For the past few years, I have started to think about the origins of some of my ideas. There is never a single ‘Eureka’ moment – in most cases there is a chain of connected conversations or events. The Velvet Rope Marketing came about when I picked up a book by Peter Fader form my bookshelf; the book itself had been bought because I chose to spend a few extra hours in New York’s Strand Book Store because my Air India flight to Mumbai had been delayed a few hours and I had to checkout from the hotel. I wrote about this in “Life’s Daily Clue” (as part of my Proficorn series), and concluded: “It is therefore important for the entrepreneur to go through many different experiences – talking to different people, reading widely, taking time off to be alone, traveling to new places. Each creates a new clue – if one knows where to look. Each prints a new dot – to be joined with others. It is from these clues that new patterns start forming.” As I think about it now, it is much more than a clue – any event can be the start of a connecting thread, which leads us to a new portal of ideas and experiences.
When we are unable to explain or connect the dots, we see it as luck. As I wrote, “At some level, decisions we make cause us to be in situations where we can get lucky. Had my initial efforts at creating a successful business not failed, I would not have started IndiaWorld. When I got an offer to sell Netcore in 2011, was it luck? And when I look back, was it good luck that the buyer backed out at the last minute? What would my life have been had I sold Netcore a decade ago? Life is all about a stream of events and decisions. What we think of luck are just decisions either we made or someone else did. At times, it is better to ascribe it to an unseen force than take up ownership especially when things are not going right!”
My broader point is that we should pay a little more attention to the connections in our lives. One event leads to another, which in turn opens another door. We have to put ourselves in places where these connections can happen. The equivalent in relationships is the idea of “weak ties”: “In social networks, you have different links — or ties — to other people. Strong ties are characterized as deep affinity; for example family, friends or colleagues. Weak ties, in contrast, might be acquaintances, or a stranger with a common cultural background. The point is that the strength of these ties can substantially affect interactions, outcomes and well-being.”
We should put ourselves in situations where our connections can expand – meetings, conferences, travels, readings, reflections. When something interesting happens, think for a few moments on how that came about, what was the chain of moments leading up to that moment. It is these connections that make life so rich and varied, so full of surprises.
As James Burke wrote, “Following the trail of events that leads from some point in the past to the emergence of a modern invention that affects our lives is like being involved in a detective story, in which the reader will know at any particular stage in the story’s development only as much as did the people of the time. As each story unfolds it will become clear that history is not, as we are so often led to believe, a matter of great men and lonely geniuses pointing the way to the future from their ivory towers. At some point every member of society is involved in the process by which innovation and change comes about, and this book may help to show that given average intelligence and the information available to the innovators of the past, any reader could have matched their achievements.”
Our life is a story of connections. I have seen this in my life. There are many in my life that have materialised a sequence of events that has changed the course for me. Whether it was the sale of IndiaWorld or my entry into the world of politics, it is the “connections” that have made all the difference.
