A beautiful mind and the three acts of creativity, madness and awakening

During the past few days, I rewatched the Oscar winning movie “A beautiful mind” which is loosely based on the life story of Nobel Laureate John Nash¹. After doing his ground breaking research on Game Theory, Nash suffered from paranoid schizophrenia for a quarter of a century (from 1959 to mid-80s). But what is unique about Nash is that he has miraculously recovered from it and has continued to do good research since then. During the process of remission, Nash also got transformed from an arrogant and self-centred elitist to an engaged, lucid and “a very fine person” as his wife Alicia puts it.  I got so fascinated by these two transitions – from genius to madness and from madness back to a creative person that I read the biography of Nash also called “A beautiful mind” written by Sylvia Nasar. Subsequently, I watched the video interviews of Nash on YouTube and at the Nobel website and also watched the PBS documentary “A brilliant madness”.

Here is my reflection on the evolution of a human mind in three acts: creativity, madness and awakening². I am taking a few pictures from the movie to illustrate the transitions. In each stage, I will also add a few titbits from the biography. Finally, I will connect this story to each of us and make it a metaphor applicable in our lives. “(Movie)” is used to indicate depiction in the film, while “(Real)” is used to present the story of real Nash. All the references to real Nash stories are from Sylvia Nasar’s biography.

Act-1 (Creativity): 

(Real) As a graduate student in Princeton, Nash (Russel Crowe) attacked several difficult problems. Nash Equilibrium, a concept in game theory won him a Nobel 40 years later. Apart from that Nash also got good results in topology. He discussed his ideas with giants like Einstein, John von Neumann and other faculty members in his math department.

(Movie) Nash is playing a game with his friend and rival Hansen. (Real) While at Princeton, Nash also invented a game called Nash which became quite popular on the campus. After his PhD, Nash went to MIT as a faculty and produced very good results.

Act-2 (Madness):

(Movie) Nash meets his prodigal roommate Charles Herman (Bettany) in Princeton, a literature student.  At MIT, he meets William Parcher (Harris) of US Dept of Defense and starts working for him to crack secret Russian codes transmitted through everyday newspapers / magazines.

Both Herman and Parcher are fictitious characters created by Nash’s mind who become real for him at times.

(Real) Nash didn’t have visual delusions and didn’t see people like Herman and Parcher. But he heard voices which he interpreted as messages from extra-terrestrials. At various times, he declared himself to be “The Emperor of Antarctica”, “the prince of peace“, “person recruited by aliens from outer space to save the world”, “the most important person in the world” etc.

(Real) In early 1959, Nash delivered lectures at Columbia and Yale on Riemann Hypothesis. Both talks were incoherent and gibberish. Audience realized that something was wrong. By April 1959, he was admitted to McLean Hospital near Boston. Later, he was also admitted to two other hospitals near Princeton.

(Movie, Real) In mental hospitals, Nash underwent treatments like insulin coma therapy.

(Movie) Nash doesn’t like the medicines. “Why can’t I apply my mind to solve this problem?”, he asks his psychiatrist Dr. Rosen (Plummer). “Because your mind is where the problem is in the first place!”, Rosen tells him. This is the fundamental paradox of human madness – you can’t use the mind to solve the problem created by the mind. Or at least, not in the same old way, and not by the same old mind.

Act-3 (Awakening):

(Movie) Nash’s first moment of awakening happens when he realizes that some of the characters he sees, especially Herman's niece Marcee (Cardone), don’t grow old. Hence, he rationally concludes that they are not real. Nash is learning to employ his mind to solve the problem of the mind – a breakthrough!

(Real) The awakening has been a slow process for Nash and I didn’t find any reference to a first moment of awakening anywhere. In fact, Nash puts it as “a continuous process rather than just waking up from a dream.” Nash also compares it with dieting. “It is a matter of policing one’s thoughts trying to recognize paranoid ideas and rejecting them, just the way somebody who wants to lose weight has to decide consciously to avoid fats or sweets."

(Movie) Several years later, Nash requests his old friend Hansen who is now a faculty at Princeton to give him an opportunity to teach. Hansen asks him, “Are they (the fictitious characters) gone?” Nash tells him, “No, they are not gone, may be they never will be… but I have gotten used to it now… And as a result, they have, kind of, given up on me… That’s what happens with all our dreams and nightmares. Got to keep feeding them to stay alive.”

The story of the human mind:

Nash’s story is not unique. The three stages through which his mind went through – creativity, madness and awakening -  is also the story of the human mind. All of us are creative when we are kids. As we grow old the voice in the head starts commenting on our actions and the actions of people around us. Repetitive and incessant stream of wasteful thinking leads to firm beliefs in ideas like “I am useless”, “My boss is crack”, “It’s all her fault”, “Hinduism is good, Islam is bad”, “I am better than him” etc. Separation between what is real and what is imagined becomes blurry just like Nash.

When Nash was later asked, “How could you believe that extra-terrestrials are sending you messages?” He said, “Because, the ideas I had about supernatural beings came to me the same way that my mathematical ideas did. So I took them seriously.” We are no different. Thoughts change our perception and we don’t even know it.

Personally, I find Nash’s method of observing current thoughts and discarding them if found wasteful as a powerful method. It is a continuous process and needs alertness especially during slippery moments.

Notes:

1.      I turned to the film after hearing spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle refer to this film during an interview with Oprah Winfrey.

2.      Borrowed from how Nash’s biographer Sylvia Nasar puts it in the book: This is the story of John Forbes Nash, Jr. It is a story about the mystery of the human mind, in three acts: genius, madness, reawakening.

Related articles:

1.      Realizing my biggest addiction – Thinking, Jan 3, 2015

2.      “Thought as a system” by David Bohm, a book review, Nov 14, 2014

Learnings from teaching of “Design Thinking” course at IIM Bangalore

I got an opportunity to teach “Design Thinking” at IIM Bangalore in terms 5 & 6 of the academic year 2013-14 (roughly from Sept 2013 till March 2014). This was part of a course on innovation I co-taught along with my friend Prof. Rishikesha Krishnan. Term-5 course was for PGSEM students (working professionals with average 7 years of experience) and term-6 class participants included both PGP (full-time, flagship program) and EPGP (full-time students, average 9 years of experience). In this article, I would like to present my top 4 learnings from this teaching experience.

Ground rules: The DT course followed the iterative process: Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype and Test. It was emphasized that the process is more important than the outcome.  This was elaborated with following three ground rules: (1) Insights gathered from the field research will be given more weightage than those gathered only through secondary research (2) Customer validation is more important than excel validation and; (3) Iterative experimentation is important and no penalty for failed experiments.

Here are my four learnings:

1.      1. Passion trumps in challenge selection: In a class, we applied pain, wave & waste tool to generate challenge options. One team selected the area: pain of riding a two wheeler in rain. They wanted to create a car-like comfort while riding a two-wheeler in rain. I asked the team members if they were mechanical engineers or had design background. The answer was negative. So I warned them that just showing PowerPoint suggestions will not take them far in the course.  The team indeed ended up prototyping options using tent rods (see picture). It was a pain area all the team members could relate to and that made a difference. There were passionate about the challenge area and that made a big difference. My learning is that passion as a parameter is most important parameter to look at while selecting a challenge area.

2.      Depth of immersion matters: As the first course progressed, I realized that the quality of data gathered, the challenge framed and the subsequent solutions created depended a lot on the depth of immersion i.e. the number of interviews, the amount time they spend in the field, the different stakeholders they talk to etc. Finding time for this activity could be a challenge given that the participants were working professionals. Hence, it was suggested that the team picks up problem areas which are in or around campus or easily accessible to all the team members. Students were also given specific targets on the minimum number of interviews (say, 10), talking to different stakeholders and making other contextual observations.

3.      3. Experimentation needs rigor: As the mid-term presentations began in term-5 course, I observed a lack of rigor in the measurement and analysis. For example, a team was experimenting with approaches to improve waste segregation on campus. They had pasted signs that may improve the segregation. When the results were presented, data about exact people passing the dustbin, people doing it right, not doing it right wasn’t available. This was an important learning for me. It meant I had to improve how I taught experiment design which I did subsequently. I introduced randomized control trials in term-6 and some of the teams used the technique.

4.      4. Presentations in every class helps: In term-5 we had two rounds of presentations. In round-2, we observed that there was a wide gap between the number of iterations and learnings of the teams. I also got a feedback from students that they would have done better had they seen how some of their peers were progressing through the course. I introduced one more round of presentations in the term-6 batch. This was useful in giving feedback on next rounds of experiments. Besides, a few students talked about how their project is doing towards the end of almost every class.

Overall, I felt Design Thinking offered a complimentary perspective to students who are good at using quantitative techniques in developing new ideas.

Image source: student projects

3 principles of immersive research

Immersive research forms a core element of Design Thinking methodology. It involves immersing yourself in (potential) customer’s context and deriving deep insights on what he/she needs. It is similar to doing ethnographic research. In this article, I would like to highlights 3 principles of immersive research which I have found useful in my work.

1.      Context is more powerful than person: Waste segregation drive began in our apartment complex three years ago. Initial response was disastrous. The initiative champions were frustrated. They said, “We will not improve. We are like that only”. But they didn’t give up. Upon further investigation they realized that the residents are not their primary customers. Their real customers were the maids who did the cleaning work in the apartments. So they held awareness sessions for the maids. Situation improved a little bit. Then they realized the confusion people faced in deciding which is dry waste and which is wet. So every apartment was provided two dustbins – red and green. Slowly, the adoption improved. Today, the people who were thought to be “like that only” actually are proud of the recycling the apartment is doing.

A key principle of social psychology that is active here is: Context is the primary driver behind our actions and not the inherent personality traits. This has significant implications. When we interview people or conduct surveys – what people say they do or believe may be very different from what they actually do in a given context. Hence, people doing immersive research need to pay a lot of attention to the context – personal situation, surroundings, interactions, facial expressions, bodily gestures etc. If one is conducting an interview, it is advisable for another team member(s) to make notes of the surrounding situation, take pictures / video if possible.

2.      2.  Their perspective is more important than my perspective: One of the project teams at IIMB (where I taught Design Thinking) decided to work on the following challenge: How might we improve the experience of auto rides in Bangalore? They all have had their share of bad experiences with Bangalore’s auto drivers. Their objective was to “fix” the experience through a solution. For the next few weeks they went around the streets interviewing auto commuters and auto drivers. Until one day, when one of the auto drivers mentioned to them, “My son is ashamed of the fact that his father drives an auto”. That sentence really hit them. Suddenly, they realized that auto driver is not a “villain” who needs to be “taught a lesson” through their solution. He is also a human being just like them with his own set of constraints and challenges. Eventually, they modified their challenge statement to:  How to build a sustainable business model for unorganized auto-rickshaw segment thereby enhancing the value delivered to both customers and auto-drivers?

Until the auto driver’s admission of why his son is ashamed, the team saw the whole situation from their perspective where auto driver was the unstated villain. Once they represented the same data from auto driver’s perspective, a new reality emerged. Until we can see the data or knowledge we gather from the stakeholders’ perspective, our insights remain incomplete. Keeping our biases aside to look at the reality is perhaps the most difficult aspect of immersive research.

3.      3.  A bright spot is a more useful starting point than a dark spot: Another project team in IIMB chose to visit an old age home in BTM layout. The inmates kept saying that they were very happy in the old age home. However, their facial expressions conveyed a completely different story. Perhaps they had realized that these students were there only for a short visit. Why should they complain about anything? The students, however, noticed something interesting. Many of the beds had strings attached to them (see the picture). These strings were a kind of protection mechanism for the old folks to not fall off the bed. That was a jugaad which the inmates were living with. However, the student took a cue from this “bright spot” to see if a low-cost bed can be prepared with simple modifications to the existing bed. The idea appealed to the old age home management as well. 

   What is not working – the dark spots – are, of course, important in immersive research. However, “bright spots” – what is already working well also provide excellent seeds for future solutions. They are indicators of the intent and the suitability of the solution in the cultural context.

In short, paying attention to the context of the people, seeing things from their perspective and noticing the bright spots play an important role during immersive research.

Image source: Auto driver and the old age home images are from the PGSEM class projects of 2013.

Related articles:
1. Immersive research: P&G's approach of getting deep customer insights, Dec 18, 2008
2. What innovation programs can learn from Quality Circle (QC) activity, Feb 17, 2012

Managing the tricky transition from “idea?” to “idea!”

When Steve Jobs shortlisted the idea of portable music player during an offsite in 2001, the idea had many unknowns. These included questions such as, Who is the customer? Which technology do we use? What business model shall we adopt? Etc. Let’s denote such an idea with the notation “idea?” The question mark at the end indicates that the idea has uncertainty associated with it. Fast forward 3 years and Jobs was in Madison, New York City and he saw people wearing white headphones on every block. That is when he realized that the idea has taken off – it has become “idea!” – an idea without much uncertainty. Every successful innovation goes through this transition from “idea?” to “idea!”. However, many fumble during the transition. Let’s see how in this article.

Tata Nano stands out for the unusual pre-launch publicity it got as an innovation. As it was being launched several success stories were being written. However, the car has done far below expectations so far. In FY 2012-13, 23K Nanos were sold, in the first half of FY 2013-14 10K Nanos were sold as against the nominal factory output of 250K cars per anum (source: Wikipedia). As Nano was being designed and developed, I am sure it was being treated as an “idea?”. However, as it was being launched, was Team Nano  already treating the idea as “Nano!” – sort of “done deal!”. This part is not very clear. At this stage, the business model (Who, What, How) was still untested and hence it should have been treated as “Nano?” and subjected to rigorous testing. Based on the publicly available information, it looks as if that didn’t happen (I could be wrong here).

No matter how successful an idea is, it doesn’t last forever. Hugely successful iPod is no exception. Around a year ago  (Jan 2014), Tim Cook CEO of Apple announced, “All of us have known for some time that iPod is a declining business.” In fact, in 2009, Peter Oppenheimer, then CFO of Apple, mentioned, “We expect our traditional MP3 players to decline over time as we cannibalize ourselves with iPod Touch and the iPhone” So when did the iPod go back from “idea!” (success guaranteed) to “idea?” (future uncertain) state again? Well, it was in the same year in which Steve Jobs had seen iPod on every block in Madison, New York City – 2004. It was in this year that Jobs expressed his concern in an Apple Board meeting, “The device that can eat our lunch is cell phone.” The project that got started eventually led to the creation of iPhone.

That brings us back to the question – Is there anything like “idea!”? Can there ever be a state in the journey of a product where success is guaranteed? I don’t think so. In fact, the euphoria around the market success can be a sure shot sign of some untested assumption being overlooked. The only time an idea enters “idea!” state is while it enters the sunset zone – and the certainty is that of death! Of course, in the case of iPod, even that is uncertain in the near future.

In short, no matter how fantastic your idea is, don't be in a hurry to treat it as an "idea!". Treat it as an "idea?"  and be clear about the key untested assumptions at every stage of its evolution.

source: Steve Jobs comment on the future of iPod that he presented to the board is mentioned in his biography "Steve Jobs" by Walter Isaacson, page 465.

Realizing my biggest addiction – Thinking

I rarely drink or smoke. The last time I had a drink was more than six months ago. Don’t even remember the last smoke. Addiction has not been a problem for me. Or so I believed. Until I heard Eckhart Tolle point out my biggest addiction – Thinking. That was a rude shock. Not only was I not aware of the incessant, involuntary and repetitive thought patterns going rounds in my mind, I considered thinking to be my greatest asset. How did I get convinced about this addiction? And, what have I done about it? Let’s see in brief.

What’s wrong with thinking? Well, thinking per se is not bad. Thinking enables me to help my clients and improve the process of innovation in their organization. Thinking helps me plan and solve problems – individually and collaboratively. However, this useful thinking forms only a portion of the overall thinking that is going on. What is an example of thinking that is not serving a useful purpose? 

Here are a few samples:

• Will my workshop go smoothly tomorrow? (anxiety)
• Will I continue to get new projects this year? (worry)
• Why did I have to say it that way? (guilt)
• Wow, I managed to stay afloat for eight years as an independent consultant (pride)
• I should get the contract (expectation)
• If he had been more involved in the project, we would have done better (blame)

Again, there is nothing wrong with each of these thoughts. In fact, a thought like “Will my workshop go smoothly tomorrow?” may lead to an action that improves the design of the workshop. However, the problem starts when these thoughts start repeating themselves and create a snowball effect. The story in the head becomes a full-fledged movie being played in the repeat mode without any commercial break.

What percentage of my thinking is useful? Well, I don’t have a scientific answer to this question. But Eckhart claims it to be a tiny percentage, say less than 10-20%. However, the fact that I am dissipating a large portion of my energy for non-useful activity is not the main reason I started looking at it closely. The repetitive negative thinking causes psychic pollution. It affects everybody around me. When I bring anxiety home, I am affecting everybody at home. And then it affects the people I send Whatsapp and Facebook messages to. It has a huge multiplier effect.

Which one causes more pollution, my car or negative thinking? Again, I don’t know. But knowing the power of network effect, I won’t be surprised that the psychic pollution beats the car pollution hands down.

OK. So what do I do about it? Well, I am still experimenting. Last year I wrote about the practice of Attention-Alertness-Acceptance, the Vipassana (mindfulness) meditation and catch-me-if-you-can experiment. I hope to continue with this experimentation and see where it leads. No matter what happens, I am enjoying the experimentation.

Sources:

Eckhart talks about thinking as the worst addiction in the popular video: How do we break the habit of excessive thinking?

10-20%: Eckhart says, “Mind is a torture instrument 80% of life” – in the interview “Conversations on compassion” at Stanford by Dr. James Doty (The quote is at: 12:10).

Infinite vision and the questions that shaped Aravind Eye Care system

India is a land of paradoxes. On the one hand, we have sixty people losing sight in an eye camp and thirteen women losing life in a sterilization camp in the last two months. On the other hand, we have Aravind Eye Care system – overlooking 1000+ sight-restoring surgeries every day with world class quality standards, serving poor and rich with compassion, and in a financially self-sustainable way.

The canvass that Aravind covers is so vast that any narrative that tries to present Aravind story will be incomplete. But some are less incomplete than others. “Infinite Vision: How Aravind became the wold’s greatest business case for compassion” by Pavithra Mehta and Suchitra Shenoy is perhaps the least incomplete and lucidly written tale of Aravind, its founder Dr. Venkataswamy and many others who shaped the infinite vision. Here are two things that I found most interesting in the book.

1.      Questions behind the answers: If Aravind is the extraordinary answer, what were Dr. V’s questions? This is the core riddle the book aims to address. Through the personal journal Dr. V kept over the decades, the authors get a peek into the questions. “How to organize and build more hospitals like McDonald’s”. Reads a journal entry from 1980s. Notice that there is no question mark (?) at the end of the sentence, a peculiar characteristic of Dr. V’s writing. It is as though each question contains a seed of the answer. Another entry reads - “How was Buddha able to organize in those days a religion that millions follow. Who were the leaders. How were they shaped.” At Frankfort airport Dr. V watched a plane land and the process that followed and said to his friend, “This is how we should run our operating theatre.” In 1978, Dr. V visited 40,000 square-foot training facility at University of Michigan School of Medicine. After seeing the training centre, he mentioned to Dr. Suzanne Gilbert, “One day, I would like to have a centre like this one.” She was baffled by this remark of the Indian doctor who at that time ran an 11-bed eye clinic.

2.      Light behind the spirit: Dr. V was deeply influenced by the teachings of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. The spiritual quest got translated into questions like – How do I become a perfect instrument? (1980 journal entry). The book beautifully weaves the thread of Dr. V’s spiritual journey towards becoming a perfect instrument in the narrative. However, a question arises - What did it mean on a day-to-day basis to Dr. V? Following excerpt from a journal entry gives a glimpse:

You feel drawn to a patient because he’s from your village, known to you, and then you try to do your best for him. But at times, a patient is aggressive and demands some privileges. He says, “Could you see me first?” This upsets you, and with that feeling of annoyance you treat him. You are not able to disassociate him from his mental or emotional aggressiveness. … To do this [treat him well] you must bring into your own being silence, calmness, and quietude. It needs enormous practice to realize the experience of silence in you.

“This man’s spirituality wasn’t incidental to the story. It was what everything else hinged on,” says Prof. V. Kasturi Rangan of Harvard Business School who wrote the case on Aravind that became popular world over.

Personally, “Can spirituality be integrated in organizations?” is a question I have carried with me for some time now. The book gives a ray of hope. Kudos to Pavithra and Suchitra for bringing out such a wonderful story. Hope it reaches out to more people.

I would like to thank Mr. Thulsi for giving a copy of the book to me. He is playing a key role at Aravind in shaping the “Infinite vision” and inspiring many.

Book image source: flipkart.com. 

How to build curiosity stamina?

Stefan Hawking, the famous Physicist, in his first Facebook update in October said, “Be curious. I know I will always be.” That’s not very different from what Einstein said, “I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious.” Most of us may not be passionately curious about anything. Is there a way one can build curiosity stamina systematically? Let’s explore it in this article.

Many times we confuse curiosity stamina with what kids demonstrate. They keep asking “Why?” questions one after the other. That is a useful start. However, that is not an indicator of curiosity stamina. Jamsetji Tata took a soil sample near Nagpur for testing in 1882. He wanted to check if the soil is right for steel production. The result was negative. He continued to perform such tests whenever a soil showed promise and kept a journal to keep track of the results. For how long? 17 years! That’s curiosity stamina. It is remaining curious around a single question or a topic for sufficiently long time. Not jumping from one question to another question from moment-to-moment. Ask yourself – how long do I remain curious around one topic? For most of us, the topic is over once a quick-fix is given.

Here are a few more examples of people demonstrating curiosity stamina:

·        Andrew Wiles: Remained curious about Fermat’s Last Theorem for more than two decades before committing to the problem for another decade. (See the story).

·        Rahul Bhatia: Remained curious about starting an airline in India for more than two decades before starting Indigo. He and his friend Rakesh Gangwal first discussed the possibility in 1985.

Is it possible to build curiosity stamina systematically? Here are a few tips:

Start a curiosity diary: One way to get started is to maintain a curiosity diary. That is what I do. It contains links to articles or newspaper cuttings which have aroused my curiosity. For example, see the clipping of the Rahul Bhatia article and highlighting of the part that made me curious. Most of the themes will be forgotten over time. Some themes will recur mostly because they resonate deeply within. They are good candidates to pursue further.

Identify the core challenge: Frame the challenge differently. For example, see “5 ways of framing a challenge”. Ask, “Why is the problem not solved yet?” See how others have tackled the challenge. Ask, “Can I make progress here?” Andrew Wiles was suggested not to work on the Fermat’s Last Theorem for his PhD because he was told, “You could spend years getting nowhere”. It is only after a new mathematical result was published in 1986 which suddenly created new hope for proving Fermat’s Last Theorem. The new result had created a linkage between Fermat’s Last Theorem and an area in which Andrew was already a known expert (called elliptical curves). It meant chances of progress were now higher.

Perform low-cost experiments: Prototyping is a great way to get to know an area. It tells you whether some aspect of an idea works and it also demonstrates whether you have the skills to make progress. It allows you to get quick feedback. You may want to try what others have already tried, just to make sure it doesn't work. Don’t forget to re-frame the challenge as you learn new things.

Look for collaborators: Many times things don’t work out the way we would have imagined. Pressure from your day-job mounts and you really feel drained. Where do you get your energy from? In such situations, it helps to have a buddy who shares your passion. It is not easy to find one. However, you increase your chances of finding one if you socialize your idea. Write a blog / paper, join a community / forum and share your thoughts / challenge / ideas. You never know from where your collaborator may come from.

These are a few things I do to keep my curiosity alive. Perhaps you may have your own ways. Please feel free to share your thoughts.