A BANK OF EXERCISES: GATHERING, EXTRACTING & GENERATING INSIGHTS

I have created a bank of exercises to illustrate the importance of gathering, extracting & generating insights, using the book, 'Unleashing Genius, with the World's Most Powerful Learning Systems', by Dilip Mukerjea, as an intellectual platform in a personal coaching assignment.

The ultimate purpose of the assignment is creating concrete deliverables from the insights, such as a plan of action for building personal effectiveness & enhancing peak performance.

Any reader who has a copy of the foregoing book can make use of the exercises for his or her personal as well as professional development.

1. Read, if not skim & scan, ‘Unleashing Genius’. Pay particular attention to the 3 sections, namely, ‘01: The Brain’; ‘04: Reading Dynamics’ & ‘06: Creativity’.

2. What do you think are the significant ideas of the book mentioned in (1)?

Additionally, can you provide some highlights in terms of salient aspects, pertaining to each significant idea? You can use a mind-map to illustrate your response.

3. How can you relate your personal insights from ‘01: The Brain’ with the concept of developing personal effectiveness & enhancing peak performance?

4. What do you understand by the following phrases mentioned in the book:

(a) ‘Reading on the lines’;

(b) ‘Reading between the lines’;

(c) ‘Reading beyond the lines’;

(d) ‘Reading beyond the page’ (or what I like to term as ‘Reading outside the lines’)?

From the standpoint of building strategic agility & operational versatility in a rapidly- changing, chaotic world of ours, I would consider (c) & (d) as very vital, as one needs to constantly come up with new & novel ideas, & also putting them to work (i.e. 'translating ideas to ca$h', as Dilip likes to put it!).

Do you agree? If so, what are your personal thoughts with regard to practical lessons you can draw upon?

5. Given a choice, how can you synthesise & factor in the key insights from (3) to build a long-term personal efficiency program for your own self?

6. Dilip has a favourite catchphrase: ‘Are You Busy Living or Busy Dying?’ in the book. What comes to your mind when you read it?

How best can you draw practical lessons from your understanding, within the context of your own personal & professional development?

7. In ‘06: Creativity’, Dilip starts off with the statement: “Elements of ‘Braindancing’ to help you kick-start your journey towards entrepreneurial excellence”.

Firstly, what is ‘Braindancing’ to you? What do you think is its association with ‘Creativity’?
Now, how can you synthesise these intellectual deliberations with what you had already completed earlier, in (3)?

8. On page 363 of the book, Dilip has outlined a simple exercise: “Convert these empty circles into meaningful images.”

Now, take out a blank sheet of A4-sized paper & replicate the page. Do the exercise as instructed.

How about doing a variation of the exercise: instead of ‘circles’, use ‘squares’ this time? What is your new outcome, when compared to the earlier exercise, with ‘circles’?

[We will debrief/discuss the outcome of this exercise to help you draw valuable lessons.]

9. On the inside back-page of the book, Dilip has created a mnemonic ‘CATSEYE’.
Think about its application possibilities, & share your personal thoughts, using yourself as a personal test case.

10. In association with key insights from (9), & combining them with the pictorial ’12-spoke wheel’ illustrating the “stunning array of learning miracles” on the back-cover of the book, explore how you can draw up a tentative implementation schedule, say for the next 90 days, as far as your own personal & professional development is concerned.

REQUISITE MATERIALS:

‘Unleashing Genius’, by Dilip Mukerjea;
One Drawing Block, preferably A3-sized;
One Lecture Note-pad;
Colour Markers;