New youtube channel - niche down or go wide

 I have been planning content and what I will make my videos about on YouTube.

I am glad that I have gone over the hump and started to push small videos as shorts meanwhile. two shorts have gone out, while I have prepared some content for my channel.

The biggest question where I see a lot of contradictory advice is whether to narrow down or go broad-based on your interest.

it's quite confusing.

Youtube being the second biggest search engine in the world, means that you can get visibility by making useful content on a completely different topic - I have been thinking of making a video about our three-year ownership of Volvo XC90, what are the things that I love about the car, and what are the things that I don't like about the vehicle. similarly, considering collating videos from our recent trip to Wisconsin, as a travel log to showcase where we stayed and how we planned our trip.

On the other hand, I can see that building your channel on a particular theme, around the persona of the viewer is a strong approach as well. There is absolutely no doubt about it, but can it be too painful to collect feedback just by choosing a topic or persona like that. how do I know that niche will work?

I am torn, but I am thinking that at the beginning I should make videos on broader ideas, create separate playlists, and see how the world's second-largest search engine treats my content.

I will return to record my observations.

if you have not seen my channel, pls check it out here iSaurabhMittal - YouTube

Cheers

A new beginning - my youtube channel is here

After toying with the idea for a long time, I pushed myself ahead by starting my YouTube channel today.

the first video is live and available here https://youtu.be/YtoD79pmALk 

Creating video content is harder than the textual format which has been my preferred mode for content creation.

Several skills come together to create a video.

- writing the idea

- creating a thumbnail which essentially needs some design and photography

- shooting video - is the easiest in the scheme of things

- editing the video - there is no upper limit here

As I have started, I have kept it simple.

my goal for first few videos is to do them a talkhead style and then collect feedback.

Let us see where this goes.

Cheers

This post is to clear my mind and help move forward

I am writing this post to clear my mind and document where I was in the middle of 2024, a day before my birthday.

The last 4 months have been hard. 

There is very little happening in the market. 

B2b sales are down. 

The pipeline is dry. My days are dead.

There are tons of ideas that I have executed to improve the situation:

1. Attending conferences to bring in new leads.
2. Reach out to every contact we have spoken to in the past 2 years. anyone with whom we have first-round meetings, demoss or any type of contact made this list.
3. Drive inside sales team to industry-focused outreach,  dedicated accounts list to reach into named accounts list.
4. Writing campaigns that have a tremendous open rate but zero inquiries.
5. Continuous training to the inside sales team on phone calls emails, and LinkedIn.
6. Writing a ton of content on LinkedIn myself to share what I am learning (and hoping that this will spread the word, and get us established as a thought leader).

Nothing has worked so far. 

The only positives have been:

1. Increased views on LinkedIn. Some of my posts went into 6k views 
2. Strong open rates for emails written by me. these are over 15% open rates. Some of my written emails have been used by my team, which has done well.

I have a feeling of burning out. 

However, There have been a few existing customer conversations. [I am planning to get involved deeply there].

What do I enjoy doing the most?

my ultimate favorite thing to do throughout my career is consulting and helping customers. specifically, working on a high-level transformation journey, where I get to study a CIO or CISO goals and turn that into vision. this generally requires understanding pain points across systems, use cases, goals, and systems. almost like a business architect or an enterprise business architect.

The second thing I enjoy the most in my roles is consulting at a granular level. driving initiatives and projects with my team, more like a delivery leader who can sell more and more to customers, by way of delivering results and building a relationship.

None of those are happening right now. 

Existing customers are maximized and not the reason for our problems.

We cannot land new customers. 

What can happen next?

There are a few scenarios that I can see playing out. 

I have seen these play out in my head so many times. 

It is worth writing on a piece of paper (or this blog) to get them out of my system.

1. Status quo- Nothing changes for the next few weeks. After our company is merged with the acquiring company, then we see an uptick in conversations and opportunities.
2. Finding another opportunity where I move out. This is a low-possibility item, given the market is slow, too many layoffs, and tons of talent in the market.
3. Finding a new customer via our inside sales efforts. All it takes is one good opportunity that can change everything. this is likely, but inside sales trends have been poor in the past 4 weeks.
4. I get fired. least likely knowing my CEO. but, if I were at any other place, I wouldn't be around. Most companies and leaders don't like to point things towards themselves, and it is easiest to fire others. 

My CEO understands that and also knows that I am the best in the industry with the stack of skills that I bring to the table.

To keep me from going insane, I am spending time reading good material, continuously executing email campaigns, and thinking about how can we keep our message sharp.

Apart from that, I am trying to spend time on other things outside of work (though unable to completely plug it off).

Cheers for now.

The Joys of Security conferences

The security conferences scene is exploding...
with fluff.  Some honest talk is below. 👇

It is a bubble that may last longer than I like.

The keynotes are regurgitating high-level common sense stuff.

The solutions are generic. Vendors are desperate to speak to Prospects.

As a vendor, If you don't attend the conferences, there is this fear of missing out.

Vendors swarm executives. 

They may have access to funds. 

Not because they are thought leaders.

You realize,

• more than half of the "Executives" showed up for free food, to build their social profiles, to skip work, or all of it.
• most have no intentions, interest, or authority to make a buying decision [irrespective of their titles].

Who is having fun on whose cost is unclear?

A clear case where selling shovels is more profitable than digging gold.

How to do deep work and accomplish great things, learnings from Cal Newport

 Listening and reading to cal Newport has been refreshing. I have heard great things about his book "Deep Work" and it has been sitting on my table for a few days.

I happened to listen to a couple of his podcasts, and YouTube videos.

I also dive deeper into his book and start devouring some of the chapters. Here are some of the lessons I came out learning from the book, and I thought I would share

What qualifies as deep work?

It must demand brain power.

Things that are hard and need us to think, plan and engage our brains.
It must happen without distractions and context changes.

A zone where we only focus on one thing.

Why focus on deep work?

It moves the needle. It is the Strategy. the Big decisions. The Directional ideas. These are important to our lives, helping us achieve big goals.
Shallow work is necessary as it moves things and keeps the light on. We need to strike the right balance based on our job or work.

Here are a few strategies cal suggests:

1. Know Your ratio of Deep Vs Shallow work. Each of them is important in its own way but be aware of what is your mix.
2. Study your work pattern. Establish an approach that works for you. Cal outlined the following:

Monastic approach - Focus on that one thing.Disconnecting from everything else.

Biomodal approach- Shuttling between the two. Turn into a monastic and then return to normal. A few hours a day or a few days a week of distraction-free time.

Rythmic approach - Finding a secured time on a daily or a rhythmic basis to do your goals. This is shorter in comparison to monastic or bimodal approaches. For example, 15 mins to write every day.

Journalistic approach - Making the best use of time when you can find it. Using time emergencies to induce and complete work.

3. Set up a space and a routine for deep work. Make it non-negotiable.
4. Set up a ritual. It may be the desk or the cup or drinking coffee or closing the door of the room. Let your brain knows that it's time for work.

What are the practical tips that have helped you carry out deep work?

Finding where to go is the most difficult thing in the world

 The resistance is real.

In enterprise sales, there are days when your calendar is already filled. you have meetings, proposals to finish, pricing calculations to be done, slides to review, executive summaries to write, and deliver presentations.

But, there are days when you are faced with an empty calendar. A blank sheet of white paper.

When those days come right after a grueling work week, it's a welcome change. you relax. organize your work. think about strategy, improve, and prepare for the next thing.

but when these days are followed by empty calendar days, the resistance becomes your enemy.

Breaking the rhythm becomes really difficult.

It becomes hard to differentiate if this is temporary or permanent.

To some degree everyone faces it. 

We want our strings attached to someone or something, so they can pull us.

Having a clear direction to march towards is such a luxury. 

You are told where to go, and what to do.

But the hardest thing in the world is to put that plan for yourself, let alone an entire organization.

Why no is reading my posts? Or newsletter? Or cold emails

 The above questions have plagued me often.

This is a constant question i ask myself every few days when I notice a plateau.

In my pursuit for engagement, I turn to twitter.

I drown in the ocean of smart writers, great hooks and threads.

They have so much to say, yet the real connection missing. That secret sauce is often behind a sales page in form of a ebook or a guide or a course.
A ton of them offer their highest value product Free. ”only until this friday”. If only you gave them the email ID right now.

But, my question remains open.

This question is like asking

"What is the meaning of life".

There is no one answer.

Plus it may not be worth finding the answer but living and experiencing.
Here is what has what has helped me move forward every time i ask that question.

Clarity and Purpose

What is that i am sending that email? why i am writing weekly? What is the larger purpose behind? knowing this is important. it reminds you of your mission. Doing something without a mission can be disorienting.

Who is this for, What is in it for them

Why should they read? It is important to continue to sharpen the persona for whom you write. It better be not for everything. and, why? Assuming that persona and putting yourself in those shoes, tells you what may be worth their time. Why should they read? why should they get on a call? why should they leave everything and listen to you?

Embrace Trial and Error mindset

This is the life and blood of anyone who works with any creative pursuit. No one knows the recipie. heck, if there is one, it changes. People are doing million things. so, it is important to start with a failure case in mind, and adapt trial and error mindset.

Simplicity of the message is super power

The simplicity is key. writing in simple language. focusing on benefits. not blowing your own horn. keeping the message short. the simplicity matters. Dont over complicate it.

Staying at it if the purpose is noble

The final piece is to pick yourself up and show up. even when you feel like giving up, do it one more time. remind yourself about the goal and the purpose. If the purpose is noble, stay the course.

Here are 7 powerful Daily practices that have a deep impact on my work, personal life, and mindset

 The biggest gains in life come from compounding. be it an investment of money, time, or building skills. The longer the time horizon the bigger skill you can build.

A shortcut method will not work. Here are things that give me immediate returns on invested time. I ask you to try them out and include them in your day.

7 hours of sleep

sleep is a game changer. Our brains have neuroplasticity which means they can change. The right sleep and nutrition can do amazing things for us. Lebron James schedules everything around 10 hrs of sleep at night. He knows sleep is at the core of peak performance.

10 glasses of water

Once you start chugging more water, you realize how dehydrated you have always been. Drinking more water gives me higher energy, reduces fatigue, and keeps me active.

Write to untangle your head

I have been guilty of not being regular. The days I write are calmer. Writing down first thing or in the first hours of the morning helps me untangle my mind and reduce anxiety. My tip is not to not write with a pre-set format or prompts. write as your head wants. keep it open-ended. the mind will clear itself.

Exercise to change your state

Exercise is amazing. it has one of the fastest ROIs. you don't need to run a marathon or deadlift 500 pounds to get benefits. a few mins of sprinting can fire you up. Tony Robbins says, change your state to change your mindset and strategy. Something that ups your heartbeat and gets blood pumping can do wonders for our mental state.

2 to 5 mins of Deep Breathing

2 to 5 mins of deep breathing can clear your head. the extra oxygen helps calm the body and reset the monkey's mind. I usually do this a few times a day, and it feels incredible.

5 mins of Meditation

Sitting down and meditating is a game changer. My personal practice is not to use any chants. I sit down with my thoughts. 10 mins of meditation have great benefits throughout the day.

Fasting for 16 hrs

I have been intermittent fasting now for over a year. I eat my first meal at 12:30 and my dinner at 7:45 pm. The mornings are chugging water and coffee. This has been great for me. It has ROIed in reducing weight, making me fitter, more active, and more attentive compared to my old self.

That's it.
What are your favorite activities? The ones that have a quick return on time investment in improving your days?

Controlling what is controllable in enterprise sales

 Everyone wants to get the sales, bring more customers, and add revenue.

Every leader wants results.

Outcomes matter. But, are they in anyone’s control?

Spending any type of money, talent or any resources can’t guarantee results.

They can increase your probability.

So, why not leaders and the community start focusing on the process.

What is in their control?

What can they influence?

It’s the effort. The method. The process.

Every leader that asks for results, or wants to deliver outcomes should focus on the quality and direction of the effort.

A strong focused effort will always yield results.

But focusing on outcomes only means results will elude you.

The outcome focused culture only breeds frustration, anxiety and the revolving door policies that a lot of companies in the US are famous for. 

If the sales resources/leaders dont bring in revenue, lay the team off, hire a new one and start again.

That needs to stop.

Notes from the book - Extreme Ownership

 This is a solid book. You must have read A lot of the principles in various books. What makes it special is the storyline, and lessons learned from SEAL training & War experiences.

The book has 12 chapters around 12 key principles.

Every chapter starts with an anecdote from a war experience.

That follows a principle explanation

and followed by the “application to business’ section.

This is another way to read the book if you wish to skip the war experience storytelling.

I particularly found application to business helpful.

Here is what I learned from it.

1. Extreme ownership- acknowledge mistakes, not blame others. It is about leading the team to success.
2. There are no bad teams, only bad leaders. Extreme Ownership means taking full responsibility for projects, teams, and outcomes.
3. It is not what you preach, it's what you tolerate. Focus on Quality and performance. Set Benchmarks. Iterate until teams achieve those and provide support to make those happen.
4. Believing in the cause and spreading the ‘why’. Understanding why something is being done helps teams persevere through challenges.
5. Team and mission should always be above ego. Operating with a high degree of humility is important for leaders and teams.
6. Success is always a shared goal. It comes from understanding the end goal and the role everyone has to play to get there.
7. Complexity compounds every problem. Keeping things simple and concise is important. This applies to communication, protocols, expectations, goals, and everything.
8. Focus and execute. Determine the highest priority tasks and execute them. It helps not lose focus, or get lost in the details. Communicate priorities. Ask for inputs. then go solve them and execute. Repeat the process.
9. Setting up decentralized command. setup boundaries and within those, let everyone make decisions and experiment. It is important for leaders to step back and have a bigger and broader point of view.
10. Planing is the most critical part of executing any mission. Even more important is the post-mission brief. It is critical to reflect and learn. Consider that as your own feedback loop. The purpose of the plan - objectives should be clear to all the folks responsible for executing it.
11. Leading up/down the chain. The big picture should be always understood by the team. Leaders and teams must understand each other’s roles. They are always working to achieve a common goal. Take responsibility for leading everyone be it superiors or juniors or peers.
12. Leaders must act decisively amid uncertainty based on available information. The picture is never complete, perfect or 100% data is available.

The 90 day notice Period. Why a dangerous bubble is building in the Indian IT Industry

 Great resignation gets a lot of attention. But, Due to the talent crunch, its flip side is companies throwing absurd amounts of money to retain and attract new talents. In a competitive market like India, IT talent with niche skills get 3 to 5 offers each. Candidates use these offers to trade better packages. Here is why I am happy about it, and also alarmed by this trend.

1. Apart from a few organizations pushing people to return to the office, access to talent has flattened. You could work from anywhere and deliver the goods. The value of good talent has gone up.
2. Any biased arrangement eventually fails. Indian IT Industry has been running the practice of 2 to 3 months notice period. It is an attempt to strangle talent, of course, making new hiring even more painful. Due to this, Engineers have realized their value appreciates every day while they are on notice period. They are taking full advantage of it.
3. Hiring companies splurge on an engineer who has 15 15-day notice period vs 90 days. It gives them an edge in fulfilling a requirement for a customer.

I am happy for the IT engineering community to take full advantage of the potential. I won't take any high moral grounds here, because the industry leaders & companies have not set a great example.

However, I see a major downside to this trend:

1. The flattening of the world is squeezing the contracts. Customers are not paying more. Margins are not going up. Money splurged by the hiring companies will come from these diminishing margins and bottom lines.
2. Business is not sustainable if the cost of doing business becomes higher than the value it creates.
3. It is commendable to pocket a great package after negotiating several offers but may come at a risk. Companies that are today involved in bidding wars may become unstable tomorrow. Companies would resort to cutting staff the moment they are unable to meet the revenue & margin targets. This is setting up an approach of hiring and firing for business needs.
4. The strongest offers don’t mean cutting edge or most exciting projects.
5. Wealth creation happens on sustained long-term bets. The short-term uptick from negotiations won't help.

Companies should make policy changes with notice periods. Our next progression will come from automation & building a gig culture, and not trying to retain talent by these unscrupulous methods.

I cut my 7 meals a day down to 2 and I am not going back

 For the past month and a half, I've been eating two times a day. The experience has been liberating. In this post, I share my experience and some of my learnings through this change. The outcome has been great, and I am not going back.

Daily Routine Before I made the change

• Start of the day: A cup of tea + 2 biscuits
• Breakfast @ 9: 3 eggs or oats. A couple of toasts of bread with peanut butter.
• Snack @ 11:30: granola bars, fruits, junk sometimes.
• Lunch @1: Typical Indian lunch- vegetables, Curry, and a couple of roti (bread)
• Snack @3:30: granola bar
• Tea time @5:30- 6: some small food serving.
• 7:00-7:30 I would have a protein shake with water & a spoon of peanut butter after getting back from the gym.
• Dinner @ 8:30- vegetables, curry with roti.
• late-night snack. (occasionally)
• Four Cups of Tea. 2% milk sugar.
• One cup of coffee. Pour-over, black & no sugar.

What changed?

• I eat two times a day.
• My first meal is at 1 p.m.
• My second & last meal is around 7:30 p.m.
• I drink a lot of water.
• Three cups of tea. One cup of coffee. No sugar.
• I don't drink any liquor.
• No snacking. No binging.
• Read and learn about insulin and how the body produces and stores energy/fat

Observations in the past 45 days?

• I am much more attentive throughout the day.
• No effect or impact on my way of training or resistance training.
• No negative effect on my work routine.

This change showed me how much wasteful eating I was indulging in. It cant be useful to my body since what I am operating is far more efficient.

How do you make a shift?

1. The first barrier is to make a mental shift. There is an adaptation in unlearning eating patterns and shifting over to fasting.
2. The image of Feasting and fasting has been impactful on me. That is how humans have lived for millions of years as a species. We should not be snacking all day.
3. Start slow.
4. if 18 hrs of fasting is not an enticing idea, reduce # of times you eat.
5. Give a minimum of 4 hrs gaps in between meals. let the body digest what it has gotten, and not always be in a catch-up mode.

This has been a great experience.

Fast forward, a year from writing this post, I documented 7 daily practices that have impacted my life and work in a powerful way

I found the following videos and Doctors as mentors on these subjects

10 work ethic traits we can learn from Ravish Kumar

If you listen to Indian news, you have heard about Ravish Kumar, NDTV. It does not matter if you like or dislike him, agree with his style or not. You can not ignore him.

I highlight Ten traits we can learn from him and apply to whatever you and I are doing. These are also the reason according to me why ravish continues to be visible and appreciated.

1. Detailed- Ravish's reporting and analysis is impeccably and sometimes painfully detailed. He comes with specific clauses & snippets from govt websites, international press, and sources. On issues like jobs, immigrants, ravish has built a massive library of reporting work.
2. Find a new viewpoint- Ravish is a good storyteller. However, his genius lies in finding a fresh point of view when everyone is focused on one viewpoint.
3. Use facts and backgrounds - Ravish leverages facts and data points heavily. He presents facts instead of using emotions to create impact.
4. Leverage community - Ravish is seen quoting and leveraging other experts in the community. He shares good work from various reporters, organizations outside of NDTV.
5. Give credit - He often credits his colleagues, reports, cameramen, and border community for their contribution. He is regularly seen recommending good books and reports.
6. Focus on substance - He doesn't indulge in bickering around the issues. He focuses on substance. He dives deep into long-tail subjects.
7. Keep things simple - His reporting style, studio setup, etc are super simple.
8. Keep it calm - He doesn't invite 20 people to the panel. He doesn't shout. He is not animated or raises his voice.
9. Show up every day - He shows up every day with detailed work, day after day. It is visible in his reports. He proves there are no shortcuts for doing great work.
10. Sarcasm - he is highly sarcastic and uses it to wake up listeners.

What did you think of these 10 points? share in Comments.

Ravish kumars book