Rajan Singh

Founder

HabitStrong

In this age of unending busyness, distractions, and social media addictions, we help you build a life of calm productivity and focus, so you can succeed without burnout, late night, and long hours. 

We don't have any shortcuts or magical remedies. Instead, in our online programs, we give you a methodical, step-by-step approach to solve the problems of productivity, digital addictions, lack of focus, anxiety, etc.

ConceptOwl

We offer science and math learning programs for small-town students. 

We later transitioned to HabitStrong, to offer habit-building programs.

CourseBrew

An innovative online learning platform providing interactive video based learning.

Founder and CEO

New Silk Route Private Equity

Investment professional at New Silk Route, a USD 1.4 billion private equity fund focused on growth stage companies in Asia. 

Focused on healthcare and infrastructure, and was a key member of the team dedicated to building a large medical device company focused on emerging markets. 

Working as an investment professional, realized that lemmings are unfairly accused of behaving like investors.

Vice President

McKinsey & Company

Advised insurance, pharma, biotech, and banking companies. Areas of work include screening of  acquisition targets, launch of new businesses, cost rationalization, private equity due diligence, valuation, and corporate finance.

Ended up as a slave to PowerPoint, without hope of liberation in this lifetime

Consultant

Indian Police Service (IPS)

Commissioner of Police, Trivandrum City, and other senior positions in Kerala Police. Led 3,500 strong police force in Trivandrum (Kerala's Capital).  Extensive experience in managing and motivating large workforce, handling civil disturbances and conflicts, traffic management, crime control, and police modernization.

Inevitably I started taking life too seriously (what with all the parades, pompous ceremony, and frantic phone calls). So decided to bring some sanity back into life and go do an MBA

Police Commissioner

In summary, I am tempted to say something profound such as: "Visionary leader with XX years experience of saving humanity". But I will spare you the agony... 

The truth is that after many detours and experiments in life, I find myself an entrepreneur! 

Email: rajan.singh@habitstrong.in

We conduct online bootcamps to build life-changing habits that help inculcate discipline, focus, mindfulness, and a no-compromise mindset.

Currently, our programs cover digital deaddiction, building a mindful morning routine, deep work, flow, and focused learning. 

There is a lot of theory out there in videos and books, but often, it makes no impact. We make actual behavior change happen through a scientific, no-nonsense approach, mostly based on my personal life experiences.

You could think of us as a gym for habit-building.

I need some help. 

My father-in-law is in an ICU in a hospital in Gurugram and we want to urgently move him to Bhubaneswar, once the doctors confirm that it is safe to do so. 

We might need an air ambulance for that. 

If you or someone you know might be able to advise on the safest and most cost-effective way of doing it, could you please drop in a comment or message me? Else, if you could spread this message, that would be wonderful. 

Much appreciate your help at this difficult time.

Arpit Shekhar

Anushka M.

Yesterday, I wrote a LinkedIn post asking for some help with air ambulance evacuation for my father-in-law. 

I was looking for a few leads since I am totally unfamiliar with the space. But what happened was totally overwhelming -- hundreds of LinkedIn connects and well-wishers messaged, called, and emailed me. Many directly contacted air ambulance providers. 

I am laden with immense gratitude for all your help. 🙏 

I will respond to every comment and message separately as I just work through this. I have received your kindness without having done anything to earn it. 

I thank you for all your prayers for my father-in-law and send you my heartfelt thanks and gratitude. 🙏


PS: The evacuation plan is in progress.

The most intelligent people from my college batch are not the wealthiest. And it should not be surprising. 

If fact, among any graduating class of IITs or NITs, you will find little correlation between intelligence and wealth. (And slightly negative correlation at extreme intelligence levels). 

Here is probably why:

1. Highly intelligent generally want to do things that are intellectually hard, which pushes them into academia and research that don't pay all that much. In some sense, their intellect itself moves their definition of success away from wealth. 

If unconvinced, talk to any mathematician or scientist at TIFR and ask if they would like to publish a fantastic research paper or own a Lamborghini -- you probably know the answer! 

2. Conversely, things that generate a lot of wealth rarely require extreme intellect. Instead, they require a host of other abilities, risk-taking, people skills, etc. 

3. In life, we generally get what we optimise for. In trading or business communities, every family runs successful businesses. Similarly, you will find doctor families, where everyone is a doctor. And so on...

We are all seeking success. And however you define success, will move you in that direction. 

Whether it will make you happy or not, though, is a totally different question. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

Who is lying? 

85% managers at Microsoft say that employees are slacking off, while 85% employees complain of overwork and burnout -- these are Satya Nadella's words. 

The truth is this: nobody is lying but people don't know WHAT they are supposed to deliver. They then keep spinning their wheels for long hours so at least, they won't be accused of being lazy.

I know it because I have done it. 99% of the time I have work till 2 am or 4 am, I did not know exactly what I was supposed to do.  

It may sound like I am criticising managers or companies -- I'm not. Creating clarity is often hard. 

What should the output look like? What do you need to do to deliver the output? How much time should it take? These are hard questions. 

Even at my small startup HabitStrong, we sometimes struggle with these questions. At a company like Microsoft, this is 1000x harder, especially when you are doing things you haven't done before. 

But just because these questions are hard doesn't mean we can escape them. 

Instead of just asking for more, first create task clarity. If that takes 2 out of your 8 working hours, that's ok. 

The world doesn't care how many nights you did not sleep. It only cares about what you actually created. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

I was wrong. 

Overwork is how you grow your career. Overwork is required for nation-building and for building our economy -- even meaningless late-night work or sleeping in front of your laptop is known to increase GDP. 

Overwork is your national duty. Better stop whining and get on with it. One generation must sacrifice, and luckily for you, it is yours -- so be grateful. 

But is overwork prescribed for everyone? Of course not. Billionaires are exempt because they have earned it. Their kids also are exempt for obvious reasons. 

Senior executives are exempt if they please. Since I (kind of) fall in that category, I claim to work 20 hours a day, 7 days a week. Who the hell are you to fact-check it? 

Now some will say it sounds so bad! Fair enough, let us call it 'hard work' instead of overwork. Problem solved? 

But some whiners won't stop complaining. They will complain about stress and anxiety. They will crib about blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, and misery. They will even claim they don't get enough sleep or workout. 

These ungrateful people forget that when they go to hospitals, the hospital revenues, and consequently, our GDP goes up. But how will they understand? 

See -- some people will die in this process. Many others will suffer. That's collateral damage. No need to get so worked up about it. 

Now shut up and work 20 hours a day. Stay busy. Look busy. And don't ask questions.

After all, it is your fault -- who told you not to be born with a silver ladle in your mouth? 


#sarcasm

Yesterday, a third of my LinkedIn feed was about Anna's tragic death. Today, it is probably less than 10%. A week later, she would be forgotten -- we would have moved on to something else.  

The overwork epidemic will continue. We will keep glorifying long hours -- the macho guys who are a bit embarrassed to do that right now, will be back again in full form. 

Ultimately, nothing will change. The cycle will repeat. 

The same drama. Just a new cast of characters. 

***
At HabitStrong, I solve the problems of busyness, digital addictions, and overwork: www.habitstrong.com

One of my McKinsey colleagues was a doctor from Weill Cornell, one of the top medical schools in the US. 

One day, I asked him, "In the US, why does medical training give so much importance to soft skills and how doctors talk to the patients? Should you not be focusing mostly on clinical skills?

"After all, if I am being treated for a serious ailment, I want a good doctor -- even if they are not good at talking to patients." 

My friend disagreed and argued how critical patient-doctor communication is, even for effective treatment.

Today, I no longer hold that opinion -- I was wrong. The way doctors communicate with patients really matters. 

When doctors talk with empathy, patients and their families are able to ask questions and make better decisions -- they don't feel helpless. But just as importantly, healthcare is as much about 'care' as it is about medical science.  

I have seen some of the best doctors in Trivandrum -- they explain things so gently and kindly! One doctor sat down with me, drawing diagrams and explaining the patient's situation for over 30 minutes. How many would do that? 

Sadly, I have also seen the opposite kind, who respond with jargon and frustration whenever someone asks questions. 

All good communication starts with empathy. And I think it applies not just to doctors but to all of us -- whether we are consultants, managers, salespeople, or in any other role. 

If you can talk to people with patience and clarity, in simple non-jargon language, you are already a cut above the rest. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

Our Wharton professor teaching us Legal Studies spoke so softly that sometimes, his voice would be reduced to a whisper. And for an MBA, his was the dreariest of subjects one could imagine. 

Yet, his case study discussions were so engaging that when his voice went down to a whisper, the class would go deafeningly silent. 

When you have something real to say, you don't have to raise your voice -- instead, the world will lower the noise. 

The people who shout the most often have the least to say. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

You know a thing that differentiates developed and developing countries? The scale of corruption. 

In UK, the PM is accused of accepting gifts worth tens of thousands of dollars. Israeli PM's wife was accused of accepting free meals worth $100k. The corruption of US senators/mayors is also typically in the same range. 

However, in India, even some small-time politicians will get offended with such small amounts -- our corruption scandals run into hundreds of millions of dollars, when not billions. Same goes for many Asian and African countries. 

But why is the corruption in developed countries so petty? Because to indulge in large scale corruption, you need active connivance, or at least passive acquiescence of people around you. In short, the whole system has to be compromised, not just one or two people. 

And in developed countries, the rule of law is so strong that a corrupt person won't be able to bend the whole system -- they have to remain a lone operator. This is what applies a brake on their corruption ambitions. 

As India progresses, our per capita income will grow. But the real test is rule of law. 

The day our corruption scandals turn out to be in lacs of rupees, we will know that we have arrived. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

Yesterday, I met a bunch of my extended family members in their early thirties, all working in professional services. By conventional standards, they are doing very well, holding good positions in well-known companies. 

But every one of them seemed seriously unhappy with work -- long hours, meaningless meetings, no life. 

And their unhappiness wasn't stemming just from long hours, but how the misery was artificially created by over-committing to clients, unreasonable deadlines, lack of clarity, and so on. 

Apparently, Indians feel no guilt in encroaching upon people's weekends. The only consolation I could give them is that the US is no different. 😊 

To be fair, professional services is a tough business -- tasks are hard to define clearly, scope creep is common, and clients can be demanding. 

But if we knew that our teams won't be available for a minute beyond 50 hours a week, won't the work get done? Of course it will. We will prioritise better, manage client expectations, and cut out the waste. 

But since people's time is 'free,' we overconsume it.

I am very proud of how professional services firms have put India on the global map and have created so many jobs. But they can do even better. 

This is not about companies vs. employees -- after all, everybody is suffering, including the CEO. This is about treating people's time with respect. 

The day we start respecting our time like we respect money, change will begin. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

A family of four was crossing a desert -- the father on the first camel, the mother on the second, and the two kids on the third camel. 

The kids were restless, constantly needling the parents. Exasperated, the father finally shouted, "Will you please stop asking when we will get there? For God’s sake, we are nomads!"

This story comes from Jack Kornfield, a renowned Buddhist mediation teacher. 

But does it not apply to all of us? How many times in our lives have we gotten caught up in this "When will we get there" question? I have done it more often than I would like to admit. 

We are all life's nomads. There is nowhere to get to. The journey is all there is. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

When I briefly lived the US, people were fair and polite, sometimes to a fault. But once in a while, there would be a subtle hint of racism. 

And surprisingly, it often came from people of colour who had themselves been discriminated against, including Indian-Americans. 

And the only time someone seemed distinctly uncomfortable around us (with an air of unmistakeable superiority) were kids of a distant relative! 😊 

We are all capable of prejudice and hostility. We have the potential to be kind and empathetic, as well as cruel and insensitive. 

The traits we choose to nurture, are what we become.

If somebody is really in a toxic job, why don't they just quit?

What we don't realize is that human decision-making is rarely driven purely by logic. 

When people are in toxic jobs, their anxiety is almost always on. And once our anxiety or fear gets triggered, the fight-flight-freeze response deactivates our prefrontal cortex (the 'thinking brain') and we can't think straight anymore. 

Even otherwise, our emotions -- positive or negative -- influence our behavior and decisions way more than we think. (Else, iPhones wouldn't have the market share they do.) 

And then, there are the real world constraints -- you may hate a job but your family needs food on the table. How will a person struggling to survive compute the pros and cons of quitting and finding another job?

In short, our brains and lives are too complicated. If not, nobody would stay trapped in bad jobs, relationships, or even habit patterns. But people do. 

That is why, the fact that a job has many takers doesn't tell you all that much about the job. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

There are many ways to fail in life but here is the most time-tested recipe: 

1. Fragment your time into small chunks by randomly switching between tasks, emails, meetings, etc. Never keep solid blocks of time for important tasks. 

2. Prioritize reacting to your emails and firefighting, above your own priorities.  

3. Multitask: Always do multiple things at once. Look very busy.  

4. Stay addicted to your social media, WhatsApp, etc. 

5. Treat email like a Formula-1 race – reply with alacrity and speed, to every email, no matter how random or irrelevant. 

6. Worry more about disappointing others (e.g., if you didn’t reply to their emails) than disappointing yourself (by ignoring your own work). 

7. Always be hopping and jumping on to calls. Put Spiderman to shame with your jumping skills. 

8. Do lots of meetings to pick others’ brains, or submit your brain to be picked by others. 

9. Attend every office meeting if possible – ideally, do them back-to-back. 

10. Make everything urgent. 

There are many more ideas I can share, but this is a good start. This recipe is extremely popular in the modern world, and it works. 

As a bonus, it creates frustration, burnout, and homicidal anger. Wanna try it out? 

#sarcasm

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

Can someone in your company disappear for two hours to work on a high value task, without being interrupted?

And of course, assume that they don't just vanish -- they inform the relevant people, sort out any dependencies, and even tell you how reach them in case of a true emergency (e.g., godown on fire). 

Even with all that, can someone disappear for two hours? 

If yes, you don't need a 'Great Place to Work' certification -- you are already in one. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

During one of my consulting engagements, we got a pretty nice-looking PowerPoint presentation ready for the client. But they asked us to have it beautified by another vendor of theirs. 

So we sent out the deck to this vendor, not knowing what to expect. 

But when we got it back it was no longer a consulting presentation -- it was a work of art. Every slide was so beautiful that you could sit and admire it. 

And I think that was dangerous! 

The more beautiful a presentation is, the less critical you are in evaluating the underlying substance or business judgment. However, you pay consultants for good business answers, not for artwork. 

Of course, we all believe that we are objective and only others fall for these 'superficial' attributes. But the reality is that we all do. 

Whether you are reviewing a presentation, interviewing a job candidate, or evaluating anything -- be aware of this bias. The better looking something or someone is, the lower your objectivity.     

You can't eliminate it totally, but you can be aware of it. And that is a good start. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

I recently wrote about my young relatives in professional services feeling unhappy and crushed by long work hours.

In response, my friend Smruti Sarangi, whom I highly respect, noted that these long hours are necessary since new joinees are often unskilled and need training. My post may also have implied that I was criticizing the services sector, which absolutely isn’t true.

Just to highlight their contribution: When I joined IIT Kanpur in 1991, TCS offered only 6 jobs. Today, IT and other services firms employ millions from tier 2 and 3 colleges, pulling so many out of poverty! I have massive respect for them.

But we might be able to do the same or even better work without these long hours. So let me summarise my thoughts: 

1. The folks who complained about the long hours are successful mid-level leaders heading for leadership roles, not new joinees. 

2. Long work hours are often artificially created by inefficient management, lack of task clarity, over-commitment, and lack of respect for personal time. 

E.g., if we waste the day and get serious only in the evening, and then slog through the night -- that is a problem. 

3. For the Nth time, long hours are ok if really necessary. But people become zombies when they are sleep deprived. And zombies don't do good work. Plus, they are humans like us.

I am not advocating a 40-hour week  -- just cutting waste and interruptions, and working efficiently. 

The US or European companies hiring us are not doing charity -- they come because we deliver. But we can find ways to do it better. 

My point is simple: Treat people's time as a finite and precious resource. Everything else will follow. 

***
At HabitStrong, I offer programs for calm productivity, digital de-addiction, and building focus: www.habitstrong.com

Why should work take 12-14 hours a day? Honest answer -- it shouldn't; at least not for 95% of the people. 

But since talk is cheap, I am going to run a test pilot with one company to solve this problem. And I will share the results publicly. 

For the last few months, through our Zen Productivity program, we have been helping hundreds of individuals go from busyness to calm productivity. And now, we want to help a whole company (or a team) fix this problem.

Here is the reality of long hours -- most of that time is lost in multitasking, firefighting, ad hoc tasks, ineffective meetings, checking emails, and so on. We live in a hyper-connected world, but our poor little brain is still the same old -- it can do only one thing at a time, and all the attention switching is tiring it out. 

My approach to fixing the problem is simple (but not easy): cut interruptions ruthlessly, have clear priorities, do deep work, and free up your mind by visually organizing your work. 

99% of the time, burnout and stress are avoidable. But let us test this out. 

If you are a decision-maker and want your team to go through this pilot program, please apply using the form below. Due to limited bandwidth, we will pick just one company for this. 

We need to end this overwork epidemic. Time to give it a shot. 

Here is the application form: https://lnkd.in/gT4c-NPq

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