Vikas Vinayachandran

Post Archive


  • Authenticity – A Leadership Essential

    “Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.  I heard a story of authenticity………..  A mother took her 8 year old son to meet her swamiji (religious leader) as…

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  • Follow Your Heart

    Former President A P J Abdul Kalam gave a regaling talk to an enthralled audience at a “Times Avenues” event on career options recently. [Kalam Tell Students To Follow Their Heart, Times of India – June 23rd, 2009] Speaking in his typical anecdotal manner, Kalam doled out advice on issues ranging from current prospects for…

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  • Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish

    I recently read an excerpt of Steve Jobs’ Commencement Address that was published by the Stanford Report dated June 14th, 2005. His closing lines revealed an amazing idea of inspiration in me. Jobs credited the birth of this caption to a publication called The Whole Earth Catalog. This magazine was synonymous to today’s Google and other…

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  • Integrity – The Stronghold of Successful Living

    As a Soft Skills Trainer and Executive Coach, I believe that training would be starkly incomplete without touching upon the importance of Integrity in one’s life. It is the foremost value essential to success in all that we undertake. The essence of integrity is beautifully summed up in the quote by Don Galer, “Integrity is what we do, what we…

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  • Leadership Skills – The Gandhi Way

    Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (2nd October 1869 – 30th January 1948), is lovingly known as Bapu (Father), and is the Father of modern and democratic India. As we stand at the threshold of his birth anniversary, we need to remind ourselves that there…

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  • The Leader Who Bought the Ferrari He Wanted

    The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born — that there is a genetic factor to leadership. This myth asserts that people simply either have certain charismatic qualities or not. That’s nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born.Warren G. Bennis Am I a leader? Am I a…

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  • Emotional Intelligence Leadership – The Key to Success

    Assuming that Emotional Intelligence is directly linked to leadership, there are three questions that need to be answered:• What is Emotional Intelligence?• Why is it important?• How can Emotional Intelligence Quotient be increased? We looked at the answer to the first question in my previous article titled, What Is Emotional Intelligence? Let us now look at the answer to the second question.…

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  • Leadership – Asking the tough questions

    Being a leadership coach I often have the privilege to be in the presence of future leaders. There is one question that I ask in every session, “Who is the leader that you emulate?” I get answers like, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and disappointingly………… Hitler. It happens session after session. Regardless of how…

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  • Leaders – How Clean is Your Window?

    It was raining very heavily and the little restaurant where I was having dinner was very crowded. All the tables were occupied and some hungry customers were waiting for their turn. Some children were crying as they had to wait and the harassed waiters were hurrying to serve the diners. Amidst all this confusion there…

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  • Leading from the Back – Kalaam’s Leadership Experience

    “The idea is that leadership at its most fundamental is about moving people in a certain direction—usually through changing the direction of their thinking and their actions. And the way to do that is not necessarily by charging out front and saying, “Follow me,” but by empowering or pushing others to move forward ahead of…

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