How Cultivators Work: Meet Pinaki
Pinaki Kathiari
Cultivators do a lot. They’re the folks who are going above and beyond in their role to make a positive impact on their company or team. And that means that staying motivated and preventing burnout are necessary parts of how they succeed. Every Cultivator is different, and so our curiosity got the best of us…we decided to ask them just how they do it!
Pinaki Kathiari, CEO and Co-Founder of Local Wisdom, and an active member of our Cultivators Community was game to go first. Here’s what he had to say about staying motivated and making time for care:
As a Cultivator who is committed to creating positive change at work, how do you stay motivated?
Change things up. It’s easy to feel you’re in a rut when you’ve been working on the same things for a long time. I switch it up and do something else for a little while. It gets me excited to return to what I was working on previously.
Reflect on all the mini-accomplishments. Big things don’t just happen. There’s a large number of little things that need to happen to get there. So if I’m frustrated by the process, I think about the wins and outcomes so far.
Kill ideas, fail fast (or defer them). There’s a problem when you become action-oriented in that you have lots of ideas, and it’s challenging to move them all forward. So I stop taking action when I know it will hinder something else, and I put it in my notes where I will get back to it later. I also kill ideas fast to have room for new ideas.
Take a count of the people you’ve impacted in your work/life. There are our friends and co-workers, but then there are their families and their friends and co-workers. If you’ve helped someone solve a problem or achieve a goal, even a small one, consider the residual effects of your support.
Proactively thank people for specific things they’ve done. I make it a routine and part of my meeting notes. Forcing myself to remember and celebrate others allows me to acknowledge the progress for myself, the person I thank, and everyone else who bears witness. In my observation, this creates a snowball of motivation for myself and the people around me.
What's one way you practice self-care during your day/week to support you in doing your best work?
One thing I’ve recently started to do is to dance in the morning. I’ll play three random songs from my Spotify playlist and dance. No audience, no routine, just letting the music move me. I do this on days when I don’t go to the gym, and it helps me move in ways I usually don’t. It also makes me laugh because I may do something silly; meanwhile, it pushes blood flow around, especially in the morning after getting out of bed.
There are several other self-care practices and hobbies that I’m proactively doing, but not all at once: sleep (aim for 8), exercise (I do Les Mills Body Pump), yoga, breathing exercises, setting mental self-expectations, having dedicated thinking time, video games, books (fiction and non-fiction), good conversations, DJing, seeking joyful moments with my family.
Connect with Pinaki and get inspired by other changemakers like him by joining our Cultivators Community.
