Reflection
Name: Akshita Srivastav
Role: Psychology Research
I am sharing my learnings from Round 1 and Round 2.
Round 1: Round one had two parts in itself. The first part had technical
questions about research methodologies and approaches. After two years as
a psychology student, I have extensive textbook knowledge about research
but these questions helped me ponder about the real life applications of
them. From what I’ve researched and found it, DT is looking for conducting
psychological research on the effects of their teaching methods on the
interns. The technical part of the first round gave me insights on what kind of
problems I will be dealing with, i.e. Pedagogy. The second part of the round
focused on personality questions, it was to see if I have what it takes to be a
DT intern. Whether I’m a collaborative individual or not and what type of
leader I would make. Answering these questions was very enlightening. They
gave the opportunity to think hard about what kind of Individual I am, about
the things that I have done and about what I’m capable of.
Round 2: To be honest, round two was a lot different than what I expected it
to be. I immensely enjoyed both the videos and I like to believe that I took
something from them internally. The first video of Mr. Hariharan started with
him talking about how important it is to start by taking small steps, to not be
overwhelmed by all the information that comes towards us. Personally, I
found it really reassuring as a newcomer. Listening to him talk about
significance of big and of small contribution made me realize that I can still
contribute to the society, even as an intern. Anand Sir talked about
journaling. He emphasized how important it is to reflect on what you achieve
in a day, good or bad. Journaling helps us reflect on our contribution on a
daily basis. He highlighted that we need to keep on learning and keep in
practicing. Without putting what you’ve learned to practical use, you start
loosing the motivation but if you put too much gap in learning, you loose
curiosity. He also emphasizes that reusing internally developed components
can help speed up the process of development and increase efficiency. Mr.
Hariharan talks about Kafka as a software and how his team was able to
efficiently understand what it is, it’s workings and implement it to solve real
world problems.
The second video, by Jim Collins was especially insightful. I learned that I
need to start asking ‘What works? ’ before I begin to think about ‘Why it
works? ’ as this is the way of thinking of all great empirical minds. I learned
that if I want to be an empirical thinker, I need to find and ask the right
questions instead of looking for precise answers. That I need to be
courageous enough to ask the most audacious of questions. In order to be a
great thinker one has to increase the ratio between the questions asked and
statements made. He emphasized the importance of being interested in
others rather than trying to be interesting. On the basis of years of research,
Jim Collins concludes that in order to have a great corporation, you need to
have an efficient management and a set of core values that are
unnegotiable. These two things are more important than business strategies
and financial aid. He shared the story of how he conceded and agreed on the
importance of great leaders as opposed to good ones, in keeping a
corporation alive. He said that a great leader is ambitious for the cause, the
curiosity and to create something and not for themselves and their own
success. One of the parts that I personally found really insightful was the
stockdale paradox. He explained how you need to have unwavering faith in
yourself and your abilities but you also need to face the brutal facts of your
reality. I look forward to finding my three circles, what I’m passionate about,
what I’m genetically encoded for and how can I make myself useful. I’malso
going to implement the 10 to do objectives that Jim Collins gave as well as
his concept of Stop to do list. I found his idea of personal board of directors
very useful. I look forward to being a level five leader, to have the blend of
humility and professional charisma, to be ambitious but for my organization
rather than my fame. These concepts have encouraged me to dive deeper
into the ideologies of Peter Drucker.
Overall, these rounds have helped me realize how I can improve and what
practices I can implement in my day to day decision making.