Non Selective Listener but Selective Communicator

Published On - June 22, 2021

Makarand Patwardhan

You must be wondering what this fellow is referring to. I was also wondering same thing, when 3 decades back, when I was a novice planner, my boss told me these lines.

Let me take you back in time, when desktops have just arrived on corporate scene, and we were thrilled to use Lotus 123. For all our calculations we were dependant on Calculators (my boss used to have Casio scientific calculator (many of you might have heard about this)).

As Internal opportunity came, I was shifting from “Research” to “PPIC”, yes, it was possible to shift like this! In Research, we always used to envy the PPIC fellows, as they used to be omnipresent, used to talk with every fellow in factory, used to attend meetings with big bosses and so on.

First day in PPIC for me was like entering a foreign language class in full swing. There were nine fellows in PPIC office and whole day I was trying to digest the new terminologies like Rolling Plan, Frozen period, Planning Bucket, likely to be available, operations report, OPD (over printing data), first pack approval, line clearance, so on and so forth. Next day I met Boss and asked him, apart from learning the techniques of planning, what else will help to be a better planner. (In today’s terminology, I was asking which soft skills need to be learned and/or improved to be a better planner)

Coming back to point, boss just said “You need to be non-selective listener but selective communicator”. He took me on factory round, which lasted for four and half hours.  Apart from production persons, we met so many non-production persons like maintenance, engineering, projects, warehouse, quality, Data Centre (We used to have data entry operators), factory medical doctor, ……. list goes on. Boss used to talk with everybody and ask any exception to share. e.g., maintenance fellow will inform, there is break down of some machine which he is attending just now, &how much time it will take to repair etc. Boss will make mental note and we will proceed further. After returning to PPIC office, he went on calling various departments for updating any corrective actions or change in plans.

He then emphasized the sentence which he told, as a planner you should be like a sponge and absorb all the information coming in and then analyse. It should “Click” as to which information has impact on what part of plan and communicate the likely impact to the concerned/affected person/department. He gave an example to say, we met the maintenance person, he mentioned about the breakdown of a particular equipment. I knew which batch is running on that equipment. That batch is part of export consignment (FCL) which is planned for dispatch in 11 days. Because of breakdown of the equipment, the product readiness is likely to be delayed by minimum 2 days and hence he called Export department to give alert about likely delay.

He also mentioned that our communication should be done in such a way(Selective) that we should not allow the source (of information) to get dry(You all know what I mean!).

In today’s world where the information is available in abundance and AI and other digital tools will help you take decision faster as compared to days when data/information collection was a manual process, still in my opinion, the skill of listening and communication mentioned by my boss still hold good, what is your opinion?

If you look at your professional career as an average 35 years journey, you need to have both short term and long term focus. If we define the short term as initial 10 years of your career, it’s important to focus on learning operating stuff or functional skills as you begin your career. Most of the times/More often than not, your performance at this stage will be evaluated basis your speed of delivery, technical accuracy, enthusiasm, ability to work in a project team and above all, willingness to learn.
It’s important to build and nurture the core, especially when you have spent around 10 -15 years of your career (remember number of years are indicative, each one moves differently in their career journey based on their potential as well as opportunities). Building a strong core to me means developing your expertise, knowing well what you are really good at and also understanding what others think about your expertise. Here, you need to pick up new skills and expertise along with people and team management capabilities. At this stage you also decide which industry or sector you would like to be in and whether you want go deep and specialize in a field or widen your competency base and move into general management. Ideally, at this stage you should also experience what it means to work with different geographies, cultures etc., if you get such opportunities.
You grow rapidly in terms of knowledge, expertise, leadership capabilities, business acumen when you have spent around 20 years in your career. It’s not the number of years which defines this phase, but the kind of challenges you have handled, expertise you have built, teams you have developed or customers you have won, all of these help you to shape your future. You learn a lot from your achievement and equally from the mistakes you have made over the years. You build your presence, wherever you work and beyond the company as well, by taking keen interest in your profession and furthering it’s development. This phase also helps you to secure your future financially and make clear plans for the rest of your life.
Many a times you look beyond the obvious career trajectory and question what can be your next challenge or goal. Not that everyone thinks like that or needs to think in that way. Many people happily accept the “ceiling”, continue their journey and achieve their set career and life goals. While some take a leap and opt voluntarily for a new career challenge and opportunity to fulfill their vision. This kind of career transition is possible when you are truly attached to your core values and determined to walk the lane once again for a new quest and ambition and mentally strong to manage associated disruptions. You don’t measure the success here in defined societal standards, but the way you move closer to your vision and how much difference you are able to make to others; these become important parameters. Ultimately, who defines your success?
Share this post