Focus is overrated
As CBSE Xth standard results are declared, most toppers can't think beyond careers in Engineering or Medicine. As experts extol the importance of being 'focused' in building successful careers, I am reminded of an article by Mahesh Murthy that appeared in the BW magazine that talked about Focus being overrated.
Excerpts from the article -
'Somehow, the highly-focused do-no-wrong Mr Xs of the world never impressed me. My heroes have been different. I've been a huge fan of Richard Feynman, the Nobel-winning physicist who thought up quantum electrodynamics, helped make the atom bomb, figured out why the first space shuttle exploded, taught drumming to the Brazilian samba team, wrote a treatise on picking locks, and also figured out how to pick up women at a bar when he was scrawny, broke and not exactly good looking.
It blows me away that Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull is a hugely successful fish farmer. Or that Neil French, the legendary creative director I had the fortune of working with, has been an account executive, an art director and, among other things he wouldn't want me to mention in a business magazine, a bullfighter.
Focus isn't bad - but it's way overrated. We need the senior vice-presidents of Obscurities, but I believe we need the Feynmans, the Andersons and the Frenchs a lot, lot more.'
Excerpts from the article -
'Somehow, the highly-focused do-no-wrong Mr Xs of the world never impressed me. My heroes have been different. I've been a huge fan of Richard Feynman, the Nobel-winning physicist who thought up quantum electrodynamics, helped make the atom bomb, figured out why the first space shuttle exploded, taught drumming to the Brazilian samba team, wrote a treatise on picking locks, and also figured out how to pick up women at a bar when he was scrawny, broke and not exactly good looking.
It blows me away that Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull is a hugely successful fish farmer. Or that Neil French, the legendary creative director I had the fortune of working with, has been an account executive, an art director and, among other things he wouldn't want me to mention in a business magazine, a bullfighter.
Focus isn't bad - but it's way overrated. We need the senior vice-presidents of Obscurities, but I believe we need the Feynmans, the Andersons and the Frenchs a lot, lot more.'
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