Thought Leadership

  Why Great Problems Never Get Solved    Click the Link Below to Read 👇   https://www.linkedin.com/posts/shahnawaz-qasim-ips-16583110_humanityleadershipseries-leadership-activity-6748468469097926656-0YJF Photo by Miguel Á. Padriñán from Pexels

  In Leadership Journey Never Forget These 3 Three Engagements    Click the Link Below to Read 👇   https://www.linkedin.com/posts/shahnawaz-qasim-ips-16583110_humanityleadershipseries-leadership-activity-6748241352338812928-mXiv Photo by Daria Shevtsova from Pexels

  Are we Merely Numbers ?  Click the Link Below to Read 👇 https://www.linkedin.com/posts/shahnawaz-qasim-ips-16583110_humanityleadershipseries-leadership-management-activity-6745917250936598528-gQWx Credit : Photo by Black ice from Pexels

Your Some Truths will get demolished someday  Suppose truths which we have been born believing into suddenly get questioned. How do we react ? Our responses to our own credible doubts are our first test of impartiality It is a commonly held belief that the Greeks taught the world the finer elements of Mathematics including Trigonometry. Hipparchus (100 B.C) is regarded as father of Trigonometry Plimpton 322 But the Babylonian Tablet Plimpton 322 recently decoded tells a different story altogether. This Tablet precedes Hipparchus by over 1500 years  Plimpton 322 reveals that the Babylonian were already using Trigonometry based on the sexagesimal system unlike the decimal system later used by the Greeks  Then who is the father of Trigonometry ?  Learn the Lessons  There are many lessons to learn from this factual observations.  Our worldly truths are like the truths of the Cosmos. Always changing & perpetually surprising  Never ever fixate your mi...

The Uniformity in Digital World  The European Union(EU) wants to create a common charger for all the phones. It wants complete uniformity in electronic accessories The EU wants to reduce the electronic waste due to diversity in the phone chargers The similar efforts in 2009 failed due to interoperability between devices But in Technology the uniformity ultimately gets achieved for the ease of doing business Diversity is Humanity  But imagine creating similar controlled uniformity in human thoughts, ideas, ideology, perceptions etc in our existence It would be a Herculean disaster in the leadership of Ideas What looks as absolute necessity when we deal with Natural Sciences looks totally unscientific when we interact with the Social Sciences We as the people must know that there are worlds existing within the world. There are mini universes being born & breathing within the same universe Let me tell you the greatest Thumb Rule of human existence “ Uniformity is a blessing ...

Translations laid the foundation of civilization  Every year 30th September is celebrated as the International Translation Day.  The art of translation actually laid the foundation of human civilization & its subsequent progress The Sumerians were the first to translate thoughts into pictorial languages The Akadians, Assyrians, Egyptians & the Babylonians improved upon it The civilization also improved along with it Translation is the transfer of Ideas & Vision  If the Greeks would not have borrowed Alphabets from the Phoenicians & then translated the Mesopotamian knowledge, there would have been no philosophy If the Arab-Persian-Turkish system would not have translated the Greek, Indian & Chinese knowledge, there would have been no Medieval civilization If the West would not have translated the Indian & the Arab- Persian- Turkish knowledge there would have been no Renaissance & the modern civilization Translation is the transmission of leaders...

Madness and civilization Michel Foucault, the french philosopher wrote the famous book Madness and civilization. His views changed the perception of Deviance from individualistic to collective in the social framework. No worldwide intellectual circles of that time remained untouched from his book  Look at things  differently  There was also one scholar who read this book. But his attention got fixated on a passing small paragraph which read “ ‘ In the universality of the Western ratio, there is a division which is the Orient … The Orient is for the Occident everything that it is not ”  This small paragraph evoked sea of thoughts in the mind of Edward Said & the rest is history in the field of Post colonial intellectualism  Influenced by the paragraph, Edward Said wrote “ Orientalism” which is considered one of the most influential books of the 20th century. From this book was born the concept of Orientalism which changed our perception forever  Ironi...

Do not value the Periphery More  “ Whether the history exists or not is doubtful but there is no doubt that the historians exist. ” Thus lamented a great scholar of history once We value the periphery more than the core as it is easily accessible. To understand the crux one has to transcend the margins & that is difficult While learning we tend to get more influenced by the narrator than the Process, Facts & Events itself. This makes us vulnerable to one sided & distorted understanding of the phenomena The Wisdom to Learn  That is why Wisdom teaches us to always isolate the Matter, Narrator & the Phenomena separately Matter & Phenomena definitely has a natural inbuilt connection with each other. But the Narrator is an artificial construct to both of them. It has the power to redesign the Matter & Phenomena relationship to the point of falsification So do not attach more value to narrators than what is required. Attach much higher value to yourself to un...

History is Not Only About History  Generally we read History to understand the society, culture, polity, economy, governance etc of that era. Often we compare those aspects with our present times & deduce learning inferences But how many of us read History from a geographical & topographical perspective to understand climate change ? The Imperceptible  When Alexander marched through Persia, his historians talk about greenery, fertile plains, flowing waters etc in one of the provinces. But in the 19th century another historian talks about the same province as arid & dry There are innumerable such geographical inferences from history Some climatologists study history to compare the climates of the two eras & deduce their findings Such climatologist offer one simple & effortless solutions to the study of climate change The above discussion highlights the importance of “Seeking & Perspective” Seek what you Seek  You get what you seek even from the most...

The Great Imbalance  Have you ever realised the great imbalance we have created in our Self Communication System . Though inadvertently developed but it has a profound & lasting impact on your leadership attributes Speaking, listening & writing are the core  Self Communication System   which connects your personality to the outer world. It's like the visa by which you enter the other people’s mind  But to avail the visa one has to first get the passport    Picture credit : Thought Catalog from Pexels  The Passport to Success  Reading is the passport of your personality. Without it your entire  Self Communication System    is an exercise in self deception  We must have read upteem articles about personalities & their reading lists. Their list is not so important. But the fact that they read is some pointer towards their success  Now the basic question is what to read. The answer is a simple formula which I have ...

The Epic of Gilgamesh "If you want a new idea, read an old book" said a wise man onceThe earliest recorded epic is from the Sumerian Civilization called the "Epic of Gilgamesh"(3000 BC ). It is in the form of five surviving poems Gilgamesh was the ruler of Uruk. He wanted to go to war with the kingdom of Kish Gilgamesh knew that Ego has no place in leadership matters First he consulted the council of elders who always opposed him. As expected they opposed his ideas & plans Next he deliberated with another council of elders who supported his course of actions Now it was Gilgamesh turn to take decisions based on the different advices What Gilgamesh did afterward is another matter of debate Hear all the Sides  Leadership means hearing all the sides of the arguements including the one opposed to your vision, strategy & tactics Those who are convinced & have faith in their own vision have the confidence to hear all shades of the arguements Those who desist fr...

Neccesity is the Mother of Inventions  The prehistoric humans had no written form of communication. Every communication was oral The earliest form of written communication was pictorial. But it could not serve the purpose The Sumerians developed the cuneiform writing. But it was no easy task to remember more than 300 different wedges & even more combinations of wedges Religion popularized the written style of communication  The Akkadians popularized  cuneiform writing  by creating religious hymns in this style The Assyrians refined  cuneiform writing  & the Babylonians shaped it to the point of Alphabets The Phoenicians created the Alphabet system of Writing. The Greeks borrowed the style & created Philosophers out of this A human Revolution in Communication has begun. Art, literature, philosophy, medicine, history, geography etc took birth from the womb of Alphabets No Ideas are Original No Ideas are Original per se. But Improvisations are most...

How Thought Leadership makes the difference The Egyptian, Assyrian & Babylonian civilizations were almost contemporaneous at some point of time in history. All three were glorious chapters in human progress. But there is a stark differences between the Egyptian & the other two civilizations The legacies, memories & the visible representations of Egyptian civilization has survived till now. We can see the pyramids, mummies, tombs, texts etc etc .But the other two have almost faded away in history. It took lots of efforts to trace out & join the dots of Assyrian & Babylonian Civilization. But for the Egyptian it was available in all its splendor  & glory from the first day  Why was it so ?  The Egyptians built their entire civilization with rocks, stones, indestructible materials while the Assyrians & Babylonians entirely with the clay. Same material was available to both. But it was the matter of choice. One Civilization thought about the long t...

Perspective is everything  When we talk about the Greek Civilization, we are generally talking about the Athenians. We are seeing history from the POV of the Athenians. We are not witnessing history from the perspective of the Corinthians, Spartans,Thebans or anyone else The celebrated intellectual E. H. Carr says that we must find the missing POVs of everybody to understand the real history behind any history Everybody's perspective is essential in understanding the completeness of any issue. Those who seemingly matter less actually matters more in the real facts The complete perspective  This is equally true for leadership. The completeness of the perspective is essential to the success of the leader. A leader must have eyes & ears to find & listen to all the unheard voices in the organisation Unrepresented, unheard & silenced voices are graveyards of leadership Those who represent more, shout more & have more access to leadership necessarily does not me...

The Oldest Recorded Civilization Known To Man is The Sumerian Civilization The oldest recorded civilization known to man is the Sumerian civilization which existed in the present day area of Iraq starting from 4500 B.C. The Sumerians were the first to invent the Cuneiform Writing which later became the modern day Alphabet System. They were the first to advocate Individual Freedom and that’s why they started the first codification of laws to set the limits of the state. They were the first to ever record the concept of Democratic Assembly as mentioned in one of their poems. The concept of state started with the Sumerian. We are a civilization today because the basic foundations of it were laid in the Sumerian civilization. How We Are Still Following The Sumerian Schooling System There are many contributions and interesting facts about the Sumerians. In this article we will concentrate on one of its most interesting aspects- Education & Schooling System. The facts concerning Educatio...

The earliest book on plague  One of the finest books to read on Pandemics or Epidemics is “ A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe”. This book is basically a journal which details about the bubonic plague which devastated London in the 17th century.  It is same today  Some of the incidents and social circumstances described in this book are no different from what is happening today in corona crisis worldwide. Sample one paragraph from the book. The sample Reading  “This was a very terrible and melancholy thing to see, and as it was a sight which I could not but look on from morning to night, for indeed there was nothing else of moment to be seen, it filled me with very serious thoughts of the misery that was coming upon the city, and the unhappy condition of those that would be left in it. This hurry of the people was such for some weeks that there was no getting at the Lord Mayor’s door without exceeding difficulty ; there template was such pressing and crowdi...

Father of History Nobody can claim to know history without knowing 𝓗𝓔𝓡𝓞𝓓𝓞𝓣𝓤𝓢. Herodotus is regarded as the father of history. The 9 volumes  He wrote his 9 volumes of books called Histories. This book deals extensively on the history of the Greco-Persian wars fought in the 5th century BC. Herodotus is believed to have written his voluminous book around 440 BC. Though the book is not what we know as academic history today. But definitely it is the first and most successful endeavor to write history comprehensively. Most of our knowledge about the Persian Empire of that time comes from this book.  The Greek POV The book is not impartial in its observations as it is written from the point of view POV of the Greeks. Nevertheless the Style, Geography, Events, Descriptions of war etc dealt in the books are matters worth going through. If you love history you will love Herodotus. The sample below is the history from his book. "My history hence proceeds to inquire who Cyrus w...

Leadership & Society  I𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝗺𝗮𝗻, 𝗴𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗵𝗶𝗺 𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿. 𝗕𝘂𝘁 𝗶𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝘀𝗼𝗰𝗶𝗲𝘁𝘆, 𝘁𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗮𝘄𝗮𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿 . COVID 19 & the society  With the grave threat of COVID19 , all societies have seen reduction in their social and economic powers. There is scarcity of capital, infrastructure, equipment, medicines, doctors, leadership etc. This is the loss of power of any society. Now is the time to see and observe which society shows unity, resilience, compassion and farsightedness in the fight against the pandemic.  The compassionate societies  Only those societies which have qualities bereft of hubris hubris in abundance would be able to cope with the aftermath. Those who lack those qualities would carry the scars much longer and may collapse one day. It is not only about material things that keeps any society away from t...

Truth too needs symbols  Truth, even though it is truth, still requires symbolism to highlight itself. One of the most iconic examples that can be cited is of Socrates, the Great Greek philosopher. Bertrand Russell writes " Oracle of Delphi was once asked if there were any man wiser than Socrates, and the oracle replied that there was not". Socrates the philosopher  Socrates was put to trial and condemned to death by the Athenian establishment. The charge against Socrates was that he was corrupting the minds of the people specially the young generations. Most of what we know about Socrates comes from the writing of his two pupils Plato and Xenophon. Plato, himself a great philosopher, was present in the court during the trial of Socrates and he wrote the entire dialogues of Socrates in the form of the book called “𝗔𝗽𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝘆" The Apology  At the end of the trial Socrates addresses the unjust court and remarks “ 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗱𝗲𝗽𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗵𝗮𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗿𝗶...

Rumi Jalaluddin Mohammad Rumi, popularly known as Rumi, is one of the greatest and most widely read mystic poet. He lived around the region of present day Turkey in the 13th century AD.  Shams Tabrez  He wrote mostly in Persian.. Shams –i- Tabrizi was the wandering Sufi who ignited the fire of mysticism and love in Rumi. It is said that Shams –i- Tabrizi shaped the entire intellectual consciousness of Rumi. Rumi says about him 𝙁𝙧𝙪𝙞𝙩𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝙢𝙮 𝙚𝙭𝙞𝙨𝙩𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙚 𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙗𝙪𝙩 𝙩𝙝𝙧𝙚𝙚: 𝙄 𝙬𝙖𝙨 𝙧𝙖𝙬, 𝙄 𝙗𝙚𝙘𝙖𝙢𝙚 𝙘𝙤𝙤𝙠𝙚𝙙, 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙄 𝙗𝙪𝙧𝙣𝙩 Maqalat –e- shams-i-Tabrizi Shams and Rumi had intellectual discussions and these were noted by Rumi’s students. The notes were compiled by an Iranian scholar into a book “Maqalat –e- shams-i-Tabrizi, The Discourses of Shams –i- Tabrizi. This book gives us the best insight into the mystic genius of both the great souls. Rumi’s Mathnawai is regarded as the one of greatest poetry book ever written. After translation into ...