The ability to influence behaviour “positively” – yeah sure; movies do that

They can make you fall in love with man eating animals…. Fall in love is an understatement. I remember the kids going absolutely crazy at Ahungala at the sight of cubs. I mean – just think about it – the fiercest animal in the planet today. You don’t have to do it any harm. It simply needs to be just a little hungry to eat you up and crunch down your bones. But they make you love a lion, they make love a shark. And when my baby niece goes “I love shark” I really want to kill the cartoon makers. Harmful things should not be portrayed as friends with the exception of Casper!

And oh btw – I think Nandos and Chicken King should seriously think of revising their logo. And well at KFC I don’t really expect a chicken to come walking up to me and say hello. Fine, may be I’m doing something wrong but I really don’t want to know that I’m eating something that’s walking around. Eeek!

EQ goes a long way

You can have a paragraph full of qualifications that follow your name. You can have you PHD at 28. You can be extremely skilled and experienced at what you do but if you are not a good dealer with people there’s not a very long way that you can go. The theme of this blog is people. (Read the white font right at the top) What a vain topic to waste a whole blog on. But isn’t life all about ourselves- people. We spend a good half of it wondering what to do and then when you have finally have made up your mind it probably is too late.

Am I getting lost now? Well, coming back… why are People skills considered to be not very important? Can we actually teach people how to deal with other people or is it one of those natural traits that one is born with? Some people believe that winning people means winning everything. I arrogantly refuse to think about it. I don’t necessarily think that you need people to get to the top. And as I contradict myself I look at the role models and examples around. Honesty and character make you shine. They eventually win you people. They cause you happiness. A dynamic personality and extra ordinary PR skills can make people smile at you for sometime but as Stephen Covey and many others agree it is integrity and character that gets you the long lasting relation and trust of people. Yes EQ does go along way but EQ is built on the foundation of character. As I can put it nice and short – “a good people dealer is a good people leader and you can never be a good people delear at all until you are a person yourself”. Dare to disagree!

Rafters Retreat

Last Sunday we had a staff trip to Kitulgala which gave us an opportunity to see the fun side of some individuals. Rafting was a nice experience and what was nicer was jumping into a very deep part of the river thanks to the life jackets that we had on. I called my parents up before we left for rafting just in case I wasn’t coming back. Yes, I made sure to call back once we had finished and to tell them that I was unfortunately still alive and very sadly not even bruised.
All the way back it was puzzles and riddles racking people’s minds. A certainly fun-filled and delightful experience and if I may say – it also included some knowledge sharing and team working skill sharpening. As apposed to the wild life chase we had last time this was more of man against nature. I was secretly anticipating the raft toppling just to see what kind of reaction people would show but not even the killer’s fall caused us that. L Wicked thought.. he he. On a more cheerful note, nothing did go wrong except that half the team successfully managed to get themselves lost on the way back from Laxapahana. Yes, there are some pics but I’m not allowed to post them so I leave the rest to plane ol imagination.