Do you have your 'Hackathon' in place?

The Economic Times, one of the leading business news papers recently published an article. The article spoke about the concept of 'Hackathon'. I was as curious as you are to know what this concept really means.

Its a one week global event organized by Microsoft where its employees from 114 countries participate to think differently.

"Hackathon is about people getting involved in understanding how they have changed their thinking, in terms of challenger spirit and growth hacking in order to make things happen faster" defined  Bhaskar Pramanik, Chairman, Microsoft India.

"We are trying to get our employees to think about ways in which we can disrupt what we have done so far, relook every situation we are in, and differentiate," he says. To growth-hack, is to have the mindset that you need to find the shortest path to success. "It is what we call 'jugaad', but based on principles, to make sure your methods stand the test of time," he adds.

So what is the significance and why are we discussing it today?

We have a constant fight against time to complete the work or activities or assignments or meetings at hand in the shortest possible time and with more productive outcomes. You agree?

What caught my attention in 'Hackathon' are the key words that define it. It has key words like thinking differently; challenger spirit; making things faster; disrupt what has been done so far and relook at every situation & differentiate.

Do you think at an individual level these words apply to you and me as well? Do you believe that filtering our activities through the framework of these words can improve our efficiency?

Lets check this with an example

Lets say on the professional side you are told to reduce the project timeline & cost by 20%. On the personal side you are concerned that your daughter's exam is nearing and you want to remain involved so she gets the comfort and confidence to crack the exams with better grades.

It will be interesting to write down the defining words of Hackathon one after the other and check whether it re-directs our focus; re-orients our energy and improves our efficiency.

 

My experience. It does. I just did this exercise with my set of priorities...

 

How about you?