Value Self-Worth

I know a person, let’s call him David, who has a big boat. He loves to take pictures on the boat, often with scantily dressed women around him. He also has a fast car and a big house. He loves to show this to the whole world. His live looks really cool, it could maybe even make people jealous. But, is he truly happy?

Sources of Self-Worth

Yesterday I had a great discussion with a friend about self-worth. Where do you get it from? He identified four sources: 1) other people’s opinions, 2) your possessions, 3) your actions, 4) your relationship with God. As you can see he is a religious person, so for the non-religious people I would like to translate the last one to 4) your values (or your relationship with yourself).

The first three sources of self-worth are external, the fourth one is internal. If you go bankrupt you may need to sell your car. And if you have done something bad in the past you may feel a lower sense of self-worth for the rest of your life. And public opinion is always changing. What remains constant, what isn’t influenced directly from the outside, are your values. They can influence your decision making, but they won’t judge you. Your values are, in my opinion, the best source of self-worth.

Combination of Sources

Does that mean that I’m only driven by my values? No. I’m just discovering what my values are, what I hold to very dearly. I’m just discovering how you can live the most fulfilling life, how to become calm. And I still get great pleasure from the good things I’ve done and look back with regret to other negative actions. I still find it nice if someone gives me a compliment about my clothing or my business.

Is that bad? I think it’s not. I think it’s a stepping stone to getting your self-worth from (only or mostly) your values. And during that journey, I will still be content with some external sources of self-worth, whilst at the same time, I will continue building my internal senses.

If I look back to David I can’t really judge if he is truly happy. He may be spending all his savings to live his extravagant lifestyle and he will be poor soon, but get his self-worth from his possessions. He may get bad press and have the opinion of others change for the worse. At the same time, he may have a strong sense of self-worth that is based on his values. He may just be around scantily dressed women and fast cars because he is interested in these things, without getting his self-worth from them.

How is your self-worth determined? 

5-Hour Workday

I wrote the following post back in October 2015. Although I think it was a great idea, we now do work for the normal 8 hours. Is just convention, regression to the mean? Or is it also because we enjoy the time spent there? I don’t have the right answer, but none the less it’s very interesting to do this again sometime in the future.

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In 1926 the Ford Motor Company introduced the 40-hour workweek. Ford was one of the very first to do this. Ford had two reasons for this move. The first is explained best in his own words: “It is high time to rid ourselves of the notion that leisure for workmen is either ‘lost time’ or a class privilege.” The second reasons is an increase in productivity, he wanted people to use the time on the job in a more effective way. Today we, at Queal, are experimenting with the same policy.

5-Hour Workday

It’s not 1926 anymore and we do different work than the people on the assembly line. Our work requires us to think creatively, to give all of our attention to coming up with novel solutions. And what we (and others) have noticed is that our brains don’t work that fast after a while. There are diminishing returns after working for a few hours. The best things happen in the morning when you are still fresh. So from today onwards, we will work between (approximately) 9 and 2.

For myself, and hopefully my colleagues too, this brings two big benefits. The first is that my pay per hour effectively doubles. The same amount of revenue and half the hour, you do the math. The second is that I will use my free time to learn more. I’ve always been learning, now I have more time to follow Coursera courses, visit a museum or take up a new hobby.

I will report back next week with our findings!

Tracking Time

At Queal, we keep consistent track of the time we spend on our tasks. In this post, I will explain why we do this and what we do with the information we gather.

Toggl it
When I start working, the second place I go is Toggl (after Basecamp, our project management tool). Toggl is a time-tracking app. In it, you can define what you are working on and for which project it is. When you are done with one task, you can enter the next one. If you forgot to do it, you can add a task manually. All in all, it will take less than 2 minutes per day to use Toggl.

Increase productivity
The value of Toggl, for Queal, is the insights we get out of the tracking. The first one is pro-active. If you enter each task you will work on, you become more aware of what you are planning to spend your time on. If you, for instance, enter ‘check social networks for updates (on Queal)’ for the third time in a day, you will know that you are probably not working on the most important thing.

And when you enter the next task in Toggl, you see how much time you spend on the first. And as we all know, sometimes time moves faster or slower than we initially thought. By seeing where you spend your time hour-per-hour, you gain insights in where you’re time is actually going.

At the end of the week, we take some time (about 20 minutes) to check back on the time we’ve tracked. Here we specifically look to see if we’ve worked on the most important tasks. We ask ourselves the following questions:
– What was my biggest time drain?
– What have I done that I can automate/eliminate?
– What was my most valuable contribution?
– Knowing this, what will I focus on next week?

After going through this personally, each one of us gives a short summary to the rest of the team. If necessary there is feedback. And after that, it’s time for the weekend or the ‘vrijmibo’.

Being Driven

What is the common ground between Elon Musk, Tony Hsieh, Richard Branson, John D. Rockefeller, and George Washington? It’s not their motives, Tony Hsieh named his memories ‘Delivering Happiness‘, John D. Rockefeller became one of the richest men in history. Elon Musk wants to make us humans an interplanetary species, George Washington was one of the founders of America. They all have different goals in life, but what makes them all alike?

Extremely Driven

As a red lining between the (auto)biographies of these different men is their focus. Each one of them found out what they wanted to achieve in life. At least, I think they know now/knew when they were building their businesses. I think they all knew that they wanted to achieve something great, something that would stay for longer than their own lifetimes. I’m not sure if they knew from the start what exactly they would achieve, but that each of them was convinced they were meant for greatness.

I also think that each one of them had a quality that is essential for entrepreneurs. They all had persistence. They were all willing to stick with their idea when they faced adversity. When Richard Branson was being harassed by British Airways he stood his ground. When Elon Musk didn’t have big contracts with NASA he put up all of his money to make SpaceX happen anyway. And when Tony Hsieh started Zappos he had to convince his investors to stay on when they were still making big losses.

Intentionally Irrational

A person in business needs to be very rational. You shouldn’t let your every emotion upheaval your business. What I do think is that the people who stand out in history have an idea that is uncommon. They have developed a hypothesis and will not let go of it. When their family and friends say the idea is crazy, they only become more determined to accomplish it.

In a way, they are being very irrational. They break the rules. They show the world that you can do something in a different way. Richard Branson showed us that flying can be fun. Tony Hsieh has taken customer service to another level. Elon Musk has taken space travel and shown the USA and Russia how you can do it better.

In my life, I’m not sure if I’ve come across the big idea. I recognize some of the characteristics of these great men in myself. I can only hope that I will also make a dent in the universe. What about you?

Search for Freedom

Recently I’ve watched the movie The Search for Freedom. On the surface, the movie was about the lives of extreme sportsmen and sportswomen. It features everyone from half-pipe snowboard champions to skating legends. The message below the surface is one of freedom. All of the athletes said that they found freedom through their sports. They were able to live in the moment and escape the real world.

Finding Freedom

I can identify with the message, albeit on a more constrained level. I’ve never participated in sports challenges on a professional level. I did experience this freedom on ski trips. When you are going down a hill you are just qualified for, your whole focus is in the now. You forget everything else. I always look back at ski trips with great pleasure and I can’t wait to go on another one.

In the Flow

My question is if this experience of freedom can only be experienced during extreme sports. I think not. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has written a great book about this topic, Flow. In the book, he describes the concept flow, also described as optimal experiences. Here are the seven components to such an experience:

An activity has to have 1) a clear goal, 2) which can be completed, 3) that we can focus on completely, 4) which provides immediate feedback, 5) to which you are engaged, 6) is under control, and 7) makes you less self-conscious. This entails activities in which you become one with the activity you are doing.

Freedom at Home

Do you need extreme sports for this kind of experience, I think not. Someone who is doing yoga, playing chess or when you do fulfilling work can also have the experiences. I do believe that extreme sports are excellent examples (and they make for great movies), but optimal experiences can be experienced everywhere.

The two things you can do to have more optimal experiences are 1) have a clear goal, many people don’t set goals in work or in their personal lives, and 2) get immediate feedback, only if you know how you are doing you can learn to progress.

I believe that if you work on it, you will be able to have optimal experiences in your daily life.

Law of Motion

If I could be qualified to give layman’s description of Newton’s first law of motion, I would go with the following: If something is in motion it will keep moving at the same speed if no obstacle is encountered and no drag is experienced. Imagine a spaceship, or better Voyager 1, moving through space without anything in its way. Voyager 1 is currently 18.2 billion kilometres away from the sun. How did it get so far?

No Obstacles

The first reason is the vastness of space. There is not much it can bump into. And even these things have been calculated.

The same can go for businesses, if you choose a blue ocean strategy (more in a future blog), you will have a whole category/product to yourself. And when competitors show you, you must be the one that has the manoeuvrability to go around them and outcompete them. Only that way you can keep your momentum.

No Drag

The second reason is the emptiness of space. There is nothing dragging Voyager 1 down to a screeching halt. It moves fluently through space, never slowing down.

In business, I see this as the way you’ve organized your own company. Everyone should be working on the same goals, there should be no friction. It’s only with speed that you get to see the returns for all your work. An unnecessarily hierarchical or slow company can be its own worst enemy.

At Queal, I believe we are on top of these things. The drag is minimal within our organisation and our goals are clear. What can improve is the clarification of our goals to our partners. And with regards to the obstacles, we are still working in an ever-increasing universe, let’s see if we can create our own Milky Way.

How about you and/or your organization?

Happiness

Happiness is what makes life worthwhile. It supersedes other goals, like money, friendship, and love. In the end, we all want to be happy. So striking, and unnerving is that there is no direct route to happiness. When people try to buy it by becoming rich, they will want to become even richer, they stop enjoying the little things, and their happiness will not increase. I, therefore, find the quote by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (author of Flow) so great. By living in the now, you will be happy, no matter the circumstances.

The centrality of happiness is very well illustrated by the number of quotes on the topic. This paragraph features some of the greatest thinkers of all time and their views on happiness. 

“Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness.” – George Orwell. 

“Remember, happiness doesn’t depend upon who you are or what you have, it depends solely upon what you think.” – Dale Carnegie. 

“Pleasure is the only thing to live for. Nothing ages like happiness.” – Oscar Wilde. 

“Happiness is like those palaces in fairy tales whose gates are guarded by dragons: we must fight in order to conquer it.” – Alexandre Dumas. 

“If you want to understand the meaning of happiness, you must see it as a reward and not as a goal.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. 

“…happiness is the highest good, being a realization and perfect practice of virtue, which some can attain, while others have little or none of it…” – Aristotle.

Profile of Warren Buffett

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.
Warren Buffett

There is rich, and there is Warren Buffett. Do I mean that he is more wealthy in terms of money than everyone but a handful of people on this earth? Yes! At the same time, I am referring to his life philosophy. Warren Buffett lives a simple life. He does not live in a large mansion, nor does he have a 10 man strong security detail. He spends his days reading and learning, ever advancing his knowledge. There are many leaders who have built great companies, Warren Buffett built a great conglomerate.

The first rule is not to lose. The second rule is not to forget the first rule.
Warren Buffett

As noted in an earlier article true entrepreneurs are risk-averse instead of risk-takers. Warren Buffett, on the one hand, finds opportunities where others do not see the advantage of doing business, yet also tries to leverage his buys so that he is never in a position to lose. By having his things in order he is prepared for the worst, so when things get tough he will stand strong. Next to being risk-averse he also likes to keep things simple, Warren Buffett believes in not complicating things when not needed and has a strong ability to see through complicated matters and to spot the silver lining.

Honesty is a very expensive gift – do not expect it from cheap people.
Warren Buffett

Trust is another one of the great characteristics that Warren Buffett possesses. By strategically giving trust to people around him he has created a company in which there are low interpersonal costs and people can build on each other. Warren Buffett has been in a partnership with Charlie Munger for almost the whole of his life, he has trusted him in everything and therefore discussion will be constructive instead of destructive. Trust is not only an interpersonal skill for the good, it also has saved him many millions on due-diligence and other non-trust measures that did not have to be executed.

I have always wanted to improve what I do, even if it reduces my income in any given year. And I always set aside time so I can play my own self-amusement and improvement game.
Charlie Munger

The last lesson learned here from Warren Buffett and his business partner Charlie Munger is to be a learner your whole life. Investing in your education, reading every day, is what they find to be one of the key habits of smart people. This means cutting down on your time spent with ‘news’ and social media, but to set aside a minimum of 1 hour a day to read, to understand, to discuss and build your cumulative knowledge.

By trusting the people around you, getting the right people on the bus (a risk-averse one that is), and building your knowledge base – you will reach an ever-growing body of success!

References & Further Reading:

1. http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2013/05/the-buffett-formula-how-to-get-smarter/

2. http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikaandersen/2013/12/02/23-quotes-from-warren-buffett-on-life-and-generosity/

3. http://www.forbes.com/profile/warren-buffett/

4. http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/

Absolute Moral Rules

Currently, I am taking a Coursera (online university courses) on Practical Ethics. Next to lectures and readings the course also consists of writing assignments, this is the first one. In this short essay, I am defending absolute moral rules. Disclaimer: I have yet to figure out for myself the position I want to take concerning morality/moral rules, but this one comes pretty close.

Do any moral rules hold without exception, no matter what the circumstances?

Moral rules are concerned with the principles of right and wrong behaviour. They define in a broad sense what behaviour is looked up to, and what behaviour people condemn. According to James Rachels, a person, a moral actor, is perceived to, at the very least, to guide one’s conduct by reason while giving equal weight to the interests of the people affected by the decision. David Hume states that reason is the consequence of our passions, our behaviour follows from them and thus also morality. Emmanuel Kant opposes this position and states that we can have a universal moral law. In this short essay, I will defend this last position by defining, examining and defending a universal moral rule.

Doing justice is one of the 13 moral rules that have guided one of history’s greatest men; Benjamin Franklin. In doing justice he means that you wrong none, by doing injuries or omitting the benefits that are your duty. With this, he means that a person is not to bodily harm another person, and thus doing injustice to the other and yourself. Also when you have benefits that are your duty to give to others, it is morally wrong to omit it from them. Doing justice here is an absolute moral rule, it is a principle that ought never to be violated.

There are two main objections to the use of absolute moral rules. The first is concerned with the use of the rules; is it applicable to everyone?. The second is concerned with the consequences of the rule; what about the consequences? I will defend the use of absolute moral rules using the example of doing justice.

It is true that not everyone does justice, and even the people who do justice, do not do this all the time. In different cultures, people have defined specific cases of justice on different terms. Even over time, the notion of justice has had changes. These changes, however, are subtle and are concerned with specific cases and not the idea behind doing justice. Take for instance the benefits of your labour, to whom do you distribute them? If a person decides to give everything away to charity this can be conceived to be a morally just decision. At the same time, a person who only spends his money on his own family is not doing something wrong morally. But when a CEO receives a large bonus whilst his company is losing money, everyone can agree that this is morally wrong.

What if everyone does justice? This opposition is concerned with the consequences of the moral rule (which in itself is deontological). Imagine that you are in a room with a terrorist and the only way to get to know where a nuclear bomb is hidden is via physical torture (i.e. doing injustice to the terrorist). The moral rule can still apply here, based both on deontological and consequentialist reasons. Concerning the former, it can be stated that doing any bodily harm to anyone is wrong in that it violates the rights a person has, terrorist or not. Holding onto a moral rule can, therefore, be seen as more important than the catastrophic outcomes of a particular (hypothetical) situation. Concerning the latter, you do not know if the terrorist will give the right information. Taking both positions together, doing injustice is a means that is not defendable by its ends.

Some moral rules hold without exception. Doing justice is one of the moral rules that endures criticism and is universally applicable. It is true that not all proposed moral rules hold without exception. Some examples of questionable moral rules are; have patience, be loyal. Other moral rules are very much debatable as to whether they hold without exception (e.g. do not gossip, be forgiving). Next to doing justice other moral rules also make intuitive sense and equally successfully can stand opposition; respect others, be dependable, humility.

Having all moral rules be dependent on the consequences of a situation is the opposite view of the one being defended in this essay. This is essence is a consequentialist argument. There are two problems with this kind of an argument. The first is the extent to which you define consequences, for who, when, where, etc.. The second is the practical application of consequentialist thinking, it is not practically possible for a person to, for each decision, to determine and weigh the effect of his actions. Therefore using a consequentialist approach to moral rules is both impracticable and unclear in its definition of what is right and wrong.

Doing justice is a moral rule that holds without exception, no matter the circumstances. This moral rule, and others, can help us understand better and let us live a moral life.

Control Framework

Have you ever struggled with something that did not want to go to where you were aiming for? Or some you felt that you were constantly reacting to external things and had no time for your own plans? Everyone probably has. There are two small frameworks that can help you identify when this is happening – and get going again. One step at a time.

As humans, we have the unique ability to act, to think about what we will do between stimulus and response. If you are happy and accidentally bump into your neighbour, “sorry” will be the most likely response. But when you are having a bad day, “ugh” would be more likely. The first framework is best explained by Stephen R. Covey:

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space lies our freedom and power to choose our response. In those choices lie our growth and our happiness.”

If we are aware of the freedom to choose our response, the second step is to identify when to do what:

1. Direct control
2. Indirect control (influence)
3. No control (concern)

Direct control has to do with the response we ourself can give. Here we can directly choose to react differently. By changing your behaviour you will actually be able to influence your attitude (try sitting upright for 10 minutes – do you feel the confidence?). Of course, you are not always able (or willing) to change your behaviour, but it is always a possibility.

Indirect control is about the responses of the people around you, people with whom you have a personal connection. If you keep positively affirming a friend, their belief in their own capacity will grow. The influence, however, is indirect, you cannot look inside the head of your friends and your influence, therefore, is limited.

No control lies in situations where, whatever you do, the situation will not change. Screaming at the presenter on television or extensively worrying about things happening on the news will not change anything. It is these kinds of situation that you should divert the least amount of energy to. And yes, it can sometimes be a relief to scream at the television, but it will not lead to change.

Think for yourself on what level your behaviour falls, are you focussing on your direct circle of control or more on no control situation. Sometimes by doing less, you can do more. When keep barking up the wrong tree, your energy will be wasted. If you work with your direct and indirect circle of influence – your energy will grow. You will become proactive – one step at a time.

Photo Credit sqauwkpoint & alljapaneseallthetime