
Will software programmers not be needed anymore for coding, and will this job be replaced by AI?
Here is this video, Andrej Karpathy, Founding Member of OpenAI, is talking about how software is changing in the era of AI.
We are moving from an era of software 1.0 to 2.0 to 3.0: “I think kind of there's a growing category of new kind of code, so not only is it a new programming paradigm, it's also remarkable to me that it's in our native language of English.”
“At Tesla, when we were working on the autopilot, I observed that the software 2.0 stack literally ate through the software 1.0 stack”
“If you are entering the industry, it is a good idea to be fluent in all three paradigms - software 1.0, software 2.0 and software 3.0. You must be able to fluidly transition between these paradigms - You are going to train a neuralnet, you are going to prompt an LLM, and make a decision if this piece of code is going to be explicit.”
The analogy of AI to electricity throws many new dimensions on how it is expected to change the industry when Andrej Karpathy quotes Andrew Ng, who said, “AI is the new electricity.”
“AIs are like superhuman things but have cognitive deficits.”
“A lot of software will be partially autonomous.”
Andrej Karpathy stresses the importance of human-AI collaboration loops.
There will be a lot of code that needs to be built for LLMs.
Click on the above link and watch this video.
Understanding And Measuring Ownership At Work.
What exactly is ownership, and why is it important?
“Ownership refers to the mindset and behaviours of individuals who take full responsibility and initiative for their tasks, roles, and outcomes, both successes and failures.”
The important words in this definition are:
Responsibility
Initiative
Success and Failures
When we look for people to work for us or hire, we evaluate for grades, analytical thinking, communication, functional and technical skills, but do we evaluate if they have demonstrated ‘ownership’ in what they do? The individuals may have all the competencies, but if they have no ownership, it shows in the quality of work and starts to show in the attitude of the team and company culture. The question really is, how do you ‘understand’ and ‘measure’ ownership?
To understand ownership, it needs to go ‘beyond the job or roles’ that people do or hold. When somebody demonstrates ownership, they look at the problem or job given to them from a bigger lens rather than a narrow view. They ask vital questions like:
“What factors affect in achieving the results other than what is visible?”
“Who are the actors in helping me achieve the results I want? Who are the doers, influencers and decision makers?”
“If it has not worked in the past, what were the reasons - controllable and uncontrollable factors?”
“What can be done differently to fast-track the results much better than what we need? Is there a hack that is possible?”
Individuals with an ‘ownership mindset’ look at all dimensions from every perspective rather than just the task at hand. They also look at co-opting people in different ways after assessing their level of buy-in into the initiative. For them, the only focus in front of their eyes is the ‘results’ to be achieved. They do everything possible to break hierarchies, silos, mindsets to get the results that is needed. They really don’t care about designations, job descriptions, but have a ‘keen eye’ on relationships and enablers who can get the objective met. They are ‘not insecure about failure and credit’, especially who takes the credit for the results. But they are willing to stand in front, if there is failure. They don’t resort to blaming others and finding scapegoats in case there is a problem or a bump in achieving the required results. They have a ‘limitless boundary’ in terms of patience, and they go as far as they can to see things through. They have an incredible way to be both ‘hands-on’ and ‘hands-off’ when needed, as they are very perspective about people, process, and closure on schedule. The last thing you will see is that they don’t ‘abandon the boat’ till they have given their last bit to any project or initiative or even to a company they have worked for.
The next question is, how can you evaluate people with an ‘Ownership Mindset’ beyond just competence and standard tests?
Ask or look for examples of failures in their life or career, and the reasons. We normally look for success markers, but failure teaches more lessons in what it takes to own up to things.
Look for behaviours when the individual has gone ‘beyond the brief ‘ to get things done and mine for reasons as to why she or he did it. It can actually reveal a story behind the mind of this individual.
Understand any individual’s ‘Circle of Mentors’, ‘Circle of Influencers’, ‘Circle of Followers’, ‘Circle of Advocates’ and ‘Circle of Believers’ both at work and outside. That can help you understand the leverage the individual has built for himself or herself.
One observation that can help unravel the work ethic of the person is when you ask them about their view on the ‘circle of competence’ that they need to do their role successfully now and in the future. And where do they stand in terms of capabilities around this?
Ask them what they would like to sacrifice in the short term for the long term. People with an ‘ownership mindset’ have a lot of clarity on this and don’t miss the forest for the trees.
Ownership is the art of believing in no barriers or bottlenecks but possibilities.
Some of the lessons we learnt from this week’s mission:
Ownership is about spending energy fixing things.
Outstanding leaders are missionaries. They can see the future far ahead of others.
The best software programmers will need to be fluent in all three paradigms - Software 1.0, Software 2.0 and Software 3.0.