Introduction
Welcome to The ContraMind Code.
The ContraMind Code provides you with the system of principles, signals, and ideas to aid you in your pursuit of excellence.
The Newsletter shares the source code, through quick snapshots, for a systems thinking approach to be the best in what you do.
The Code helps you reboot and reimagine your thinking by learning from the best and helps you draw a blueprint on what it takes to get great things done.
Reinventing Organizations
by Frederic Laloux
Frederic Laloux is one of the leading and most influential management thinkers today. In this book, he writes about the evolution of different paradigms of the human organizations through the ages and proposes a new one: Teal Organization.
The Teal Organization is built on three pillars:
1. Wholeness
2. Self-Management and
3. Evolutionary Purpose
Laloux defines a teal organization as one where management is based on worker autonomy and peer relationships.
How to Enhance Learning Through Creativity
Prof. Manish Jain is a Synopsys Scientist, Creative Learning Director, Teaching Professor at Center for Creative Learning (CCL) IIT Gandhinagar, whose life goal and purpose is to create and foster makers who can take innovation to the next level.
In this episode, Prof. Jain speaks about how the education systems robs children of their sense of wonder, the role of the CCL in training teachers and helping students rekindle their joy of learning science, and his Khichidi Theory of Education.
If you find this episode valuable, please like, rate the episode and also share it in your network too. It will help us reach more people and also enable audience discover it online and also benefit from this episode.
Listen to this episode on:
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Practice Analytically, Perform Intuitively.
This is an absolutely great and a must watch David Perell’s Video. David Perell talks about Bryson DeChambeau, who is one of the most influential golfers alive today. In this video, he breaks down Bryson’s approach to the game and what it can teach us about practicing our craft, trusting our gut, and performing intuitively at a high level.
Understanding Money And When Is It Of True Value to You.
This is an article written by Lyn Alden on What is Money, a brilliant treatise on how money evolved over centuries and how it has also significantly changed over centuries.
While reading the article, one thing that was striking was the point she makes about the difference between money and currency.
Money is a liquid, fungible asset and one that is not a liability. It’s something intrinsic, like Gold.
Currency is a liability of an institution - may be a central bank or a banking institution - money held by banks as a reserve asset in order to support the currency that they issue as liabilities.
For example, if we have a dollar, it is an asset to us but a liability of some other entity. However, if we hold gold, it is an asset to us and a liability to nobody else. No wonder, when a crisis hits the world, Gold prices hit the roof!
So, the money we hold is real money and is of true value to us at any point of time - say either during a war or a crisis or an economic downturn etc., only when its value does not get shaved-off in such situations and one that holds its value in bad times more than in good times! Most often the liability is not restricted by our own liability but also includes any government’s liability or events across the world.
Lyn Alden writes -
‘In China, consumers aggressively monetize real estate. It became normal for families to own multiple homes. In the United States, consumers aggressively monetize stocks. We plow a percentage of each paycheck into broad equity indices without analyzing companies or doing any sort of due diligence, treating that basket of stocks as simply a better store of value than cash regardless of what is inside.
From a developing market standpoint, the fiat/petrodollar standard contributes to massive booms and busts because a lot of their debt is denominated in dollars, and that debt fluctuates wildly in strength depending on the actions of US policymakers. Developing countries are often forced to tighten their monetary policy during a recession in order to defend their currency, and thus while the US gets to provide counter-cyclical support for its own economy, developing countries are forced to be pro-cyclical, contributing to a vicious cycle in their economies during recessions. In this view, the fiat/petrodollar system can be considered a form of neocolonialism; we push most of the costs of the system out into the developing countries in order to maximize the stability for the developed world.’
So, what is money and what does it take to protect our money that we have earned, due to our hard work and effort? The quantum does not matter, as every little counts, because it is our sweat and blood. The money we have, must protect us and our families during a crisis like the COVID pandemic that we went through or a sudden war that has erupted recently, which has a global impact across countries.
True money is one which has no liability and gets to at least hold its value in good and bad times- more in bad times than in good times! Because, that is the time when we need the money most.
Some lessons we learnt from this week’s missions:
The future of great organizations will be based more and more on worker autonomy. However, people have to understand that with more autonomy comes a high factor of accountability and risk taking. This is a different kind of stress that they must be ready for. Hence, if they are not aligned to the most important three pillars - have a high degree of self-management and discipline, carefully matching their life and career purpose with their work( which means some companies don’t make sense for them to join even though they may be high paying or aspirational or both), being self-aware of what their strengths and weaknesses are, becoming truly an expert at what they do and improving their skills all the time - they will remain in their own ivory towers blaming organizations while they may be the ones who will be pulling back organizations to the old model of management and not moving it to the new model of management. From the other side, company managements need to then look at their own practices like hiring methods and work practices to create a platform for this change.
Teaching is an art and learning happens only when the teacher inspires. Most often teaching is treated as a chore and learning is evaluated by scores and ranks. While this may not represent true learning as there may not have been fundamental understanding of concepts. In the real world, conceptual understanding differentiates the quality of understanding a problem and the solution that is provided. True innovation can happen only when there is a deeper conceptual understanding of any subject and teaching as an art form needs to act as a catalyst to enable this.
The importance of being analytical in your work process and methods cannot be undermined. But, performing intuitively is a skill one has to develop too. Master craftsmen have perfected the art of deeply observing their work-outs or practice sessions analytically but on stage they perform intuitively. But, what allows them to perform intuitively is the fact they have looked at their performance behind doors scientifically. If you want to be a master of your craft, whatever profession you may be in, this is a critical practice that you must develop or work-on.
The concept of Money is often misunderstood. The true value of money is one when it holds its value more in bad times than in good times!