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Showing posts with label leadership. Show all posts
Showing posts with label leadership. Show all posts

Monday, September 13, 2021

5 core qualities of a good leader

Most of us unfortunately, tend to lead a life of a follower. This tendency of following instructions without questioning had been ingrained in us by our poor education system, which is designed to produce industrial workers. 

Midst of rapid rat race in corporations, we mostly find managers of numbers rather than leaders. however there are few qualities, which radiate out of a good leaders. those qualities separates them from crowd.

In this blog we have listed 5 qualities of a good leader in modern world.

5-qualities-of-a-good-leader




1)Art of story telling: 

Influential way of communication has always been main weapon in arsenal of a leader. Story telling is a classical way conveying  thoughts, ideas, beliefs and values. 

From long time we are teaching moral values to our kids with stories; but some how we tend to ignore the power of it. We have almost forgotten that all the ancient scriptures are nothing but values and life lessons conveyed with stories. Point here I wanted to make is storytelling is a powerful tool to influence followers. 

It is observed that we tend remember or get convinced, when the lessons are ingrained with emotions. Story is nothing but play of emotions and imaginations.

Good leaders are good storytellers too.

2)Empathy:

A good leader is often a empathetic person, Before leading his subordinates/colleagues he should be able to understand what they are going though, how they think. Metaphorically a leader should put himself in shoes of his followers.

Even though Its important we rarely find leaders who are empathetic. Most of modern corporate mangers often fail to understand their subordinates but pass orders.

Empathy is under rated but extremely important quality of a leader.

3)Adaptable : 

A leader often has to lead his/her subordinates in unknown situations. If situation demands he/she has to lead from front with example. For that one has to be a quick learner and adapter.

So leader should be extremely adaptable with quick learning capabilities.

4)Allocation of resources: 

Optimal allocation of resources is important for efficient management. resources could be anything we use, it could be any commodity, money people or even time. Choosing right person for right work allocating right time for it is key.

5)Original thoughts and opinion oriented:

Leaders are always original and structured thinkers. Their ideas, decisions and opinions are often derived by their values and beliefs. They are not driven by success, fame or by money. but those will be definite/obvious products of their work.

their thoughts often will be clear and rational. With this they try to lead their team by example not paying attention to unnecessary noise.


Bottom-line:

There could be other various traits of a leader; but it broadly fall under above five. With these qualities leader becomes effective team player with vision in mind.  I believe leadership is a trainable skill; we can all be leaders in our own way by becoming little more of above 5 ideas every day.

Sunday, July 11, 2021

Movie recommendations for defense aspirants

Hollywood:

  • Fury(2014):

Main theme- The story revolves around a mission in war like situation involving Tanker called Fury and her crew.
IMDb rating- 7.6/10
Available on- Netflix




  • Saving Private Ryan(1998):

Main theme- A story of  searching a soldier naming Private Ryan. The search party was lead by a young captain, the story showcases comraderie &determination and movie seems realistic.
IMDb rating- 8.6/10
Available on-  Amazon Prime



  • K-19: The Widowmaker(2002):

Main theme- A Soviet Union's Nuclear powered submarine misfunctions in its maiden sail, The story revolves, how her crew workaround(knowing they will die) to avoid nuclear disaster at shore.
The movie is based on true story of K-19.
IMDb rating- 6.7/10
Available on- 



  • USS Indianapolis men of courage(2016):

Main theme- Movie revolves survival and court scene after sinking of US Naval ship, hit by Japanese torpedo called Kaiten. The US mission was a classified one so it is less known to public, the movie is based on true events.
IMDb rating-5.3 /10
Available on - 

  • Unbroken(2014):

Main theme- An Olympic track record holder, fighter pilot gets crashed into sea and gets captivated as prison of war. The movie shows protagonist's struggles.
IMDb rating- 7.2/10
Available on-  Netflix


  • Dunkirk(2017):

Main theme- Story based on true events of World war -2 Where soldiers of England and France are pushed to costal town of Dunkirk. Movies showcases struggles of soldiers their evacuation and national politics/Partiality while evacuation.
IMDb rating- 7.8/10
Available on- Amazon Prime

  • The hurt locker(2008):

Main theme- The story of sergeant and his subordinates deployed in Iran. The recklessness of protagonist causes some difference between him and his team during mission. The movie has won several awards and It surely will give you goosebumps.
IMDb rating- 7.5/10
Available on- Amazon Prime

  • American sniper(2014):

Main theme- The movie is about mental thoughts of a SEAL sniper, who had served in Iran.
IMDb rating- 7.3/10
Available on - Netflix

  • 1917(2019):

Main theme- It is the story of two British soldiers, who had to cross enemy boarder to pass on a critical message to save thousands of their comrades 
IMDb rating- 8.3/10
Available on - 

  • Topgun(1986):

Main theme- This movie has been inspirational to many defense aspirants. The story revolves around A Navy Lt taking part in selection of top Naval aviators strike squad called Topgun. The story has emotional touch to it, involving a love story and protagonist Maverick looses his buddy to an crash due to technical failure onboard.  

There in a part -2 planned to this

IMDb rating- 6.9/10
Available on - 

  • The Imitation game(2014):

Main theme- The movie is based on true story involving discovery of Enigma machine by Alan Turing to crack German messages. After watching this movie you will get to know how calculative world war-2 was. Alan Turing and team literally decided who is going to die in WW-II
IMDb rating- 8/10
Available on - Netflix

  •  JAR HEAD(2005--):

Main theme- The movie is based on stories of soldier who gets deployed in foreign countries, the stories mainly based on self talks and the uncertainty they are facing.
IMDb rating- 7/10
Available on - 

  • Sully: Miracle on the Hudson(2016):

Main theme- Captain of a passenger does unusual landing over Hudson river. This is based on true story, which showcases so many leadership qualities.
IMDb rating- 7.4/10
Available on - 



  • Captain Phillips(2013):

Main theme- The theme of the movie is a story of captain of a cargo ship under attack by somalin pirates. Like Sully this movie also a true story, showcasing lots officer like qualities.
IMDb rating- 7.8/10
Available on - 

  • Forest Gump(1994):

Main theme- A Man with relatively low IQ recalls his early life in this movie. the movie shows his life in Army and important historical events.

IMDb rating- 8.8/10

Available on - Netflix



  • Inglourious Basterds(2009):

Main theme- The movie is story of few Jew undercover soldiers working to bring down Nazi.

IMDb rating- 8.3/10

Available on- Netflix



Bollywood:

  • URI: The Surgical Strike(2019):
Main theme- The movie is based on true events; It depicts incidents involving counter surgical attack conducted by Indian Army, against terrorist group, who were directly responsible for URI army base terrorist attack.

IMDb rating- 8.2/10

Available on - 

  • The Gazi Attack (2017):
Main theme- This is one of many unknown true tales of armed forces; which actually occurred during 1971 Indo-Pak war. The story of bringing down the Pakistan Submarine PNS Gazi.

IMDb rating- 7.6/10

Available on- Amazon Prime

  • Laksya(2004):
Main theme- This is a story of amature confused college going kid who turns out to become, Indian Army officer and leads a successful operation during Indo Pak war.

IMDb rating- 7.9/10

Available on- Amazon Prime

  • Shourya(2008):
Main theme- This is a courtroom drama, involving case against a serving Brigadier. The movie shares similarity from a hollywood movie- A Few Good Men' (1992)

IMDb rating- 7.3/10

Available on- youtube for free

  • Raazi (2018):
Main theme- A true story of a RAW agent who played a key role during Indo-Pak war of 1971. this is unique as it is story of a women who is married to Pak Maj. and had been key intelligence source.

IMDb rating- 7.8/10

Available on- Amazon Prime

  • Boarder(1997):
Main theme- Collection of  small story about life of soldiers during war are bundled together to make a movie.

IMDb rating- 7.9/10

Available on- Youtube for free

  • Holiday: Asoldier is never off duty(2014):

Main theme- A solder on holiday bursts out Terrorist gang.
IMDb rating- 7.9/10
Available on - 




  • Shershaah (2021):
Main theme- It is a movie based on life of one of the Kargil heroes Capt. Vikram Batra. 

IMDb rating- 8.8/10

Available on- Amazon prime



These are just some from whole bunch; Feel free to put any movies in the comment section below, to update the list.

Monday, February 15, 2021

15 OLQs: Qualities being checked in a candidate at SSB

Services selection boards interview are one of the toughest interviews in India. It is so, for a reason to filter candidates who are worthy to be officers. SSB interview is nothing but a series of personality tests. It assesses to find whether the candidates have it in them to lead men into battels without any specials incentives but a possibility of casuality or even death.

Those qualities are of an Army/Navy/Airforce officers, which in short known as OLQs(Officer Like Qualities). 


OLQs-officer-like-qualities


There were totally 21 OLQs at the inception of SSB in after changes it has been brought down to 15. Those qualities are bifurcated into four factors, those are as shown below

Factor I: Planning and Organizing

1)Effective Intelligence
2)Reasoning Ability
3)Organizing Ability
4)Power of expression

Factor II: Social Adjustment

5)Social adaptability
6)Cooperation
7)Sense of responsibility

Factor III: Social effectiveness

8)Initiative
9)Self confidence
10)Speed of decision
11)Ability to influence group
12)Liveliness

Factor IV: Dynamic

13)Determination
14)Courage
15)Stamina

***********

Lets briefly understand one after other; what each quality mean.

1)Effective Intelligence:

It is the capability of an person to solve practical daily problems; It is different from basic intelligence (which is measured in stage-1 as OIR tests).

2)Reasoning Ability:

It is the ability of a person to understand any situation and reason the cause and effects of it, with application of logic. In Hindi it is known as Tark shakti

3)Organizing Ability:

As the name suggests, it is the capacity of a person to organize resources, problems, thoughts and ideas.
Just to explicitly mention here the resources could be any useful thing money, time, material and human resource.

4)Power of expression:

This is the most basic and important quality of a person. It is ability of the candidate to communicate his/her thoughts opinions and ideas effectively with ease. 

This includes effectiveness in verbal, non-verbal and written communication.

5)Social adaptability:

It  is the ability of a person to adapt to any situation, group or social environment very quickly. Adaptability will be well enhance with quick learning and reasoning ability.

6)Cooperation:

Cooperation is basically person's attitude towards collaboration and team work. It is how he reacts to difference in ideas and opinions for the collective cause. Anywhere in social scenario group goal comes first then comes individual ambition.

Dictionary meaning of cooperation: The action or process of working together to the same end.
 

7)Sense of responsibility:

It is the understanding and clarity in mind of a person in performing his/her roles well without reminder or no ones forceful instructions. Roles could be of a child, student, citizen and teammate etc.

8)Initiative:

Taking first step towards team/collective goal and sustaining  the zeal until it is achieved.

9)Self confidence:

It is the faith in one's own abilities. (especially at unfamiliar situations)
 

10)Speed of decision:

As the name suggest; It is the ability of a person to come at workable decisions fast and accurate.
 

11)Ability to influence group:

As the name suggests It is the ability to make his/her followers to work/behave as intended.

As mentioned in the beginning of the blog; officers has lead men into battels without any specials incentives but a possibility of casuality. So the qualities mentioned so far, especially ability to influence group is essentially should be there in an officer.

12)Liveliness:

It is the capability off a person to be joyous and inspiring even if the situation get stressful. Optimism, clarity off thoughts and control over his/her emotions comes into play here.

13)Determination:

It is sticking to what he/she believes right; until the end. 

In other words it is a sustained effort to achieve objectives in sprite of obstacles and setbacks.

14)Courage:

It is capability of a person to appreciate and take well purposed (and calculated) risks. Courage has two forms to it  (i)Moral courage: standing for what is right.  and (ii)Physical courage: Standing for physical risks.

15)Stamina:

As all knows, It is capability of a person to withstand physical and mental stress. It includes both physical and mental endurance.

Assessors at SSB check for above qualities using different tools in various tasks/tests of Individual interview, GTO tasks and Psychological tests. Now the question is


As a candidate/defense aspirant, should you know about 15 OLQs?

The single and straight forward answer is NO. Some people say it is better to know OLQs, some coaching classes even guide aspirants wrongly to portray OLQs on purpose. 

but remember, by just fake portrayal and mugging up officer like qualities you will not gain them. It takes time and effort to inculcates each qualities unless you have them as a part of your upbringing.

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