Journey and Milestones in 2020 – Year in Review #16 [Countdown #5]

Journey and Milestones in 2020 – Year in Review

We have now completed 15 posts of this 2020 Year in Review series. I have been adding one post each day for the last 15 days. This now leaves us with 5 days to go in 2020 and 5 posts in the series. At the commencement of the year, I had recorded my 20 thoughts for 2020 in January 2020. But, all plans for 2020 have gone haywire, and these thoughts may be out of place by the end of the year. Or, are they? Since 2020 has given us the courage to face anything, let me take a brave step. In the last 5 posts of this Year in Review series, I will compare each of the 20 thoughts written at the beginning of the Year (“opening note“) with my experiences during the year. Let us start with the journey and milestones in 2020 – the Year in Review.

Countdown to 2021

I will be picking up four pointers from my opening note in each of the last 5 posts. Rather than picking these points sequentially, I will weave them into common themes. The first thought that I shared in the 2020 Year In Review series was that of a milestone year. Hence, let me commence the last phase of this series with a look at the journey and milestones in 2020.

Journey and Milestones – 2020 Year In Review

I will keep reproducing extracts from my post at the beginning of the year, but you can read my post on 20 thoughts for 2020 here. While discussing the journey and milestones in 2020, I will refer to the Thoughts Numbered 5,6,7 and 8 from the opening note. So, let us commence the journey!

The Long and Short Of It

The 5th point in my opening note celebrated the achievements of one of our colleagues. She had spent 50 years working with the same organization. I wrote about how we need to rethink our approach in the light of increasing life spans. Such thought processes have been cut short in 2020. The primary target right through the year has been to come out alive from the pandemic.

I don’t think I could have started off the year and this countdown with a more dramatic irony! Despite the pandemic, we may still have statistically valid evidence of increasing life spans. However, our own journey represents only one unique data point and that is our life. As individuals, we care about that, rather than about the average human beings. While planning for our lives, we need to take possibilities into account, rather than averages.

What if we live and work longer than we expect? And as 2020, has shown us, what if we live shorter than we expect? This is the long and short of the matter and the reality of life. We need a flexible plan that can help us and our dear ones in both the scenarios.

Gold and Silver

If the 5th point in the opening note was about a Golden anniversary, the 6th one was about a silver anniversary. On the 25th anniversary of commencing my work journey, I thought about consolidating my learning in “a 25 part series or a book”. I even remarked that I hoped to do this by the time I celebrate my golden anniversary!

I did end up doing both – authoring a book and writing an expansive series within 2020. The context of both the series and the book was different from what I expected at the beginning of the year. However, I have stuck to my initial thoughts of consolidating the learning in a cohesive structure.

The Book – Connecting the Dots

I did write a book on How to stay positive and productive in your war against Corona, within a few days of the commencement of the lock down. One of the thoughts that I mentioned in #7 of my opening note is relevant in this context. I had shared the details of my journey in an interview last year. In my thoughts for 2020 (#7), I had remarked that things happen for a reason and we can only connect the dots looking backwards.

The inside story behind my book illustrates this concept. I did have an intention to write a book ‘some day’. In fact, I had done some reading about self publishing on Kindle intermittently over the last few years. I even attended a book publishing boot-camp over the weekend in 2019. But, despite all this, I did not put thought to action. My timeline was “some day” in the future and that is not a coherent plan! I only created rough outlines and storyboards for book ideas such as Applications of AI for Business Users. However, I did not cover any further milestones in my book writing journey.

The Dots Connect Looking Backwards

In 2020, with the onset of the lock down, all the dots connected in hindsight. All the relevant factors seemed to conspire and come together. I had already done all the preparations and gained the know-how of writing and publishing a book. People needed help to deal with the lock down and this became the objective of the book. I also had the necessary skills and took out time to quickly finish writing and publishing the e-book. Moreover, e-books became one of the rare things that people could have actually ordered during the lock-down! The detailed story of the book is covered in a post of this Year in Review series and the book is available on Amazon.

I could not have seen all this at the time I was building my skills and knowledge. The dots only connect when we look back upon them. We can’t connect them looking into the future. I will reinforce this lesson for 2021 and beyond. We need to do our job in creating the dots that we want. They will connect on their own in the future in ways that we cannot imagine!

The Year In Review Series

I had intended to write a 25 part series on the lessons from my professional experiences. Instead, I ended up writing 20 detailed posts as part of this Year in Review series. I was able to share so much from the last year itself, and did not need to draw from my experiences over 25 years!

Halfway through writing this Series, I stumbled upon a discovery. The master post of the series was appearing on the 1st page of Google search for ‘experts year in review’. A few days later, it became the 1st result on Google, ahead of a billion other search results. (Search for ‘experts year in review’ on Chrome browser in incognito mode from New Delhi on 24th December 2020).

I did not have all this in my mind as I started the year. I only intended to consolidate my observations in a cohesive structure during the year. This is yet another example of the dots connecting in unpredictable ways, and yielding unbelievable results!

Locus of Control

One of the posts in the Series that deals with Locus of Control is pertinent in the current context. In the “Long and Short Of It” explained above, I refer to uncontrollable factors such as our life span. However, the way we react to these and how we tweak our plans is in our control.

Even though my life was turned upside down during the year, I ensured that my locus of control remained internal. Instead of writing about my professional journey, I wrote about more contextually relevant aspects. Instead of writing a business book, I wrote a lifestyle book for the lock-down. I was able to help people during the toughest phases of their lives.

The mental model of Internal vs External Locus of Control can help us change the course of our lives. I hope it will help you in navigating through 2021 and beyond into the New Normal. As one of my readers wrote on LinkedIn about my book

“I can proudly say that when life gave me lemons, I made a tall glass of delicious lemonade and sipped through without losing my calm! All thanks to Mr. Rajiv Maheshwari, the author of this masterpiece.”

The Journey and Milestones in 2020 and in the New Normal

The 8th point in my opening note mentioned another impending milestone, as our organization nears it’s 100th year. I had also remarked that milestones provide an opportunity to reflect and take a long term view of our journey. I asked a rhetorical question – “2020 is a milestone year, isn’t it?”

Little did we know at the beginning of the year that this milestone will change the course of our journey! However, as I have seen from my experiences in 2020, we must focus on doing the best that we can. The only thing that is in our control is to become You Version 2.0 – a better version of ourselves. Let us put this into action each day as we traverse the remaining journey and milestones in 2020 and in the New Normal!

Year In Review 2020

Check out the master article for the Year in Review 2020 that contains links to all posts in the series. Also, bookmark the master article on the browser to read all the 20 thoughts from 2020 and lessons for 2021.

About The Author

Rajiv Maheshwari is a business and start-up advisor, and the co-founder of From The Experts Mouth. He is a management professional with over 25 years of experience, and worked as CEO for a decade, and in leadership roles with NYSE listed companies such as Accenture and WNS.

He is a Chartered Accountant and MBA (Director’s Merit List from IIM Bangalore) and an autodidact, who is on the path of self-directed life long learning and sharing. He is a thought leader, author and keynote speaker and has developed several frameworks to bridge the gap between academia and industry.